The Extra's Rebellion
Chapter 106: A child’s dream (2)

Chapter 106: A child’s dream (2)

"The voices said the blood they injected into me belonged to an higher life form greater than the celestials... What even is a celestial?

And is the blood supposed to make me feel... ashy?"

"The voices gave me this thing to help with the rusted feeling in my throat.

That means they care about me... right?"

"They keep saying if the results of the experiment done on me got out, it would revolutionize the entire world. No one must know, they said... Did they not see me standing right there?"

"The next experiment might end my life, they said... don’t they know I’m immortal?"

"Who’s the clan head? Why do they need his permission to keep hurting me?"

"Why did Aunt Keede say she’d ruin my mother and make sure I die here...

Doesn’t she know I have ears and can hear?"

"Mother... I have to save Mother.

But how?"

****

Just one word, the last spoken by that younger Zephyr.

"Why?"

It echoed like a stone dropped into an endless well, not in protest, not in anger, just... confusion.

And then, silence.

Two more years of memories unraveled in pitch-black, suffocating quiet. Not silence like peace—but silence like death, a mind too broken to scream.

Zephyr couldn’t think, more like his mind stopped thinking until he heard Keede whisper to the voices, who in turn took him to the bath house— While he was handicapped.

The had used a controlling seal, despite not seeing it, he could hear the suggestive suggestions that flowed into the young Zephyr’s mind from time to time. But unfortunately or fortunately they was no mind to manipulate.

They used the controlling seal and told him to wait till the princess walk in and defile her. They had to explain to him how to used his lower half and it would have been embarrassing if not for the fact that they was no mind present and Zephyr sanity has unraveled.

But the truth was that the princess wasn’t the main reason for the operation, infact it was the voices that alerted the guards who then rushed him, and killed him while he was busy completely the task.

That was the first timeline.

In this one—

He moved again. Staggered forward.

Blank. Robotic.

But just before it happened—

pain.

Blood in his throat. The princess stood over him as she watched him draw his last breath.

But at that moment Zephyr reawakened with questions in his mind.

He gasped, staggering within the void of memory, the dream of pain snapping like taut thread. But his thoughts didn’t follow immediately. They froze—trying to catch up.

And then came the question. The only one that mattered now.

’Why would someone do this to a child? Not a stranger, not an enemy. Family. Blood. Aunt’.

’What kind of person wakes up every day, looks into the eyes of someone so small, and chooses to hurt them anyway?’.

’Was it hate?’.

He could understand hate.

He’d lived it, breathed it. Parents leaving their two kids to fend for their self was the ultimate betrayal.

But this... this was something deeper, a joyless cruelty, mechanical almost like a ritual.

There had been no "lesson" in his torture, no "discipline", no "shaping of strength."

Only... the breaking. Over and over. Until there was nothing left to break.

’Is that love?’. Zephyr didn’t know who was speaking at the moment, was it him or was it the other Zephyr.

’Was this how family was meant to feel? Was I and Ethan better off without longing for one’.

He thought of his ’mother’— of her soft voice calling him her sun. Of lullabies under flickering stars.

’where was she?’.

Then he thought of Keede.

Of her smile as she tore into him with her own hands. Of her voice echoing— "Let him see me. I want him to remember this pain."

He remembered singing in the dark, alone, wounded bit still trying to be good.

And he remembered the food dropped on his head, the whispered words— "Be safe, young lord". He and Serena wasn’t even related by blood.

Even then, he had scrambled for scraps like a beast, his mouth bloodied and eyes hollow. But at this moment he knew that he didn’t remember, he relieved it.

’So what was love? What wasn’t love?’.

What kind of world made you wonder if pain was supposed to feel like home?

Zephyr didn’t know, not anymore. His mind succumbed to a sudden dizziness.

But one thought lingered.

’If this is Demios clan definition of love.... does that mean I love them so much that I want them to burn to the ground?

Now that I think of it, they do say love burns bright like the sun’.

