8 Taking Beatings Left And Right (1/2)

Max was born in a rather small hospital near the outskirts of New York City, a city that held millions of people in its endless number of buildings. Right from the moment he opened his bright golden eyes, everyone who had been present for his birth knew that Max was special. His eyes contained a deep intelligence and insatiable curiosity, one that could easily be seen as the baby stared at his mothers face for the first time.

From that first day and onwards, the baby should have had a bright future awaiting him, with two parents that loved him guiding him along the way. However fate wasn't that kind as only a few hours after his birth, his mother passed away due to various circumstances involving the delivery and her already weak condition prior to the delivery. The impact of his wife's death was more then Max's father could bare and he vanished from the hospital completely, leaving his son behind. It would later be revealed that he committed suicide that same day by intentionally driving his car head on into a semi.

Now from day one, Max was alone in the world as even after a whole week had passed, no relative or friend of the parents had come to claim the kid. Though he was just a newborn and would be justified to stay in the hospital for a while, he was eventually put in a foster home. This was unusual considering how things should have played out, but fate seemed to have it against the poor child as he was sent to the worst foster home in New York City.

The foster home was run by a guy named Conalds Rishardson, a tall man with a protruding beer belly and constantly smelled of weed. The home itself was a large two story house that looked rather nice on the outside, but reeked of marijuana and beer on the inside. Needless to say that it didnt pass inspection protocals, but for some odd reason, no one had ever filed any complaints against the man or the living conditions.

Max was dropped off here at the age of 5 months, a time where he had already began to crawl and could even almost get to the point of nearly talking coherent words. If he had had teeth at the time then he no doubt would've been having various conversations. Despite him being quite a special kid, not one single person at the foster home seemed to care. In fact Conalds grew a dislike for the small little toddler almost the moment he saw the intelligence in the baby's eyes. He felt that it was unnatural and he right then and there refused to feed it, let alone change its diaper.

Max would go every other day without food as Conalds intentionally ignored the baby, only acknowledging Max's existence when the stink from the diaper would interefere with his 'round the clock drinking. The baby no doubt would have died if one of the other residents in the foster home didn't take over and begin to feed and change the baby every day.

This continued until Max was around 3 years old and his intelligence had increased and was shown as he would walk about the house doing mathematical equations he found in books thrown around the rooms. He would do so quietly though so Conalds couldn't hear him. The older he had grown, the more Conalds had taken to verbally abusing him on a daily basis. The shouting had only grown in time and it even seemed that sometimes he would get to the point of nearly hitting the poor young boy.

In fact, he did eventually hit him and then, after realizing that it felt good to smack the kid around, began to do it on a regular basis. He would go out of his way to punch and kick the poor kid whenever he was feeling frustrated, however as he wasn't entirely stupid he would always hold back just enough so as to not leave any permanent damage. He would always feel better after seeing young boy squirm on the ground, writhing in agony. Over the next few years the beatings actually began to evolve and intensify into something more.

The rest of the residents of the foster home didnt consider Max to be a brother to them or even an acquaintance. They were afraid that if they decided to help, then they would recieve the same punishment as he was getting. However, after watching the beatings escalate into more dangerous activites, the residents eventually informed the police. Conalds was arrested soon afterwards for various charges and Max along with the other residents were scattered to various foster homes.

Max, now a good 9 years old, had become an emotionless shell of his form self. The eyes that had once teemed with intelligence and curiosity now looked dark and uninterested. He was still beyond smart, but now he went to great lengths to hide it. Conalds had told hom during one of his beatings that he was only getting kicked because he acted to smart for his own good. From that point on, Max figured that nothing good would come from showing other his intellect and he decided to keep it hidden.

The new foster home was much nicer then the last one and even had rather cool people running it. Of course, fate was once again unkind as it threw yet another curveball towards the young 9 year old boy. This time it was in the form of the residents, 3 teens (two boys and one girl) who had been in the foster home for more 3 years. They had grown bored of the tedious life and while they liked their foster parents, they weren't too big on other people who moved in.

The first encounter the three had was wjat paved the way for the next 3 years of pure physical abuse. Though it was just a bit of rude words on Max's part, not a single one of the three had the mental capacity to just laugh it off or to simply let it go.

As Max was walking into the room, he ignored the other three and began to set his stuff down near the empty bed that his new foster mom had told him was his. While the three had been chatting away happily just moments ago, the moment Max had walked in, the room had fallen dead silent. Max continued to pretend that they weren't there and began unpacking his stuff.

