The Dream Shifter

Chapter 190

Miltiades judged the sight carefully. He had seen the teenager not react before after a strong offense. 'Is he really giving up? Was I able to bring us one step closer to peace again?' Several more metal rods came from the ground pinning the other arm and his legs to the wall. The last piece rose up hovering centimeters from his chest waiting for orders.

'…did my arm really break?' A haze hung in Seiji's mind. He felt confused. '…I can't feel it anymore… does that mean it was just a dream?' Everything in his body felt numb. Seiji never knew such a feeling. '…he thinks he's won…but I'll…' In all of his fights, his body never felt so cold or distant to him. He did not like the feeling, not at all. '…bastard… Bastard! The only one that can beat me… Only he can…'

A flash of sparks around the metal that restrained Seiji alerted Miltiades to a new change. He leapt back keeping a safe distance to see what was coming. The metal the pressed against Seiji sparked again. Faint light glowed around Seiji before disappearing. The ends of the rods dented and bent away from Seiji releasing him from their hold. Dropped back to the debris-filled earth Seiji landed on his legs. His right arm dangled at his side coated with fresh blood.

Seiji leaned backwards a little as though under stress from his weight. His raised left arm held firm out in front of him. "I only need one arm for you!" Charging forward blindly, Seiji struck out at the metal pole near to Miltiades with enough force to bend it. Metal sparked against metal crashing and shaking the support that Miltiades used.

Taken a little aback by Seiji, Miltiades hovered by his spot before returning to his senses. 'He's not any different… He's still just fighting as stupidly as before…fueled by rage… Time to put an end to this!' He launched a new series of attacks at Seiji to force him back. Miltiades stopped with his swinging games. He focused on the mental strength to end their fight.

The fight turned against Seiji again as he could not deal with all of the objects coming at him with only one arm. Valliant efforts bore inventive methods to keep in the fight for Seiji. He kept his fist in the action, but would switch up to use his legs to block or divert him away from attacks. It allowed him to stay in the fight longer, yet it was becoming clearer the futility of it. He refused to acknowledge or even notice it.

More strikes broke through his defenses pushed back further away from his opponent. His shoulder took another blow turning crimson with blood. Another block by his legs sent him flying back unable to keep support followed by a tearing of muscle. Seiji cratered into the pile of junk kicking up a cloud around him. However, he punched his fist into the ground casting his body into the air forcing him back into the fight. 'I won't lose!'

'I won't lose!' Miltiades continued to keep up his assault no longer waiting. The fight became important to him. He no longer thought about proving himself to the Captain or his squad. He was not trying to find his place among his new comrades that still did not trust him. Miltiades' heart burned to his desire and passion. 'I'll protect all of Atlantis from rebels like you! I must! So that it never happens again…'

The most recent series of blunt strikes rammed Seiji's back horizontally into an adjacent pole. His body slid down slowly. Two more poles came up looking to force him to wrap around the pole. Seiji saw it coming but discovered his strength left him. His eyes widened in shock as he realized he no longer had anything left. He was done. "Damnit! I won't lose!"

In the next instant, the sound of cloth tearing and metal sparking ended it all. Miltiades came to rest upon his platform letting out a sigh. It was over. He could not feel happy about it. It was what he had to do. "I wish—" A shifting shadow on the top of the nearby pillar alerted him away from where Seiji was.

Rested atop the metal rod a black figure remained crouched withholding its true form. Hung from the side a b****y figure held motionless at its side. The draped figure came back to life quickly pulling up, but failing. "Let me go!"

"I don't know why I bothered…" remarked the shadow. A small puff of air came out as it looked like it turned away from Seiji.

Seiji muster his strength to raise his head to stare at the one that pulled him out of his death. "Don't interrupt my fight! I still have to—"

"You lost. Face reality."

"I haven't lost! I won't ever lose! No one can beat me except—"

"You lost to someone better than you. Accept it like the type of man you claim to hold yourself to."

Stunned shock washed over Seiji as he finally heard the words. 'I lost? I lost?' Seiji's body became relaxed almost limp as it settled in.

'So you lost again, huh?' a younger Yuki said staring down at a younger Seiji left motionless in the alley. 'You know they say you learn something from losing too…or some crap like that… What did you learn this time?'

Seiji grinned up at Yuki no longer feeling the soreness of his muscles. 'To punch harder!'

'Figures you'd say that…'

Seiji felt the painful breeze blowing against him suspending in the air. Across from him, Miltiades stood towering over him. 'Yuki…I lost again…'

Seiji felt the painful breeze blowing against him suspending in the air. Across from him, Miltiades stood towering over him. 'Yuki…I lost again…' The words tasted bitter to him, but it was less about sourness and more the fact of their familiarity to him. He hated it. A terrible, rotten, sour taste buried itself first in the nose. Then just when he thought the stench was gone, it sank down into his throat. Growing in weight like a kilo of lead the putrid smell rested in his stomach. A rank, ill odor decayed in his belly churning an awful stink lingering for days until he could bare it no longer.

