[Joshua Allen]:
With a start, Joshua woke up breathing heavily, panting almost, as he began blinking away the remnants of his nightmares, recalling what little he could even as they were already blinking away from his grasps.
"There was that giant serpent thing, a super volcano, that winged figure and…," Joshua paused. "And that voice…."
Joshua felt a shiver run down his spine, even as he remembered what the voice told him.
'Free me,' it said to Joshua, its voice like poisoned honey mixed with gravel even as it pleaded.. 'Free me and success in all your endeavors will be guaranteed. Free me and I can give you power beyond what you can even imagine.'
Joshua shook his head, shaking himself away from his thoughts as he got up and ready for school. He couldn't afford to linger on his night terrors, not when he had to focus on so many other things, like his upcoming SATs and sports. He had no idea how he was going to pass the former considering he basically cheated his way to 10th grade using nerds, but he figured so long as he was awesome on the field, his academic career could be ignored, if only a bit. He'll figure something else out eventually.
Joshua brushed his teeth, shirtless, his hard-earned physique as flawless as ever — He flexed what muscles he's worked so hard to earn, reminding himself in the mirror. "You're perfect. You're great. You're flawless," even as he got ready for the day.
He put on a shirt, some jeans and his favorite pair of sneakers. He grabbed his leatherman jacket with the last name "Allen" etched in the back in fine red lettering, and made his way down the stairs.
He headed to the master bedroom on the base floor of the three story suburban house, where a sickly woman with pale skin and a sickly physique rested with tubes to a machine connected to her and a ventilator, regulating her breathing. She had brown hair that seemed to be turning grey and falling off in patches. Even her breathing was rugged, taxing and labored, like every intake of breath physically hurt her to draw.
This was Joshua's mother, Karen Elizabeth Allen.
Joshua walked up to his sickly mother, and pecked her forehead. "I'm off to school. I'll be back soon. I promise."
He let up the window in the room, just a tad bit — enough to let in fresh air. He was certain his mother would like some, being cupped up in this room, bedridden for months at a time. It was for the best that he gave her some sense of relief, even if that relief was just a breath of fresh air. It was the least he could do.
'Free me! And your mother shall be cured!' He remembered the voice say to him. 'Free me! And your mother lives!'
As Joshua walked to the door, apple in hand, he looked down at the counter, where the mail rested. There were three 'OVERDUE' envelopes written in red.
'Free me, and you will attain riches beyond belief!' the voice had said,
Joshua shook his head, almost as if to clear his thoughts. He had to show his skills on the field. Only then can he help his mother or even himself.
As Joshua left out the door, eating the rest of his apple, going for his mustang out front, he failed to see that the window he let up allowed a mysterious figure cloaked in black to enter the house through said window…
Nonetheless, Joshua went about his day as usual — He went to Football practice early that morning, and blackmailed a few nerds to do his homework from days prior to be done just in time for his 2nd and 3rd period.
"Good, I love being me," Joshua muttered to his reflection in the bathroom mirror as he washed his hands. "I get everything I want, always."
'Except a cure for your mother,' a voice inside his head said, causing him to pause, looking in the mirror with squinting eyes.
"What ?" he found himself asking aloud, causing him to turn around and look behind him. But he didn't see anything out of the ordinary nor was there anyone else present but him in the bathroom. "I must be losing my mind. I'm totally going insane. Must be the stress…".
'No, you are just retarded… and a narcissist,' a voice mysteriously said, causing Joshua to flinch backwards, in terror.
"Who said that?!" he basically shouted, causing a student who had just entered the bathroom to look at him funny. "Go fuck yourself before I steal your girlfriend, nerd! Get the hell out!"
Then, to the student's surprise, Joshua picked the boy up by the collar and physically kicked him from the bathroom, into the crowding hallway of students, before closing and locking the door. He then made his way over to the mirror again, but his eye caught something…
"Wha—?" Joshua saw that his eyes were glowing a chaotic red, somehow. "What is happening to me?"
'Free me! Become my avatar!' a voice that sounded eerily similar to the snake's voice from his dream urged from inside Joshua's head.
"What? Avatar? Like those blue people?" Joshua asked, confused and lost. "Why would I want to be a tall, ugly, blue alien?"
'Insolence!' the voice responded.
His reflection showed a cruel-looking version of Josh, with red and black scales on his face and demonic wings sticking out from his back. When Joshua touched his own face, he felt only skin.Was it his imagination?
'No, it couldn't have been,' he realized. 'I'm not creative enough to make up shit like this. What the hell is going on?'
'Free me! I can offer you power!' the voice repeated.
"Wha- w-who are you?" Joshua asked, curious, looking closely at his reflection in the mirror, both horrified and curious.
But suddenly, the voice vanished, the reflection returned to normal, and the bell rang, waking Joshua up to reality. He was still in the bathroom, but his reflection was just him, not…whatever that thing was. And, with a final glance at his reflection, Joshua rushed out the bathroom, unaware of a pair of chaotic red eyes watching him from the bathroom stall…
Joshua was walking to his car, his school day and practice finally over. He had managed to get in his Mustang and turned on the air conditioning, just in time to escape the August heat. He started the car and left the school grounds, tired and exhausted from after school practice which had turned into a killer on his body that evening.
It had been a few hours since the bathroom incident. Joshua would fleetingly hear the Voice as he called it here and there through his day, but, mostly, he'd just ignore it and focus on bullying the nerds into giving him the perfect grades. Physically, he was doing better than ever, as he felt a new surge of energy in his body that just felt… right. It was helping him in all aspects of his sports career… Well, except for academics, but he had the nerds for that category.
Still, he passed all his assignments for the day, so he was not worrying about it too much, even if used the nerdy clique to do it. He kind of missed Corven — He loved bullying the bastard — He makes it so easy to hate the guy, it shouldn't have been fun, but his unpredictable nature always made it fun and kept Joshua guessing what he'd do next to get away from Joshua. It was funny and pathetic in every way. Sometimes Joshua had to restrain himself from actually killing the boy.
'If he did not want to be bullied, why make himself so small and nerdy in the first place?' the voice said, to which Joshua could not help but agreeing to. He'd typically ignore the voice, but it made such sense to Joshua, it understood him to a degree —- He chalked it up to being an extension of his own naturally sadistically flawless mind.
He was just pulling down the street when a siren had him and the other cars on the road pull over as a fire tuck passed, followed by an ambulance.
"Tch! What a nuisance," joshua thought aloud, as he checked out the direction they were heading — there was smoke flowing in waves in the distant sky. "Is there a fire?"
How shocked Joshua was when he pilled into the street of his home, only to find his own home up in flames. He would later learn no survivors were found and his mother was dead, burnt to a crisp, hardly recognized even to Joshua. And the worst part was the cause of the fire. What was the cause? Arson.
No one knew who it could have been. The neighbors couldn't have done it, nor did they see anyone enter the house in Joshua's absence. But the fact remains that there was a wide open window, and it was that very room that the window was wide open in that was the starting room of the fire.
The only sign left by the arsonist, however, was a strange pendant of a ring with two wings around its side in hardened mercury silver… A crest Joshua recognized. He'd recognize it anywhere. It was the same crest he'd seen countless times whenever he would bully Corven.
In his mind, he vowed to get vengeance on Corven Umbrovante. He wouldn't rest until Corven got everything he deserved — Until Corven lost everything he had, and everything beyond.
Ironically, he had unconsciously given into the voice that was inside his head…