Chapter 28
Of Young and of Woes
While the kids busied themselves with the issue of getting supplies, Ethan stayed back at the lodge with Layla and Elijah. The former's routine didn't change much with the new boy's arrival–she still spent a good chunk of her day with Tian, running about the forest. They'd also found a rather friendly rabbit that they'd been feeding secretly and playing with, which consumed even more of their day. She'd only come back for meals and when it started getting dark, but as both Elijah and she were quite shy, neither spoke much or tried to initiate.
On the other hand, Ethan busied himself with several things, nominally the question of how he would help Elijah Awaken to the same class in the past rather than become a Blood Devotee like Tara and Ronald. Well, how was simple–get the boy trapped in a situation with seemingly no other choice but to sacrifice himself for the others. But as Ethan was out of the question, and Tara and Ronald were occupied elsewhere, that left Layla. Naturally, Ethan had zero intention of ever allowing even an iota of potential danger to besiege the young girl, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t… orchestrate something to make it seem as though she would be in danger.
To get there, however, he'd have to get Elijah at least slightly invested in life here, in life in general, as well as Layla beyond her being just a 'cute, young girl'. That wouldn't be particularly difficult, but it might last a while. Elijah's experiences shaped the boy's perception–and his experiences were vile, unrelenting, and ugly. In many ways, Ethan still wondered how 'the goodest of men' crawled out of Elijah's life story. He was even tempted to ask but knew well enough the boy would just blankly stare at him. The true measure of a man's worth was not in the words or promises–but in actions when words and promises were inadequate to save.
Beyond just helping Elijah Awaken, Ethan’s unrelenting pursuit of ‘hit words’ finally yielded a result. Though the script that Tara and Ronald scrambled together was woefully inefficient and had such a high rate of false positives it was headache-inducing, Ethan waded through it all just on the off chance that it might return a true positive–and, from the shallow appearances of the article that Ethan was reading through for the fifth time, it just might have.
The article was published on Soompi of all places. It wasn’t particularly long, just three paragraphs. It detailed an account of the professional stalker hearing that one or another K-pop star was seen in a particular area and rushing over, never finding the said K-pop star. However, they did find something else they found somewhat strange: a power unit frozen over in a thick sheet of ice. It was an article that didn't pick up a lot of buzz, especially because it seemed that when other people went to verify, they found no such phenomenon, just a power station that wasn't in operation.
Ethan’s interest, though, was burning; it was definitely an Awakened. In fact, he was fairly certain that he knew precisely who was the culprit–Choi Min-ki, a Busan native, who went on to have a somewhat tantalising career as a First Generation Awakened, meeting his demise some three years post-Descent in the first ever recorded sighting of a Terror. The reason why Ethan was beyond certain it was him was simple–he was the only Awakened from the entirety of the Korean Peninsula, North and South, to have an ice-related class for the first two years of post-Descent. In fact, it was a point of pride and international suspicion that he may have been stealthily 'removing' all people who did Awaken to Classes with ice powers. Nothing was ever proven and Ethan himself never bought into the story, but everyone did know who Choi Min-ki was.
There was a problem, however. Choi Min-ki was a narcissist–a classic one, at that. He loved attention, and he never shied away from public displays of power. Choi Min-ki in Ethan’s memories would never silently endure something of this magnitude on his shoulders–he would have flaunted it by now to everyone and everything who would listen. This tidbit terrified Ethan as it suggested one of two things: either Choi Min-ki wasn’t nearly as much of a narcissist as he presented himself to be in Ethan’s past life… or this wasn’t Choi Min-ki.
In reality, there were a few more possible scenarios, but Ethan was too busy temporarily spiralling to catch on to them. This almost didn’t seem like the world he knew. Though he was alarmed to learn that there were three more Awakened between him and Tara and Ronald, in his mind he could have compartmentalised and chalked it up to just a random chance, a statistical error, an anomaly that wouldn’t have much impact on anything. But this… this was different.
That was why he was repeatedly reading the article, desperately searching for anything he might have missed–but there was nothing. It was a rather boring article that didn’t probe deep into the strange thing as it was just a byproduct of a failed story. And what was worse, all other six articles and some forum comments Ethan found confirmed that there was no sheet of ice. It was just an out-of-order power station.
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"Fuck," he mumbled lowly, putting the phone away and leaning back on the couch. It was only then that he realised Elijah was sheepishly standing to the side, a cup of coffee still steaming on a tray.
“F-for you,” the boy mumbled lowly and put the tray down. With Tara and Ronald gone, sleeping arrangements didn’t need to be altered, but once they return, they’ll have to shift.
“Sit,” Ethan said and the boy obeyed, sitting on the opposite couch. “Did most of your initial fears go away?”
