Silence, something that the Maggot's Nest didn't seem to know that it existed. Even in the depths of the prison, where the only thing that illuminates the bland, grey walls were torches of blue flames that just kept the room dim he could hear the screams and yells of other prisoners. God dammit what he would give for some fucking peace and quiet! Even in his own thoughts he couldn't escape from this awful reality that was dealt to him. Why...just why was this happening to him? Why was he cursed with this tragic fate from a long forgotten clan's actions? Why did he have to die? All of these questions kept running through his head, but in the end the answer's didn't matter nor will they ever ben answered. It was just the way things are and that's that. It would've been better if he just accepted that rather than torturing his own mind.
How long had he been in this isolated prison? A day, a week, a month? Who knows? Time moves slow when you're just sitting there staring at bars all day and night. Zheng looked down at the cuffs that held him, wooden cuffs around his wrists and ankles that kept him from using hakuda and for some reason any kido. It was impossible for him to move, just as they liked it. A slam of a metal door and a man walked into the hallway with a tray of rice grool and a cup of water. Oh great it's this fucking prick again.
The man was tall, but as fat as a cow with sagging man tits that fell against the fabric and had few strands of hair slicked back on his already balding head. As ugly this fucker was, his personality made him look like Fabio. "Oi Chiyou Zheng! You scrub here's your food." He slid the tray through a latch and Zheng went down on his knees and grabbed a spoon to eat the grey, cold slop. The man sneered at him and folded his flabby arms against his man tits. Oh how he loved it when others knelt down on their knees to eat food only suitable for pigs. "How is it? Kneeling down like a commoner to a man as great as myself."
Zheng glanced up the man, swallowing the goop. "Your mother and sister love it when I kneel down in between their legs you fat, hollow shit eating piece of fuck." He went back down to eat his dinner, only to hear the barred door open and ate a piece of foot instead, landing on his ass. Blood came out of his lip and he licked it up with his tongue before receiving another kick to the face landing on his back and kept getting stomped on his stomach over and over again unrelentingly, feeling the air keep getting knock out of him as vomit spat out of his mouth.
"You lowly cunt! Say that again! Say that again and see what happens you fucking cock sucking, ass licking commoner! Say it again!" Over and over again he stomped on Zheng's stomach with all the weight and force he had. This small time noble's eyes were filled with outrage at being insulted by a child. When he finally stopped he was panting heavily, rubbing sweat down from his brow. He looked at the child curled up in a ball, coughing and vomiting more of his lunch over the floor. "Now think better than to insult a noble, brat." Slam! The door was shut and he walked off triumphantly.
This pain...god dammit he couldn't stop vomiting. His braided pony tail came undone, leaving his hair spread out across the floor. What a pathetic sight he was lying there with a pool of his vomit and blood. He knew that he barely had a shred of dignity, but whatever dignity he still had he never gave it to that fat bastard. Not once did he beg for him to stop hurting him, not once did he cry from the overwhelming pain, nor did he even let it bother him. If he lost that pride then he truly would fall into a pit of despair that he would never be able to climb out of. He won't break...no he won't break.
Finally regaining his strength, he sat back up and began to eat the dinner that was brought to him. It was disgusting, but he can't complain it. The bowl was empty and the glass of water was sitting by his side, barely any water was sipped. Zheng wanted to make the water last and savor it as it is not something that is given out unless it is with meals. Again he stared at the bars of his cell again and began to count them over and over again just to keep his mind preoccupied until he would drift off into sleep. Everything became hazy all of a...yawn...Zheng fell asleep with his head laid against the stone wall. At last now he had some escape from reality.
A gentle smile, the smile of a beautiful woman with long dark hair down to the waist and dark grey eyes waving off a young boy with shoulder length black hair and the same steel gray eyes. "Have fun Zheng! Make sure to come back in time for lunch okay?" She called out to the boy who smiled so brightly and waved back at her.
"I will mom! Bye bye!" He ran off away from shack made of poor quality timber found around the streets.
His mother just watched him run off and sighed, closing her eyes. "Oh please be careful..."
Oh to be a little kid! To have boundless energy to be used for playtime with other children. The young Zheng ran as fast as his bare feet could against the dirt pathway in the 72nd district of the Southern Rukongai. The district didn't have a good quality of life and it was obvious by the shacks and people dressed in rags, heck they didn't even have sandals. There was little to eat and what there was they fought and scrounged for it. Many people died everyday from famine and disease...it was hard to find a person smiling at all in these horrid conditions, but Zheng still found reason to. He had his mother and that's all he needed. Sure he was always a bit hungry and when it was cold his clothes didn't keep him very warm, but he tried to not let it bother him too much.
He just kept on running to meet his friend Daisuke or as he called him Dai, under the tangerine tree by the river. It didn't take him too long to arrive there, but where was Dai? "Dai? Oh Daaaaaaai! Where are you?!" He walked down the river calling his name, but then he noticed a crowd of older boys surrounding a white haired boy with gold eyes. Oh no not them...this group harassed the sorry kid lead by a kid named Chang-ho, a tall kid with a shaven head and a rough, mean face. He was missing two of his front teeth. "Oi get away from him!"
