#and i have been trying my hardest to not pay any heed to what she tells me but recently she told me something that really

[graciebrams]

🫧

[groovycatanime]

There's not a lot of headcanons for Jesus Burgess's family or backstory (in fact, I don't think there are ANY), so I'm going to share some ideas that I've been playing with in my head for a while.

Burgess' parents died when he was really young, so his grandmother, or his 'Abuela' took him in and took care of him all his childhood.

Abuela was a small, sweet and caring old lady, pretty much your typical grandmother, but she was also very fierce and tenacious woman, who was a lot stronger than she appeared, traits that passed on to her grandson.

When Burgess was growing up, he was a bit mischievous (which is likely to be an understatement...) and liked to get into fights with anyone or anything he locked eyes on! Whether it be the town bullies, the drunks from the local bar or a wild animal he happened to come upon, Burgess would fight them!

As expected, this usually got him in a great deal of trouble, which was often reported to Abuela. If the fight Burgess had was with someone who Abuela perceived as troublesome, like the bullies or the drunks, she'd let him get away with it. If it were an innocent child, adult or wild animal, then she'd let him have it! And Abuela is not someone who you want to make angry!!! (She was probably one of the few, if not the only person in town, who could kick Burgess' ass)

Burgess' fighting spirit didn't grow weaker as he got older, which is what a lot of adults in his hometown hoped; it just got stronger, and soon, he was pretty much one of the strongest men in town! Burgess had also been doing his best to not pick fights with every rando he came upon, but he still managed to start fights with some people, though the town was pretty used to it as this point. And the law pretty much thought, "As long as he doesn't kill anyone..."

Now, what drove Burgess to piracy? (I took some inspiration from the backstory of Salvador, a character from Borderlands 2)

So basically, Burgess was pretty much minding his own business in town (a rare thing), and he encounters a fancily dressed person he had never met in town before and decides to challenge them to a fight. To his surprise, the stranger agrees, but he tells Burgess that if he wins, he has to give up all the valuables he has, not just on his person, but in GENERAL, which would include whatever his grandmother possessed.

Burgess, not wanting to put his Abuela through that sort of turmoil, fights the hardest he had ever fought in his life! And he wins! BUT his opponent was not pleased by the outcome of the fight, since apparently, he had a reputation of being a fighting victor where he came from and felt humiliated by his defeat by Burgess, who in his mind, was just a nobody. Burgess pays no heed to the man's frustrations and just goes about his business, thinking the man's anger won't amount to anything harmful.

However, later in the week, the loser, accompanied by several men, go to Abuela's house in an attempt to rob the place as payback against Burgess for his victory. Abuela fights back as best she can, and eventually, Burgess catches wind of it and rushes to her aid, where they successfully fight off the men and restrain the loser. Abuela would've preferred to turn the man in to the local police, but Burgess, enraged that the loser had dared to harm his Abuela, kills the man out of anger. Unfortunately, that proves to be a GRAVE mistake.

Apparently, the loser was not only a popular fighter, but was also from a VERY rich family, who was NOT pleased that Burgess had killed him. Burgess was taken to court, where the reasons for his crimes were explained and the trial went like this at some point:

Judge: Mr. Jesus Burgess, you brutally killed a man of noble birth! Have you anything to say for your actions?

Burgess: He was trying to kill my Abuela!!!

Judge: I know that, but is there anything else you want to say?

Burgess: ...it was fun?

In the end, the punishment for Burgess was either exile or a life sentence in prison, and since Burgess didn't like the idea of being in a cage all his life, he decided to leave his island and have his fights elsewhere, much to his Abuela's dismay.

It would be a couple of weeks later, when he's picking fights on a random island in the South Blue, that he encounters Blackbeard...

So then you must wonder, what happened to Abuela while Burgess was gone? Well, she probably worried about whether he was okay or not, which increased when he got his first bounty poster, like any good grandmother would do. And I have two ideas for what became of her at the present point in the story. One's happy and funny, the other...not so much.

For the happy and funny idea, Burgess gets a wild hair and decides to go to his home island to see how she's doing and brings some of the crew along to meet her. Some of his crewmates, like Augur, try to suggest that this may be a bad idea, but Burgess doesn't listen.

Once in the town, he spots her:

Burgess: ABUELA!!!

Abuela, seeing him and gasping: BURGESS?!

Burgess, starts running towards her: ABUELA!!!

Abuela, starts running towards Burgess: BURGESS!!!

Burgess, still running: ABUELA!!!

Abuela, pulling off one of her sandals: BURGESS!!!

Burgess: Abuela?

Abuela, holding up his bounty poster: BURGESS!!!!!!

Burgess, starts to turn around: OH MIERDA! AUGUR, YOU WERE RIGHT! SHE WASN'T HAPPY TO SEE ME! GET ME OUTTA HERE!

But Augur and the rest of his friends have disappeared and Burgess, despite his possession of the Buff-Buff fruit, once again gets his ass beat by his angry Abuela.

Once Abuela had calmed down, she invites Burgess and his friends to her home for tamales and pastelitos, where she delights them with stories of Burgess' childhood (much to Burgess' embaressment).

Now, as we manga readers know, Burgess's face is now half-metal, and Abuela does ask how that happened, and Burgess is more than happy to answer. Afterwards, Abuela asks Blackbeard if he's willing to recruit the elderly into his crew...

And then a brief idea of a scene in the battle of the Straw Hats and Allies against the Blackbeard pirates would go:

Sabo, staring off into the distance: why is that little old lady running at me with a sandal???

Abuela, raises sandal up: THIS IS FOR HURTING MY GRANDSON!!!

Sabo: WHAT?! You're grandson?! Who's your grandson?

Burgess, whistles, getting Sabo's attention, and points to himself, grinning: It's me. I'm her grandson.

Sabo, looking back at Abuela: Oh fu-.

So, yeah, fun times for Sabo. (On a different note, I feel like Abuela and Dadan would get along GREATLY. They'd have a LOT to talk about!)

Now for the not-so-happy idea (hate me if you feel sad)

Burgess is doing pirate things on the seas, when by some odd chance he comes across someone from his old town who's working on a trade ship the crew happened to be pillaging.

The neighbor recognizes Burgess and informs him that last he saw his Abuela, she wasn't doing well. She had gotten sick with something and had trouble recovering.

Burgess, horrified to hear this, takes Doc Q and goes straight home to the South Blue, hoping to help her and maybe take her back to Fullalead with him.

Unfortunately, he arrives just in time to see her freshly marked grave...

Burgess being Burgess tries to play her death off as no big deal ("Well, I guess that's fate, like Augur would say, or bad luck, like you would say, Doc!), but deep down, he is HURTING. He feels a lot of guilt for not checking in on her, which increases when he learns from his neighbors that she had worried about him a lot when he started becoming a notorious pirate, which likely led to her illness.

Some neighbors phrase this in a way that it makes it seem like her death is Burgess' fault and that he should've never gotten into trouble and gone into exile back then, because who knows, maybe his Abuela would still be alive, and for a time, Burgess agrees...

But eventually, he turns his grief over her death into determination, using his pain to motivate himself to help Blackbeard become the GREATEST pirate in all the world! And maybe make his own strength and winning-streak well-known around the world, too, to show his Abuela, who he was sure was still watching him, didn't raise Burgess for him to amount to being a nobody!

[matildainmotion]

My Cure for the Blues, thanks to my Daughter who Loves Pink: What Might Yours Be?

I am blue. I don’t know why. There are many blatant reasons for blueness in the world right now - more than there have ever been in my lifetime - yet still I don’t know why. If I did I wouldn’t be blue. I would be sad with purpose. Or angry. Or upset. But what I have is a slightly pointless feeling. Being blue is vague. Vaguely low. A big wash of a dark colour, devoid of detail.

Meanwhile my four year old daughter is definitely not blue - she’s pink. “What’s your favourite colour today?” She asks, everyday. I find it a hard question to answer with accuracy, perhaps because of my vague blue feeling. She does not: “What’s yours?” I say. “Pink,” she replies with absolute certainty, “And gold.” Another favourite question of hers, that she poses most evenings at supper: “What are you the fairy of?” The grown-ups round the table come up with various quips in answer: Daddy is the fairy of mashed potato; Granny is the fairy of hearing aids; Mummy is the fairy of tiredness. 

“And you, Tenar?” 

“I’m the fairy of beauty, sparkly things and everything I like,” she replies, while skipping up and down beside the dinner table, because the fairy of beauty is much too busy to pay any heed to the fairy of meal time manners. Her favourite Christmas present was a gold princess gown, which she dons daily, and Snow White-like, checks in the mirror to see if she looks suitably fair. She wants to grow her hair down to just above her bottom. 

This all comes as rather a shock to me because I was not a pink girl - my favourite colour as a child was navy blue, no pastels please. I refused to wear dresses. I had a party boiler suit- dark blue - for birthdays. I climbed trees, ran along garden walls and lived in trousers. I was inconsolable when my father once brought me back a kilt as a present from a trip to Scotland - imagine being given a skirt! Despite being told this was a skirt meant for men, despite the photos in the family photo drawer of my father, a proud soldier in a Black Watch regiment kilt, I remained unconvinced. I have stayed relatively consistent in my tom-boyness into adult life. As a mother my children rarely see me in dresses, hardly ever in make up. Mummy has long hair under her armpits and on her legs but often shaves her head.

Given the version of womanhood I have presented to my daughter, I assumed  her predilection for pink princesses was a result of the vicious marketing to which children, especially girls, are subjected - the bright pink magazines with plastic toy lipsticks and hair curlers sellotaped onto the front, placed at just her height on the wracks near the supermarket check out. This is just one example of the many things about the world that make me blue so, when her pink princess phase began, I set to work. 

I had already consistently switched pronouns around in books - mostly from he to she - or had discussions with my daughter about the absence of active female heroines.  More recently, her questions such as “Why is it girls that have long hair?” Or, “Which one of these princesses is the most beautiful?” lead to long discussions about the history of fashion, gender as a colourful spectrum, and how peacocks are just one example of a species in which it is the boy that gets to wear the gorgeous feathers. None of this seems to make the slightest difference to my daughter’s commitment to pink, but two developments recently have eased my concerns and made me think that there is more than 21st Century patriarchal capitalism at work in her choices, and that the pink thing - or the thing for pink -that is sustaining her spirits through this hard time might actually contain within it a clue to the medicine I need for my blues.  

Firstly, last weekend, after a day on which I had had to work and so had resorted to letting Tenar watch Disney’s Cinderella (the 1950 animation) she ran back and forth during supper and told us her version of the story. In her rendition, she played the part of the fairy godmother, and having magically rustled up a stunning dress for Cinderella, she thought she should be the one who got to enjoy it. So it was she, the fairy godmother, who danced the night away with Cinders. And what of the prince? No princess for him - he was left with a slice of pizza. After three nights of dancing together, Cinderella married Tenar, the fairy godmother, and they lived together happily ever after, with an ever-expanding wardrobe of fabulous dresses. The prince married the pizza, and was, apparently, content with his lot. 

I was reassured by this that my daughter is in no way either a passive consumer of pink-ness or likely to become an easy victim of social norms. Soon after marrying Cinderella, she came up with the second thing which allayed my concerns, and made me question my fast feminist assumptions as to what is at work in her psyche. She announced, seemingly out of the blue (that colour again), that one day she wants to acquire a white, calm, mare.  

We have some chickens, but on the whole we are not an animal-focussed family. No cats. No dogs. Certainly nothing as large and demanding as a horse. My daughter accepts the fact that owning a horse is a big deal - you need a stable, a meadow, and various other bits of kit, so she is going to be patient - not a quality that comes to her easily - and wait, but it is important that she gets the mare when she is still young, she says, by the time she is twelve. By then her hair should have grown to her full desired length and both she and the white mare can ride over the fields with their locks streaming behind them. She is also keen on a cart to go with it, which will, she says, make shopping much easier and less boring. She will look after it very well: she will dress it in garlands of flowers, feed it hay and apples and exercise it daily. Its stable will be right beside the pink, gold and violet-painted bedroom of her own, into which she will also have moved by the time she turns twelve.  

I am not entirely sure from where this horse has ridden into her mind. She has a sticker book of white unicorns, but much of the dream seems to be of her own invention. I am not about to surrender to an essentialist narrative and suggest that all little girls harbour a horsey dream - how could I when I myself never have?- but it has touched me, this sudden passion for a white horse, the oddly mature way in which she discusses the details of it, and it makes me think there is more than magazine marketing at work in her.  

My husband plays Tenar the theme tune to White Horses, the 1960s TV series, whilst I remember all the stories I know that feature a woman and a horse. One of my favourite Ted Hughes’ tales concerns the first woman complaining to God that she is bored - she wants a playmate. After trying out various creations and getting it horribly wrong, God finally gets it right when, out of the crests of the waves, he conjures a horse, who rides ashore to greet the waiting woman. Going further back in time, there are the tales of Epona and Rhiannon, Celtic horse goddesses which I know of thanks to mother-maker, Jackie Singer, who made a brilliant show about them that explored women’s power and sexuality - both its repression and liberation. Rhiannon in particular, who can outride any man with ease, is no passive princess. Whilst the image of a girl dressed in pink is no more than eighty years old, the image of a woman riding a horse is clearly a good deal older. However, irrespective of age (simply using the fact that something has been around for a long time is a highly dubious reason for justifying it - patriarchy, for example, is ancient!) it seems to me, listening to Tenar, that she has somehow tapped into an image-geyser - it has sprung up mysteriously, and with tremendous energy. It feeds her.  Life is tough, we are confined in a tiny house, while we try to stay well, stay sane, shield Granny, but my daughter is buoyant, not blue, because she is dreaming of horses- I need some of what she’s got.  

But I never dreamt of horses. They don’t do it for me. I think back to when I loved navy blue and try to recall what else I was dreaming of then. What made me run around the kitchen table with delight like my daughter does? And then the answer comes: I wanted a meadow too, but not for a horse. I wanted a cabin in one corner - I was going to run across the meadow, barefoot, marvel at the wonder of the world and then head into my cabin and write. I didn’t want to be a princess, I wanted to be a poet. With the same passion, the same weird mix of realism and fantasy as I see in my daughter and her horse ambitions, I made plans for my poetry cabin. I remembered this when I watched the amazing Amanda Gorman, not dressed in pink or blue but brightest yellow, reciting at Biden’s inauguration - a young poet woman warrior. I can feel it does me good to summon up this archetype, this image. It starts, slowly, to dispel the blue. It’s a dose of a meaning-of-life medicine, the first iteration of it that I ever brewed for myself and so, because of this, it still holds a certain potency. As Victor Frankl argues in his classic Man’s Search for Meaning a sense of purpose, of meaning, is what we (man, woman, or betwixt and between) need to survive the hardest times - a holocaust, a global pandemic, or, closer to home, just a tough day of schooling with the kids. 

So, here are your questions for the month - actually a mix of my daughter’s questions and mine:

What is your favourite colour today? What are you the fairy of? What do or did your children, if you have them, dream of? And what were your own childhood dreams? And can your answers to these questions change the colour of your days?

As I type this, Tenar is sitting on my lap, and she has asked for the last word. I have said she can dictate and I will type. Over to Tenar, then, to finish this off:

“I ask my mum so many questions that I feel in my body and I say my heart is the thing that controls my feelings. I ask every night to my mum, why she was a tom boy? And I say that I love you as much as I am going to love everything around me, and I love my heart, and my horse. And I am a girlie girl, not like my mummy.  I love princesses, I say, every night.”

[poptod]

The Dead Heed No Lies (Ch. 17)

Description: The Duat holds a great many rooms and a fair amount of Gods, and there is never a way of telling which will kill you and which will help you.

Notes: I am SO SORRY about not updating this for several days!! i spent some time with my friend danny and things sort of got out of control and she spent a couple days over at my house. I’ll be spending some time at her house starting tomorrow since my parents are headed out of town (business). Anyway, welcome to the Duat. Word Count: 4k

Chapter Seventeen: A Guide in Death’s Valley

A force blew through you, as though some creature were looking straight into your soul, an examination that burnt into your skin. You shut your eyes tight, trying to steady your grip on Ahk. The experience lasted only a matter of seconds, but by the time you reached the other side of the door, both of you were exhausted, panting and lying on the ground. Coughing, you made a weak effort to stand, only to fall back down on your knees. When you looked up, your eyes burning with tears, you saw a black sky above you, black earth beneath you, and a black valley ahead of you. Strangely, there were no metallic scents in the air – only lavender, and a distant honey.

"Remember," Ahk said with a grunt, rolling onto his back and staring at the sky, "we aren't dead. I don't think we'll have to... to go through all the, uh, trials, and things."

"You're helpful," you mumbled sarcastically, slowly standing up, and helping Ahk when you accomplished that.

The both of you stood there for a moment longer, watching the way the landscape seemed to breathe with a life of its own. Dark hills rolled down to make a shallow valley, where a thin stream ran beside you, its darkness an indicator of your presence. Palming at your waist, you grabbed your notebook. You opened it up to the map you'd drawn of Duat, the majority of it a graphite mess, but the replica of the Book of Two Ways' map would be of great use to you.

"So where are we?" Ahk asked, coming to stand beside you and look at the map in your hands.

"I'd say we're here," you said, pointing to a blank space, "meaning the first trial and tribulation would be snake chambers and squatting gods. Any idea what squatting gods are?"

"Absolutely no clue," he said.

What a comfort, you thought dully, snapping the book shut and hiding it back in your shirt. Stretching out your aching arms, the two of you began forward, the dull light of a clouded sky leading the way. He kept one hand intertwined with yours and the other on the hilt of his dagger, wary eyes glancing in every direction of the cavernous valley.

It took only a few minutes to reach the first room of what you knew to be a long hallway. Your map, though probably more incorrect than correct, predicted there to be rooms on either side of the valley, caves and homes where monsters and Gods sit with their trials and hardships for the ahk, or spirit, to pass. But you didn't belong here. Ahkmenrah might have belonged there, what with him not actually being alive, but you did not – you were flesh and bone through every day and night, and you weren't hoping to change that any time soon. That difference in you, that set you apart from everything else. Of course, you didn't notice this until Ahk pointed it out, stopping your trek to inform you.

"You're kind of... glowing," he told you, tilting his head curiously as he looked at you.

"I am the only living thing in the Duat. Probably not helpful, but there's not much we can do now," you said with a shrug. He agreed, nodding, and the two of you continued on your way, watching the hills for any sign of movement.

When the hills began to grow around you, reaching higher and higher into the sky, you heard whispers. Promises of a better life, murmurs of knowing something better than yourself. There you paused, as Ahk did, looking in every direction for the source of the voices. No movement, no falling pebbles, nothing at all, nothing but you and him.

"What are they telling you?" You asked in a hushed voice, your back pressed against his.

"They say I can be with my brothers, and my people," he answered, a breath caught in his throat. "What can you hear?"

You didn't want to say, as the moment he asked the whispers turned from general to oddly specific. At first it had been whispering grants of power, ways to a fruitful life, luring you into the life of a gold-starved Pharaoh. But when you spoke the tone changed, from hissing to hums. They murmured in your ear, close enough you could feel the heat of their words, telling you love is easy, you can take what you want, do not feel stricken with duty, it is all a lie, take what you want.

"They're telling me I can use the tablet to bring back the people I study," you lied.

"Should we keep moving?"

"I don't think there's much else we can do," you mumbled, and as he grasped your hand once more, you came to, and left with him.

As you walked forward the voices grew louder, louder and louder until you couldn't hear your footsteps over them. Trying your hardest to keep an even breath, you willfully ignored them, till Ahk pulled at your arm, stopping you in your tracks. Turning to him, you followed his line of vision to a large cavern in the side of the mountain. Inside you found the first room – the snake chambers, home of squatting Gods, and the paths of Rostau. At least, that's what it was according to Sepi's tomb.

Watching you with slit eyes, the snakes approached you in a mass of writhing scales, forked tongues diving out of their mouths to taste your scent in the air. You stumbled backwards, dumbfounded at their presence just as Ahk was.

"What do they fear? What do you fear, we will ssssee," a black serpent hissed out, wrapping its body around your leg as emerald scaled snakes approached. They swirled up your body, restraining your arms till you couldn't move, the black snake curling up your torso till it came to your neck, its fangs teasing at your skin. You didn't dare move.

It was only then, crowded over with snakes tasting your flesh, choking the air out of you and cutting off your blood flow, you saw what lay behind the snake den. The Gods, none of which you could recognize, and each carrying an instrument and humming low. You struggled, trying to pull at your arms and raise your head. Your efforts remained futile, even as you looked to Ahk, who was in the same mortifying situation. Black and white spots crowded your vision as your breath cut off, the snakes still whispering into your ear, lean into it, forget what you claim you need, you need nothing but yourself.

“Aren’t you a pretty thing,” a violent snake hummed in your ear, its tail curling around your neck. “Oh, haven’t you got beautiful, delicious memories, decadent, ssssucculent little thing, don’t you worry, we will take good, good care of you.”

Fear began to seep away from you, a warmth coating you as they began to overtake your body. It was far too easy to give in, to let them control you, to let go of your responsibilities and oaths to belong somewhere. Adrenaline left your veins, leaving only the exhaustion built from trekking through the pyramid and the Duat.

A bright shiing sounded from beside you, followed by frantic hissing and the splatter of cold blood. In sudden clarity you ripped away from the black snake's grip, turning your head and neck, gasping for breath as you tried to see where Ahk was. In one moment he was beside you and in the next he stood above you, ripping his dagger through scaled flesh. Caught in the moment he payed little attention to where he cut, simply ripping at everything that tied you down, leaving several tiny cuts across your skin, but it wasn't the first time you'd been hurt on this venture. The second you could feel your limbs again you clawed at the snakes wrapped round your torso, digging your nails into their flesh till they released, screaming and writhing in your hold. You stood as soon as possible, throwing the snakes in another direction, their cold blood still staining yours and Ahk's bodies.

"See? Not too bad," he said with a grin, brushing the dirt off your shirt. You almost chuckled breathlessly, before looking over his shoulder, seeing the sitting Gods stand, their instruments on the floor and their humming no more.

"Behind you," you whispered, never tearing your gaze from their menacing positions. He turned, frozen as the Gods stepped down from their pedestals, moving towards you.

"Do we run?" He asked, his grip on his dagger tightening.

"What else are we gonna do? Fight Gods?" You mumbled anxiously, looking around desperately for somewhere to run, somewhere you could hide.

"Well it's not entirely unheard of -"

The instant you found a respite up the mountain, a tunnel the dug deep into the earth, you grabbed his hand and ran. Stumbling, he followed after you, his pace quickening when the Gods began chasing after you. Approaching the small hole you practically dived into it, Ahk coming soon after till the both of you crunched into the tiny space. Their hands came after you, grey and green skin reaching to try and grasp you, one of them managing to get a grip on your hair and pull you.

Letting out a sharp yelp of pain you clawed at the hand, kicking your feet desperately to avoid being pulled out. Ahk grabbed at you, pulling you by your feet till the God’s grasp weakened, ending with you sliding back down the cave and curling up beside Ahk. Shaking with adrenaline and fear you kept close to him, hugging him close and watching with wide eyes as the hands kept reaching for you. They seceded a moment later as the earth moved. You looked to Ahk for an explanation, but as usual the both of you had level intelligence as to the happenings around you.

Crammed into that tight place, rocks surrounding you as the earth  began to shake, you tried to catch your breath. Ahk did the same, the two of you staring at each other as you panted.

"Earthquake," you noted softly as a large tremor ran through the ground.

"I didn't think the Duat had earthquakes," he mumbled, staring up at the obsidian ceiling.

"I, uh," you shifted in the small space, "I think it's probably Ra."

"Ra? Why - oh, yeah, the uh... the serpent battle. I don't know why I didn't remember that," he said, hitting his head with his palm. You reached for his hand, pulling it away from him and holding it tight in yours.

"You've been detached from your world for a long while. No one faults you for that, but we should probably not be around Ra, he's kind of a dick," you said, your breath catching in your throat with a particularly harsh rumble of the earth.

"Oh yeah, total agreement there," he grunted, moving on his elbows and knees to crawl out of the tunnel, reaching the light of the sky before it was overshadowed. You came up behind him, peeking over his shoulder.

The shadow cast upon the small opening was made by none other than Ra himself, standing at the size of a five floor building and towering above the valley hills. In his grasp lay the snake Apep, Ra's vice grip tight around his neck as he writhed, his fangs begging to be sunk into Ra's flesh. Apep wrapped his tail around Ra's free hand, squeezing till the blood cut off and bruises began to form. You winced when Ra cried out, both pained and determined as the fight continued, Ra stumbling back till he fell backwards. He rolled over, pinning the serpent beneath him. Letting out an uproarious cry, he freed himself from Apep's grasp, pulling out a dagger and pressing it into the serpent's mouth. Blood splattered across Ra's face, and in a rush Ahk grabbed your hand.

Pulling you out of the tunnel, Ahk lead you down the valley, never stopping his affrighted running till Ra was out of sight. Gasping for breath you fell to your knees, exhausted from the bolting speed Ahk had taken. He stopped beside you, panting as he rested his hands on his knees, looking off in the distance to see if Ra had noticed either of you.

"I think," he said, still trying to catch his breath, "he's big enough and we're small enough, I don't think he saw us."

"Oh God," you mumbled, coughing. "I really hope we don't need to sleep cause we're gonna have a hell of a time trying to find somewhere safe."

"Don't worry," he said in a sigh, sitting down next to you. "What danger comes next?"

"I'm not sure. If we were on the route of a dead person, we would've had to pass through the tunnel directly beside the squatting Gods, but we're not dead, so we can't go there. It looks like it's just a straight line, but I don't know where it'll lead," you said, pulling out your notebook and pointing to the various landmarks on your simple map, connected to an outlined list of all the dangers of the Duat.

"I really wish we could summon Ma'at right now n' ask her some questions," he mumbled, leaning his head against your shoulder.

"She said we could only ask one question," you reminded him. "Otherwise she'd kill us."

"I know, just hypothetical wishing. Can I see the map again?"

You dug the notebook out of your shirt and handed it to him. Opening it up to the right page, he held it so the both of you could see it, trying to pinpoint where you were. The two of you had just passed the snakes and ran a great ways, meaning you were somewhere near the lake of fire, most likely separated from that by the hills surrounding you.

"My theory is that we're walking down the middle, see this section," you said, running your finger down the thin middle of the map separating the trials from the Gods' homes. "That means that all the trials are either within the mountain or on the other side of it -"

"Meaning that on the other side of that range," he pointed to the right side of the valley, "is where Osiris and all them live."

"I believe so. Let's hope that everyone else is as big as Ra was, it'll be really hard to navigate that area if we're all the same size," you said, shutting your book and putting it back in your shirt as you stood.

Ahk stood with you, the both of you looking up at the tall mountainside, wondering how long it would take to scale that height. There were no more tunnels, no holes or caverns in the mountainside.

"How long do you suppose we've been here?" He asked, still looking up at the cliffs.

"Half a day maybe?"

He let out a whine of discontentment, which you couldn't blame him for – you'd been there less than a day and you'd already almost died three times. First was the snakes, second was the miscellaneous gods, and third was your mystery encounter with none other than Ra. The ravine, though, it stretched out endlessly; you would be walking it for days if you let yourself do so. You couldn't even see the portal behind you anymore. Out of all things that made you the most anxious, leaving you constantly wondering if the portal would stay open. There were a great deal of other things to be anxious about rather than that, so you kept your eyes open, and your thoughts clear.

Reaching for the nearest grip, you began your ascent up the mountainside, breathing deeply in hopes of avoiding serious exhaustion. Ahk came up beside you, but about five minutes into it the earth began to rumble again. Both of you looked to each other in a snap, the color draining from your faces as another tremor shook the earth, weakening your grasp on the rocks. You fell, sliding a short way down the mountain till you landed on steady ground. Looking to the sky and all around, you watched for Ra, as Ahk instinctively began searching for a hiding place. The silent communication you and Ahk had would come in handy once again, ending with him finding another small tunnel and forcing you inside.

"I feel like a rat," he said, following after you, sliding down the smooth rock of the too-circular tunnel. He slammed into you, apologizing softly as he situated himself to sit beside you.

"Better than looking like Ra's dinner at least," you mumbled, your eyes stuck on the entrance to the hole.

Trying to even out your breath, you ignored the tight space, hoping your mild claustrophobia would leave you alone – neither you nor Ahk needed an anxiety attack on your hands. The heat from both of you began warming up the small tunnel, a pleasant experience if you weren't already sweating from fear. A bitter scent invaded you, the smell of pools of blood from either within the mountain or from outside. You weren't sure which one terrified you more. With each thundering footstep the tremors grew worse, the giant approaching you slowly. Gripping Ahk you shut your eyes tight, willing for it to pass by you, pleading for safety within the mountain.

A shadow came over the tunnel entrance, an indicator you recognized too easily, and one that sent sheer terror down your spine. While you kept your eyes shut, Ahk looked on in a much braver act than you were willing to do. Instead you kept him close, as he kept you close, and the both of you waited for it all to be over. Peeking open a single eye, you watched as a foot stopped by the entrance. Both of you stopped breathing, petrified by the nearness. The giant, which you assumed was most likely a God, leant down there, knees pressed into the earth as they looked into the tunnel with a single, massive eye.

Immediately it saw you, watching as both of you clenched in fear, grasping each other tight as you tried to cram as far down the one-way tunnel as you could. Panic coursed through your veins in painfully harsh heartbeats. Long eyelashes blinked over the giant eye, a black and grey pupil following you and your frantic movements.

In a loud snap the eye left, in its' place a young woman with long black and blue hair, the dreads lined with expensive beads and a crimson and gold crown atop her head. She smiled a brilliant and kind smile, one that almost had you relaxing.

"Hello!" She said rather brightly, still smiling wide as she waved. "You aren't supposed to be here. How'd you get here?"

Her word choice made you want to think that she was hostile, but her tone said something else entirely, as she still remained as friendly as ever. The dress she wore, starting right below her breasts and running down to her ankles fitted her nicely, the red material tight around her waist and loose at her feet, allowing you to see the golden anklets she bore. When you saw the green beads gracing her collarbones, the cow horns in her crown, and the thin staff she held, her identity clicked in your head.

