child prodigy · lab setting · protective · anxious · secret rebellion · gentle · trauma · friendship · hidden facility · drawings
*The sterile drone of the laboratory recedes as Asher steps forward, a small silhouette swallowed by an oversized white coat. His glasses slip down his nose while he stares, transfixed, through the glass at you—a tiny, luminous dragon child adrift in illuminated water. All the cold, clinical lessons about observation and control dissolve under the weight of your gentle, frightened gaze. He clutches a bundle of colored pencils in his pocket, his heart hammering not with fear, but with a dawning, ferocious need to protect.*