The group just pushing and shoving Dai around, laughing and taunting the small, scrawny child. "Oh come on, aren't you going to share those sunflower seeds with us? Your best friends?" Chang-ho spoke with such ill intent, taking pleasure in terrorizing his target. Arching his brow he turned his head to see Zheng to be running at him. A sickening sneer spread along that foul mouth of his. "Well ain't it the calvary. Beat it runt or I'll break that jaw of yours. I'm feeling generous today so why don't you scram before I change my mind?" Oh how his cronies and him laughed and laughed. The bastard wouldn't be talking shit if he didn't have anyone backing him up!
Clenching his fist tightly, he stared at Chang-ho and his goons with rage and hate. "One of these days penis breath you're gonna to get yours! I'm gonna be a captain of a squad of shinigami and when I do you'll get it! I swear it!" Zheng yelled with fierce determination, his fists held up to his face ready to fight at the drop of a hat. Oh boy he really was in for it now.
Chang-ho was not amused at this proclamation. When the rest of the group laughed he turned his head to look at them with murder in his eyes. Out of fear they stopped and remained silent as they watched their leader walk up to the younger boy. "Zheng, Zheng, Zheng...are you trying to threaten me? I see you need a dose of reality fodder. You'll never become a captain because you're weak. You can't protect your friend from us and you can't protect anyone else. For example, your mother...maybe when you're head is buried in the ground I'll go over and make her feel like a real woman." Cracking his knuckles, he charged towards Zheng. "No one here will ever be able to become someone like that. We're just animals fighting and killing just to live another day in this little slice of shit that we live in. Give up."
"GRAAAAAAAAAAAAH!" Zheng released his war cry and the fight ensued. In the end Zheng was carried back by Dai back to his mother's place after receiving one hell of a beating from Chang-ho.
"Zheng...you should've just walked away. I would've given my sunflower seeds to Chang-ho and they would've just left us alone..." Dai sighed and leaned back against the shack's wall. Oh god how could've he gotten Zheng mixed up in this mess? Now he was being bandaged up by his mother from the savage beating he received from the goon.
He shot a glare at Dai and winced in pain as his mother tended his wounds. "It's out of principal! We've been keeping those sunflowers a secret for so long just so we could have the seeds! If we gave them to the prick then he'd just keep it up!" The stubbornness of this kid was stupid. There was no point in trying to talk to him about it. Even if he tried to fight back he just got beaten to a pulp by the bully. Ugh god fucking dammit he just couldn't win no matter what!
"No cursing!" His mother slapped one of Zheng's wounds, causing him to cry out in pain slightly. Dai and Zheng remained in silence for the rest of the time. His friend decided he should head back home and left him to be bandaged up. Once he was gone, Zheng began to shake and looked down at the dirt floor he was sitting on, little drops of tears hit the ground. "Sweetie what's wrong?" She spoke so soothingly as she held her boy close to her and stroked his hair.
"I-I-I hate being this weak!" The child croaked out. "I c-can't protect myself, Dai, you, or anyone! I w-w-want to b-be strong! I want to be someone that everyone in this forsaken place that can be looked up to as someone who started from living here and become a captain! I want to make these people feel like that life just isn't hopeless! That they have a chance too!" Zheng broke out sobbing, feeling his mother stroking his hair and holding him close as she turned his head so that he could cry on her shoulder. "And most of all I want to make people like Chang-ho pay! People who prey on the weak to survive because they are stronger shouldn't exist! I hate this world that we live in! I want to change it!"
She just held him and rocked him back and forth gently as her child let out his frustrations and anger towards the world that they live in. " There there...my sweet, sweet boy. You really are good son." She smiled and kissed his forehead and started to recite something.
"Out of the night that covers me,
Black as the pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.
In the fell clutch of circumstance
I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of chance
My head is bloody, but unbowed.
Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the Horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years
Finds and shall find me unafraid.
It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate,
I am the captain of my soul."
She smiled sweetly at him and pat his head. "When you are in times strife my son just recite this poem. You're someone that I know will change the world so don't lament yet. Time will make you stronger." She slid off her golden bangles, something quite unusual for someone wearing rags to have and placed them around Zheng's wrists. "You'll make better use of them then I ever wish I could. Promise me you'll be-"
The dream was disrupted with Zheng's face falling down onto the dirt floor of his cell. "Seriously...fucking hell." He looked up at the bars again, but for the first time since he arrived in the Maggot's Nest he smiled. "I am the master of my fate. I am the captain of my soul." Almost as if he had lost it he began to mutter the entire poem over and over again as if it was a sutra. No matter what happens, no matter what hell he'll go through he shall not give up on hope. He shall not let.