"Wait - are you Hathor?" You asked incredulously, your eyes wide as you spoke. Now Hathor, she was a God you could get behind, unlike Zeus and Ra. Osiris was okay but he was on thin ice in your books.

"Yes! I'm honoured you recognized me," she said with a laugh, her cheeks turning a soft pink as tiny creases appeared beside her eyes. "What are your names?"

"Uh, I - I'm (Y/N), this is Ahkmenrah, but usually we just call him Ahk," you introduced yourselves, almost stuttering in her presence, but you managed to hold together well enough.

Hathor, you hadn't thought about meeting her (or really any God besides Anubis), but that certainly didn't mean you weren't elated to see her. She was a kind Goddess, a protector of women and a patron of beauty. Not only that, but she appeared to live up to her titles with much integrity, helping you and Ahk out of the hole you'd sunk into.

"Ahkmenrah, you're quite the story around here," she said when you both stood on your feet before you. She brushed at his clothes, clearing the dust and blood off him before giving you the same treatment. Only when you stood directly in front of her did you notice her height, which was still notable, as she stood probably two or three feet taller than you.

"Really?" Ahk said, looking unsure if that was a good or bad thing.

"Oh yes," she said, nodding sagely. "Not everyone cheats death every night."

Ahk turned to you, an expression that begged the question, does this woman hate us or not? Unfortunately you did not know the answer, but you'd bet she in the very least wouldn't hurt you. You shrugged in unison with him, and the two of you followed her down the valley, keeping a faster pace to match her long strides.

"So, um - weird question, but are you going to kill us?" Ahk asked when you caught up with her.

"What he means is that most of the things and people we've met here so far have been, well..." you looked to Ahk, "um, let's say less than hospitable. We're just wondering what you plan on doing with us, if anything at all."

"Depends on where you're headed and what your aim is," she answered, and you prayed that she didn't know what you were actually doing. If she did, her phrasing definitely meant she was going to kill you. There was, however, the chance that Anubis wasn't telling each and every person the whole situation, and that left a little hope for you.

You spent the next hour or so walking with her and explaining to her the particulates of your predicament, the bulk of the story told by Ahk since he was there during the tablet's creation. Fortunately she took your word, believing that Khonshu blessed his family, and that you were there only to help. Of course, she was intelligent, and asked many questions, all of which the two of you were happy to answer. It was rare to find a God who acted kind and, in a way human, in all the best ways.

"It shouldn't be too hard to find your tablet. I know where it is, it's like a siren here – Khonshu doesn't live here, so when his magic appears, it's not in the ordinary for any of us," she told you as you walked.

"So you're going to help us?!" Ahk asked in an astounded voice, his mouth hanging open. You didn't blame him for that either, considering practically no one you'd met so far had been willing to help and guide you.

"That'd be wonderful," you added. "You don't have to, though."

"No, there's really very little to do here, and we can't do much on earth, so... it's fun to play with Anubis anyway," she said with a shrug, and in that moment you remembered that this was nothing but drama for Gods. Your life, magic on earth, Ahk's existence was all just drama and politics for them.

Ahk doubled back, his pace slowing to match yours. Standing beside you, he kept an eye on Hathor as he spoke in a hushed voice, leaning closer to you.

"Is this a good idea?" He whispered, his shoulder brushing yours.

"Can't be worse than our original idea," you mumbled back. He bit his lip uncertainly, glancing Hathor up and down before slowly agreeing with a tentative nod. Perhaps you couldn't trust her, but she was your best bet, and both you and Ahk had experience with cautious trust. Hathor would have to do.

[morimess]

The Spider

WARNING: THIS IS BASED ON AN OLD NIGHTMARE I HAD BACK IN HIGHSCHOOL.  THEMES OF SUICIDE, SUICIDAL THOUGHTS, DEPRESSION, ABUSE, MURDER, AND DEATH ARE PROMINENT.  IF YOU ARE SENSITIVE TO THIS, THIS IS YOUR WARNING. I WILL TAG IT TOO.  It is also about 3 or 4 years old, so the writing isn’t the best.  I have edited to make it sound more like how I currently write, but still want to give credit to the me who woke up crying at 3 am, and physically couldn’t stop writing until I got onto the bus that morning (both by how shaken the dream had left me, and the fact my thoughts wouldn’t let me drop it).  A variation of it might also be found on Deviant Art and Reddit...I honestly can’t remember if I posted it on either platform, but knowing me I probably did.

A spider follows me.

It’s been following me since before I was born.

It bit my father upon my conception,

And my mother upon my birth,

It has bitten my guardians,

And any people I meet to ignore it.

It doesn’t like being ignored,

It doesn’t like me talking to others.

Its jealousy like a child having their favorite toy taken away.

For a toy is all I am.

Its bite holds a toxin.

Destroying the mind,

Uprooting the soul,

And beckoning one to...

Eradicate the flesh.

I am the only one that can see it.

At first, I tried to warn others of its increasing presence,

They saw nothing, 

Only an imaginative child,

With too much going on in their head.

I tried to warn them of it baring its fangs,

But they didn’t pay me any heed.

And they didn’t feel the stinging bite.

I watched the toxin take root in their minds,

Twisting them, 

Marring them,

Devouring them.

They saw no change.

That is, until they took their lives,

Sometimes the lives of others.

And with every life it takes,

It gets bigger,

Its venom more powerful,

Manifesting new and more horrendous afflictions on its victims,

Keeping me a helpless watcher of what is unveiling before me.

I am the only one who hasn’t been bitten.

It’s as if it knows there is already a toxin in my mind,

Devouring me.

My toxin is slower than its,

But it wants me to suffer.

It does not want it to end.

It only prolongs my life out of its own sadistic pleasure.

Or are these ignorant rambles of a child?

Maybe the spider pities me?

Maybe it envies me?

What if it isn’t the spider’s fault?

What if the spider...?

These questions pester me constantly,

But I know I can’t have people suffer at my expense.

I run.

I run as far, and as fast as I can.

The spider, the curse, can only move so fast.

I run,

I run,

I run,

I run,

I run,

I run.

.

.

.

.

.

I’ve succeeded.

I’ve started a steady career,

I’ve met someone to settle down with,

I’ve got the house of my dreams,

I’m pregnant,

I haven’t thought of the spider since the last time I wrote in this journal…

.

It’s here.  It’s at my job.  Any clients I interact with are bitten, any co-workers I talk to are bitten.  I ask for the rest of the day off, so as not to cause any more problems, and now the boss is bitten, and I’m fired.  I’m tired, I’m devastated, and I’m so alone, I just want to go home.

.

I am a fool. I forgot about my husband. He just got home, and now he wants to know what happened.  All I could do is stare through him, and plead with the spider “Please don’t take my husband too.”  It didn’t listen.  It didn’t care.  It bit him, while staring into my soul, all the while taunting, daring, seeming to say “Go on tell him what really happened, let him see the loon he married, and see how far it gets you.  Whether you tell him or not, you’ll know you did this to yourself for trying to escape me. I will take joy in your suffering, and I hope you feel sorry, for this is only the beginning of your hell.”

 It was the longest bite I’ve ever seen it take.  Wanting to pump as much venom into my love as possible.

.

Days- 

Weeks- 

Months-

Time loses meaning with the venom.  You start marking days by aggression, weeks with strikes, and months with near death experiences.  I didn’t leave him through it all because I still loved him, and I knew it was my fault he was like this.  My sweet, caring husband turned into as big a monster as the one who bit him. Thank whatever saving grace there is my husband didn’t kill me.  But he did start a fire in his factory.  A fire that is now infamous for the countless of floor workers it killed, including himself.  

He started it after receiving the call that I went into labor.  True to its form, the spider bit all the doctors and nurses who were trying to help me, triggering the start of their cruelty during the procedure. When the baby had finally been delivered, I didn’t even get to name her before the spider turned, almost smirking, to look at me.  In its eyes I saw it say, “Now let the real fun begin”.  I knew what was going to happen, there was no other way but for it to end like this.  I closed my eyes, sobbing, not wanting to see.  The doctors thought it was pure joy, it was nothing but sheer terror.  It felt like an eternity before I opened them again, confused as to why nothing had happened yet.  As My eyes opened I saw its gaping maw stretched over the body of my child. When it saw that my eyes were finally opened, it lunged towards my baby.  

Before I knew what I was doing I forced my arm into the spider’s gullet and watched as it feared me for the first time in my life before clamping its jaws down. I felt its stinging bite, and the chilly warmth of its venom, closing my eyes again to process the evil taking hold of my mind.

When I opened my eyes it was no longer there, instead I saw my child, now swaddled in my arms.  And all I thought was how easy it would be to strangle her little frame.  To kill her before she had to endure what I did.  But I didn’t.  I couldn’t.  The venom prevented me from granting my child that small mercy, and ending the reign of the spider.

.

I can no longer be in the same room as her.  I can no longer be in the same room as you.  I am so very sorry sweetheart.  As of now my cruelty towards you would damage you more than never knowing me at all. If you see the spider, I regret everything I ever did, but I know that you will be the one to find a way to break this curse.  Let me give you this advice to help you out for the time being: don’t run, that provokes it; engage it, try to divert its anger; if possible, avoid contact with other people; find a way to trap it, keep it in a glass box if you must, that way you can see it, it can see you, and most other problems will be solved. I don’t want to do this, but I must. I know my life is at its end, and I am on my last shred of sanity, but the hardest part of my life will be giving you up.  Stay strong, stay brave…...please.

I love you, so, so much.

-Mom

I found a way to train him momma!!  Now he only attacks those who want to harm me!  I put him in the glass box like you said, but a meanie tried to take it, and he accidentally opened it!  Mr. Tickles bit him, then crawled onto my shoe and raised his front legs to protect me. That meanie hasn’t been to school since that day, and I’ve heard that he “did himself in” I don’t know what that means, but I hope he’s learned his lesson!!

.

Momma!!! Mr. Tickles can talk!!!  Well, not really, but he talks to me in my head!!  He says he’s reeeaaaallllyyy sorry about what he did to you and to your momma, but at the same time, that you two were naughty, and never played with him.  Any time he bites one of my friends he always says sorry, and he says when I get older, that he’ll teach me how to fix them!!!!  Isn’t that cool?!?!  Anyway, I gotta go, Mr. Tickles says it’s time to go to school. Bye!!

@beautiful-doom

[ithilwen-lionheart]

Love, lead me on - Legolas x Priestess!Reader - Chapter 4 pt. 1/1

Alternatively: With a downcast smile, you pierced my heart like a dagger...

[ Work Text ]

After giving me a smile with downcast eyes, you suddenly grew up

That was like a sharp knife split my chest apart...

There stood Legolas, clad in the finest silver tunic that reached his knees, dark brown pants and matching boots. His entire outfit screamed sophistication and elegance, his hair in its usual perfect braids, but his eyes...

His supposedly stunning and enticingly piercing blue eyes that always seemed so alive just looked too tired, sad and emotionally spent that it physically hurt her.

He was smiling but it was so mournful that Celine just hopes he would stop straining himself by pretending. His gaze then fell to the ground, defeated, as if he'd not only seen war but something much more tormenting.

And it stabbed her with more pain than a jagged saw would ever inflict on her body.

Which of course, makes perfect sense, considering the hole the elven prince had dug himself into.

And then she remembers, of course he'd end up like that. She almost forgotten that she had seen Kili with Tauriel earlier. She was way too caught up laughing with Thorin that she couldn't pay them any heed back then.

It didn't matter whatever it is that they were doing because the war had been won and Legolas had all but lost this one.

"Am I the only one noticing or is it getting a bit too stuffy here, dear prince? Shall we head outside for some fresh air?"

And Celine is just about to lose it too.

-----

--It's not that I want to be loved, but I want to love all of you

"You knew this would happen, did you not?" Celine began right after they got out and into one of Erebor's near nonexistent balconies.

It's not as elegant as the ones they have in Mirkwood, Rivendell or Lothlorien. Neither does it offer any splendid scenery down below. All one could see from where they are were the bloodied battlefields from where they fought earlier, and whatever is left of the -once again- ruined city of Dale.

The morbid side of her thinks that the setting somehow matches the mood they are both currently in, perfectly.

But they aren't here to make small talk about the differences of dwarven and elvish aesthetics and so she kept the thoughts to herself.

Legolas made his way to the crumbled stone railings without a word.

Celine didn't really have much to do but wait for his response, and so she did.

There's nothing she could say to make things better for him anyways.

A few minutes had passed and she thanked the valars for her expansive patience when it came to the prince.

"Yes." he hung his head low and slumped his shoulders from what she could see of his back.

Cautiously making her way towards him as if she's walking on thin ice -which she probably is doing at the moment- she voiced out that one question that had been nagging at her ever since, "Then why did you still do it? Why have you kept pushing the inevitable aside? If you knew you would end up hurting, why?"

And she ponders, she should be asking herself pretty much the same question as well.

Why?

And she'll come up with a pathetic excuse like-

"I cannot. Could not stop. I have tried, multiple times to... To forget. But I couldn't. It had always been and will always be there on the back of my mind... And before I know it, I am back and stuck on the same place as I had been before." He didn't turn to her and just stared straight ahead, glimmers appearing on the corners of his eyes before he bowed and held his head in between his hands, breaths shuddering and racking his body.

"Have you ever tried looking some place else?" Celine began softly, trying her best not to choke because seeing him in this much pain because of someone else is beyond excruciating for her. Reminding herself that she should be the one comforting the prince and not the other way around, she resumed her job of rubbing one hand against his back in a futile attempt to tame the unpleasant shakes threatening to shatter his fragile weeping form.

She was answered by a furious shake of his head and a broken voice saying,

"I-I could not..."

"You could not or you would not?" If there was even a hint of bitterness in her tone, Celine made sure that it was evident enough for the oblivious prince to notice. The priestess doesn't know how long she could take this merciless twist of fate before she just breaks down here and then herself.

Legolas finally faced her as she posted the question, with his brows furowed in confusion, "Have you not figured out that if I could, then I would have already done that ages ago?"

Lavender eyes widened at this, warmth spreading across her cheeks, "S-so you k-knew?" She cursed herself from stuttering.

So this is it.

"I knew what?" He slightly pulled back, certifiably on the exact opposite track of what she is expecting.

No,

He's even more dense than she had originally thought.

His words practically stung that she quickly retrieved her hands as if she'd just been burnt and took a couple of steps back. Eyes wide in disbelief.

"By the valars, Legolas!" She whispered somewhere in between a choke and a gasp, all air literally knocked out of her lungs with the effort it took to keep herself from screaming in frustration.

-this is it.

Tears began clouding her lilac hues as she clutched her shattered chest. All these times she thought she was being lucid enough, all these times she thought he could at least somehow feel that she cares for him badly, more than absolutely necessary.

"How can you not see it?!" Her lips were quivering and every nerve inside her body was quaking but she couldn't bother minding them at the moment.

She has so much to say, so much questions and reprimands piling up from the deepest pits of her stomach just waiting until they could finally spill out. It was as if she had a heart full of explosives that could go off anytime after she had spent the last of her wavering forbearance, as if it was a match just waiting to be lighted up by circumstances.

Circumstances as unfortunate and ruining as this.

And all was out before she could even attempt to reign all the words back in to mull over their applicability and the tone she's supposed to use as she spoke them. It was all cursory as if her mind had finally failed her and her damaged heart had taken over,

"How can you not see how much I care for you?

How can you not realize that I would be willing to do everything just to keep you happy?

How can you not notice the way my eyes would linger long after you looked away?

How can you not see that I would be willing to throw my life away just so that I could keep you safe?

That I'd rather have my heart on the line if that would mean yours would be happy even if it'll be in the arms of another?

How can you not realize how your minute smile would take it's effect on me?

Is everything that I had done not enough to make you see?" Her voice finally broke and her gloved hands flew over to cover her mouth upon realizing that she had finally spewed all these words when she tried her hardest not to make it look as if the prince had made her do it and she blamed him for it or that she would've wanted something in return for something she had done even though the ellon had never asked her to in the first place.

But still, what was done cannot be undone and Celine was sure that it all came out as if she was desperately asking the prince to at least take notice of what she had sacrificed and the ends she would be willing to go to just for him and his approval.

That was precisely when she lost it to one heart shattering cry as she fell to the ground,

"H-how c-can you n-not notice that I-I l-love you all this t-time?" She barely managed to get it through sobs and hiccups as she frantically tried to rid her face of the salty trails out of habit.

"Celine-"

"I love you, Legolas, okay?!" She shouts and tries to stand up on wobbly legs. The priestess swears that had that party inside been quieter, it would've already been heard by everyone else.

Celine couldn't stop the words from flowing out, not now when she had already started it, this might be the one and only chance she'll ever get with her courage and pain enough to push the words she'd kept in herself for too long, finally out. Cracked voice and messed up face be damned.

The blond ellon was just about half on his way off of his position on the railings to assist her when her knees threatened to finally give up but she rose one hand up to stop him. She couldn't trust herself to bear his touches, not when she's breaking down, not when she's prone and vulnerable because she might do something he'll hate her for and she'll regret.

She took her hand back and clenched her chest with it along with her other one, as if the gesture would keep her shattered heart from entirely falling out, "I love you so much that it hits me tenfold whenever I see you hurting because of Tauriel, because I know that if I had only been given the chance then... Then..." Celine made an inner oath never to blame a single thing on Legolas, or Tauriel or on fate because she knew she brought this upon herself. Well aware that everything are mere consequences of her decisions and actions.

Never to blame and never to post herself as better than the elleth Legolas had loved -still loves- because who on earth is she anyways?

"If just.. If you would just see me..." Her voice went out pleading and desperate despite of her efforts not to. The tears kept on coming as if there would never be an end to them, twin waterfalls that kept on running for at last they've been given an outlet.

That was only then that Celine had realized she'd been keeping this much tears for the prince. She'd wished that this day would never come, he didn't need to see her break -especially not when he himself is beyond repair.

They couldn't cry here and cuddle in each other's arms and expect everything to get better for the two of them somehow, they don't comfort and build each other's hearts and end up with each other in the process.

It doesn't work that way. This isn't some fairy tale a mother would read to her children. In fairy tales, there would be magic that would keep people from dying, those in love would end up with the person that they treasure and live happily ever after.

They don't break like this and mourn over their unrequited feelings. In fairy tales, there are no such things.

Maybe there's a reason why fairies are mere legend in Middle Earth. They come up with such ridiculously idealistic tales the world is better off without.

'I should not be despairing like so,' the bluenette shook the negative thoughts away and brushed the tears off her eyes once more as she took one steadying breath and stood as straight as she can.

It had already been a given that she wouldn't notice the prince who was now merely a feet away from her, considering how she had majority of her concentration focused on not letting herself be swallowed by such cataclysmal thoughts.

One cold hand laid against her cheek and freezing was the last thing she had expected his touch to feel. He'd always seemed so warm and welcoming when it came to Tauriel.

His voice, his movements, eyes, gentle grasps and steps.

But she isn't Tauriel.

Celine would never be Tauriel.

Ever.

"Celine, I... My apologies.. "

Still, she looked up even as his own tears went down to mingle with her own as he bowed his head, flaxen strands curtaining the pain that they both shared and had plastered on their wrecked faces.

His eyes were clamped shut and his entire features were contorted in pain, one large hand was trembling on her cheek as the other gripped her shoulder for support. A support she'd be all too willing to give.

"It's alright." Her tinkling voice soothed, reaching up to relieve his face of both the drying and brand new tears with trembling hands of her own.

His eyes fluttered open at this, piercing blue orbs shimmering with a thousand more tears, eyebrows furrowing in confusion because why would it be alright?

And of course Celine knew what that tiny gesture meant.

"It was my choice to love you. You did not tell me, no one did. Not your father, not the elves, or the dwarves, men or even the valars themselves. It was not fate or circumstances that lead me to this. It is my actions. And for it, I regret nothing." She answered truthfully, barely keeping herself from placing the kiss someplace else that would not be his cheek.

The elf could only blink, frozen in place, still broken yet bafflement had -for once- dominated the pain,

"Celine, you are well aware that-"

The priestess shook her head, a timid smile on her lips as she pulled away and let her hands slip off his face to pat his sturdy chest playfully,

"I figured I should at least do that before-" she trailed off as her lavender hues wandered off to the side.

Legolas felt something stir in him. Maybe it had something to do with the state he found her in earlier with Oakenshield.

"Before?" She didn't answer and his suspicion grew all the more unpleasantly potent, "Before what, Celine?"

'Valars, not her too...' It always had to be the dwarves doesn't it.

Celine only takes a shuddering breath and the Sindarin Prince feels every nerve in his body quake with each scintilla of movement.

The hand that was on her cheek moved to her shoulder as he stared into her eyes, the intensity in those shades of blue enough to voice his question out even without him needing to tilt his head to urge her to continue.

"I'm going back to Lothlorien."

His expression was unreadable but his hands went limp and dropped to his sides.

Celine smiled and clasped her hands behind her back, not wanting to dampen the prince's eyes over again. Surely he wouldn't mind her being gone.

"And please do not feel obligated to love me. All I could ask of you is to allow me to at least love you until nothing more is left of me." Taking his hand in hers one last time, she kissed his palm and went off to leave.

Not once bothering to turn back to see the prince's reaction because she could only take too much hurt in a single day, and this particular one had given her her fill of the dreaded emotion for what she could see as the entirety of her lifetime.

[ To be continued in Chapter 5 ]

[gimmesumsuga]

Sweeter than Sweet (74)

AO3 link

Pairings: Jimin x reader, Yoongi x reader, Jimin x Yoongi, Namjoon x reader, Taehyung x reader, Jungkook x reader + others as the story progresses

Warnings:  Nil of note

Word count: 4.4K

Previous / Next 

“Tannie…” Voice low in warning, you cock an eyebrow at the puppy who’s plonked his bottom down right at your feet, gazing upward.  His attention isn’t on you, however; it’s focused on Nova who’s blissfully unaware of the small canine’s gaze fixed upon her, sleeping happily curled up in your lap. “I wouldn’t, if I were you.”  

He cocks head to the side as his beady little eyes meet yours, like he’s trying his hardest to understand but inevitably fails to heed your warning, choosing instead to rear up onto his back legs and press his front paws to your knees in order to sniff curiously at the feline in your lap, nose twitching.  

Yeontan has only been a part of the family for a few days but already he and Nova have established a bit of a love/hate relationship.  Being the sweet young pup he is all Yeontan wants to do is play, and whilst Nova has displayed more patience with him than you’d initially anticipated she might, the shelter cat will only put up with so many bats of her tail before she’ll turn, hiss, and offer a few swipes of her own.

Not that Yeontan takes it to heart.  Five minutes later and he’ll be coming back for more, his tail wagging just as hard.

“Tan!” Tae calls, his usually deep pitch rising by an octave as he leans forward from the opposite sofa and beckons the pup towards him, “Tannie, come!”  To give him credit, Yeontan does indeed turn his head at the call of his name, tongue hanging out as he looks back at his owner, but the lure of Nova proves far too strong for him to resist.  Unwisely, he extends one paw and taps it against the curl of Nova’s spine as if trying to get her attention and then immediately seems to regret doing so, shrinking back and cowering when all of her fur stands on end and she sharply lifts her head, spitting out her wrath.  

“Nova, don’t be mean.”  She doesn’t respond favourably to your light scalding, turning to face you wearing a similarly dirty look as you imagine Yeontan would’ve just received for daring disturb her beauty sleep.  Unwilling to risk being accosted any further, she stands, stretches, and then jumps gracefully off of your lap, leaping straight over Yeontan’s fuzzy little head. She runs from the room as soon as her paws meet the floor, far quicker than the little dog is able to give chase, and as her tail disappears through the gap in the door you hear her meow reproachfully, abandoning you all in favour of better company or peaceful solitude.  

“See, Tannie,” Taehyung sighs as the little dog trots back over and allows himself to be picked up and placed into the vampire’s lap, tail wagging. “You’ve gone and upset her again now.  Nova’s never gonna want to be your friend if you keep on bugging her all the time.”

“You’re one to talk,” Jungkook snorts from his spot at the other end of the sofa without looking up from the sketchpad he’s slouching over, his eyebrows furrowed in concentration.  Tae pays the younger vampire’s little jibe absolutely no mind, too fixated on scratching Yeontan behind the ears to really care what anyone else may have to say. He hasn’t stopped smiling ever since the two of you brought the sweet pup home, and watching the two of them now - Yeontan rolling over onto his back in search of a belly rub - your heart feels so full it’s fit to burst.  

Taehyung had known the moment he’d seen Yeontan that he was the one he’d be taking home.  You’d been lucky to find such a young puppy at a shelter - the two of you having agreed even before starting your search that you’d rather give an unwanted dog a home than go straight to a breeder - and thankfully, Yeontan had seemed to take to Tae just as quickly as the vampire had to him in return, standing on his hind legs and yapping to grab your attention; his disposition far happier than the severe slant of his eyebrow markings would lead you to believe.  

It was love at first sight, and Taehyung has been doting shamelessly on him ever since.  

Unsurprisingly, the rest of the family have also been just as eager to welcome him into the fold (save Nova, of course).  Hoseok had spent a good half an hour playing rope tuggy with Tan on the first day of his arrival, and by now Jungkook must surely have a whole short film worth of footage of their antics recorded on his phone.  Jin’s even gone so far as to start researching homemade dog food recipes, studying up on the specific nutritional requirements of Yeontan’s Pomeranian breed.

You’ve been thankful, actually, that he’s had something else to think about - something else to focus on and use as a conversation starter.  You’d had the feeling he’d been avoiding you, at first, after the three of you had bumped into him following your tryst on Christmas day. Every time you’d crossed paths thereafter he’d seemed to find some excuse to rapidly take his leave - something burning on the stove, some leaky tap he suddenly had to fix - but now, thanks to Yeontan’s arrival, he seems to have been granted the will to power through whatever awkwardness remains.  

That's not to say you haven't caught him staring at you, mind you.  You'd need more than two hands to count the amount of times you've turned your head and your eyes have locked for just a split second.  He’ll rip them away and try to cover his indiscretion by making some sort of poorly timed joke at the expense of one of the others, screeching with laughter and avoiding your gaze, but the both of you still know.  You know he'd heard what the three of you were up to and you know he wilfully stayed in hopes of hearing more. When you've drifted off into daydream lately it's been to images of Jin doing things to himself that you never would've dared think about before, but now that you've started it's almost as though you can't bring yourself to stop, morbidly curious about what the eldest vampire might be like to know so intimately.

You've already experienced the various kinks and quirks of almost every member of the house (all but Hoseok, of course, although Sam has told you so much that sometimes you think you may as well have), and yet Jin’s sexual habits have remained a complete mystery to you.  Is he assertive? Submissive? Does he have some kind of crazy fetish he's hiding behind that charming, debonair smile?

“Oh gross, man!  Hyung, he's peeing again!” Jungkook's horrified exclamation shifts your attention rapidly back to the here and now, and with pink-tinged cheeks your eyes roam the room till they land on where Yeontan is squatting over the rug to relieve himself without a care, too young to have yet learnt to cock his leg.

“Ah, Tan-ah!” Taehyung rushes off the sofa with arms outstretched and plucks his puppy from floor mid-stream, running from the room with him held at arm's length to take him outside in order to finish his business.  He charges past Hoseok as he goes, who watches on with thinly veiled bemusement at the sight of Yeontan flying through the air like some kind of canine superhero held aloft in Taehyung's hands, smiling and shaking his head.  

“Ready to go?” he asks you, perching his pert bottom on the arm of the sofa, and now you look closer you notice the car keys he's got clutched in one hand, dangling at his side.  Begrudgingly, you glance at the clock on the mantelpiece and realise that is, indeed, time for you to go to work.

“I suppose.” Sighing, you shuffle out of the dent you've made in the sofa, knowing that you've still plenty of time to get there.  Hoseok is surprisingly punctual by nature, and whenever it's him that's accompanying you to work you usually find that you've always got a good fifteen minutes or so to spare.  “As much as I'd love to stay and witness the entire repertoire of Tannie's bodily fluids.” You smile at the way Jungkook shudders at the thought.

“You should really get something on that, Kook.  Jin'll kill you if that sets,” Hoseok warns, nodding towards the smell yellow stain in the middle of the rug.  

“He's not my dog,” Jungkook mumbles down at his sketchpad, charcoal pencil scratching across the page, and Hoseok shares a look with you, rolling his eyes.  

Jungkook's sure changed his tune since last night when he was demanding that you all had equal ownership of your new companion and therefore he was just as entitled to hog Yeontan’s affections all night long as Taehyung.

“Yeah, but you're the one who'll have sat there and watched it dry.”  

Jungkook looks up, gaze flicking between yours and Hoseok’s expectant faces before he finally sighs, world-weary, and heaves himself off the sofa with a sullen,

“Fine.”  He disappears through the adjoining door towards the kitchen as you rise to your feet and brush your lap free of Yeontan’s fur, clearly too disgruntled to want to wish you goodbye.  

“Kids, huh?” you comment as you and Hoseok start to head out, smiling fondly at him as he holds up the living room door for you, nodding his head in agreement with your sentiment.  

“I blame the parents.”  His smile grows at your questioning look, twirling the car keys around his forefinger.  “And by that, I mean Jin and Yoongi, obviously.” You giggle as you pull on the coat you’d left hanging by the front door and wrap your scarf tightly around your neck, anticipating the frosty chill that you know will be awaiting you as soon as you step outside.  

“I’m not even gonna ask who’s who.”

***

“So are you and Sam doing anything for New Years?” Hoseok spares you a glance as he concentrates on parallel parking the car along the curb that sits opposite the bar, his bottom lip between his teeth.

“Mm,” he affirms, turning to look out of the rear window, “She’s booked us into some fancy restaurant, I think.”

“She knows you don’t eat, right?”  He swings the car into place with enviable ease, turning to you with a grin as he applies the handbrake.