“... yeah.” Elijah nodded.
“And did some new ones creep in?”
“... yeah.”
“Do you know what my job was before this whole apocalyptic nonsense?” Ethan quizzed, taking a sip of coffee. It was actually decent, he mumbled inwardly.
“... psychiatrist.”
“Oh?”
“Tara told me.”
“Of course she did. I’m assuming she also warned you about me, saying that I’ve already wormed through your mind and understood you inside out.”
“...”
"Tara is simple," Ethan said. "As a person, she's complex, of course–we all are–but as a problem, she is simple. In fact, most people are. My biggest challenge as a psychiatrist wasn't trying to decode what was wrong with my patients but stopping myself from screaming the simple solution at them."
“...”
“I know, right? I sound like a psychopath instead,” the boy chuckled lightly, seeming to relax ever so slightly. “But… it’s the depressing truth. Most people were so self-convoluted they never developed the skills necessary for self-examination. Sitting in front of the mirror and accepting you fucked up, and then figuring out how to stop yourself from doing it again. It wasn’t even their fault, honestly. The world just spun the web that way, and tapestry aligned as so.”
“...”
“I think you’re a good kid, Elijah,” Ethan said. “Do you know why I think that?”
“...” the boy shook his head, looking up at him.
"In the first three days of your staying here, you picked up on a lot of habits of everyone in the house," he said. "For instance, you noticed that Layla loved having freshly squeezed orange juice in the morning. So, every morning, you woke up early and squeezed out a batch. Not just for her, for everyone. You also noticed that Tara hated coffee and preferred tea, but still drank coffee instead because Ronald and I like it. So, you drank tea with her, so that she wouldn't feel isolated. Yet, you shoved so much fucking sugar into that thing secretly, I'm pretty sure you were drinking diabetes."
“...” the boy chuckled sheepishly yet again, scratching his nose.
“And you noticed something that neither of them did,” Ethan cracked a smile. “Ronald’s rather boyish crush.”
“... you think so too?” Elijah asked.
“Everyone always thinks they’re so slick hiding it,” Ethan shrugged. “There ain’t no hiding it. Body’s chemistry doesn’t give a shit about your embarrassment. It wants that bond, and there are always signs of it.” The boy stayed silent as Ethan took a few cups of coffee. “So, what did you notice about me? Be honest, I don’t bite.”
“... you know, already.” Elijah spoke softly, though with a certain level of conviction. “You’re always aware. Of everything.”
“It’s called being too self-conscious,” Ethan smiled. “I’m a control freak, Elijah. Have been almost all my life. While I’ve managed to train my brain to afford me some leeway, as otherwise I would have never taken you with me that day, I cringe and shudder when things spiral beyond my ability to manage them. I’m not aware of everything, always. That’s not possible to do, despite my best attempts. For instance, I legitimately don’t know whether Tara and Ronald will come back alive. But, the sick part of me is fine with it for one simple reason.”
“...”
“They’re not Layla or me.”
“...”
“Both those kids have a very warped idea of who I am and what I stand for,” Ethan said, taking a sip and looking out toward the window. “It’s my fault, partly, since, well, I may have led them to believe those things. But skyscrapers of success cannot be built on worship.”
“Why… are you telling me this?”
“Well, for starters, you ain’t buying it,” Ethan chuckled. “You seem like one of those rare oddities that are wired with a gut feeling for people who mean well and for selfish cunts like me. But, to you, I don’t compute. I seem a contradiction. And, well, I kind of am. I do have good intentions, but I’m not a lover of a well-natured path. Tara probably told you what I told her–that I intend to prevent the world from collapsing,” the boy nodded faintly. “And while that is true, I’ll likely burn it to the ground achieving that. Well, not literally. There’s some nuance there.”
“...”
“The point is,” Ethan stood up. “You’ll either come on board or you’ll die. I do need good people, but I need people that are like Tara–good, but hypocritical enough to understand sometimes good is cripplingly evil.”
“... then kill me.” Elijah’s words caused Ethan to stop and look at the boy. The boy was looking up, directly at him, the pair of brown eyes unbending in their will. Ethan still didn’t understand it.
“...” Silence reigned between the two for a long while before Ethan suddenly cracked a smile. “You’ve got a dragon in you, kiddo. Hone those flames, we’re all gonna need them soon enough.”
Elijah remained seated in desperate confusion as Ethan left. The cryptic words rang against the walls of Elijah's mind on a repeat, but he couldn't decipher them. They meant nothing to him and yet Ethan spoke them with such conviction and certainty that the boy knew the words weren't hollow, empty, and meaningless. So, he seared them into his memory and found them a permanent home in his heart. Why? He didn't know. He wondered whether he would ever know.