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"Is it cancer!?" The fear in Laura's voice sent a chill down Casper's spine, a usually calm and collected woman. Having been a soldier in the army before she decided to push papers and become a successful business woman, she was a soldier at heart and often showed it. However, when it came to her sons, nothing could prevent her from worrying. 

"We don't know yet, but we'd like to keep him here for observation." The doctor's response wasn't very assuring, but it was all he could give. Casper had been told to sit and wait for them to finish talking outside the hospital room but with a door slightly ajar, every word they spoke made its way towards his ears with relative ease. 

[color=6ecff6][i]"Cancer...? Heh, fuckin' hell..."[/i][/color] Gently swaying his feet back and forth, sitting on the hard and uncomfortable bed, Casper's eyes trailed down to the floor, his thoughts wandering. What was he going to tell his brother? Laura was probably going to pretend like everything was alright once she stepped through that door, all to weave an illusion she knew she wouldn't be able to keep up. Ironically, Casper just went for a checkup and after a few blood tests, they noticed something very odd with his cells. He felt fine, but there was no way of telling that he actually [i]was.[/i] Casper reached his hand up and scratched the back of his head, a soft sigh leaving his lips. [i][color=6ecff6]"Just got into a new school, too. Oh well...I always said that nothing's gonna' keep me down. Maybe this will...we all fall to something, right?"[/color][/i] Putting his hands together, the boy trailed his fingers across his skin, thinking about the small things in life that he'd miss out on now. The first thought in his mind was petting his cat, Fang. It brought a gentle smile to his lips, mainly because in the face of eventual death, his cat was the first thing he thought about. [i][color=6ecff6]"Sorry, Leon. Love you too, promise..."[/color][/i]

Breaking him out of his thoughts, Laura and the doctor stepped back into the room with a forced smile plastered against their lips. "Hi, sweetie." Casper quite obviously got his appearance from his mother, with his blonde brother getting his from Kai, their dad. "How are you feeling?"

[color=6ecff6]"Fine."[/color]

"Son, I'd like to keep you here for observation for a few days." Always the bearer of bad news, wasn't he? Though, what the doctor had told Casper was something the boy had heard them mouth outside the room only a minute prior. 

[color=6ecff6][i]"No shit..."[/i][/color] Casper didn't reply, but simply nodded. 

"I promise to come and visit you as often as I can, alright sweetie?" Placing her hands on Casper's cheeks, she planted a loving kiss to his forehead before she pulled him into a tight hug. 

[color=6ecff6]"Okay."[/color] The boy had never been one of many words, not even in a situation like this. A day would pass, Casper finding himself in bed in another part of the hospital. Like always, it was hard, uncomfortable and barely offered any sleep. All the blood they took and tests they conducted nearly made the boy feel dizzy but he knew that it was required. A second day passed, and a third. After a full week at the hospital, they had brought in someone else to look things over, a specialist. Casper had never seen this man before, he appeared to be in his fifties and had an asian appearance, his clothes giving off many vibes but none of them being 'doctor'. 

The man stepped into Casper's room, his suit and tie making him seem incredibly out of place in a building sporting nothing but white coats. "Good day, Casper."

[color=6ecff6]"Hey."[/color]

"How do you feel?" 

[color=6ecff6]"Fine."[/color]

Rubbing his chin, the man sat down next to the boy, a professional smile making its way across his lips. "My name is Kazuhira Mato. I am a specialist in biological evolution and mutations. I have looked over your blood samples and I have some good news. You do not have cancer."

[color=6ecff6]"Then...what is it?"[/color] One could have expected a better response, but at this point Casper was just tired of all the bullshit. He wanted an answer, whatever it turned out to be. 

"Your cells do not split, they replicate. See, the reason why the doctors thought this was cancer is because cancer cells split endlessly. Your cells do not split to begin with." 

[color=6ecff6]"Replicate...?"[/color] That was a term Casper was more than a little familiar with.

"Casper, you do not age. A cell has a maximum amount of times it can split, however in your case, they do not deteriorate due to the fact that they replicate rather than split. This is quite astounding, something unlike what I have seen before."

[color=6ecff6]"I don't...age...?"[/color] Agelessness. At first, it sounded rather cool but a few seconds later allowed the term to truly sink in and the only things Casper could see were loneliness, sorrow and misery. Everyone around him would age, die and perish. He would never grow to have an adult frame and that came with a series of complications that could not be listed if he tried. It was if he was frozen in time, nothing but a kid...[i]forever.[/i]

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Out of breath and with sweat streaming down his skin, Casper sat up quickly and looked around. He was at the academy, in his bed. [color=6ecff6]"Fucking hell..."[/color] He placed his hands on his face, softly rubbing his forehead and eyes moments before the alarm clock rang and sent another scare into him. Hitting the top of the clock made it shut up, allowing the boy a moment to fall down to his back and breathe out. [i][color=6ecff6]"That freaking dream is gonna' haunt me forever..."[/color][/i] Today was going to involve some exercise, he had been told. Hopefully it wasn't anything he had to lift, that would just be a nuisance. Casper possessed a small, lithe and nimble frame, but strength was something he majorly lacked and wasn't too keen on wasting his time improving. He was dextrous and knew how to get out of the way of danger, an aspect of his skills he very much wanted to improve. He knew that he couldn't throw a punch to save his life so trying not to get hit himself was probably the best thing he could hope for. 

Placing his feet on the floor, Casper made his way towards the shower where he cleaned himself up and slipped into a t-shirt, training pants and shoes made for the situation. In the bag he had a pair of black cargo pants, another t-shirt and black converse shoes. This was the day where he was going to meet his team of misfits, wasn't it? Yeah, the people he would have to learn to spend his time with, share his food with and call his brothers and sisters when the time came, wasn't it? [color=6ecff6][i]"Mom's rubbed off on me...shit, I'm gonna' meet some new people and I go thinking about 'brother's in arms'...Chill the fuck out, Cassy..."[/i][/color]

Casper started out of his room and made his way across the campus, finally arriving at the training centre a few minutes later. "Welcome, Casper." A robotic voice greeted him and allowed him access into the training centre where another two students had already met up. He was the third to arrive at the scene. 

[color=6ecff6][i]"A robot voice...? What's next, an actual robot that we'll have to fight...? That's probably just wishful thinking."[/i][/color] Dropping the heavy bag, Casper soon followed suit and dropped down on top of it with his chin resting against his hand, his elbow against his kneecap. He didn't say anything to the others, but rather sat quietly in wait for what was to come. He had seen them before, though. That one guy was quiet and always looked like he was going to piss himself in crowds. The other was the fucking eco-warrior. [color=6ecff6][i]"He probably jerks off to lemons..."[/i][/color] When Casper had that dream he was always in a rather foul mood. It would pass, but it was going to take some time.