(Clarifications:
/-- [] --/ = Represents a thought, thought process, or inner realizations.
)
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I comfort Lyanna and she begins to settle down. The engine hums below us, steady, the maze stretching past the window. For a while neither of us says anything. But that changes when her breathing slows, and her pulse calms.
Lyanna’s head slowly makes a turn to face me.
"Wanna hear what happened?"
My head jolts at her, and my mouth opens almost immediately to give her the obvious answer, but no. I don't answer right away. There's a part of me that wants this too badly, and I notice it before I let myself say anything. The same way you notice your own hand reaching for something before you've decided to take it.
I push the ‘want’ down far enough that it doesn't show.
"Only if you want to tell me."
She looks up at me for a second, then looks back down at her hands.
"...Maybe."
...
I wait anyway.
A while passes.
"It's kind of long-"
"I've got time."
She picks at the edge of her sleeve.
"You're not going to… tell anyone right?"
"No."
There is quite literally No One ELSE TO TELL HERE CHILD. WHAT THE FU—
"Ok." She still doesn't look at me.
"I'll… I guess I'll tell you the short part."
We were home watching TV since it was our ‘off’ day from school, work, etc. It was me, my mom, dad, my brother…
She stops there for a second.
I know I said ‘off-day’, but that didn’t really matter to my father. He used to go in his study a lot, but he never said why. And he had this ring he never took off.
She glances at me, quick. Slides down the length of my arm, abruptly jumping to her hands at the point of mine.
My mom had one too. It was a bracelet I guess, but I’m not too sure how to describe it. But I could definitely tell it wasn’t any sort of fancy jewelry judging by how ugly it kind of was.
A small pause.
I asked her why she never took it off once and she said something like, ‘we're not supposed to need them, but that's why we do’. I didn't get it, and I still don’t.
She picks at her sleeve again before continuing, quieter now.
That night was normal. All was pretty normal until some things happened. I woke up and there was something in my room.
Her voice drops almost to nothing and I have to lean in slightly to catch it.
It had no face. Just… dark all the way through. And it was... It was facing me. Right in front of me, centimeters from my face. I couldn't move.
She stops again, longer than before.
"You don't have to keep going," I say. "If you don't want to."
She shakes her head, still not looking up.
"No, I- it's fine."
She doesn't sound fine, but she keeps going anyway.
My dad came in, but he didn't look scared. I remember seeing his eyes slide back from the corner of my room to me; Well, to it. He said, "You’re early." Not even to me. That… thing passed right through me, and my bed just… melted. I’m pretty sure I hit my head on the floor before he grabbed me and we ran.
There were more of them in the house. Just standing there, and then moving a little whenever we got close. Like they wanted us to go a certain way.
A breath. Her hands have stopped moving now, just resting flat against her knees.
My mom was already in the kitchen. She said something about ‘wards holding longer’ than she thought. I didn't know what that meant, and like for most things I still don’t. The wall started to melt, not even burning. Like it was turning into gel.
She did a thing with that bracelet where she turned it around once. A ring of light came out of her hand when she did that.
"Head to the door, I'll be back in a minute.", that’s what she said.
/--She glances at me here, then looks away again just as fast. Like she was checking to see our reaction--/
We ran, the kitchen exploded behind us, I got a cut on my heel, my brother got hit on the arm, I’m pretty sure a piece got stuck in my mom's leg. But we didn't stop— We couldn't stop—
"Sorry if I'm bad at describing here."
"No no, you're doing pretty good"
"Ok."
We got outside, and when I looked back, she came out a few seconds after us. The thing was that there were more out here too.
She turned back to the house.
"I'll be right back"
She gave my brother a normal looking nail, just a regular one. Except that it was warm.
"If it comes to it, you'll know what to do with that."
He didn't ask, I didn't either. That was because not even... him or I knew what to ask.
Then she went back in.
Her voice catches slightly here, but she still doesn't stop.
The ‘things’ outside started getting closer and there was this sound. I don't know how to explain it, because it wasn't really a sound, more like it was inside my head.
My dad just stood there watching the door.
Then she came back out glowing. The light went all the way around her with smaller rings around that too.
She did this with her arm—
Lyanna demonstrates with a right-handed swing over the control panel of the engine; Face of her palm in opposition to the direction her hand is flying, completely stretched out.
—and a bunch of them just stopped. I wasn't scar— I was relieved for a second there.
An empty smile flashed at me for a second there.
Then something came down over the house. Not one of the blank ones. Just something bigger. It went through the roof like the roof wasn't even there. It just… passed through.
Her hands tighten on her knees.
I… don’t think she got to finish whatever she was doing.
The rings broke one after the other. And then there was fire, but it wasn't normal fire, No.. I’m not sure how to.. explain it, but…
She closes her eyes taking a second for herself, trying to bring the picture of it up.
My brother stopped doing anything after that.
I have to ask if she wants to stop again, but I’m too invested. So many things I want to learn about her situation. So many questions. What it would be like to experience it.
I don’t get the chance to ask any, because she keeps going, faster.
I don't remember a lot after that. Things fell around us and nothing hit us, and I used to think that was lucky.
