With every clock larger than a wristwatch, David had always found thin, relatively short chains which held the weights and caused the gears in the clock to move. David had expected to find a similar, but longer chain in the grandfather, but what he got excited him. Instead of a thin, elegant thing, the chain in this masterpiece was thick and present. It wasn’t ridiculously thick, like a chain for a boat or a car, but it was thick enough to fit comfortably in David’s palm. Even when he put the clock back together, he couldn’t help himself but sneak a touch of the chain whenever he passed through the foyer. Sometimes, if he couldn’t hear anyone else in the house, he would grab the chain, holding it back and stopping the clock for a few seconds. He loved the feeling of impact that it gave him, like he was somehow changing things on a greater scale than himself. Because of him, the clock would always ring a minute late, a minute early, or exactly on time. Whichever he preferred, really.

Now, if his foster parents knew what he was doing while they thought he was playing with his “siblings”, they would get very, very mad, (though David prided himself on leaving the appliances he touched in a better condition than when he began, except for that one child’s toy. Nobody ever did find out why it wouldn’t work…). On this particular day, David was finishing his third round completely dismantling the clock, and would have been the third time he successfully reconstructed it, if not for the scream outside.

         Leaving the clock in pieces behind him, David burst through the front door to find his foster sister and brother sprawled on the concrete of the driveway, surrounded by a clan of five older boys. He knew that the scream had come from his brother, Mark, who despite him being only slightly younger than David, was significantly less mature. His face, pressed against the sidewalk by one of the boys, was beet red and flooded with tears. David’s sister, Andrea, was about the same age as the other boys, but she too was on the ground. She wasn’t held there, but whenever she made a move to get up, one of the boys with a cigarette in his mouth would push her back to the ground.

         David balled his hands into fists and marched into the driveway- he wasn’t much of a fighter, but he didn’t need to be. His foster parents certainly heard the scream, he just needed to make sure they didn’t kill Mark. He rushed the boy holding his brother down, smashing into his shoulder with his own. He never wanted to get into a fight, but he knew he had no choice if he wanted to save his brother. The older boy, who had been using his body weight to hold Mark down, lost his balance and tumbled onto the pavement. Mark, now free, scrambled to his hands and knees, taking deep heaving breaths.

         “Go!” David shouted just before a fist the size of his head collided with his face. The oldest boy- the one with the cigarette sticking out of his smug mouth- had turned his attention away from Andrea and onto David.

         Reeling from the blow, David barely managed to stay on his feet. His ears were ringing, and his eyesight, normally a perfect 20-20 vision, became blurred. The right side of his face felt hot, the side he had been hit on. And there was a small trickle of something down his cheek- something which wasn’t water nor sweat.

         As David turned to face his attacker, a stray right foot kicked his feet out from under him, and he found himself with his ass on the ground, and the smoking kid on top of him, pressing down on his shoulders.

         David’s ears were still ringing, but he could faintly make out the words “idiot”, “why” “care” and “retard”. The older boy managed to push David down by the shoulders, but David kept pushing back, trying to get up. A sharp cry pierced the ringing in his ears, and David twisted his head just in time to see Mark’s head hit the sidewalk with a sharp crack.

         He moved his head as if it were on a swivel- his parents should have heard one, if not both of Mark’s cries. So where were they? Wait… was it Monday?

         Realization smashed into David like a truck as he felt all hope leave his body. That’s why they told him to play outside. Every Monday, they would go to some friend’s house who lived down the street. It was usually fine, but sound didn’t travel nor did it echo particularly well in the neighborhood. The parents would have been able to hear the screams if they were in their house, but now…

         Adrenaline surged through David’s body as he tried to force himself back up again, tears shining in his eyes. Laughing, the smoking boy shoved him back down, blowing smoke into David’s face. David’s arms couldn’t quite reach the boy’s chest, so he frantically battered at his captor’s arms, his punches as weak as his open-hand slaps. He couldn’t tell if Mark was breathing, but he had to get to him. The rest of the boys had surrounded the smoker and David, laughing and jeering along with the captor. One of the boys kept Andrea from getting up or moving close to Mark. The jeering faces closed in on David, and he felt a greater rage swell within him- along with something else.

