Michael falls into a sudden sleep and sinks into his old memories, as if it were a bad dream…
"Where is my mother?" asked little Michael, 5 years old, to the director of the orphanage; a person with a face as old as it is evil, always covered with a very long black dress, even if she was not a nun. "She abandoned you. That's why you're with us now" said the director with a coldness not even remotely human.
"That's not true! She would never do that!" replied a boy, 11 years old, next to Michael, whose face however was not very recognizable in the dream.
"Jack. I want my mother back!" said Michael crying, referring to the boy next to him. The latter tries to reassure him, but with no success.
After a few minutes the director took the two children to their rooms: "Be good, don't make a mess and stop whining, damn it" said the director again.
Their room had a bunk bed that was almost completely rusty and was almost completely bare. The colors were gray, like the environment of that damned orphanage in the countryside; where everything could be done without fear of the authorities…
The dream suddenly jumps in time: the images are blurry, you can only see tall, black gates. There was an 8-year-old Michael on the ground, covered in mud, screaming: "Jack! Please don't leave me, don't go! Fuck please!". Jack was running away, climbing over the gate, he managed to get past it and turned around with tears in his eyes to look at Michael on the ground.
Suddenly the current Michael woke up. He was out of breath and sweaty, as if he had run a marathon.
He touched the scars he had almost all over his body and whispered: "brother my dick".
He went out of his house and from his pants pocket took one of the few cigarettes he had left and lit it with the fire of a nearby bonfire, lit by someone else. He took a few puffs of that cigarette trying to blur as much as possible the memories of that tortuous past, but it is difficult to forget those moments. Those tortures…
As soon as Michael finishes his cigarette, he goes straight to the Kallax market to look for someone else to rob, or some stalls where he can get some food.
Along the way he sees various gangs trying to rob the citizens or homeless people who are completely exasperated, to the point of not even having the warmth of any human being.
He finally arrives at his destination. In the market he pretends to look at things in general and then moves on to observe his new prey. He approaches to steal something, but the vendor he had stolen from the day before appears behind him. The latter shouts at him: "Thief! Thief! This bastard is a damned thief!".
All the other merchants look at him and shout at him, starting to chase him with makeshift homemade weapons.
Michael curses and tries to activate the Mana of Will, but without success: "why the fuck doesn't it activate!? Shit!". Michael started running like he had never done before and somehow managed to lose them and hide in a deserted alley.
He waited a few minutes and finally tried to get out of the alley; until a man grabbed him by the shoulder and slammed him against the wall, with a rather superhuman strength.
"Fuck that hurt" Michael said, while trying, unsuccessfully, to remove the man's arm from his shoulder.
The man was hooded and had dirty, but strangely elegant clothes, with a leather jacket made of medium-high quality. Of his face you could only see a poorly maintained black beard and mustache and cruel, bloodshot eyes.
"Hey boy. How much do you think they'll give me if I catch a little thief like you?" he said in a tone that could scare anyone, while looking at Michael a little.
Michael was uselessly on guard, even though he was still stuck to the wall because of the man's strong grip on his shoulder.
"I was kidding!" the man said, amused by Michael's alarmed face, letting go. "Don't worry, I won't do anything to you. It was just a little prank."
Michael remained silent for a moment to formulate what he had said, getting pissed off after a few seconds.
"What the fuck is your damn problem, how can you start playing such stupid pranks on Kallax. I mean, did you want to kill me!?"
Michael said, trying to punch the man in revenge for the pain in his shoulder. But with the end result of hurting his knuckles.
"Shit, are you made of steel?"
The man started to chuckle and, taking off his hood, said "My name is Thalud, I'm just a traveler."
He was a good-looking man with kind eyes now; he almost looked like a normal person in the middle of a garbage dump, which Kallax was. He's about thirty years old.
"Anyway, seriously, boy, you made me curious earlier when you tried to activate your power. It was the Mana of Will, right?"
Michael looked at the man in surprise "what do you know, old man?"
"V-Old man!? Well listen, I know quite a lot about this power, after all I have it too".
"You must be wondering why you couldn't activate it before, right? I'll tell you, but maybe in a different place"
Michael a little hesitant said "Come to my house; it's safe there. But know that if you try to trick me, I'll kill you, old man."
"Sure, sure. And stop calling me old though, I'm only 30 years old" Thalud said slightly irritated.
"Exactly, you're old" Michael said to Thalud, earning him a dirty look".
So they walked towards Michael's house…