“How can I describe to you the joy I felt, my father so caught up in the moment that he thrust me upon his shoulders for the entire arena to see, nearly dancing beneath me in all his glee. Thousands rushed towards us, touching my blood stained hands and trampling the body of Volva as is it were cumbersome garbage. Their fingers sifted through my black hair, tickling my sides as I laughed in wonderment, all the while my father, the very King was simply one of them, chuckling and lifting me higher as if I was his trophy.

“And it was at that moment that I achieved the very thing in which I had always strived and which I was to become a slave to in later years. Approval. I felt it abounding around me, wrapping as it were, rising from the crowds, but more importantly from my father.”

Vegeta chuckled softly, the pleasant smile warming the chilling room as I merely listened in minute horror to the depiction of what would have been………. Well not only impossible for a three year old…….. but an abomination in human society.

“After that,” Vegeta continued, completely oblivious to my wide eyes and pale skin. “I became something of a deity to my people, a living legend as it were. The size of Volva seemed to have grown even after his death, the extent of my wounds more gruesome with each telling of it, the gore of the last blow more heroic, if such a thing can be described so. I was the talk of the planet as it were, the three year old God that had become a man in a matter of thirty minutes.

“The highly sought for “man” status in my society had little or nothing to do with size or age. It was achieved through actions, through heroics, through bravery. More truthfully, through death. And that, that I became an expert at. Whether or not the second kill, or the third kill was the ending of my pity, I cannot tell you. I don’t remember. Or more likely, I don’t care. For it was gone by the tenth and replaced by a feeling of utter fulfillment. Contentment even. And I began to rival in the splash of blood in my face, the thick wetness of it soaking my hands to the bone, even the smell of the inside of a body became a perfume for me.

“I chose my victims as any of your fictional vampires might, picking the most obscene, loathsome killers for my bloody “feast” as it were. I would go to the most horrendous places now that I recall it, places where the nobles wouldn’t have stopped to take a shit, and I gloried in that. I suppose in one way or another I’ve always been a rebel to such high class society, never caring for the aristocratic ways of thinking or the gentle yet trite way of speaking. At four years of age I was a regular at the local bar scenes, drinking my hollendais drink, or as you humans might refer to it as “soda or pop”, even the occasion glass of “milk” if I really had no care for appearances.

“Those who recognized me, stayed out of my way. Those who didn’t were sure to after the night was over. I was a cunning sort of hunter, laying low like the Earth Tiger and simply waiting for the right time to smite my victim, whoever he may be. Sometimes he was a mere soldier, drunk and hungry for a brawl, picking on me for my size, my drink, my…….everything.

“Other times he was a nobody, a common thief, a criminal, a rapist or……… my personal favorite, the appalling child molester. I can recall quite fondly the horrible Feiw, the sickening scratch of his unkept facial hair against my soft cheeks as he whispered tales of a batch of puppies, waiting for me out in the ally way if I would only accompany him. Whether he noticed the eyes of regulars on him, or the snickers in the background, I’m rather sure he didn’t, blinded by his own supposed “victory” over the little unsuspecting child that tottered sweetly behind him, eyes beaming at the chance to touch soft puppy fur, and Feiw’s own eyes gleaming at the prospect of touching other soft parts of the child.

“Reaching the dark ally way, he had swept me up into his arms like a lifeless doll, pinning me against the gritty surface of the brick wall, and running his hands obsessively through my soft, tangled hair.

“Sweet boy, sweet boy.” He whispered psychotically over and over again, running his hands down every surface of my body, touching the forbidden places as if there was no unspoken law against such fondling. And I let him do it for a moment, numb in my young years to such pinches and caressing, feeling in my own mind that it was a sort of gift for him. His last.

“Beautiful little boy,” he’d crooned to me, his rank breath blowing hotly into my eyes. “Silky black hair, smooth skin,” he’d unbuckled his pants at this time, beaming at the prospect of such a willing victim, who’s eyes gleamed just as brightly as his at this moment.

“Give me a kiss sweet Angel, my sweet little cherub.” He’d whispered, guiding my fat little hand downwards. And I had. After his arms lay useless five feet from his squirming body, blood pumping like a fire hydrant out of the empty sockets. I walked innocently around him, kicking in his ribs and hearing his moans and screams as if we truly were accomplishing what he’d wanted so desperately to do.

