Kay POV

It's been a long, hard night. I put up at Bloodshed's dorm, got out of bed because of the relentless ringing of the alarm clock. My hair's messed up, got no time to comb it. My clothes are crumpled, got no time to iron it. Life has been very manual, and I suddenly realize that the past 17 and a half years of my life was way, way better than how it is now. I push the door open myself, and there's no cabin. Life as a poor, shitty beggar.

I pity myself.

The fighting starts today.

Out of the dorm, I see that girl with violet eyes.

Janel.

Wow, she's already waiting for me. That early?

"Hey, pretty boy. You are really, really late." she gives me that kind of look, annoyed.

There is something off about her, though.

She really knows how to piss people off.

But, gosh, she's hot.

Nah, no time to think about that.

I dash towards BTC, disguised as Brains Tuition Centre, with Janel behind me.

I open the old wooden door and step on rough, cement flooring. The lights above my head are swaying left to right, with an occasional stoppage of electricity. I walk slowly down the wooden steps, creaking every time. My hands are gripped on so tightly to the handlebar, for fear that when the next stoppage of electricity comes, I would lose my balance and roll down the stairs.

On my left, I see Janel overtaking me and coolly walking down, not even caring about the lights. She must be that used to it.

I've been walking down for like three minutes already, and I still see no ending. I bet she's already down there, waiting for me. Again.

How many times does she have to wait for me?

Then, I realized that I was just a few steps before the end, the darkness below was merely just no lightings at the blind spot.

How foolish of me.

I turn into the corridor on the right and opened the door.

It was very, very stuffy in there, so much so a minute in that place would kill me from humidity. Beads of sweat was already trickling down my forehead within seconds.

There, two guys, about my age, in a boxing ring in the centre. Their hands are both up, ready to defend any attacks from the opponent. For a moment, everything moved like they were trapped in thick, syrupy honey. I could see this really murderous expression on the first guy's face, and a clearly scared expression on the other as the former threw a powerful uppercut at the latter. He spits blood.

I cringe.

Just after that, the bell rings. Both parties retreat.

On the right, a few girls were practicing this japanese, very old martial art called taekwondo. I saw it in this movie called "The Olden Defence". Just a ton of hand and leg movements. It really looks like some sort of dance. They raise you up over their shoulder and slam you down. I think it's because of how fake their taekwondo is that makes it look more like a dance. The movements I see here are way more authentic than those in the movie.

Watching the girls is a woman with a gigantic dragon tattoo on both her arms, the trainer, I guess? I know it's childish of me, but they really look like they are looking at me with murderous eyes, their motive, to kill me.

But if they were to end my life, I would gladly accept it.

My parents are already up there anyways.

I wince when I see the piercings that penetrate her nose.

Are nose piercings really that nice to look at? They seem horrible.

Janel's already at the corner, screaming wildly and punching a punching bag.

The trainer comes towards me with a creepy smile cracking across her face. "So, we got a new student here. What's your name?" she puts her hand behind her back and takes a huge step forward.

"Kay," I answer short and sweet.

"Okay, Kay," she gestures for me to stand there and wait. Then comes an ear-piercing, booming shout, "Class can you greet the new student? His name's Kay."

Everyone stops whatever they were doing. I can already see some of the girls gossiping, something like, "What's this rich kid with damn corrupted parents doing here," "Urgh... that rich guy's son?" "Oh... Kay, that man's son. I know him." But what I know is one thing.

That they were all talking about my parents.

My corrupted parents.

Nonetheless, the sounds of their greetings ring in my ears.

"Janel, can you come over?" the trainer roars. Janel drags her feet over reluctantly the moment she saw me. I'm going to face her snobbish attitude for this whole training session. "He's all yours."

I curse in my head.

She leads me over to the punching bag. "So, to begin your training, I would have to take a look at your standards. Go ahead," she says with that icy stiff expression still plastered on her face. This is the time I prove myself, to not be the old, weak kid I used to be.

I imagine the punching bag as my parents. "No, no son! Please... no! We plead for your forgiveness, we really didn't mean it. We're sorry son, we really are."

I snicker.

Time for revenge.

I grit my teeth tight as a tick, my hands rolled into a fist. I see the horrid, pale expression on my imaginary parents' face.

I swing my arm and it hits the punching bag, the blowing impact immediately repelling my hand away.

The punching bag had a hole split at where I punched. Sand started seeping out through the hole, and slowly, the place became a mini beach.

Janel just stood there, mouth agape, legs rooted to the ground. I, too, was stunned at myself. How did I do that?

Applause reverberates around the room. Embarrassed, I blushed a little.

"Urmm... wow. Th... that's impressive." she slowly manages, "It's good, really. Frankly, I won't be able to manage that." I recover from shock and give her a smile. "Except that I don't think we would have a punching bag now..."

My cheeks flush so red, they look like two big, juicy apples.

Frantically, she went to get some tape while I stood there still amazed at myself.

I think hatred is what drives me, isn't it? After a little bit of repair, the punching bag was fixed, but it seemed a little too bloated and there was no sand at the top of the punching bag.

"Okay," she continues (I hate the way people like to stress on the kay in okay), "I believe you must have been through some sort of training, so you already understand and mastered the fundamentals, is that?"

I just shook my head.

She blinked a few times at me, confused.

"I have never went for any training before, a beginner, you can say," I explained, only to make her more confused.

