Underground Hatred - My Hero Origins (MHO)

25: Double Sighted

Word Count: 2784

(Kat)

 Kat's feet bounced her from her toes to her heels and back again. Boredom slowly consumed her figure as she stood in a lazy line, four people back from the counter. A slightly crumpled paper sat in her left hand with an enclosed envelope, the other hand fiddling with her Blackberry in her baby pink jacket pocket. Her soul grew antsy as the line went on for eons, up ticking her time, stuck as an ordinary citizen. An ordinary citizen. An odd term that continued to haunt her, despite years of mingling in her real world. The term seemed so foreign for years, and now it applied to her.

The word was more unusual than normal—the sensation rolling in Kat's warm chest. A finger tapped silently against the back of her Blackberry in her pocket while pondering, searching for the reason why being an "ordinary citizen" was unfamiliar so suddenly. Her mind drifted, fingers corresponding the warmth of the Blackberry to a never-ending cycle in her pocket of the back-and-forth feed of the technology and organic matter: two individual things, but from different worlds.

The thought of Davis drifted into Kat's mind. She was unsure why, but it held the impression that he was the reason why she felt as such. His presence had wavered through her brain normally, but finding his apathetic face staring back at her, she knew. She knew he was the reason why she experienced an awkwardness standing in the line. She knew he brought her back to the youth she was supposed to revel in, not the adulthood she found so quickly. He pushed her out of her normal boundaries, the two's adventures the epitome of what Kat could never experience back home. He brought that to her. He never pushed it away as others had.

The person at the front of the line moved, the chain reaction of people approaching the front desk setting off. Kat was now the third person to be seen. The paper and envelope burned in her hands, reminding her of the inevitable doom that awaited her like a prowling lion. The flames of the papers licked up her arm, her palms sweating at the heat. Her heart began its escalation. She tried to calm it, expressing to herself that she was perfectly fine, but the constant state of panic and fight-or-flight instinct that occurred for weeks now told her the opposite.

Her head ached slightly more than usual—a throb compared to the pulsation from earlier. A pickaxe repeatedly stabbed straight through her brain, a scowl crossing her face. A roll of nausea encased her stomach. During the night, she managed to remember the whole event. She could pinpoint when she received her concussion. Great surprise took over her at the epiphany that only yesterday had she gained a concussion after so many times getting thrown around. The bullet graze could also be identified when she was wriggling through the shelves to escape her pursuers.

No reasonable explanation could be found as she searched for why she risked so much the day before. Yes, it was all stupid. Did she face death millions of times? Of course she did—but what was new? So many times, she found death staring her down, ready to pull her into its endless abyss, and yet she was still standing, mocking the entity with her stubborn nature. She refused the offer time after time again, and before it was spite. The day before was not spite. It was something stronger, but emptied Kat's being of hatred. It was warmer, more protective: what was it?

The person stepped up in front of Kat to wait next. Kat's hand tightened against the Blackberry in her jacket. Again, she tried to comfort that she was fine. The fire grew brighter in her hand, finding its way to her shoulder. Her neck grew hot, the fire starting its dance near the base. The smoke curled into her lungs, igniting her veins aflame. Her presence was a fireball in the middle of a civilian common area, burning bright with an invisible story playing behind her amber eyes: the story of why she was there, how she got there.

Her brain pulled away from the inevitable doom making its way to her. Instead, she dwelled on the words of Davis from the morning: W—We meet at 4pm in the afternoon at the beginning of th—the warehouse district. We're getting that information tonight.