Air Hero

Opening up II

“Kalina, is it fine for me to be living how I wanted to? What if my parents will blame me? They will come asking, why am I so happy even though they are dead? I am afraid that when I am feeling happy, I will feel pain again. I’m afraid that someone will take away my happiness just like they took my parents from me. What if one day my power is gone? I don’t even understand how I got this power. At the appraisal on the headquarters, it is clearly said that I have no power.”

“Max, your parents won’t blame you for being alive. Trust me.”

Kalina then folded the sleeves on her left hand and showed it to Max. There’s a horrifying long wound as if she was cut by something sharp.

“Look, Max. I was involved in an accident just like yours. At that time, me and my father are on our way back home. Suddenly, a villain appeared and used his power to create mayhem. Our car is one of the victims as the car immediately flipped over and burned. Due to the impact, I can barely keep my consciousness. However, I remember my father, despite his bloodied look, he tried his best to use his left hand to push me out of the car. He can’t even get himself free because the car crushed his right side and lower body. The last word that he speaks still lingers in my head. ‘Live on, Kalina’.”

Kalina clenches her fist, blinked her teary eyes, and coughed to clear her throat.

“After that incident, my mother never blamed me for what happened or for surviving alone. Although my father passed away, she is very thankful that I survived. I believe your parents will be the same. They must have felt relieved that you managed to stay alive. So, don’t blame yourself for what happened.”

Hearing the consolation from Kalina, Max couldn’t stop his tears as it comes out in large drops.

“Uaaah!”

In the past ten years, Max only cried once or twice, and that’s it. He always controls his fragile emotion behind his cold and robust façade. Finally, all the burden in his heart is being unlocked one by one as Kalina talked to him.

At this point, Kalina walked up to him and hugged Max.

“It’s alright, Max. Let it all out.”

Only after some time, Max stopped crying. He is a bit embarrassed as he has never shown this side of him in front of anyone else, but he did today in front of someone that he just met.

“Max, are you feeling better?”

“Yes, thank you.”

“Then, can I ask you the next question? Why are you hiding your power?”

“Well, to be honest, I am quite angry at the United Heroes association. After all, this started because they appraised me to have no power. Suddenly, I discovered that I have a superpower. What will you do if you’re like me?”

Kalina also didn’t know of what she will do if that’s the case. To think that Max's last moment with his parents is him getting angry at them because of the appraisal result and the appraisal result turn out to be incorrect. Max must be feeling very wronged.

“So, can you tell me about your power?”

“I believe it has something to do with wind. Can I show it to you?”

Kalina nodded, then at once, Max controlled the wind to be gathering in front of him. With this, Kalina confirmed the fact that Max indeed has a superpower.

“Then Max, this might be a scary question for you since it is causing you such mental trauma, but I need to ask this anyway.”

“Go ahead. You can ask me.”

“Do you remember that two people are chasing you and Yuna?”

Max nodded and smiled bitterly as he knows what she is going to ask.

“Then, is it true that you’re the one that killed them?”

Previously, when Max just wakes up, and she showed him the footage of himself, Max went hectic as he wanted to deny reality. Right now, as his heart is slowly being untangled, he feels that he will be able to face it.

“It is true. Will I get in trouble because of it? Will I go to jail?”

“You can rest easy since what you’re afraid of won’t happen. It is considered self-defense as they are a highly dangerous criminal. Can you tell me what happened in detail?”

Max feels conflicted, but he decided to tell everything to Kalina. Previously, he is afraid of the guilt and tried to deny it, but since Kalina assures him that he won’t be in trouble, he tried to face it head-on. After resolving his doubt about his parents, Max can feel a new strength coming from inside him.

“At that moment, I feel as if there’s something that I can control from the wind blade that Bonio unleashed, so I tried it as my last attempt. Who knows that I will succeed, and with my command, it immediately flew straight and killed the man?”

Kalina matches Max’s confession with the autopsy report, and it indeed matched as there’s a bullet-like wound on Bonio’s temple.

“After that, I run towards the bathroom and throw up.”

Hearing Max's explanation, this must be what they called perpetrator trauma. She couldn’t believe how Max experienced such things at a young age. Then she heard how he regained his sanity somehow after knowing that his life is still in danger. It seemed that Max's will to stay alive and get revenge for his parents is strong enough to get over his perpetrator trauma, although she isn’t sure whether he fully gets free of it or not since he is still showing symptoms on the first time he wakes up. This is something that she needed a long time to observe before giving him his final verdict.

“Then, how do you kill Yann?”

Max then told her about his strategy, which clearly amazes her. She didn’t know whether it was his battle sense or something that enabled him to think of such a strategy. Although it is ruthless, nothing is off-limits, especially when your life is on the line.

Finally, this explanation tells Kalina how the wound inside Bonio’s body is created and how Yann died in one attack from someone who barely has D-rank power. It is something more of a cunning strategy that killed Yann other than battling on even grounds. Kalina has no rights to criticize Max since it was because of the strategy that Max is still alive.