Though I'm pretty sure it wasn't luck.
The last clear thing is both their heads… on the ground, next to each other. Something went through my brother's stomach, the same way the wall did before.
He looked at me just for a second. He looked really scared. I was scared.
I wish I could've done something. I so wish, pray I could've done something.
Tears are the next thing I see.
I remember being on the floor staring at him, trying to ignore the… heads rolling next to me, trying to ignore that… thing coming right for me to the right. And honestly. I wish I could’ve at least held his hand when he reached out for me. I wanted. To. Do. Something.
Just... Something... But...
Then everything got bright.
Then nothing.
Then white.
Then I was here.
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Shivers run through my entire body, and I completely stiffen. My eyes are refusing to move along with the rest of my body.
I don't know what to say at that.
I scramble for something and come up with nothing, and the silence just sits there between us.
"…"
I look down, planning what to say. At least trying to form a sentence.
She's asleep. Out cold mid-thought.
My head falls back against the seat.
A bracelet with that description, was, and is likely, an augment. But that’s only possible for an individual with a core... right? That shouldn't work without a core...
Wait... A nail that glowed on its own..
But that's an artifact... right? That also needs the user to possess a core... I'm not getting it...
I try to form a coherent thought, but the silence of this damn place is so loud sometimes.
I can't stop seeing it. The nail glowing in her brother's hand, the rings breaking apart one after another.
Every detail she gave me keeps replaying on its own, uninvited, and somewhere in the replay something starts to feel something. Not sad, Not horrified, even though I should be. I feel a roaring sense of complexity, but that complexity is delivered to me with the wrong seasoning, because I feel good. Good in a way that makes my skin feel too tight for my own body.
That can't be right.
I try to push it down and it doesn't move. If anything, it gets louder, my pulse climbing, my muscles humming with something that wants out and doesn't care what door it uses.
What the hell is this.
My entire body is shivering at this point, and my heart feels as if it's about explode.
The engine rumbles under us, steady, indifferent to any of it. My entire body suddenly feels weak. I’m starting to feel the exhaustion that’s been building through the couple of days that I skipped sleep.
My breathing starts running in a faster lane when my gaze drops to Lyanna asleep on my lap. Black dots flicker in my eyes, making my vision dip. And among those flashes of black, memories begin to surface.
My eyes fly wide open.
Ki—
The next thing I see, is Lyanna. Not a memory, just her at this moment. On my lap. Asleep.
Something in my head, driven by emotions uncalled for in this moment, supplies an idea I never asked for between those flashes. Fully formed, already halfway built before I can stop it.
Pupils dilating and constricting, shaking as if a fever took me over. Eyes completely fixated.
The thought doesn’t leave, almost like my mind is actively wanting to reject that I might be losing my sanity; Rerouting the sensation I have to something else. To distract myself… from me. My body actually shifts toward acting on it when Lyanna turns on my lap. But my will catches up and locks everything down at once, hard, like slamming a door I didn't know was open.
I'm losing whatever grip I have left and I can feel it happening in real time, watching myself from somewhere just outside my own skull.
I don't move. I physically can't. My hands are still at my sides, and some far-off part of me is screaming at them to stay there, and they listen, but only because the rest of me has locked up along with them.
Except they're not at my sides.
The engine keeps humming. The fucking sound is driving me insane. Lyanna keeps breathing, slow and even, completely unaware of what's over her own head. Because my hands are already there resting on top of it, careful, gentle.
She has no idea how close I actually am.
I’m gasping for air when I click back alive.
"WHAT IN THE FUCK AM I THINKING"
Lyanna jolts awake, and the first thing she sees is my knuckles digging into my own skull hard enough to hurt; Disgusted at myself in a way that feels almost like relief. At least disgust is a feeling I recognize, a feeling that belongs to me and not to whatever the fuck I was just going through.
"Slap me! Or punch me, I don't care which, just do it!"
"Wait— what?"
"Just do it!"
The thoughts keep screaming underneath everything and the rest of the world goes quiet around them, narrowing down to just her face and the sound of my own voice asking for this.
"SLAP ME DAMN IT"
Lyanna looks more shaken by my reaction than by whatever I was about to do. She doesn't know what that was, thank god, and after one beat of hesitation, she swings.
It lands hard, and my vision clears instantly.
She grabs onto my shoulder, stuttering.
"Jesus— why did you— I— what—"
I shake my head, try to play it off, and God, what the fuck could’ve happened if I had let that happen...
The feeling's still sitting somewhere under my skin, quieter now, manageable, but not gone. Filed away rather than dealt with, the same way everything else gets filed away rather than dealt with.
"Much appreciated.”
I’m a bit out of breath after being mentally assaulted out of my own space.
"What?"
"Conversation for later."
A boom of exhaustion blasts the front of my head, and the energy drains out of me all at once. The adrenaline gone as fast as it arrived.
"I'm tired. I am really, really tired."
Her face does something between confusion and alarm. I pass out as my head hugs the sturdy control panel before she can ask anything else.
"...Ok, what's going on here."
A sigh, somewhere above me.
"Not this again."