" So is there something wrong with me?" I asked Master Shadow. We sat in the lab room and I was seated on the testing table across the room from where he was. He was sitting in a chair, typing away on his laptop.

" I wouldn't say wrong. You seem normal and from what I've seen you have control over your powers."

" So what's so unique about me then?" I asked with concern lacing my words.

" Well, you fell under the Jitsu and Proctor categories as you already know."

" Yes," I replied.

" But, your Proctor levels read different than any other Proctors' that I've seen."

" Which means what exactly?"

" That is what I do not know. Your levels for Jitsu seem to be within the normal range, but your Proctor levels have higher numbers in certain things than most Proctors. You also have lower numbers in some things that Proctors would be higher in."

" Is that bad?"

" Now I'm sure you have many questions, but I'm not fully sure why your numbers read that way as well. But we did find traces of something that could be potentially dangerous in your blood system."

" What?!"

" We found a serum called rubise inside of your blood system."

" What is that?"

" It's a mix of chemicals that are basically used to manipulate you. They are injected into liquefied ruby and then injected into humans by syringe."

He continued to go on and told me the story of Vesuvius Kiryan and how he had created the serum. He then went on and told me about Viktor and the Kiryan War of 1910. I found these things quite fascinating, but they left me with many questions.

" So now the Kiryan's are in hiding and their serum just randomly appeared?"

" Well I don't know if they're in hiding. Their bloodline could possibly be dead by now. No one seems to know of their whereabouts."

" So you believe that I was manipulated because I had this in my bloodstream?"

" All signs point to yes. I was told that you had the red eyes before and then once your eyes changed color, you acted kind towards the others. This switch of personality could be caused from the rubise being switched off," Master Shadow said.

" How was it switched off? "

" That, my friend, is what we do not know. That is why I have to ask you some questions," he said while opening a drawer that was attached to a desk. He pulled something out of it and walked over towards me.

" Alright Mr. Knightly, may I take a look at your eye irises?"

" Um..sure?" I said in a tone that sounded more like a question than a statement. He walked up closer to me and told me to look up while he put the mini flashlight in my eyes. When he was done, he walked back to the desk and put the mini flashlight back where it was.

" They look fine. There's no tint of red in them at all."

" Okay. Well that's a relief," I said.

He smiled. " Yes it is." He typed some information into his computer and then sat down on his chair and faced me from the opposite side of the room.

" So, I'm thinking that maybe if I ask you some questions about your past, we may be able to put pieces together. So the first question would be do you know or remember anything of how this rubise could've gotten into your bloodstream?" He spun his chair around and began typing into the laptop.

" No. I mean, I remember that I wasn't the only one of us who had red eyes. Matter of fact everybody-"

" Us? Who's this us?" He asked cutting my sentence off.

" My colleagues in the organization I was in."

" Who were these colleagues?"

" Nicco, my best friend and Jin who was a total-"

" So you remember these people?"

" Yes. Why wouldn't I?"

" Do you remember anything of your life before you entered this organization?"

" I have memories, but they're blurred. I vaguely remember my family. I had multiple siblings. I remember my mother's face. She had long brown hair and a warm smile. That smile seemed to brighten up my life. Then I remembered me looking out at a pond of water and my younger siblings were with me. I remember Nicco. We've known each other since before the organization, but we barely remembered each other except for the few memories that were still intact."

" Anything else you remember?"

" Well.....," I said.

" Go on," Master Shadow said.

" I remember running and running. Not wanting to stop. I think I was trying to get away from some people. I was only a young kid then, but I remember that someone else was with me. I was telling the person to run in front of me and to hide and as much as I pushed my mind to remember, I just couldn't remember who that person was. The one thing I do remember though is seeing my family get slaughtered before my eyes," I felt my eyes tear up. A knot formed in my stomach as I tried to fight back all my emotions. Though I didn't want to say anymore, my lips continued to speak.

" They killed my mother right in front of me and I watched as her body went limp before my eyes. I remember letting out a scream. Then I saw my father guarding all of my siblings, begging the people not to hurt them. Then they slaughtered him. After that, I ran and ran but then they came for the person that I was running with. They came for us. I managed to get away but I don't remember what happened after that. All I know is that they killed my family...." I said, feeling my hand form into a fist. A tear fell from my eye.

" I'm very sorry to hear that Mr. Knightly," he said, almost emptily as he continued to type away.

" One last question," he said while typing. " Who was your organization leader?"

" A woman by the name of Shizuka. Shizuka Tomonori," I responded. All of his typing stopped and he looked straight forward towards the wall in front of him.

" Do you know her?" I asked.

" I've heard the name once or twice. Just where, I cannot recall." He said, still looking at the wall.  "So do you think that maybe she had some relation to the rubise?"

" I never saw her use anything with liquefied ruby, but it's a possibility," I replied.

" Especially if you can't remember anything from your past. It sounds almost like your memories were extracted from you. It sounds almost like all of this was set up. But I can tell you that the rubise seems to be inactive right now. Do you remember how you felt before when your eyes were red?"

" I thought we were done with questions," I said.

" Well that last question led to another," he said, slightly smiling.

" Okay. Well when my eyes were red, I wanted to hunt down Kratos and KL. But then I remember that my eyes started to change color when I was at Shizuka's place and that's when I started to think that it was wrong to want to hurt them. Then they turned red again and I went back to thinking the way that I usually did."

" It was definitely the rubise working. So you were trained to hunt these two and you were under a Master. Which means that you were under her command, which then means that she injected you with the rubise since rubise only activates with commands from the person who injects it. This would make sense since your other colleagues had red eyes."

What he said was all adding up. All of these bits and pieces of my past and present began to align and something just clicked . " I...I can't believe I let her take control of me like that...."

" You were injected. It was nothing that you could control," Master Shadow said.

"I just....I'm speechless." My brain couldn't comprehend it. I was being used this whole time. I was under someone else's control this whole time. It was just a horrifying thought to think about. My motives, my actions, they weren't really who I was. They were what she wanted me to become.

" When did you entirely want to stop hurting them?"

" After...after I had shot KL's best friend. He then went flying off of a cliff. She looked so hurt, and to see her hurt like that because of something that I did was just horrible. That was when I felt this...this warmth overtake my heart and when I saw her crying like that, I knew I couldn't hurt her. I had to protect her. So, I promised myself that from then on I wouldn't hurt her but I would protect her with everything that I had."

" That's it!" Shadow said, as if an idea had just hit him.

" What?" I asked.

" From what you are saying, it seems like you have may have been Broken by KL. This would explain the why the eye color changing occurred and why you feel obligated to protect her. Her powers probably switched off the effects of the rubise. But...if you feel like you need to protect her this much, this might just be why your Proctor levels are off. This would mean that....."

" That what?"

" This would mean that we will have to do some more tests on you."

" Aww..." I said, unenthusiastic. " Why? Testing sucks."

" Because I believe that you are KL's personal guardian," he said while smiling at me.

So many things were happening all at once and so fast that it made me question whether or not the life that I had lived was real or just made up by other people's commands.

© Lightning_Stryker 2016