She sat there sobbing. Her entire world was gone. How could this have happened? How could this have happened? How could this have happened? How could this have happened? How could this have happened? How could this have happened? How could this have happened? How could this have happened? How could this have happened? How could this have happened? How could this have happened? How could this have happened? How could this have happened? The question wouldn’t stop gnawing at her. Maybe if she could have found an answer, she could have silenced it. But there wasn’t one. All she had was a child’s worldview shattered by the lies adults told. Bethos, the loving god, was supposed to protect His children. If nothing else, now she knew better. Bethos wasn’t out there. Or if he was, he was an uncaring jerk. She decided that if she ever met him, she’d rage at him until she was hoarse.
Eventually, a tow truck carted off the wreckage of the sedan. The mechanic then got back into his truck. “But what about me?” Those were the first words she had spoken since the incident.
He ignored her and drove off. He was, after all, a typical Stiftung man. He ignored her because she wasn’t a person, just an unwanted thing. She was someone else’s problem.
Her next thought was to go home. Her brain hadn’t fully registered that she no longer had a family, so she decided to return and wait for them. Sadly, she didn’t know how to get back there or even what her address was.
She had been abandoned in downtown Stiftung. She went into a nearby bank and tried asking for help. They promptly kicked her out. She tried several more places, all with the same result. No one was going to help her.
She spent the next hour wandering through the city, going the direction they had been traveling when the impact had occurred. Eventually she came to a residential area. It didn’t look like her neighborhood, but she thought maybe she could find someone to tell her where she lived.
The whole neighborhood was a collection of large apartment complexes. She picked one at random and knocked on the door. A bearded, pot-bellied man answered. His face displayed instant annoyance. “Get lost, kid.”
“But I need help—”
“I said, ‘Get lost’!” He kicked her in the solar plexus, not hard enough to cause serious damage but hard enough to hurt. She fell down and hit her head on the concrete.
The man slammed the door, leaving Maya to nurse wounds both physical and mental. She stood up and felt the back of her head. There was a little bit of blood.
* * *
After another hour of wandering, she came to an overpass above the river. It was then that the hopelessness of the situation dawned on her. Her parents were gone and she had neither food nor housing. The question again appeared in order to torment her: How could this have happened? Why was the world allowed to continue existing in such crappy shape? Everything she had heard at church had been a lie. Bethos wasn’t going to pull her out of this situation.
The next day, after the tragedy had had time to set in, she tried to figure out what she was going to do. The overpass would serve as shelter for the time being, she decided. She then realized her stomach was growling. Mental anguish has a habit of destroying appetite, at least temporarily. She needed to find food. Her parents had been carrying all the money, so that presented a serious problem. Obviously buying anything was out of the question, at least until she found a way to make some.
After a while, an idea formed in her head. It wasn’t exactly a brilliant one, but it would do. She found the nearest fast food restaurant—Die Burger Hause—and stood out in front of it. She waited around until another kid wandered out with his parents and holding a paper bag. They had clearly ordered it to go. The boy was about her height, making him as good a target as she was likely to find.
She wasn’t proud of what happened next, but pride had no place in her new world. She simply swiped the bag and ran. The boy started bawling. Maya was disgusted, but not with herself. She was disgusted at the spoiled kid’s weakness. He was male; he would never know the pain she had been through over the past day. How dare he allow himself to be reduced to tears over something as trivial as a stolen lunch? If he were a girl, the world would have eaten him alive. Yes, she now saw the world for what it was—a horrible, unfair place where no one cared about you.
The boy’s parents briefly chased after her before deciding it would just be easier to buy another kid’s meal. She took the bag back to the overpass and greedily devoured it. In her previous life, her parents would have chastised her lack of manners. She decided a lack of manners was a right she had earned through her suffering. Anyway, there was no longer anyone around to give a damn.
Over the next week, she developed a system for stealing from the miserable wretches of Stiftung. She got creative, varying the methods, locations and victims of her crimes. She made it a point to never repeat a theft until a certain amount of time had passed. She was very successful at securing food.
Soon, however, a new problem arose. The current month was Remn, which meant it was getting cold out. Maya would need warm clothes very soon. Fortunately, there was a church not too far from the overpass. On Glifday, exactly one week since the accident, she snuck in there. She knew from experience that everyone left their coats, hats and mittens hanging on racks in the narthex. She simply helped herself to everything she thought she would need. She felt a twinge of guilt robbing from a church, but that quickly went away. After all, these people were hypocrites. They preached love but ignored people in trouble.
So Maya returned to the overpass with her pilfered clothing in tow. She had taken all she could carry. She put on a heavy coat and mittens, while the rest she made into a little bed. The coats were great as blankets.
* * *
She spent the next several months doing whatever she had to in order to survive. For a while she just stole. Eventually, though, she worked out how to steal people’s wallets, so she didn’t have to resort to theft as much. She made a comfortable living as a street urchin, confident she would never be caught. She fancied herself much too clever for that.
