10. No

Through all the week, he ended too tired to try anything. After his interviews and trainings, either he came back to his home directly to his bed or to be for some hours with his family. After the second day of the week, he forgot completely about his Sunday’s encounter and the name he told him to look for.

At the beginning he was really motivated and feeling proud of his accomplishments. He won in his training matches, he kept smiling and answering as the kindest person in all the island, even he thought his sense of humor was improving.

He almost felt like a new man, someone more optimistic and ready for anything. Which, of course, gave a lot of more hopes and happiness to the people that was always listening to him. Even their family was amazed by how sincere his smiles were lately. Not that they thought of him like a liar, only that they believed he put too much effort in his personality after knowing the grumpy and shy Teshal they saw growing up.

However, all that energy and optimism lasted five days more. As if he was running out of battery, his brightness began to minimize. His smile was still there, his winning stake was intact, his answers as animated as ever. Just when he got to hide himself was when he felt as if all his energy was drained away.

It was a pretty normal occurrence around his third month as the protector. Being a whole different person of his usual self was more tiresome as he’d thought. But no, after six months and a week of his debut, looked like he was not cut off to be that shiny.

It was Sunday in the afternoon, after waking up and look for an hour, or two, to the ceiling, that he remembered the name the boy asked to look. First, he took care of himself: with a shower, a meal and some movies with his family.

At noon he was ready to do the search, but all his plans crumbled at his feet when he was called to misguide a ship that was coming from the east. With nothing more than a sigh, he went to the car that was waiting for him to escort him to the place needed while his family went to hide. It wasn’t his chance yet.

9. Etc

With nothing more to say between them, they walked to the shore, took off their shoes and let the cold water from the sea soak their feet. It was a peaceful night, the city noises were quieter as other nights, the stars shone brighter too.

What started as an awkward company from a stranger, became a comfortable moment shared by two nameless persons. They didn’t need nothing, nor talk about anything, just here, each one of them with their own thoughts until the clock reached owerin the morning. 

“Would you be back at the same place tomorrow?” asked the boy when he stood up, shaking off the sand from his clothes.

“I don’t know, I’m not this free every day,” neither that he felt like going to the same places as a routine, he was always walking to different directions when he felt like running away from his true life. Sometimes going from north to south, from some streets to one city to another. In those cases he was thankful that his powers allowed him to go across long distances by himself in a short time.

“Well if someday you feel like going to a peaceful place with people that would never ask questions, look for “etc. lost”, there’s an address where I usually go, it’s a nice place.”

“And why are you not there but here or that other place?” the protector asked, still without looking at him, the observation made the boy laugh.

“Sometimes you feel like drowning your problems, sometimes like forgetting the noise you can’t erase and sometimes like silencing it peacefully.” With just that, the boy left. Teshal stayed in the same place for a little while longer until he thought it was enough.

It was a lie if he said he wasn’t interested in what the boy was saying, but his every week activities kept him far from that curiosity. His trainer decided to reinforce his training sessions in every aspect, and the people from the media was as interested in his as in the beginning, making him wonder when he would become old news.

He carried his smile and reassuring looks wherever he was asked to go and was presented before the people of the island. Without caring about being asked the same questions, made to show the advances in his trainings or whoever he met, his calm and kind demeanor was never lost.

Although he never thought of himself as handsome, only plain looking, people kept treating him as if he were some young idol the younger and the older could dream about. One of the reasons he abandoned all the social media focused on the reality, just keeping himself entertained with animated movies, comics, books, and videogames. Not that he had something to call enough free time to that. 

8. Turn left

The silence between you prevails for a bit longer than before, this time the protector even turned around to see if he was still there, and he was, just drinking in silence, with his eyes fixed in nothing.

He couldn’t know what made him asked about those exact situations, neither if was speaking about himself or someone else. Still, he wasn´t feeling as curious as to ask, he could relate of the time he had so many questions to ask, those that pop-up in his mind without apparent reason, and he knew how uncomfortable would made him feel when he didn’t have any way to explain it.

“Want something to drink?” finally asked the boy when he got up.

“No, thanks, I don’t like either alcohol or coffee,” the protector answered absently, he was a bit focused in the song that was playing from one of the establishments. Until he heard a laugh came from the guy he had at his side, making him turned left to watch what was making him be so loud, noticing that he was still looking at him.

“So you decided to come to a place where the only thing they sell are drinks made of alcohol and coffee, even if you don’t drink any?” At that point he was hugging his stomach, people around look at him as if they wanted to know what was so funny so they could laugh too, but when they just saw the other guy looking so confused, they lost interest.

“For a reason I’m not inside those places and only here,” the protector answered when the other’s laugh started to cease.

“Well they have teas, weird fruits drinks, coke and other stuff, I guess.” He went back to seat at his side, watching from there to some of the menus of the locals. The action made Teshal give a faint smile before he stood up.

