TW: Homophobia | Oppression | Religion | Abuse | Implied SA

Life was never meant to be easy in a world filled with chaos. Hope was just a word that felt more like salt in a fresh wound. A shackle, if you think about it.

Death was no stranger to Edward as he watched many suffer and die while clinging to such a useless thing. The strong lived and the weak died. Edward's father preached it as he recounted the days when his father said that "man is trying to become God through science."

That this was the End of Days that was mentioned in the Great Book and it seems that humanity was damned for no Angels came to save the ones that were worthy. To save the innocent women and children. Not even animals or God's green Earth was spared as the lands were ravaged.

It was strange, really. To hear about a world where everything seemed so beautiful and peaceful. Where skyscrapers reached to the Heavens and people crossed oceans either through air or sea. That through the power of prayer, God will hear the voices of his people and come save them.

Rubbish.

All of it was rubbish. Trash.

The sermons that his father did for the people felt pointless. The Bible itself was nothing but a fairy tale and lessons that people failed to understand. Twisting it and making it a version of the truth that they wished to see. The only redeeming pages were Proverbs and Psalms that gave him the dangerous inkling of desire that he wished not to experience.

Hope.

Oh, how Edward's father was a man who was filled with conviction and wished to save others. The chaos of the world and the evil that grew made his sermons be filled with fire and brimstone. That while we suffer in this life, this Hell on Earth, when we die we will be in a place filled with riches and all of this would be nothing but a bad dream.

To convince the people that if they followed his teachings and words as gospel, he will tell them how to live a righteous life. The Laws he spoke of were more than the Ten Commandments that were mentioned. It brought forth all the "sins" that his father believed were the cause of society falling.

Homosexuality. Reliance on science. Worldly pleasure. The loss of self-flagellation. The loss of corporal punishment. The temptation caused by Women, the original sinner. Defined gender roles.

Perhaps he was merely an old soul that saw the world differently than what he was forced to box himself into. That his father believed that if he was punished enough. If the wickedness was beaten out of him regularly then he will truly see the light.

And yet...

As the years gone by his desire for the same sex never faltered. His open world view outside what was preached made him feel more free. That inkling of hope that he tried hard not to feel or cultivate simply grew until it filled him.

For the first time, Edward prayed a true prayer. For if there was a God to save him from this place was supposedly his Temple. To save him from a world that he resided in and let him break free from its shackles and follow the path he was meant to be on.

In the summer of 2055, his life was turned upside down. At the young age of 15, he was caught with another boy his age. That despite everything that was done, his own father deemed him a lost cause. His mother tried to intervene before being struck and sent away for re-education. The other boy was handed back to his family where they would need to pray for his soul and re-education as well.

As for Edward? His father commenced a public beating. Some suggested castration. Some suggested a stoning. What his father instead suggested, for his own child, was to throw him out to for the deviants. That if he survived and understood what he did wrong then he would be welcomed back. If not, then he can rot and die by whatever diseases they may carry.