Beauty in Justice: Chapter 1 – Awakening

Chapter 1 – Awakening

It’s not uncommon that a family will find themselves as the random target of murders. Jane’s family is one of those families as a boy marked with satanic cuts on his body kills her parents, grandparents, and siblings when she’s still a child. She manages to survive by hiding until the authorities arrive to detain the boy and bring him to a place to be cleansed of his demonic possession. The boy’s parents don’t give an explanation as to why they made demons possess their son and accept their sentence and execution. Even though Jane knows the boy unwillingly killed her family, she still struggles to forgive him and settles on forgetting about him.

An orphanage run by priests and nuns takes her in and raises her through her childhood. Despite the horrific loss of her family, she grows up learning to love and help others while learning to serve God above all. Among the children, Jane is the one who keeps everyone in line. Even the older kids don’t do a good job of being as assertive and caring as Jane. As the kids grow older and become nuns, priests, are adopted, or marry each other and go out into the world as a couple, Jane stays behind to teach and tend to what is her new family.

One morning, she notices that not everyone is accounted for at the breakfast table. She heads outside and to a cave in a nearby mountain where she knows the missing two children are. Inside the cave, she finds the children looking at the draws on the cave’s walls.

“What are you two doing here?” Jane asks them.

“We just wanted to come up here,” one says.

“We thought that it might hold some secret. Do you know what the drawings on the walls are?”

“I drew these when I was about your age. This was my secret way of relaxing when I was your age.”

“Wow, you drew these? You drew some weird drawings of scary angels fighting demons.”

“Let’s just say that I’m a fan of justice. It’s the reason why I pick so many action and mystery stories to read to you.”

“Are you a fan of justice because of what happened to your parents?”

“Dude!”

“Oh! I’m sorry, Jane.”

“No, it’s okay. It doesn’t bother me anymore.”

“Are you sure? Some of these drawings look really violent.”

“What can I say? I was an imaginative kid. Still am. Before, I thought my imaginary friend was helping me draw these pictures.”

“An imaginary friend?”

“Yeah, he was a giant wasp. Still pops up in my imagination sometimes. He inspired me to make these drawings to accurately show how good punishes evil.”

“If that’s true, then will the evil people who hurt us get punished?”

“Yeah. The priests say they’re the reason we don’t have much to eat or fix our house.”

“Yes, they’ll get theirs eventually.”

“But they keep taking from us!”

“I heard from the sisters that they could be taking our home away from us and force us to live on the streets just like the other orphanages!”

“Listen to me. That won’t happen. We paid this month’s rent.”

“But what about next month? I heard we barely make enough.”

“Just leave the adult stuff to the adults. You should be worried about kid stuff like playing, having fun, and learning.”

“How are we going to do that?”

“Do you remember that song I came up with?”

“Kind of.”

“Sing it again!”

“Okay, I will, but you have to dance with me.

 

Let the sun in

Feel its warmth on your skin

Today's another gift

Being young lasts only so long, don't forget it

 

Have fun

Go for a run

Smile and be happy when all is said and done

 

Being Young Only Lasts so Long

Dance with me and sing this song

Love each other and learn to get along

So you can grow up and be strong

 

Let the moon in

Feel the chill on your skin

Time can pass by in the blink of an eye

Be brave and don't be shy

 

Learn more

It isn't a chore

You don't know what could be in store

 

Being Young Only Lasts so Long

Dance with me and sing this song

Love each other and learn to get along

So you can grow up and be strong

 

Life will be hard, it is filled with terrors

But don't crack under the pressure

And you will make the world better

 

Being Young Only Lasts so Long

Dance with me and sing this song

Love each other and learn to get along

So you can grow up and be strong

 

We will make the world better

And be together in Heaven forever”

 

After singing and dancing, the two kids smile and laugh.

“I love hearing you sing, Jane!” one says.

“Sing another one!”

“I’ll sing to you another one later. We have to get back home before breakfast gets cold,” Jane says.

“Oh, that’s right!”

“We planned to be back home before breakfast.”

“Then you should hurry back before we get everyone even more worried about you.”

Jane and the two kids go back to the orphanage only to find officers arresting some of the priests and children who appear to be wounded. Everyone is outside and appears to be sad.