The day came when her delusions were shattered. She awoke to find an angry mob under the overpass with her.
“That’s her!”
“She’s the one who’s been robbing people left and right!”
“It’s judgment day, stupid girl!”
Maya had gotten careless. That was the only explanation. She had allowed them to follow her home and discover where she lived. Now she would pay the price.
They seized her. She noticed the mob was comprised solely of men. They yanked her hair back, causing her to wince in pain. “What’s going to happen to me?” she asked.
“If you were a boy, we’d give you a good talking to. But you’re a girl. No one needs you. No one gives a damn about you. We’re just going to put you down.”
Panic invaded every inch of her being. “No! Please! I’m sorry! I’ll give it all back! Well, except for the food. I ate it.”
“Too late, girl. You’re like a weed that needs to be pulled out. And that’s exactly what we’re going to do.”
She thrashed about with all the strength she could muster. The crowd suddenly went silent. Had they reconsidered? Would they show mercy after all?
She looked down and saw with horror the reason they had been rendered mute. Maya was holding the arms of the men on either side of her. By some method she couldn’t explain or even fathom, she had ripped them from their sockets during her frantic attempt to get free. Blood burst forth in a gruesome torrent. The dismembered men were in shock.
This could not be happening. Little girls didn’t have the strength to literally tear people limb from limb. And yet, she could not deny what she was seeing.
“She’s a monster!” someone cried.
“Kill her!”
One of the men pulled out a pistol and aimed it at her. She threw up her arms in a pitiful attempt to stop what was coming.
He pulled the trigger. The bullet tore into her elbow. The impact drove her backwards onto her
bed of coats. She knew she would die now. On some level, though, she was OK with that. She would be reunited with her parents.
However, a gasp from the crowd alerted her to the fact she was still conscious. She looked at her arm where the bullet had hit. To her amazement, there was only a dark purple bruise. What on earth was going on here?
“What the hell’s wrong with this girl?”
“Yeah. Why won’t she die?”
“I’ll be bet she doesn’t survive this.” The man who said that stepped forward carrying a shotgun. He pointed it directly at her head. He planned on blowing her away at point-blank range. All this violence for one little girl.
But before he could pull the trigger, a wall of flames suddenly descended upon the throng. It formed around Maya, separating her from the men who were so intent on killing her.
Once she heard the screams, though, she knew the fire wasn’t simply separating her from them. It had engulfed them and was roasting them alive. She covered her ears to drown out their torment, but it was futile. They screamed so loudly nothing on earth could drown it out.
After a minute the flames died down. All around her the remains of the mob lay black and ashen. She put a hand to her mouth to hold back the cry that wanted to escape.
“Are you all right?”
She looked up. Another man, also wrapped in flames, descended from the sky next to the overpass. However, he was not being burned. The fire clothed him like any other attire.
“I…” She didn’t know what to say. What could she say?
She turned around and ran. She didn’t know who this man was, but he was a man, and that made him the enemy.
In the blink of an eye, he appeared in front of her, cutting off her escape. “I just saved your life, kid. It’s not very nice of you to run off without showing gratitude.”
“T-Thank you.” She didn’t say it because she felt gratitude. In actuality, it hadn’t dawned on her yet that he had saved her.
He gave her a wolfish grin. “That’s more like it.”
“W-Who are you?”
“I’m like you, kid. Think of me as your future, what you could become.”
She blinked “What do you mean?”
“It’s like this,” he said. “We were both born with the potential to become gods. I became one, and so can you. Your power has only just begun to awaken.”
“A god?”
“That’s right. A bonified deity. I made it happen, and so can you. Don’t you want to become a god? Think about it; doing whatever you want; no one telling you what to do or walking all over you. You could run this city.”
She thought about it, all right. It sounded awesome. If she had the power this man had, no one would ever wrong her again. She could get revenge against this cruel world.
But he was still a man. “How do I know you won’t hurt me like everyone else?”
He showed her that grin again. “Not all men are bad. If you give me a chance, you’ll see I’m a swell guy.”
“I don’t know…”
“Hey, I get it. You’re not sure about this. Don’t worry, no pressure. You’re free to continue living in this city, stealing what you need to survive, occasionally getting hunted by a bloodthirsty mob. It’s your choice.”
But there wasn’t a choice, was there? If she wanted to live in this world, she would have to go with him. “OK. Teach me how to be a god.”
His smile was as bright as the flames he generated. “You won’t regret this.”
* * *
Two years later.
Maya was in the training ground behind Urkstat Castle, Zero Grade’s base in the Murnau Islands. They had hideouts all over the world, though Belial refused to tell her where the main one was.
She launched energy arrows at the training dummies positioned along the wall thirty yards away. Only half of the arrows hit their targets.
“No. All wrong,” Shinigami said. He stood behind her, his arms folded in a stern stance. He had been assigned the unenviable job of teaching her how to conjure weapons. She wasn’t suited for hacking, slashing or bludgeoning, so she created a bow and arrow setup for combat.