“I think I chose my victims in this way for peace of mind, finding some contentment in reminding myself of the justice of what I did. Ending Feiw’s life left no lingering guilt or detachment in me, knowing that in his last painful breaths, as I’d knocked in his knee caps and laughed at him, that no child my age, or older, (as I was later to find was more often his taste), would suffer at his perverse hands, or be the victim of his sickly thirst for the troubled youth of this part of town. No child would grow with mental scars of their memory with him, or be scared into silence by his threatening to kill their “mommy” or brothers and sisters. No child would grow to be as he was and in this knowledge, I consoled myself. Not that I’d needed to later on, as I could find some mortal sin in all my enemies.

“If I feared death, I don’t remember it. I suppose all men think they’re invincible to some extent, the idea of mortality simply too far away from their minds to ponder on for long. Life is stronger than death and to focus all meditation on the ending of it was as if you’d never lived it at all. And yet I fear death now, even as I know it is coming upon me as quickly as ever.”

He paused to look at me sincerely, to see my reaction even as I watched the turning of the recording tape in the machine, unsure what to think at that moment.

“I fear death.” I said honestly, looking up to stare into his endless gaze. I felt my hands tremble slightly at his handsome face, how the planes of his skin seemed made out a different material than my own, and trying so desperately hard not to believe what he told me, detailed as the facts admittedly were.

“All men fear death Tazial.” He said. “Be it be a religious man or an atheist, the idea of ceasing to exist is loathsome in our minds. Does the preacher volunteer himself to die at the hands of his enemies simply because his trust in God is so complete that Heaven’s gates are real to him? If the almighty afterlife is so fucking glorious, how come I hear no volunteers from the clergy of the human society? The Pope and all his faithful followers?”

“So you don’t believe in God?” I asked, nearly horrified by the answers he could give me. For all my sins, all my hatred of myself, I needed faith in God as desperately as I needed the air in this room. But he simply shook his head at my eagerness for an answer, running his delicate hands through his black crop of hair.

“Every man believes in God Tazial.” He said gently, leaning back and staring at me seriously. “The Mormon, the Protestant, the Catholic, the Atheist. It’s a part of us all. This wish, this belief in something greater than ourselves. Perhaps simply because in the way of things, we will never have ultimate control. Leaving the turning of the universe to fate alone seems rather vulgar, and so our minds find a way to cope, depending on some force, be he God, Allah, Buddha, Jesus, etc. to watch over us.

“Even the devout Atheist must have some amount of faith in this force, whether or not he admits it. Do you doubt that your beloved Charles Darwin, in his last moments did not wish against all wishes, and hope against all hope, that every word he’d uttered against the belief in God and an afterlife was not spoken in complete idiocy? Do you think that even the most faithful Atheist, as he lay upon his death bed, does not to some extent doubt his beliefs, wishful thinking even? No Tazial, I believe in God.”

I let a breath of relief flee from my pressurized lungs, needing his acceptance in my belief. For all his supposed insanity and crazy, impossible tales, my respect for him had not dwindled even the slightest bit, if not even growing as he continued onward.

“And so the first few years of my life went.” He said calmly, lacing his hands behind his head and stretching lazily.

“I was the living legend as I said before, a God in the minds of my people and perhaps even myself. At the age of five years old, FIVE years old Tazial, I was as strong as my father. As you may have imagined, this was considerable, age or not. My father wasn’t King by birth right alone. No. He had his strengths, both in mind and body. And for what its worth…” Vegeta said thoughtfully, his handsomely defined eyebrows curving slightly inward. “For what its worth, he loved me.”

I looked at him strangely, I know I did. It was a strange thing for him to say honestly. Didn’t every father love their son? What a weird concept.

“I hadn’t wanted his love.” Vegeta continued. “It wasn’t a goal, or an achievement to me. I doubt it ever even reached my mind at that young, foolish age. Approval? Well, that was one thing. But love? In the Saiyan culture love was about as important as nail polish in this society. A nice thing I suppose, but not detrimental. And yet now as I ponder over it, and look back, I know again how stupid our ways were. A civilization will never survive on terror and tyranny alone. In the end, the harder it is run with violence and hatred, the quicker it will fail.

“Perhaps, perhaps if we had only had more passion for life. More value for it. More love even. But,” he shook his head. “Its not important now. Why dwell on a past that you can never change? My story isn’t about morals and feelings anyways. So lets get on with it shall we?

