Outstanding Story - Alicia Beaumont

“Alicia Beaumont” is one of the outstanding stories of the second biannual Short Story Contest 2016 written by Arathy T.R., Brunei Darussalam.

Alicia Beaumont

Being the daughter of the richest man in France is hard.

I’m Alicia Beaumont. I was born with blue hair and have always been called a witch because of that. My only friend is a boy named Felix. He was the first person who tried to get to know me and not judge by the way I look.

My life was simple until I attacked my maths teacher.

Ms. Sarah was scolding us for being late for class. She was mad at me for some reason.

“What did you do today, Ms. Beaumont? Burn your cat?” she asked.

“I don’t burn cats,” I mumbled, pulling my cap down lower onto my head.

“Aren’t witches supposed to love messing around?”

“I’m not a witch.”

“Hah, you are just ruining your family name. You worthless witch,” she snarled.

The next thing I knew, she was buried under piles of notebooks. I felt a hand grip my wrist dragging me out of the classroom. I stood there petrified.

“I am a witch. What did I just do?” I sobbed

“Alicia, listen to me. You aren’t a witch, you are a Teleki,” Felix said.

“What’s a Teleki?”

“A Teleki is a superhuman being who is born with the ability to move things with their minds,” He replied.

“So I can control things with my mind?”

“Yes, I’m a Pyroki, someone who can produce and is immune to fire. There are more people like us out there.”

“But my blue hair?”

“Telekis have unnaturally colored hair. All superhuman types have a recognizable mark on their bodies. I was born with a fire tattoo on my shoulders.”

I took the news more calmly than I thought I would.

I stayed alone in my room for hours practicing to move things with my mind with a bit of help from Felix. It was actually pretty fun and I learnt a lot of new things. That’s what I thought then.

……………………………………………………………………………………………

I’d been seeing him around for a while but I never noticed him until I went camping that day and he came up and talked to me.

I was camping in my favorite spot in Redwood forest when he came up to me. His voice was raspy like fingernails on a chalkboard. He wore a black hooded robe covering most of his face and held a cane in his hand engraved with the head of a skeleton. A black python was crawling around his neck.

“Miss Alicia,” he said, “how is your telekinesis powers?”

“How do you know my name?” I asked, alert for an attack. Felix has told me a lot of things about us superhumans and I’ve learnt there are bad and good people within us too.

“Ah, miss. Wouldn’t you like to know?” he said lifting up his hands. Growls filled the air as the man was surrounded by animals. “Tear her down, my pets,” he said. The animals charged together.

Small animals like cats and dogs were easy for me to take down but it was the lions and wolves that nearly killed me. I tried to take down the vicious animals but I was already wounded. I was losing a lot of blood. I stumbled and was unable to get up. I yelled for help.

“It’s ok. We’ll take the rest,” I heard a familiar voice say as howls pierced the sky.

“Felix!” I smiled before I lost my consciousness…

……………………………………………………………………………………………

I sat up with a start.

“Alicia, are you alright?” I heard Felix ask.

I snapped my head towards his voice. “Who was that, Felix?”

“Gared Backslash. An Animman who turned bad.”

“He controls animals. How did he turn bad?”

That’s when I noticed the other three people in the room. “Who…?”

“I’ll tell you everything along the way. We have a long way to go. You have to leave before Gared returns for you. Your family will be safer here.”

I happily obliged, and that’s how my journey began…

……………………………………………………………………………………………

Alicia put down the pen and leaned back in the chair. It’s been a long time since the superhuman war ended. She has moved on from everything that happened.

“Felix..” she murmured, tears filling her eyes.