Normie Begone!

One morning, Zini woke up to yet another surprise. Her mother was the first person she spoke to about it.

 "Mother, what are these on my skin? They're scales, like a reptile!"

 Her mother smiled a knowing smile and laughed telepathically directly into Zini's mind. "You look like a humanoid dragon, Zini." She joked.

 Zini's face contoured in disgust. Why? She wanted to be a beautiful warrior princess to impress her father, and now she was going before him as a horrid dragon woman. Of all creatures, Zini believed fate chose this appearance for her months before the girl's 18th birthday. The pain rose in her tummy again and gathered in her eyes to form a building well of tears. She cried until there was nothing left to wipe from her eyes. At school, she was the source of all reptile jokes and insults among many others. Was it her scaly skin or her unusual gray hair? Or even her yellow eyes with a tinted glow. Zini thought her yellow eyes were a beautiful feature. Some Anomaly boys she had crushes on were blessed with the same color eyes. Unfortunately, despite that unique trait, her overall appearance was more like a monster's and even more so to the boys she liked. Heartbroken by all of this, Zini wanted to die, coming to even despise her appearance much more than her father did. 

 Zini hated her appearance so much she tried to take her life. This was problematic to her because every attempt failed. At first, she tried stabbing herself with a simple kitchen knife, but the blade wouldn't pierce her skin. Most of the times the knife broke or bent in half. Other times it broke depending on the amount of force applied to the jab. When she even used an energy pistol to kill herself with, the gun blew up in her hand after her skin deflected the blast back into its barrel. It was frustrating. Couldn't she just end it all? 

 Soon, the long-anticipated day arrived. She wasn't the least bit surprised when her father couldn't even bear to look at her. She could feel his disgust in her appearance every time he looked in her direction or thought about her. Those emotions saddened Zini to the core and almost made her give up on pleasing him. At one point, Zini felt like not enlisting because of her appearance.

 "No, he will see that I'm not a Normie anymore. I have superpowers now!" Zini reasoned.

 She came before her father in the throne room. The walls were lined with soldiers. Her father's eyes were as plain as ice, except for the twinkle of disgust.

 "Prove to me and all present that you're worthy of induction into our military." he said briskly. She could tell he didn't expect her to prove him wrong, he didn't even want her to, but she was going to do so. She assured herself.

 Today, he was going to regret not spending enough time with her. Then there were the many times he spoke to her at dinner only through the maidservants. Even after her transformation, Zini believed he would accept her as his daughter after she passed all his tests here and now. Zini was going to prove her worth! So she waited for him to direct her in what challenges to take. These were usually obstacle courses varying in difficulty. There was a deafening silence that filled the room as Zini stood there in front of him. The only thing Zini heard was the collective condescending thoughts of those around her. The room was also saturated in jealous and envious emotions. Suddenly, Don's gaze pointed to a gauntlet consisting of his Royal Guard. Bile rose in Zini's stomach. Her father was trying to kill her. Why didn't he allow her to do the normal challenges? She felt his murderous rage. He was thinking it was a perfect opportunity to get rid of her. How funny, she thought. He didn't know she was nearly invincible. She couldn't be killed. Only her mother knew this fact, but soon everyone in the room would know.

 The gauntlet course started.

 A burly looking man stabbed her only to get his sword broken and so Zini threw him. She flung his body across the room like a rag doll. Zini launched another guard into the air with a knee kick to the stomach. Everyone watched in awe as she smashed through her father's gauntlet with ease. Of more surprise was that she was the only person left standing.

 Zini faced her father once again. Her face drenched with sweat and blood, not from just herself but from her adversaries. She wiped the sweat and spit from her face in a display of arrogance before. She sensed his rage—his disgust of her rang loud throughout his mind. He wasn't proud of her. His feelings were far from it. He wanted to get rid of her for challenging his authority and he failed at doing so. He rose from his throne, glanced menacingly at Zini, and without a word directed to her, turned to his guards.

 "Take out the trash!" he said while pointing a finger at her.

