The Last Hope

Chapter IV, The Incident

"That was the first lesson, remember? I said that you would be training all the time. As for the other questions, I do not feel the need to answer them. Now come, let me take you to your training room!" I was beginning to despise the mannerisms and personality traits of this person I was supposed to refer to as, "Master". I guess he wasn't too pleased when I said that out loud.

"What was that?" He snapped. Oh boy. If I didn't like him when he was happy... "nothing" I feebly stated. "No, no, no no no no no no. 'Nothing' is nothing. That however... That was something. Now... let me ask again. What did you say?" I could only say a weak "sorry"

"Oh I see! If you are sorry for it... It must have been something awful!" He said in a mocking, childish tone "I have to make sure something like that never ever happens again! Stay here." He walked off, back into his office from whence we had just emerged. About several minutes later, he returned with a sheet of white paper, with words inscribed onto the page in his hands. Before he gave it to me though, he said something describing the contents of that small page. " Since you have been so disrespectful, I have come up with a list of... difficult tasks for you." With that he handed the paper over, facedown, to let me read through. I flipped it over, and this is what it said:

To do:

Take all vines off of the exterior of the mansion

Scrub the outside walls until they glean

Clean all rugs and carpets of the main hallway and any rooms attached

Vacuum floor and walls of the entire mansion

scrub the ceiling - I will provide the tech to do it

Replace shingles of roof - again, I will provide necessary tech

Organize my office table and drawers

Sort all papers in my office into the filing cabinets available

Paint walls with a new color. Make sure it is a dark one.

Dust everything in the mansion

As I stared down at my list of chores, I wondered how I would ever get them all done. Master Gratow piped up and got my attention, "Get started then! And don't you DARE do a whack up job just because you want it over with! I will be inspecting everything you have done once you say that you are, 'finished'." After his little talk about his inspecting and all that, he turned and began sauntering away. As if I would just skim over my jobs to get them done faster, I thought. But then I had an idea... before he could leave, I said " If I, the little boy that i am can do this, why haven't you? Because I am fed up with this treatment!" Bad idea. He stopped in his tracks, and started s l o w l y turning around to walk back towards me. I immediately regretted what I had said. He continued to walk closer until he was only about 3 inches from me. I had been looking down toward the ground until this point, but now I slowly looked up at him. Almost as if his gaze had the power of the cold itself, as I was frozen in place as soon as I made eye contact with him.

He spoke in a quiet, calm voice, which was more intimidating than anything he had ever done before. "If you ever disrespect me again... well... you may find yourself on the other side of these walls. Is that understood?" I couldn't speak. My body and mind seemed separate; my mind thinking that it was sorry, but my body just petrified. I just stood there, looking into his eyes, until he angrily turned and walked back in the direction he was traveling before I distracted him. As soon as he turned a corner, I just collapsed onto the floor. For some reason, that encounter drained the strength out of me. I never wanted to do anything like that again, as it just knocked me out afterwards.To no-one in particular, I said, "I'd better get started" Then... I passed out.