Strength Read Free

lightheaded and started to slump, but her captor’s strong grip caught her arm. She heard a shuffling sound from behind and feared an accomplice joining in on the catch.
    Without letting go, her captor pulled her behind him and brandished his weapon in the direction of the shuffling. Roxie peered around his shoulder, level with her nose, and saw an aged man fidgeting under a tattered blanket. The hobo raised his blanket to his chin and scrunched lower against the brick building. Roxie regarded her captor with equal fear, who then turned his head to check the intersection behind them. She noticed his eyes. They were glowing red.
    His eyes glow too! She stared at them, unable to believe what she was seeing. After all this time, she wasn’t the only one.
    The big man released Roxie’s arm. “I’m not here to kill you,” he said in a deep, soothing voice. He sheathed his dagger. “Is your arm alr—?” Taking a step back, he stood still with his arms at his sides and mouth barely open. He studied Roxie’s face.
    Roxie gazed back and watched his eyes lose their glow, just like she’d seen her own do countless times in the mirror. The first time she’d seen her eyes glow was at age five, during a frightening thunderstorm. Her shocked grandmother had carted her to the bathroom to show Roxie her eyes. Young Roxie had blamed the glowing on the storm, despite what Grandma had said. Later on she learned the glow was linked to certain emotions.
    “Yeah, my eyes glow, too,” Roxie said. “Yours weren’t a trick of the street light or something, were they?” She sorely hoped not.
    “No, mine work just like yours. Is your arm alright?”
    Just like yours. This time Roxie’s mouth fell ajar. “No way!” She looked into the man’s deep blue eyes. “All this time... I’ve never seen... Man, I wish you could show me again. You don’t have any control over it either, do you?”
    He shook his head. “It’s caused me problems sometimes,” he said with a rueful grin.
    “Boy do I know the feeling.” I’m really not the only one. Roxie had resorted to home schooling through eighth grade to spare herself, her peers and teachers, and Grandma a lot of awkward grief.
    She studied the stranger with the aid of a dim streetlight. The man was half a head taller than she, bore a clean-shaven face and scalp, and had broad shoulders and lots of muscle. He wore a T-shirt, cargo pants and combat boots, all black, and he had a backpack and canteen slung over one shoulder. His belongings, along with the small sheath strapped to one arm, gave her the impression that he wasn’t from her part of the world. But that didn’t matter. They were two of the same… something. “Are we aliens?”
    “Pardon?”
    “Aliens. You know: people from another planet.” As soon as Roxie said it, she realized how absurd she sounded. She felt her cheeks flush.
    The man let out a soft laugh and shook his head. “No. We’re Aigis.”
    “Eye-jiss?”
    “Yes.”
    “But you’re an alien, right?”
    “No; just an Aigis.”
    “Are you from Earth?”
    “No.”
    “Then that makes you an alien. What planet are you from? And why do you speak just like I do?”
    The man laughed again. “I’ve learned how to quickly adapt to contemporary dialects. My name’s Aerigo. What’s yours?”Eyes widening as if he’d just remembered something, he set his pack and on the ground, unzipped the side, and started rummaging around.
    Interesting name. “Rox, sir,” she said. “What’s ‘Aigis’ mean?”
    “Shield of the gods.”
    Roxie scrunched her brows. “What’s that mean?”
    “Many things. I’ve been looking for you for the past two weeks. I need your help.”
    “My help?”
    “I was instructed to find you and train you.”
    “Really? By whom?”
    “Someone named Baku. He’s our ally. I’ll explain everything I can in a moment.”
    “Bah-coo?”
    “Correct.” Aerigo stood and faced Roxie, a glass bottle in hand.
    Eyeing the bottle, Roxie