The next time I opened my eyes. I found myself in a comfortable bed in a white room with a couple of bland windows to the side. Besides me was a man in a white coat who seemed to grab data from the monitor. Without noticing me awake, he picked up some papers and left. My eyes were so heavy to keep open that they kept closing on their own, even though I wanted to know what was happening around me. I did not know where I was or who these people were.

Outside, though, an argument erupted. Voices of a man and woman loudly echoed throughout.

"Amelia, where is he?" a familiar voice I had heard not too long ago questioned outside of the room I was being kept in.

They made the walls to the room of concrete, but somehow, I could hear them. When I glanced towards the door, I noticed there was a small black cat with bright blue eyes sitting by it.

"He does not want to come." The woman called Amelia answered, sounding somewhat annoyed.

"Are you sure he is the one that does not want to come, or you?" The man questioned her motives once again.

"Why would he want to come? Tell me, Ben, why? That thing in there killed our parents. Dragged him from his party and into the abyss before anyone could do anything about it. It took us hours to find him!" She snapped back to the man called Ben.

"You and him both need to understand that it was not her fault." Ben tried to convey his point to her, but she was not accepting it.

To be honest, I would not have either.

"Everything that happened is that thing's doing. It is nothing more than a monster that needs to be put down!" Amelia fumed at his view of what had happened.

"I knew it. You are the one feeding him these useless thoughts. Are you insane? Did you even care to read my report?" The man countered, not understanding why Amelia was having such a hard time accepting his truth.

"Ben, I do not think you get..." Ben quickly interrupted Amelia, losing his cool.

"No, Amelia, you do not get it because you were not there. All your life they have given you roses and flowers. As if life was in black and white. But it is fucking grey, Amelia. If we would have listened to Fenris, instead of telling him that his feelings were wrong." Ben's voice shook, trying to hold his emotions in place before continuing.

"Amelia, he came to us multiple times, telling us his friend was in danger. He even came to us on the day of his birthday, caring more about his missing friend than about his own party and gifts. What child does that? He was serious, but we ignored him because it was just a stupid witch coven that we had already put down once before. If we would have searched just a little longer instead of feeling like nothing could happen, we would have avoided this! Tell me, sister, don't you understand that we could have avoided this whole thing? Do you not realize that the thing you are calling a monster is just another victim of our negligence?!?!" Ben ranted, having had enough of Amelia's opinions on the matter.

"I will not allow Fenris to be exposed to this thing." She continued, unwavering in her beliefs.

It was like Ben had said nothing. In response, he sighed, feeling like the words were falling on deaf ears.

"Well, good thing it is not your choice. And stop calling her a thing. She is a child that needs help. He was the only one who saw it before any of us. She will be his charge and that is final." He declared, leaving Amelia shocked.

"No, Ben, you cannot do that! He is a child! Traumatized by this whole thing! That thing is something that needs to be locked away or killed!" Amelia yelled, letting her raw emotions show, triggering her brother to lose his patience once again.

"Amelia, can you read the damn report I gave you instead of saying things that make no sense? If you would have read it instead of riding off to grief, you would know she cannot die. That cat helped us, made damn sure to tell me and every survivor that if she died, it would mean the end of this world. You can ask Tania if you doubt me. I am sure she will set you straight too." Ben snapped, having enough.

Amelia struggled to find an argument against what he had informed her of. But it was not long before she continued to try to sway her brother.

"That does not mean that monster needs to roam free!" Amelia continued to argue.

Ben countered her points.

"She will not be free. She will live within the Cerberus Order. Under Fenris's protection. Either way, it is not your choice." He clarified, leaving her unsatisfied.

"And it is yours?!?" Amelia challenged.

He seemed to get annoyed.

"It is his burden to carry now." Ben declared, not backing down.

"I will not allow this!" she snapped, not wanting Fenris to come near this monster, me.

Even if they had not given it a name. It was me. Their argument made me realize that this, even though it felt surreal, was not a dream. What happened was real. And I caused it all. Their argument did not end there, though. It continued.

"Amelia, it does not matter. Don't you get it? Let me put it in simple terms for you. The phoenix crystal failed to dispel whatever the coven did to her. That poor girl is the vessel for the gate until she stops breathing. And if she stops breathing, we all do. Putting her in isolation would be a mistake. We already experienced what she did when she was scared and full of sorrow. Can you even fathom what will happen when she is full of resentment? We will just be doing the same mistakes that our ancestors did. Don't you see that?" Ben continued to try to make sense to her.

"I..." Amelia struggled to find the words to convince Ben of her side of the story.

"It is over Amelia. I love Fenris too. He is our goddamn brother, but his childhood ended the moment we failed her and him. Remember that it was us who failed, not this poor child who..." Ben stopped for a couple of moments before releasing yet another sigh.