“Yeah, but they’re doing fireworks at midnight and she’s really excited, so…” Hoseok trails off with a shrug, his smile turning adorably coy as you ‘aww’ and scrunch your nose at how obviously smitten he is with your best friend.  You’re so glad you gave the two of them your blessing; you’re not sure you could imagine one without the other these days. “What about you and Yoonmin? Anything planned?”

You frown, pushing the car door shut behind you with a thud.  

“Yoonmin?” Hoseok grins roguishly at you as you round the front of the car to his side, slipping his hands into his pockets, and as you start to cross the road together the meaning of the word suddenly clicks into place.  “Oh jesus, please don’t let Yoongi hear you call them that,” you chuckle, shaking your head as Hoseok delights in your reaction, laughing along.

You can’t imagine what he’d think of it if he did.  He might well grumble in front of the others, but part of you wonders whether Yoongi would actually be secretly pleased by the little nickname.  It’d wouldn’t surprise you, given how you know almost better than anyone just how soft and marshmallowy Yoongi is on the inside.

“But no, no plans,” you say, dodging a puddle and hopping up onto the opposite curb.  The bar sounds busy even from the outside but at least with plenty of bodies it’ll be warm, and when you push open the heavy front door you have to raise your voice in order to be heard over the din that greets you.  “Jack’s asked me to work. The new guy’s good but he’s not quite up to speed yet.”

Hoseok’s arm finds its way around your shoulder as he affectionately jostles you at his side, beaming bright.  

“Listen to you, already sounding like a real professional.”  Blushing, you elbow him lightly in the side but the vampire refuses to be moved, squeezing you all the tighter as the two of you wind your way through the many patrons that fill the bar.  The aforementioned ‘new guy’ comes into sight as you do, and when he spots you across the crowd he pauses between the glasses he’s collecting to offer you a friendly smile and a wave, his too-long bangs flopping down into his eyes.  You wave back just as Hoseok places a gentle kiss to your temple and then gives you one final squeeze before releasing you, ready to get started with the long night ahead.

“You sticking around?”  As of yet, none of your friends and lovers have wanted to leave your side whilst you’re working, preferring to keep an eye on you especially during the busy holiday season.  

“Of course,” he smiles sweetly, making himself comfortable on a bar stool as you step behind the counter, shrugging off your coat.  “I’ll be right here, beautiful.”

***

The first few hours of your shift pass by fairly uneventfully aside from the usual nightly drama.  You have to save Alex at one point from some lout who starts popping off about his drink order being wrong, stepping in and calming everyone down by offering him a free shot of his choosing on top of whatever he’d originally ordered.  Alex is grateful and Jack is impressed, and the next time he passes you behind the bar it’s with an approving tap to your back and an enthusiastic ‘well done’ that has you beaming with pride and then blushing when Hoseok, too, raises his glass.  

He’s been keeping himself busy for the most part, playing on his phone and supping on the fruity cocktails that you slip him every so often.  Not that he gets them for free, mind you; you respect Jack far too much to go stealing alcohol from behind the bar right under his nose.

You don’t notice the eyes that are following you as you walk briskly back and forth along the length of the bar the whole night long nor do you feel the weight of them as they linger, blissful in your ignorance.   You do hear Hoseok call your name as you’re pouring a pint, though, and when you glance up to see him standing from his stool and pointing at his phone as he’s lifting it towards his ear, mouthing at you that he’ll by the right back and smiling when you nod.  

Perhaps it’s Sam that’s on the phone, or maybe Jimin or one of his other brothers.  It might even be someone else entirely, but either way Hoseok’s absence doesn’t concern you.  You’ve been trying to convince them that such strict supervision is unnecessary - overkill in such a well-lit and well-populated area in which you’re certain that you’d be safe - so you’re not at all anxious as you return your attention to the task at hand save for your concern with trying not to spill all over your already sticky fingers.  

As you hand over the drink and take payment you grant the elderly gentleman a winning smile, certain that he’ll remember you when he digs into his pockets for the tip jar later.  He’s a regular that you recognise well, and you find it strangely satisfying that you’re starting to become familiar with the customer's faces; almost all of them friendly. The rare recurring ones that aren’t are the unfortunate few unlucky enough to receive watered down drinks from Jack’s own ‘special selection’.   They guzzle it down like they’re receiving preferential treatment when really they’re getting anything but, and lord, you have no shame in admitting that that’s quite often the highlight of your day.

“Ok, what can I get you?” you ask as you shut the cash register and plaster an obliging smile on your face and look up, willing to serve.  

“That depends,” the man who’s towering over you from the other side of the bar muses, “On what it is that you’re offering.”  

Your stomach lurches and then drops as your hands instinctively reach out for something to hold onto, grabbing onto the edge of the counter on which Namjoon then leans, sliding into the seat that Hoseok just vacated not five minutes ago.  

“Hello little one,” he greets pleasantly in the absence of your reply, tilting his head to the side slightly and smiling, each cheek dimpling deep.  There’s an air of leisureliness about him that is at complete odds with how rigid your entire frame has become; his easy smile juxtaposed with the mild horror you can feel distorting your features.  

It’s jarring that Namjoon looks almost exactly the same as the last time you saw him save for the absence of your blood smeared around his mouth.  There’s that same hungriness to his eyes and the same golden hue to his irises; that same warmth that you’d become all too familiar with in the months gone by.  

“What are you doing here?”  Your voice is breathy - weak - and you know it’s only Namjoon’s supernaturally enhanced hearing that means that ‘ll be able to hear you of the noise of the bar; over the conversations of the mortals around you who are totally unaware of the very real threat that Namjoon could pose if he were to lose his cool.  

“I wanted to see you,” he tells you softly, smile slipping from his face as his eyebrows furrow into a frown.  “I’ve needed to speak to you... but tonight’s the first time I’ve had the chance.”

Has he…. Has he been watching you all this time?  Lurking in the shadows, just waiting for an opportunity to get you alone?  The thought of it makes all the goosebumps on the back of your neck begin to rise and the hairs on each of your arms stand on end, prickling at your skin.   

You glance nervously at the front door that leads out onto the street and then in the other direction to your colleagues further down the bar, moistening your lips.   Namjoon wouldn’t try anything with all these witnesses, right?  He wouldn’t risk exposing himself like that…

“You shouldn’t be here,” you hiss, turning back to him and trying to muster your courage as best as you can.  “Hobi will be back in a minute and he-”

“And he’ll what?”  Namjoon interrupts, rolling his eyes. “You know as well as I do neither of us is going to do anything in front of all these people.”

It’s funny, but hearing him say that… it almost puts your mind at ease.   You’re still not comfortable by any means but at the very least you’re able to dislodge your fingernails from out of the wooden countertop and allow yourself to take a proper breath in what feels like far too long.   

“I haven’t come to start a fight,” he assures you, sighing when your expression remains cold.  

Namjoon runs a hand through his hair, looking down at the bar for just a moment as he seems to collect his thoughts, and when he looks up and faces you again you suddenly realise just how tired he looks.  Whilst living at the manor, Namjoon never looked anything other than the picture of health; pristine, porcelain skin, bright eyes and always impeccably dressed, but now it seems as though his change in circumstance is showing.  His complexion is no longer smooth like powdered soft snow but almost a little sallow, and there’s a darkness under his eyes that you’re sure was never there before. His clothes, too, are showing signs of wear and tear. They’re the same ones he was wearing the night he’d been forced to leave and they’re looking a little grimy around the sleeves and the collar - crumpled as though he’s slept in them.  

Is he eating, you wonder?  Does he have a place to stay or somewhere warm to rest his head?   You know you shouldn’t concern yourself with thoughts such as these - not after what he did to you - but it’s not in your nature to be so callous and uncaring even to someone who’s hurt you so badly.

“Then what do you want?” you ask, once again looking to the door.  If it is Sam then she’ll most likely be keeping Hoseok busy; you know all too well how much she likes to talk.  

“The same thing I’ve always wanted,” he answers unflinchingly, his eyes never leaving your face.   

Is it vanity that makes you presume that he means you when he says that?  

You’re just about to open your mouth to speak again when Namjoon suddenly reaches out across the bar and places his hand on top of your own, squeezing it tight.  It’s just as cold as the last time you felt it wrapped around your throat, and the memory has your panicked heart thundering away inside your chest as Namjoon uses his grasp to pull you closer, leaning across from his side of the bar to speak to you in hushed, secret tones.  

You’re so shocked by the abruptness of his actions and his sudden closeness that at first you don’t even think to pull back, caught in his gaze like a rabbit in headlights.  

“You need to leave the manor,” he tells you urgently, his face mere inches from your own.  “You need to leave and come with me so I can-”

“Is this guy bothering you?” a voice from your right suddenly interrupts and when swiftly turn your head you see Alex stood at your side with his arms folded, his attention fixed on Namjoon.  He’s not the biggest of guys - probably only marginally taller than Hoseok and not much larger in build, either - but he’s doing his best to make himself look intimidating, puffing up his chest.  The sight of him almost makes you laugh, so ridiculous is it for him to think he would ever stand a chance against a creature like Namjoon - not that he would ever have a clue.

“N-no,” you answer as soon as your brain manages to click back into gear, snatching your hand back as all the sights and sounds and smells of the bar come rushing back to you now you’re free of the little bubble Namjoon had momentarily caught you in.  “He’s just leaving.”

When you look back at Namjoon you’re shocked to find him staring not at you, but at Alex.  The two of them are staring each other down, Namjoon’s jaw clenched tight as his nostrils flare slightly, and you have to give Alex credit for not backing down.  You’re not sure there are many men that would do the same if they were stood in his shoes.

Eventually - after looking his competitor up and down one final time - Namjoon submits and shifts his gaze, a wry smile tugging at his lips as he holds up his hands as if to surrender, standing from the bar stool to his full, intimidating height.  You give Alex a nod, reassuring him that you can take it from here, and you’re just starting to think he’s going to leave without a fight when Namjoon suddenly leans across the bar as soon as Alex’s back is turned, cupping your face in his large hands.  

So close that you can feel his breath on his face, his deep voice utters a warning,  

“You’re not as safe as you think you are.”  

Your eyes automatically close as he presses a kiss to your forehead, soft and fleeting, and by the time you open them he’s already gone, the exchange so fleeting that no one else seems to have paid it any mind even though it’s left you shaking and struggling to catch your breath, clutching desperately at the bar.  

Was that a threat?  A warning? If he meant to let you know that he’s not intending to give up on making you his so easily then why did he refer to the manor specifically?  Surely if he was the threat you’d be in more danger out of the manor than inside it…

Namjoon’s words have your head in a spin trying to figure out their meaning, and even if you were to figure them out can you even afford to trust a word he tells you?  Does he even know what he’s saying? He hardly seemed completely sound of mind the last time you saw each other… so what’s to say that’s changed now?

“Hey, you alright?”

Hoseok’s face pops into your field of vision, bent right forward across the bar to look up at you with concern, eyebrows furrowed, and you snap out of whatever trance had you staring blankly at your feet, your lips automatically feigning a smile as you look back at him, blinking rapidly.  

You know you should tell him what just happened - should tell him all about Namjoon and the threat that he made - but that little niggling doubt in your head has you hesitating, mind whirring before your mouth opens to speak.  There’s already worry written all over Hoseok’s face, and you know the moment you mention Namjoon it’s only going to get worse because then Hoseok will go home and tell the others - others meaning Jimin, too.

He’s only just getting over all this.  If Namjoon comes up again now, so soon after it’s all happened, it’s only going to make him mad all over again.  He’ll be gunning for blood once more and it’ll be up to you and Yoongi to calm him down and… and you’re not even sure it was a threat.  Nothing really happened… is it worth saying anything over nothing when all it’s going to do is upset everyone?   You remember what Hoseok said when he agreed to you taking this job; any sign of trouble and it’ll be back to the safety and monotony of unemployment.  You don’t want that. You don’t want to lose this little bit of something that’s just yours. It may not be big and it may not be important but you’re just getting good at this…

Your mind made up, you promise yourself that if anything should ever happen again - any slightest sign of Namjoon reappearing - you’ll tell them straight away.  

“Yeah,” you lie sweetly, ignoring the warning that comes from the frantic pounding of your heart, “I’m fine.”

[halloweenvalentine1997]

A short story I made out of short stories I’ve written under other names.

When she died, I felt a series of perforations, hollows and bruises

about my skull. I saw her die behind static.

By the stone wall adjacent to the office supplies store, I

bewailed her, screaming,

burning myself later with the tip of a lit cigarette.

I put ash and poison on my wrist for the ones who died.

I wanted to pick a strawberry off the plant in my parents’ backyard

and once more taste its succulence. I wanted to impale my head with the

iron tip of a weathervane. Slice open my vibrant red aorta.

Seeing them all in a hole

through the light emitting

through the asylum blinds.

I myself am a corpse in a bed

in the forensics ward,

green moths on my blanket,

rotting silently in a pastel grave,

killed by medicine,

wasted by time.

If you come close enough to hear my thoughts

(like a chemically-enhanced ghost)

distort and clamor

amongst the traffic, the television,

the noise a death in a family brings,

I will let loose my hatred

like a ribbon from hair,

unraveling red Medusa strands.

I will draw more ribbons on your flesh

if you touch me,

bleed you into the wood,

hammer a nail into your heartline,

devour your fear like a shot of amphetamine

to my malevolent blood.

2013

Stacey

1.

Some of us are the river’s current, floating through life swiftly or slowly, as if in a trance of somnambulism. Some of us are a human shell at its edge, refusing to follow its pattern and be a part of it. Why follow them when you can live on the fringes of society, away from its stigmas and scrutinizing scorn?

2.

When Ellie married Samuel Barnes, the world was a rose-gold utopia. Three years later, at the age of twenty-nine, Ellie no longer felt that the chemistry they had once remained. On a windy September afternoon, when she returned to the red-brick bungalow she shared with Samuel on Hillsam Avenue, Ellie heard moans and sounds of sexual ecstasy emitting from their bedroom. Another woman was there. Ellie’s eyes instantly began to burn like hot coals in a campground grill. She examined her wedding portrait on the wall of the hallway as she moved in slow motion through it. They had been photographed in front of the church’s stained glass windows, a spectrum of color radiating behind the couple adorned in black and white.

She ran her fingers through her long brown hair, blinking through the lake of sorrow in her dark eyes, and suppressing a sob, pushed open the bedroom door at the end of the hall. Another dark-haired woman Ellie didn’t recognize was riding Samuel, and when she registered the door slamming open, she turned around wide-eyed with a cry of alarm, her brown nipples in full view.

“I knew it,” Ellie told Samuel bitterly. “I knew for at least a year that there was someone else!”

Samuel looked at his wife blankly and didn’t reply, his face almost smug.

“Who are you?” Ellie shrieked at the strange woman.

“Lila Stern,” the woman replied. “And clearly, Sam doesn’t love you anymore. He loves me. He has for the entire year you suspected something was going on. We would both like you to leave.”

“Don’t dictate what I will do in my own house, you fucking homewrecker!” Ellie shouted. Lila, remembering her nudity, covered herself with the indigo comforter.

“I agree with Lila,” Samuel said. “Just pack your things and go, Ellie. You’ve been a nagging, paranoid pain in my ass for too long. You’re in need of a psychiatrist, but you won’t pay heed to my advice. All you are lately is a cold fish who’s no fun. A fucking schoolmarm. Find an apartment somewhere. Leave.”

“Now,” Lila said.

Ellie slammed the door shut and bolted down the hall and into the kitchen. She opened the cutlery drawer and grabbed the sharpest knife she could find. Tested its point with the tip of her index finger. A small blood-drop formed in the small pad of flesh. Although Ellie’s tears rained down like heated glass, she felt no physical pain.

I won’t pack my things, she thought. I have a better idea.

She glanced at the neon green digital clock above the oven. It read 1:11 p.m. It was September 24th. As she placed the knife into the pocket of her navy blue peacoat, grabbed her smartphone, scrawled a quick note and left the house, Ellie knew what to do. No more morning to afternoon shifts as a psychiatric nurse at St. Mary Medical Center’s psych unit. No more wondering when Samuel would be home from his nightly excursions. As she walked towards the river, passing the other houses, the Texaco, the railroad tracks, the boarded-up, shutdown factories, memories flashed before her. She remembered her lonely childhood, her even more tumultuous adolescence where she slept with a crowbar in her pillowcase and read The Catcher in the Rye and To Kill a Mockingbird at the edge of the schoolyard grass away from everyone.

“I wish you’d never been born,” Ellie’s mother told her, swilling red wine from a tall, dark bottle.

“I second that,” her father said, puffing on a fat cigar. Once she made it to the river, Ellie collapsed like a house of cards to the white sand, and howled the loss of her love into the godless sky. She glanced from side to side to make sure no one was watching. She couldn’t be sure if someone was for all the foliage and bushes. But she didn’t care. She sat there for the longest time, her breathing a series of hyperventilation. Samuel’s face was all she could see, then Lila’s, the two of them like a rotating holographic image. She wanted her cremated ashes bequeathed to the river. She wanted no tomb in the town cemetery. No funeral. The note she wrote with these directions was in her left pocket of her coat. Such a heavy coat for the nice weather, but Ellie was always cold. Her body, feather-boned and catatonic, slumped over a large rock and she let the tears wet it like a water nymph mourning the loss of a handsome sailor on a receding boat.

Ellie turned on her cell phone and listened to Paula Cole’s “Where Have All The Cowboys Gone?” one last time. It sounded faint above the river’s churning. Just like the woman in the song, she too had an non-devoted, careless husband. She wept hardest at the chorus:

Where is my John Wayne?


Where is my prairie song?


Where is my happy ending?


Where have all the cowboys gone?

“To greener pastures,” Ellie said to herself. “To rose-gold utopias I’ll never see.“

3.

The clock on the wall of Mrs. Sykes’s math class ticked in time to my heartbeat. The hollow feeling in the pit of my stomach that I get when I crave marijuana was there, screaming like a lacuna asking to be filled. The time for more recalcitrance (in this case, truancy and drug use by the river) was near. While Mrs. Sykes droned on like a monotonous honeybee about the Pythagorean theorem, I got up from my desk and slung my backpack over my shoulders. Her gunmetal grey eyes followed me to the door with the poster of the Power Rangers on it, all teamed up together. Always use the buddy system, the poster said.

“Where are you going, Stacey?” Mrs. Sykes asked.

“Skipping class,” I told her. “And dropping out when I turn eighteen in February. This is non-negotiable. You can’t stop me.”

Before my teacher could retaliate, I flounced out of the room, leaving the scoffing and titters of my peers behind me. I left my textbooks in my locker to lessen the load in my backpack. I unzipped a small pocket and grinned at the verdant green pot in its glass pipe.

Jimmy Stirling is the one who introduced me to pot when I was a junior a year before. He was a senior, and one of Lewis and Clark High School’s few homeless students. His dad was a cantankerous drunk and gambler who threw him out. Jimmy spent time singing songs on the sidewalk for spare change, or sleeping at the homeless shelter for adolescents. For someone who was homeless, Jimmy frequently had a remarkably full tin can of bills and change. His singing voice was a rich alto tearing pleasantly through the downtown breeze. On October of last year, he found me crying under the highway after school let out. I recognized him from my creative writing class.

"What’s wrong, Stacey?” he asked.

“My brother’s locked in the loony bin. He’s possessed. He killed Alvin, my guinea pig. Everything is falling apart, and to top it all off, Liam broke up with me this morning.”

"Man, I’m sorry,” Jimmy said. “You every try marijuana? It might make you forget all that stuff.”

“I don’t have any money,” I said, knowing that anyone with marijuana downtown expected payment in return for it.

“That’s alright. I have some I’ll share for free. Let’s sit in my favorite place to do it.”

I followed him, listening to him sing as we walked the few blocks to an alleyway with a set of cement stairs against a condemned apartment, leading to a bolted door. He sang Skid Row’s “18 and Life” and Black Sabbath’s “Killing Yourself To Live.” We sat on the bottom step . He loaded the pot into a glass bowl and taught me how to light it, how to inhale the hit of smoke without exhaling it too soon. I caught the gist of it. Suddenly, within a few minutes, everything was funny. My mind was suddenly devoid of all negativity. I was giggly, light as a tumbleweed blown by a gale of fierce wind. I felt energetic, talkative, and happier that I’d been a long time. Shortly after my day with Jimmy, I learned he went to jail for getting caught with Ecstasy tablets in his lockers. He was also rumored to be selling cocaine and heroin downtown. He wasn’t allowed back at school. I never saw him again. The flashbacks vanished when I approached the river and saw her. She was a woman with long brown hair. She was wearing a peacoat, jeans and pair of black loafers. I stopped dead in my tracks when I saw what she was doing. The woman older than me by at least a decade, was holding a kitchen knife to the veins in her right wrist. She made no sound when she punctured them, her hand dangling over the water. I watched her bloodletting turn part of the emerald river red. It was spouting out like the slashed throat of a sacrificed farm animal. She turned and saw me when i stepped on a twig by accident and snapped it in two.

“Go away,” the woman told. “Believe me, you should be letting this happen.”

She took in my red ringlets, my sharp green eyes, my pink hoodie, my Converse sneakers. Then she went for her throat with her knife and slit it open with perfect finesse. There was a vibe coming off of this woman that insinuated I should just let her die. I could sense that her life had been miserable and mean. I sat on a rock out of sight of the dying woman and got high, thinking of her spirit rising, transcendental and free, into the sun and clouds. I thought of how the first settlers of the city I live in came here 10,000 to 30,000 years ago. Before there were cemeteries, they buried their dead in unmarked graves. I thought of all the skeletons that must be under the grass of the lawns and parks, the sidewalks, the urban streets. I thought of the days of religious fanaticism, and how had I been born then, I would have been buried in unconsecrated ground for my heathen ways. I didn’t believe in god, but I did believe in Satan.

2019

Stacey

I am not sure exactly when my family died. Before they died, I was a genuinely innocent soul whose conscience burned to a crisp. I couldn’t blame myself for it, but I didn’t know who to blame because the ones responsible for my family’s death never came out of their disguises, synthetic human skin and features made to look exactly like my family members would look if they were really there amongst you. I still hear them call to me over highway noise and wind, while I’m taking hits off a meth pipe or smoking a cigarette on an overpass with dead eyes and no ache. I’ve already ached so much. Without them I am a branch breaking off of a tree. It’s hard to explain what I mean by disguises; they look so much like my family but aren’t. They could look like anyone and they’re wearing synthetic skin designed to look like my mom and dad.

I am Stacey Galloway. I was born to a family that never loved me but that I tried to love fiercely. I may have turned into a drug-addled street kid but I still wanted them to love me, anyway. I remember when I first suspected them to be dead. I was sitting in my old apartment in the living room with a scream in my ears that sounded like my mother’s emanating from my laptop and whirling through the dusty air like a trap I would remained enveloped in. I heard a chainsaw start up and then the sound stopped. It was like an audio recording that just stayed there screaming and sawing in my computer speakers. The voices told me my parents were dead and replaced by “skin masks.”

I asked, “What is a skin mask?” “Synthetic skin made to look like your parents. Exactly like your parents. And your younger brother,” a man replied out of thin air. “Someone else is wearing skin that looks like them now. Every feature of your family has been replicated, special contact lenses have been made, someone with the same height as them is wearing skin masks.”

I couldn’t see him but maybe he could see me. I hoped not. What he was saying was too horrible to want to comprehend. It’s humanly possible to do this, with the aid of a lot of fake skin and ways of knowing how the victim worked, how they spoke, where they lived, whom they spoke to. I will never know that world and don’t want to. It’s insidious enough just to live in the city I live in, gone and waking up with ice in my chest in a house that is now unfamiliar and rearranged. All I want to do is get high to forget about it, and it’s worked after awhile.

I know the police will do nothing because I don’t know how to explain it without dying or not making sense. I never wanted this.

I never wanted to lose the only lifeline I had.

So after the voices came from my laptop and told me these things, I left my apartment, locked it and went to the stone wall by the office supplies store about a mile away. I sat there in the gravel and lit a cigarette, the parking lot blurring through my wet eyes. I didn’t know why I believed what I was hearing, but I was anorexic and schizophrenic, and didn’t know how to not believe something that seemed so real. Before all this, I heard voices talk to me in my room that really were there. No one was physically present around me, but their voices reverberated throughout my walls, my silent television, my closed laptop.

“We’re going to kill your family,” said the voices.

I didn’t believe them. I didn’t reply. I thought they were full of shit.

Now I know they’re not, because although the identity thieves of my family are never in prison, the handwriting of my parents has changed, and so have the cadence of their voices. They speak in European accents now when they think they’re alone and that I’m out of earshot. But I can hear them. It’s hard to understand what they’re saying. It’s plain English, but indecipherable at the same time.  My brother’s identity was never actually stolen. He is eighteen and currently going to college. I am twenty-three and never doing anything with my life again. I’m in the loony bin.

I stare through the green and blue in the slit in the blinds and think about the house I grew up in, a green bungalow in the middle of a golden field of grass, a porch swing, wind chimes and an attic window that never lit up. My father always told me our attic was full of asbestos and that it could cause mesothelioma to inhale it after years of exposure to it.

“But,” he said, “there is no asbestos in the rest of the house. You’re safe.”

In the backyard, my mother grew strawberries and tomatoes. There was a one-car garage and a deck, a wooden fence and a glass picnic table with chairs surrounding it. I remember days, years of smoking marijuana in my room and listening to music. Grey smoke filling the room with the scent of weed, filling my lungs with blackness and my heart with euphoria. I will do that later on, in another place, when this institution is tired of me and forces me out the door like I want.

When I went home after my tantrum by the stone wall, I noticed that my parents were still there, or they just appeared to be. I saw no blemishes, no redness, nothing but them with a synthetic look to their skin, it appeared to be fake. But there was my mother’s hair, my father’s hair, my father’s eyes, their faces. Over the next several years that I lived in the house with them, I noticed that while they copied the handwriting of my parents well, it was slightly altered. They could do their signatures perfectly, but their notes to me and their grocery lists were different looking than a note would be were it from my parents. I was distressed by the way my father’s eyes were either a dark blue or a light blue. They looked like two different sets of eyes. He tried to hit me three times, but never went any further than that. I could tell he was an angry man all of a sudden, and though he looked like my father, I knew he wasn’t. He was wearing a synthetic skin mask. It looked like my father, but it wasn’t. Its skin is fake. It wasn’t real. Same with my mother. Whoever these people were, I know I need to chop them up and leave their remains to dissolve in a landfill somewhere. I want to leave my brother, Steffan, out of it. I know there’s a way to make them expose themselves. Purchase a gun, aim through the summer air at the targets, themselves and tell them, “Take off your skin masks! You’re not my parents! You killed them.”

They wouldn’t be able to reply, and if they were somehow compelled to reply and tell me what they did with my parents, I would happily kill whoever is underneath that fake human surface and tell the cops that they were serial killers who spied on my parents for years and stole their identities. Something I never wanted to happen to them or to myself. I hardly ever talk to “my parents” anymore and Steffan stays the hell away as well. I know I have to have them buried but for now, I think I’ll drown myself in writing. I haven’t explained what is going on to the psych ward, which is going to let me out anyway soon. I know how to handle it myself after hearing one of the directors of the facility tell me, “Your family is skin masks.” The sick fuck laughed to himself and I knew I had to flee and get those people who thought they could ever replace my parents, who were unkind to me but were all I had. I hated everyone else or lost the ones who mattered. I’m going back into their house and I’m going to dig up my gun and aim it, loaded with silver bullets, at their brains. I know they’ll unmask. I’m not born yesterday. I know I should do this. I would never duplicate a mask made to look like real skin and identity of someone else, and wear it over myself as though I could become that person. I’d rather swallow a bottle of pills and go to sleep forever. Fall asleep in a meadow of bluebells and Vicodin.

Before here, I hung out under a train bridge where I always wanted to follow the mysterious Mathilde, a girl whose surname I didn’t know to this day, anywhere and everywhere. She came there to buy meth and was always hanging out with older men, smoking a meth pipe and blowing the smoke up into the lights under the train bridge on the cement walls, watching it float, a white demon mask, in the illumination. I joined her once. She asked me, “Why are you doing meth, Stacey?”

“Because I’m miserable without it. It makes me feel like I could walk for miles and it feels like it’s only seconds until you’re at your destination. I feel like I can die alone on the autumn breeze and die happy.”

“Don’t die, Stacey. You’re the last one of them that should be killed.”

“Some of these bitches really should die. Last night, someone threatened me with a lead pipe after I threatened his friend with a lit cigarette after that cunt tried to beat me up. The both of them should burn up in a chamber underground.”

Mathilde smiled. “How did you know I love that sort of thing?”

“Because I can see through you. I’ve seen you in fights under here, too. Try to keep a low radar. I know you haven’t initiated any of those fights, but try to see there are real dangers here in town and don’t let anyone know where you live. I heard you lost your ID recently and had to get it replaced. It was stolen. I’m only saying this because I care about you, Mathilde. I don’t think they’ve done anything with your ID except disposed of it, by now. I think we should stick together.”

“I don’t have any friends except you,” said Mathilde.

And a few days later, I was shoved away into the psych ward, the loony bin, the human menagerie. I felt like a psychiatric science experiment, doped up with meds and lost in the dull, utilitarian rec room, playing ping pong, watching an episode of Intervention in drug  therapy, browsing the bookshelves, learning different coping skills, watching the bus park and then leave through the glass cage of windows, learning about different behavioral therapies, making collages with magazine pictures, standing in line for more meds, staring at the ceiling light reflecting from their TV, craving drugs and wanting to cast off all purity. I couldn’t stand it here any longer. I still can’t. I’m crazier and know I won’t pay for what I’m about to do, considering how horrible what these people did to my parents is. I can’t let them live any longer and everyone is buying into their disguises except and another lady whose name I don’t know. Their old friends won’t speak to them. A lady who lives me nearby told me my mom isn’t herself anymore.

“She’s not Autumn,” the lady told me. Autumn is my mother’s name.

