#𝔩𝔢𝔞𝔫𝔡𝔯𝔬 ⸻ ft. emery fernsby

[endlesswoes]

➷Closed; em @fernsbys ↪ Location: The Church

He didn’t technically drink. Not really. 

Once in a blue, on a motivation sucking day he’d find himself welcoming a glass of moonshine along the company of Emery. The occurrence happened a little more than he’d valiantly like to admit, but with the world ending around them as it was, Leandro couldn’t find it within him to hold back. Moving the liquid in his glass, he stared out onto the distant woods and wondered how it would all go down. 

“Because this has to be it, right?” he asked, more to the open space around them than to his friend, “There’s no way that He would place us here with expectations of returning us back into… what? Normalcy? Reality?” There weren’t many options left for him to associate what Arcadia was - biblically. His words weren’t meant to actually induce too much thought, just searching for some form of comfort without asking for it. 

[endlesswoes]

The air around them seemed to shift almost instantaneously and without warning. The lights above his head flickering on and off at increasing speed until a noise to his left made him turn. His gaze shifted to the window where the outside was still quite visible in search of the source. From his current position, Leandro couldn’t see anybody beyond so he stood and headed towards it for a better look. He was about six feet away from it when he heard the noise again, only this time it came from inside of the church and not the window where he’d first heard it. 

“You hear that?” Lea asked Emery, although when he turned in her direction, she seemed lost in her thoughts. With a simple shrug, Lea headed towards the sound. 

Opening the curtain of the confession, Lea found an identical image of his wife staring back at him. Sol sat there in her nightgown, giving the impression that she’d just crawled out of their bed for some tea, as she often used to do in the middle of the night. But it wasn’t dark outside, and she was long dead. Leandro’s breath caught for a moment and he contemplated whether to call Emery to his side for a second witness or if he was truly going mad. 

No confíes en ella, amor. Ella te quiere herir. 

Leandro did a double take at the sound of her voice. The familiarity in its tone and symphony with which her words flowed. Memories of her reading the bible for them before bed quickly flashed and he let out a painful sigh. Looking into her eyes made his knees buckle so abruptly that he had to reach for the walls of the booth in order to stay upright. This was cruel. 

“You aren’t real.” he said, shaking his head slowly as his eyes glazed over. Lea wasn’t listening to her as much as he was trying to understand the appearance. It wasn’t possible. It wasn’t real. Sol was gone. Awaiting for them in heaven like his teaching had told. “You’re just in my head.” 

This place was never meant for you and I. Todos ellos? Esas gente no son buenas, Leandro. Jehová te protegerá y te mandara sabiduría pronto. No pierdas la fe en El. They’re all sinners. They’re all liars and murderers and have lived their entire lives against His word. Solo mira a tu alrededor. 

All of Sol’s words swirled around in his head, forcing him to believe a truth he couldn’t prove. It’s what this place did to everyone within, and as hard as he tried to fight against the pull of darkness that plagued Arcadia, Leandro was too weak to fight against his love. Too tormented to step away and far too lonely to let her go. Even if everything she spewed went against what he truly believed, he couldn’t help but want to believe her. Sol had never lied to him a day in their lives, so why would she start now? With a sense of dread washing over him, Leandro asked, “Qué quieres de mi?” 

Despite the nightmares and the slashes at his back, a bit of her was better than none at all. This apparition held those very lovely eyes he’d stare into the twenty eight years they had spent by each other’s side. The same soft and gentle voice that first caught his attention and later adorned his life. Made every bad thought in his head dissipate and fueled his need to be better. To be the man she deserved even if he couldn’t provide her with more than his love. To be hers against all odds when everything that he was should have lured her away. She had saved him. Given him a home. Showed him how to love. 

Protege a nuestros hijos, Amor. Desaste de ella ante que les haga daño. 

As if her words hadn’t been strong enough on her own, Lea turned to Emery but found the bodies of his children instead. Lifeless and bloodied while his friend stood tall wielding a knife in his direction. Mocking him with a look of satisfaction despite the scene at her feet. Daring him to come her way so she could strike him down just as quick and easy as she had done to them. To Diego, who never stood a chance against this town having been born within its grasp, then Lupita who’s suffered far more and experienced pain that no child ever should. Both gone. Both dead. 

His entire soul escaped him and before clarity or even sense could find its way to him, Leandro reached for the large wooden cross that hung over the confession booth and stalked in Emery’s direction. Lea didn’t give her a chance to finish saying his name before he struck, knocking her upside the head and watched as her body hit the ground.