 Zini learned how to control herself and keep her anger in check long ago, but that skill seemed to vanish in that moment. Hearing those words coming from the only man she tried so hard to please incensed her greatly. Memories of all the things her father had said, all his actions towards her, and the nonexistent father-daughter relationship replayed in her mind. The girl couldn't recall what it was she said or how she said it soon thereafter. All she remembered was watching herself nearly kill all his men in the castle sent to restrain a raging woman. When none were left, she turned towards him. Her eyes glowed an eerie blue glow on top of her yellow irises. She could sense his rage turn into extreme fear when their eyes met. The blood of every soldier sent to restrain her lay splattered across his room. More soldiers came to defend their king, but they reasoned doing so would be quite futile. They believed he was about to be assassinated.

 "What you wanted for me on this day will happen to you!" Was only an echo of rage she repeatedly heard in her mind as the events played out like a dream sequence in Zini's mind. Rage consumed her. The compulsive urge to end him for all the pain and trouble he'd caused her couldn't be controlled anymore.

 Suddenly, Zini woke up in the wilderness. It was nothing like the palace. When she opened her eyes for the first few minutes, everything was dark and incomprehensible. She closed her eyes and opened them twice. Where was she and how had she gotten here? She took deep breaths and tried to remember. The memory came in bits as closed her eyes again and everything occurred to her. Her mother had exiled her to parts unknown just as Zini went in for the killing blow on her father. Zini was now somewhere deep within Normie territory. She took a deep breath. She was here now, among these people.

 It was not good for her to refer to them as Normies anymore. Even when her race always referred to them as such, Zini believed it was wrong to do so in the first place. There and then, she made up her mind that she would not refer to them as Normies or lesser beings. The Creator named them humans and that was the term she was going to use henceforth. Besides, no human wronged her as much as the people she once regarded as family. Zini wondered, where then, did the humans come from? She knows they'd been in existence longer than the Anomalies have. Blending in with the humans became nearly impossible—they feared her. This fear caused many to flee once they saw her. Thus, she'd found herself alone shortly after meeting one.

 "Step away from her, Bob, she's going to hurt you!" one of the humans told the other who promptly fled.

 She used her telepathic ability on some of them, and what she saw frightened her. The Stardust Dragon. That was the constant repetitive thought in their minds when they saw her. Who then, was this creature and why was she known as the Stardust Dragon? When she looked further into their minds, she saw that the Stardust Dragon was a humanoid dragon lady who left destruction in her wake, hence the dragon part of her name. Her enemies became stardust after they were disintegrated by her powers of energy manipulation.

 What baffled Zini was why then, the humans thought of her as this being. She did not in any way match the description. Or did she? She knew of her own dragon-like appearance, but it was the powers that puzzled her the most. There was no way she could do some of the things this Stardust Dragon already achieved. Zini thought this had to be her mother falsely planting this misinformation into the minds of captured and tortured humans. This reasoning faded when Zini encountered this surface thought in almost every human she came across. Everywhere Zini went in the human city, she received troubled and menacing stares. Sometimes she was even shot at by the police or military. This situation became a source of worry. Why couldn't she find peace? Why was she exiled from her home to be faced with more trouble? She craved friendship and real interaction with people.

 Zini craved friendship and genuine connection with others. She wanted to explore the outside world, to discover, but not alone! Maybe, just maybe, she might even find a human mother and father to love her. Something her parents failed to do. Or perhaps, she could find a group of friends that'll always have her back. Would it be so hard to ask for both? That sounded like too much to ask for. Zini felt that she could only have one. In her quest for acceptance and naturalization, Zini traveled the known world, continuously exploring the Ancient Isles. She eventually came across a city occupied by the Nexus. Interestingly, the city was called Dragora. She was afraid to approach them at first. What if she was rejected again? What if they fled at the mere sight of her?

 When she approached Dragora's city limits, those doubts and fears faded. The city's gatekeepers were accommodating and welcomed her into their fold. She began to wonder, wasn't her purplish skin noticeable? Oh, it was well concealed perfectly in her brownish scales. At first glance, the Nexus is an advanced technological race like the Anomaly, if not more. Considering the many battles they've won in the past, Zini believed they were far superior. Many of them had superpowers, but some didn't. The part she considered most interesting was that the Nexus race didn't ostracize those who didn't possess powers.