         The next few blows to the smoker’s arms were much different. The captor’s face turned from a mocking sneer to shock to genuine pain. David felt a faint pop as his fist collided with the skin of his foe. Howling in pain, the smoker yanked both his hands back, clutching his right arm. Which gave David an opening.

         David’s fists collided with the smoker’s chest in a short barrage, pushing him completely off of David. The attack was short enough that David didn’t feel any other pops of fracturing bone, but he did feel something like a shockwave when his fist collided with the other boy’s. But it was like a shockwave in the same way that a ripple was like a wave- technically similar, yet different in intensity. There was a slight shift in the wind, but no light-warping explosion.

Two sets of hands grabbed David’s shoulders, which he quickly broke free of. He ran to Mark’s unmoving form, spinning around and kneeling in front of him, placing himself between his brother and their attackers.

         Smoker, now without his cigarette, stood and glared at David.

         “You are so fucking dead! You hear me, freak? Dead!” he shouted, spittle flying from his mouth.

         David stole a glance at Mark’s chest- it was rising up and down. Good, David thought as he clenched his fists tighter, now to keep him that way.

         All five of the boys advanced- the one holding Andrea down had relinquished her when David went berserk. But as they approached, balling their fists and cracking their necks like a poorly-coordinated biker gang, Smoker faltered.

         His face was suddenly wreaked with exhaustion, his breath turned to raspy heaves, and his face turned an unflattering shade of ash. His face turned downwards, his hands latched themselves to his knees, and in all, he looked like he was about to throw up.

         Everyone stopped what they were doing. The other members of the gang turned towards him, fear in their eyes. Instinctually, David unclenched his hands, his eyes fixed on Smoker’s face.

         One of the other boys put a hand on Smoker’s shoulder, “A-are you all right, boss?”

         Smoker shook his head, and with a hand to his mouth, he began to cough. But it wasn’t a normal cough- it wasn’t dry or wet, but rather… sharp. Grating, even. And it didn’t stop at one.

         What started as a handful of tiny coughs had evolved into a continuous stream of violent exhalations. It wasn’t long before Smoker was on his knees, coughing at the pavement. It wasn’t until something red and small flew from his mouth and splattered onto the concrete that the rest of those present began to act. The other members of the gang all ran for the hills (in a proverbial sense, there weren’t any hills in that particular neighborhood), glancing at David with looks of pure terror as they ran off in separate directions. As for David, when he saw that first drop of blood hit the pavement, his heart dropped.

         I… I didn’t hit him that hard… I couldn’t have hit him that hard!

         Smoker continued to cough, blood now spewing regularly from his mouth, forming crimson rivers in the sidewalk cracks. David rushed over to his former enemy, now victim, and placed his hands on Smoker’s lower chest and back, trying to feel a way to help him breathe.

         “I- I don’t- what did I do? I’m sorry!” David whispered, barely aware that his thoughts were now available to the rest of the world.

         The coughing didn’t stop- though now it was more like vomiting. And with the blood came black fleshy chunks which David did not recognize. David’s eyes danced around the scene in horror. And what he whimpered; his thoughts screamed.

         Why is this happening?! W-what did I do wrong?! Take-take it back. Take it back! TAKE IT BACK!

         The smoker collapsed completely onto his back, hitting the ground, blood now bubbling from his mouth. His chest jerked up and down, but there was no breath. With his mouth and shirt covered in his own blood, he stared at David.

         From then, it took only a second for his eyes to turn vacant and glassy.

         It was at that very second David started to cry.

When their parents finally came home, they stared in horror at the scene before them- Mark, beaten and bloody. David, with blood in his hair and his clothes, curled up and sobbing by the door to the garage. And the cigarette boy’s body, its blood staining the pavement around it. The moment she had gotten the chance, Andrea had run down to the house where their fosters were staying. By the time they returned, it was long since over.

The parents immediately summoned the police and the medical professionals. Smoker, who David learned was actually named Pietro, had lived with his mother down the street, who was hysteric with grief at the news. His father had long since left both of them, so while Pietro’s mother was easily able to yell and scream at David, she had nobody to turn back to. Three days later, her manager found her in her home, hanging from the ceiling. Her name was Samantha. David was taken down to the police station, but when they asked what happened, he couldn’t find any words. Even the insistence of his foster parents yielded no results. He just sat there, staring at his hands, which he kept close to his chest and clenching each other tightly enough to turn them purple. There wasn’t any blood on his hands- that much he knew. But what he saw, what he felt, he caused Pietro’s death. It wasn’t blood he saw when he looked at his hands, but death.

