Part 1

When you’re struck by lightning, the joules of energy that run through your body can be lethal. With a direct lightning strike, your body becomes part of the main lightning discharge channel. One portion of the current moves along  just over the skin, known as  a flashover, whereas another portion of the current moves through your body, inflicting unspeakable damage, and sometimes death.

The heat emitted by lightning is 50,000 degrees Fahrenheit. That is five times hotter than the surface of the sun and, with a direct hit, you suffer heart asystole and respiratory arrest. Both happened to me. My heart stopped for five minutes and I was jolted back to life by the paramedics.

When I got struck by lightning, something else happened;while it didn’t hurt at all, it did leave a permanent Lichtenburg figure on me, which never went away. I was a medical mystery. It also awakened something in me that was beyond anyone’s imagination, including my own.

My name is Alex Jennings and I was 17 when I died. I can’t begin to describe the immense heat I felt as that lightning bolt went through my body, and when I opened my eyes, smoke was emitted from every pore of my body. I laughed as I opened my eyes, purely because I couldn’t believe I was still alive.

It happened during a football game, and I was standing close to the chain link fence when it hit me. Everybody saw it happen, and I became a freak for a completely new reason. Nobody could believe I had survived that, not even the doctors at the hospital I had been transported to.

The odd thing about it was that there was no thunderstorm. There were no dark clouds, and the lightning had seemingly come out of nowhere. It was just a single bolt, aimed directly at me, while the sky was blue and clear.

Before that day, few people knew my name and I didn’t exactly strike fear into the hearts of my enemies. I was tall but skinny, because I had asthma and my extramural activities consisted mostly of reading and hacking. That was the one thing I was very good at, but nobody knew that. Nobody really knew me.

I lived in Boulder, Montana, with my mother, Thalia. She had been a single mom for as long as I could remember, and I’ve never met my father. He died when my mother was still pregnant with me, but I have photos, and I kind of look like him.

I was just your normal, average teenage boy. I was the nerd in the library, the one with no friends, though I rarely got bullied, not physically, at least. I could handle the name calling; it didn’t bother me that much. I liked my solitude. That didn’t last long though, because soon, everybody knew my name.

After that day though, my asthma was gone, and I had more energy than I knew what to do with; literally and figuratively. I started going to the gym, and suddenly, I had friends at school. I didn’t sit alone in the library eating my lunch anymore, and because of that, my mom just told me to be careful.

My body bulked out, and no matter how much time I spent in the gym, or how hard I pushed myself, I didn’t suffer another asthma attack ever again. My senses were sharper and I felt stronger, almost like I could do anything I wanted.

A month later, I was standing outside in our yard as the thunder crackled loudly above me. Thalia was working the nightshift and I could feel the lightning running underneath my skin. It started in my left hand, where my mark was, and I could physically feel it on my fingertips.

My mark started at my wrist, covered my entire left arm and ended just below my jawline. It was an intricately designed mark which would darken whenever I felt electricity in the sky. I didn’t tell anyone what I experienced when it rained; I was already a freak.

The mark on my arm also darkened when I weighed your soul. I called it that, because I didn’t know how else to describe the things I saw and felt. I could look at a person and know if he or she was good or evil. It was an intense feeling of electricity that told me I had to kill someone; someone evil, someone guilty.

In the beginning, I didn’t understand what was happening to me, only that it was something I had at my disposal, something I could use to do good things. I’d never thought of myself as a hero or special, but I would soon find out that being special also put a target on my back.

I worked part time at the Riverside Youth Correctional Facility, located just outside the town’s border. I had worked in a small office where I digitized the prison’s records and kept the files updated. It was mainly an after-school job, three hours a day, and that’s where the idea of who I was to become had been born.

I understood things better and I felt things. I soon learned to trust those instincts, and they were never wrong. I perfected how I did things, and now I strike fear into the hearts of those who dare mention my name; and I’ll smile as I look down at you, taking your last breath.

For me, it was easy. We didn’t have a pack, and Thalia didn’t mind living as a lone wolf. It gave me the freedom to do the things I had to do. Thalia worked long hours at the hospital and honing my skills for what I was to become was crucial.

I had no fear and I had no guilt in taking lives. It became second nature to me, it became a part of me, and I became very good at it. But like with everything else in life, it shows you the middle finger because we all make mistakes, even me.

So, here is where I start my story, and the path it took me on. I became known as Kifo, the bringer of death, or if you prefer, Hel’s executioner.