She offered a hand on his shoulder, a reassuring touch said more than she ever could in words. This place was Hell, that much they'd established from time to time. It was never different. But every time they seemed to have gathered some hope - shit like this happened. An unexpected blizzard, a loss of supplies they already struggled with having, people who were out there.... doing God knows what. She shouldn't say - or rather think - the Lord's name in vain, but whoever was up there had to excuse her for now, with these extreme conditions they were in. ''I don't know... I...'' Emery wished she could tell, wished she had an answer for his questions. Questions she so desperately wanted to ask, too.

''Everybody's...'' Dead.

A white flash ran before her eyes and she gasped, her knuckles white as she clung onto the back of the pew she sat in - leaving reality for a nightmare she'd never dared to imagine.

Death came for those she loved. Blood. There was blood everywhere she could see through the blizzard - coating every bit of the porch of the common house and beyond. ''No...no...no please...'' she begged silently, a pleading voice that died within the roughness of the wind. ''This can't be-'' tearful eyes saw the smoke coming from the back of the house she'd come to accept as her home - a place of safety and even love. The sound of footsteps made her turn around - to see if anyone had gotten up - if anyone had survived.

No. No, fuck, no. It couldn't be. Those things that only existed during the night...that only should exist during the night....they walked around in daylight. In the midst of them she could see a familiar face. Just one. How was it possible...? He wasn't being held hostage, was he? Leandro... she wanted to scream, she wanted to say his name but a heavy lump in her throat had her voice dying out.

Droplets fell onto her face. Warm. How were they warm? Rain was never warm, especially not in a - red coated her trembling fingers when she ran them over her skin where the drops had fallen. Looking up, every cell, every vein, every muscle in her body ran cold. Colder than the snow, colder than the wind. Her lungs were frozen - her lips were wide open but no scream came out when she saw her love, her everything, her wife's body hanging above her. Her lifeless body hanging from a tree. The tree. The goddamn fucking tree - its branches, its body, its entirety grew bigger and bigger and the ground underneath her slipped away. She fell into an endless pit of darkness - having lost everything and everyone; and most of all...hope.

Disoriented by what had just taken over her, by the vivid hallucination, illusion, night terror - whatever it was, it left her vulnerable. Unprepared for what came, for encountering a completely different side of the man she had just civilly talked to.

''Leandro⸻no!''

[endlesswoes]

“No! Not- no, I’m not. I don't know.” Lea spoke out, trying to make the words leaving his lips to sound as true as they once were, but it was hard to remain faithful and whole when you weren’t sure what the day would bring. He wasn’t someone who allowed his misfortunes to take him over, but his mind wasn’t a place he could often control. Less so after arriving here, and even less after losing Sol. She had been the only person keeping him from completely buckling to his knees. 

Over time, he learned to accept his new normal, but the thought of his children experiencing all of this with them made him angry. “This place just…” he sighed and shook his head, bringing his cup up to his lips as he took another sip. There wasn’t anything he could say that Emery didn’t already know. Nothing he could possibly express concern over that someone else hadn’t thought of and found reassurance somehow for. All he needed to do was stand strong along with the rest of the leadership. 

“How much of the food was lost?” he asked, concern written in his voice, “Can we even make it through this? Without having to send troops out there to combat the storm?” How many people would they need to send out to die? “Where is everyone?” 

Lea pushed off his seat, walking towards the front door, for a better look outside. The gust of wind that pushed through him made his skeleton shiver, but he leaned out to check either way. After no sign of anybody approaching, he closed it back up and leaned against it.

Fuck. Fucking fuck. All this waiting for two no-shows and she couldn't even blame them because the weather was more than awful. A blizzard that put everyone on edge and she wasn't even able to leave to return to her house now. The common house. She hoped the house and its people were alright, that was all she could do for now. Hope. Not pray, she'd never done that in her life and surely wouldn't start now. Not even being trapped in the church would convince her to do so. Her eyes were glued to the weather outside, hoping for the storm to pass, waiting to see a familiar face she could let in, but no one came and the howling wind and its grey curtain of snow didn't seem to end anytime soon.

''You're not giving up hope, now are you? Is that even allowed in your way of life? You can't lose hope. Not you, not the pastor, of all people.'' Emery wasn't a believer, she would never be. But she was a consoler, in some way. She'd finally left the doorpost and sat down not too far away from Leandro, eyeing the other glass she'd still left untouched. ''We'll take it one step at a time, like we always do. Wait for the storm to pass. Rebuild. Help people the way we do. You do... your mass thing, and I do whatever I do.'' She couldn't help but feel for the man, even though they had their differences in their beliefs. ''Chin up, Leandro, take this day as a loss and feel better tomorrow. Drink it off if you need to, I won't tell a soul.'' Though she'd rather have him focused and here in the moment, because by the sounds of the wood creaking and nearly getting ripped off its hinges, she didn't trust this building for shit if the wind picked up even more.