A rhythmic beat of hard thuds comes from a small room. A young boy is endlessly throwing punches at a mat on the wall of his room. His hands are covered in calluses and red from strain. The mat on the wall is worn and dented. Caved in the same spot he is hitting.
Similar dents cover the walls, some worse than others while some are covered by new padding.
The pain in his hands doesn't seem to bother him. He seems dazed and lost not in thought, in a numbness more painful than what he's doing. No thoughts. No feelings.
His room is just as empty. A plain messy bed, an empty desk with dents and white matted-up walls. There are no windows or natural light in sight. The only thing that fills this empty room is the radio playing. He mimics the same beat as each song that plays.
A knock at the door doesn't seem to get through to him. Another knock follows and then another until a loud slam shakes the room, knocking his radio over, finally gaining his attention.
"Open the bloody door! I've been knocking for ages." A rough elderly voice says from behind the door.
"F*ck off." The kid replies as he goes to put his radio back up.
"This little..." She sighs. " You don't have a choice here, lad. Open the door or I'm breaking the f*cking door in."
The kid groans in a mixture of annoyance and anger. He puts the radio back up before impulsivley slamming his fist on the desk, knocking it back down again. He goes to place the radio back up but another load slam at the door stops him.
He stomps over to the door and slams the button to open it, but as a result, the button gets jammed. It opens quickly showing an older woman and a younger kid.
"Damn it what did you do this time?" The woman complains.
"Your fault for pushing me." the kid says as he hits the wall to unjam the button.
"Pay attention next time and f*cking be respectful, you have a gift." She pushes the younger kid forward.
The older kid looks at him and looks at the woman.
"An earth kid... What about him?" He goes back to unjamming it.
"Oh, you shit." She rolls her eyes. " Have some f*cking gratitude, Chairman Jejtana picked him for you."
"Cool, now f*ck off."
"You gotta be- I don't have the patience to deal with you. " She pushes the younger kid forward and starts stomping away. "This is Tab. If you break him, Chairman Jejtana ain't giving you another chance."
The younger one looks on at the older one, seeing him finally unjam the button and close the door. Yet the older one doesn't acknowledge his presence, seemingly trying his hardest to ignore him.
The older one goes to his radio and puts it back in place but it doesn't seem to be working anymore. He grunts before starting to fiddle with it.
The younger one continues to stare before going to bed. He starts to make it, straightening the bed cover and tucking in the blanket. Once everything is done, he proudly sits on it.
The older one barely notices at first but seeing him sit so proudly catches his attention. He sits down as he takes a part of the radio to check the power supply.
"Do you know why you're here?" the older one says.
The younger one doesn't say anything but looks on at what he's doing intently. This peeves off the older one.
"How old are you?" The older one says.
"I just turned 13. " The younger one replies.
"So I'm older than you..." He takes some pride in that fact.
YOU ARE READING
Warframe: The outliers.
Science Fiction25 years before the main story of warframe The little prince of the ship has had enough of being a corpus. He's battered and injured, and he lost the only thing keeping him together on the ship because of a tenno. He goes to his mother, one...