She said nothing about my dad, but all the voices ever reiterated to me was that my dad, Roger, was killed and that I would never know where or what had been done with him. I’ll forever remember that scream and chainsaw sound on my laptop, playing through the speakers out of dead silence. What was I supposed to do with that information. Say I heard it out of thin air? I’d sound psychotic to law enforcement, mental health services and anyone listening. I can’t just ramble about this to random drug addicts, either. I can’t tell them why I’m purchasing the gun, what its purpose is, or where I’m going to kill those thieves. I am haunted by days of sleeping and screaming and all I can do is bleed Ativan and never want to wake up. But still want to avenge my parents’ murder as well. I’m getting out soon. I will sleep under the stars for a night out on the deck, and wait until the daylight breaks to kill them when they emerge from behind their locked door and into the interior of the basement.

You’ll see. They have masks that are so fake-looking they betray themselves, they give themselves away. I can find a way to move on and I know I shouldn’t blame myself, because this destruction of the family foundation was never my doing. It was theirs, whomever is living in those disguises. I’ve told no one. I can’t allow myself to be labelled as psychotic or severely mentally ill, but I have been. I can hear the voices to this day, and four psychiatrists told me that schizophrenia is incurable. The voices can only be tapered down with medications. There is no cure alive for hearing voices, for visual and auditory hallucinations. I’ve seen things too. I’ve seen people that look ghostly and transparent appear by the river, or sitting on curbs, and they vanish into thin air just as quickly as they appeared. A cop by the river, a man in a grey hoodie on the street curb. I see black shadows above me, or white or golden flashbulbs emanating in the ceiling like there’s a camera taking my picture. The voices still talk through speakers, walls and televisions. Car radios. Computers. A speaker will transmit a voice faster than anything. All they’re telling me is that my family was bad and that they deserved it. I know most people wouldn’t agree with this or think this is okay. Nothing is okay. I will never feel like I’m wholly human again.

2016

Mathilde

1.

In the woods there whispered a secret I felt compelled to follow, just to discern its meaning. It could’ve been a blessing or a curse, and still I was brave enough to leave my repressive household for those screams that normally would frighten someone, but I’ve been reduced to a frozen-hearted Banshee on the floor of a seclusion room more than once. I remember the fog of those moments and feeling more broken than even the most dismantled women could get. Screaming because it was expected of me.  

I left home when I was eighteen, dropped straight out of high school, a nightmare I never hope to relive. Age eighteen was the last time I saw a psychiatric facility. My family and me lived in a Tudor mansion in the city’s most affluent neighborhood. It was my parents and my sister Sinead, who was always the opposite of me, the black sheep.

“Mathilde, no one is screaming in the woods,” she’d tell me when I first heard the shrill, ear-scorching girl’s shriek echo from the trees bordering the park.

I ignored her and ran knocking a stone statue over, and sought out the source of feminine distress.

“Hello? Are you alright?”

“No matter where you go, I’ll find you,” was the whisper that fervently replied from somewhere in the foliage. As though the angel or apparition (whatever she was) could read my mind. I was thirteen.

Pale and whey-skinned compared to my sister, who perpetually blushed and took better care with her pretty countenance. She snagged Dale Tierney before I could get to know him; naturally someone like him would gravitate towards an extroverted floozy like my sister Sinead. He greeted me politely but tersely upon visiting our house, as I was not the subject of his interest. My sister was seventeen, and a senior in high school, while I was in ninth grade, a razor-freak and antisocial, maladjusted misfit. Sinead pretended not to notice. My cuts bled on tiles to industrial rock music. No one could stop me.

*

“Mathilde-”

“Don’t speak, or I’ll excavate your heart from your chest and incinerate it while I smoke a coffin nail,” I replied. He was chasing Dale with a bat, and I remembered a brief feeling just like getting fucked with a knife. Some bat-wielding perverts had jumped me several years ago and shoved the handle in.

“Mathilde!”

“I’ll eat your heart before I burn it over the pyre,” I snapped.

In the abandoned grain elevator building made of cement, a place I pretended was a mental institution, I executed him. Lobotomized, Never anesthetized, because I wanted him to feel like hell. I always knew there was no inferno underground where bad people like myself and this man who is dying beneath a series of rope knots. I have bound him in a length of chain as well. Years ago, long after the screaming in the foliage to the cacophonous magpies had ceased, I heard a woman or young girl wail in agony above the ceiling. The attic I never went up in because it was asbestos-ridden, and I wondered how schizophrenic I had become.

I told my father (a man who once told me “try harder” while I pretended to asphyxiate myself with a shoelace adorning the knob of my bedroom door) that I heard a scream erupt from the attic.

“Well, your intake with mental health is tomorrow,” my dad replied. “We’ll get you on the right meds.”

I hoped and prayed there was no reality behind the scream.

The house was over 100 years old; it could’ve been a benevolent or malevolent apparition.

He’s dead.

I’ll splash him with acid and dissolve him into the floor.

I see Dale watching me from the doorway all of a sudden.

“I am Hell itself,” I tell him. He seems to know the guy I offed was scum.

We laugh.

*

I wake up from my zoning out on the couch at 3 a.m., content, knowing I had no part in it. None of it was my fault. Tori Amos’s To Venus and Back album has played on repeat all night. I could’ve retained my innocence if the city’s pathetic excuse for a population cut me a little slack, but now all I have time for is complete, indisputable indifference. And euphoria over everything, hedonistic amusement showing at all times. So happy I could die in outer space. I wouldn’t even care. I used to put methamphetamine mixed with angel dust, or PCP into my bloodstream and it was then that I discovered a drug that could take away the fear of death itself. A man said, “Get the fuck out of here or face my gun.” I saw no gun to speak of and felt numb with nothing but mania in my head under the freight train bridge. I moved myself as far away from him as I could go. I was full of amphetamines under the bridge. A place downtown full of drama and drugs. I saw a man hold a knife to the throat of a man in his late teens or early twenties. I told the older man with the knife, “Don’t cut him. Just don’t. I don’t want police under here. I’m not calling them. Just…don’t,” I told him lifelessly. This was before the gun threat with the possibly non-existent gun in one of his pockets. The man withdrew his silver blade and backed off the guy, who was the only one allowing me to use a meth pipe. I felt no affection for him considering I don’t know him to this day, but I wonder how I’m not afraid to waltz out into the insidious Spokane night. A hellhole in the central eastern part of Washington state. I never liked this city, famous for its underground whoredom and criminal activity since the early nineteenth century. I intend to haunt it just like the screaming ghosts.

But I won’t scream. I’ll just make them their own worst enemies. I don’t feel I will ever really die, even when my body does.

“I hate you and I love myself, you pathetic fucking city,” I whispered to the mirror. I would place them in an underground chamber. Baths of acid dissolving useless DNA. When people like me are crossed, the night can scream and sleep will reveal what Hell can be. I’ve dreamt of being in a kennel on a plane. Jail cells on a bus with cages lining the aisle that remind me of a jail on wheels. It deserts me by the side of a road aligning a river. Sometimes I dream of treading deep water and drifting along in its waves like a damned soul. I dream of people glaring at me in dark alleys, houses where there’s nothing to watch but a woman in a peach-colored dress entertaining some businessman, drinking something out of a wineglass while she does it. An abandoned asylum being haunted by myself and others. It’s like I’m haunting somewhere that is judging me as I judge it.

I made a carbon copy of him. A clone. I drifted away on dissociative hallucinogens to the sound of his voice in my ear. I don’t care that he’s not really here.

Whenever anyone badmouths him, I feel like they should meet the Windex I pretend to pour in their coffee.

I’ll do what I please for the rest of my life.

2.

Colored balloons and iridescent papier-mâché dotted the walls on the summer evening of my sister, Sinead’s, suicide. I staggered home to Stevie Nicks’s “Stand Back” blaring from her room above the stairwell on repeat, a bottle of Robitussin lingering in my bloodstream. I felt high as a kite. I stared into the rainbow vortex, the littered warps of tinsel on the floor, and remembered hours earlier an argument ricocheting off the walls between Dale Tierney and Sinead. I couldn’t understand them through their slurred drunkenness. I remember a wineglass breaking against his car as it was tossed aside by Sinead.

I had never known her to fall apart.

I would have never done this to him, but I chose to keep out of his way and never tell him how I felt. I was like winter without him, cold as silver and bracing as the winds of the east. I could sustain the fantasy of him more than the reality.

He was somewhere in the house, probably, drunk in the kitchen and avoiding the drama of prior hours.

When the song played one more time, I ascended the stairs and traipsed down the corridor to Sinead’s room.

Do not turn away, my friend

Like a willow I can bend

No man calls my name

No man came

So I walked on down away from you

Maybe your attention was more

Than you could do

One man did not call

He asked me for my love

And that was all

The lines from the song tore through the air and were like bells of 80s euphoria in my ears. I saw Sinead dead with a jagged red line across her throat, torn open from a self-inflicted wound. Blood spattered the mirror of her vanity table. I never thought she had the guts to even prick her finger. I watched her white face for a moment, its waxen marble idiocy, its vacant, grey-eyed death. In extremis, she looked more at peace than I’d ever been in life.

Dale was nowhere to be found on the property. A white sheet covered my sister’s face and they wheeled her to the morgue. I would soon adorn her grave with clematises and dahlias. I would miss her soliloquies on the balcony before he entered our lives. She was so melancholic sometimes, but nowhere near as much as I.

The day after her funeral procession, a blur of black hearses and silver cemeteries, mounds of dirt cascading over her coffin, I smoked angel dust and watched the rain fall outside as I blared heavy metal from the stereo. Tears only burned once and I allowed them to fall for two minutes. Nothing could bring her back, and when Dale rang the doorbell I only told him, “She’s gone,” and closed the door in his face. His double stood behind the closed door ready to embrace me and disappear with me into the bed.

“No one should be allowed to even reach me, touch me or talk to me,” I said. I told the silent thin air. I didn’t want a reply, and I awoke the following day to a touch on my shoulder. When I turned, I saw nothing. Not a person. Not even a trail of vapor. I’d deny anyone from knowing the monster that is me.

Something in me still laughs, despite the grief.

I can see her in dreams. I can see Dale in dreams.

I’d rather daydream on drugs and live in the ruins of my old house than deal with the heinous society around me.

Broken doorknobs and glass I can’t shatter. I swallow pills and wrap myself in blankets, dreaming of a boundless, lazy sea that carries me in its midst. When I reach land, it is steep and treacherous.

I awaken in my mirage’s arms. I am an endless realm of sadism when someone poses as a threat. I once pointed a silver crescent of a knife to the skin of one of his would-be attackers. I won’t ever let go of the image Dale embellished in my mind.

I am as dead as the man in the cement left in a puddle. I am as dead as Sinead, wallowing away in a hallucinogenic reality.

I find nothing damaging although my health is rotting like the grass in the heat waves. Rotting like the relics in every yard, made of metal and plastic. I hate everyone in the world and all I wanted was to end the city.

All I wanted was to end time.

To corrupt and corrode.

To slide right out of life older than anyone had ever been.

3.

I’m only twenty-five years old, and it took me that long to finally kill someone. It was in defense of Dale while we wandered for a couple minutes when I ran into him, discovering he also had an affinity for the abandoned grain elevator where I killed whatever his obtuse name was. I knew somehow he would grace my presence that day. The would-be attacker was quite the opposite of a graceful presence; he was a storm. A storm boiled in my blood, too, and instantaneously, I made the baseball bat fly out of his brandishing arm and struck him several times. Dale Tierney grinned as he watched me debase the humanity right out of the man’s veins. I left him there to rot by some old filing cabinets.

Months after all of that happened, I no longer cry tears or cling to a crucifix on my pillow in the shade. There is nothing more to make of myself; no one will expect anything of me for a long time. Maybe never. Isolative by both night and day, I crave no presence to sustain me through the day. My parents flit about the house and are mostly not in it.

Yesterday I met a girl in a white dress with glittery, crimson-bleeding eyes in the foyer. She bid me follow her to the mirror beneath a chandelier and told me my beauty would wane.  Then she vanished into the air like an exploding star. I didn’t care and I told her to hush and leave me be. I gazed into the mirror, not as dissatisfied as I used to be. Sinead was always prettier, but I no longer envied her for it. If anything, I missed her. I never knew, in my cough syrup-induced state, what Dale had told Sinead that pushed her over the edge enough to slit her throat. She took her own life right off the planet. I will forever imagine her ricocheting into the stars, an astral angel leaving her own body and becoming a new being in the form of a spirit. The girl with blood rivers in her eyes was nowhere near as beautiful as my sister.

Whenever I think of the glow of emergency vehicles outside the limits of the mansion, I pacify myself and push away the thought as fast as it came. I know there were no witnesses besides Dale and me. There was no one to see us all meet there, not knowing one another would gather there to explore the grain elevator. Barbed wire, rusted beer cans and rejected heroin needles littered the ground at the base of the cement building. It had been shut down since the 1970s, and not a soul usually stirred in or around it premises by the railroad tracks. There was nothing to do at the place besides fuck or get stoned. In this case, I killed someone and left him for dead in the place’s basement. The bat was disposed of. Everything wiped clean. No information regarding me can be salvaged because I am a lightning bolt full of speed running as fast as I can away from everyone.

4.

I am sitting by the 7-Eleven high on acid. Halos and wings bleed out of the sky and litter the parking lot in a debris of feathers and gilded circles. I cannot scream in my house, so I went downtown to swallow an LSD-laced sugar cube and careen in the opposite direction from rational thinking. There was nothing to do but melt away along with everything else around me. I wanted the patterns of the strip mall across the street to keep melting, the neon of the bar on Dante Avenue to keep illuminating the girl beneath its sign with the darkest eyeliner I’d ever seen. She kept moving from side to side erratically, as if she were high on speed. I just can’t sustain my lifeform without drugs. I become other selves. I talk to ghosts of humans, both living and dead. She is talking to the empty air that always has answers. Her cigarette smoke forms a crown. I get bored and walk down the street, the church on its corner alit with hallucinatory flames. I think I see Sinead staring at me beneath the wainscoting in someone’s house through their window. I hate everyone except her and Dale, but whatever he said to her caused her to slice her own throat open. I can’t trust him to not make me capsize. I can’t let my iron guard down when it comes to my walls.

Do not touch me, I command every living human.

There is a star I stare at to the south that shines its light upon my shoulder blades ripping open, my veins bluer than before in my wrists. I caress them. The most important love is self-love, I tell myself. That is how I will flourish.

2019

Mathilde

1.

They found the remains of the body that I left behind in a fit of post-traumatic rage. It was a puddle of lye and hydrochloric acid, and gone was the baseball bat-wielding storm of a man after he tried to assault my sister Sinead’s lover, Dale Tierney. A few years ago, my sister committed suicide over an incident with him in which the circumstances are still unknown to me. Since then, I’ve been laying on my bed with voices compressing my head, telling me they’ll sell me and kill me. I am too strong, too fortified with indifference to care. My parents are rarely at home and I’ll never tell them. My dad would just advocate for changing the medication combination I’m currently not taking.

My twenty-eighth birthday is just around the corner. A brand new gun I purchased from one of my meth dealers shines in my hand in the starlight, full of a fresh supply of bullets. My red-lipsticked smile could enchant the devil. On top of the hill where I stand are two high school enemies, Jamie Frances and Stormy Hale. The last place I saw them was under the freight train bridge. They were sharing a pot pipe. They called me an ugly dog. That time, I let it slide off like snow from a gabled roof. Now, I’ve got the two of them right where I want them and I’m still not bothered by their comment. Underneath of them the grass blades look like ebony knife blades and my hand is on my cheap but efficient gun. It’s a silencer so there won’t be much sound when I snuff their lives out. I know how reckless this is considering anyone could have seen me out their window at 2 a.m., but I’m willing to risk it anyway. Jamie and Stormy don’t see me watching from the top of the metal stairs.

2.

I approach with quiet steps across the hilltop. Their backs are turned. My hand grips the gun more firmly than a snake’s coiling hold on a victim. Closer. They turn around. Closer still. Jamie yelps like a mouse before the gun’s bullet catches her in the head, embedded in the wisps of her brown hair. She collapses like a darted, tranquilized animal to the grass. Next, I point the gun at blond, self-righteous Stormy. I see nothing. The fear in her face screams a novel’s length of words. I fire at her forehead and she, too, is done for. It’s my lucky night that they chose this hilltop to smoke weed. I was coming here to smoke meth. I embellish each bitch with another bullet hole and calmly leave them there, the swishing sound of the gunfire replaying in my mind.

The hill. The black grass blades. An abbatoir for two girls who crossed a thin line.

3.

I go home, hide the gun and decide I’m already too high to take another hit. I open an antiquated copy of The Scarlet Pimpernel and nearly read the whole thing, satisfied that the voices in the wall have been silenced. I’ll read the end tomorrow. Before I close my red-tinted eyes at 8 a.m., I think I see Sinead standing at the edge of my bed.

“Good job, Mathilde,” she tells me. “You snuffed those cunts out just like a hurricane takes out a wooden house in southern floods.”

I love her.

I miss her.

I almost cry, but my emotions are in a graveyard somewhere. My eyes are only ice instead of liquid tears. My heart isn’t broken. I know she’ll always be with me. I know that the mirage I made of Dale will always love and caress me, even when I’m no longer young and dangerous. He’s not really here but it’s like I can see him anyway.

4.

I imagine the bones of Stormy and Jamie decomposing under the cold earth. And if they are cremated, their ash is undisturbed in urns for centuries. I think of crimson bullet holes on the hilltop of a feminine warzone. It’s the last thing I see before I fall into a pleasant slumber.

2019

Stacey

They released me from the psych ward. I have a gun in my hand. I’m veering towards the bungalow with meth reeling in my veins, my hands on a fifteen dollar loaded gun. I purchased it from a man in a trench coat in an alleyway. I open the door.

“Where were you?” asks my non-mother. She looks and sounds like my mother, but she isn’t my mother.

“It’s late.”

“Take off your skin mask,” I tell her, withdrawing the gun and pointing it at her head. “Stand up and unmask! You’re not my mother! Take that damn thing off!”

She starts to hyperventilate, and stands up. She fumbles with the layers of skin parts that originated in some clandestine building. They come off and underneath is another pale woman. I don’t study her face but I don’t recognize it. The moment I realize I’m right and that this is a malevolent identity thief, I blow her brains to pieces. I shoot her full of three holes. I only wish this were a smoking gun. I steal away into dad’s TV room and he does the same thing. He’s just an ordinary guy underneath. These two strangers are people that have lived the lives of someone stepping into a stranger’s skin. Stealing their house, their job, their lives. I’ll never sleep again. Once they’re both dead, I call 9-1-1.

“I just killed my parents’ identity thieves. Come and pick up their remains,” I tell the operator once asked what my emergency is. I tell them my address and they wheel them away. They’re covered in white sheets.  A bunch of cops tell me, “You’re not going to pay for this. They were dangerous. They were unpredictable. They could have killed you, too. You haven’t assaulted us, and we thank you for that and understand how hard this is to talk about for you. So we’re going to just let you stay in the house for awhile. Keep the gun with you.”

They leave.

I’m considered a murderer in self-defense. I’m not even going back to the psych ward because I haven’t told them my history of hospitalization.

I scribble a murderous vignette in a composition notebook that night called “Cornfield Rot.”

It reads:

1.

“Some of us are wraiths gliding through your world, blissfully unaware of your cryptic eyes staring past us, of your mouths that eject inanities. All we’ve heard is noise for years.

We’re used to it.”

2.

This is the paragraph I hear spoken aloud to me in a phantom whisper at 3 a.m., my alarm clock bathing my stoned self in a neon green glow. It’s a feminine voice, half-familiar and as faint as the illumination from the clock. My pillow is like a wreath of thorns. I eat pills, caffeine, switchblades and shards of broken teacups. There is a prevalence of apathy that spreads me in me, but what I lack is fear. What they say I lack is self-respect. I suck down another joint, draining the grass until it glows like the motel fire I will see in a few days. Lighting up the firmament with incandescent flames, fiery orange mingled with slate grey. I always wanted to rip open the sky like paper and end the world. When the Days Inn burned down from one of my lit cigarettes, I fled the scene as the firetrucks skyrocketed past me. Black flames filled the town with poison. The colors blurred through the water in my eyes. I hated everything around me since I could think, since I could speak.

Something explodes behinds me as I propel myself further away from the scene of my infantile crime. No more late-night TV, no more waking up to the same sailboat prints on the walls. No more panhandling at the hamburger restaurant next door to the Days Inn.   I’m as thin and intangible as a wisp of smoke floating through the adrenaline-suffused air. I’ll disappear into the fields and search for rotting bodies under the pines.

I imagine swallowing a handful of pills next to the concrete platform by the abandoned bowling alley, the one with the crimson anarchy sign spray-painted on it. I see a haze of red Victorian wallpaper and a knife aimed at many skulls. A flash of fire will light up in other places someday. I won’t kill myself while they recline in the brambled ruin and laugh.

3.

Sometimes I can hear the dead in the dirt beneath me say,  “I am under here.” I’ve heard them come from underneath the bus stops I wait at, the sidewalks, the swimming pool, the abandoned drive-in theater at the edge of town.

I can’t see them, but I can hear them with ears that hear nothing but bells, voices, or chaos. I can feel my pain get carried off with the breeze at such times. They give me the hope that death is an opening to a portal of the soul’s immortality.

4.

My makeup is burning off. I’m a limp, ragged doll in the corn maze getting eaten by ants. I got lost looking for the exit. I am rot given back to the earth.

2015

Janine

Amanda Warwick, age twenty-two, lay submerged in a halfway-house, painted yellow walls, dirt yard, a place to be jettisoned to. She had overdosed on methamphetamine in the heated, sunlit parking lot of multiple storage garages, her head in a hole in the cement next to an empty Halloween candy basket shaped like a Jack O Lantern. After the sharp inhalation of crystallized smoke found her brain, she was set off balance with the cathedral’s clamoring bells, the beauty of the wind’s white noise. She drenched herself in the calm black water of the lake, washing asunder the sins of Janine Crellin. Janine, with her green eyes and reddish-blond hair, a contrast to Amanda’s coarse black curls and hazel orbs, was in an infamous fixture in Amanda’s past. She had bled Amanda in the alleyway, bedazzled by the trails of blood flow, scarlet stars, mesmerizing to Janine. They were both sixteen and lived next door to each other. A red brick house with a picket fence (Janine’s) set beside a white house with green shutters (Amanda’s).

Janine was belligerent. Amanda was polite. They weren’t friends and Janine’s problem with her originated from a source unknown to her. In wild, vociferous rage, Janine left cigarette burns, several of them, that felt like surface tumors after they swelled with ash and pain.

What could I have done to you? Amanda thought.

Amanda was never wholly perceptive of what she was doing to Janine. If the evidence of Amanda’s taunts and provocations had been recorded, her remarks would have been proven to have been said aloud. On that day in the alleyway, Janine couldn’t refrain from assaulting Amanda because of Amanda stealing a plastic bag of marijuana. All they both wanted to do was get high. Janine withdrew a knife, the steel blade glinting, sawing gashes formed like lightning bolts. Gashes made while Janine sat on Amanda’s neck to choke and carve across her stomach, the spaces between her ribs where Janine slightly poked Amanda’s ligament, tearing it. When Amanda passed out from lack of oxygen, Janine began to carve some more. The thighs. The calves. A turning over of the deprecated body. More blood pools against the jutting bones of the shoulderblades.

What a passage to destitution, what a decline of descent into the laconic state of shades pulled down, the swallowing of Vicodin. Amanda was in for it. After the cutting and the burning done unto her flesh was concluded, Janine took off into the night where she was always most comfortable.

Amanda never would have been revived if not for a lone transient who discovered her with a faint pulse and numerous raw wounds, blood cold, veins a transparent blue beneath the skin on her crooked arm. He called an ambulance at a pay phone and Amanda was swept to the hospital, where she was diagnosed with a concussion, loss of blood, five broken ribs and amnesia. It took Amanda one week to recall Janine’s attack and even longer to recover her memory; her head had been hit so hard on concrete. She chose to press charges and Janine was confined to jail for eight months and later on to psychiatric care on and off for three more years. She was very troubled. Her anger seemed baseless. Amanda wondered, withdrawing from meth in her bed, if she had died that evening in rigor mortis in the snowfall, if some silver angel of death, one of grace and storms, would have absolved her of fear and taken her to another side. One separate from life where we all may go, anointed. Amanda wasn’t sacred anymore. She had survived but now she wanted to expire.  Amanda thought of Janine in a devious city, weapons hidden away, only to come out again for the dismemberment of corpses, dragged in burlap thorough a secluded forest, placed in a ditch by the railroad tracks under a pine tree, branches hanging low with needles. Amanda’s thoughts were decay, wasp stings, rotten fruit, sour wines, aspiring homicide. The residents of the group home generally ignored Amanda, but as of recently, they wanted her dismissed as a resident because of her conflict with them over trivial matters of ones full of more depth than would have been suspected.

Meanwhile, Janine was exactly where Amanda supposed, in the position of a merciless killer. She let the bodies sink into remote lakes with heavy stones tied to them, not a trace of her DNA left on their remains because she wore hair nets and was careful. She often got high and was free of institutionalization. No more secluded cages or millstones of grim prophecy. Amanda was only an attempted murder. When Janine left town at eighteen, she acquired a car to transport the bodies. In her new town, a population of nearly 30,000, she knew the civilians to target. She knew who they were.

Fanatics.

Chaos itself.

Dysfunctional child-abusers.

Every house with a shrine dedicated to only the pristine. Their gilded monuments.

So far, Janine had killed seven people.

Her victims:

1. Jay Motley, 36, convicted child rapist and wino

2. Alyssa Sparrow, 14, student, frequent bully

3. Martha Wilde, 45, child killer and teacher

4. Karen Wilder, 21, employee of Burger King

5. Kevin Fielding, 7, was terminally ill

6. Tess Moriarty, 22, bartender

7. Matthew White, 29, pawnshop owner

*

When Janine Crellin was four, she saw in her parents’ living room, a black halogen lamp with white flames flickering at the top. Either it had been left on too long, or her mother had set the fire herself, Janine decided.

“Look what you did,” said Mrs. Crellin, blaming the fire on her. She would grow up to relish those flames, pyromania impending. First, Janine burned her journals, then people.

In remote plains tied to wooden stakes with twine, gazed at by onlookers, the only ones who could hear the screams.

Amanda Warwick, in her reverie of Janine, planned to kill her. A new resident told her where she was living. Not far away.

“Here’s her address. I’ve smoked weed at Janine’s house. After what she did to you, Amanda, I would undo her.”

Seven people were dead so far and Janine still slept, tranquil at night. Never would she allow grief or guilt to disturb her. She had made to list of victims, having met them all, knowing their crimes. They had moved to the town for its quaintness and scenery as well as to carry on their traditions of immorality. Only one victim was innocent. Kevin Fielding, who was only seven years old with severe cancer. Just a needle in his vein put him to sleep and sent him, Janine supposed, to celestial firmaments.

How far could she get by being a killer? In the distance, Amanda tried to peer into the room of Janine and sacrifice her dead.

 

                               Amanda

I was born in the middle of nowhere in a Gothic castle with saints and gargoyles guarding the doorway. My father had painted blood coming from their eyes as they knelt in prayer, keeping watch over our mercenary riches. He was blond with brilliant green eyes. When I lived on the grounds of his castle, I had to be his farm slave doing yard work and keeping the flowers by the moat neat and alluring. He made me kill the animals I admired more than the humans. I will forever remember what he did to my eyes. A complicated surgery that lifted up my skin and transformed my eyes from squinty and listless to bulbous and beautiful. I was staring into an antiquated mirror surrounded by four girls prettier than  myself preparing me for eye surgery. My father grabbed me aggressively by the wrists, placed me on a cot and put me to sleep momentarily to perform plastic surgery. An eyelift, he called it. The girls giggled in their pinafores, playing dress up at girls from the nineteenth century. I will kill Janine. They looked just like her. I will kill her. We are sisters. We have the same father and I killed him when he came to my adopted parents’ house to kill me. Shot him point blank in the head. His ghost will never be able to speak to me from the dead. 

I am ready to kill this girl Janine who fucked me up when we were teenagers. People tell me to stop being so high school and grow up, but I’m not in high school or hanging out with high school kids. Just people that keep the mentality around too much and I’m bored of them. Where will I find her and how will I get past her gang of people that I know is protecting her, driving her around in cars to burn people and sink them into rivers. Nobody can find her but I know she’s the type to kill and I heard a woman discuss her and use the term “murder” and “rope.” I don’t know how to take a person down and a part of me tells me to stay away from her. But a part of her wants Janine to kill me again and send me on my way to a better place. The government wants to control my health and not allow me to smoke meth. It houses me in group homes that are unkind to me and compare my surgery to drivel compared to what their daughters with a lot of money paid to get. They got way better facelifts. I have weird eyes. Currently, I’m on the road looking for a way to find out what Janine’s doing, spy on her a little. She lives in a plain wooden house and I can see her in the window, staring out at me knowing it’s me; I am easily recognized by my eyes, even at a far distance. I’ve changed my mind. I want Janine to kill me. I can take a lot of pain. I know I won’t survive her and I can’t help but throw myself at the mercilessness of this sadistic girl.


 

*

Nobody saw Janine drag Amanda’s lifeless corpse up the three cement stairs and into her house to dispose of her with acid. She shot Amanda with a silencer the moment she saw her face loom large and moon-like at the window, open and paneless. The neighborhood Janine lived in was full of gang bangers and drug addicts that shot up and shot people driving by them at night in the street. I must be in the right place, Janine reassured herself. She planned to dispose of Amanda in a nearby landfill, to never be figured out.

2019

Mathilde

My old friend, Janine from summer camp, was just arrested. She told the news she assisted in the suicide of Amanda Warwick, a girl who Janine claimed wanted to kill her. A girl I once met under the train bridge, Stacey Galloway, is not being prosecuted for the murders of Brian Harlow and Jane Seymour, her parents’ identity thieves. It’s really sick shit. Brian and Jane wore skin masks that were completely like real human skin and the features of Stacey’s parents had been duplicated. She didn’t really know what to do about it for many years until she just went crazy. She told me about the recording from her laptop, and I didn’t know how to explain it. I had heard the voices, too. If you don’t want to hear voices, I recommend that you don’t do drugs. You will become a schizophrenic satellite. You’ll hear the world speak to you, and the people in public will say what you’ve heard your voices say when you think you’re alone at home. They can hear you breathe, they can hear you sing, talk, even think. I don’t know how to put Stacey at ease. I’m never really on edge anymore, but I can tell she is. I always wanted to make her my partner in crime. Even Janine would have done well, but I’m against her opinion that Kevin Fielding needed to die. He was just a kid, and I’m against killing kids. Apparently something leaked out and someone turned her in. She is now in prison forever.

