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FOUR: OF MONSTERS AND GOLD

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Monsters.

Monsters are an interesting concept.

You tell a child to draw a monster and they will probably draw something akin to a mythical creature; something like a dragon, an orc, an ogre, you name it. Ask children to describe a monster and they will tell you it's the mean things in life. The mean things living under their beds or inside of their closets and those that are going to eat them if they don't hide under the covers, or do that what their parents told them to do.

Then there are those that get beaten and burned by monsters. Those that get torn apart - dismembered even - all for the sake of a monsters amusement. If you were to ask those children to describe a monster to the best of their capabilities, they would probably tell you a monster is that what becomes of someone when they've been bad, when they didn't follow the rules; when they made mommy and daddy angry. They'll describe men and women that turn into monsters fueled by abuse; whether the monster be alcohol, drugs, or an addiction feeding off of the pain of others. Ask a tortured child to draw a monster, and what you get won't be an ogre. It won't be a dragon. It won't be something that looks like you would come across it when watching the latest Disney or Pixar movie. No. The paper will be a victim to scratches of pens and pencil, lines crossing over each other in pure fear and agony. It will be a sad stick figure; a screaming stick figure. A stick figure with occupied hands. Hands filled by bottles, syringes, or even belts. Hands filled with all things that cause a form of pain; a form of hurt. Hands that are so scarred by the battles of life, that they seem to find no other solution but to cause harm and create scars themselves.

Monsters are an interesting concept.

Ask a teenager what a monster is, and the answer will most likely be some sort of human they've met or heard about. Maybe they will tell you their mother can act like one when they don't do the dishes, or clean their rooms. Or you could come across a teenager that'll reveal to you that their monster takes the form of their teacher; not for giving homework, or making them study, no. But for touching them when they shouldn't. For looking at them in a way nobody should ever be looked at - especially not when the eyes that are gazing at their victim belong to a teacher, or someone you thought you could trust.

They could tell you the monsters they encounter are the thoughts invading their minds when they have to bike home alone after the sun is long past the stage of setting, or when they have to walk home alone after nightfall. Maybe their monster is the dark, and all the possibilities that it hides away in its sinister, ashen cloak. Maybe they will tell you they still check under their beds for monsters; not for the mythical ones, but for the murderers and stalkers lurking in the shadows.

Now if you ask an adult to describe a monster, the replies you get will probably vary from imaginary creatures to simple human beings. The veil of a happy world; the illusion of a harmless existence, it could be ripped away before someone's eyes at any age. A father can be a monster. A mother can be a monster. An uncle, an aunt, a grandmother, a 'friend', a teacher, an ex. Everyone can be a monster, so are you? Are you someone's monster too? At the end of the day even monsters have their monsters; things they're so deathly afraid of, it causes them to be unable to function.

Someone could see themselves as a monster; see themselves as the cause of all misery and pain and as a result come to the conclusion that the only plausible next step for them to take is to rip and tear themselves apart for their own pleasure, to feel something; even if it is hatred or anguish.

A monster could be the one you claim to love most, disguising themselves as someone who loves you just the same. Someone that strings you along, for the benefits of you, your body or your connections. Monsters can come dressed as people that claim to love you more than the stars scattered around the night sky; that claim to love you more than the sun loves the moon.

Even someone as young as an infant knows a monster; the world. The very first daunting and terrifying thing being the horrific reality it's now thrown into. Ripped away from the warmth and security of its mothers womb, and plunged into the awaiting arms of life; of society.

Some see death as their monster. The monster that rips children away from their mothers; kicking and wailing for it to not be true, for their baby - their whole world - to not have been snatched away by the greedy insatiable claws of death. The monster that leaves behind those that are broken; torn apart and too shattered to even get up and leave their beds in the morning; too exhausted to function the way a human being is told it should. 

The funny thing is, if you were to look up the definition of a monster, the words that show up before your eyes won't come remotely close to the real things; the real monsters.

"A large, ugly, and frightening imaginary creature"

Fake. Not real. Imaginary.

Now I ask of you one thing,

draw a monster for me.

And tell me,

What is it exactly that makes it a monster?

2006

If you were to ask Matthew Murdock what a monster was; he'd be conflicted; hesitant to offer you a response because, when it comes down to it, who was he to call someone a monster? Yet, deep down, the Murdock boy would have an answer. A multitude of answers, really.

The one that claims the responsibility for the death of his father. The one that shot his beloved father in an alleyway; the one that murdered the only family member he had left - that he knew of, that is.

He'd tell you that monsters are those in which frustration and helplessness boiled over, and left only violence as a viable option. He'd tell you the father of the little girl he hears get abused is a monster. That the sounds made by a human writhing in sheer agony could only be those caused by a monster.

