Illustrious has a minion!

Fabled the Preod

Nobody really wants to be a hero.

Sure, we all dream about that day. Making a difference, changing the world, being adored by the masses. Fame, fortune, everything.

But no one ever stopped and asked a hero what it's really like. When the cameras stop flashing, when the lights are down, when all the women are done swooning and the adoring citizens are done screaming. When you have to take off your mask, and live with what's been done for the day. When you have to live with the choices you've made. All the noise is gone and you're left with your own screaming thoughts.

Who am I to judge? Who am I to say what a hero's life is like?
I'm just the guy from "The Incident". They only call me this because they think it highlights what I did. "Renowned, glorious in deeds or works". Ha.

None of them never ask about the ghosts that haunt me at night.
They see me as this redemption story; the worthless guy off the streets turned to a hero. Cleaned up his act, an inspiration to us all. It's all so superficial. They don't even know the half of it. No one ever asks; I know they don't care enough so I don't tell them.

I was homeless, ragged, living off the streets. Looking for the next high, the next little bit of anything to take my mind off of the complete garbage that was my life.
I had a lover you know, if you can call it that. She was always on something, and I'm not sure if she loved me or the idea of a fantasy life that could exist while she waited for her next fix. I'm not sure if that fantasy was the fairy tale dream or a sensual goddess, but it didn't much matter to me.
I was content with having one thing worth anything in my life; even if it wasn't "real".

So when I saw the smoke in the air and I knew it was coming from that abandoned warehouse, the one she frequented to so often, I felt for the first time in my life the need to do something...anything.
I sprinted down the back alleys, ramming through the double doors. I think there were some junkies yelling the first intelligent thing in a long time, telling me not to go in, the place was on fire and collapsing. But I had stopped listening to anything at that point. The smoke rolled across me as I opened the door, debris caught on fire piled around me.

And then I could hear her. I heard her scream; bewildered and at the same time hazy. Like she thought this was all just a bad trip, and it would be over once she worked it all out of her system.
I ran toward her voice, and could see her body shifting through a hole in one pile of debris. I sifted through the ruins, trying to make a hole large enough to save her. She saw me and smiled dreamily, like I was an angel in her nightmare.

Then I heard that shuffle behind me.

I turned quickly, wondering what was going on. Was the building falling even faster than before?
But no, I saw the head of a child. Then her body, squirming about under a few fallen beams. Making a cage that an adult could escape fairly simply from, but not such a small child.

I looked at her clothes. They were current, the outfit put together with great care and love.
She wasn't "from here". She wasn't one of us. One of the lost, homeless, broken, beat down people roaming the street.
She was lost. In the wrong place at a horribly wrong time.

The beams started falling with greater speed, the flames roaring up around me. My head was going light with smoke, and I knew I didn't have much time.
I looked down at the hole I had been digging. At my lover, staring at me with those bloodshot, dazed eyes; vacant and lost.
I thought of all the chances she had had, and all the chances I had had. All of the screw-ups that had led us where we were.

And all the chances this child hadn't had.

And I ran.
Away from her. To the child.
I lifted the beams off her with a bit of effort, lifting her from the ground and dodging a beam or two that began to fall.
Then I ran even faster to the door, coughing, determined for once to do something worth doing.

I never looked back.
I was afraid to. Afraid that moment would trap me here forever. Afraid that I would be trapped with her.
Her as she came out of her high and realized this fate I left her to.

I stumbled out the door, heaving and staggering.
Onlookers watched, awed. I heard a whimpering cry and a woman rushed toward me.
She snatched the child from my arms and hugged her. I had never seen someone look at me with such disgust. As though someone as low as me should ever touch her precious infant.

But then an amazing thing happened. She paused and looked back, this time with complete gratitude.
She stammered thank you over and over, crying and shaking and hugging her child.

The building collapsed long before the fire department arrived.
The flames and smolder were put out, the place condemned even more than it already was.
And the woman, telling the officials, telling anyone who would listen, the story of my saving her child. Her gratitude.

The rest has gone by so fast, I can hardly tell it anymore.
I was recognized and had an easy time getting out, getting back on my feet.
I've become successful now, doing very well for myself. A true redemption story.
The man I am now is why they call me Illustrious. I've done great things for this city, and am well on my way to do more.

But at the end of the day, none of it makes me as happy as it should.
Because no one ever bothers to ask why I ran into a burning building. No one cares. The only concern is that I saved a child, and that makes me a hero, and that that's all that matters. Right?

...Then why when I lay down do her eyes haunt me; like an angel turned to nightmares?