The police soon released him back to his foster family. It turned out that Pietro had died from an extremely violent stage 3 lung cancer. By this point, David had learned about Samantha’s suicide, and the instant he got home, he isolated himself in his room. He didn’t know much about cancer, but he knew that somebody doesn’t suddenly get sick and die in a few minutes. He clutched both his hands close to his chest as he lowered himself onto his rock-hard bed. He was still dressed, the light in his room was still on, and his pillow was on the floor, but he didn’t care. He closed his eyes and began to sob, his new mantra echoing through his head.

Take it back.

Take it back.

Take it back.

The entire incident was ruled as an accident, so no charges were ever brought to David. But that didn’t stop his foster parents from sending him back into the system- they just couldn’t manage three children and such a negative reputation in the neighborhood. Andrea was the only one sad to see him go. Before he left, she gave him one of her bracelets- a simple golden chain she’d seen him look at whenever he wound up in her room, one she knew he’d tried on. And with a hug, David and Andrea separated, never to see each other again. Mark didn’t see David off, he adamantly refused to believe that David would leave. And so they parted without a word.

 As David drifted from home to home, eleven in total throughout the state of Florida, the echoes- the wounds of what had happened followed him. He was still wicked smart, but the brightness in him was gone. Whenever he wasn’t at school, he isolated himself in his room, or the basement if he didn’t have his own room. He rarely touched anyone, and he refused to participate in another fight, even if it meant his foster parents had to pick him up from the hospital. Or drive him there. Some places were nice, with kind, fair couples who actually liked children. But more were couples who couldn’t care less about raising a son or a daughter, only interested the money they brought with them. But all of them gave him away when they caught him in girls clothing, or when he had forgotten to unbraid his hair or remove the polish from his fingernails. Most of the time, they would yell and scream at him, telling him he was an abomination, but other times… well…

David could remember the one time he was caught wearing his foster sister’s clothing at his fifth foster home. He had just started puberty and he already felt uncomfortable in his body, big and awkward and… wrong. His skin didn’t feel right, his face didn’t look right, and his clothes just weren’t right. When he’d tried on his sister’s clothes – a simple dress, still much too big for him – it didn’t make any sense to his extremely powerful (if hormone-addled) mind, but it was just… right. And in spite of how horribly it fit his body, in spite of the fact that he still wished he could rip his skin off his bones and change into something more… himself, when he looked at his form in the mirror, he couldn’t help but smile. The skin above his ribcage still bore the scars from the beating his foster father gave him three minutes later. As David grew older, he evolved into someone who is invisible in a crowd. Watching the world from a glass box, only able to see, to analyze, never to be a breathing part of it.

He probably would have ended up working at a mechanic’s shop for the rest of his life if it hadn’t been for Ed. Ed was short for Edmund West, and was David’s foster father from when he was sixteen to eighteen, but they always stayed in touch. Ed was single, which with foster parents can either be a manageable thing, or an absolutely terrible thing. But with Ed, it was a great thing. David was his only foster child, which made sense given the fact that he was at least seventy and not getting any younger. Ed didn’t have a single mechanical clock in his house, which saddened David at first, but he forgave that when Ed asked him for help with his car. The past couple of houses he had lived in, the second they saw his record they did two things: They locked up their tools, and they forbade him from entering the garage, shortly after they threated him within an inch of his life if they saw him anywhere near women’s clothing. But Ed either didn’t read David’s record or he recognized the boy’s talent. They spent hours in the garage, tinkering on that old land-yacht of a car. And slowly, David began to smile more. But he wasn’t about to change anything, no matter how he felt. He fully planned on going to work at a minimum-wage job, preferably one which involved clocks and/or cars, and push away those aspirations and constant feelings of discomfort. But Ed was having none of that. The instant he saw David’s GPA and SAT score, he fired up his coal-powered computer and, with bony fingers and a shaky grip on his computer mouse, filled a dozen college applications in David’s name, and bought a small mechanical wristwatch.