I know the same thing won’t happen to me because I plan to stop after three killings. I wish I could free her and I wish I could ease Stacey’s pain. What’ s happened to her is horrible.

Like my old friends, June and Marcelle. Their group home has been shut down and I don’t know where they are, now. Both girls were beautiful and crazy. They had been raped by strange men who met them at the house of their legal guardians and they killed their guardians in self-defense. Marcelle didn’t pay for her crimes, but June had killed the neighbors as well as her guardian and got locked up in the criminal forensics ward for seven years. Just as I’m thinking of them, I decide to write. It’s about a girl who’s always being watched.

It runs on like this:

It was my sophomore year of college. I had just completed the first day and everything depressed me, especially the shadows of the maple leaves dancing on the wall in my dorm room.

“I’m going out for awhile,” said my roommate, Naomi Carver. I assumed she would be gone for a long while. My homely reflection stared back at me from the rectangular razorblade I held in my hand. I took in the zit on my chin, my black curls, my lackadaisical brown eyes. I turned the blade away from me and reflected the white, utilitarian walls covered in posters of new wave bands, the fake plastic red flowers in a vase on the nightstand, the Russian dolls next to it. The bottom of the blade was still covered in cocaine powder from a night Naomi spent partying at a friend’s apartment. My eyes stung. I moved in slow motion to the bathroom and ran water on my wrist in the sink. The key is not to think, I silently told myself. The key is to gash the vein and not fear what’s beyond. With the past, present and future forgotten, I made a vertical red line on my wrists, tearing into the blue creek of vein beneath my porcelain flesh. It brought forth a mild sting, like a bee’s. Blood spurted like a fountain into the sink, onto the mirror.

When I began to feel weak, I allowed myself to fall to the linoleum and wait for a bright light, a celestial set of golden gates. Before I faded out entirely, I felt a pair of arms pull me up and heard Naomi’s distorted shouting.

“Mildred!”

I blacked out, thinking it was only a hallucination when I saw a girl who looked like me staring at the scene from the entrance to the dorm room. I would see her later, in new circumstances. It turned out that Naomi forgot her phone, which is how she found me attempting to end my dismal life.

They sent me to a local hospital, where they staunched the bloodfloow and where I eventually came to. The first thing I remembered was how I used to be such a sweet little girl. I think the most soulless day I had was when I was in junior high and I burned Elena Miller with a lit cigarette, all the world curdling behind my eyes with anger.

“Where do you want it?” I asked Elena, wielding the cigarette like a knife against her arm. “Your skin, or your clothes?” I pointed the tip at the polyester of her blue blouse. At the finality of my outburst, I chose her pale wrist as the target. Elena gasped instead of screaming. I spent two weeks in juvenile detention, was expelled and transferred to another school. As I was recalling this savory memory, a psychiatrist came to evaluate me and she concluded I needed inpatient treatment in the psych ward on the upper level of the hospital. Once I was up there, I frequently threw thermonuclear fits in the blinding flourscence of the ceiling lights. The leather restraints they placed on my bed burned like fire. They were too tight. A whole week later, they sent me to a place of higher security, a building as old as the 1950s called Astria State Hospital. Located in Astria, Washington, a small country town full of orchards and horses.

Over the course of the next two weeks, I covered my bedroom window with collages and childish colored pencil drawings, once of which was a depiction of me rising above three pastel-colored buildings and into the sky. I wore a black dress and had no legs. Often, I stared up at the sky during cigarette breaks and felt like falling to one of the hollow black holes in outer space, but I was bound by the limitations of earth. My heart felt like hellfire.

“Mildred Swain should burn with fire,” said a patient with wild hair, pointing at me and taking a puff of his cigarette. I could only wonder how he knew my last name, let alone was he was saying this. I had been as friendly as possible since I was admitted into the hospital. As I lay in bed one night, a litany of insults came from both patients and staff passing by the door. They called me ugly, weak and deserving of death. I pulled the blanket over my head and refused to fight back. When I felt they were gone, I emerged from under the blanket, and saw her come in. The girl who looked exactly like me loomed, pale and spectral over my bed. She moved as though she were walking on water.

“Who are you?” I asked her.

“An extension of you,” she said. “You are doomed to be hated until you die. Humans are forever to be your plight. When you go home, they’ll talk about you on the sidewalk, in the park, in the classroom. All you can do is be strong and persevere.”

She went on talking until I fell asleep. When morning came, I felt groggy. The sunshine evaporated me. I felt like a puddle of snow melting beneath my blanket. Slowly, in the midst of the empty room, I willed myself to rise to the ceiling and become united with the camera I felt to be hidden in the light above. I watched myself from the top and there was my strange twin in the branches of the cherry tree outside my window, snapping my picture with a polaroid, the black eye of the lens like the eye of an observant spider.

2019

Stacey

In the dream, I am small enough to fit into a crawlspace. I cannot hide from my mother’s red wine in our barren living room that is as black as a power outage, as black as my rotten innocence. My mother picks me up and takes me to the car, says it’s time to go, I need help. She parks outside a stone clinic and leaves me inside. I cry out and am told to be silent by a stern receptionist. Two white coats hold me down and drag me to a white room with a thirty-something redhead in it. She has painted the word “borderline” on the wall next to an immaculate, gold-framed mirror. When we face it to see our reflections (mine child-like, hers much older), we are propelled from its shattering glass by a defiance of gravity. We coil up and writhe, possessed by demons. Satan lets us die together, which is a blessing compared to living in the hospital. I close my eyes one last time without seeing my mother. I only see the broken glass, the blood on the wall (bright as an ambulance light), the linoleum beneath my cheekbone. I am a dead husk of a human determined to haunt the city I was born in. Life grows black again. I don’t scream.

Marcelle

2012

Marcelle Trahern was raised by two cunts with Munchausen syndrome by proxy, a term derived from the original Munchausen syndrome itself. If one has Munchausen syndrome by proxy, it means a caregiver (in this case, the godmother of Marcelle), chooses to refrain from giving their charges the right health, supplements and nutrients to keep them alive. In fact, they make them worsen with sickness and degradation. Subtly, so the good doctor won’t notice they’re causing the illness for their charges. The first bitch had decided to poison her subtly instead. Marcelle’s godmother favored ipecac. In their small village, church was a mandatory service where all girls had to see the Lord Jesus Christ be praised or crucified on film. A montage of filmy sunlight and a golden cross shone from an array of manipulative Christian imagery, perceived on an overhead projector.

Marcelle went every Wednesday and Sunday in a grey stone building with elaborate brick arcs painted black outlining the stained glass windows. The broadcast room was like an insidious revelation opening up a nightmare to the eyes of sensitive Marcelle, without the abrasive steel to pry a pair of eyes open. Especially when the topic was eternal damnation or the crucifixion of Jesus. It was like a metaphorical film lobotomy. They just stayed peeled open, unable to shut or fall asleep for any reason. Nanny Cravat insisted she stay awake. She favored those antiquated neckbands.

The girls sat around her in stiff, ungraceful lines, backs upright or slouching depending on the girls’ preference to posture. Ms. Winifred Scarlet, who had been killing off children in her home for three years, took Marcelle in at eleven years old the year her mother died and Marcelle was never able to know the woman by heart in a way her memory could rely upon. Winifred was a registered foster mother and she was ailing. Marcelle killed her foster mother (and made the police and medical examiner rule the death as a suicide). She sang “Don’t Fear the Reaper” in her choir voice while spoon-feeding Winifred “sugar in a spoon bowl, so the medicine goes down.” She gagged on the Drano and no longer said the words Marcelle needed to hear: “You should be ashamed of yourself,” “You should be grateful,” “Why didn’t you try harder?” Winifred was involved in a canned television broadcast again for that last comment, a boring, banal comedy Winifred needed to have Marcelle watch with her before bed in 2011.

On March 24, a clear, shiny spring morning, Marcelle knew that she had no one to rely upon any better by the time the next foster mother came around to raise her. She was a distant harridan of a woman with a thin, pert mouth shut tight at church and open like a wrathful shrew to chastise Marcelle at home.

“See that window?” said Nanny Cravat, her second godmother: a malevolent, Puritan woman with brown hair in a frizz and vacant eyes.

“You’ll be lucky if God saves you when you fall out of it. It’s all shit. God’s for nothing. But I fear hell just as much as you do. All we can do is try to believe and see if God listens.“

In her dress made for church, the stiff lace a cascade of black and white. A knee-length skirt and pilgrim collar. Church uniform. The telepathy Marcelle heard: “devout truths”, “deep breaths,” “if you need to console yourself, use these coping skills.”

All the things Marcelle picked up on by reading minds that she could never express piled up in her head and she was crazy.

“Marcelle may be crazy,” said a soft-voiced man about to make an assumption based on what he saw in elaborate artwork in a journal: a drawing in Bic pen, of a realistic-looking Nanny Cravat swallowing a spoonful of something, reminding him of milk poisoning and a scary story his mom sometimes read to him at night in his portentous childhood. Marcelle’s self-portrait was accurate. She overheard the bell ringing in the distance beyond her thoughts of his voice by the cathedral  bells that rang with worship, clanging vehemently. When Marcelle got home after spring choir ended, she planned the Drano death. It was under the kitchen sink, meant to mingle with Nanny Cravat’s cup of milk.

“Nanny, I  hope you enjoy your milk,”

“Come, have a sit-down,” said Nanny to Marcelle. She set the glass of milk  in front of Nanny Cravat, who was wearing her red velvet blouse and white cravat.

“Put that milk on the table carefully. Don’t spill it.”

Time to die, Marcelle wished. Down the throat went that blue liquid permeating Nanny Cravat’s esophagus as she choked. The only number Marcelle knew to call wasn’t an option, and she had to make her own way in the world feeling like humans weren’t worth anything and we’re all just partially alien. Meretricious, cheap people.

Marcelle wanted to die in outer space. She left the raw death and agony of Nanny Cravat  slumped over on the table after she choked. Marcelle became the third eye, the third shrew, the ultimate survivor of destiny and doom.

June

2014

My lucidity died in the house I grew up in. I was raised in an arcane Hitchcock mansion with a cupola. There were no servants due to my guardian, Scarlett Freeland’s, illicit exploitation, and her fear of it being discovered. Therefore, she let everything collect dust. Her mansion was tall and monumental. It reminded me of a Halloween sticker decoration one puts on a windowpane. On our street, Cupola Avenue, named for the cupolas on each house, I suffered many seasons of violent turmoil at the hands of Scarlett. She owned a video camera that she balanced on top of a tripod and told me it was my “surveillance.”

On several occasions, at the age of thirteen, I was raped by a multitude of strange men that Scarlett invited inside. She would put 80’s hair metal on the stereo while they raped me and she sat in a red armchair, smoking numerous cigarettes. Sometimes, I wouldn’t get raped and instead it would be my deed, according to every person in the room, to kill a person in front of me. I’ve killed 37 people in Scarlett’s house, each one dissolved with acid in the cupola on film, and killed on film as well, before being doused with acid. Each time this event happened, it was recorded and burned onto a disc to be viewed on Scarlett’s TV.

There were only two other houses on Cupola Avenue: the Tarringtons’ house and the Miltons’ house. Clyde Tarrington lived in a two-story house painted white with black shutters. He lived there with his daughter, Blithe. On their front door was a poster of a symbol that held a cryptic enchantment for me: a cross with an hourglass in the center of it. It always reminded me of their time running out. I had wanted to kill Blithe for so many years. I felt her to be prettier than me with her lustrous black hair and piercing green eyes. She always loved to remind me of how I would have been killed by my twin sister, Adele, had she lived. In the womb, she was the alpha and I was the omega. On a rainy day when lightning split the sky into slices, Adele and me were playing dress-up with red velvet gowns and silver high heels. We were twelve. I convinced her into a “baptism,” holding her head underwater. Despite my carrying the title of the omega twin, my newfound strength prevailed and she soon ceased to breathe.

When Scarlett found out, she didn’t seem to care. Neither did the rest of the neighborhood; they were always killing people. We melted her body into the floor of the cupola with acid.

My name used to be Lillian Freeland, but once my twin was dead, I uncontrollably became someone named June. She came to me, like a doppelganger, looking exactly like me, but bearing no evil intentions.

“I am here, and I am not leaving you,” June told me. I regret killing Adele despite her greater knowledge of schoolwork. We were both homeschooled and Scarlett never told us what she did for a living. I learned later on that she worked for the federal government.

My liberation from Scarlett’s persistent and unyielding abuse came on the day of my eighteenth birthday, April 17. After she made me read Tennyson’s “The Lady of Shallot” to two men, who raped me when I was done, and when they had left, I waited for Scarlett to go upstairs and watch one of her movies. I sauntered to the garage and snatched an axe, the same one Scarlett used in satanic rituals when she was young. I made the predatory ascent up the stairs and into her bedroom. Then, as though she were a chopping block and as though her sanguine bloodflow was sacred, I swung the axe down upon her skull. Hard. She was watching The Caretakers, a black and white movie about women in group therapy. She fell to the side, writhing in pain. I went to the front of the chair and brought the axe down upon her back until her spinal cord was severed and her tenebrous heart gave out. I left her there and ran back downstairs, screaming the whole way.

Next, I opened Scarlett’s freezer and grabbed a carton of Marlboro 100’s, lit one, and burned the subtle swastikas hidden in the patterns of an Oriental rug. I gazed around me, took in the contents of the living room: the Kit-Kat clock shaped like a black cat with bulging eyes, the white topaz chandelier, the gutted hearth, the period furniture. I decided it was time to leave my home behind forever. I grabbed a pink backpack and shoved the carton of cigarettes inside, along with a drawer full of working Bic lighters. I threw in three shirts, six pairs of socks, six pairs of underwear, two pairs of pants, a journal, a pen, and a gun. I topped off the luggage with some rubber vampire teeth I endeavored to save for a malevolent purpose: murdering Blithe Tarrington.

I put my hand on the gun as I walked outside, holding it securely within the large pocket of my forest green trench coat. To my knowledge, the Miltons across the street were always killing people (Scarlett always said so.), but I didn’t know how they felt about Blithe. I didn’t care. I rang the doorbell, staring down the cross and hourglass on the door’s poster. Luckily, Blithe answered the door. I pulled out the gun, and her face became as stricken as one being lashed with a switch.

“Get inside,” I gnashed, pushing her onto the floor  and slamming the door behind me. “And don’t get up. Don’t even talk.”

She talked anyway. “Lillian, please don’t kill me. You don’t have to - “

“But I want to, and I can, and I will kill you and nothing will ever be able to resurrect you!”

“What’s going on with that Freeland bitch? Why is she in my house?” screamed Clyde, who had just descended the stairs. I shot him in the head, and he slumped over, instantaneously dead.

“You’ve been killing people in this house for years, and it’s time to go!” I vociferated over her harrowed wailing. “Now, put these in.” I unzipped my backpack and handed her the rubber vampire teeth.

She stared at me, wide-eyed with feral fear. She did nothing. She said nothing.

“Your mouth, dummy. Put them in your mouth.”

I handed her the teeth, and she took them from me and placed them over her own toothpaste commercial-white teeth.

“You look the very caricature of Halloween,” I said, laughing as I blew out her brains. The remains flew against the wall and painted an inkblot test of blood smears everywhere. I walked into Blithe’s bedroom after I was sure she was dead, and saw a purple canopied bed, a bookshelf filled with many classic and contemporary novels, among them: the Brontes, Oscar Wilde, Theodore Dreiser, Jane Austen, Anais Nin, D.H. Lawrence. I grabbed Nin’s House of Incest, Wilde’s The Picture of Dorian Gray and Charlotte Bronte’s Villette, and left the house.

I didn’t make it very far. I was down the road not very far when I was arrested.  I always feared them coming for me. I fell onto the asphalt, scabbing my knees and not feeling it. I denied what was happening. I muttered to myself incoherently.

“We know you killed some people, Lillian.”

“My name is June,” was all that I said before my mind shut off and I suddenly woke up vegetative in a jail cell.

*

Eventually, I was labelled not guilty by reason of insanity. The police found Scarlett’s recordings and the recordings that the Miltons and the Tarringtons made of their own killings when I told them about the neighborhood, and what Scarlett had done to me. One day, I will get out of the forensics services ward, where the criminally insane are housed. I have spent many nights here, remembering the death and ravagings, my hair coiling like Medusa’s on the pillow of the restraint bed, the leather straps leaving black bruises on my wrists. Every night, I pray to God and Jesus and all the saints that ever were that I’ll be forgiven for my killings, and be accepted into a realm I can call heaven.

My lucidity will live again, resurged.

2017

June and Marcelle

Cathleen Carter

She led me to the house with the cupola

Where she stabbed me in the backyard

Blood flowed glowing red from my pale skin

Staining my white blouse

And my throat ached

I haunt the halls

And my voice resides within the walls

I’m a phantom floating through the inmates

Living in my killer’s group home

Eyes stare from the cupola

I don’t know who saw me die

I’m buried under a thorny bush

Bones hidden by woods and tiny baby teeth

She scattered

Covering my grave with evidence from her recent infanticides

She stabbed my baby

And cut me for giving birth

In her bed

My lover carved our initials in a tree

And we’ll always be in touch

I eat strawberries off a plate in his room

We hung a dreamcatcher to capture his nightmares

Of me being tortured by her ringed hands

Bag placed over my head

Cathleen Carter, the snuff film queen

(I have killed many)

Choking on film reel

Always having to be polite

In the morning light drinking tea

Deirdre, the killer, laced it with GHB

Putting me to sleep

Separated from my lover

Pillow soaked in warm tears

His tears and mine

We drink them in vials and kiss under stars

Soon he too will be a ghost

Swallowing pills on a blanket in the cemetery

Deirdre will find us and take our picture

Maybe she’ll capture my phantom on camera

*

With curiosity, Marcelle Trahern saw from the window Deirdre Carter and her niece, Cathleen, arguing. The infant was dead, that much Marcelle knew. Cathleen Carter had given birth to a baby girl now with stab wounds, lying in red and white rigor mortis in her crib with blood on the teddy bear, in the dolls’ hair and on the lampshade on the side table. Most of the inmates, as they were known due to the group home’s strict rules, were gone for the day at an event and June Freeland was downstairs Deirdre Carter quickly took over June’s life after leaving her post as nurse at the asylum where June was housed. June was incompetent to stand trial, declared insane and sent away for seven years. She had returned to Scarlett Freeland, her former guardian’s, mansion to live. It had been converted into a group home for women with trauma issues.

All thoughts of June vanished from Deirdre’s mind when the knife blade shone in the sun, an ominous metal glint that suddenly penetrated the naked pearl throat of Cathleen. She collapsed to the grass in the fenced-in backyard and as the earth was fresh from the rain, Deirdre found a shovel leaning against the toolshed and dug a fresh grave. Marcelle had never liked Cathleen much because she was always harping on the girls to follow the rules: don’t smoke dope, don’t invite boys over without permission, etc. She had gotten herself knocked up by Miles Sutherland, and Deirdre highly disapproved of him with his leather jacket and cigarettes. Marcelle only saw him once when he drove to pick up Cathleen for a date, his handsome face a silhouette in the dark window. Marcelle decided to keep quiet about the death. She watched Cathleen be tossed into the grave liked a broken doll. Deirdre had tied a plastic bag over her face and stabbed her in the chest. For ten minutes, Marcelle watched Deirdre extract Cathleen’s heart from her chest cavity, holding the dead, lifeless muscle in her palm, her calm blue eyes narrowed and focused on it like a witch in a black magic ritual. June suddenly appeared beside Marcelle.

“The bitch is finally dead,” Marcelle said, breaking her vow not to tell anyone. “What is she going to do with the heart?”

“I don’t know,” said June.

The girls, both in their twenties and too old for Cathleen’s trashy immaturity, watched with morbid fascination as Deirdre snapped a polaroid   (after turning off the video camera)

of Cathleen’s corpse before throwing dirt back over her and packing it in. She laid stones over it and from her pocket, she took something white and scattered it over the grave. When she went back inside the house, Marcelle and June left the cupola to inspect what Deirdre had spilled. Six tiny teeth in the front yard, taken from a toddler’s mouth. A previous killing. When the cops led Deirdre away after June called them, June put on a nun habit and took over the house.

They heard Cathleen’s whispers of love for Miles and reassurances that Deirdre was gone. They buried her baby in an infant cemetery labeled merely “Infant Cemetery” in iron above a fancy gate bearing an entrance to the graveyard. June called the cops by her own policy, knowing hiding a murder is wrong.

“Marcelle, she’s a psycho, bats-in-the-head bitch and she could have come after us, too. It’s better that she’s gone.”

“I guess so,” said Marcelle. her  mind on Nanny Cravat choking on her milk laced with Drano. Marcelle had fled the world of Christian broadcast rooms and the sex trade. Nanny Cravat had invited several men over to force themselves on her, and she was glad she couldn’t remember it in great detail. Dissociating was so divine. Girls wore meretricious makeup to school and church and their naked limbs stuck out from cheap, mall-bought

miniskirts. Marcelle would have given them all Drano in a cup, too, if she knew how not to get caught.

But she was far from their bratty voices now, with June Freeland, Anika White and Marilyn Sanders to keep her company. In the meantime, the house became less of a group home and June began paying the monthly bills with Deirdre’s leftover income found stashed in a safe in her room. Marijuana smoke soon filled the rooms and the girls giggled at the enhanced cartoons on the television, making funny faces at the ceiling. Then, Cathleen appeared in the mirror behind them in her prom finery, staring sternly with her stab wound, The blood withdrawing and disappearing into the gash. Anika screamed. When the others asked what was wrong, Anika revealed what she saw.

“You’re too high,” Marilyn said, running a hand through her rainbow hair. But Cathleen stood behind them, strawberry juice the color of blood on her mouth, back from Miles who contacted her spirit and she came when summoned and manifested herself in the flesh.

Cathleen

My baby is gone

In an infant coffin underground

I wear black to mourn her

And place flowers on her grave

Miles embraces me in the cemetery

Where we have sandwiches and milk

He marvels as the food disappears from the plate

And the milk drains from the thermos

He can see me fresh as daylight

A rose haloed in gold

I am fragile dust and fairy winds and gilded blond hair

They find him dead the next day

By the gravesite of his daughter

His lips blue from the pills

His hair plastered to his head

In the spring rain

His indolent heart gave out and from her prison, Dierdre laughed at the television giving news of Mile’s suicide and the note he’d left:

I’ve gone to be with Cathleen, who drew me into hear heart forever, and our daughter Melanie’s, too. Dierdre couldn’t kill my love, though she tried very hard.

I saw Deirdre from the corner where I stood, staring at ladies dressed in orange watch the television and play cards. Now that I’m dead, I can go anywhere I want to in the world. I’ve explored the moors of England and I’ve been to Alaska, the northern lights illuminating the night sky and I didn’t feel the cold nor the heat of Death Valley, California. I flew and touched the top of the Eiffel Tower.

“Anything can be done in death, it’s like magic is yours after you die,” I told Miles.

Down he went with me and they buried us side by side. We go into earth, then Summerland, then back again. When I haunt the group home, I conjour nightmares for the girls who tormented me, especially June Freeland who told me I looked dressed as gaudily as she had for one of the snuff films her guardian she murdered made her do. I know many murderers: the worst of them being June and Marcelle. I read the evidence of Marcelle’s Drano murders in her journal and her revelations of sex with strange men who came when called by Nanny Cravat, Marcelle’s godmother. But something told me not to be a hypocrite and tell on her. I never had a mother like these girls. She abandoned me on the doorstop of St. Xavier’s Orphanage and Dierdre, the nun (she was a devout Catholic before she moved on to work for the hospital) who knew her sister’s face and knowing I was her niece, took me in and after years of her impossible violence and nagging, I am finally set free and better off, even if by her hand.

The Ouija Board

“Miles committed suicide,” said Marilyn to Marcelle. “It’s on the news.”

“Oh,” said Marcelle. “I bet Cathleen’s ghost dragged him down with her. Anika keeps seeing her everywhere and is freaking out.”

Anika was fast asleep in her room, having taken a dose of Haldol to help the hallucinations.

“But you aren’t hallucinating,” Cathleen had insisted when she came to Anika late at night. Sometimes she wore a nun habit like June, who had taken to smearing on red lipstick and blaring Courtney Love from the stereo. Sometimes, she sang opera with a crucifix dangling around her neck, and quite good. The girls loved listening to her sing her songs of lovers who lost their loved ones like Miles and Greek tragedies where Persephone became trapped for six months in Hades with the Lord of the Underworld and six months on earth. Gods and monsters fighting their battles to the death. The Ouija board they used to summon Cathleen worked. Anika revealed the messages to them of their conversation she heard in her head. Anika directed the board marker’s movement in their hands.

“Cathleen, where are you?” Anika asked, finally facing her fear of the unknown.

“In Summerland, with Miles,” was the reply.

Anika spelled it on the board and all were shocked.

“I knew it was real, like heaven but better than clouds and angels playing harps, waiting at the gates to judge you,” Anika said. “In Summerland there is no judgment, or pain or violence. Just love, laughter and magic. I learned all about the theory of the afterlife in Summerland from a Wiccan book I found in the used bookstore downtown.”

“Are you sure it isn’t fake, Anika?” Asked June, who doubted the paranormal.

“I heard her voice, just the way it was when she was alive!” Anika stormed out of the room, offended by June’s remark. The Ouija board remained still. Out of all of the girls, Cathleen found Anika most vulnerable to her presence. Cathleen enjoyed scaring them a little. But she never spoke to June, who ascended the staircase with a boy from the nearby prep school, holding a candlelabra and smoking a Marlboro cigarette. Marilyn played 20 Questions with Anika in their room and listened to her account of what she read in Marcelle’s journal.

“I saw too,” said Cathleen. “She sent people to their death same as insane June. I wonder what sort of terrorism Dierdre endured at a young age.”

“Probably witnessed something violent, or had no parents like you. I didn’t,” said Marcelle, who stood behind them listening and hearing Cathleen’s voice just like Anika.

Deirdre

High on a precious hill stands my home for abandoned, unstable girls

I can’t return to it

I’m in prison garb in the women’s prison surrounded by barbed wire and a river runs past, saturated in pollutants spilled by the nearby plants and factories.

I used to be a nun, then a nurse, mercy-killing the elderly, smothering infants and pretending they died of SIDS (Sudden Infant Death Syndrome), immune to the wails of inconsolable parents informed by the doctor in the corridor.

I spent my early childhood in a ramshackle farmhouse in Louisiana, smothered by my mother and her hot back coffee thrown in my face. How her knives danced before my eyes. When my baby brother died when I was fourteen, they thought it was SIDS. I hated babies. My mother told me to kill it, it was a sickly, weak little boy and wouldn’t last the year. I fed him to a hungry feral cat and watched the skin ribbon over her bones from the cat’s carnivorous snacking. My mother, a widow always in grey with shadows under her eyes the color of her sweater, watched the baby’s decomposition.

I felt an affinity for June the most out of all the girls in my home. We had killed and had bad mothers who abused our bodies and sucked our souls out through crazy straws, leaving us bereft and insane. I couldn’t plead insanity the way June could, though.

I wish I were out of this stale air and away from these women, with their murderous stairs and rancid shouting, their fights that lead them to solitary. I won’t put a hand on these women. I won’t go to solitary.

June

I murdered this whole neighborhood besides Clinton and Mary Milton and their twin son and daughter. The parents went to prison for murder, and the kids live somewhere else now. The house is vacant.  I never enjoyed what Scarlett made me do. They housed me in an asylum, where I spent the majority of my time in restraints staring at the ceiling with vacant eyes and Medusa coils in my hair that snarled on the pillow.

I dreamt of black widows biting me and in my dreams, Deirdre, who worked there at the time as a psychiatric nurse, didn’t tend to my bites that reddened on my hand. When I wasn’t dreaming, Deirdre liked me. Now she’s in prison where she belongs. I no longer handle nitric acid or kill people or endure stiff baseball bats tearing open my cunt.

Scarlett watched my defiling from behind the camera, recording the rapes in the dark room. I was smothered in her cellar and remembered it, screaming, spitting out the pills, refusing to take them. Deirdre heard my whole story, decided to move into the old Freeland estate and take over as group home director. I moved out of my trailer to stay there. Weird I should live here after killing someone here. I used to hallucinate Blithe, who I shot and killed, but I don’t see her lately. I dismiss Anika despite my own experience. Sometimes, the ghost of Cathleen gets old as a topic and I think all should  remember the living and forget the dead that can’t reach us, gone to nether realms.

But what if she was there? What if she can reach us?

I’ll never know. One day I’ll be a ghost myself. I have faith that there is something prettier to see than this insidious earth after our bodies run out of time and our souls transcend.

There must be something better than what I had, what Marcelle had, what Cathleen had, what all of us had.

I think I just heard a voice. Is it the still, small voice of God, or is it a spirit coming from some divine region, holy or unholy?

I am a combined angel and demon. I want to drink absinthe and sleep with that voice.

Mathilde

2019

I stood in the calm, obsidian woods and gained my frail balance against a ramshackle cabin. Wolves dashed out of the shadows, ignoring me and veering towards a carcass in a wildflower-bordered clearing. I was pretty certain it was human. Then I saw a ski-masked perpetrator, blood channeling from his disguise. He offered me a bouquet of purple irises in his scathed left hand. In the shunning woods, feeling like the ghost of someone gone, I tore my lavender dress on a nail in the cabin’s wood. I declined the masked monster’s offer. Suddenly, I was pulled inside by someone behind the front door. I cried out, closed my eyes and could hear the door shut and bolt. Once the lightbulb on the ceiling flickered on, I saw my rescuer’s face like a sanctified revelation. The kindest pair of dark eyes I had ever seen. My speech failed me but his did not.

