7 Memories

December 1966

Standing in the stands of the plaintiff's side of the court, I looked at the judge who was currently reading the result of the trial, with a sinking feeling in my stomach. Each word he said only increasing my despair and anger at the fact that the law could not get justice for my elder sister.

"Looking at all the statements presented and the reports provided by the Police department and the hospital, this court finds that Mr. D'Antonio is not guilty due to insufficient evidence of a foul play. This courts finds him not guilty of the charge of sexually-assaulting Miss Eleanor Monroe.", said the judge and then brought down the gavel with a bang.

Later that same night, our family of four was driving back to their home. I could still hear the sobs from mother and sister. Dad's grip on the steering wheel was so hard that his knuckles were white.

Suddenly, a big truck collided into our car from the side and I lost consciousness.

When I came to I could see that our car had been overturned. I moved my head to see that mom and dad were still in the car and unconscious. But I could not see sister. A sound from outside got my attention. I moved my head to see that sister was lying on the ground and there were 2-3 guys kicking her.

"No", was the only groan from my mouth.

"Bitch, because of you I had to stay in the prison for 2 weeks. Because of you my father hit me. Because of you my brothers make fun of me.", he was saying, kicking sister with each sentence. "What is not to like about me, huh? I am handsome, I have money, I have power. All we did was spend a night together. And you were trying to ruin it by crying the entire time and saying you don't like me and all that shit. Then you had to go to the police with that shit you call a family. Anyway, not to worry, after today, you will be dead. That's all you deserve, bitch.".

"No, please", came my voice, but it was too faint to reach even out of the car. And then in front of my eyes, 'BANG', he shot sister in the chest. 'BANG' and he shot her again.

"NOOOOOO", I screamed. Sister was dead and then there was an explosion in my head and then I lost consciousness.

When I opened my eyes, I could recognize that I was in a hospital. However, everything was so bright, everything was so loud. I could hear repeated sounds of "DhukDhuk". It took me a while to realize that it was the heartbeats of 8 people. It took another moment to realize that one of it was my own heartbeat. I tried to look around and there were some weird colors in my vision.

"Hhhooowww aaarrreee yyyooouuu mmmyyyy cccchhhhiiilllldddddd??", came a very weird voice. I tried turning my head towards the sound. Only, the motion of my head seemed to be very slow. Like really very slow. My head finally turned towards the voice and I could see that grandparents were around my bed.

"AAAaaarrrreeeee yyyyoooo aaaallllrrrriiiigggghhhhttt???", I heard the weird sound again. I saw the movement of my grandmother's mouth and understood that she was saying something to me, or atleast trying to. I thought something was wrong with grandma Meg and I focused on her to see if I could figure something out. The moment I did that, I could suddenly see her face as if it was right in front of my eyes. I could see the muscles of her face stretch and relax. I could see her pupils dilate. All of this was very weird to me and I mentally recoiled back trying to get away. The moment I thought of that my vision came back to normal. Well, as normal as it was since I had woken up. I could now hear grandmother's heartbeat rising up. I could see grandma Meg's face contort into a worried face but SLOWLY.

It was only then I understood that my senses had been enhanced somehow and that my thinking was very fast which was leading to the weird speech. I wanted everything to go back to normal and then suddenly as if a command had been executed and everything was back to normal. My vision and eyesight went back to normal. My thinking was also back to normal since I could hear grandma Meg in her normal tone," Is something wrong Veronica??".

The moment everything went back to normal, I could feel some sort of energy moving back in my body as if it was going into a dormant state. I focused on the feeling and on the energy and again I went back to the weird heightened state. I switched back and forth many time between the two modes until I felt an arm on my hand.

I decided to reply to grandma to calm her," I am fine grandma Meg. What happened??"

As it turned out everything was not alright. My elder sister had died at the hands of the same man who had raped her. My parents were in a coma and the doctors did not know when they would wake up. I also had many fractures and a pretty heavy concussion. I spent the next 3 weeks crying and looking around the hospital ward towards dad and mom hoping that they will wake up. My grandparents tried to talk to me but I was inconsolable. I wanted my family back. But it would not be the same and it was all due to that bastard Cassian D'Antonio. I wanted revenge against the people who had ripped apart my family. I made a promise to myself in those deep dark hours. I will destroy the D'Antonio family completely. I instinctively started to use my heightened state and decided that it must be something that I awakened due to to the trauma of the accident. It looks like I was not well at all. I had damaged some part of myself on that road and now my body was behaving strangely.

But I could see its benefits as well. Despite the weird state I would usually be in when I used this energy, which took some time getting used to, and despite that fact that if used for a very long time I would be exhausted, I decided that I would use whatever advantage I will get out of this for my revenge.

First thing I did was find out how long I could stay in the heightened state and how long before I could access it again and how long it would take to get the energy to refill back to full. I found that I could use the enhanced state for over 6 hours continuously and it would take around 2 hours to get back to full.

