He went to school as usual. Nothing new. Gazes and stares. But one gaze was different. It held hatred. Bill. "So now he wants revenge," Arthur thought.

  At lunch, Bill stopped him. "What do you want?" "A rematch. That is all I ask for." Arthur sighed. "Okay."

  They went behind the school. No teachers. No witnesses. The fight started.

  Bill got a metal bat. And so, Arthur took a stone.

  The metal bat flew past Arthur’s head many times but for one moment the metal bat hit his shoulder.

  Arthur didn't flinch. He took the bat to the shoulder—CRACK—and drove the stone into Bill's face.

  It ended the same way: a broken nose for Bill.

  Bill clutched his nose.

  Arthur sighed seeing the blood from Bill’s nose increase by the second, he took his bag and he started walking towards the broken fence opening to get back to the school.

  “NOW!” Bill screamed.

  Ten guys jumped the fence and they took Arthur onto their shoulders.

  But then... the darkness swallowed the schoolyard. The ten students turned into The Army. The same army the Prince had killed. Bill looked at his hand. He didn't have a fist; he held a sword.

  The Shadow was watching from the roof. "Show me what you can," it hissed.

  Arthur ran at them. He tried to summon the feeling. He buried his imaginary sword in one body. He saw a head fly. He countered. He fought. But he wasn't the Prince.

  He killed two. But the third jumped on him. The fourth pierced his body with a sword.

  The sword felt like thunder on Arthur's body. His blood splashed out—running away from him. Even his own blood was running from his weakness.

  The world snapped back to normal.

  There were no swords. There was no army. Just eight guys, standing above him, kicking him in the ribs. Spitting on him. And the Shadow was one of them. Standing there, looking down, spitting on its own host.

  "See?" the Shadow whispered. "See what happens to who rejects his powers?"

  It reached out a hand of darkness. "Take my hand. Let us take them to where they should be. let the dirt be their bedding for all of eternity."

  Arthur looked at his hand. It was full of his own blood. He didn't raise it. He was too weak. But then... a single crack.

  The Shadow grew. It lunged. It took Arthur's hand. The darkness flowed into him.

  Arthur stood up. The bullies stepped back. Because when they looked at the ground... Arthur didn't have a shadow anymore.

  Arthur stood up. He brushed his lip. The copper taste didn't make him sick anymore. It tasted like fuel.

  He dragged his tongue across his palm, savoring the iron, and felt the Shadow inside him purr.

  The bullies flinched, stepping back. "Gross."

  "Gross?" Arthur asked. His voice didn't sound like a teenager. It echoed out of nothing, as if two people were speaking at once.

  He raised his hand. The air became heavy as lead. "KNEEL FOR THE KING."

  He dropped his hand. CRACK. All eight bullies hit the pavement instantly, their knees shattering against the concrete, forced down by an invisible weight.

  "Now," Arthur whispered. "Who is your King?"

  He opened his mouth. He didn't speak. He spat. A thick, black, viscous matter spilled from his lips. It hit the ground and spread. It moved like living oil, racing across the pavement, swallowing the school, the sky, the sun.

  "Where am I?" Bill screamed.

  The author's tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

  Bill ran. He ran into the darkness. "I see you," a voice broke the silence. Bill looked behind. Nobody. He ran again. But the darkness didn't end.

  He started to breathe heavier by the second.

  And then he stopped to catch his breathe.

  "WHERE THE HECK AM I?!" Bill shouted into the abyss.

  "The Void," the entity said, stepping out of the blackness.

  He walked toward Bill. His steps echoed like thunder in an empty hall. He grabbed Bill's head.

  "LOOK AT MY EYES."

  Bill tried to close them, but he couldn't. He looked.

  He saw Death. He saw his own corpse rotting. He saw his mother dying in a hospital bed. He saw his father burning. He saw his little brother screaming. He saw his own face melt off his skull.

  Bill screamed. It was a sound of pure madness. But Arthur didn't stop. His fingers buried themselves into Bill's face, sinking into the skin.

  And in the darkness, it wasn't just Bill's scream that echoed. The others—somewhere in the dark—were screaming too.

  "You need to be cleaned," Arthur whispered. "Filth."

  His hand started to blacken. It lost its shape, becoming pure blackness.

  He touched Bill. The blackness started to spread across Bill's skin, moving like a single drop of ink falling into clear water. Veins turned black. Skin turned gray.

  "Stop!" Bill screamed. "I won't—"

  Arthur’s eyes snapped to him. "Silence." The air froze. "The dead don't talk."

  Arthur changed. His eyes became pitch black. His iris expanded, but not into a circle. It became a white crack. A jagged, vertical line, like a lion's eye, but broken.

  His hair lost its color. It bleached out, turning a cold, shimmering silver.

  "I have had enough of being weak," Arthur said, his voice vibrating. "No one should be better than me. Not even him."

  The ink covered Bill completely. He stopped screaming. He stopped moving. He became a black statue. Frozen in terror.

  Arthur let him go. The statue stood there, a monument to fear.

  "No," Arthur said, tilting his head. "Don't look so sad, Bill."

  He smiled. "Give me a hug, Bill."

  Arthur ran at the statue. He wrapped his arms around it in a warm, tight embrace.

  CRACK. The statue didn't just break; it collapsed into a cloud of gray silence. Arthur inhaled. The dust of what used to be Bill coated his throat, dry and chalky. He didn't cough. He smiled, breathing him in.

  He brushed the gray dust off his silver hair.

  "Oh," he sighed. "Too sad. I couldn't even give him a proper hug."