“Why’s going on here?” Jane firmly asks one of the officers.

“Your building is being bought by someone who can pay your rent better than you can.”

“What? You can’t do that!”

“Yes, we can. We own this place and you can barely keep it up.”

“Because you charge us so much every month that we barely have enough for everything else.”

“Your excuses won’t save you.”

“You can’t take our home away from us! I won’t let you!” one of the kids say before attacking the officer.

The child is harshly hit with the blunt end of the officer’s sword and falls unconscious.

“You don’t hit a child like that!” Jane says.

“I was just defending myself. It doesn’t matter what his age was.”

“You-!”

Jane is hit as well and falls to one knee.

“Keep giving me trouble and you’ll end up the same.”

“Jane!” the kids say.

“You monster!”

The children run up to the officer and attack him. More officers try to help the officer by attacking the children with the blunt end of their weapons.

“Stop!” Jane yells out.

“All of these children are criminals for attacking an officer and deserve no less than death! Show no mercy!” one of the officers say as she takes out her sword and raises it.

“No!”

Jane rises to her feet and throws herself in front of the child who is about to be struck. Time stops just as the blade nears Jane’s head. She blinks a couple times before realizing that time has stopped.

“Huh? What’s going on?”

She slowly moves her hands and takes the sword out of the hands of the officer and throws it aside. A hole opens in the space behind her and an angel comes out of it. It has no eyes, four wings with an eye on each one, a giant eye in the center, pincer-like hands, and legs that look like the legs of a spider.

“Who are you?” Jane asks.

“Be not afraid. I am an angel sent by God to give you the blessings you need to bring justice to this place.”

“If you are sent by God, then I will serve.”

Jane is transformed with a wave of the angel’s hand. Her hair turns red while her eyes turn pitch black. Another set of black eyes grow on her head along with a pair of antennae while her hair curves up. On the side of her face grows two insect-like lower jaws. Her fingers become claws that are colored red and black while her once simple dress transforms into a dress that appears to be designed after the body of a wasp except everything is colored black and red. After the transformation is done, she looks at herself in horror and her fear triggers her face to transform into a screaming wasp for a second.

“What did you do to me?! Is this truly a gift from God?!”

“Be not afraid because God makes everything good and beautiful. Now, hold out your hand and let His creations overwhelm your enemies.”

Not sure of what to do, she follows the angel’s instructions hoping that she’s doing the right thing. Swarms of insects come out of the forest and attack the officers. They bite their skin and crawl into their mouths and ears as time goes back to normal. The officers panic and run away as the insects chase them away. Even though they should be happy, the priests, nuns, and children can’t help but be frightened by what happened to the officers and the insect woman standing in front of them.

“Thank you for saving us, but who are you?” one of the priests asks.

“I’m Jane, father!”

“Jane?”

“Yes! I know this may seem like a lot, but an angel stopped time, transformed my appearance, and gave me this weird blessing to control insects. You have to trust me!”

There’s an awkward silence until the child who was knocked out gets up and looks at Jane. It takes him a second, but he recognizes her and goes up to hug her. The rest of the children run up to Jane to compliment her on her new ability and talk about how weird her new appearance is. Jane explains what happened in greater detail to the priests and nuns to try to understand what is happening to her.

“I think I know what might be happening,” a priest says as he takes out a letter from his desk and looks over it.

“What is it? Tell me!” Jane asks.

“Among the things we found at your house was this letter. It was written by your parents and told anyone who read it to make sure their children would be brought to a location where they would be safe and receive their purpose in life. This location is the cave in the mountain behind the orphanage.”

“Does the letter say what to look for in the cave because I’ve been in it so many times already and nothing happened?”

“No. It just says to go there. Maybe something different will happen now because of your transformation.”

“I guess that’s my only choice. I’m still not even sure if I got these abilities from God or not.”

“If you’re not sure, then just do what we’ve been teaching you. Trust in Him.”

“You’re right. I’ll go to the cave and see if I can’t find anything new.”

“We’ll pray for your success.”

The priests, nuns, and orphans watch as Jane goes up to the cave while they pray for her. Meanwhile, she can’t help but look at her new body and says a silent prayer for everything to turn out okay.