Next I asked my grandparents to train me. I knew nothing about fighting and I needed some training. Alan and Megan, who were the parents of my father Clark were a retired Cop and Doctor respectively. William and Amelia, who were the parents of my mother Monica, were a retired lieutenant colonel and herbal medicine consultant respectively.

I knew I had given my grandparents a big shock. After all, one grand-daughter was dead, their son and daughter were in a coma and the only surviving 6 year old grand-daughter was asking them to learn to fight and heal. They thought that I was thinking rashly and this could let them help me to cope with my grief. Little did they know that I would settle for nothing less than the complete destruction of the D'Antonio family. They were a big family that spanned many countries and had hundreds of main and branch family lines. The family had been around for a long time and thus going against them without a plan would be suicide.

At my insistence my grandparents started to train me. But after a few days, they stopped everything and took me to a psychologist. Reason being that I was haunted by the nightmares of my sister and parents. On the rare occasion that I did not get the nightmare, my dreams were filled with trying to kill the D'Antonio bastard and his family. At the psychologist, he usually tried to talk to me to get me to move on, but my hatred and anger was so much that I could not move on. When grandparents asked what else can be done he suggested to use hypnosis to suppress the memories for some time. Later on in my life I would remember everything but by that time I would have enough maturity to tackle this problem. I tried to say no, but my grandparents were scared that I would do something bad. Thus, the psychologist called for us on a separate day and started to try the hypnosis on me. It worked for about 2 minutes but just when I was about to go into hypnosis induced sleep, my heightened state activated and countered whatever effect he was trying on me. I still acted as if I was under hypnosis and tried to act out the entire part of having memories suppressed since if I showed that I was not affected my grandparents would try something else. Once the session was over I acted appropriately like coming out of a trance and tried to smile happily. Luckily, with my heightened sense and control, I was able to put on an expression as if I was very happy. My grandparents bought the act and thanked the psychologist. While they were talking about the payment, I looked around the study, where there were a lot of different types of psychology books kept. My eye caught a book called "Secrets of the Mind by Guru Ashoka". It was a Hindi book by an Indian Guru or Sadhu that was translated to English. Looking at the back I got a description about the book. The book talked about meditation and its effects on reinforcing the mind and its focus. It also talked a little about hypnosis and how to avoid it. Once I read that I knew I had to buy it secretly. I was about to be hypnotized just now and I wanted to know how to save myself from it. I did not want to rely on the heightened state since it was fueled by some energy in me and I did not know if the next time hypnosis was used on me I would not have exhausted the energy for it. I needed a way to resist hypnosis all the time and with a way that did not use up my heightened state. We left the clinic for home. I made a purchase order to the local bookstore to get the book and asked him to keep it quiet since I wanted it as a present for my grandparents. It took him 10 days to acquire the book and then I bought it using the money that was saved up by both my sister and me.

My days after that started to follow a particular pattern. In mornings, I trained in martial arts with my grandfathers, normal first aid and some herbal training with my grandmothers during evenings and meditation at night. I also studied and made use of my parents notes in the afternoon. My parents were biomedical scientists. They were good enough that they had been hired by a Multi National Company for research and development into various types of drugs and solutions. Dad had degrees in Biochemistry, Botany and Biomedical fields, while Mom had degrees in Clinical Research, Chemistry and Biology. One day I was just cleaning their books and research journals when I got curious and just started reading them. I did not understand what concepts and theories had been written down. However, there were a lot of descriptions on how they made many of the stuff and their effects. While I did not understand the theories behind them, I did understand how to make those drugs, solutions etc. Not only that, they had even written down the different types of things that were being created and researched for help in army and other things. I decided that I will learn the theories in time and started to first create some of those things that I could using the materials that I could acquire. My parents had given almost their entire lives to the field. I and my sister had always wanted to tread the same path. Now I will walk down this path in their stead. I want them to be proud of me. Besides, I just might stumble onto something that may help to heal and bring back Mom and Dad. This will also help me in my revenge.

It was through these books and journals that I started to try to replicate some of the things in it. Initially I made some mistakes, but my heightened thinking and control over my senses allowed me to have near perfect recall and near perfect control over the processes. I would remember something and then go on to research that specific theory or product. With my heightened state I found that I could very easily perform Chemistry experiments excellently and the margin of error was very small. Needless to say, I made some very dangerous stuff. We also moved to Brighton. My grandparents did not want to stay in London because that was the place where D'Antonio family had a heavy presence. We had hired a nurse that would look after mom and dad at home itself. The doctors had told us that it would not matter whether they are kept at home or in the hospital since at this point all they can do is wait for them to wake up. Once they wake up we can come to the hospital to get them checked up. I did not tell my grandparents about what I was doing. I knew they will never let me work with dangerous things nor did I tell them I am going to use this in my revenge. Better they did not know.

"Ha....Ha....Ha"

Two years have passed since then, soon I will put to use all my training. I was jogging in a park in Brighton as a part of my daily routine. After that I will go clean up at our home and then after breakfast I will start towards London. The London D'Antonio family was hosting the wedding of its eldest son today. After the wedding the married couple will go to a resort for the wedding night. I will be there to ensure it is their last night ever.

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