"Did you even read what she endured? If you had, you would see that there is no wonder why those things that emerged from her killed everything that they deemed as a threat. It is a miracle there were survivors. I really do not want to see what could happen if she is full of hate." Ben said.

Amelia tried to defend herself.

"I could not stomach the medical report," she responded, leaving him unsurprised.

"Well... I read every detail because I was among the people who failed her. And since you insist on calling her a monster. I will tell you everything that made her into that because your delicate stomach could not handle a piece of paper." Ben confronted her.

She told him not to do so, but it was too late. He would not stop because of her pleas. If anything, he wanted her views to change.

"I will start with the straightforward stuff for you. Multiple beatings produced hematomas all over her body. She got lacerations to her lip and the inner tissues of her mouth. Probably from a fist or something else, we still are trying to find things back at the manor to add to the report. She also had multiple lacerations with a heated, sharp object to her torso, deforming her for life. I do not think she will have normal breast-like you do sister, so consider yourself lucky." Ben snapped, continuing his assault.

"Her abdomen has been scarred for life too and she has multiple burns in those areas. They cut her arms and legs into which will probably leave scars too. That child is just a year younger than our brother yet is thinner than she should be. They probably starved her often, but that is not even the worst of it. She is skin and bones. Oh, on her back you can see scars from multiple whippings she endured over the years." His sister, who walked away, interrupted him.

"I don't want to hear anymore," Amelia said, walking away from Ben as a loud noise came from the door.

"Too bad, Amelia. You will not let your cripple brother here without his cane, right?" Ben threatened her.

She ran back to him. He had snapped his cane in half.

"Ben! Are you crazy?!?" she scolded her brother.

He continued with his report.

"She had multiple lacerations in her anus, rectum, colon, vulva, and vagina, too. We believe a stick was used to violate her. They found multiple splinters in her colon and in her uterus, cervix, and vagina during surgery. One even made its way to one of her ovaries, damaging it. She will have a hard time to have a child like you. The saddest part of all of this is that it could have been avoided if we had searched the manor and found her in the basement where she laid for an entire day." Ben finished.

Amelia called for help from the nurses that were down the hall. Most of the things he said that day made no sense to me. I would not know until later what the sisters had truly robbed me of. After that, help came and dragged Ben away. Amelia left angrier than what she had arrived. Tears ran down my eyes. I remembered everything that had happened, who that voice belonged to. So, that young silver Lycan was Ben.

The cat that sat by the door turned back towards me and swiftly jumped into the bed. Her blue eyes were radiant as I reached out to it, only to feel a familiar aura coming from it.

"You are still here..." I sobbed.

She seemed to smile before licking my fingers. Her tongue tickled as she sat down on my belly that was slightly sore. Tears still fell off my cheeks as I petted her, even though it hurt to do so.

"I cannot keep calling you her or you, now can I? Hm... Shade... Do you like it?" I giggled a bit.

She purred in response to her new name. Before I could say another thing, the same man in a coat came into the room only to rush out in a hurry upon spotting me awake. However, the expression of fear when he saw me burned into my mind. I was left alone once again. Was it truly my fault?

I... It can’t be. I...

It was not long before an armed group came into the room, followed by the female vampire that I had seen back when there was chaos. This time she wore an eye patch that covered her left eye. There were traces of claw wounds on her face. The look of fear on most of their faces told me all I had to know. What the two argued out of my room was true.

Trying to not think, I just stared at the female vampire as she came up to me and grabbed onto my hand. Next to the bracelet I had, she placed a black bracelet next to it that had the same crystal as before for a charm. She did the same to my other arm. Before grabbing my chin and checking my neck. She then released a sigh of relief.

"Lieutenant, are the inhibitors working?" Asked one soldier, who seemed terrified to be in the room with me.

"Yes, they seem to work for now." The vampire lady answered, picking up a chair and sitting next to me.

"Do you remember anything?" She asked.

I remained silent. There was no way I would tell her, but it did not matter if I did. She already knew by the silence that I remembered.

"Can you tell us what happened to you?" She continued to piece everything that happened together.

I remained silent. There was no point in answering her questions. Instead of giving up, she continued to question me, as I stayed the same. It all changed though, the moment the door opened once again, and I saw his face. Fenris... Ben accompanied him and what I presumed to be Amelia, a white-haired female Lycan.

The moment the silver boy's gaze met with mine. An expression of pure shock appeared on his face before he bolted away from the room, breaking me from within. His expression hurt more than anything that came before this moment.

"I told you so!" Amelia yelled at Ben, running off to check on Fenris.