As someone studying law, the line between good and bad often flickered in and out of existence. The sides of good and evil; peace and destruction, they started to look the same at times. He'd seen it in many lawyers and firms alike. People taking on cases - swearing to defend people - knowing damn well that those people weren't deserving of defense; weren't deserving of freedom. All because they were the monsters that took it away from others. He'd hear it in their heartbeats, in their voices. But he knew, that even if he did not have the capabilities of listening in to peoples inner workings - to the workings their vocals and frankly, the evil nagging at their souls – he would still easily be able to know when a person was lying scum or not. And he knew, that the corrupt lawyers knew those facts very well too. Only to them, the money offered by monsters was enough for them to ignore everything that screamed evil; that what laughed at pain and applauded misery.

Of course it would be easy to say that criminals were monsters; that those who murdered were monsters. But even saying that seems wrong. After all, nothing is that easy; nothing is strictly black and white that way. What if the real monster was the thing that drove a criminal to try to rob a store; what if the real monster was the poverty created by those that were well above the definition of wealthy? What if the monster was the very thing that drove a person to murder another? That threatened the unlucky person - now turned murderer - to pull the trigger or plunge the knife?

Those who killed for fun; for pleasure? Those are monsters without a single doubt. But is a person that is forced to kill also a monster? Is a person that follows orders a monster? Even if those orders are to kill? Even if the deaths caused, are those of abusers?

How do you decide that? How does he – as a lawyer to be – truly know when he's doing the right thing? How will he be able to make sure he doesn't ever mark someone not deserving of the title, as a monster?

It's thoughts like those that keep him up late at night, long after his best friend has dozed off, snores that are somehow both soft and loud shattering the silence of the night as glass hit with a baseball bat.

All Matthew Murdock wants to do is the right thing; but why is that so hard to do? Why is the bad so easily accomplished while the good hides away under lock and key?

▬ι═ﺤ

2000

Sweat dripped down his back as he punched the bag filled with sand before him; releasing harsh puffs of air with every slam of his fist against the leather surface. His hands were adorned with gloves; gloves he had tried to wear many times when he was a child, regardless of whether his hands had been big enough at the time. Gloves that now fit him like, well, a glove.

The muscles of his shoulders and back ached with every movement, his knuckles felt bruised, and his breathing was ragged, yet, the male didn't stop punching the bag that hung from the ceiling above him.

"Don't you think it's time for you to rest a bit Midas?"

Midas. A stupid nickname given to him when he had been around eight years old- a stupid nickname that still followed him 'till this day. Just because he'd shown interest in rich man's golden watch - well, anything golden to be totally truthful; eight-year-old Midas was a sucker for shiny things. The only remnants of that love still left in him now would be the various rings adorning his scarred, bruised fingers.

Midas; the one that turned everything to gold with his mere touch. The legend known for his foolishness and greed.

Quick paced rhythmic hits slowly dwindled down to softer punches, giving the punching bag time to stop shaking and return to its still, lifeless existence. Unfastening his gloves, Roman pulled his tightly wrapped hands out of them, throwing them to the side after he completely freed himself from their damp, leather cages. Not sparing the older woman a glance, Roman reached for his bag - a bag that had been carelessly discarded on the floor the moment he'd entered the room - and pulled out a bottle of water; one he had thankfully remembered to fill up that morning. Taking a few big gulps of the liquid, Roman composed himself enough to answer the woman now  standing behind him, facing his back.

"Don't you think it's time for you to leave me alone Andromeda? I'm a big boy now, I can take care of myself you know"

His statement was met with a dry chuckle and a shake of the head. To say Roman had grown up from the street rat she found him as would be an understatement. His once skinny frame developed into one of unbreakable stature, muscle lining his limbs like tight fitting clothing would do on a particularly rainy day. Not to mention the fact that his growth spurt had done Roman well in terms of his build and length; the once 4'1 seven-year-old boy had turned into a strong 6'1 young adult.

"Yeah well, I'll leave you alone the moment you start acting like someone who can be trusted to. I mean seriously Midas, if I wasn't here to remind you to function like a human being, you'd be withering away by next Tuesday." Andy scoffed. "Besides you're only sixteen years old, like hell you'll be able to take care of yourself" Before the male in question could even open his mouth to combat her words with a – most likely – rude retort, the woman spoke up again. "And don't even try to deny it you know damn well I'm speaking the truth"

Shoulders sagging in a combination of exhaustion and exasperation, Roman only let out a grunt in response, knowing there was nothing he could do or say that would even come close to proving andromeda wrong.

Getting annoyed by the sticky feeling caused by the sweat lining his body, Roman pulled off the shirt he'd been wearing before, letting the semi-cool air around him crash against his flushed, burning skin.

A whistle could be heard behind him. Not a whistle created to hint at attraction, no, more so a whistle one lets out when words like 'damn' aren't enough to describe their feeling of surprise.