“It was the age of 6 years old that my childhood was officially over. And I recall every single second of it completely. The dread I had then was nothing to the dread I feel at having to relive it. Its like visiting a grave. You do it, but you don’t want to. Not really. And I suppose that’s what this story is, is it not? Returning to the grave, the burial ground of who I could have been, the man I might have become. The end of the beginning, or the beginning of the end.

“It was just another day now that I think back on it. The name Frieza was on the lips of many, though this was no rare occurrence. I remember waltzing like God himself through the posh hallways of my father’s gaudy palace, the sharp clicking of my shoes accompanied by the hushed voices and curious whispers of my servants. Frieza. Frieza. Frieza. It was like the grim reaper of names to many, though it meant virtually nothing to me, immaculate as I viewed myself.

“Frieza was a crime lord of my part of the universe, clearing and wiping out planets to be sold at high prizes to those in need of one. There were many different angles to look at it. Horrifying was one. Ingenious, was another. But again I say the name meant next to nothing to me. I knew I was under his jurisdiction as you are under your American president. But does it bother you? Is it that much of a hindrance on your entire day? Not really. It’s a name. Just another name I intended to conquer with age.

“And while I knew his authority over me and my father, my entire kind actually, was considerable, I paid it no heed, viewing myself already as a soon-to-be Super Saiyan.”

“Super Saiyan?” I nearly laughed, the sight of his face enough to silence my pathetic attempt at humor.

“Yes.” He said rather spitefully. “Super Saiyan. A legendary Godlike being, with the power to overcome ANY enemy. Even if his enemy was Freiza himself. Laugh in your heart now Tazial. It was a goal thousands died for.”

Yeah, that did it. I was silent.

“Walking into my father’s throne room, I was met with complete silence. Its hard to believe how loud the absence of sound can be. A dozen pairs of eyes met with my own, my gaze sweeping every one accusingly. A child with the face of an Angel and the glare of a ruthless killer. My father looked at me in a way I’d absolutely NEVER in all my short life seen him do, a very real fear in his gaze that set my entire system on red alert. Standing to my far left was Freiza, in all his foreign beauty and smug existence. I’d only seen him a few times but it had been enough to leave a lasting impression upon my young mind.

“In all honesty he wasn’t an intimidating man. No massive muscle build even touched his appearance, his physic very slim and childlike. I guess in its own way it worked as yet another tool of him. For what unsuspecting fool would imagine that this white, purple tinted creature standing perhaps only at a small five feet had the power to eliminate entire sections of the universe? But I knew. It was in his aura, his presence, just the way he conducted and held himself. Yes, I knew that posture very well. It imitated my own.

‘ “Frieza.” I said nonchalantly, crossing my chubby arms over my chest and acknowledging him coolly as if he were an equal. He merely giggled, in that malicious way that I was soon to hate as powerfully as any man hates the approach of death itself. His tail skidded across the marble floor as he walked towards me, his pale skin hidden by bits of armor.

‘ “Little Vegeta.” He said sweetly, his voice at the pitch of a teenage girl, all the more reason to fear him. He was phony. Yes, that’s the word. Everything ABOUT him was false, insincere. Behind that sweet face, that in all its innocence rivaled my own, behind that raspy, yet high pitched voice was a great, great monster that even in all my incompetence had the power to send chills up and down my spine.

‘ “How you’ve grown in my absence.” He said almost mockingly, running a cold finger down my cheek like so many of my victims did. I even smiled to myself, as if it were a foreshadowing of a brilliant victory to come.

‘ “Why, you’re even more……… Beautiful than I remember.”

“I shuddered inwardly at his flattery, looking up into his searing red eyes and finding them ugly. They were dull. A dull burgundy, almost a burnt brown color, hideous against his white flesh and purple “armor”, if you would call it that.

‘ “I know.” I said in that cute, cocky manner that was all my own. I shrugged off his hand as it came in contact with my shoulder, staring up into those lifeless eyes and seeing my own reflection gazing right back.

“I can remember peering into the eyes of one of the guards I knew well, Nappa, the rhino of a man that had been my “watcher” since I could remember. And if it was possible, it seemed the great bulk of a man was nearly in tears, refusing to meet my gaze and instead staring accusingly at my father who remained deadly still, like a deer in head lights, as you humans say.

‘ “So young Vegeta,” Frieza said smoothly. “How goes your training?”

‘ “Well enough,” I said smartly. “Why are you here?”