 And David was none the wiser, at least he was until one day near Christmas, Ed plopped a thick pile of opened letters and hugged him tighter than David thought possible. for a man his age. A flustered David asked what it was all for, to which his father showed him the already opened letters (Ed didn’t put much stock in patience), they were college acceptance letters. All of them practically begging him to join. David was so immensely stupefied that he didn’t even register Ed’s second hug, and he could barely feel himself when he was presented the watch. It was everything David loved about watches, a beautiful mechanical marvel made from a pristine silvery steel without so much a scratch on the outside. And once the outer shell was removed, David found all the internal mechanisms to be just as beautiful if not more so than the watch’s face itself. And judging by the expression of amusement and joy on Ed’s face, David had a sneaking suspicion that his foster father had also checked the insides of the watch just to be sure.

David went to college and began his finer education as an engineer, to which he excelled at. Designing and constructing mechanisms, whether they be electronic or otherwise, was little more than child’s play to him. But more than anything else, he absolutely excelled at computer code, which soon wormed its way into his mind, his everyday life. He would be looking at a menu and thinking of how to code a program to flip burgers- then he would scrap that idea and come up with a detection program to determine the readiness of pasta. It was usually took him the better part of an hour to order anything at a resturaunt. He was a prodigy in his field, but to the exasperation of his professors, he had no ambition, no desire to advance anything but was rather content to only learn what already was, and imagine new possibilities. But he would never act on them. But that hardly mattered to David, he was finally in a place where he could learn, make friends, and most importantly, he was safe. But the echo of the combined pain of his past would not let him go. Even among his best friends, he was still timid and was constant in his desire to stay out of conflict or argument. He barely touched anyone or anything, only consistently coming into contact with his computer’s keyboard. The first few months he lived in the dorms, he hid his precious watch underneath his mattress, until he moved it to the safe he bought with his own money. He spent most of his time hidden from others, and while he sometimes accepted invitations from his friends, he never hung out with them with any consistency.

Every once in a while, though, he’d get close to someone. Emotionally, if not physically. And he’d get the urge to cross that barrier, hug them. Not just out of brotherhood, friendship, or love, but because he craved contact. He wanted to be touched, to feel human.

But every time he did, the echo would return.

 Pietro’s body, sprawled on the ground.

The death that was his hands

The screams of his heart.

Take it back.

 

That phrase resounded through his mind, jolting him out of the memory, and he was suddenly back to screaming his head off  As his screams ceased, David heard something out of the corner of his ear- a deep, yet melodious voice, unlike the ragged thunder-voice he had been hearing.

         “Oh, no Thor!” The voice faintly said, “Look what you did to that poor, baby human! And I thought you liked mortals!”

         Over his agony, David managed to catch those words as his eyes snapped open and he thought Thor?. His thoughts immediately went to the Thor he had seen from film- a sexy blond man wearing a red cape and chainmail bodysuit, brandishing a hammer with a solid metal brick-shaped head.

         That was not the Thor he saw.

         For the briefest of moments, his large figure crossed his gaze, briefly illuminated by the bright blue flashes. And even from far below, on the ground, David saw enough of the man to be terrified. To say that Thor was a big man would be like saying that a mirror is shiny – if you say it everyone will look at you funny. The man hovering over David was massive, easily over nine feet tall, wearing brown wool pants which strained against his thigh muscles and a sleeveless dark leather jerkin which strained against his beer gut. His hair was a dark red, growing from his head and around his mouth like a swath of angry vines. His beard hair reached the center of his gut, and his head hair reached the base of his calves. His face may have been chubby, jolly even. But in that moment, David saw Thor’s face contorted into an expression of pure rage, hard as stone and with a look that would shatter diamonds. His mouth was dripping with some kind of foam- maybe residual beer, maybe from sheer rage- the unknown terrified David. His fear certainly wasn’t abated by the fact that this massive boulder of a man was flying in the crescent moon’s lightt. And then he spoke, giving David even more reason to be terrified.

         “SH-SHUT UP!” the thunder voice said (Yes, I know it’s obvio-, fine, whatever) sorry, THOR said (Happy now?), followed by another flash of white-blue in the sky.

         David tried to move, but every time he even thought about it, his hips exploded in agony. He twisted his head sideways towards the direction of the light, his eyes wide with terror, hands scrabbling for anything to hold, to distract from his pain.