She sighed. They had been at this for days, yet she couldn’t steady her bow enough to reliably hit her targets. “What am I doing wrong?”
“Your energy isn’t fully stabilized. You lack concentration. It is a common problem for potential gods in the early stages of their training.” His voice never betrayed any emotion. He was always calm and cool.
“Then what should I do?”
“You must focus all your energy on materialization. Remember—your weapon is simply an extension of your body. It takes practice, but with repetition it should become as easy as breathing.”
So all she had to do was keep at it. Fair enough. She conjured her bow again, creating the arrow out of thin air as she pulled back the string. She decided she would take things slowly and not rush as she had been doing.
She lined up the first target and took a moment to make sure her accuracy was up to snuff. She then let the arrow fly. It struck the dummy in the head.
Shinigami nodded, evidently in approval. “That is better. Keep doing it that way, and you will master your weapon before you know it.”
Over the next several months, she did indeed master it. Belial said it was remarkable progress, and that the god-potential was strong in her.
One night, at dinner in the castle’s main hall, she asked him about it. “Where does god-potential come from?”
“From the same place as your actual god-powers,” he explained. “Energy left over from the Big Bang. Each universe is created from a massive explosion, releasing unbelievable amounts of energy into said universe. The energy doesn’t stay still, though. It moves from place to place. If a human is conceived and gestates within these energy vortexes, they’ll start to gain god-powers.”
“And the powers show up when you’re a kid?”
“Not always. Sometimes they lie dormant. Some people go their entire lives harboring these powers but never become gods. You need someone to train you to use them.”
She smiled. “Like the way you’re training me.” She had to admit, she had developed a certain fondness for Belial. He was never cold to her like Shinigami and Hera were. To him, she was special. Perhaps even as special as she had been to her parents. The thought of them gave her a pang of sadness.
“What’s wrong?” he asked her.
“I miss my parents. Why didn’t Bethos save them?”
He snorted in derision. “Because he’s a pathetic upstart who lacks the power to save people. Oh, sure, he and his ‘Academy’ do their best to answer prayers. But you know what? It’s pointless trying to save mortals. They’re all going to die anyway. We should be having them worship us. At least then they wouldn’t be trying to get things for free. They’d offer us their devotion in return for our mercy. That’s a great deal in my book.”
“But you saved me,” she reminded him.
“Let’s get a few things straight. One—you have god-potential. That makes you more than a mere mortal. Two—I didn’t do it for free. You’re going to help me get inside Divine Protector Academy. You’re the key to getting the last of the blood I need. God-candidates are very hard to come by, and Bethos’ school has most of them.”
This wasn’t the first time he had explained his intentions to her, but she remained uncertain about the plan. “Do you really think I can do it? I’m not a very good actor.”
He dismissed her concerns. “There won’t be any acting involved. You’ll be enrolling as yourself—an emotionally fragile girl who had to survive on the streets of Stiftung. Just leave out the part where you met me and you’ll be fine.”
She nodded resolutely. If he said she could do it, she would do it. Besides, she was looking forward to paying Bethos back for failing to save her parents.
* * *
Belial soon returned her to Stiftung. The overpass had long been cleared of the charred remains of the men who had
tried to kill her. Belial laughed about it. “I was following the story for a while ‘cause it was so damn funny. The police launched a full investigation but could never find the culprits. Don’t worry; they’ve stopped looking for you. No one’s even mentioned the incident in a while.
Maya took in the warm breeze. The month was now Hor, meaning it was summer. She didn’t need any more coats.
“Remember the plan?” he said.
“Yes. I’ll pray to the Lost Gods to come and save me.”
He nodded approvingly. “That’s right. And make sure to mention the weird powers you’ve ‘inexplicably’ acquired. They’ll come right away.”
And with that, he left her to wait under the overpass.
* * *
She spent the next two days praying night and day. She did almost nothing else. On the third day, a beautiful blonde woman showed up in a sleigh driven by two giant cats. “Hello, Maya. I’ve heard your prayers. I’m Freya. I’m here to take you away from all this.” You’re over two years too late, stupid lady. Maya kept her criticisms to herself.
So she simply said, “Please, save me.”
“Don’t worry. Everything’s going to be just fine from now on.” Freya proceeded to explain about gods and god-potential and god-energy. Maya pretended to be surprised yet happy her prayers had been answered. “Are you ready to come to Divine Protector Academy?”
Maya gave her an innocent smile. “I sure don’t wanna stay here anymore.”
“Great. Just hop in the sleigh and I’ll take you to your new home. Don’t mind the cats. They don’t bite.”
* * *
In no time Maya was taken to Mt. Orleia. On the outside it was a huge, intimidating structure. Inside, however, it was more utilitarian. She met Aphrodite, and then Brandon Strong, and then she was escorted to Bethos’ office. She was shocked by his appearance. The people at church had always portrayed him as a tall, bearded white guy. This was the exact opposite.
God School Page 18