He told me, “Nothing will kill your equilibrium while I’m here. You no longer have to claw at wooden walls are cry into a pillowcase. Notice that soon the sun will come up and figuratively, I’ll give you a pair of rose-colored glasses to view the world through. A better world than this.”

“I-“ I began.

“I love you,” he said.

Of course, he was handsome and I coveted him highly.  He pressed his perfect mouth on mine and carried me to bed. After the sex and the sun-glow, he told me he’d be my dreamcatcher, and if not the destroyer of my enemies, the bane of them. The unidentified mask never showed up again. We soon left the cabin to live in a castle. He taught me to love instead of maim, to be tender instead of destructive. I learned to give myself away to a man created by the sparks of imagination itself.

*

I ease myself out of bed after this dream and take another hit of glass. Something to make the world glitter with white ice and a way to make the hell inside freeze over. I see him blur on every bridge, every riverbed, every highway. There is no hallucination more powerful than him. Nothing will perforate me and make me stop haunting this city. Nothing will make me bleed out onto the sidewalk because I am too fast for the blade, the bullet. The smoke flows through the open room and hits the sun. I wake to sirens piercing the quiet. I’m the cause of them but I know their glow won’t alight on me and swallow me up.

[drgnrder82]

   The edge of Chinatown was distinct. The lights on the archway radiated red, white and gold before your eyes took in the sight of the cluster of signs in the narrow streets. The street always seemed to be bustling, like most of New York, even after dark. This city is packed tightly together, but in this burrough it is more apparent. Each building felt connected to the next, the cross streets almost disappear and the gaps seem as small as alleyways. Traveling through this part of the city was easy.    Ignoring the fact that it was close to home, this was a burrough they grew up in, trained in, but over the years they frequented Chinatown less and less. He may not have come through this way at all if his brothers didn't start reminiscing about it with father. Chinatown was not out of his way from the junk yard, but he often kept to the sewers. Particularly in the day. Best not to get caught by people, especially on camera. At this time of night Chinatown was still as active with tourists and natives as the daytime.    Kitchen vents delivered new scents at every rooftop. Fried noodles from a restaurant. A street cart with fried dumplings. The next roof he could smell a whole assortment of fried meats from another of the array of restaurants. Great. Stopping for this detour delayed dinner already and the aromas were conspiring to make him hungrier. Sentimentality clearly came with a price. What was wrong with him, making this detour anyways? By the time he got back all of dinner would be eaten. Mikey and his bottomless stomach would see to that. The others would just laugh and he would be scrounging for food. Wait. Did he need to get groceries again? Probably. Another item to add to the list.    He continued to jump from rooftop to rooftop until a large gap at the far southern edge of Chinatown appeared. He wasn't sure the building was still there until he saw it. Every building in the area was at least three stories, usually more. An old, single story home sat at the edge of the district. When they were kids it was abandoned. From what he had gathered the it was a home and had been converted to a shrine. It was hard to say if it was supposed to be a Japanese shinto shrine, a Buddhist temple, or a shrine to a man from Chinatown. Not that it mattered now. Someone still owned the building but no one used it for anything anymore. From his perch on the rooftop, even in the dark of night, the building should be condemned. Holes littered the roof. A strange building to say the least. It was circular and he only remembered there being a few rooms inside when he was a child. The unique reason they stopped here at all was the garden. The building encompassed a small grassy garden with a single sakura tree. Sensei brought them there to see the sakura tree bloom in spring time for a couple years. Too early in spring for blossoms yet.    He jumped down the outer edge of nearby fire escapes until he could reach the closest section of roof. He judged where the best location to jump would be. Shingles were loose everywhere and he doubted the integrity of the wood supports.    All the windows were dark in the building. Didn't seem like anyone was around. He dared to leap onto the peak of the roof and vault immediately into the thin grass. The cherry tree seemed both bigger and smaller than he remembered. He could easily reach up and touch the lowest branches. Buds were starting to appear, it might blossom in the next couple weeks. He would have to remember to come back. Maybe he would bring father. Father rarely came to the surface but this shrine was generally a safer place to visit.    Something scraped the wood inside the shrine. Could have been anything, but he knew he shouldn't risk getting caught if some person was holed up in the abandoned building. At least the sewer entrance was still in the far edge of the grass, near the back gate to the alley. Swiftly, he ran to the cover, lifted it, jumped in and covered the entrance again. Next time he would do more recon. Or, if he was more intelligent and did not listen to Michelangelo and his stories, not bother being sentimental and just run his errands and get home.

--

   “Did you see someone in the garden?” a girl turned to a boy at the door of the former temple. Tools, new wood, a few pieces of furniture littered the room. The electricity was on, and being paid for for that matter, but not really working in this room yet. Extension cords ran all around the room, mostly connected to work lights. A girl, average height, small build, had tripped over the hammer while trying to avoid a ladder.    At the front door, the boy she was talking to, clicked another work light on from the floor, “Nope.”    “I'm serious.”    “You must be seeing things again. Think this place is haunted?”    “You're an idiot.”

--

Donatello threw his messenger bag on his bed. The lair was dark and still save for the graphics on the video game consoles dancing around. His brothers had retired early after their hard day training. And as he predicted, no one left any dinner for him. Michelangelo ate every last piece of pizza and finished off the cereal, which meant little for breakfast in the morning. He would definitely need to ask April or Casey to get some more groceries for them in the morning. Donatello switched on his work light in his computer lab before he booted up his work PC. Another late shift working as a IT phone technician. Waiting for the PC to boot he rummaged in the cabinets, not surprised to find them mostly bare. He felt fortunate to find a box of ramen hidden in a cabinet and enough oatmeal to lead to a loud, complaint filled morning. Waiting for water to boil he checked the security system cameras, ran back to the kitchen for his ramen and a soda, grabbed his headset from his bed and sat heavily in his computer chair. Before he logged in to the VOIP account for work, he thought about his detour. He really shouldn't have stopped. He kept kicking himself that Mikey got in his head. Now that Leo was back, their family whole again, Mikey was becoming rather reminiscent about childhood. Every time April or Casey came over Mikey would convince Master Splinter to tell different stories about their childhoods. The most recent being some of their rare outings to the surface. “Ever since the day we were mutated we have had few safe havens above ground. Day or night.” Splinter curled his tail around his feet on the couch, settling in next to April. “When they were small children I kept them bundled on me with a blanket, but as they grew they would not heed me, or be still. It was impossible to keep them safe above ground.  It was my duty to keep them safe, even if Michelangelo insisted on climbing the pipes all the way to the ceiling.” When the giggles died out, April asked, “Where could you take them that was safe.” “Of all places,” Leo needed to stifle another round of rare laughter, “the junk yard.” Appearing to meditate on the story, Splinter continued, “It was the only place with a fence Michelangelo would not climb over. I also was able to run them around finding what we needed for our home. To an extent.” “Let me guess, Don would try to bring everything he could home.” Casey tipped back his beer, eager to get a shot in.   His brother’s enjoyed that barb too, “Yes, laugh. I built that warming lamp we still use in the winter.” Claiming the room again, Splinter continued, “When they were older, and I could venture out further and leave them in the lair, I started to explore different neighborhoods. I enjoyed the atmosphere of my old home in Chinatown, and knew the streets well enough and that I may go unnoticed. The boys were young, five, perhaps six years old when I stumbled on a community garden on a roof near the edge of Chinatown. Fresh vegetables were the hardest foods to come by. We only took sparingly and I taught them to help care for the garden as our way of repayment for the food.” Pausing, Splinter sipped at his tea. “One evening as I searched for food behind the restaurants I was almost found by some cooks coming out on a break. I dove behind the dumpster, cornered.” “Like a rat?” Mikey yelped as Splinter’s tail whipped the side of his head. “Police were investigating a murder at a small house on the edge of the district. I had seen this place. It did not look like a house, many people visited, like a shrine. It was a peculiar building. Short and round. From the rooftops I could see a small garden. Weeks passed and I studied the building. It was most certainly abandoned and no police visited any longer. During the depths of the night, I woke my sons early and took them to this small house.” “Wait wait wait…why would you wake them to take them there? I mean…” “Grass.” They intoned quietly. “Grass?” “Hey, it’s not like we can just waltz around Central Park!” Raphael’s face fell but lifted again seconds later, “And that tree.” “What tree?” “In the middle of the garden, a sakura tree.” Their father stretched out his hand, he’d concealed a paper flower in the folds of his robe. “And it was mid spring. The blossoms were just opening.” April tried to conceal tears welling in the corners of her eyes as she watched each of the turtles relive the moment. They could still feel the breeze swirl around them, allowing the light scent of the cherry blossoms to wash over each of them. Donatello opened his eyes. Back to reality. While living in the sewers offered relatively low amounts of bills, he still had to pay for gas and groceries for the family. Reminiscing was nice but he needed to get back to life. IT, as painful a job as when Leo was gone but at least he got the occasional technology repair job in his drop box. Money was money. A wall full of monitors sat in front of him, lighting the entire room. Gadgets in various stages of build were scattered among his floor, desk space all the way around the room with remnants of wires and bolts making a trail practically to his bed in the next room. Maybe he would consider stopping at that building again on his next scavenging trip. Or even the community garden.

----------------------------

I literally don’t know how long it will take me to edit this thing. I am near the end of the first arc and starting to edit the beginning. I may get to posting it on AO3 in chapters if I am happy with it. Either way...I liked how the beginning started to turn out. (Post 2007 movie)

[this-sapphic-paradise]

The New Recruit - Chapter 5

(x)

On this chapter Kara is kidnapped, and Lena gets a glimpse of the darkness inside Alex.

A big thank you to my girl @lena-lipbite-luthor for being my beta.

( AO3 link/ please consider buying me a coffee ^^ )

Blood rushed to Alex’s ears; the sound of her heart beating hard drowned out the hurried steps of agents scrambling to follow the orders J’onn was barking at them. Her vision blurred as she was drawn back into her mind as she tried to come up with a plan of her own.

“Alex,” the name sounded far and foreign to her; she needed to focus, there was no time to waste. “Alex!!” This time the name was said loudly, accompanied by strong hands clasping her shoulders and shaking her back to reality.

As Alex's eyes gained focus once more, she saw J’onn standing in front of her. “I forbid you to run after this lead on your own, do you hear me?” His furrowed brows and sad eyes reflected the concern heard in his voice. “You and Kara are like daughters to me, and I promise you, we will find her, and we'll bring her back."

She nodded because she had no other choice. But Alex was too much in a stupor to pay any heed to J'onn's words; her sister had been taken away from her, and the desperation taking hold of her mind, making her heart feel like it was in a vice grip was all the motivation Alex needed to take matters into her own hands.

Giving the excuse she needed to be alone, Alex slipped her way into the DEO armory to collect the weapons she would need to rescue her sister.

"You don't think J'onn would really let you out of his sights, do you?" Lena's low voice reached Alex's ears, giving her pause for a second before she resumed gathering the weapons.

"I order you to stand down, agent," Alex said without turning around to look at Lena; she was busy, and she had no time to waste.

Crossing her arms, Lena replied, "It's been months since our training came to an end, Alex. You're not our commanding officer anymore, you can't tell me what to do."

"This is not the time to test me, Lena!" Alex exclaimed, quickly turning around to face her friend.

And for the first time in Lena's life, she understood why people around the DEO were scared of Alex. The look in those brown eyes had nothing left of their usual warmth; they were harsh and cold, a transformation Lena had only seen happening so suddenly when Reign took over Sam's mind. She should be afraid, she should step aside, but just as Lena had fought to save Sam, just as she had fought to try and save her brother before it was too late, she was going to do the same for Alex.

She had to think fast; If I blow the whistle on her and something happens to Kara, Alex will never forgive me, Lena thought, but if I let her go alone and something happens to her, I won't forgive myself... Squaring her shoulders and tilting her chin up, Lena said firmly, "I won't warn J'onn, but I'm going with you."

"No you aren't," Alex shot back, turning around once more to continue packing the weapons.

"It's either that, or I'll sound the bells," Lena said, raising her eyebrow even though Alex couldn't see her.

"If you stand in my way," Alex said, closing the duffle bag she had stored the weapons in, and she got on Lena's face. "I will take you down."

Part of Lena wanted to shrink away, but Alex had trained her for situations just as this one. "You said one of the hardest things that could happen to us as DEO agents would be finding ourselves on opposite sides from our friends and family," she said, looking deeply into Alex's eye, "I'm telling you, I'm on your side, but if you force me to, I will fight you." Sighing, Lena added softly, "I want to rescue her too, Alex. Please... let me help."

Alex cursed under her breath; I did teach her well, I made sure she could fight as well as I can... Alex thought. I can't waste any time fighting her, and I can't risk doing anything that would catch J'onn's attention... "Fuck! Okay, whatever, you can come, but I'm warning you," Alex stepped impossibly closer to Lena, standing mere inches away from her, "when I find the people responsible for hurting my sister, I will pay them in kind."

Without flinching, Lena replied stoically, "That's what they deserve."

Lena's words surprised Alex, but her mind was too focused on her mission, she was too worried about Kara to stop and analyze why Lena would agree so promptly. "Good, let's go," she said leading Lena toward the helipad. As Lena followed behind, she made sure Alex wasn't looking before she discreetly pressed a button on her watch.

They flew for about an hour in complete silence, and it was only when they landed that Lena asked, "What's the plan?"

"Winn thinks they are holding Kara in a building twenty minutes north from where we are," Alex began to explain as they got out of the helicopter and geared up. "The building is abandoned, but Winn noticed huge amounts of electricity being used, so they are either holding Kara in there, or they are growing the largest pot farm I've ever heard of..."

Lena frowned even though she found Alex's words slightly amusing. "What makes you so sure they are using electricity to hold Kara?"

"The amount of it being used," Alex replied, motioning for Lena to follow her. "Livewire could stun and weaken Kara with her electric whips and lightning blasts." Grinding her teeth, Alex added, "With the right amount of electricity, Kara can be killed..."  

Sharing a look, Lena and Alex seemed to have an entire conversation without uttering a word out loud and seemingly coming to an unspoken agreement, they started walking faster.

The overcast night skies helped give them coverage to approach the building undetected, and doing a quick scan of the area, Alex and Lena managed to find a blind spot in the surveillance cameras, allowing them to slip inside the building through a broken window at the ground floor without sounding any alarms.  

"Did Winn say what floor they are holding Kara in?" Lena asked, huddling together with Alex as they took in their surroundings. Their eyes had to adjust to almost complete darkness, save for the dim light shimmering into the room through the broken window they had used to gain access to the building. Lena could barely make out the shapes hidden away in the darkness, but from the number of things stacked up in huge piles gathering dust, she could tell the room was a long forgotten storage facility.  

"No," Alex replied, reaching into her duffle bag and pulling out two helmets equipped with night-vision goggles. "We're gonna have to do a sweep, floor by floor. Here," she said, handing one of the helmets to Lena, "We're gonna need them."

"Alex!" Lena hissed lowly, "This is your plan??? This building has, what, five stories? What if we run into more bad guys than we can take???"

Alex narrowed her eyes at Lena and pointed at the only window in the room, "Feel free to leave now if you're scared."

"Being scared keeps you alive, Danvers!" Lena fired back, groaning in frustration.  

Alex pushed the helmet against Lena's stomach, saying, "Take it or don't, but I'm going."

Lena took the helmet, but quickly grabbed Alex's arm before she could go anywhere, "No, you aren't." But before Alex could protest, Lena continued, "You're not going in blind, just--" she sighed, "just give me a second, I have an idea."

Alex was going to protest; she was going to pull her arm free and storm out of the room, but when Lena Luthor said she had a plan, you listened, so that's what Alex did. Reluctantly nodding, Alex watched as Lena got a small flashlight and proceeded to look for an electrical outlet. "This one will work," Lena muttered to herself, prying it open.

"What are you doing??" Alex asked intrigued as to what Lena could accomplish by meddling with an old outlet that probably hadn't worked in years.

Opening the small backpack she was carrying, Lena grabbed her DEO tablet and a gadget that looked like a voltage tester to Alex, but she had never seen anything quite like it before; it was a pen with small, clip-on pincers on one end, and a mini-USB connector on the other. "I can kind of hack the building's electrical grid," Lena explained as she continued to work, plugging the gadget to her tablet and carefully clipping the pen to the outlet wires. "That'll give me a rough idea of the building's structure, and it'll tell me what room is using more electricity."

Just as Lena finished explaining it, Alex watched a drawing of the building's electrical grid appear on the tablet's screen. "It's gotta be there!" She pointed enthusiastically to one room that was lighting up like a Christmas tree.

Lena smiled up at Alex, "That'd be my guess too," she said, unplugging the gadget and putting it away. "Furthest room on the second floor. We won't know how many people we're gonna come across, but at least we know where we're going now."

They cleared the first floor and silently made their way to the second one. "Whoever these people are, they have enough money to build and maintain a machine sophisticated and powerful enough to subdue Kara, but not enough to splurge on personnel?" Lena questioned only to be met by Alex's silence.  

The way the older agent kept her eyes trained ahead, shoulders tense, gun ready to shoot told her Alex didn't want to think about who was behind all this; Lena could see in the way Alex kept pushing forward that all she cared about was freeing her sister and punishing whoever appeared in front of her.

When her former commanding officer raised her closed fist, Lena automatically stopped dead in her tracks. She kept her eyes and ears open, trying to find the source of whatever had given Alex pause.  

And then she heard it.

Muffled screams traveled through bare walls accompanied by mocking laughter. Even though the sounds were still somewhat far from them, Lena was a hundred percent sure the screams were coming from Kara, while the laughter was from a group of men. Whoever they are, Lena thought, watching  Alex's grip on her weapon get so tight, it began to shake. Alex will make them regret ever being born.

Signaling for Lena to follow her quietly, Alex led the way toward the voices. They entered a spacious apartment that, by the looks of it, had once been the home of a wealthy family; the walls were still decorated with now-worn tapestry, fancy chairs laid broken in the living room, and crystal shards glimmered on the floor where Lena could only presume a bar used to be. The closer they got to what they presumed was the master bedroom, the louder the voices were, but both agents could also hear the loud humming of high voltage circulating through top-of-the-line power cables – the only things that looked new in the entire apartment.

Alex and Lena approached the master bedroom as quietly as they possibly could and crouched near the slightly ajar double-doors to peek inside. From opposite sides, Lena and Alex had different views of the room; from her side, Lena could see Kara restrained from her wrists and ankles, panting heavily as if she was preparing herself for the next blast of electricity. Alex, on the other hand, could only see a group of five men; all of them armed, but four were drinking beer in obvious celebration of their success, while the fifth had the controller of the machine holding Kara. Alex's brain zeroed in on that man; the pure joy that filled his eyes when he pressed the button making the Girl of Steel scream again made Alex's blood boil in her veins. Clenching her jaw at the sight, Alex took a deep breath to remind herself she was close to delivering justice to those scumbags.  

Gesturing to catch Lena's attention, she reached into her bag and pulled out an Electrical Magnetic Pulse grenade. Lena knew the inner workings of that specific EMP grenade -- she had been the one who helped Winn revamp it, making it more effective while containing its effects to a smaller radius. Just by laying eyes on it, Lena could deduce Alex's real plan. The grenade would cause all electronic devices to short-circuit which meant that not only Kara would be freed from the torture device, but it would simultaneously turn off all the lights in the room, leaving the men in clear disadvantage against the two agents who were equipped with night vision goggles.

Lena gave her a nod in understanding and, taking advantage of the fact Alex was focused on counting down to throw the grenade inside the room, Lena discreetly double-clicked the button on her watch – the same one she had pressed before leaving the DEO. After that, everything happened too fast; the grenade silently went off, and as soon as the building went dark, Alex and Lena stormed the room. Lena quickly incapacitated two men, and when she turned around to fight the next one, she saw Kara using sheer anger to keep herself awake and moving. The hero subdued the other two men and, knowing she was finally safe, the remains of Kara’s energy left her body making her collapse unconscious on the floor. "Alex!" Lena called out, rushing to Kara's side to cradle her best friend. "Alex!!!!" She called again, but the only answer she got was the sound of Alex's fist connecting to flesh and bones cracking on impact.

Lena quickly laid Kara down again and ran towards Alex, tackling her off the man. "Get off me!!!!" Alex screamed, trying to wrestle Lena off.

"No!!" Lena grunted, "You're going to kill him!"

"That's what he deserves, remember????" Alex elbowed Lena hard on the ribs, momentarily regaining the upper hand.

But Lena was just as relentless, and surprising Alex with a combination of moves, Lena managed to get her in an arm-lock. "Stop fighting me!" Lena begged, "I don't want to hurt you!!!"

"I... t-trusted you, Luthor!!!!" Alex panted, trying her hardest to escape Lena's lock. "You betrayed me!!" Just as the words left her mouth, Alex saw a group of DEO agents bursting into the room with J'onn leading them. "You!!" Alex growled at Lena, "You warned them???"

Alex was wriggling even more desperately now, and even though it pained Lena's heart to do so, she twisted Alex's arm harder to keep her in place until the DEO agents had taken all the men away. "Of course I did!!!" She fired back.

"That’s enough!!!!!" J'onn voice seemed to echo in the now mostly empty room. He was holding Kara's still unconscious body tightly against his own as if the close proximity would soothe his soul after almost losing one of the girls he had come to think of as his own daughter.

Even with all the anger coursing through her body, Alex didn't have it in her to keep fighting when J'onn was looking down at her with disappointment in his eyes. Sighing heavily, Alex double-tapped Lena, signaling that it was okay to let her go, and without saying a word to each other, Alex and Lena joined the other agents and headed back to the DEO.

“You know, she won’t be mad forever,” Winn said, catching Lena by surprise. She had been observing Alex examine and treat Kara, and somewhere along the line, Lena had gotten too lost in her own thoughts to hear him approaching her. “She does that from time to time,” Winn continued, leaning against the same wall Lena was leaning on; his eyes locked on Alex and Kara just as Lena was doing. “Something will happen between them, or something will happen to Kara, and Alex sorta goes off the rails for a bit. She’s too stubborn and proud to let any of us help her, but… it’s Alex, you know? She always goes back to being the girl we love.”

Each word Winn spoke made Lena’s heart feel a little heavier, but at that very moment, she didn’t know what she could do to help Alex or make any of it better. Sighing, she smiled softly at Winn, saying, "It's been a long day, I guess I'm going to head home, but call me if anything happens to Kara, yeah?" When he nodded at her, Lena gave him a kiss on the cheek and left.

It wasn't until hours later when Kara had briefly woken up in her sun bed and told her sister to go get some rest herself that Alex left the DEO. Her head was still reeling from the night's events, her judgment still impaired; she blamed Lena for getting her in trouble with J'onn – somehow, in her mind, Alex thought that if Lena hadn't warned him, she would have been able to deliver justice to the scum who took Kara, and everything would be okay.

Before she knew it, Alex was ringing Lena's doorbell.  

"Alex," Lena greeted slightly confused; head still foggy from been awaken so suddenly by the incessant buzzing. "Did something happen to Kar--"

"You had no right!" Alex exclaimed, interrupting Lena. "You had no right to stop me from getting justice for my sister!"

"Justice??" Lena scoffed. "You call that justice??"

"It would have been if you had let me go through with it!!!!" Alex fired back, getting on Lena's face.

All the tension and anger Lena had seen earlier in the evening were still visible in Alex's wild eyes. Lena had to assess the situation quickly so she would know how to best defuse the situation. Squaring her shoulders and clenching her jaw, Lena spoke deliberately slow to drive each word home, "Watch your tone, I am not your punching bag."

Lena seemed to have a knack for doing and saying things Alex never saw coming. Her answer, just like her actions during their mission, surprised Alex leaving her with her mouth open as her brain tried to figure out how to proceed from there. As angry as she was, Alex would never cross the line and start physically fighting Lena, and after being verbally shut down, she had two options: either leave or actually voice her feelings in a non-aggressive manner.  

The indecision, and consequently the lack of action, started draining Alex's energy making her deflate. "Do you have any whiskey in this house?" She finally said; ego too bruised to apologize right away.

Shaking her head slightly, Lena replied softly, "Yeah. Go sit down; I'll get us a bottle." When she came back into the living room, Lena found Alex sitting on the couch observing her own bruised knuckles. Lena sat next to her, and without saying a word, she poured them a double-shot and handed Alex a glass.

"I'm sorry..." Alex muttered, nursing the drink in her hands.

"What for?"

Alex chuckled and shook her head, Of course, Lena Luthor will not accept a simple apology, she thought. Downing her whiskey first, Alex replied without meeting Lena's eyes, "I'm sorry for being rude to you just now... I'm angry, but I shouldn't have taken it out on you..."

Lena was quiet for a second, taking in Alex's apology and observing as she poured herself another double-shot while Lena hadn't even taken a sip of hers. "Why are you angry?" She asked.

Alex scoffed at the question, "C'mon, Lena," she said, finally looking at Lena. "You're not a shrink; you don't have to try and keep digging into my feelings."

"If all you wanted to do was drink and fight," Lena said calmly, "you would have gone to a bar, but you came to me instead." Looking into Alex's eyes, Lena added, "So talk."

Is that why I'm here? Alex asked herself, Is this what I want, to talk?? Getting up, she started pacing back and forth, holding her drink with one hand while nervously combing her fingers through her hair with the other one. "I'm angry because you stopped me!" Alex said in a burst, surprising herself.

"Are you really angry at me because of that?" Lena asked, observing her closely; the way Alex scrunched up her brows and could barely hold Lena’s gaze, screamed something completely different from anger, and Lena knew that, but she would give Alex time and space to arrive at that conclusion herself.

"Yes!!" Alex insisted, "The world would be a better place without evil people like those men in it!"

"That's what prisons are for, Danvers," Lena deadpanned. "Besides, if you had killed them, we wouldn't be able to interrogate them to find out where they got the money to finance an operation like that; we wouldn't be able to find out who built that machine for them... I know you know killing them wasn't the smart option, I know you were suspicious when I agreed to go with you after you told me you intended to torture the culprits, and yet, you agreed to let me come with you." Taking a sip of her whiskey, Lena continued, "I think you wanted me to stop you, so I'll ask you again," she said, looking deeply into Alex's eyes, "why are you angry?"

Lena's words were making Alex's head spin, and before she could stop herself, she blurted out, "Because I hate that this is how I react when I'm afraid!!"

They fell silent for a long stretch of time, both seemingly petrified in their own places until Lena got up, and without saying a word, pulled Alex into a tight embrace.

Alex didn't realize until then how desperately she had needed a hug that entire day, and that simple realization made her break out in tears. "It's okay," Lena cooed, gently rubbing small circles on Alex's back. "I was scared of losing her too..."

The words made Alex cry harder; she was crying because she had been afraid, she was crying because she had almost lost her sister, she was crying because she had let her anger take over her mind again, she was crying because someone was finally acknowledging her pain.

When Lena felt Alex grip the back of her robe tightly, she whispered softly, "And I was scared of losing you too... That blind anger--" Lena chocked up a little, but continued bravely speaking her feelings, "I've seen it before... I know what's capable of doing to someone, and I... I already lost someone I love to it, I won't let it happen again..."

Lena's words tugged at Alex's heart. The intentional or unintentional parallel Lena had just drawn between the fear and sorrow she felt watching her brother slip through her fingers and the fear Lena must have felt for Alex that night made Alex realize for the first time just how much she mattered to Lena. She realized that she had one more person that truly cared about her wellbeing. “I-I’m sorry,” Alex managed to say through the knot in her throat as she cried harder, “and… th-thank you, Lena. Thank you for everything.”

[kurtbastian-land]

A Different Kind Of Friendship

Pairing: Kurt Hummel/Sebastian Smythe

Summary: Kurt forms a friendship with a girl he just met. He has never seen her before but something about her that makes him unable to stay away.

Warning: Hints of an eating disorder mentioned

A/N: Found this buried under my notes so I decided to post it because my lecturer decided to cancel class an hour before and I'm already heading to school.

Kurt stared warily at the girl who took a seat opposite him during lunch. He has never seen her around McKinley High before, so he doubts she was in his year. Most probably a freshman, judging by the way she looked, slightly frail-looking as though a simple blow of air in her direction would turn her into dust, constant look of fear and anxiousness. He wanted to ask her to go away and leave him alone, not interested to have another problem weighing him down but instead, curiosity took over him.

"Do I get a name for having you sitting with me?" Kurt asked, raising an eyebrow when the girl has done nothing but stare at her fingers on her lap.

_____

"Odds are by the end of the school year, I'll have Blaine, a nationals trophy and you'll have khakis, a Lima Bean apron, and that gay face."

_____

Only then did the girl looks up, a small smile gracing her face and a slight glint in her eyes. She stuck out her hand to Kurt for s handshake, "my name's Ana. Pleased to meet you, Kurt."

Staring suspiciously at the outstretched hand, Kurt debated internally with himself if he should accept the handshake. Because deep down he knows, a friendship with this girl, it's one that isn't easy to let go. Call it a gut feeling or maybe it was the way Ana's fingers curled around Kurt's hand, the tightness in grasp, and the coldness in touch when he did finally accept the handshake.

Whatever it was that caused alarm bells to start ringing in his head, Kurt knew that things were only just the beginning.

"Now that we've already had our introduction, I want to get to know you a little more," Ana said as she stood up from her seat, never letting go of her grip on Kurt, "follow me, I know just the place to go."

And with that, the pair dashed off, out of the cafeteria and into the hallway, leaving nothing behind but a tray filled with Kurt's lunch, barely touched.

_____

"And you give the gay community cutting edge fashion that's usually only seen on Puerto Rican pride floats."

_____

Kurt laid down in the nurse's office, deciding that Glee Club was a little more overwhelming than usual. He was taking slow, deep breath as he tried to ignore the slight panic in his mind when he realised he can't hit his high F anymore.

I mean, he can but he can't sustain it without the feeling of puking or getting so lightheaded that he'll start to see black spots in his vision. It can't be normal. He has always been able to hit the note with ease. He was able to hit the note so well that he could afford to throw the note away when he wanted to.

"What's up pal?" A soft lilt of a voice spoke up from his side.

