8 "18th" Birthday

Today is Oz's "18th" birthday, declared by his mother, and Family. Have thrown him a Birthday party, the first one since his birth.

Oz was in the sub basement working on an experimental E-Tek Suit, that him and his uncle had been designing together.

Oz: "Nnnnn.... hmmmmm... Ah! Alright, awesome! It's finished!" He holds up the gray metallic suit in front of him. It looked just like the others, but the gray had become a lot darker from the usual suits. "Well, time to try it out." He quickly puts on the suit and places his hand over the crystal, The lines of lights over the suit, and the crystal glowed brilliantly. Illuminating the entire room, then suddenly fading back into the suit.

Standing there wearing black and gray combat boots, with black Cargo pants. White wife beater and black finger-less gloves. Oz had shaved the sides and back of his head, his hair in a faux hawk, and the E-tek crystal as an earring in his left ear.

Oz: "Alright, first Lightning Essence." He closed is eyes, focusing the on purely the lightning inside him charging his suit. The soles of his boots emitted a dark purple light with arcs of lightning, and sparks zipping off as his body had begun to levitate off of the ground. "Awesome, if I break down the capabilities of lighting to its minimum I can even manipulate Electromagnetic Waves in all sorts of varieties!" He began to float higher from the ground before he was interrupted by his uncle.

Brow: "Hey ki-" Brow had just started speaking as he saw Oz floating mid air in the middle of the sub basement. "You never cease to amaze me kid. Come on down, it's your birthday! Let's Celebrate!"

Oz: "Birthday?" As Oz drew his attention towards Brow he had let go of all of his focus and dropped straight to the floor and right on his ass. "Oww..."

Brow: "Yea kid, it's your 18th birthday! Well the final growth period for your body anyway. For a Elf your looking pretty bulky now ain'tcha?" He said laughingly as he slapped Oz's shoulder.

Oz: "Heh, yea I guess so..." Oz chuckled a bit realizing that for an elf he was abnormally muscular, most Elves have fair skin all around, with slight toning. While Oz, himself has a Grecian god bod, in a sense. He recollected himself and turned to Brow. "Now what's this about my birthday?" He asked utterly confused.

Brow: "Of course, your now an adult, and its time for your decision. Would you like to go into the Soldier Academy, or the S&M Dept.? Even though I already know the answer to that just from what I have seen." Brow said with a prideful tone, as he crossed his arms.

Oz: Having sat there on the ground for a moment. "Soldier Academy." Oz said with a stern tone.

Brow: Looking at Oz puzzled by his answer, he couldn't help but ask. "Why? There is so much you can achieve at the S&M Dept.! So much that you could do!" Brow was a bit frantic, but was more astonished by his answer.

Oz: "I have " Oz said looking into Brow's eyes.

Brow: "Okay... If you've made up your mind, I won't dig any further..." Brow started walked back up the stairs and yelled back down to Oz, "If you don't hurry I'm going to eat all of your cake you little bastard!" He yelled as he sprinted up the stairs.

Oz stared at the stairs for a second, then he smiled with a slight chuckle. He closed his eyes focusing on Brow's presence in the house, just as brow was about to take a plate of cake, Oz appeared out of his shadow from underneath and took the plate before he could.

Oz: He picks up the cake with his fingers and takes a giant bite out of it in front of Brow. "Heh, too slow old man!" He said laughingly with a mouth full of food.

Brow: Picking up a plate of cake and placing his hand under the plate, he begins to speak, "You really think that your funny don'tcha brat? Well how about this!" Launching the plate towards Oz he unintentionally hit Marina with the cake splattering it all over her face making her drop the palate of drinks onto the floor.

Oz: After patting Brow on the shoulder he whispered into his ear, "It's ye, who cast the first stone, that is burnt by fire." Before trotting off in the other direction.

Marina: The plate and cake slowly slid off of her face, when the plate hit the floor brow twitched in horror. "Honey, since when was throwing food, ANY PART OF FOOD ETIQUETTE!?!?" Marina had gone into a full blown rage mode all over brow.

Oz: Shortly after the the brutal beating Uncle Brow had received, Aunt Marina stood up straight and brushed off her clothes. "So why a birthday? We never even did it in the virtual world, so why now?" He asked Marina.

Marina: "Honey, can you go get Kara, it's best to let her explain." Brow nodded his head after hearing Marina and left.

Not even 2 minutes later a large explosion had taken place on the right side of the lab shaking the entire building, and filling Oz with this tiny inkling of dread in his heart.

Rushing to where the explosion had happened, Oz had found Brow lying under a rubble unconscious, and the laptop that his mother's crystal had been hooked up to completely destroyed and in pieces. But his mother was no where to be found.

Oz: Running over to Brow in a panic he started to yell and shake him. "Brow!? What happened!? Where is Mom and who did this!?" With a vengeance in his tone, his attention was caught by a blue spark out of the corner of his eyes.

Turning to look in the direction the spark had come from he could see a blue flame off in the distance slowly fading away.

With in a fraction of a second, his Lightning Essence had enveloped his body from head to toe. Oz stood up and began to walk towards the blue flame. Arcs of dark purple lightning emanating off of his body electrifying the air. In a flash he was gone from the scene, leaving sparks behind.

Before Marina had made it into the room, and made it to Brow's side. Looking around she could see the electrical scorch marks left by Oz's feet. She could only stare blankly at the scorch marks, then having her attention attracted by Brow, who had just started waking up.

Brow: *cough, cough* Barely able to open his eyes, brow had regained consciousness. "They found us Marina.... Gahhh!" Brow placing his hand over his stomach as blood began to seep through his clothes.

Marina: Walking over and looking at Brow's injuries, she spoke with a cold tone. "I am honestly quite shocked that you had managed to survive, Brormund." Seeing how much pain Brow was in she finally couldn't hold back her sorrow that she had kept hidden and looked away.

Brow: Noticing Marina's actions, he could only assume she was up to something. "Marina... Di-did you do t-th-this?" *Vomits blood* Having been able to hardly speak that sentence, he had began to vomit blood all over himself. "W-h-why Marina? Why?"

Marina: Turning around, she walked to the whole in the wall and stood in the entry. "It's always been survival of the fittest. If your weak, you die, and if your strong, you survive." Speaking with a dark solemn tone, she turned back around to look Brow in the eyes.

Marina: Brow looking back at her, he could see that Marina had streams of tears flowing down her rosey pink cheeks. "I am so sorry.... This was the only way..." She walked back over and knelt down by his side and gave him a long lasting kiss.

As she kissed him, she stabbed her hand into his chest and ripped out his Essence Crystal, finally ending his life.

As she held his crystal up to her chest, she screamed and cried out in agony. After her scream she looked down at the Essence Crystal filled with red and a metallic silver energy. She spoke her last words before leaving with the crystal in hand.

"I love you Brormund...."