Work Text:
Let me tell you a story...
Once upon a time ago, a single parent struggled to look after their many children. Some children strived for attention by publicly exceeding in their many talents, earning tired praise. Others acted out, doing all those things a parent wishes they didn’t, and were rewarded with loud rows and chastisement. But there was one child that was simply normal. With no extraordinary talents and no drive to make their parent’s life harder, the child simply went unnoticed.
After years of being unappreciated, the child approached their parent and made a proposition; If the parent helped to fund them, then the child would move out of the overcrowded house and go to the newest university to establish them self and then send the earnings home to help foot the household bills, until their debts were repaid. An agreement was reached and the exhausted parent relinquished the quiet child into the wide world.
The child started out well; establishing its roots, learning for those already there, keeping in contact with its parent and keeping out of trouble. But as time began to pass the child grew. It realised that it was stronger than the others that surrounded it, so stopped listening and pushed them away, experimenting with its new found powers. The child decided to focus instead on trading its parents care packages for unsavoury items, which it then sold to bloat its feeble income. As the child became more self-aware it stopped communicating with its parents, slowly reducing the promised sums and simply sending favoured sweets and empty promises.
The parent was beginning to worry for its increasingly independent child, and so sent its most reliable child to keep check. Unbeknown to the parent, the quiet child and the reliable child had spent their early lives in a heated rivalry that had only flamed with time. With the favoured child’s re-entry into the quiet child’s life, money began to flow once more, leading the parent to believe all issues to be resolved. Unfortunately, the favoured child commenced to bully the quiet child whilst sending news of peace and happiness home.
Time passed and the quiet child grew to loath its seemingly uncaring family.
Life for the child was unbearable under the constant watch and disapproval of its older sibling.
Things needed to stop.
An epic fight began between the siblings with both sides taking serious injury. The favourite child sent pleas for help home, informing their parent of the quiet child’s wrongdoings, prompting the dispatch of more trusted children to advocate on the overworked parent’s behalf. As the size of mutual parties grew, the siblings realised that fighting would never solve their dispute and so, after long nights and even longer arguments, the quiet child left the family and finally achieved its independence.
The parent would forever miss its child, but understood the natural instinct for freedom. From then on, the parent strived for equality within its family, aiming to quell qualms before they became physical.
And the child? It’s still trying to find itself and only time will tell how this story will end.