****

Few minutes back outside his door...

Samantha stood frozen, her fist raised to knock.

She hesitated.

She had worked up all the courage to speak to him, to apologize, to— something— but now, the silence behind that door felt unnatural. Suffocating.

She turned to leave.

But then—crash.

Glass? Wood?

Her head snapped toward the door, another crash. She leaned closer, pressing her ear against the cold surface.

Another crash.

Then a voice— Zephyr’s.

"Stop... please... no more. No more...".

Her heart leapt into her throat.

"Zephyr?". she called out, voice tight. "Are you okay?".

Another crash. Louder. Followed by a thud.

Her hand jiggled the knob. Locked.

Panic set in. She tried pushing the door but it wouldn’t burge. Then she heard another crash.

Then she stepped back as she invoked her Art, ready to break down the metal door.

Just then, a calm voice behind her

"Is everything—". Miss Esmeralda.

But her sentence cut off sharply. Her expression twisted into something grim.

Without hesitation, she stepped forward—

BOOM.

The metal door ripped clean off its hinges and crashed a few feet away.

Samantha’s breath caught in her throat as she stared at the door lying a few meters from her foot.

She quickly got the thought out of her head as she rushed in—and froze.

Zephyr’s room was a mess. Shattered glass. Torn fabric. The air reeked of burning ozone and blood.

And on the bed—

Zephyr.

Tangled in Miss Esmeralda’s arms, her hands gripped him tightly as he thrashed and writhed, trying to hurt himself, clawing at his skin, muttering incoherent pleas through cracked lips.

"Please... no more... I beg you... no more...".

His hair shimmered with a lavender gleam. His eyes glowed like twin vortexes—swirling with agony.

Samantha stood paralyzed at the door.

He looked like a different person. And worst then usual.

"Quick—put him to sleep!". Miss Esmeralda barked, not taking her eyes off Zephyr.

Samantha turned, startled to find the rest of the squad had already gathered behind her.

Gary blinked, unsure. "But—"

"Get rid of the damn cloak!" Miss Esmeralda growled, voice sharp with authority.

Without a word, Gary reached up, unzipping the high collar that concealed his mouth.

A faint phantom mark shimmered across his tongue as he spoke.

"Sleep".

The word moved with a pressure that was visible to the naked eye.

Zephyr’s body slowed. His thrashing dulled. His muscles went slack—but he kept whispering, broken and helpless words.

"Please... No more... please..."

Miss Esmeralda gently laid on the bed before ripping the fabric and wrapping it around his hand, if he did go into a frenzy before anyone got here.

Samantha stared at the sight as a feeling of guilt spread across her chest, she reckoned that she had struck a cord when she berated him.

But she didn’t know that it would reopen his trauma. She knew how it felt as she herself suffered from a trauma like that. But her’s wasn’t bad enough to the extent of inflicting damage. Or was she just stronger.

She contemplated suicide sure but this was next level, she was now getting why he always looked distant and... Dead.

Anytime she gazed at his eyes whenever he was lost in thought, his eyes looked similar to those of the dead and to those that was preparing for suicide.

"Samantha watch him, and if he tries to do anything hold him till I return". With that she left, clearly showing that she was on her way to report the incident.

Samantha took a wooden chair that was still intact and sat near Zephyr.

"I-i-is h-he going to be okay". Cynthia spoke up in her little voice, clearing the silence that had descended on them.

"I don’t know". She didn’t know if he was going to be okay, she was able to go through her’s because she had a family, but the last time she checked, Zephyr has never interacted with the people from his clan or even from one of their vessels clan.

She didn’t know the relationship he had with his clan, but she was sure it wasn’t good.

They was Miss Merin but she hasn’t seen her for like six months now. Miss Merin was the only person she was sure Zephyr would open up to.

They were his squad mates— ex squad mates, and she was absolutely sure that if she hasn’t heard the crashing noise, they wouldn’t have known he had a meltdown.