Post by Tj Abhorsen Wannabe on Nov 21, 2006 14:30:33 GMT -5
Lack of Colour
By Tj Denton
By Tj Denton
Mutants. People hate them, they want them dead. They’re genetic abominations, sins of the flesh, worse than lepers and Satanists combined. At least, that’s what I was always told. You know, the ugly old man with greasy hair yelling at you from street corners, a crumpled bible clutched in his hand as he tells you you’re going to hell even when you’re only six years old? God the World’s a sick place.
You know, I’d always thought life was difficult, even while my parents were still around. Mommy dearest had an alcohol problem and my ‘big strong’ father figure was a man who liked to sleep around, take steroids and blow his pay cheque at the pub every month.
It’s not all that difficult to guess that my childhood wasn’t the best in the history of universe. But, then again, there were people who had it worse than me. There was this guy in preschool, his parents had abandoned him into care. That’s worse than my situation. Right?
So basically, eight years of hell. My mom yelling at my Dad, my Dad hitting my mom until finally the shit hit the fan if you know what I mean. I’d never really been aware of how bad my life was compared to all the other kids. I mean, my Dad didn’t use his belt when he hit me and my Mom’s drunken screams weren’t that loud when I shoved my head under the pillow. Childish ignorance, it’s so comforting at the time but looking back one thing always sticks inside your mind. Did I really take that shit?
Anyway, yeah, my Dad stumbled home drunk and had a little tussle with an equally drunk mother of mine. Our neighbors heard the commotion and before I could even say bye I was quickly whisked away by a Social Worker.
My second family were nice. I was technically their first child, they let me have cocoa pops and watch Sesame Street in the kitchen. They were very smiley, they never got drunk or even hit me. That’s probably the happiest I’ve ever been. The guy who fostered me was called Gary, his wife was Kate. They fostered me because apparently Kate was infertile and they had, at once, insisted that I refer to them as mom and dad.
It didn’t last though, I was there for barely half a year before something happened. It was good for them, bad for me. I didn’t realize it at first. They pulled me into the kitchen and sat down at the table with me, very parental expressions on their faces. Kate was pregnant. I was excited at first. I mean, what kid would be? I thought I was getting a little brother or sister. I was so stupid.
I should have just stuck to calling them Gary and Kate, maybe then it wouldn’t have hurt so bad when they told me I was going back to stay with Elaine, my social worker. They only had one bedroom and, naturally, their own flesh and blood came first. I don’t think I ever spoke to them again.
I wasn’t fostered again, I just stayed at a Care Home until I was fourteen. That was it happened, maybe my life would have turned out better if I hadn’t been a mutant. I’d hated school as it was while I was at that age. I was the weird guy from the Care Home who couldn’t afford new clothes and was too stupid to understand Maths.
Maybe it was a relief when my ‘gift’ emerged, it finally gave me an excuse to feel sorry for myself. I actually was different, I was a mutant, I could freaking see into people’s minds! It wasn’t how you’d imagine, not endless maze of numbers, no books upon books full of abstract words and no cute little cartoon critters storming around on your brain.
No, just colours, every shade imaginable, just contained in one mind, different shapes, different shades, different orders and different patterns but basically the same. Flowing colour that was never stopping and, somehow, I could understand what it was saying.
Being a mutant’s not as easy as it seems. No X-men came to rescue, the Avengers didn’t try to recruit me, heck I would have even taken Spiderman, looking back at it now. No, I was left alone, no-one was like me. It’s no wonder I ran.
Yeah, that’s right, I ran. I ran like the stupid shit I am. It could have been worse, sleeping on the streets, scrounging food. It’s not as difficult as people make it out to be. You can find somewhere to sleep and food to eat if you know where to eat. It didn’t take me long to settle into the routine.
But the fact remained, I was a mutant and the general public was pretty much vying for our blood, guts and anything else they could get their grubby little hands on. I could see thoughts, they whirled around me like roller coasters. A lot of the time I couldn’t even discern thoughts from voices, so of course I was going to be discovered one day.
Lynching is a horrible word, it’s also a really bad thing and you really don’t want to go through it. I just ran and ran, crowds of men that thought they were better than everyone else were chasing me with baseball bats.
You know, it’s strange, a lot of these men were old, bald and fat, they obviously just despised me because I wasn’t. They were jealous, jealous that I was the next stage in Evolution and they were the missing link.
I would have died if it’s been for Them. Lucid, reaching up through the ground and pulling me down through the ground. They had someone there, he had sensed me, sensed my power. They knew I was a mutant so where they.
They called themselves Morlocks, they were like a family. They looked out for each other, got food and provided warmth. They were the underdogs of society, many of them with mutations so grotesque that they wouldn’t even let fellow mutants look upon them. It’s strange, but I’ve upheld the opinion all my life that these were quite possibly the most human people I’ve ever met.