  "We are one, Arthur," the Shadow hissed.

  Arthur looked at it. And at that moment, for the first time in its life... the Shadow’s smile evaporated.

  "Who..." Arthur whispered, stepping closer, closing the gap. "Who is 'we'?"

  He put his hand on the Shadow's chest. "You are just my slave."

  He pulled. The blackness of the Shadow started to get sucked into Arthur's palm.

  The Shadow screamed. Its arms flailed, hitting Arthur, trying to push him away. But Arthur didn't move.

  The Shadow's legs gave out. It collapsed, shrinking, the ink draining away into Arthur's veins.

  The last wisp of blackness vanished. Arthur looked down. What was left wasn't a monster. It was a 17-year-old human girl. Naked, shivering.

  "A girl?" Arthur laughed. "What got you in my mind?"

  She scrambled back, putting her hands over her body. "Your father," she whispered.

  Arthur walked to her. He grabbed her hair and forced her to look at him. "Why?" "To... to seal your powers," she stammered. "Until you could control them."

  Then I don't need you anymore," Arthur said, releasing her hair. "Should I kill you?"

  She started shaking violently. "No... please..."

  Arthur smiled. His silver hair shone in the dark mental space. "No. You are my slave. Why should I kill you?"

  She bowed her head. "Yes. Yes... I am your slave."

  Arthur chuckled.

  "You should have put someone stronger, Father," Arthur whispered. "She gave out from the first slap."

  "Stand up," Arthur commanded. She stood, trembling. He examined her.

  She noticed his look. Instinctively, she put her hands on her body.

  And then... it stopped. Everything stopped. Silence came crashing down.

  There was nothing in the void except the Eye of a Predator. She looked into Arthur's eye. The black sclera. The white iris. And she saw the crack in the center grow bigger.

  "FROM WHOM ARE YOU TRYING TO HIDE?!" Arthur shouted.

  A wall formed out of nowhere. Invisible force slammed her against it, crushing her arms to her sides. She was frozen.

  Arthur walked up to her, his face inches from hers. "I am your master," he whispered. "You have no secrets from me."

  Tears ran down her face. "Yes... Master."

  Arthur stepped back. "Garbage."

  "I had enough of this place for today," Arthur said. His form in the Mindscape started to melt, dripping away like black wax.

  He snapped back into the real world. The bullies were gone. Just the stain of ash on the ground. He scanned the area. He saw a security camera buzzing, its red-light blinking. He spat a glob of black ink onto the lens. "There," he whispered.

  He waited in an alley until nightfall. Then, he entered the school. He walked the hallways until he reached the security room. It was locked.

  Arthur didn't pick the lock. He gathered saliva in his mouth and spat on the floor.

  The black puddle bubbled with a wet, sucking sound. It rose up twisting and forming into a small, faceless figure.

  "Master," the ink-thing whispered. It reached up and unlocked the door from the inside. Then, it dissolved back into nothing.

  Arthur walked in. He scanned the room. His eyes fell on the computer tower. He walked over and placed his hand on it. SLURP. The metal distorted, twisted, and was sucked into his palm. The computer was gone.

  He walked out of the school, lighting a smoke. "Hey! What are you doing here?!" A flashlight beam hit his face. A security guard was running toward him.

  Arthur didn't look up. He took a drag. "Not now, filth," he said, exhaling white smoke. "I am having a smoke."

  He dropped the cigarette. He activated the waypoint—a small speck of black matter he had left outside the gate earlier. ZOOM. He vanished from the hallway and reappeared on the street, blocks away.

  He walked home in the silence of his mind. "Master," the girl's voice echoed in his head. "What?" "Can you... let me free from this wall?"

  Arthur sighed, annoyed by the nagging. "Fine." He moved his hand slightly. In his mind, the wall released her.

  "Thank you, Master."

  "What is your name?" Arthur demanded. "I-I—" "ANSWER THE QUESTION!" Arthur shouted. "I DON'T HAVE TIME FOR YOUR STUTTERING."

  "I am Jean." "Jean?" "Yes, Master."

  Arthur gathered a lot of saliva. Black, viscous fluid. He spat it onto the pavement. The puddle bubbled and rose. The girl, Jean, formed from the ink. She was shivering in the cold night air.

  "I didn't get you here because I freed you," Arthur said. "I just wanted a maid to serve me. And you are that."

  "Master..." she whispered, covering herself. "Can you give me some clothes?"

  He spat on her. The black slime coated her, hardening and weaving itself into fabric. A hoodie. Trousers. "Come."

  He reached his home. He could hear his father inside, on the phone with Sean, trying to find out where Arthur was. Arthur opened the door. "I am back."

  His mother ran to him. "Arthur! How could you—" She stopped. She stared at him.

  Silence stretched in the hallway, heavy and suffocating. Peter’s jaw hung open. His mother’s eyes darted from the silver hair to the girl’s bare feet. For ten heartbeats, the only sound was the clock ticking.

  Then, she looked past him. To the girl shivering behind him. "Who... who is she, Arthur?"

  Jean started shaking. Arthur looked at her. And She stopped shaking instantly.

  "She is my girlfriend," Arthur said.

  "What?" The whole family—Mom, Dad, brothers—said in unison.

  "What is for dinner today?" Arthur asked, ignoring their shock. He started walking to the kitchen, grabbing Jean's hand. "You are eating with me, babe."

  They walked into the kitchen, away from the family. "You have feelings, didn't know," Arthur whispered, leaning close to her.

  "I am a human, Master," she whispered back.

  Arthur smiled. "Good. Then eat."

  Act 4.