"Oi, BRAT!!"
The 'brat' — a young, malnourished-looking boy — startled at the call. Yet, forcing a businesslike smile onto his face, he looked up at the 6'7 giant and his gang making their way toward his humble corner. He hid the trembling of his hands by clasping them behind his back.
"Y — Yes!? Haha! Kind sir, I knew you would love my product! Would you love to have anoth —"
Without even giving him the chance to finish, the giant grabbed the boy by the collar — or rather, the worn piece of cloth hanging around his neck — and delivered a resounding slap across his cheek.
Crack!
An unholy sound, one that was decidedly not the sound of flesh, rang out the moment it landed.
"WHAT THE HELL DO YOU MEAN LOVE THIS BULLSHIT PRODUCT! Do you know how much you charged for this piece of crap!? Huh!?" The giant hoisted him off the ground and hurled him toward the nearest dumpster. The act immediately startled the resident lurking inside, sending the creature scrambling in every direction — each one as far from there as possible.
"S — khind shir! W — what do you mhean — ergh! — bullshit?" The boy stammered, clutching the bloom of pain spreading from his cracked jaw.
Far from placated, the giant seemed only more incensed by the question. Without a word of explanation, he continued to beat the boy. His gang joined without hesitation. The boy tried to fight back — truly, he did — but the sheer, oppressive force radiating from those bodies, every single one of them at peak white core and their leader a mid-level green core, left him utterly constricted, like a fly pinned beneath a thumb.
They continued until the boy was left half-dead, with several bones that were, without question, broken.
"HAHAHA! USELESS SCAMMING BRAT!"
"Boss, can we just use his hole next?"
"Ptui!"
Ignoring the crude jab from one of his lackeys, the giant reached into his pocket and produced something, tossing it onto the boy's ruined, crumpled frame. "This. This shit right here. You said it would bring me to the moon." His face contorted into a deep, ugly scowl.
"I'm still on the land! What the hell!?"
But it seemed the boy could no longer hear a single word, his senses dimming and swimming from the relentless punishment.
'Oi oi! Don't lose consciousness, Caelan!' A familiar voice suddenly resounded inside his head. A friend. A family.
A part of himself.
But he ignored it, and made himself as small as possible. The giant took his silence as a sign of unconsciousness. He then ordered his lackeys to search the boy's entire body and strip him of every coin they believed had been scammed from them, before finally vacating the scene. Some of them were laughing. Some were still seething. There was even a disappointed sigh buried somewhere in the group before they vanished from sight entirely.
The silent observers of the scene — those who had been holding their breath — at last dared to move and resume their daily rituals. Begging, haggling, robbing, and sundry other behaviours. A complete hellhole for outsiders, but one that he called home.
Only after a full fifteen minutes had dragged by did the boy — Caelan — manage to move. Yet rather than fear or misery written across his face, what settled there was a notorious, ear-splitting grin. Ignoring the screaming protests of his body, he hauled himself upright from the dumpster and stumbled, step by agonising step, into the indifferent crowd before disappearing into its current.
After putting considerable distance between himself and the scene, he ducked into a deserted corner and glanced about warily. He peeled off his clothes, unearthed a backpack he had stashed there earlier, and retrieved a bottle of slightly yellowish water, upending it over his head. It washed away the brown hair dye and the cheap, chalky stage makeup plastered over his otherwise pallid, sickly white skin.
"Hik hik hihi.. haha. Haha! Cough cough!" While winding bandages around his torso, he laughed — or rather, attempted to and spectacularly failed — like a man unhinged. Why not? He had just succeeded in swindling the most formidable brutes in their territory out of their own money through a masterwork of misdirection. It may have looked like they had robbed him, but Caelan was anything but obtuse. After selling the fabricated drug to them under this counterfeit persona two days prior, he had used his meticulously honed replication skills to reproduce their banknotes on scraps of paper he had scavenged.
And naturally, simply handing them the forgeries outright would have been the end of him. So instead, he let himself be beaten — not that the choice had truly been his to make — and allowed the entire spectacle to read as a daylight mugging. By the time any of them thought to scrutinise the money, the dealer would be long gone, and only this black-haired boy named Caelan would remain.
After managing to cover most of his wounds and lacerations, he slipped quietly out of the empty corner wearing inconspicuous, long-sleeved black clothes, worn thin at every edge. He did not even bother to conceal his stumbling. Instead, he leaned into it, composing his face into something pitiful and haggard as he dragged his feet across the cold metallic floor. After an hour of that mournful shuffle, he finally saw his house. No — home.
Something in his face dissolved at the sight. A genuine, unguarded smile surfaced. He straightened his posture, stood upright with mechanical precision, and completely disregarded the broken bones as he stepped inside.
"I'm ho —!"
Smack!
Before he could finish, a blow connected squarely with his head. Yet it was nothing like the violence from earlier. This one was almost tender, all things considered, given the intent lurking behind it.
"Ouch! What was that for?" He feigned complete obliviousness.
"WHAT WAS THAT FOR!? You! Just look at yourself! Why did you get into another fight again!?" The evidence was plain enough from his face alone. Though, during the beating, Caelan had been deliberate about shielding his face above all else, making the damage marginally less catastrophic — by his standards, at least.
Even as the woman continued her furious tirade, she dragged him toward the worn couch and commanded, "Open your clothes."
Caelan merely flashed her a placating smile. "Don't worry, I already learned to wrap it myself."
The black-haired woman's sharp gaze turned glacial.
"What are you hiding from me?"
"What? It's true though." He played at not understanding.
Unsatisfied, she grabbed the hem of his already-rotting shirt and tore it open.
Rip!
"Hey —!"
!!
As if his face were not damning enough, his torso was swathed from collar to waist in bandages, several patches of which were already blooming with fresh crimson. Worse still, a portion of his ribs jutted at an angle that defied what ribs were supposed to do.
"Oh my gosh! W — what. No, who did this to you!?"
At that, Caelan found himself caught between telling the truth and holding the line. But truthfully, it would have been a lie to say he had not already accounted for this moment. Swallowing quietly, he pressed on with his plan.
"I —"
"It's those sons of bitches, isn't it?"
!!
There was only one group that warranted that particular contempt — the notorious gangsters who lorded over their district. The very ones who had just left him half-dead not two hours ago. Caelan's heart lurched violently behind his broken ribs at her uncanny guess.
"What? Of course not! Why would I ever provoke those people?" He tried to steer her away from the truth. "Even if I did, I'd be dead already, not just bruised!"
But perhaps his acting had finally frayed at the edges. Or perhaps it was something more primal — a mother's instinct that no performance could ever fully deceive. Because the next moment, the woman — his mother — collapsed into tears.
"I — I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry!"
Watching her come apart like that planted a profound, gnawing guilt deep in Caelan's gut. He opened his mouth. Closed it again. He felt too ashamed to offer even a single word.
"I should have listened to my instincts. I should have realised sooner that it was you they were beating.
I'm sorry for being a coward. I'm sorry I didn't protect you. I'm sorry I let them take your money.."
Her words hit him like a second blow. His eyes went wide as the pieces locked into place.
"Y — You were there!?"