The Real Ram

Chapter 8

 About ten minutes pass, and finally I hear the training room door creak open. "Zoe? You in here?" Beast's voice echoes in the training room. "I mean I know you are, but are you going to talk to me?"

"Do I have to?" I respond.

He sighs and makes his way to my voice and eventually finds me. He smiles sadly and sits beside me. "How's your ankle?"

"Fine," I say softly. "And before you say sorry, just hear me out. I don't want you to apologize. It's not your fault and I know that's the common response to someone when they tell you about a sad moment in their life. I don't want to hear it. I just want it to be the past, okay?"

"Zoe, let me tell you something," he looks down. "My father wasn't all that loving. He was born from a shifting family and he didn't get to express the gene. He learned to deal with it, but he was never accepted into his family. To them, he was the freak. They kicked him out when he turned sixteen, and he met my mom a few years later while delivering pizza to her house once a week."

"That's a cute love story," I comment.

Beast smiles thinly, "Well he never bothered to mention to my mom that he had an ability gene. When I was born, I soon started to show my abilities by accidentally changing. He finally came out with it and it broke my mother." I feel his emotion, weak and solemn. "The thought of having a monster for a son..." he shakes his head. "My mom left pretty soon after that, and my dad pretty much blamed me too. He kept me for a little while after that, and when I was about two my mom called. She gave him a choice. Me or her."

"He chose her, didn't he?"

"I was sent to this compound that night and he went off to be with her. I haven't seen them since."

"That sucks."

He sighs, "I've learned to put it in my past. Besides, living here for most of my life, I learned how to use my abilities sooner than a lot of the kids. But my main point is that my father didn't like me either. He blamed me for his troubles because I was the problem." Beast turns his eyes to me, "Zoe, I just want to tell you that you weren't the problem. My parents were much happier once I was out of the picture. Your stepfather is still the man he was. Your brother leaving didn't make a difference. Your mother dying was not your fault. He's the problem, not you."

"You don't know the whole context of those situations," I shake my head.

"Want to help me then?"

"My mom worked here, as you probably figured out. She didn't see me much and she felt like she should come home as often as possible. Mr. X couldn't give her the amount of days she wanted, so her visits slowly started to dwindle. Back then my abilities weren't really showing, but she had a hunch." I take in a shaky breath, "One afternoon I was home with Phillip, my brother, when suddenly everything became so much more...sharper. I noticed the stains hidden in the cracks of the floor and I noticed the dust in the air. The light outside felt like it was burning my eyes even though the dark curtains where closed. We didn't know what was happening, so he called the only person we trusted to talk to."

"Your mom."

"She left the compound right away, telling Mr. X she had an emergency. She came home and helped me calm my eyes down. She showed me all her research and told me about the gene that ran through her line of family. She gave my all her notebooks so I could read up on all the Omega stuff and tricks with the ability we shared."

"How old were you?"

"I was only four then."

"Wow, and you understood it all?"