“Maybe another day, I’m not feeling like tasting nothing right now, thanks.” He started walking from where he came from, he still didn’t want to go back to the House, so he wanted to be at the shore for a bit. However he quickly noticed the same guy was still following him, now without his glass. “What? Are you gonna stab me or just rob me? I don’t even have my phone with me”

What he said made the guy laugh again, putting on his sweatshirt hood to walk at his side. “Man, relax, I like the way you see the things, at least what you said before so now I’m curious…” They walked that way for some minutes, less than five till he spoke again “Wait… are you maybe the thief here? I didn’t bring my prone either and the money for my drink was everything I had in me” He showed how his pockets were empty.

“Do I look like a thief?”

“Well, you’re more covered than me, either you’re a celebrity, someone with low self-esteem or a thief” He was referring about his mask, his cap covering his hair and the hood he had on, even though they were near the cost, where those clothing were far from a normal outfit. “But I don’t care who are you or if you’re gonna kill me right here, I just feel comfortable around you.”

7. Fallen

Sundays were the only days he could really rest for all the week activities. Primary because the training always worn him out the most, making him be fully awake, though not fully recovered, at two in the afternoon. He always loved to sleep, to stop thinking and let the day pass without having to do nothing, so his force came out to him thinking in how much he would enjoy his only day off. He even went and slept in the basement of the Protector’s house so the noises from his family wouldn’t wake him up before his body said that it was enough sleep.

It was true that being with his family, as if nothing had changed, gave him some energy back, but nothing beat a moment for him to be alone and far from all the remainders of how his life wouldn’t ever be the same as before. Sometimes he wouldn’t be out of the basement until the next day, sometimes he came up to eat with his family and watch some movies, a few times they even went to the movie theater, always in incognito mode.

Sometimes, like that one, he came out in the night, when they were about to had dinner. After a short chat, his family went to sleep while he decided to go out.

Again, he was walking alone through the streets of the city, with his identity covered, he just watched from afar and heard the sounds of the sea. He was glad that his resting day wasn’t ruined by a ship sighting, as it had happened before.

He stopped until he reached a plaza where the shops around where of coffee and beer. The young and the old were almost mixed, with loud music and bright lights which made it look as it was daytime still. He went and seated in the hedge that surrounded some trees, looking at the few stars he could watch from there.

People was around smoking or drinking, talking aloud, but he had his mind far from there. Once again thinking in the day he had fallen in all the madness of the powers he never asked for.

“What’s so interesting up there?” asked the person that occupied the space next to him, he didn’t bother in look if was a woman or a man.

“Nothing, but there’s neither down here”

“Yeah, I know the feeling.” The short laugh he heard made him know it was a man, maybe young as him. None of them speak again for some time, for a second he wondered if the guy went already or if he was looking the same as him, however he didn´t took down his face until he felt his back ache, just the moment he decided to speak again. “If you could give your life to people who wants to live, but can’t, would you do it?”

The protector thought about it, it was almost what he was doing, giving his all to the people of the island who wanted to live. Even if he didn’t want it, it was what he needed to do. For a moment he thought the boy saw through his disguise, but when he turned to see him, he noticed how his eyes were a bit watery and red. The question was not in that sense.

“Yeah, I would do it,” he finally said, looking up once more. “There’s people dying who wish to live, and people living with the growing wish to be dead. I would love to give both what they want.

“But it could be that people who wanted to die… may realize that they wanted to live in the verge of death, doesn’t it? Cowards, maybe.”

“No cowards, indecisive or maybe, gifted, because in the right time they saw his mistake.” The conversation was turning too weird, we wasn’t sure anymore if it was real or not.

6. Lifestyle

On Saturday Teshal awaken before his clock alarm went off, he laid on bed thinking first in what he needed to do. As his trainer asked, he was to train by himself with his powers, they still wanted to know the limits of his powers, to know if those were completely as the original protectors, if those were stronger or weaker, if they could be combined or not. Because the danger it could led if he got distracted or were to try something too violent, he was made to train alone, so he didn’t hurt anyone, in one of the island’s highest mountain.

Every Saturday he had to exhaust himself entirely. In the first three months was with each of the powers of the original protectors. Used them in all the ways he was able to imagine and to know how much it took a toll on his body. The next two months were about combining them, make the most exhausting and easy combinations, to know which were the ones he could use when his energy was almost depleted or in his last moments.

The last month was about using all of them, all the time, all the combinations possible and even the weirdest. Those experiments, which discussed previously with his trainers, ended with him falling asleep on top of the mountain, too tired. When he hurt himself, he took some minutes or hours to heal before restarting. 

He knew his family was not really happy with that training, it was the day they hated the most, so they tried to keep their minds far from it, however the mountain was almost in the center of the island, almost everybody could see the explosions and lights coming from up there.

