Nikola Burns and the missing vessel.

The Burning room.

We pray to the Allgiver Rhea always

.A goddess and a god ,Rhea is a construct of two identities; Life and Death.

We do this, then we pray to all the other gods that come after Rhea and before our god Denyr, My family's patron god . The god of storm. He used to bring good crops , back in the old days. But our god is not benevolent; most aren't.

    Nik was standing in a kid's room , in what looked like an old victorian house.
It was his old room.There were  posters of planets  on the walls. Up on the ceiling, he could see fake glowing sticker stars , perfectly mimicking the night's constellations.

His mother and father had put up the stars as compromise when he insisted on cutting off a hole on  the ceiling so that he could see the stars at night.
Nik smiles, it was one of the few memories that he had of his mom that was real. It felt like finding a pattern in the stars .

But his smile dims.

He knows what's coming next.

A thunder shakes the room and Nik could almost feel it in his bones.(It was stronger now than before),he thought.

Then there was fire everywhere;On the curtains and the paper walls . His old posters of planets were burning. The paper stars were falling  ashes on the ground .

The flames were licking Nik's whole body .
The warmth envelopes  him but it didn't burn.

It never did.

He was expecting to see his mom.

Whenever He saw her, she never talked ,always just observed. But a woman's gentle voice greeted him. "Nikola , my little furball"

Nik turns his head."where are you ?", he demands.

Nik had thought that he'd  forgotten the voice of his mother; but  as soon as the voice said his name, he knew it was her.

Tears were  welling up on his eyes, perhaps, because of the smoke.  He could feel his lungs  heating up, breathing fire.

"You've grown up stronger than I imagined.much stronger. I miscalculated. You are , after all , my son,. This was all for you my furball. But I have failed you.", she said , sorrow on her voice.

before he could say anything , a blinding light filters into the room and into his eyelids when he closed them.

The sound that came next was so loud, Nik felt his head crack in half. Suddenly, the room collapses. The fiery walls cave in on Nik.

Nik woke up sweating and gasping for air. He could still feel his lungs filling up with smoke.He shoves his blanket away and shifts to sit down on the side of the bed, hands clenching on the sheets.

The dream was different this time.

It felt as real as the pounding of his heart

Nik has  been having the same dream since his mom left 10 years ago.

It changed throughout the years. At first , it was just Nik standing alone in the room. Occasionally, he would see a faint vision of his mother. Despite this, and to Nik's great frustration, no words ever came from the apparition.

It was only this year that the madness started, the room would burn after a flash of light and the roar of thunder , but the room always stayed there ,a solid fortitude. Today was the first time that his mother spoke to him, and the first time that the room went down.

It somehow felt like the end.

Nik leans in , opens up a drawer, and starts rummaging for something.  A picture. He was looking for a picture.

He finds it .

In the picture,a woman was  sitting on a plum leather chair . Her arms wrapped around a sleeping boy with dark messy hair.  She had smile on her face .

Her eyes were smiling too. It was the color of cloudy skies ,gray and brewing; But it was bright in this picture, a silver lining in the clouds.   It was the same one Nik has.

The woman in the picture always stayed the same. But the boy has changed. He looked fuller now, his structure more flesh and muscle than bone. His hair changed too.

Nik's hand shoot to his hair. Before his mom left, Nik used to keep it in its natural messy state . She had called him her little furball and would ruffle his hair  and  kiss him on the head. He didn't care about the other kids teasing him for it .

After she left, Nik hated it.

Now it's kept shorter. He liked it better that way. It was cleaner.

Nik turned the photo. It read,"My little furball", on a handwriting that was not familiar to him.

" Nik, you're gonna be late! Breakfast is waiting!", shouts Mr. Burns,his father, always full of energy.

With a sigh, he puts the picture back in the drawer next to the old planetarium posters and shuts it.

"I'm up!"

Nik changed to  his clothes . He puts on a hoodie and a bomber jacket. On the back, there was a rainbow patch stitched to it. Nik had put it there to cover up a hole.

He grabs  a necklace from the side table. It was the only thing that his mom had left him. He wears it everyday , sort of as a lucky charm.

He remembers the day when they had to evacuate the whole school because of Nik. That was also the day he had left his necklace.

"Mr. Burns , your son must be at fault. Just last month, we've had computers circuit out. All of it was used by Nikola . That is no coincidence. Burning notebooks in school grounds just can not be tolerated." , A man said. Nik was sitting down outside the dean's office. His fingers were rubbing his neck, where his necklace was supposed to be .  The window pane that separates the office from the corridor was thin , it carried sound  crisply. " My son is just 7 years old , how would he know how to break computers? And burning notebooks? He doesn't have  a single match on him. It must be the kids. OH if I find out that someone is bullying my kid . I-."

two soft knocks on the door break the memory.

"Yeh?"

A head pokes in through the door . " just making sure my son's still alive .come on I made pancakes"

NIk perks up ." You're kidding right? i thought pancakes weren't an appropriate meal?"

"It still isn't. It's a desert . quite disgusting . But since my son is turning 16  today, I thought  it would be high time he became morbidly obese...Happy birthday kiddo"

"Thanks Dad" he said Chuckling." I'll be down in a minute."  He puts on the necklace and hides it underneath his hoodie.

The Dining room was as tidy as ever . Two plates , precisely placed in the middle of two place mats had pancakes  with blueberries on top of it. It was coated with the most golden syrup Nik has seen.  He takes a seat and starts digging in. His father was cleaning the pans he used to make the pancakes. " my own son won't even wait for me to eat .I feel like a maid in my own house!", he said dramatically.

Nik stops shoving pancakes in his mouth. The blueberries were now shoved to the side. He swallows and says,"you like cleaning so much. Didn't wanna trouble you.  Plus, running late for school"

"Want me to drive you or is Brianne driving?" He walks to Nik and puts a glass of water on the coaster  for Nik.

" Brianne and Harp are gonna pick me up at downtown . I didn't want her to, but  she said it was my birthday. Maybe I will get fat after this day. What  with everyone pampering me."

" Bring your friends over, I won't be home till late. Go have a  party, Nik.", Mr Burn's say with a twinge of concern escaping his voice. Nik repressed the urge to roll his eyes.

" I can't have a party here. You'll go mental if we don't put our drinks on the coasters." Nik said only half-jokingly .