I Am Zero (Prologue to Call Me Zero)

I traveled far, I reached for the stars.

But those stars don't reach back, they're better left alone.

A/N: reminding you one more time, read this only after you've completed the main fic and make sure it's before the epilogue.i'll be doing an FAQ about all 3 parts of the fic once the epilogue is posted.

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It started when I was about seventeen, I think.

Mother had sent me away to the Academy when I was 16. They didn't like to admit it then, but that was what they did with the kids who they thought didn't have a future. The losers. The ones who didn't have enough talent or courage or whatever to make something of themselves. So they made somthing of you instead.

The truth is, her wife was the one that convinced her to do it.

Not that I disliked her, no, but I think she had it out for me. Apparently singing and sitting in my room drawing all day wasn't how she envisioned her child spending their life. So when I wouldn't do what she wanted, I suppose the easiest thing for her to do was send me away.

So there I was, attending the Academy, assigned to a major that would best suit my "abilities". They told me I was going to be a pilot. More specifically, an explorer. They told me it would be my job to fly to nearby star systems and research and report on what I found there. And if I found life, I was never to make any form of contact with it.

Despite my anger from being sent away like that, the idea of being able to explore the stars intrigued me, and it was one of the only things that kept me going.

At the Academy they taught you everything you would need to know to be successful in your major. The most important in my case being how to pilot a ship.

After a year of practicing, I was confident enough to go exploring on my own.

I think that's where I made my first mistake.

Well, in my opinion it wasn't a mistake. It was the best damn decision of my life. But anyone else from back home would tell you otherwise.

Not to mention I still had three more years of training left. But that's beside the point.

When I was seventeen, I decided I was going to get a head-start on my career. I snuck out of my dorm in the middle of the night, with nothing but a backpack and my sketchbook, and stole one of the practice ships.

Like I said, best damn decision of my life.

And that's how I ended up on Earth. I can't say how I found it, I just flew in a direction that felt right until I finally came across something. Though that route would become very familiar to me later.

The second best decision of my life, and what many would say was an even bigger mistake, was landing there.

I met Lindsey in one of those places where all the human's go to drink things and listen to loud music. I like those places. That was my first time being in one though, and coming from a place like my home... suffice to say it was a bit of a shock. I remember being very confused. Although, my memory's still fuzzy so that might just be me right now.

Somehow, at some point, she found me in the crowd. It was after her band had played a show. She saw me from the stage, I think. Saw that I was scared and alone. She came to help me. That reminds me of someone else, too. But that's a story for another time.

She tried to talk to me. I remember being even more afraid then. I couldn't understand anything. And the way they communicated! Humans, I mean - they're so dull. Their minds are so weak. They couldn't understand anything I tried to say to them. They couldn't even hear me. They were too busy making noise with their mouths. Mouths aren't for talking, that's what minds are for. Yes, mouths are for singing - sometimes - and for everything else. But talking? It feels so strange to talk to them. To not be able to communicate like I did when I was home.