He hated it.

A cold day or a hot day, neither mattered anymore. It was both that day for him. The day was so frigid that all he wanted was to be held by something warm, tell him everything would be fine, and work out. The day was so unbearably sweltering that sweat soaked into his cloths with such paralysis that even moving felt like an impossible feat.

Seiji, age eight, stood in his bare foot with a simple shirt and shorts wrinkled heavily looking like he had just woken up from bed. Had he had partially closed eyes he would have passed the test of being sleepy. Yet he was unable to close his eyes even a little. They were wide-awake, so wide it was painful. He stood in the doorway to his mother's room, a room that he was accustomed to walking into in the morning to greet her as she tidy the room.

Her room was a place only for her. He had never known his father to be there, even in the house at all. He hardly remembered the face of his father. It was only because she smiled warmly picking him up and told him that he was his father that Seiji even knew. It was his mother's room and she was always there. Every morning he counted on seeing her there. Every morning he could see the warm smile. Every morning she would let him help her make breakfast. Every morning grandfather spent time telling stories while she held on to him.

Every morning he knew it was going to be warm.

It was so cold that morning.

Little Seiji's eyes could not even budge from looking forward. The shell shock that had hit him minutes ago did not fade away. Her room was empty. She was not there. The smell of her perfume no longer hung around. The sheets on the bed were unmade and tossed half on the floor. Drawers in the dresser hung low or cast to the corners upside down.

Each piece in the room was hot and festering. The tears and cracks all bore emotions so strong that even Seiji, as young as he was, could feel them. Viewing the whole room as a scene, it all played as a blurred fast-paced movie to his eyes. He saw it all. The heat made him sweat, nothing that tears could calm.

Ten minutes passed before Seiji's mind even functioned or his lips tried to utter a sound. When his foot stepped into her room rigid and weak almost making him collapse, it felt like he had ran a marathon with all of his strength. He reached out his hand still catching faded images of her going about cleaning. "…mom?" He followed her around the room trying to keep up, but always just out of reach. "Stop! Mom! Come back! …come…back… Mommy!" Seiji dropped to the floor no longer able to see her in his mind.

As time in the room crept onward a faint scream from another room wound its way to Seiji. He snapped his head up realizing immediately the sound. "Shoji!" Seiji darted for the hall, but paused looking back at the room. "I…I…can't…" He rushed to see what was wrong with Shoji tending to his needs, but when he finished he returned to the room. The empty room loomed before him.

Seiji spent his morning cleaning up the room. He put all of the things back into place. He remembered watching her and helping with the small things. It had to go back. It had to be the same. The longer that he worked the more certain he became. "I can't let him see!" It was her room. She was still here.

He finished with the room and stood back to take it in. It felt as though a bit of the warmth had returned, but it still felt bitter and empty. Seiji could not look at it anymore. His feet made him flee back to his room. A short distance, but his lungs heaved and heart pounded in his ears. He slid down to the floor forced to catch his breath. "…mom…"

Not until he heard the whining from Shoji again did Seiji dare to move. Once he heard his brother though, he discover new energy and stood. When he reached his little brother, still an infant at two years of age, Seiji watched confused. All Shoji did was cry at him, but he was not sure what was the matter. He had already finished what made the most sense and it seemed too soon to be that again, maybe. "What do you want? I don't understand!" A growl came from Seiji's stomach. "Oh…I forgot to about breakfast…"

Lifting Shoji out of his crib, Seiji wobbled a little with the size of his little brother. Once he had him in his arms to carry, he started walking out of the room. "Let's go see mom! I bet she making—" Seiji came to a sudden stop and the weight of Shoji disappeared for him. Absent to his mind, his legs had resumed walking him through the hall. Eventually, he found himself in the kitchen with his little brother seated in the chair staring up at him with the expectation of food.

Countless thoughts crowded into his mind. The dizzying torrent of questions without answers paralyzed him again. However, all it boiled down to the same thing each time. He stared back at Shoji regaining his focus. 'I'm his big brother! I can do this!'

Watching someone else cook did not seem that hard to Seiji to duplicate to him. If she had been able to do it, he should be able to just as well. A half hour later, a scolding from their grandfather and burns and cuts made him realize the difficulty of cooking.

Life moved on around the shrine whether Seiji wanted it to or not. Shoji, he knew was too young to understand. Therefore, he could not blame him for not acting any different. Yet it frustrated him that he seemed to be the only one that noticed. In spite of understanding, his heart kept hoping and drawing him to her room each morning with the expectation of her being there with a smile as always, like it had all just been a terrible dream. He wanted to wake up from the nightmare that only he experienced.

Rumors in school soon circulated around him. They isolated him repeatedly having found something to sink their teeth into, the boys. He only had three surrounding him. "Is it true that she couldn't stand you and left in the middle of the night?" The other two snickered and laughed.

"Hey, I bet he couldn't stop wetting the bed! So she left such a bad child behind!" added the second boy finally finding a pause between laughter.