         There was another roar of thunder-voice, followed by a flash of bright blue. And then, before David’s eyes, a pair of feet drifted out of the air and landed softly on the ground. The feet were clad in a pair of shiny black dress shoes which gleamed with malice of the distant fire. Immediately after, there was a clunk of metal on the ground, a cane’s metal tip had made contact with the cracked pavement.

         “What’s this? Another asgardian!” The melodious voice said in an excited tone, “I didn’t realize you brought a friend, Thor! Why don’t we take him along for the ride?”

         Wait… What?!

         Before he could act, well try to act, strangely bony yet strong hands slipped under his form and lifted him into the air. Cradled like an infant, David watched in horror as the ground shrunk away. He felt the wind smash against his face and yank on his hair. Scrunching his eyes shut in terror and pain, he heard the distant screams of Thor, and he felt an intense heat on his face, like he was laying next to a campfire. He also felt himself change direction. Over. And over. And over again. Up, down, left, right, upside down, rightside up. After a handful of minutes, David was crying, quietly begging for it to stop and desperately trying to ignore the flooding warmth in his shorts.

         The few times he did open his eyes, he noticed tiny details about his… rescuer? Kidnapper? Pilot? The man was wearing an old-fashioned kind of suit, lightly reminiscent of the clothes old plantation workers would wear, but somehow both tackier and higher-end. The shirt he wore was a purple as deep in color as his voice, while his jacket and pants were a rich midnight black that stood out even against the night sky. In his breast pocket David caught the glimpse of something purple- a handkerchief, perhaps? In the shadow of the moon, David could see that his Pilot was wearing a kind of top-hat, but in a fashionably short critique of Abraham Lincoln’s iconic style. His face was completely shrouded in the shadow of the hat, but he reeked of strong tobacco, and no matter where David angled his head, the smell wouldn’t cease its assault on his nostrils. Although David couldn’t see his face, he couldn’t help but feel like the man was staring at him, which only prompted him to keep his eyes shut.

Over the howl of the wind and the thunderous screams of Thor, David could just barely make out the sound of a nose taking short whiffs.

         “What… Is… That… Smell?” The melodious, dignified and now-disgusted voice said, perfectly talking around the cigar in his mouth. “Is this your first time flying, Asgardian?”

         David started to shake his head, but then stopped himself. He had no idea what an Asgardian was, but the last time he was off the ground- the trip to Haiti from Florida- he had made copious use of not only his vomit-bag, but three of his fellow passengers’. Only his sheer terror and lack of physical food in his gut was keeping him from repeating this event, and he wasn’t about to move any more than he had to.

         “You know… you’re an odd barbarian. Are you one of the vain ones Thor was talking about?” The non-Thor voice asked.

         “No I-I’m not… anyone, please…” David sputtered, “Please put me down…”

         “Hmm… you’re not much fun.” The air stilled. “Fine, have a nice trip!”

         The stranger let go, and David fell…

         For less than a second before he collided with the ground, hips first. The screams emanating from the poor man echoed through the streets, and anyone who heard it presumed that he was dying of blood loss. The stranger hovered over him and took a deep breath, and though David couldn’t see the man’s face, the low humming he made gave away the fact that he positively relished David’s agony.

         There was a flash of heat on the right side of David’s face, and he flew to the left, feeling bits and pieces of shrapnel each embed themselves into his right arm, his back, and lightly scratch his face. He tumbled away, feeling his left arm slam against smooth concrete. Smooth- rubbed away by years of tides and storms. The sound of lapping water was just barely audible. David was at the docks, at the edge of the city.

         David felt a sharp vibration in the ground- not enough to be another explosion, but enough to be a person landing. Or, more accurately for the weight felt, an elephant landing. Gritting his teeth, David managed to push himself up just enough to turn his head towards his attacker, and immediately wished he didn’t.

         David didn’t imagine it was possible, but somehow Thor looked even more terrifying on the ground. The light from the fires in the city burned behind him, casting a long shadow onto the entire dock. David could just barely make out the red-orange edges of his long hair and beard, as well as the general outline of the rest of Thor’s body. At his side he held a large hammer, but not the rectangular brick-like weapon one would expect from a war-hammer, but instead a pentagonal head separated into four sections, a quiet blue light shining from between the gaps in the weapon, pulsating with energy.