"Okay, so I have to explain the very basics first. Boxing is an art by itself. When mastered, you will be performing the moves all by muscle memory. Basically, when in the arena, you always have to keep your hands up. Never let them go down, because you will be knocked unconscious, Kay Will. So always keep them up, protect you face. Next, okay, you know how to punch already, but let's get the technique right..." Janel went on blabbering. All I did was just imitate what she did and learn, the words didn't matter much.

So, we seem to be getting on better terms than before.

The day passed really quickly, with Janel coaching me and myself picking up new fighting techniques and skills. We grabbed our belongings and left, and for the first time in forever, Janel and I have an informal conversation with each other.

"Hi."

"Urm... Hi?"

And so we start talking about all sorts of random stuff, the weirdest things you could ever imagine. It was so, so random. Till when...

"Can we like, I don't know, talk about other stuff... Urm... What jobs do your parents have? You're one rich guy, that's what I know."

"They are," I hesitate, "up there guarding the gates of heaven."

Her reaction was appalling.

A tear flows from her eye, and for the first time, I saw the weaker side of her. The her that cowards into a corner and bawls her eyeballs out, the her that is controlled entirely by fear and nothing else, the her from the other side.

She takes a deep breath and sighs. Her previous icy stiff expression melted into a quiet, solemn expression. I had to hold back my tears and bite my lips at that sight.

Another tear rolls slowly down her eyes.

She turns around and leans against the wall.

I don't need to look at her face to see that tears are flowing down like a river. She's definitely trying to wipe the tears all off, to get ridof all the sadness that was all contained in the bottle of her heart. I know, because I have experienced it before, grieve is very, very powerful. It can make you do the craziest things, and come back thinking how crazy you have been to have landed yourself in such a terrible state.

I already know what she wants to say.

"You know.. you don't have to tell me - or anyone - anything, just... I don't want to see... Man, I have no idea how to explain," I went on and tried to comfort her, because I already know, her body language tells me.

She is an orphan.

I hear her choke violently.

Taking small and careful steps, I walk over towards her. For a second, my arm is raised above her bent-down back, then I gently land it.

She chokes even harder this time. Must have been me.

Just then, she receives a phone call.

The ContactPad slips out of her pocket and moves right in front of her.

The unfamiliar face of a guy pops up on the ContactPad.

She swipes.

"Cassidy... She...She joined your parents up there. Must be because she wants to see your parents again.~soft laughs~"

I'm surprised this guy called Calum (as written on Janel's phone) can still crack jokes out of a person's death.

"Cassie, she... No, no, NO! No.... Cassie... why... I'm so sorry Cal, so sorry. Don't worry, Cal, I promise my parents will be up there to guard your dear sis, be strong, okay?"

So Cassie's Calum's sister.

And he can still say things like that.

Now I look back, how wonderful was my life without a sister. She dies and I would kill myself already.

I wouldn't be here at all.

Janel throws her ContactPad onto the road, and it smashes into a million pieces.

She clenches her hand into a fist and squeezes her shirt, overcome with agony and pain and grief and sadness and every single emotion one could think of.

Just like how I first got the news of my parents' death.

I sit down on the couch in my room, a bag of potato chips in my hand.

Headline news, Babies Getting Killed from Pesticides Sprayed on Apples.

What in the universe?

Weird.

I switch to another channel.

I vomit almost immediately.

The sight of a man getting stabbed in the gut was sickening.

At the back of the stadium is a banner writing one word.

BloodShed.

I switched to another channel once again, already starting to feel bored.

Okay, fine, a cartoon, fair enough.

A knock on the door was heard all of a sudden.

Curious to see who had come to visit me, I dashed towards the door and immediately opened it.

I am greeted by a Defence officer with a very bulky physique.

Why is he here, did I do anything against the Defence Commandments?

"I am told Phil and Jen are closest to you," he begins.

Why is he talking about Mom and Dad? What happened to them? They are still in the sky trying to get my balloon right?

Is he going to tell me that they got the balloon? Yay!

Yay!

"Yes, they are my parents!"

"They... unfortunately, passed on... bleh bla-bleh bleh bleh... I am sincerely apologetic" He hands me two sheets of paper. He gives a salute and leaves right after.

Well, I didn't know what he meant when he said sorry.

He just said sorry.

Okay then, I guess he's just saying that Dad and Mom would come back later. It's fine, because I WANT THE BALLOON!

Wait a minute...

Did I just see the word death?

I scanned through the papers.

Death Certificate

This document hereby officially acknowledges the death of

Phil and Jen

Dated 5 January 2157, 09 37 hours

Present by: Defence General, Pete

I have hereunto affixed my signature together with a witness on 4 January 2157

Signature: PETE

No, this is not real. Not real! My parents will not die, they will never! Please... please tell me this is not true.

I can't take it anymore.

I jump on the sofa, taking pillows and trying to rip off the covers, before giving up and throwing it on the floor.

I run to the wall and ram my shoulder into it, ramming till I couldn't take the pain.

It was too much to take for a kid.

I collapsed to the ground in agony, with that sliver of hope I still carry slowly disappearing as the grandfather's clock ticked.

I snap out from my daze when Janel shakes my shoulder. "Continue walking," the words spill out from her mouth. I could see that her eyes were swollen to a beetroot red, tears dried up on her face.

The whole walk back to the Bloodshed dorm was silent, with Janel's face tilted slightly down.

A very awkward tension formed between us.

She didn't bother to say a "Bye bye," so we just entered our rooms.

"Finally..." I whispered to myself. Besides the intensive training I have been through was the "drama" I had gone through today. Time for a good night's rest.

I dropped flat on the bed and cuddled the soft bolster to sleep.

The world around me fades into black and white, before swirling into darkness.