ANTI-HERO, j.grace

FIFTEEN

Klein Maddox knew that she was not a good person simply because Kieran Maddox was. He was the sun, he was laughter, he was unyielding warmth, and he was a hero. She is the shadows, the harsh rain, tears in your eyes, and she was no hero.

Maybe she had been once, good when she was young and naive and glowed with gold every time she smiled. 

There had always been a distinction between the twins with Lorraine Maddox's words: Klein was pretty, Kieran was perfect. And he was. He excelled at everything, be it fighting or using the singing voice he hated so much. And he was the best brother he could have been. They fought tooth and nail as brothers and sisters did - she was annoying, he was too protective - but when it came down to it, they were all they had.

They never should have split up, the archers should have attacked as a whole and they should have all stayed together. He should have let her fix his chest plate, he never fixed the straps right and it always hung slanted and loose.

"Where's Kieran?" She had asked, fuzzy eyes scanning the room around her. Will, Chiron, Austin, Jake Mason.

No Kieran. She just didn't understand why.

They had tried to talk around it at first, trying to coax her attention to her leg as they spoke of the prosthetic they would be making. Klein didn't understand that either - why would she need a prosthetic? Where was Kieran?

She asked again. She asked again and again and again until she was all but pleading with them for an answer as to why he wasn't at her side.

The memory itself wasn't clear, blocked fully from her memory - a trauma response, or maybe just for her own benefit to keep from reliving it too often. Either way it was blurred. Sometimes Klein thought they she'd prefer to remember it for it felt wrong to have such a disarrayed recollection of finding out her own brother had died, but even the slightest of call backs left her paralyzed.

"Klein. My dear, I am so sorry... Kieran did not survive the fighting."

Kieran Maddox did not survive the battle - he didn't even make it off of the battlefield. He had taken a sword through the chest, the blade piercing straight through the opening made by the breast plate that he had refused to let Klein fix before they separated.

His rank of archers had been closing in on her own, aiming to make a half circle and trap the enemy on one side while Cabin Five handled the drakon. It had all been working perfectly, they were pushing through the enemy forces and holding strong even as their own numbers began to lessen. Kieran couldn't help but feel hopeful - this is what he had been training for, this is what he was born for, and he was doing it.

He was shouting orders when it happened - there was an alarmed array of cries as the sword plunged through the back of Klein's leg and she collapsed to the ground in agony. An arrow struck the attacker straight through the eye, but Klein didn't stand, nor did she move.

There were screams of warning as the sword plunged through the side of Kieran's chest. A strangled gasp was torn from his lips, his lungs contrasting on instinct as the coppery metallic taste of blood flooded his senses. The attacker ripped the sword out and was immediately hit with an arrow to the neck.

Kieran collapsed to his knees, and then he crumpled against the ground.

Kieran Maddox died thinking that his sister had been killed. Klein Maddox never even saw her brother take the hit.

The girl couldn't make herself believe Chiron's words. She pushed herself off the infirmary bed, ready to quite literally make a run for it when she crashed unsteadily to the ground. Her right leg was gone, Will and Austin had rushed to her side to pull her off the ground but she had already started crying. And as Chiron's words finally made their course, as they punched past her lungs and took a hammer to her heart, Klein Maddox screamed.