This month kept the same target about making the weirdest or useful combinations until he ran out of energy, even new ones were added for him to restore his energy without stopping his imaginary fighting. That’s why he was laying on his bed without moving, even after his phone was ringing with his trainer trying to reach him before he went up the mountain. He knew it was a savage training, he knew it hurt and he hated to be too tired to go back to his home before the next day. It wasn’t healthy, it was hated by his family and by him, but it was really needed to go that far with a body he thought it wasn’t the same as before.

When he picked up the call, his trainer told him about new ideas and new warnings. “It’s ok, I always control the fires before it consumes the woods,” he tried to reassure his trainer because last week people though it almost happened, the thing was he fell asleep for some seconds before realizing where his fire was going; this time he had the idea to cover his peripheral area in ice and crystal that could prevent any accident.

Before going out from his home, he received his mother meal, the one she prepared every Saturday for him to eat when he needed. He was grateful although there were many days in which he had to throw it away because he was too tired to feed himself or in too much pain to feel hungry. But, as always, he would never tell her about it, to no one. In his new lifestyle the lies and pretending were his most trusted defenses.

5. Not to brag

The train scheduled for that day, Friday, was in the south military facilities. As previous visits, he was there to learn more special fighting techniques and information about the modern gun power they’d found in some ships that he stopped. Sometimes they spoke about new tactics or countermeasures worth to change, but that mostly happened the first weeks after the latest attack or ship sighting.

For that day, however, he was sent with some elite soldiers to train. Some were around his age, some older and two youngers, all of them with the muscles trained and showing off, a big contrast with his thinner and shorter physique. In fact, all of them were laughing about it, taking a photo before the exercise, preparing for the video while exercising and hoping the photo after was as funny as the first one.

When he began learning about fighting, something he never did before, he gave his trainers a hard time. At first because his physical condition was the worst, although he was not overweight, he was absolutely not used to physical activity like running, so he had to train that part before learning how to punch.

He detested being sweaty and tired, but he still put all his efforts in getting better, even when fighting without using his abilities, he was trying his best. Once they let him mix his supernatural abilities with his fighting style, he became a lot better.

As much as he liked to be modest and stand out the less, his new life as the protector was everything but that. In less than twenty minutes he defeated the fifteen of them while using his powers, because that’s what they asked him to do.

In the second exercise they used weapons against him, same that he evaded as nothing and tackled them once more to the ground. The final one was without using his abilities. He was tired, so his experienced opponents, so the exercise was a bit longer and effort needed, same that he lost because he wasn’t physical stronger than them.

“I can’t wait to train with you in like two years,” said one of the youngest while drinking their special water after the last photo was taken.

“No to brag but I bet he’d beat you in five months if he trains a lot more,” joined his current trainer.

“Sorry but I don’t want to be so buff… I like my current weakling self; it makes the enemies to underestimated me.” With that, all of them laugh again, knowing it was true.

4. Revert

In the night, after another busy day visiting places as the public figure he was now, he came back the same time as his brother. Although having a younger brother being the latest protector had his brother’s life a bit changed; he still could do the same as before like going to work, now moving with a driver and car set by the government, going early to the gym and in the weekends with their mother and aunt to the supermarket.

Because Teshal was too popular, it was normal for them to be stopped to receive presents, cards and stuff that were meant to be for the protector, some for them. They weren’t really bothered by the actions, people were careful and not to all over them, but still took some time to deal with everyone. They weren’t surrounded by hundreds, sometimes between five or even twenty.

His brother chose the government transportation due that in the first days after all was settle, he arrived late to work because he didn’t want to be rude to the people who was being so grateful towards his younger brother. While his mother and aunt had their own cars, they weren’t as bothered as him.

“Hard work today?” asked Teshal’s brother while both went upstairs to change their shoes and clothes, after saying hi to their mother.

“The usual, going from here to there, talking and the stuff.” All his life, Teshal’s answer to the usual question of how was your day? Was fine. In contrast as how his brother sometimes answered talking about the thing that made him upset or were funny at work. He didn’t know why but for him, speak about something as trivial as his day, was too hard, too useless.

That’s why he never told them how hard started to be being that popular. He, who was bad at socializing and speaking out his mind, now had to talk to so many strangers about him and his new powers. As the trainers and other people told them, he could have chosen to have a bit more of privacy in his life, be more secured and less public, however that option always led to make people more curious about him and, as a result, being more intrusive and persistent. In order to keep his family safe and less bothered by strangers, he opted to be the one who always fed their curiosity to the fullest.

“Would you had liked it if was you the one with the powers?” Teshal asked his brother when they were about to begin to play videogames, as they do before everything changed, they had like one month since they could do it again.

“I’d thought about it for some time and I don’t know, maybe,” he answered with a calm expression, almost confounded. “I’m not jealous, if that’s what you’re thinking, but it might had been easier for you if it was me.”

Teshal was silent for a while, because of that his brother started to play until he stopped to look at his brother again “Would you like to revert it?”

“I don’t think so, someone has to be the hope for all to feel protected, I’m ok with it now,” he lied while smiling, making his brother smile too.