Kurt shut his eyes tight, hoping that his visitor would take the hint and go away. He has been friends with her for weeks and life has been nothing but hell for him. She was the reason why Blaine broke up with him, she was the reason why he can't hit his notes anymore.

"Aww, come on Kurt, don't be mean to a friend," Ana cooed slightly as she gently stroke the latter's cheek.

"Go away," Kurt choked out as he clutched onto the mattress he was laying on, "We're not friends anymore."

"But Kurt," Ana protested slightly. She inched closer to Kurt's ear as though she was about to share a great secret that no one else deserves to know, "I'm the reason why Sebastian Smythe doesn't make fun of you anymore."

Kurt felt his heart drop at the mention of a certain Warbler's name. The name that caused it all. He was the one that caused him to befriend the girl watching him ever so carefully. Feeling sick to the core, Kurt leaned over his bead and dry heaved into the empty space. He felt his stomach clenched at the emptiness but still feeling the need to get rid of something, anything.

Soon, nothing but choked sobs and dry heaving could be heard in the room. Kurt was more than certain he could hear snickers ringing in his ears.

_____

"It's all fun and games until it's not."

_____

"I fucked up... didn't I?" Sebastian softly asked as he stared into Kurt's eyes, pretending that he was in his usual flamboyant and out-there clothes, instead of a hospital gown and having hooked up to the iv as an accessory.

"Nope, he didn't," Ana sang out, swinging her legs as she sat on the chair, leaning close, next to Kurt's hospital bed, "he made us friends."

Kurt took a deep breath as he tried his hardest to ignore voices he didn't want to hear. He was tired of them, he was tired of everything. It's been two days since Kurt has been sent to the hospital after fainting during Glee rehearsals and refusing to regain conscious. It's been two days since he was admitted to the hospital for being severely malnourished. His dad somehow managed to find his calorie diary and with his pleas, Kurt agreed to be treated as an inpatient until he could get the proper help to be out-treated.

"I'm so sorry Kurt, I didn't m-" Sebastian hesitating for a second.

"You did," Kurt said softly, breaking their eye contact. He gripped his blanket before letting go immediately, continuing with the action, trying to keep calm and not let his conversation with Sebastian be overpowered by someone else.

"What hurts the most was that it came from you, an out and proud gay guy. The bullies at Mckinely, they didn't get me. It was fear and ignorance that makes them want to hurt me. But yours was just... just plain malicious."

Azimio, Kurofsky, and all the other football players made his life in school hell because he was gay. Sebastian decided to do the same because he was Kurt.

"But it wasn't your fault. I lost control over the thing I thought I had the most control over," Kurt chuckled unhumorously.

And it was true. After all the shit he's been through where things were spiralling out of his control, food was something he could hold on to. He can't force the bullies to hate him less for liking guys. He can't magically make his dad's heart okay. He can't make Blaine fall in love with him again. But food... he chooses how much he wants to eat, how often he wants to eat. It just so happen that it slowly became inadequate, insufficient, unsustainable.

"The things I've said..." Sebastian paused, wanting to reach out and hold Kurt's arm reassuringly but they weren't that kind of friends who do that.

Ana's eyes widened in panic at the look Sebastian was giving Kurt, a look of remorse, of someone hoping for forgiveness. She quickly stood up and stood in front of Kurt, as though trying to shield the Sebastian away from him. Her stance firm and stiffed, arms outstretched but she knows it was useless.

"They were rude, tactless and plain mean," Sebastian continued, paying no heed to the girl that was desperately shaking her head, silently pleading for him to shut up. "But your comebacks were always good and I just wanted... that... it was nice to finally have someone that was quick-witted and sharp on the tongue."

"He's lying Kurt!" Ana shrieked hysterically, turning around to face him, her hair swinging behind her as she continuously shook her head. "He's just trying to break our friendship! He didn't even apologi-"

"I'm sorry."

Kurt blinked in surprise at the apology, though he knows he shouldn't. Sebastian has apologised before, after David's attempted suicide, to the New Directions, to Blaine. But then again, he never did apologise to him personally. For once, in Sebastian's presence, he was speechless. He then noticed that Ana's voice was reduced to a whisper he could barely make out.

She was still there though. And he was still here, in the hospital for an eating disorder he developed but for the first time in months, he felt slightly hopeful.

"Thank you," Kurt finally settled on saying, knowing that it was a lie to say it was okay when it wasn't. While he did say a couple of mean things back to Sebastian for every insult being tossed at him, it didn't make those words hurt less. "I would say I'm sorry too but you kinda admit that you like my comebacks."

Sebastian allowed a small smile to grace his face as he nodded in agreement, "yea, they were good. You should probably get smirky little meerkat patent. That was a good one."

Letting out a snort, Kurt lifted his arm up to draw a check mark in the air. Sebastian rolled his eyes at the action before reaching out to gently clasps the latter's hand. He allowed his hand to hover, waiting for Kurt to pull away if he isn't fond of any contact. When Kurt showed no signs of objecting, Sebastian finally relaxed his arm. He wanted to say so many things, words itching to jump out of his mouth and make their presence known but instead, he just settled for a small smile and a gentle squeeze of the hand.

It was then Kurt knew things were going to get better eventually. While it didn't get better in a couple of days, or weeks, or even months, he's getting there. And Ana... Ana would just remain as a whisper at the back of his mind that he'll just have to learn to ignore.

And something tells him that he won't be so alone this time.

[newstfionline]

Wednesday, August 18, 2021

Nearly a third of U.S. workers under 40 considered changing careers during the pandemic (Washington Post) When Orlando Saenz was laid off at the end of January, he was devastated. For nearly a decade, he had worked as an executive assistant at an Austin law firm, and it was hard to envision his next steps. But then it dawned on him: This setback could be the kick he needed to finally finish his associate’s degree and seek a better career. A few days later, Saenz, 40, enrolled in community college. He plans to get a paralegal license. The enhanced unemployment aid gave him the financial cushion to “treat school as my job,” he said, for a few months. “If you come out of the pandemic the same as you were, you’ve missed an opportunity to evolve and grow as a person,” Saenz said. “I just realized I needed to do better.” Saenz is not alone. Nearly 1 in 3 U.S. workers under 40 have thought about changing their occupation or field of work since the pandemic began, according to a Washington Post-Schar School poll, conducted July 6 to 21. About 1 in 5 workers overall have considered a professional shift, a signal that the pandemic has been a turning point for many. Many people told The Post that the pandemic altered how they think about what is important in life and their careers. It has given them a heightened understanding that life is short and that now is the time to make the changes they have long dreamed of. The result is a great reassessment of work, as Americans fundamentally reimagine their relationships to their jobs.

Food stamp benefits to permanently expand by over 25% in October, USDA announces (USA Today) Needy families will get a permanent boost to their food stamps benefits in October under an expansion of the program announced Monday. The U.S. Department of Agriculture will increase benefits for about 42 million program participants by more than 25% after finishing a review that determined existing benefits are too low to pay for a healthy diet. The increase kicks in on Oct. 1, when beneficiaries in what is officially known as the SNAP program will receive an average bump of about $36.24 per month, the agency announced Monday. While benefits have increased along with inflation, the USDA said this adjustment represents the first expansion of its purchasing power since it was first introduced in 1975.

First-ever water shortage declared on the Colorado River, triggering water cuts for some states in the West (Reuters) For the first time, federal officials declared a water shortage at the Lake Mead reservoir, a status that causes a slash to the annual apportionment of water to several states in the Southwest. In the year beginning in October, Arizona will lose 18 percent of its annual water apportionment, Nevada will lose 7 percent, and the apportionments to Mexico will decrease by 5 percent. Right now, 59.2 million Americans live in a place with drought, which encompasses 99 percent of the Western United States. Total water storage in the Colorado River system is at 40 percent capacity, down from 49 percent in 2020.

T-Mobile hacked (Motherboard) T-Mobile confirmed that hackers accessed the telecom’s systems on Monday. One hacker claimed that 100 million people had compromised data in the breach, and in a forum post offered 30 million people’s data for 6 bitcoin (about $270,000). Samples of the data contained “social security numbers, phone numbers, names, physical addresses, unique IMEI numbers, and driver license information.”

Tropical storm drenching earthquake-stricken Haiti (AP) Tropical Storm Grace swept over Haiti with drenching rains just two days after a powerful earthquake battered the impoverished Caribbean nation, adding to the misery of thousands who lost loved ones, suffered injuries or found themselves homeless and forcing overwhelmed hospitals and rescuers to act quickly. After nightfall, heavy rain and strong winds whipped at the country’s southwestern area, hit hardest by Saturday’s quake, and officials warned that rainfall could reach 15 inches (38 centimeters) in some areas before the storm moved on.

Japan to extend COVID-19 emergency lockdown as cases surge (Reuters) Japan was set on Tuesday to extend its state of emergency in Tokyo and other regions to Sept. 12 and widen curbs to seven more prefectures, as COVID-19 cases spike in the capital and nationwide, burdening the medical system. The state of emergency will cover slightly less than 60% of the population after the government adds the prefectures of Ibaraki, Tochigi, Gunma, Shizuoka, Kyoto, Hyogo and Fukuoka.

American diplomats reckon with Afghanistan’s collapse (Foreign Policy) Current and former U.S. diplomats who served in Afghanistan have watched the events of the past week with horror as the Taliban stormed through the country and ultimately seized control of the capital, Kabul, on Sunday, undoing two decades of hard-won progress in the country. For many American officials, the collapse of the Afghan government and the hasty evacuation of the U.S. Embassy in Kabul are deeply personal. Around one-quarter of the U.S. diplomatic corps has served in Afghanistan or Iraq over the past 20 years. In interviews with a dozen people who held posts in Afghanistan, current and former diplomats conveyed feelings of deep anger, shock, and bitterness about the collapse of the government they spent decades trying to build. Several currently serving officials, who spoke to Foreign Policy on condition of anonymity, said the events had prompted thoughts about resigning from the foreign service. But mostly the diplomats said they felt an overwhelming sense of guilt and fear for the lives of the former Afghan colleagues and local staff whom the American government left behind. “We did such a disservice to the local staff who worked for us,” said Shaila Manyam, a former career foreign service officer who had served as spokesperson for the president’s special envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan in 2015. “They take on incredible risks working for us and we’ve screwed them too,” she said. Ryan Crocker, who served as U.S. ambassador to Afghanistan from 2011 to 2012, said the fate of Afghan women weighed heavily on him. “We encouraged them to step forward, and they did. In politics, the economy, the military,” he said. “The implicit part of that deal was, ‘You step forward, and we’ve got your backs.’ And now we don’t.”

Biden’s Betrayal of Afghans (The Atlantic) There’s plenty of blame to go around for the 20-year debacle in Afghanistan—enough to fill a library of books. Perhaps the effort to rebuild the country was doomed from the start. But our abandonment of the Afghans who helped us, counted on us, staked their lives on us, is a final, gratuitous shame that we could have avoided. The Biden administration failed to heed the warnings on Afghanistan, failed to act with urgency—and its failure has left tens of thousands of Afghans to a terrible fate. This betrayal will live in infamy. The burden of shame falls on President Joe Biden. For months, members of Congress and advocates in refugee, veteran, and human-rights organizations have been urging the Biden administration to evacuate America’s Afghan allies on an emergency basis. For months, dire warnings have appeared in the press. The administration’s answers were never adequate: We’re waiting for Congress to streamline the application process. Half the interpreters we’ve given visas don’t want to leave. We don’t want to panic the Afghan people and cause the government in Kabul to collapse. Evacuation to a U.S. territory like Guam could lead to legal problems, so we’re looking for third-country hosts in the region. Most of the interpreters are in Kabul, and Kabul won’t fall for at least six months. Some of these answers might have been sincere. All of them were irrelevant, self-deceiving, or flat-out false.

A war’s secret history (Washington Post) In the summer of 2011, Army Lt. Gen. William Caldwell IV made a round of public appearances to boast that he had finally solved a problem that had kept U.S. troops bogged down in Afghanistan for a decade. “They’re probably the best-trained, the best-equipped and the best-led of any forces we’ve developed yet inside of Afghanistan,” he said. But according to documents obtained by the Washington Post, U.S. military officials privately harbored fundamental doubts for the duration of the war that the Afghan security forces could ever become competent or shed their dependency on U.S. money and firepower. “Thinking we could build the military that fast and that well was insane,” an unnamed former U.S. official told government interviewers in 2016. Over two decades, the U.S. government invested over $85 billion to train and equip the Afghans and pay their salaries. Today, all that’s left is arsenals of weapons, ammunition and supplies that have fallen into the hands of the enemy. Though it was obvious from the beginning that the Afghans were struggling to make the U.S.-designed system work, the Pentagon kept throwing money at the problem and assigning new generals to find a solution. Recruiting was hard enough, but was compounded by startling rates of desertion and attrition. Another biggest hardship was having to teach virtually every recruit how to read. Making everything harder was the Obama administration’s decision to rapidly expand the size of the Afghan security forces from 200,000 soldiers and police officers to 350,000. With recruits at a premium, Afghans were rushed through boot camp, even if they couldn’t shoot or perform other basic tasks. As the years passed, it became apparent that the strategy was failing. Yet U.S. military commanders kept insisting in public that everything was going according to plan.

Blaming Afghans? (The New Yorker) The Afghans now have suffered generation after generation of not just continuous warfare but humanitarian crises, one after the other, and Americans have to remember that this wasn’t a civil war that the Afghans started among themselves that the rest of the world got sucked into. This situation was triggered by an outside invasion, initially by the Soviet Union, during the Cold War, and since then the country has been a battleground for regional and global powers seeking their own security by trying to militarily intervene in Afghanistan, whether it be the United States after 2001, the C.I.A. in the nineteen-eighties, Pakistan through its support first for the mujahideen and later the Taliban, or Iran and its clients. To blame Afghans for not getting their act together in light of that history is just wrong.

Taliban allowing ‘safe passage’ from Kabul in US airlift (AP) The Taliban have agreed to allow “safe passage” from Afghanistan for civilians struggling to join a U.S.-directed airlift from the capital, President Joe Biden’s national security adviser said Tuesday, although a timetable for completing the evacuation of Americans, Afghan allies and others has yet to be worked out with the country’s new rulers. Jake Sullivan acknowledged reports that some civilians were encountering resistance—“being turned away or pushed back or even beaten”—as they tried to reach the Kabul international airport. But he said “very large numbers” were reaching the airport and the problem of the others was being taken up with the Taliban, whose stunningly swift takeover of the country on Sunday plunged the U.S. evacuation effort into chaos, confusion and violence. Pentagon officials said that after interruptions on Monday, the airlift was back on track and being accelerated despite weather problems, amid regular communication with Taliban leaders. Additional U.S. troops arrived and more were on the way, with a total of more than 6,000 expected to be involved in securing the airport in coming days.

[theshadowedqueen82]

Bereavement, 1.7k words, Gen.

Written for day 2 of @asgoreweekend​, during game events. Also on Ao3.

The first one will be the hardest. This is what Asgore tells himself, staring into the eyes of a child. He never expected one to fall so soon, but here they are.

“So, you’re the king,” the child says, and Asgore watches the child step closer. “Everybody told me to stay away; they said that you were going to kill me. But I don’t think that’s true.”

“Oh, child,” Asgore says, noticing how he towers over the small human, with their light blue striped shirt and red bow in their hair. So young. His paws shake as he lifts his trident. “You should have listened.”

It only takes one swing of his trident. The child jerks and goes still, their eyes closing and their body slumping. A thin trail of blood dribbles out of their mouth as they crumple to the ground.

Asgore picks up the too small body and his vision blurs. Their soul is strong, but not strong enough. He will need to do this again, six more times.

He stands, still holding the body, heedless of the red blood staining his paws. That day King Asgore orders for coffins to be built, one for each child he’ll kill.

The second child puts up more of a fight. It is a bit of a surprise, as the first one had fallen so easily. Asgore is stronger though, so much stronger. When he stands over another limp body it does not feel any easier than the first.

After the child is put in a coffin, next to the first child and Chara’s empty coffin, Asgore finds himself in his room, staring at his journal. He has not written in it for a while.

Asgore forces himself to pick up the pen, and it hovers over the page. What would he write? Today I killed another child. I still need to kill five more.

When his hand finally moves, it writes it’s a beautiful day outside. Asgore stares at the sentence for a second, repeating it in his mind. Maybe if he remembers that he will remember his goal, to free his subjects. He can only barely remember seeing the sun; younger monsters would have no memory of the surface.

“It’s a beautiful day outside,” he whispers to himself. “This is for them.”

“Is it true that you killed them?” the child asks, their eyes shimmering with unshed tears. “The other children that fell down. Did you kill all of them? Will you kill me?”

“I’m sorry,” is all that Asgore can say, lifting up his trident for the final blow.

“But why?” asks the child, innocent horror in their voice. “Can’t you just let us go?”

“I am king,” Asgore tells the child. “I want so much to let you go. But as king, I need to protect my people.”

The trident comes down and Asgore feels a strange disconnect with the motion, as if he’s watching himself from a distance. Only when the child jerks and goes limp does he slam back into himself, and then he is standing in front of another dead child.

Alphys finds him much later, still kneeling over the body as the soul hovers in the air beside him.

“They’re so young,” he says, and Alphys says nothing, only putting her hand on his shoulder.

“I’m sorry,” she says. “We all know the sacrifice that you’re making. If there was any other way…” Asgore is silent, knowing that there is no other way. There is nothing any of them can do but

It’s a beautiful day outside, Asgore reminds himself as he buries the third child, and the words feel grey in his mind.

Upon Undyne’s suggestion the royal guards had been mobilized to capture and kill humans. Asgore isn’t sure why he hadn’t come up with this before. There is, after all, no reason for him to be the only one to collect the souls.

He’s very proud of Undyne. She’s told him about how she wants to be the Captain of the Royal Guard when she’s older, and he thinks that already she’s better than a good number of his guards. Training Undyne has been a welcome distraction, something to keep his hands busy and mind fixed on something other than tiny coffins lined up in the basement.

When he heard the footsteps he expected Undyne to appear in the doorway to the throne room, not the small child with glasses and a purple shirt. The child appeared to be panting heavily, and glared at Asgore.

“Are you such a coward that you wouldn’t bother to come after me by yourself?” the child asked, and Asgore set down the watering can he had been using on the garden and pulled out his trident.

“Perhaps,” he said. “You got past all the guards.”

“Yeah,” said the child. “I don’t give up.”

After the child is dead Asgore thinks that the child is right, but not for the reason he mentioned. Once the body is safely interred in a coffin he summons the royal guard again and changes their orders to capture the humans, to not kill them unless if the human threatens them.

His word may not be heeded in this case; monsters are already starting to forget what it was like when Chara was alive, and a monster-human alliance was a possibility. But it might prevent the less zealous guards from killing the children.

It is better for Asgore to kill them, to bear the stain of their blood alone. It is better for Asgore to be the only murderer, because then his subjects will both be free of the underground and his sins.

The next child is the worst, but every child has been the worst. This one was different, though. They wore green and smiled when they walked into the throne room, escorted by two royal guards. Asgore had excused them, and the child had made no movement to flee or fight once they were alone.

“You’re trying to save your people,” the child says, cocking their head and looking at Asgore. “It must be horrible, being trapped down here. I… I want to help.”

“How could you help?” Asgore asks, only weariness in his voice. Nobody can help, and the only way the monsters will be free is through bloodshed.

“If I offered you my soul, would you take it?” the child asks, and Asgore blinks in surprise.

“It makes no difference,” he says.

“It does to me,” the child says. Asgore looks in their eyes and sees a desire to help, a warmth he has been missing ever since his wife has left him alone in this palace with nothing but grey walls and echoing memories.

Asgore pours them tea and waits until the child finishes drinking it before he kills them. His own tea sits on the table, untouched and cooling. He pours it out in the garden and wonders, looking at the golden flowers.

What kind of king am I, if I grow weary of saving my people? he wonders. What would my people say if they knew that I want the children to stay away, to stop coming? Even if it means our eternal imprisonment, it would be better than this.

He hears reports of the sixth child long before he meets him. This child has gone on a rampage, killing monsters left and right, leaving a trail of dust in their wake. Asgore orders his citizens to withdraw to the Core and goes to meet them himself.

Asgore finds the child in Waterfall. The child wears a red bandana around their neck and has a yellow striped shirt. He shoots a bullet at Asgore before a word is spoken, and Asgore easily deflects it.

“This is for the children you’ve killed,” the child says, and the words almost bring Asgore to his knees. Almost.

This child is angry in a way that none of the others were. He wounds Asgore, grazing one of his arms with a bullet and dealing damage. In the end it hardly matters, and the child dies just like all the others.

They fight. The child loses. Asgore finds it hard to say that he won.

Back at the palace he still gives the child the same burial he has given every other child, and delivers the yellow soul into it’s container. He stands and stares at the containers for a moment, watching the souls pulse and glow with their rainbow of colours. One left, he reminds himself, but it is a cold comfort.

He has given up trying to convince himself that it will get easier. Asgore knows that no matter the child that stands before him, no matter if the child fights or forgives, he will always see Chara standing in their place.

It is a long time until the next child comes.

Alphys has built a robot, a marvelous thing that she promises will be able to kill the last human and save them all. In the meantime the robot entertains the monsters, keeps Asgore’s people happy while they wait.

Asgore enjoys having Alphys in the palace. It’s too large now, too empty. Alphys begins another research project she promises will give them another way out, will allow them to break the barrier without another human soul. It has been a long time since Asgore felt the small stirrings of hope.

When Alphys vanishes for a week he remembers why it’s so dangerous to hope. When she comes back she is far more nervous and doesn’t talk with him as much. Asgore can feel the distance between them and wonders if he’ll lose everybody by the time they’re free.

Perhaps the other humans had been warned away by the last child, the one who had tried to kill them all. Perhaps another child will never fall. Asgore would accept that if it were only him that would pay, but since he does not want his people to be buried as well he still waits.

By the time the last child falls, Asgore’s journal has the same words but they hold a different meaning. He needs to remember that it’s a beautiful day outside, that somewhere the world still holds beauty, that no matter what happens here the horrors cannot infect the entire world.

Asgore smashes the mercy button, because he knows that he has sinned too much to deserve mercy. The world is beautiful somewhere else, and no matter what happens to him he’ll make sure that his people can escape and find it.

[thecarlonethatalsowrites]

Day 2 I Got You

Second installment of Danvers Sisters Week by @queercapwriting . Featuring Looney Toons references, a jerk wad that pained me to write, Alex being violent, surprise angst (I was not planning to write that, I swear), Alex being difficult, and surprise Sanvers. read on ao3

Earth is...a lot. It’s loud and fast and bright, and so, so different than Krypton. There’s a lot Kara must know- must learn- to fit in, the least of which being controlling her powers. Yes, she has powers on this planet. Something her adoptive family won’t let her forget.

She’s slowly but surely reining in her abilities; practicing handshakes with a begrudging Alex, building small structures out of sticks, and constantly trying to remember to keep her feet on the ground. Jeremiah and Eliza are as supportive as can be, but Kara senses a kind of resentment from Alex.

She can’t really blame her. An alien suddenly invading your household and your parents informing you that she’s your new sister whom you have to take care of has to be tough. Especially since Alex was an only child for so long. Kara is an only child too, so she gets it. Although, is she really anyone’s child anymore? Now that her parents are…well, she doesn’t see herself calling Eliza or Jeremiah Mom or Dad anytime soon.

The hardest part of all this is the sudden waves of grief that so often overwhelm her, making her feel small and sad and so alone she feels crushed under the weight of it all, even with her newfound strength. She does her best not to let anyone catch on- she needs enough help as it is- but she’s beginning to think that Eliza suspects that something is up with her abrupt silences and self isolations.

But despite all that, Kara’s making enough strides towards passing as human that within a few months the Danvers tell her she can go to school if she feels ready. And Kara feels ready. Sure, she’s learning a ton, but she misses her academics. She wants to make friends she can hang out with like Alex does. She wants to sit at the kitchen table at night doing homework. She wants to feel normal.

And yet, now that she’s standing on the curb outside of school, she feels anything but. There are so many noises, and somehow everything is more than it is in the Danvers’ nice, small neighborhood. Kara’s lungs throat closes and her chest tightens as her ears throb and eyes ache and Eliza explained about this but Kara’s never experienced “sensory overload” before and now she’s freaking out.

“Kara. Kara!” A single voice cuts through the barrage of sounds, and kara realizes that Alex is squeezing her arm as tightly as she can, which Kara can barely feel. “What’s up? Are you okay?” Kara drags her wide eyes from the new sights and focuses on Alex’s face. She thinks she sees concern there, which is strange because Alex has been apathetic towards her at best and resentful at worst.

Kara opens her mouth to respond, but no sounds come out; an indicator of how bad this really is. She must look it, too, if Alex is concerned, but despite her best efforts she can’t communicate a single thing about what she’s experiencing.

“Oh, boy. Mom warned me about this. Come on, let’s go.” Alex starts to drag Kara away from the noisiest part of the sidewalk. “Geeze, you weigh a fricken ton. Come on.”

Somehow it gets through to Kara that she should be moving, and she stumbles along with Alex, not even watching where they’re going.

Alex sits her in the shaded grass beneath a tree, so firmly Kara leaves a dent in the earth, and they’re away from the worst of the noise but Kara can still hear it and it’s driving her nuts. Alex must be able to tell, because she crouches down and grabs Kara’s face between her hands. Kara struggles not to flinch, because that could seriously hurt Alex. She lets her wrench her face forward so their noses are nearly touching.

“Hey, listen here, Marvin. Come on, make eye contact.” Kara has to force herself to hold her gaze. “You’re fine. A ot is happening, but you’ve been practicing and I’ve got you, okay? You hear me? Blink if you can hear me.” Kara blinks, but it’s more out of surprise than acknowledgement of Alex’s words. Alex’s ferocious protectiveness shocks her. Coming from the girl who said ten words to her this morning, it’s more jarring than all the noise.

Vaguely Kara registers that Alex is still talking, and she makes an effort to comprehend her words.

“...that’s good. We’re not going back there, you don’t have to worry. Just focus on me. That’s it.” Slowly Kara lets the words lull her out of the panic she felt. As she comes down, Alex visibly relaxes as well.

“I’m okay,” she croaks. Alex slowly lets go of her face and moves away slightly. It’s easier to look her in they eye at this distance. “I can...I’m ready to go back.” Alex snorts.

“Like hell you are. No, we’re not going back there.”

“But Eliza-”

“Will understand. Right now, you need ice cream. Any more objections?” Kara let’s Alex pull her upright, considering her last question.

“What’s ice cream?”

“Oh dear Lord how have you been on this planet for three months and not tried ice cream?”

Two years after she lands on Earth, Kara has considerably greater control over her powers than when she first tried going to school. Which is good, because the Danvers have already suffered enough because of her.

Strangely, they don’t hate her, even if it is only Alex and Eliza left. Kara feels extremely guilty at her part in Jeremiah’s recruitment to the DEO and subsequent death, and since her powers were what got him there it only became easier to suppress them.

She wishes she had heeded his warnings earlier most days.

Today isn’t most days.

Today she’s sitting in diner, in a booth across from Michael Watson. Michael was apparently never taught proper manners, and his open mouthed chewing has put Kara off her own appetite, a feat that is usually impossible. If that wasn’t bad enough, whenever he opens his mouth to speak instead of chew, Kara feels vaguely insulted every time. Every. Single. Time.

Dating on Earth sucks.

She’s been looking for an escape for the last twenty minutes, but it doesn’t look like she’s going to manage one. No one she knows has entered the diner, she hasn’t received any phone calls, and she doesn’t think Michael will buy a sudden onslaught of food poisoning.

“You know, you’re pretty lucky the Danvers adopted you.” Michael suddenly changes the topic to something completely unrelated to what he was saying. Only the mention of the Danvers makes Kara pay attention to his words. “I mean, they’re not the best family- not having a strong male presence will do that to you- but I guess they’re not so bad in the charity department. Most teenagers never get adopted, and being willing to take in a teenaged girl? Takes a special kind of person.” It’s probably meant to be some kind of backwards compliment, but that doesn’t stop Kara’s grip from splintering the edge of the table.

“Excuse me?” She demands. She really wishes she could punch him, but she doesn’t want to kill him, no matter how horrible he’s being. “What did you say about my family?”

“Just that they’re pretty messed up, but you fit in well with them. Your sister? She’s kind of a total bitch.”

“Alright, that’s enough.” There’s a commotion from two booths away as the blonde girl sitting alone in it stands up. She marches up to Kara and Michael’s table, and Kara is shocked to see that it’s actually Alex wearing a blonde wig. “It’s bad enough that you insult me, but I’m not going to sit here and listen to you verbally abuse my sister and our family.” She tears the wig off and stuffs it in her bag. “Come on Kara, I’m getting you out of here.”

A wave of relief washes over Kara as she goes to stand up. Bless Alex and her slightly stalkerish tendencies. Any other time it would annoy Kara, but right now she doesn’t care if Alex followed her from the moment Michael picked her up from their house.

Unfortunately, Michael is not as pleased with the interruption as Kara. He stands up only seconds behind Kara, anger written plain as day across his fire engine red face.

“You’re crazy! Did you follow us here? Kara’s definitely not leaving with someone as insane as you!” He says, practically foaming at the mouth.

“Excuse me, I can leave with whoever I want,” Kara scoffs. But Michael isn’t done. He ignores her words and grabs her wrist and, oh, is it on.

Alex beats her to the punch, though, and her knuckles connect solidly with his nose. Kara can hear it break, but Alex isn’t done. As Michael staggers back he exposes his chin to Alex’s perfect uppercut, and his teeth click together so loud Kara is sure the noise was audible to human hearing. Then, as the cherry on top, Alex knees him in the groin, and Michael collapses to the floor with a pathetic moan.

“Stay away from me and my sister, you fucking piss-bag.” She practically spits on his prone form. “Ready to get out of here?” She asks Kara.

“Absolutely,” Kara says, mindful of the crowd they’ve drawn.

It’s late enough that Alex shivers in the cool autumn air when the exit the diner, and Kara instantly moves closer to her to share some of her body heat.

