Benedict Ignite

He didn't remember running.
That was the first thing his mind registered when the chaos finally released him. Not a gunshot, not pain. Running. His legs carried him on their own, like a wind-up doll whose strings had been snapped. His lungs burned, blood flooded his face, clouding his one remaining eye with a sticky film.
The world turned into a bloody glow of black tree silhouettes. His ears rang, through which screams and crashing sounds penetrated. The military school buildings were left far behind. He ran, stumbling over roots, unable to see the road. He knew only one thing: he had to run.
Sean. The thought of his friend pierced him. He stumbled, fell to his knees, and vomited. He sat on all fours, staring at the black ground.

“Sean…” he whispered silently.

He didn't remember getting up and running again. Only the crushing terror behind him urged him on.
It all happened so fast. They just wanted to have fun. And then everything went to hell.
A shot. A flash. And a blinding pain that made the world split in two. His ears were ringing, but Gretel's voice cut through it. And then HE appeared. Benedict remembered almost nothing. Only shadows.
He woke up in some alley. Far from the buildings, from the forest, from that carnage.
His legs gave way. He slid down the dirty wall, leaving dark streaks on the bricks. Blood seeped from his empty eye socket. The air reeked of urine and waste, but it was quiet.
He sat, leaning against the cold wall, staring into space. To the left, there was still crimson, to the right, blackness. Sean stood before his eyes. His frozen, wide-open eyes.
He didn't remember how he got here. He only remembered one thing: he abandoned them. He abandoned Sean, Bullseye, Armitage. And then he ran away. Like a coward.
Shame welled up inside him, along with nausea. He vomited again—blood, bile, undigested food. His eye socket throbbed with pain, and he felt something important draining from him along with the blood. Dragon power. His legacy. It all gone that night, along with the eye, along with Sean.
He sat in the alley, broken, and didn't know what to do. He didn't know how to look his father in the eye. How to live.