‘ “Well aren’t we the straight forward little imp!” Frieza laughed again, though the rest of the room remained hushed. His sharp nailed fingers ruffled my hair playfully and despite my usual coldness at such gestures, I somewhat enjoyed it.

‘ “Actually, I’m here on business.” He said coyly, lacing his fingers behind his back and observing my reaction. “Don’t you think so Vegeta?”

‘This time his attention was no longer on me, but upon my father who also bared my name. It was tradition in those days for royalty to carry the name of the one who came before them, but I wont go into that. My father physically shuddered and I swear to you my body temperature sank five degrees. I had NEVER seen him like this. He was afraid to even look at me!

‘ “You see little Vegeta,” Frieza continued on, smiling down at me. “Your father and I have reached an agreement you might say.” Glancing up at my father he smirked wickedly, if only revealing for a split second the terrifying creature that lay beneath the kind smile.

‘ “King Vegeta will keep this planet. This…..” he frowned detestably. “This ball of dirt you call home and all its precious little people, in exchange for a small price.”

‘I heard a muffled hiss from Nappa. Fearfully I turned to him, only to notice Frieza doing the same.

‘ “A very small price.” He said softly. “You.”

‘My blood was slammed through my veins as my powerful young heart beat faster, my feet faltering backwards as I was grabbed by two unusually strong soldiers on either arm. At that time, at that very same moment I was struck with cataclysmic fear that nearly took over every other emotion I had. All except my temper that is.

‘ “NO! NO!” I screamed hoarsely, struggling against the soldiers that doubled against me, grabbing handfuls of my precious hair and slamming me to the ground to bind my hands. I could hear the shuffling of feet all around me as my father’s soldiers of their own accord battled Frieza’s minions, being blasted to nothing by the monstrous crime lord himself.

‘ “You challenge ME!?” he screamed, thrusting his hand through the neck of a soldier as if it were melted butter. Blood burst into my eyes as a loyal soldier’s head smacked the ground right before me, my chin digging into the unmovable marble.

‘ “Father! Father!” I shrieked, my hands bolted behind me with an unknown material even I couldn’t break. My screams echoed throughout the room, accompanied by the cries of my guards and the hideous laughter of Frieza. Half a dozen guards it took to hold me down, steady enough for Frieza’s grotesque foot to appear before my blood streaked face.

‘ “Now now now, is that anyway for royalty to behave?” He mocked, my own tears beginning to flood down my soft, rounded cheeks. They were strange to me as tears have always been. Hot and wet coming forth from my body like blood. I couldn’t understand them as much as I couldn’t stop them. I only knew the agony I felt at not being able to stand and run to my father’s side. Would I have begged him to stop this brutal exchange? Would I have coward behind the man that had even less strength than I did at this moment?

‘ “You’re going to learn to respect me Vegeta.” Frieza said coldly, the innocence and mockery gone from his tone. “Mark my words. You’re going to learn one way or another.”

“Dragging me mercilessly to my feet, I felt my knees give out under me, quivering as I was hauled out of the room by powerful hands, my boots scrapping the smooth ground beneath.

‘ “Father!” I screamed, the heart broken plea sending wide eyed servants into hysterics as they dashed away from the violent scene. “Help me!”

“But he didn’t. He never came. I’ve heard the saying, that at certain parts of a person life, they feel as if a great piece, or part of them has died. If that’s so, than there have been many deaths in my life. For at that moment, as I viciously kicked at the guards with my remaining strength, brutally tearing away from them and dashing into my father’s chest, a part of me…….. well a part of me died.

“I stared into his eyes from my own blurry vision, seeing the handsome face and clear skin wavy through my sight, blurred from the hot wet tears that dripped down my cheeks. His eyes were like my own. All black. Impossible to understand in a way of their own. God…”

Vegeta looked up exasperated, breathing almost angrily.

“What I wouldn’t have given right then to understand what he must have been thinking. What could have POSSIBLY been going through his mind as he stared into me, nothing but a blank, uncaring gaze as I pleaded weakly to his deaf ears.

‘ “Help me.” I said softly. “Please………. Please dad.”

“It was the first time I’d ever called him that. It’d be the last. He gathered his hands against my chest and threw me backwards, pushing with all his might until I was nearly tossed against a rock hard surface. Cold arms wrapped around me and the rank stench of Frieza’s breath nearly over whelmed me as he laughed.