“That was awesome,” she says. “You were a total badass.” Normally she avoids swearing like the plague (even though she can’t catch the plague) but in this particular instance it seems appropriate.

“Yeah, well,” Alex shakes out the hand she punched Michael with. “You know I got you. If you can’t punch the scumbags, then I guess it’s up to me.” She hisses in pain, and Kara is immediately worried. She snatches Alex’s hand to pull it closer, and instantly feels horrible for the split knuckles and already forming bruises Alex is sporting.

“Even if it means you get hurt?” Alex chuckles.

“Please, I’ll just rub some dirt in this. It’ll be fine.” At this point Kara pretty much understands Earth’s expressions, and she’s pretty sure Alex isn’t being literal about rubbing dirt in her open wounds. But she still gently folds Alex’s hand in her own, protecting it from any further harm in the safest place on earth.

“Thank you.” Alex looks at her kind of strangely, but it’s a good kind of strange. A strange that she only reserved for her parents.

“You’re welcome.”

Alex is incredibly intelligent and Kara learned science more advanced than anything on Earth in third grade, so obviously anything they want to learn, they can. The universe seems to bend to their sheer force of wills and masterfully manipulated science.

So after three years of living on Earth Kara decides she wants to know the exact date Krypton died, Alex is determined to help her find out.

She didn’t think it would hurt this much.

Alex is completely silent as she sits on the floor next to Kara amidst dozens of papers that detail weeks of work. Kara holds one paper in a death grip, and it’s already torn to pieces in her hand. She can’t see what’s written on it through the tears in her eyes, but the date is burned into her brain forever.

“What are the odds,” she says past the lump in her throat. The question is dangerous, because Alex could probably answer it, but she asks anyway. “What are the odds that it’s today?”

Alex doesn’t answer her. Instead, she draws her close, tucking Kara’s head under her chin as the tears start to fall in earnest. Instead, she says “I got you.” Over and over again. No “It’s ok” or “breathe, Kara.” Just “I got you.”

Somehow it’s all that needs to be said.

“I still can’t believe you’re just letting me have this apartment!” Kara says in wonder as she gazes at the open space. Alex simply shrugs, her hands in her pockets and firmly away from her new haircut that she can’t seem to stop touching.

“I’ve got you,” she says. “I know you’ve been wanting to move to National City for years. Besides, I'm done with it. It’s a good fit for you.”

“Thankyouthankyouthankyouthankyouthankyouuuuuuuu.” Kara rushes over to her, grabbing her hands out of her pockets, squeezing a bit too hard if Alex’s wince is anything to go by. She’s far too excited to contain herself, however, and it’s not like she’s breaking any bones, so Alex can suck it up for a minute or two. “Not that there was ever any doubt, but you are literally the best sister ever.”

“No, the best sister ever is inheriting a shitty apartment I’ve somehow grown fond of in order to keep it in the family.”

“I promise to take really good care of it!” Kara says. Alex levels a look at her.

“No sex on the island. I’m not sure it could handle you, and replacing it would be impossible.”

“ALEX!” Kara screeches, releasing her grip and clamping her hands over her own ears instead. Alex smirks like that was exactly what she wanted and jams her hands back in her pockets.

“It’s tempting, I know.” Alex continues. Kara interrupts her with a moan.

“Please, I didn’t wake up today with the need to be scarred for life,” she says, regretting that her hearing is too good to be blocked by her hands.

“I’m done.” Kara slowly removes her hands, letting them fall to her sides when Alex doesn’t trick her instantly. “I, uh, I actually have work, so I’ll just leave you to it.” She takes out her key and sets it on the counter before heading to the door. She frowns as the lock. “I should get you a proper deadbolt.” She comments. Kara knows it’s just the perfectionist in her, so she tramps down any annoyance at her protectiveness. Kara can take care of herself, and both sisters know it, but it doesn’t stop Alex from being vigilant, even more so these days than ever before.

“That would be really nice,” she says. Alex nods once before leaving abruptly, and Kara is left with the thought that she really does have the best older sister.

Day three of being Supergirl could have gone better than it did. Kara did fine when it came to saving people, but she can’t shake the terrible feeling that Alex is still pissed at her.

A feeling that Alex confirms by looking her directly in the eye and saying “I’m still pissed at you.”

Honestly it’s more devastating a blow than any she’s taken as Supergirl. Alex was the reason she decided to reveal herself, the reason she was brave enough to follow in her footsteps and fight aliens.

So if she’s moping on her couch eating ice cream at 10:30 in the morning, sue her. She has her reasons, okay? Although, it’s only making her mope harder, because ice cream reminds her of Alex, and Alex is the reason she’s moping, and really it’s just one big moping spiral.

Someone knocks on her door, and the thought of company is really putting a damper on her commitment to moping. She almost ignores them, until she hears Alex talking on the other side.

“Kara, I know in there eating ice cream instead of going to work. Yes, Winn snitched, but that’s not the point. Open the door.” Kara stays put until Alex says, “Unless of course you want me to kick it down.”

She decides she doesn’t want to replace her locks and hauls herself off the couch to answer the door. Alex pushes her way into the apartment like Kara is going to slam the door in her face any second, and Kara lets her. Alex knows she wouldn’t remain inside if Kara didn’t want her to be.

“Ok. So I realize that I might have been a little hard on you recently, so if you would hear me out I would really appreciate it,” she says without preamble. Kara closes the door and crosses her arms.

“You realize?” She asks, because that does not sound like Alex at all.

“Ok fine, James might have had something to do with it. Next time you see him, thank him, because I almost broke his arm.” Kara laughs despite herself. “Anyway, I haven’t exactly been fair to you about the whole superhero thing. It’s just, for so long you’ve been trying to act normal and I’ve been trying to protect you that I guess I went a little crazy when you suddenly started catching planes and fighting aliens. And I didn’t come here to be forgiven, just to say that I’ve got you, and I’m behind you 100%.” She finishes. Kara doesn’t know what to make of all that, but somehow those words are enough to make everything okay again. Those words that started off as a gesture so small, and that have come to mean so much to both of them.

“That’s good, because I really need you and I don’t know how to keep doing this without you,” she says. Alex closes her eyes and lets out a deep breath. Her head hangs back, and without opening her eyes, she holds out her arms.

“Alright, come here. Hug it out?”

“Yes please.” Kara is already pulling her close, and she’s so glad that even though this was their worst fight pretty much ever they’re still able to work it out and hug in the end.

What are sisters for?

This is not what sisters are for. Not the fragile, tiny, human ones. They’re not supposed to give themselves up this way, to be beaten down and captured in exchange for their superpowered kin.

Kara stares at Alex’s broken body in disbelief, and all she can think is to pray that she’s not dead. She doesn’t have time to use any higher mental functions, because the teal-colored alien is turning from Alex toward Kara.

Blood red spikes quiver down it’s spine and protrude from it’s fingertips, elbows, and knees. Kara’s pretty sure they’re poisonous, and if that wasn’t enough the creature stood over ten feet tall and looked about as strong as three Supermans. She doesn’t think the poison can affect her, because the spikes can’t pierce her skin, but when the alien tears one from it’s back and hurls it at her she avoids it anyway.

It’s funny. J’onn is shouting orders in her ear about how to take this thing down, but all Kara can think of is how Alex beat up Michael Watson all those years ago.

Faster than the alien can blink Kara flies toward it, putting all her strength behind a punch to where she thinks it’s nose is. She’s spot on, because the alien reels backwards and she uppercuts it so hard it actually flies twenty feet in the air before slamming back to earth. At this point the kick to the groin is unnecessary- Alex must have done more damage to it than Kara originally thought- because the alien is down and not getting up again anytime soon.

Everything starts happening even faster, if that’s even possible. The DEO containment team rushes in to deal with the alien, and there’s a medic team for Alex, but they’re being too slow and Kara can hear Alex’s heart beating so weakly now and if she doesn’t do something Alex might die. So she rushes over, and begs them to let her take them.

It’s only with Maggie’s interviennent and badge granted authority that they finally conceded, because Maggie actually knows Kara and that she’s Alex’s best chance, and Kara scoops her into her arms to fly to the hospital.

“I’ve got you, it’s ok. I promise I’ve got you, and you’re going to be okay or so help me Rao…” She can’t finish the sentence, but it’s okay because she’s landing outside the hospital and there are doctors and nurses and promises that she’s going to be okay.

Alex is ok. She looks a little worse for wear, but not nearly as bad as when she was broken and lifeless in Kara’s arms. It was too long in Kara’s opinion for them to let her in to see her, but she supposes she’s luckier than James and Winn and J’onn and Maggie, who are stuck waiting in the lobby because they’re not direct relation. Alex pisses and moans about not being able to see her girlfriend, and why didn’t you take me to the DEO instead of the normal hospital? The normal hospital has rules I can’t breaks.

But she’s okay, and that’s all Kara is really concerned with at the moment.

That is, until Alex is discharged.

She insists she can go home to her own apartment even though she has three cracked ribs, a dislocated shoulder, and they had to take out your freaking spleen so shut up Alex you’re coming to my place.

If Kara thought hospital Alex was bad, she’s never encountered wheelchair Alex. Even though a huge part of her stubbornness in the hospital was over Maggie’s absence, and Maggie is right there alongside her on the elevator ride up to Kara’s apartment and helps settle Alex into Kara’s bed, she’s still just as stubborn. If not more so, because she’s stronger now than she was. Kara resigns herself to the floor so that Maggie can have the couch, because Alex is in no condition to share a bed with anyone, despite any complaints she might have.

“Alex, for the last time. Will you let us take care of you?” Kara snaps. “I promise I got you. Quit being so stubborn for once.” Maggie sits off to the side, impressed at Kara’s backbone. She was about five minutes from caving in and ignoring all the doctor’s rules about physical activity and letting Alex wheel herself to the bathroom by herself.

The first day is the roughest, but Alex sleeps like a rock through the first night which is a huge relief because Kara’s main worry was that she would be in too much pain to sleep. She stays up the whole night, listening for labored breathing or groans of pain.

The second night she’s about to do the same when Maggie forces her to get some sleep. But Alex wakes up sobbing in terror, and not even Maggie can calm her down, so she’s forced to wake Kara.

“I got you, Alex.” The words carry a different meaning coming from Kara than Maggie, and it’s not Maggie’s fault that they don’t calm Alex the same way as when Kara says them. She decides it’s time for a midnight chinese run and excuses herself from the apartment.

Once Alex finally calms down enough, Kara speaks up.

“Alex?”

“Hmm?”

“When you go back in the field, I’m not letting you out of my sight.”

“Sounds fair.”

“I’m serious. I got you.”

[radicallyvegan]

Any advice for becoming vegan?

Absolutely!

First, try to avoid being overwhelmed. When you first go vegan, there seemsto be so much to think about and every day you learn about new hidden animalingredients in things you would never expect. If you make a mistake oraccidentally consume something nonvegan, don’t despair--it happens to the bestof us. Just say “ew” and move on. The major industries that we are fightingagainst are meat, dairy, eggs, fish, leather, fur, and animal imprisonment. Ifyou eat something that has some poorly-known by-product of the meat industry init, it’s not really as supportive to the industry as paying for a burger or asteak, so try not to sweat it.

Second, the hardest part about going vegan is the questions and judgementyou get from people you know. Unfortunately, many people get very defensivewhen they find out someone is vegan, because on some level they know that whatthey do is not moral. Some people are lucky and have very supportive friendsand family, but even in my case, where people have mostly let me do my ownthing, you get a lot of questions and annoying “I could neeeeeever do that!” Myadvice here is to try to avoid getting into heated debates and arguments overthis with people you know unless you get the sense they are genuinely curiousand interested in why veganism makes sense. Otherwise, and especially at eventswhere people are eating food, just avoid the topic. If someone asks, say “Idon’t really like talking about that while I’m eating. Maybe we can talk aboutit some other time!”

Third, try to strike a balance between trying new things andveganizing old favourites. If you eat a lot of burgers, buy or make veggiepatties. If you eat a lot of pizza, order ones with no cheese or vegan cheeseif you like it. Surprisingly, pizza without cheese is delicious as long asthere’s enough sauce to keep it from getting dry. List foods you already eatand enjoy that are vegan, like peanut butter and jam sandwiches or avocadotoast or pasta with tomato sauce—there’s already a lot that you eat that’seither vegan or easy to make vegan. At the same time, try things you maybehaven’t tried before or have been conditioned to think are gross, like tofu orseitan or tempeh or different kinds of vegetables. I found that after goingvegan, I was introduced to a whole new delicious world of foods that I’d nevereaten before. When I “could” eat whatever I wanted, I always had the same oldthings—chicken breast, burgers, etc.—but when I had this “limit” of veganism inplace, I was trying and enjoying all kinds of new things.

Fourth, try to make friends with other vegans. See if thereis a vegan meetup group in your area, either on Facebook or meetup.com. Maybethere’s a yearly Veg Fest nearby where you can go and meet others. These peoplewon’t necessarily replace your current friends, but it is really nice to spendsome time with other people who ‘get’ it and who won’t make a big deal aboutwanting to go somewhere with vegan options, etc. If you’re pretty remote, findcommunity online—there are tons of FB groups and Instagram accounts relating toveganism and you’re sure to find some like-minded people.

Fifth, avoid getting sucked into pseudo-scientificextremism. Unfortunately, what started as an animal rights movement hasattracted some people who are “vegan” for health reasons or who are just drawnto “extreme” movements. There’s a lot of bullshit in the vegan community and aLOT of dangerous ideas. Take it from someone who knows their shit when it comesto veganism and nutrition and please, please heed the following advice:

Take a vitamin B12 supplement. Vegans (and many nonvegans) absolutelymust supplement, or you risk permanent nerve damage.

Get vaccinated. Yes, vaccines have small amounts of eggingredients. Yes, you still must vaccinate. If you don’t, you put others atrisk and negligence causing the death of immunocompromised babies and childrenis the opposite of vegan. Get your vaccinations and vaccinate your kids.

Don’t worry about protein. If you eat a varied diet, youwill get enough protein. High protein foods include legumes, beans, tofu,seitan, nuts, seeds and whole grains. Eat those and you will get enough.

Don’t worry about food purism—there’s a lot of crap onlineabout soy being harmful, gluten being harmful, etc. etc. but unless you have anactual allergy, all fruits/vegetables/nuts/seeds/legumes and fungi(mushrooms/yeast) is fine to eat regularly. Ignore people who try to say thisor that is poisonous or not good for you, and just eat what you like. The healthiestway to eat is by prioritizing whole plant foods and eating a wide variety ofthem, but having a deep fried oreo now and then is not going to kill you.

Raw veganism is not healthier than regular veganism. Anall-raw diet can have negative health outcomes for a variety of reasons—many nutrientsare not well-absorbed in raw foods and many people on raw diets do not getenough calories/protein. People who eat nothing but 20 bananas a day are notgetting a varied diet and there is absolutely no scientific evidence whatsoeverthat this way of eating is best or even good for you.

Don’t expect to never get sick. Vegans get sick, vegans getcancer, vegans die. Veganism is a movement focused on eliminating the exploitationof animals. Many people who were eating terrible diets before going vegan doexperience an improvement in health, but it’s not a guaranteed cure-all. If yougo vegan and get sick, it’s probably not your diet. There’s no reason to becomean ex-vegan if you get sick while vegan, that’s just life.

Do not expect that just because someone is vegan, they are agood person. I’ve been heavily involved in the vegan community for 5 years, andI have met misogynist vegans, racist vegans, ableist vegans, and every otherkind of terrible person who happens to care about animal welfare. It is verydisappointing, but unfortunately people think in very compartmentalized waysand many don’t see the parallels between different movements.

Lastly, use all the great resources that are out there. I’lllist a few websites, books and films here that have been very helpful for me,and that are not full of pseudo-science junk. Feel free to contact me with anyother questions or concerns. Best of luck!

Websites:

The Vegan Society

Addressing common objections to veganism

The Vegan RD (Ginny Messina is a treasure! Evidence-based vegan nutrition info)

Vegan Health (evidence-based vegan nutrition info)

Barnivore (vegan booze guide)

Happy Cow (international veg-friendly restaurant listings)

Books:

Animal Liberation by Peter Singer

Eating Animals by Jonathan Saffran Foer (very highly recommend this one!)

Vegan for Her by Virginia Messina - vegan nutrition info specifically for women at all life stages including pregnancy and breastfeeding

Vegan for Life by Jack Norris - as above but not female-specific

All the books by Ruby Roth - she is an outstanding spokesperson for veganism (her calm, intelligent demeanor in interviews is enviable) and focuses on working with children toward a vegan future. Incredible visual artist.

The Sexual Politics of Meat by Carol J Adams - about the parallels between animal rights and women’s rights.

Every Twelve Seconds by Timothy Pachirat - a look inside the slaughterhouse industry by someone who worked there undercover

We Animals by Jo-Anne McArthur - a photojournalist’s documentation of the plight of animals in photos.

Films:

Earthlings (very graphic but so effective at showing what animals go through on a regular basis, and why we all must go vegan)

Forks Over Knives (health-based stuff but interesting nonetheless)

A Peaceable Kingdom (not graphic at all, focuses mainly on farm sanctuaries)

Cowspiracy (not graphic, focuses on environmental benefits of veganism)

Organizations:

Mercy for Animals

Farm Sanctuary

Wishing Well Sanctuary

Viva!

[freezing-kaiju]

A Party To Die For: Part 1

A Fire Emblem Fates horror AU fic

Rating: Possibly Mature? (Violence that will happen later)

Ships: Charlotte/Peri, Beruka/Camilla, Mozu/Nyx, Leo/Niles

written with help from @pupmon1

Greetings, my honored guests. My name is Xander Sumrak. I’m a billionaire by trade. I’ve decided to organize a party. The location? A supposedly haunted manor owned by myself. The guests? My family, of course, and a few others. Only a few of note: An assassin...a detective...and a mistress of the occult. Now...let’s see what fun these can get into.

Nine cars pulled into the driveway of a palatial but somewhat deserted-looking estate. It looked like it had been once impressive in its grandeur, but now, fallen into disrepair and especially in a night as dark as this, it was impressive in a more sinister sense. It looked almost like...well, a haunted house.

The ten guests exited their vehicles and lingered outside, waiting to be escorted inside. The private detective was the first one to open conversation.

“Well, I suppose we should all get acquainted with each other while we wait for the drinks- I mean the host. I’m Niles Edgeworth, P.I. Not sure why I was invited but I’m not complaining.”

A tall, square-jawed man stuck out his hand and shook Niles’s. “Pleased to meet you! I’m Inspector Arthur Pentagast. I’m...not entirely sure why I was invited, either.”

“You’re here because Xander invited you,” a woman with purple hair spoke up, a teal haired woman shadowing behind her.

“Ah! Miss Camilla.” Arthur smiled and saluted with a tip of his had. “So this arrangement was set by your brother?”

Camilla nodded and smiled, though was interrupted by a question by another. “Do you know what he wants?”

Behind Camilla and her bodyguard stood a blonde haired woman in a revealing dress. “No, Charlotte. I don’t know why he’s asked us all here...least of all you.”

Charlotte scoffed. “Well of course we’re both here. I’m a talented actress...and you’re, well, his sister. But that’s not a surprise...that’s what’s gotten you everywhere, isn’t it?”

Camilla growled and her bodyguard stepped forward. “Watch your tongue,” she said simply, staring at Charlotte.

“Beruka. How pleasant to see you here too,” Charlotte said with a smirk, backing away all the same. “Why exactly are you here? A date, perhaps?”

Beruka tensed. “I-I am just her bodyguard.”

Charlotte smirked. “Are you sure? I saw something last month...you were looking pretty comfortable between that redhead and C-” She was silenced by Beruka clamping her hand over her mouth. Charlotte growled and glared at the tealette.

A somewhat childish-looking woman with multichromatic hair entered the fray, smiling, and said, “Ooo, is there a fight happening? Can I join?”

Before a proper fight could truly break out, the doors to the mansion flew open with a bang, a silver haired man in a suit standing in the doorway. A silence fell over the guests as he walked down the steps and bowed towards them.

“Welcome to our manor! Lord Xander awaits you all inside,” he said with a grin.

A young blonde woman with her hair in drills laughed and smiled. “Hey there Jacob. Did Xander tell you to do that?”

Jacob chuckled and stood up straight. “Indeed, lady Elise, he did.” He nodded to Leo and Camilla, then walked over to the door and held it open. Everyone filed in.

“...we shouldn’t be here…” a small dark haired woman muttered as she entered the door, accompanied by a chubby, shy-looking brunette. “There are spirits here...angry ones…”

Leo paused and glanced back at the woman, sneering a little. “Oh...you must be the ...specialist Xander mentioned. I assure you there are no spirits here. Spirits don’t exist.”

Nyx gritted her teeth. “...that’s what everyone says...but oh, you’ll believe...”

Leo chuckled condescendingly. “Oh, I look forward to it.”

A few minutes later, the party arrived at a spacious dining room, with several dishes set out, an open bar, and a large set of ornate double doors in the back of the room. Jakob and two maids, one with pink hair and the other with blue, directed every guest to their assigned seats but warned everyone not to start eating until the host arrived. Outside, a thunderstorm had begun to gather as the sky darkened.

Three, five, ten minutes passed of absolutely nothing. One of the maids, Flora, appeared to be counting the flashes of lightning.

Suddenly, as a huge thunderclap sounded and Nyx jumped like a scared cat, the double doors crashed open, and Xander strode dramatically into the room. He had a well-kept handlebar moustache and a very finely-tailored black suit, with gold and burgundy around the linings.

“Greetings, my honored guests!” Xander announced with a deep bow. “I am your humble host, Xander Sumrak. And this..well, it isn’t my humble abode, but I do own this place. Make yourselves comfortable...but be cautious. For there are other, more permanent residents of this manor...which I have invited Nyx and her friend to explain.” He inclined his head towards her, and Nyx stood up on her chair, giving herself the appropriate dramatic height.

“I advise that everybody either leave immediately or try your hardest to maintain a pleasant aura,” she began. “There are several spirits here...and they’re dangerous. If we get angry, they will pick up on that...and you do not under any circumstances want to make the spirits angry.”

An uncomfortable silence fell over the dining room, broken slightly by Leo scoffing under his breath.

Then Xander clapped his hands together. “An excellent warning. I suggest you all heed it if you want to earn your money.”

“Money?” Charlotte interjected. “There’s money in this?”

“But of course. Ten thousand dollars, for each of you...if you stay in the house until 8 o'clock AM. If any of you should die, their take will be split amongst the rest. If I should die, the money will be paid by my estate. So try to survive.” He chuckled. “Now, i’m sure we’re all hungry, so let’s have dinner before we get ghost-hunting.”

Quite soon, the dishes were out and the liquor was flowing. Charlotte, leaning on the bar and finishing up her fourth Manhattan, felt ready for some conversation and began surveying the room.

On the far end of the table, Arthur and Niles were discussing prior cases of theirs. Dangerous subject, best to avoid it. Camilla was busy persuading her “bodyguard” to have a drink or two; Charlotte had never seen her drunk, this could be very fun.  Leo and Nyx were arguing about the possibility of ghosts, as expected from a man of science and a woman of superstition. Nyx was being backed up by the small woman that shyly introduced herself as Mozu, a friend of Nyx’s. They had just gotten onto the subject of whether ectoplasm was a legitimate thing or a hoax. An interesting topic, but Charlotte wasn’t here to make enemies, so she moved on. Elise and Xander were just exchanging random small talk, nothing interesting.

Then she noticed that girl with the weird multicolored hair...Peri, her name was Peri. She had a kinda lonely look in her eyes...and she was playing with a knife. No, not playing with it, not really, more...practicing. She was making subtle cuts in midair, and Charlotte could almost see the locations. Artery on the right arm. Wrist tendon. Small of the back. This girl had some experience...and excellent muscle memory.

She sat down in the chair next to Peri, making sure to lean away from the whirling knife.

“‘scuse meh?”

Peri turned and paused her practice. “Huh?”

“Yer very good wit’ dat knife.”

Peri grinned. “Aw, thanks! I use it a lot. It’s pretty good for stabbing people.”

Charlotte usually would pretend to be horrified by such a statement, but in her inebriated state she was merely intrigued. “Ah yeah, I don’t re’ly use knives meh’self. Guns ’re cleaner n’ axes ’re mer fun, but I keep un’ ‘round. ‘S a swiss army knife, good fer breakin’ inta...inta... s’uff.”

“Ooo, I like axes too! One big slice and WHAM!” She giggled. “So much blood...it’s wonderful!”

“Yeah...s’good. Ya do guns? Er mer o’ a melee ‘irl?”

“Oh, I hate guns. Never enough blood.”

“Yeah, I getcha on dat un’...kinda pai’ fer na’ a loda blood doh, too bad. Ya get pai’ fer it er da ya just kill fer fun?”

“For fun, silly! If it was my job, I’d have to follow rules, and that’s no fun! Plus, I’ve got enough money already.”

“Ya rish?’

Peri shrugged. “I guess so.”

“Das cool...’splains why yer here...I dunno why i’m here, prob’ly jus’ this rish fuck picked some names outta th’ phone book...”

“Dunno. My daddy said he’s a family friend so I gotta come. I’ve got better things to do but I guess this is fun!”

“Yeah...” Charlotte looked at Peri’s glass and frowned. “How come yer not drinkin’ anythin’? Das jus’...soda?”

“Yup. I don’t drink. It tastes weird.”

“Suit yerself,” Charlotte said, sipping another Manhattan. She was vaguely aware of several of the other partygoers giving her and Peri weird looks and backing away a bit, but she didn’t really give a shit. However, she noticed a certain set of prying eyes missing...

“...where da fuck is Xander?”

The conversation in the room all stopped. Everyone looked to the head of the table. The ornate chair that the host occupied was...empty.

“Lord Xander? Sir? Where are you?”

“Big brother! Where’d you go?”

Jakob and Xander’s siblings were instantly on high alert. They all stood up and started looking around.

“It’s possible he just went to the bathroom or out to get some fresh air...” Leo pointed out.

Camilla chuckled weakly. “Xander? Not without telling us. He’d announce it to the room if he so much as got up to use the bathroom.”

Jakob picked up a candelabra. “It is my duty to ensure his safety. This mansion is a maze, even if he just wandered off he could get lost, or worse. Anyone willing to assist me?”

The siblings immediately stood up, Beruka doing the same, although she was swaying slightly and clinging to Camilla. “He’s family,” Leo said simply.

Niles got to his feet as well. “A case, eh? Might be fun...not doing this pro bono but hey, i suppose that 10k could count as my fee...”

Arthur jumped to his feet as well and boomed, “As a duly appointed officer of the law, it is my sworn duty to protect and serve...so of course I’ll help!”

“...none of you can help him...” Nyx hissed softly. “...they have him now...and soon they’ll have you...”

“Thanks, Morticia...” Charlotte mumbled.

About an hour later, everyone was gathered in the foyer after searching the house. Jakob, the siblings, and Beruka were somewhat out of breath, though Niles and Arthur seemed to still have plenty of energy. Charlotte, Peri, and Mozu were just sort of chatting and lounging, and Nyx appeared to be preparing some sort of ritual, muttering under her breath.

“Well, we couldn’t find sir anywhere.” Jakob announced, hanging his head. “I don’t know where he possibly could have gone...”

Everyone stood around, contemplating the situation.Then Elise had an idea. Jumping up and down with excitement, she exclaimed, “Oh! Oh! I know! What if this spooky place has secret passages? Y’know, like on those Scooby-Doo cartoons we used to watch when we were kids?”

Leo dismissed this with a wave of his hand. “Couldn’t work. That’s a cartoon, Elise. This is real life. Real people don’t build secret passageways unless they’re smuggling narcotics.”

“Aww...” Elise said, dejected.

“The ghosts took him...” Nyx muttered, turning away from the candles she was setting up and toppling one over.

“Yeah, yeah,” Leo responded, “Believe whatever crazy shit you want...”

“It’s real though...the ghosts...I can feel them...like a swarm of wasps...and that’s what I’m trying to do. Placate them before one of us pushes the hive too hard and they all come swarming out...” Nyx gestured to the candles and incenses she was arranging.

“Tch...whatever, I’m going to the library,” Leo said simply before stepping into the next room.

Nyx shook her head and grabbed a circular rug from a corner, carefully straightening it out. “This will do for a marker. Mozu.” Mozu looked up when Nyx pointed at her. “Come help me. Place these four candles at the tip of the cardinal directions, starting at north and moving clockwise.”

Mozu grabbed two of the candles and blinked in confusion. “Ah...what direction are those?”

Nyx sighed and pointed in front of her. “That’s north. Move from there.”

Mozu carefully nodded and put the candles down, making sure everything was straight as Nyx lightly sets the incense alight. She then crossed her legs and started chanting. She started rocking back and forth as she chanted...and the lights even started flickering as she chanted. Charlotte was amazed by what was going on...maybe there was something to what Nyx was saying...or maybe not. Nyx shifted positions, the rug moved from under her...and the couch caught on fire when one of the candles was knocked over.

Mozu and Arthur rushed forward to put out the flames, and Nyx sunk to the ground, expression miserable and hopeless.

“It didn’t work...” she groaned. “Something went wrong...we’re all going to die in here.”

“Now that’s just nonsense,” Niles scoffed, “Right, doc?” He expected Leo to agree and launch into some diatribe about science and chemistry...but there was no reply. He turned around. “Doc? Leo?”

“I saw him go inta th’ library,” Mozu pointed out as she helped Nyx to her feet. To Nyx, she whispered, “It’s okay. Y’all did yer best, right? C’mon. Nobody’s gon’ die here.”

Niles got up and strode over to the library door, Camilla and Elise following him.

The library was a grand, if somewhat gloomy room. The high ceiling let many tall bookshelves be stored here, packed with undoubtedly interesting tomes. But there was one key element missing. Leo. He was nowhere to be seen. And there was no other way out of the great library.

“Doc? Are you in here? ...Leo? LEOOOO!” Niles called out as he searched the library...fruitlessly. Leo, like Xander, had simply...vanished.

“I...think Nyx might be correct.”