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Free

by Kya

Although I wasn’t even born at the time, I can still remember it, for it was, for a time, the only happy moments I enjoyed. The sensation of not being there. Of existing in an egg, with food and darkness, and the comforts I so loved.

But of course, those things were bound to change.

When I first broke free from my egg, I understood nothing except that it certainly was brighter. The feelings of sight, of hearing, of touch, were indescribable to me. I listened to my owner as he chose a name for me. Of course, I didn’t understand the words, or the significance of what he had named me.

UselessKacheek. What an odd name. I did start to wonder if it meant anything. Neopets, by nature, learned unusually quick how to speak and understand. After a day or two, I learned that I was a pet called a Kacheek, with a blue pelt, and that the boy who had taken me in had created me.

After a while, I decided to try and find out what the word Useless was. Obviously, I didn’t like what I found out, but it was the least of my worries. My training had begun.

Although you would be hard-pressed to call it Training. If anything, it was the opposite. He was trying everything in his power to make me weaker. I don’t know why that was, but it was. Time passed, and my ‘training’ got tougher, mostly because of the effects of weakening me.

By the time a month or so had passed, life was painful. My strength was so weak; I could barely hold myself up. My defense was so frail, I was filled with pain whenever I made physical contact with anything, be it the ground or a Battledome enemy. My speed had become so slow; it would most likely take days to walk from one side of my owner’s house to the other. I had to be carried everywhere.

Eventually, a certain day came. As I lay on my small bed, struggling to breathe, feeling stabbing pain fill my lungs every breath, he walked into the room. Lifted me up, painfully, and walked out of the house.

Although I wasn’t really expecting it then, I was brought to Mystery Isle. He took me over to the Beach, and suddenly tossed me in the water. It hurt on contact, I couldn’t stay above the water, I couldn’t swim, and everything seemed to crash down at once.

A few seconds later, he pulled me out by my tail. He had gotten his avatar from that, and that was all the remaining use I had. I lay in his arms, choking on the water that had entered my lungs and cringing from the suffering pain. And that was my position when I entered the Pound.

Well, I was carefully set in the back rooms, where the adoptees were kept. Dr_Death seemed to be trying to be gentle, perhaps noticing what I was going through. It didn’t help, of course, but it wasn’t him that I blamed.

I blamed my former owner. I didn’t even know the purpose of my creation, but whatever the case, it no longer mattered to me.

I was picked up and abandoned by what felt like hundreds of people. They took me in, tossed my into the Beach waters, watched me drown for a few seconds, drug me out, and tossed me back in the Pound. Time passed, but nothing ever changed. I was still pained and mentally scarred, and nobody cared.

One day, a tall girl walked into the Pound. Her hair was long and golden-brown, her clothes consisting of jeans and a t-shirt, and her face looking kind. She looked around the Pound with a pained expression, and she seemed to wonder what to look for. Her eyes passed up most of the painted pets in there, instead looking at the unpainted ones, especially the names.

She stopped at my cage. She looked in at me, while I lay against the wall, having small convulsions. My eyes diverted from her pale blue ones- I didn’t want to be adopted, because it was all for avatars anyway.

She eventually called over Rosemadder, and said that she wanted to adopt me. She paid the necessary amount, and reached into my cage and took me. I trembled in pain while in her arms, and she seemed to notice. The next thing I knew, I was at the Healing Springs. The Water Faerie seemed to understand my pain, but there was little she could do to permanently heal me. Instead, she gave me a few minutes of healing bliss, meanwhile advising the girl where to go to help me. I didn’t want to stop the feeling, but I let her take me away.

I was taken all the way over to the Lost Desert, where she brought me to a tall Shrine. She continued to hold me as she spoke quietly to the Shrine herself. Eventually, a ghostly form of a Lupe in desert garb appeared and said he would help. I felt a rush of magic, and the pain lessened. He had raised my defense, thus lightening the suffering somewhat.

Every half hour, she brought me back to the Water Faerie at the Springs to receive treatment, and it was better than I could have imagined while waiting in the pound. This continued on. Every 12 hours or so, she brought me back to the Shrine, and the Lupe continued to raise my defense, apparently on purpose, until I no longer hurt constantly. She didn’t seem to have enough money to train me, but I would rather not have been trained anyway. He raised my strength until I could walk with ease, and my speed until I was quite swift.

I stayed at her small, humble home for quite a while afterwards. I was becoming content, and she was taking good care of me. She was often rushing off to talk with others over odd things with members of her Guild, but she most certainly gave me plenty of company. Not only was she around often, but also she had essentially adopted three pets, even if they were to eventually go to different homes.

Oddly enough, I noticed she seemed to have pre-determined something for me. She was constantly bringing me Air Faeries, blessing me with their abilities, and she seemed quite tempted to spend money training me in Level in order to get me another Faerie ability. She had said, ahead of time, that she would never fight me in the Battledome, so I always wondered why she was doing that. Later, of course, my question was answered, but before that happened, something else did.

One day, she came home looking somewhat ecstatic. Strangely enough, she didn’t seem to want to say what it was; this was quite unusual for her.

And then, my first birthday rolled around. The fosters hanging around us at the time congratulated me, and so did my owner. We traveled throughout the world on that day, and suddenly, at the end of the day, I noticed one thing: We were at the Rainbow Pool.

Here I was excited. Why were we here? Had she actually decided to paint me? We went all the was up to the edge of the pool before she revealed why she had brought me there.

She pulled out a Cloud Paint Brush. Some may think it could be described as a “girly” color, but I certainly didn’t think so. I was amazed that I was actually being painted a somewhat rare color. She seemed to think that it fitted my persona- the joy of being free seemed to rival the joy of flight, and of the sky. I eagerly jumped in, and she tossed the Paint Brush in also. The water turned a swirl of blue, lavender, and white, and I came out joyful at my new coat. But that turned out to be paltry in comparison to what happened next.

Days passed, little happened, but finally, my owner got what she was looking for.

A quest from an Uber Air Faerie.

Before she accepted the terms, she took the Faerie aside and talked with her for a minute. She seemed to request something, and in the end, the Faerie agreed to the terms. My owner took me to a store and bought a few things, but I was confused. Weren’t faeries supposed to only ask for one item? She came back, dragging around 5 Beauty-related items to the Faerie Quests building. She presented the Air Faerie with the items, and the Faerie nodded and smiled.

She blessed me, but instead of merely increasing my speed, she did something else. Although I found myself suddenly being able to fight gravity to a much larger degree, that was not what I immediately noticed. What I did notice was wings sprouting out of my back.

The wings were the same silvery-blue color of the Air Faerie’s wings, and in fact seemed to be shaped the same way. If anything, they were nearly exactly the same. They seemed quite functional, as I testily flapped them, still confused at what was happening.

I knew, right then, that things would be different for me.

Editor's Notes: Well, it isn't technically his B-day yet, but it will be soon, I have the Cloud Paint Brush, and I'm going to paint him then. I thank absolutely everyone, in my guild or not, for helping me with him, and his expenses for the occasional training, for the Air Faeries, and the Paintbrush. You were all so kind with him when I first found him...

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