‘ “Not so fast monkey boy.” He jeered, thrusting me into the hands of an awaiting guard.

‘ “If he gets free again.” Frieza spat. “Your deaths will be the penance.”

“But the guards had nothing to fear. I struggled no longer, watching as the sight of my father drifted farther and farther away, like the memory of a dream at day break. Still there, but going with each tick of the tock. Until, until they’re nothing more than thoughts in the back of your mind. Gone.

‘ “You’re going to learn monkey boy.” Frieza whispered somewhere behind me, his voice like the approach of death. “You’re going to learn to respect me. One way or another.”

“And I was soon to learn that one way or another was an experiment of sorts. Because I underwent both. The torment I went through. Tazial, there isn’t words for what he did to me. I can’t even summon thoughts enough to describe it. Its……. My God its unimaginable. I once believed, so long ago, that when people said that they didn’t remember things because they were so traumatic, that they were idiots. More or less. That….. how do I say this?”

He shook his head in irritation, burying his forehead into the palm of his hand.

“When people have been raped as children, beaten, abused…….. I’ve heard that they forget it or something. That its too traumatic and that some times, sometimes later on their memory is awakened you might say. Jolted. And suddenly, they remember bits and pieces of something their body has tried so desperately to forget. And they remember everything.

“If that is so……… I never want to be awakened. Please God,” Vegeta sighed, running his hands through his hair and gazing at the ceiling. “Let me sleep in what I can never remember or understand. I want to be ignorant to what happened. The horrors I’ve seen cannot be far from the horrors I’ve lived and if that’s so, let me rest in my amnesia. I’ve heard the saying that ignorance is bliss. I cannot agree more.

“All I know is that one day a three year old boy became a killer. And that one day that same boy was taken to a prison and died. And another boy took his place, leaving that Godforsaken torture chamber and rising to the being he became. The THING, he became.

“I remember now that when I was very young, killing had once been hard for me. After I left the prison? It wasn’t. It was like a sport. Alive? Oh. Now dead. Easy as that. If I thought about my life as it was before the prison, I don’t recall it. If I thought at all for a few months, I must say, that was a miracle in itself. I’d never been so void of feeling. It was like walking through life as a video game player. I moved my arms, my legs. I fed, I slept, I clothed, I killed. But I was seeing it all through the eyes of someone else. Something else. And that something, wasn’t the boy who somewhere deep down missed his father with every single movement of his heart.

“Life was death. If it was anything more, than I didn’t understand it.”

I looked at him, waiting for him to speak. Waiting for whatever words came next that could either sooth or wound me further. I felt impatient at his pause and yet hesitant to disturb it. It seemed he needed this. Time to think. But what else does a patient have but time?

“What happened then?” I asked, unable to silence myself as I leaned over the counter towards him. “What changed it all?”

“You think it ever changed Tazial?” he said softly, his eyes squinting in mystery.

“But surely somewhere along the line it must have gotten better. Surely there must have been someone or….. or something that caused you to care again.” I stammered. “Surely-..”

“Surely what Tazial?” He spoke with a hint of annoyance. “Surely miracles happen? Surely some immaculate mother-like creature took me under her wing, taught me right from wrong, turned me…… back to God as they say? Tazial, Tazial, Tazial.” He sighed. “When will you learn that I’m not lying? When will you realize I’m not making this up? This is no God damn fairy tale! There’s no happy ending. No great villain. No great hero. There is only this!”

He stood up peevishly, marching around the room and breathing heavily as if the air itself pissed him off royally.

“There’s only a past I cant change. Mistakes I can never rectify. And a future I hate as much as long for. Like I said, this is no fairy tale.”

I looked at him, my own temperamental behavior quickening my pulse.

“So you really expect me to believe all this don’t you Valentino?” I spat sickeningly through my teeth as if his very presence was a piss on my entire mood. I knew the mention of his “real” name would do its job of irritating him beyond words. I just didn’t know how efficient it would be.

My back met with a painfully hard surface, my eyes closed as his hand tightened around my throat, the fingers feeling like pure iron against my skin. I was too afraid to even register that I was scared. My blood beat in my ears as I opened my eyes, the pressure so immense around my throat that I couldn’t breathe. And even though I knew I could not, I desperately tried to suck in air as I realized that the hard surface against my back was none other than the ceiling, and I was being held against it with one hand around my throat. He was LIFTING me with ONE hand against the ceiling!

