Only Human

A/N: Because we're all human, and we're not perfect.

Zia Rashid, however much she tried not to be, was broken. Possibly beyond repair. The most painful thing about the ordeal was...no one noticed. She was just a backdrop, someone who didn't matter in the lives of the people who surrounded her. Somewhere, a thousand miles away, someone might possibly love her, and notice her, but not where she was now. No, she just faded into the background here, no matter how hard she tried to get someone to notice her.

She'd seen so much; too much for her young mind and eyes to handle. She'd watched her family die before her eyes, along with the rest of her village. The only survivor. She had been the only one who made it out alive. No one else. The images had begun to come back to her, slowly at first, but more steadily as time went on, as the final battle approached. The Serpent often crept into her mind while she was asleep and make her see this, all over again. Sometimes, it was just enough to tease her, make her want to see more of what could have been the life she could have led, the happy moments, almost making her feel worse, because of where she was now—sad.

But most of the time, it was the horrifying image of her home until she was eight being blown to bits before her eyes. The explosions, the screaming, the cries...it was terrifying. A village destroyed, ripped to pieces. Her home, where people loved her, accepted her. Now, it seemed nowhere was her home. Her mother had once told her, "A home can be any place, as long as there are people you love—and who love you—there."

The quote—her mother's voice, saying it softly—seemed so far away. Almost not able to be seen, it was so far off in the horizon. It was slowly crushing Zia to know so little. She didn't know her own family, who she had lived with since she was eight years old. She couldn't stand it; the emptiness of her memories.

Of course, not all of it had been bad. Here, in the First Nome, she had met Iskandar, her father-figure in her life—and truly, the only person who had loved her, even if as a daughter—for nearly half her life. Sadly, things had to end. He had died. She hadn't been there. No, she had been in her old destroyed village, in a freaking tomb. That was what enraged her; not being able to say her final goodbyes to the man she loved like a father, or a grandfather.

Where did that leave her? Alone. Alone in a world filled with strangers who neither wanted to know her, nor cared enough to.

It was an emotion; alone, that many mistook for an adjective. She'd felt it so much; from her peers—in her old village, and in initiate training—and now, without Iskandar. It wasn't a happy emotion—quite sad really.

She tried to stay strong, she truly did. But she's only human, just like everyone else.

And everyone has a breaking point, that one spot in time where everything gets to be too much, and no matter the strength, they collapse underneath the weight of everything thrown at them.

###

Zia didn't have the will to get up from her spot on the floor, even though she was exhausted and her bed was looking very comfortable, quite more so than the cold floor she had wound up on several hours ago, not moving since then. She hadn't been sleeping well lately, not wanting to go to sleep, knowing each night would only bring more torment, simply not wanting to see what her dreams held anymore; they were more accurately nightmares, or maybe lost memories come back to haunt her, scare her out of her mind.

That didn't stop her from being tired, however.

She hugged her knees to her chest, curled into the fetal position, rocking back and forth slowly. She fought back the curses and screams she'd bottled inside long ago, dammed only by her emotionless—fearless—mask. Now, everything bubbled under the surface uneasily, threatening to boil over any moment, for the simplest things that would set her off, make the tears sting her eyes more so than they already were. She tried to act like her usual self around everyone else—independent, strong, determined, stubborn—when in reality, she was falling apart, just beyond her shield of fake smiles she used to hide behind, like the coward she knew she was. She wanted to give up, surrender to the sadness.

No one noticed. Or cared, for that matter.

That was what made her want to give up; no one seemed to give a damn about her. She could die, and it felt like no one would ever notice it.

She leaned back against the wall, slumped over, lost all motivation to keep on living. Trying to fight the string of tears and yells that pushed on the walls she'd built so long ago, to keep all of that back, she clenched her fists, fingernails digging into her palms. But she didn't care. The dull pain felt good—it meant she was at least that much alive still. She clenched her fists tighter, her hands screaming in pain. She ignored it, even when she broke skin and blood began to make her hands sticky.

It was all too much. Sadness was heavy. It all added up to a crushing weight dumped mercilessly onto her fragile, young shoulders. Slowly, it was flattening her to the ground, crushing her to nothingness. She wanted to give into it; let it comsume her, break her, crumble her until she was no more. Nothing, it seemed, could break her, bruise her, batter her any further. She was already so damn broken inside—and might as well be on the outside too.

###

She's only human, like you, like me, like everyone in the world. We all have flaws; they're what make us beautiful, yet vulernerable. Beautiful, because they mean we're not perfect, not all the same, not everything we will be from the start. Vulnerable, because they can be used against us; our sadness turned to weakness. The sadness always hangs over our heads, like a storm cloud on a rainy day. Only, the sadness isn't weightless like the clouds. It's heavier than anything else, always threatening to crush us like a bug, break us, show us how strong it really is. However long we try to fight it, we always end up giving into the pain, the sadness. It's too much, too painful, too crushing. Although, it often makes us stronger. We learn from pain, from sadness. We aren't perfect, no matter how hard we try to be.

We're only human, and we all have flaws and weaknesses, both of which make us who we are.

A/N: INSPIRATIONAL ENDING! xD Anyway, I hope you enjoyed that. Just something I randomly thought up while I was working on my science fair.

Two more things:

1. I do not own the characters.

2. Please review!