I liked it there, I had a family again and we all liked each other. Annalee mothered me and acted as if I was her real son. She never did tell me what happened to her real children. Beautiful Dreamer would just sit there smoking but, in some ways, I liked her most of all. You could just sit with her and she wouldn’t expect conversation. She wouldn’t expect anything from you. God know how many times were just sat in the corner, silently bonding.
Things like that never last though. I’ve always known that, barely seventeen years old I knew that life was going to let you down no matter what choices you made. How depressing is that?
Tommy was the first to die. I remember this in vivid detail. She’d left for love and she’d come back, no idea why but at the time I was happy. I remember leaping up, yelling excitedly, I had sensed the familiar flow of colours that came with her mind. Her thoughts had always been a lot paler in shade than everyone else’s. She was always so innocent.
It was the first experience I’d had of death. I remember, I was telling everyone that Tommy was back, I was excited, I could sense her colours, they were closer. Then black, her colours were gone, her mind was gone. It took me several seconds to figure out what had happened. Tommy was dead and, little did I know, she was only the first.
What happened next? I’m not so sure. Do I have survivor’s guilt? Quite possibly. All I know is that I lived and all my friends died, Annalee was shot, Piper died, or so I’ve heard. Bezerker, the closest thing I’ve ever had to a brother, was killed, by an X-Man of all people.
I’ve never been sure how I survived. I was one of the lucky ones. Somehow bullets didn’t hit me, people didn’t kill me. I might have died, how can one be so sure? All I know is that, all too soon it was over and the Morlocks were ended. I was not alone however,
Beautiful Dreamer, she had helped me, stayed with me. She claims she never wanted me to die. I like to think I believe her.
We lived on the streets for a while after that. Both she and I had an unspoken agreement never to revisit the tunnels. We’d never wanted to anyway. She said it smelt of death, I agreed. Hell, I’m not even sure if they’re still there.
Pretty soon, however, we had a small apartment. It was miniscule, one bedroom. I slept on the couch. Literally only three rooms. A bathroom, one bedroom and the Living room, the kitchen accessories where crammed into the corner, almost like an afterthought. We had no money when we moved in. I remember asking her how we could afford it. She claimed she was owed a favor.
We stayed at the apartment, the landlord never came to collect the rent, he’d just walk past our door to our neighbors to collect their rent. I watched so many people get kicked out of their homes. I wondered if, after Dreamer was gone, the favor would outstay it’s welcome and I would be kicked to the curb.
The one thing that kept me sane was music, it helped me focus my powers. I could see the colours, they vibrated when music was around me. I also wondered if they liked the rhythm and lyrics as much as I did.
It’s weird. My powers were the only thing I could rely on to remain constant, well, them and Beautiful Dreamer and then fate decides to rip them away. Heh, life’s a bitch. First genetics deals you a deathblow to your soul and then fates decides to take it away just as you begin to like it.
The media called it M-Day. Tele-reverends called it redemption. I called it hell. All at once the call went out for all mutants who had retained their powers. Xavier offered safe haven with totally clean slates. Beautiful Dreamer’s powers had remained. She didn’t want to leave, didn’t want to leave me. She was afraid for what might happen to me.
I was afraid for what might happen to her. Purity were walking around as if they owned the place, kicking the shit out of former and current mutants alike. She needed protection, protection no-one could provide.
Seeing her off in the cab it only occurred me to later that it would probably be the last time I would ever see her.
I sigh as I sit back in my chair. The landlord hasn’t kicked me out yet. He denies that he ever will, apparently he promised Beautiful Dreamer, whose real name I still don’t know. My eyes are fixed on the clock, ordinarily life isn’t boring, my powers saw to that. There was always some new and interesting way to look at something. Now everything’s so dull. There’s no dancing no colours. Nothing.
The clock ticks loudly and I bite my lip. It’s nearly midnight, nearly the start of a new day. Maybe it will better than today. Sitting by the window, staring at cars as they go past isn’t the ideal pastime.
The darkness is around me and it suddenly occurs to me. I’m afraid of the dark almost. I haven’t properly been in darkness since I became a mutant, there were always lights around. They would talk to me, make everything alright, light up the darkness. Now? Nothing. Darkness, black and white, shading, graphite pencil on a dark background. I don’t like it but it’s life.
I looked at the clock, it’s finally midnight and I heave a huge sigh as I determinedly wipe my eyes which have just welled up with tears. I’m now officially twenty years old.
My voice is quiet in the darkness, meek, desolate, sad, quite the opposite of the old days. I’m alone and I hate it.
“Happy birthday me.”