“Whatever helps you sleep at night Camden.” He whispered, eyes full of malice. If I had ever brought myself to believe that this……… this creature had no potential for being the killer he claimed to be, I was wrong. I saw death in those eyes. Regretless death.

Guards burst in through the doors, four of them, heavily armed and aiming at him, screaming the familiar words “freeze!” when all I wished of Vegeta at this moment was that he move and release my suspended body. Freeze!? Pfft! Freeze indeed! All he WAS was frozen! Frozen as he stared directly into my red lined eyes, his hand like a tightening vice around my neck, digging into my soft flesh as if it would be nothing at all to simply squeeze until his fingers met with all the gore right in the middle.

“Please!” I squeaked, my face as red as a ripe cherry, my own hands holding onto his merciless wrist.

“Stop or we’ll shoot!” A guard was screaming, his voice trembling even as he spat the words. “Valentino Briefs! You have THREE seconds to release Dr. Camden or we’ll open fire. ONE!”

Vegeta merely smiled, looking down at his watch in boredom.

“TWO!”

He yawned, covering his mouth with his free hand and patting his lips.

“THREE!!”

I screamed like a child as twenty shots rang out. But it wasn’t only fear that made me quiver in terror. It wasn’t just fear that made the hot, salty liquid run down the front of my pants as I shivered, still in the man’s horrible lock. It was regret that tore out of me. Regret of what I might have discovered had those bullets not been fired at the being that must, for all the understanding of the universe, be dead entirely.

“Tsk tsk tsk.” Came the arrogant voice, rising like a dream into my mind. I was lowered to the ground even as the sound of twenty or so metal bullets clanked against the concrete floor, released as I was, from Vegeta’s hand.

“Actually, that was 5 and a half seconds officer.” He shrugged, unharmed to the naked eye. “And the name……….. is Vegeta.”

I collapsed on my knees gasping, my hands around my neck and my eyes bulging stupidly at him, as if I could merely open them wider to understand what the hell had just happened. And yet, even as I remained entirely dumbfounding, it seemed the guards were also awe stricken, gawking in utter disbelief, two on their knees still pointing at the ‘victim’, who laced his hands behind his back nonchalantly and smiled innocently at them.

“That………. That’s impossible.” The head officer stuttered, staring accusingly at his gun as if it had played some prank on him. His eyebrows furrowed, giving his young, boyishly handsome face an aged look, anger and confusion toying with him. He even glared over at me, as if I, the poor victim of a previously brutal act, was all somehow part of this misunderstanding.

“They were blanks.” Another man came to the conclusion, the whole idea of any other possibility an insult to his mind. “They had to be. Shit…… Shit they had to be!”

And yet his hands quivered and he shuffled towards the door in a crab walk, his hands and feet slithering along the ground as he sought to escape the ever present glare of Vegeta, who crossed his arms and smirked at all in attendance. And suddenly that gaze was on me, deep and empty all at the same time. Humor danced on his smile and he laughed in spite of the tension in the air that you could have cut with a knife. The fluorescent light glimmered off his unusually sharp canines and smooth, flawless skin, almost iridescent as he tilted his head back.

“And every part of you wants to believe they were blanks don’t you?” he asked us all viciously, laughing as yet another guard scurried to the other end of the room. “You humans!” he scoffed. “Does the idea of the impossible defeated scare you so? And here all along you pride yourself on never giving up. That NOTHING is impossible! Well here I stand in living color! The epitome of all you wish you could be! And what can you do but deny what your own eyes have seen! NEVER forget what I am! Never forget what I can do! NEVER underestimate me!”

He kneeled down before me, the squeak of leather shoes meeting the concrete hardly even registering in my ears as the officers called for back up. I shook horrendously, the embarrassing liquid on the crotch of my pants beginning to cool and stick to my leg. And I was again met with his terrifying beauty, seeing every curve and line that human flesh has no business owning. So close he was, that I could see the tiny pores, deep deep in his skin, invisible from any farther away than this. And those shocking black eyes, bearing into me, like portals to some……….. some other dimension or something. It was a corny analogy, I’ll admit. But then, you try looking into eyes like that and coming up with better.

“Never…” He said softly, poking my nose playfully with his finger. “Tazial. Never.”

Slapping my cheek softly, he stood up, smiling fondly as he exited the room by himself, caring nothing for the stupefied guards that yelped as he came and left.