"Hey shorty," The tallest one said in a rather ugly manner as he stood up from the chair he had been sitting on. "Aren't you gonna say anything to your superiors when you walk into the room?" He walked up to Max and gave a hard poke on the head of the frail looking boy.

Max blinked and turned his head to look at the teen without a trace of fear in his gaze. "Sure.....just let me know when they get here." After saying those words, he went back to unpacking his stuff, pulling all his hand-me- down clothes and placing them on his bed.

The girl laying on the bed laughed at Max's response, clearly finding what he said amusing. "That kids got spunk, maybe you should beat it out of him Luke!!" She sat up on the bed and looked at Max's back as he continued pulling out shirts and pants.

Max looked up and glanced at the other two people in the background. His eyes scanned over the two of them, his intelligent gaze taking in every thing about them. He possessed a photgraphic memory, a super rare trait that few possessed. Combined with his enhanced intelligence, he was basically a walking Sherlock Holmes.

"You two have been sleeping together for a while right?" Max asked looking at the two of the teens sitting together and immediately was able to reach this conclusion. He could tell by the way their hands always seemed to inch closer and the boy seemed to be incapable of keeping his eyes off the girl, his eyes filled with an emotion that Max identified as both lust and infatuation. Though it was mere speculation, the reaction gave them away.

The two of them made it completely obvious that it was the case in different ways. The girl got flustered and her face turned red with anger while giving too strong of a denial, also her eyes flicked over to a nearby dresser before settling on the boy named Luke. The boy next to her fell off the chair he had been sitting in and after getting back up blushed but didn't say anything. Both of them shoom their heads, their faces completely red.

"Shows what you know, you dumbass," the boy named Luke said with obvious condescension in his tone. He kicked the boys legs out from under him and slammed him against the carpet, nearly causing him to black out. "Thats MY girl over there, and she's only loyal to me."

Max coughed a bit before giving a small laugh, his eyes still void of any emotion, giving the feeling that he didn't care about what happened next. "If you dont believe me then check the drawer by your friends bed, my guess is that he forgot to throw away the condom wrapper after he was done." Once again he was only guessing as he had seen the females eyes repeatedly glance nervously at that one drawer. They were literally making all of it too easy for him.

"YOU LITTLE SHIT!!" Two voices screamed out simultaneously. The sounds of running feet could be heard as Luke was pushed out of the way and the view of descending shoes was the last thing Max saw before passing out.

For the next three years, Max was treated brutally physically but never verbally. He would be seen as garbage to them, kicked around whwnevr they felt like it, and freento release stress on whenever the need arose. The only reason they didn't abuse him verbally was because, even if he took a beating afterwards for it, he would always come back with a logical and smartass response that would completely humiliate them. All this arose because Max wasn't interested in giving in and becoming a simple pawn.

In his eyes, if he had tried to appease them in any way, they would likely forgive him, but he would become their pawn, someone who would do their bidding without question. This was unacceptable and he would rather be besten everyday then to live under someone he despised. He may have been intelligent, but he chose his own pride over the smart choice, a decision he deemed to be the one that most suited him.

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"So wait, your telling me that you were beyond intelligent and yet you chose to hide it?" Yggdrasill interrupted the story midway because he didn't really understandnthe logic behind it. "Why didn't you just use your knowledge to think of a way out of the situation?"

"Cause that would have felt like I was admitting defeat," Max answered, his eyes staring up at the ceiling. Even now, his eyes were void of emotion and lacked any traces of the vast intelligence in his early childhood. "Even as a kid, I hated losing. No matter what happened in my life from the moment I was born, I can tell you for certain that I faced everything head on. I never admitted defeat, and I never will!!"

"Then why did you remain weak and pretend to be dumb in a society where, if you werent smart or strong and instead were weak, frail, and stupid, you would be singled out?" Yggdrasill felt that he was talking to an idiot and that Max had basically been lying the entire time about his past.

"Well, I was going to get to that part," Max looked towards the door briefly before giving an emotionless smile. "You interrupted me before I got to the part where things were beginning to look up for me...at least when it came to a decent home."

"Honestly, your whole life is basically one whole beating....I kinda feel bad for you." Yggdrasill had actually said this with kindness. Max was certain that this was the first time he had ever said a single thing with any emotion apart from arrogance and condescension.

"My life did suck, but there were fun moments, like the past four years, after I got stuck with real parents who adopted me." Max smiled as he thought about them, and for the first time he actually felt his heart ache a bit. "They were the ones who got me into anime and movies."