"You know, even though I've seen them already, it still surprises me you actually did it" andromeda walked towards him, slowly tracing the patterns now inked into the skin of his body. The 'them' previously mentioned, referred to the ink black swords engraved into his back. The tattoos were sizable ones. Two swords crossed over each other covered the entirety of Roman's back, starting at his shoulder blades, the hilts of the swords gradually grew down to sharp pointed edges, situated at the lower end of his back. One sword was slightly shorter and wider than the other, showing that the swords – if real and able to be used – would commonly be convenient to use as double wielding weapons. The hilts of the swords were strangely detailed, more detailed than one would expect from a tattoo such as this one. Engravings of gods and death painted the hilts like millions of stories left untold.

Looking at his guardian from over his shoulder, Roman let a minuscule smirk taint his lips. "Hm, I like them. Plus, you know they'll come in useful; see it as a functional piece of art if you will" he hums, tracing the parts of the tattoo that he is actually able to touch. "You know, I've been thinking about some other ones too, to well.." Leaving his sentence unfinished in favor of taking another gulp out of his water bottle, he breathed out an almost hesitant sigh when noticing the bottle was now empty of the liquid that it had once been used to store. "You know for what"

Wrapping one hand around his bare shoulder, Andromeda turned him around to face her. Blue eyes meeting ones that almost glowed golden in the fluorescent lights above them; although she wasn't sure if it was the lights that made them that way, or if that was just his mutation shining through in way not yet discovered.

"You're doing what feels right to you, that will never be the wrong thing. I need you to trust that gut instinct of yours the same way I do, because all that doubt and insecurity swimming through your mind right now? The only thing it'll do is bring you sleepless nights and endless suffering, and I'd rather not see you withering away like that. Not you" With her hand still resting on the same place it had before, Andromeda pulls the male to her, slamming him against her chest in a fierce, meaningful embrace.

Roman relished these moments. The moments of love, sincerity and affection. When losing his parents at the ripe age of six due to his mutation, Roman also lost the only mother he had. It was a tough pill to swallow, one way too big for the small child he had been at the time, but eventually he had managed to get the capsule at least half way down his throat; it was a pill he didn't think he would ever be able to swallow whole if he was being completely truthful. Those moments, that year, Roman had been at the lowest low he'd ever been, hating himself for something he should've controlled; ignoring that it was something that he, in no way, shape or form, could have possible controlled. Yet, the darkness that had once shrouded his mind started to lessen bit by bit from the moment the stone faced, strong and resilient woman decided to take a chance on him. Andromeda gave him something he hadn't felt in what felt like ages; the feeling of being appreciated. The feeling of being loved. Whether she knows it or not, Andromeda gave Roman something that was much bigger than just a bed and a place to stay - although he was very appreciative of that too.

Andromeda gave him a chance to have a parent again, to have guidance and to have someone to go to when everything that was bad started conquering places inside of his mind; inside of his soul. Every time the darkness threatened to take over his life, she had been there, waiting for him with strong hands and calming words, managing to calm his racing heart and choking breaths; managing to calm him down when oxygen escaped him and his lungs felt like they were being squeezed together by a force too powerful for him to stand a chance against.

Sighing he closed his eyes and put his head down to push it against his guardians chest, reveling it the comfort that could only be given to you in the form of a loving, physical touch. In return, andromeda only held him tighter, as if assuring him that he was safe, and that all would be okay.

"I got you kid, I got you"

𝗘 𝗦𝗣𝗘𝗔𝗞𝗦 !

Just to clarify; I'm not saying that people that struggle with addictions are monsters. The things fueling these addictions are the monsters. It's the things that we get addicted to that can have very bad lasting impact on someone, it's not the persons fault for getting addicted. (If that makes sense)
Just wanted to clear that up!

Now I don't remember what I wrote HWHAHWHHW

I posted this chapter early because I'm in online class rn learning how to make a bedroom in blender and I don't have the energy to pay attention and was bored sooo... thank my incompetence for this update i guess 🤪

I do however remember liking the intro of this chapter so there's that.

Surprise surprise, I barely proof read this so if there's any mistakes please inform me of them in a kind manner!

Anyways tell me what you thought of this chapter! There's one more left of this part/arc before I have to write again (😫🤚🏻) so savor these updates while you can lmao.

Once again I'm going to shamelessly plug my Instagram account to you in the hopes you'll check it out because I'm shameless at this point and need the false confidence brought to me by followers (for emotional and mental reasons this is a jOke... kinda) it's @Xemmal_art 🤠

Don't forget to vote and comment because these things make my day (comments more than votes tbh, I love seeing reactions and interacting with you all)

With that being said, I hope you have/you've had a great morning/afternoon/evening/night, and will continue to do so after this!

That's pretty much it 🧍

Bye!
(Yes I used a lot of emojis, sue me. It's my dead humor rising from its grave to torment me)