 This became home to Zini. It was a relief, but she panicked, for if they knew who she was, they'd want to get rid of her and she couldn't risk that. She had to enjoy peace for a little while first. She initially came to Dragora looking for something. She'd overheard someone talking about it on her travels. It was one thing, which, if she possessed, would help her look less like an ugly dragon creature and more like a human so she could fit in. After all, the Nexus had a variety of skin tones, just like the humans. Maybe the Nexus were their cousins? She found later that Dark Matter was the secret ingredient that separated them.

 The name Dr. Lunningham came up again in this regard. Zini reasoned that as evil the Nexus painted this man in their mind, he still is their father, even if he was just a mere human. The only thing that the Nexus and the Anomaly had in common was that both races despised him for his numerous past evil deeds. It was a generational hatred of this man, but the specific details were lost through the centuries of his story being told to his "test-tube" children. Zini circled back to the love-hate correlation between her and Don. The thought used to sadden her but not so much anymore. The Nexus survived without Dr. Lunningham and Zini believed, like them, could do the same without her father.

 The thing Zini was looking for in Dragora is called an Image Emulator. She first sighted it on the black market, but they were illegal. The reason for that she didn't know. But it started to make sense to why it was the more Zini thought about it. A criminal could use the IE for identity theft. That was one of its many uses and was a nifty gadget, nonetheless. She found her way to the black market and immediately purchased one.

 "Finally, I can get myself to look like one of them!" she thought.

 The first thing she was going to do was get rid of her scaly skin. The brown skin tone she kept because it was her favorite part of her outward appearance. Her gray hair? She use to be a brunette as a child and wanted it to be so again. Zini believed she grayed too early. Most Anomaly grow gray hair in their elder years just like those in other races on PowerLand. It was quite odd for a young person, even in Anomaly culture, to have gray hair. They were seen as a "defect". Zini was no exception to being insulted for looking "old" before her time. Now she was going to change that. 

 Having successfully altered her appearance to her taste, Zini felt the strong urge to move into civilization, but this urge was countered by her love for the wilderness. She found solace only in it. The mystery that puzzled her most still remained. Even after acquiring the Image Emulator, Zini kept having vivid dreams of the Stardust Dragon battling Anomalies. Did that mean her parents were still at war with other races? Nexus sources tell her the war was unofficial for years until the Nightmare came onto the scene. Then the tides turned, and the Nexus began to lose the war.

 Zini wondered what her parents had against the Nexus. Was it because they protected the humans? The Nexus had every right to protect their "parents" from the murderous rage of their cousins though defenseless they may be in this world. Why did the Anomaly feel the other races on this planet weren't fit to live? Who gave them the power to determine who should live and who shouldn't? How did they become judges, jury, and executioners? Zini's heart sank just thinking about the answers to those questions. If only she had the power, she'd erase every Anomaly from existence that did her wrong, including her parents. Even if Zini didn't have the powers now, she promised herself, she'd erase them with whatever powers she developed in the future. Maybe she'll have powers like that of the Stardust Dragon. As scary as this being's display of power was in her dreams, Zini admired her for putting the Anomalies in their place.

 Once on her normal explorations through human territory, Zini heard murmurs around her. This only happened months after traversing the human parts of the Isles with the IE. A young woman told her daughter, a cute young child of about six, how Zini looked just like the Stardust Dragon. She wanted to walk over and tell them she wasn't in any way like that monster. The being had more dislike for Anomalies than she did or ever will. The humans should be grateful that this being is keeping the Anomaly away from their cities. Even if it's just a random encounter. Or was it? Zini wouldn't go attacking Anomaly fortifications whenever she felt like or just for the fun of it. She didn't have such drive. But she knew telling the woman that was only going to make them more scared and regard her with much greater skepticism.

 She walked by them silently. Maybe all the stories she heard about this dragon lady were simple fairy tales in her dreams. But they also felt real. They were real as her reading people's minds, as real as the purplish skin and scales she was born with. Maybe the Stardust Dragon could end this pointless war. Or was Zini overthinking a possible solution that may never come to pass? How the Stardust Dragon would do that was not a point of worry to her-at least for now. What was a current point of worry to her was the feeling of being followed.