Zero Sight Read Online Free Page A

“Step off a second. We gotta get you to a doc.”
    Tyrone looked at Miss Scratchums, glanced at his wrist, and then drove his forehead into her face.
    Miss Scratchums crumbled to a moaning heap at Tyrone’s feet.
    “ Shut the fuck up, bitch,” he growled. He looked around. Some of the Splotches were averting their eyes. The dangling wrist was a bit much for them. “Go buzz the PD. I need a tic.”
    The fellow who had just deflated my lung turned to Tyrone. “Are you sure, man?” he asked.
    Tyrone nodded. “Hell yea. Kick it.”
    The Splotches ran off to run interference.
    I tried to move my legs, but I wasn’t going anywhere. They were totally numb.
    I heard the gravel crunch under Tyrone’s feet. He walked over and looked down at me. He said something, but the lack of oxygen was getting to me.
    I could hardly pay attention.
    Tyrone noticed. He kicked me onto my back and stepped on my chest.
    A mixture of pain and panic rushed over me. The bastard was choking off my air supply. As my heart sped up in my chest, my Sight flickered back online.
    If I could, I would have shrieked at the sight. A faint red cloud was hovering around Tyrone’s body. At first I thought I was just going hypoxic, but the longer I stared, the more certain—the red mist was real. I had never seen anything like it. The mist floated about like an aura of sorts, and it felt…mean. As I examined the strange haze, a wave of energy burst from the core of Tyrone’s body. I grimaced as it blanketed over me. This wasn’t normal at all. I wasn’t just Seeing these lights; I was feeling them too.
    I had never figured out what my Sight really was. It was a talent I had long ago given up trying to explain. I had acquired my Sight when I was a child. It was thanks to my father. His beatings had given birth to my Sight. The fights would always start with my mother. He would get to thinking of her, and the rest of the night was predictable. A binge to start. A bitter swirl of words to follow. He’d say things he’d never dream of saying sober. Then his garbled rants would retreat into a language I didn’t even know. But while I couldn’t parse his phrases, I understood his pain. My gut reaction was to try and help him. His gut reaction was to punch me in the face. I was a stupid kid. I never ran. My dad was all I had. He was hurting, and I loved him. I’d step into the punches. I couldn’t bear to run away.
    In the midst of his punches, when I thought my whole body would break, I began to see strange lights. They weren’t the normal stars. They told me how to turn so that his blows would only glance. They told me when to dodge so that his punches would fly wide. They taught me the principles of angles, reach, and speed. They only came when I needed them most, only when I was really scared of dying, but they gave me hope.
    I thought the lights were angels. My grandma loved talking about angels. She said that some were guardians, guardians sent to protect those in need. Grandma said that I had one too, that all children did, and that all I had to do was listen close to hear it. I thought it was just as grandma said, that a guardian had come to protect me. The idea that something out there wanted to protect me—it kept me sane.
    As I grew older, I decided the waves of light were nothing mystical, just pure, reliable streams of data. Maybe this Sight of mine was a sixth sense that other people lacked. Some people were colorblind, maybe I could just see more than normal. Or maybe my Sight wasn’t a sixth sense at all. Maybe I just had a knack for anticipating forces. My Sight might just be an artifact, a creative way my brain had decided to represent information. I reasoned that lots of famous fighters claimed they could anticipate an opponent’s moves, and that maybe that’s all I was doing. Whatever my Sight was, I learned early to never bring it up in public. That only brought strange looks and whispers. I kept the knowledge to myself and was