But the most terrifying part of Thor was his eyes. Because of where Thor stood, the majority of his eyes were hidden by shadow. But standing out in the middle of the ink-black void within the embrace of his illuminated hair were two rageful, glowing blue points. David looked into those two points and somehow he knew instantly what they were- where a normal human would have a black pupil to absorb as much light as possible this being, this… monster, had so much energy, he was forcing light out of himself. And this wasn’t a dark blue or a hyper-saturated blue, no. This was the blue of the hottest stars, the blue at the heart of explosions, the blue of lightning. The blue of imminent death. And this great, big, mountain of a man… was walking towards the crippled, terrified David.

          “You’d hurt one of your family? Shame on you, Thor.” The shadowed man said in a mocking voice.

         The last part the man punctuated with the wagging of his finger, like a 1920s housewife telling off the family dog. Thor turned to him, and the man promptly made a pose with his cane, David could barely restrain his eyes from rolling.

         “YoUuU…” Thor slurred, pointing his hammer at the man, and it began to glow with blue light.

         “Yep!” the man said with a cheerful punch in his voice, shifting into another pose without taking his eyes off Thor. “What’s the matter, can’t hold your liquor?”

         “AAGGH!” Thor roared, echoing thunder across the water.

         As if on reflex, Thor thrust his arm back behind his head, the hammer glowing with power. Then he brought it back forward, aiming at the other man, his arm moving faster than David could follow. Then, he let go of his hammer, and it flew faster than anything David had ever seen before, leaving a shining blue comet trail as it just barely missed the suited man before colliding with the ground and rebounding back to Thor’s waiting hand, sending it flying back behind him. The ground where the hammer hit shattered, becoming a black sand as the cracks extended down to the dock, causing the concrete structure that had endured many storms to topple into the ocean like a pile of children’s building blocks. As the cracks reached the water, the ocean’s surface turned to chaos, sending several heavy cargo ships careening into each other. Thor’s hammer was the bright flashes that had devastated the city. A weapon which looked like lightning, when used, but a thousand times more deadly.

         Even in pain, even on the ground, David’s mind raced, overwhelmed by the survival instinct which Thor’s rage had fueled.

That hammer… became lightning? How was that possible? Lightning is just a stream of charged particles generated in a storm transferring from a positively charged stormcloud to a negatively charged structure on the ground, it’s impossible to turn anything into- wait. That’s not really lightning. It moves fast, and it shines extremely bright, but it doesn’t fork or deviate in any way. So the flashes- they’re the hammer itself, moving at beyond supersonic speeds? That’s not possible… but then again, I was told that movies couldn’t come to life. So the blue and white- atmospheric resistance on the surface of the hammer? It is definitely going fast enough to accumulate such resistance. But that doesn’t make sense with how it reappears. Even if there were a spring inside the hammer that compressed exactly right on impact, its momentum would be greatly decreased in the return trip. And even then, it couldn’t be so precise to fall exactly into Thor’s hand… Why am I thinking about this? Science later, run away now!

I apologize for having to hear David’s internal thought process.

         As David attempted to flee with only the strength of his admittedly weak arms, Thor roared and charged the other man, puncturing the drenched concrete with every step as he arced his hammer towards the dark man’s top hat. But just before his speeding weapon could make contact, the man simultaneously ducked his head and lifted his hat off said head, completing the move by crossing his legs at the ankles. He performed this entire maneuver in less than a second.

         “So, I was wondering…” The deep voice managed to say over Thor’s thunder.

         “DIE!” Thor screamed, swinging again, this time aiming for the man’s torso.

         “Yes, yes, wonderful contribution to the conversation,” The other man said as he executed a split-second limbo as the hammer rippled past him. “But before that, what exactly did I say? There are a couple other cities with cemeteries that are a bit too small for my liking.”

         Thor roared in frustration, spittle soaring from his gaping maw, all of which the fancy smoker somehow managed to avoid.

         “Was it that comment about your stepmother? Because, well… she is a bit of a…”

         There was another bright flash as the hammer was thrown, this time colliding with a nearby ship, punching a clean hole in the side of the vessel. It sunk three minutes later.