Unable to control the pain that swelled within, I grabbed onto my face as tears streamed down my eyes. I wailed louder than when my mother died. My light hated me. He could not even stand the sight of me anymore. The bracelets that were placed on me glowed as they tried to control the power that was swelling from within once again, but it was too much. Shade who laid on me doubled in size as my emotions were in disarray.

"Tania the tranquilizer!" Ben yelled at the female vampire.

Tania reached over towards the table where a ready syringe laid, jamming it onto my neck. It sent me back into the abyss, where I prayed I would stay. I did not want to live in a world where Fenris would look at me like that. I robbed him of his smile, which was something I could not forgive. No, it was something I would never forgive. With my dreamless state, I stood in the darkness, wishing I would die.

The next time I opened my eyes, I felt hollow. Nothing mattered anymore. Shade laid on my stomach once again. When Tania came in after being found awake again by a nurse. She explained they had changed my bracelet with another magical crystal to prevent my emotions from going out of control. This crystal would keep me from going over the edge, making it safe to be around me.

They put it to the test by telling me everything that had happened to Silverant. I had destroyed half of the town, along with its innocent civilians. Probably over six hundred people were dead or missing since the event. They were still searching for bodies.

Tania also tested my capacity by telling me how Fenris was found. It seemed one creature had attacked where he was. It killed his mother the moment it went for him as she tried to shield him from the beast. They found it interesting how it did not kill Fenris once it had him.

Instead, it dragged him towards the middle of the event. He was found just a couple of meters away from the crater. It seemed my desire to see him had made the creatures hunt him down and bring him towards me. Although that was a detail they did not fully know. For them, it seemed like a coincidence, since they did not understand my feelings for the little wolf.

The last test I had to pass was Fenris. He seemed to be a trigger for me. Amelia fought them, of course. But eventually, they brought the poor, traumatized boy back into the room with me. His eyes seemed so conflicted by everything that was happening. My obsession with him had taken away everything he loved.

For a moment and just a slight moment, I felt a rush of sorrow after knowing everything I had done before. Nothing. It was as if something temporally turned off my emotions. When I did not lose control, everyone went overjoyed. They had avoided an apocalyptic scenario, but at the same time they killed off my ability to feel.

However, unlike everyone else in the room, Ben and Fenris did not seem happy about the results at all. To Ben, it seemed inhuman what they were doing to me. To Fenris... I did not know what bothered him. Was it the fact I had made him an orphan? Or that I had killed most of the people he knew? I did not blame him for not wanting to see me. It took a while, but eventually Ben got Fenris to come into the room to visit me daily.

I was his charge for life, after all. His duty was to care for me, though he never spoke to me while he was in the room. Ben would usually try to create chatter, but I would never talk back at those times, either. I had lost the right gaze at Fenris directly.

Ben had become my guardian, he was the one officially making choices for me. Fenris was still too young to make those choices for now. Even though Ben wanted to remove the crystal that was making me into an emotionless doll, he could not overrule the Cerberus Order's will. Ben truly was a kind young man, but he was way over his head with me.

I was a monster, yet he insisted on treating me like a child. A child that took his arm and ability to walk normally. It seemed he would have a permanent limp after the event, and his arm would not regrow out of anywhere. Lycans were powerful and could heal almost anything, but missing ligaments and limbs were out of their range.

It took more than a week, but the day arrived where, for the first time, Fenris came in alone into my room with a gift in his hands. Placing it on my lap, he avoided my gaze as I picked it up and opened it. It was bread covered in pink powder, along with another small box. Opening the box, I found a red collar with a golden bell attached to it. Confused, I glanced at him to see him fidgeting with his shirt.

"It is for your... Whatever it is..." Fenris tried to start a conversation with me, making the warmest sensation rise within me.

It was almost like butterflies had invaded my tummy. However, I had no right to feel this way. It quickly changed to something else.

"Thank you. Shade says she loves it." I simpered, feeling only sadness for everything I had done to the boy that sat next to me, triggering the inhibitor to turn on.

"You do not have to say that to me," Fenris mumbled.

I nodded in response. Seeing the chance, we were alone, and he was talking to me. I offered my right hand to him.

"I do not deserve this bracelet please take it," I whispered, feeling nothing.

 He turned to me; his eyes watery before glancing down towards the floor.

"You do." Fenris grabbed onto the hand I have offered to comfort me.

Back then I did not know what he meant by what he said, but at least I saw a glimmer of hope for the friendship I so wished to have with him. I never allowed myself to be delusion by his kindness. The way he looked at me would never be the same as it once was. They would never forgive me for what had occurred the day of the fall.

Weeks passed before my wounds healed enough to be discharged from the hospital. After being let out, they sent me to live with Ben and Fenris in Cerberus' new headquarters, where my new limited life began. With each year that passed, Fenris warmed up to me again. I was his life's charge, after all. His burden to bear.

Would that be all I would ever be?