Tssss, tssss, tssss.
The sound of my nails scraped against skin let relief escape with each carved line. I didn’t care if it tore my skin away after years of abuse, if my decayed muscle and dried up veins were exposed to the world. Like I gave a shit about what strangers thought. If they gagged and cried about it? Good. They can walk away, go gawk at a bird, be anywhere else but near me.
It wasn’t like I could escape myself.
“Awh, are you brooding?”
Or escape Serena, either, who may be competing with the society for the spot of my most hated entity. I should had smuggled in a lighter.
Actually.
“I want a lighter.”
“You’re asking the wrong person,” she said, stupid patronizing smile written across her face. What, like I don’t deal with enough bull on a daily basis?
“I deal with enough shit every day,” I said and spat in her direction. It missed and plopped to the ground like a pathetic fish on the ground near her feet. I stomped on it, just to make sure it soaked in.
Serena sighed and stepped to the side. “You should be careful. Your injuries don’t heal normally, right? If you over-exert yourself, you might tear your body apart.”
Ughh. Why’d she talk like I cared about her opinion?
“Who cares?” I stomped on the ground again. “As long as every member of the society is dead before I am, I don’t give a shit.”
“Hm…”
She kept staring at me with her creepy, glassy ice eyes. What was her fucking problem? I squinted at her back, and she released this riff of a laugh that stung my ears.
“You’re the one with the issues here, not me!”
My vision went red. Fuck whatever bullshit Erna’d spew about it, she’d better die now.
I lunged to wrap my hands against her throat, but she moved out of the way like she knew I had lost my shit. I could had kept going, though, if my stupid ankle didn’t crack from a bad landing and make me hit the floor face-first.
Bella should feel relieved she ran off to do something else for whatever stupid reason, so I wouldn’t have to cut her head off for seeing this. Assholes like her and Serena deserved to die, and everyone else deserved to stay out of my godsdamn way.
“I’m gonna kill you for this.” I tried to scramble back to my feet, sword in hand, but I couldn’t even get into a kneel to retrieve it before my ankle gave out and I hit the floor again. Even if the pain seared with the strength of a whimper, the bend made it—too—impossible!
Stupid body. Useless body. Terrible, shitty body. At least everyone’s bodies worked the way they were supposed to. Lucky, useless lot. Lacking nothing. Rubbing in everything.
“Stop moving!”
Serena’s face somehow became more pale, horrified, reminding me of a mouse. A useless mouse, moused away anything unpleasant to her—me included if her disgust meant anything. “Oh, no…maybe we can set this? But I don’t think we have anything sturdy enough for your temperament.”
…
You know what. I’ll walk you through something.
If I got the chance to kill Serena, I’d get creative. She’s made of ice, right? I’d get magnifying glasses. Maybe some candles, flame’s cacophonous roar, a blaze’s catastrophe, whatever you’d wanna call it. Then?
I’d melt her. Slowly. Because I was a fucking genius. Maybe she’d make a nice lemonade. Drip, drip…
Yep.
Just add sugar, and any stranger in sight’d chug it. The perfect crime. Man, I was so good at killing people who deserved a lil extra suffering. Which was everyone. Because no one actually suffered and just bitched about it all the time.
Nevermind, this got stupid real quick. My mouth flapped open, I forced words out—just like she probably wanted. Fucking hated playing to people’s expectations, but where Erna might be a dumbass, Bella wouldn’t be if she saw I mauled a member of her merry band of losers.
“Quit pretending like it’s a big deal to you. I know it’s not.”
“Don’t be like that,” Serena said, voice more firm than before. She clasped her hands together and squeezed her eyes shut, then gasped. A puff of cold air hit my face—my nose couldn’t keep it to itself, so I sneezed, a gooey cluster of snot dripping out and plopping onto the floor.
Serena’s face when she rubbed it out with the soles of her shoes almost made it worth it, but it wasn’t enough to get her away from me.
“You can use light magic,” Serena said, like I lost my short term memory and she had to remind me of every little thing. “Share your soul’s power with me. You can do that still, right? Hurry, hurry!”
…The fuck?
“Nope. Too annoying.” Whatever she thought of doing to me, it wasn’t gonna work. I wasn’t brain damaged enough to trust any of these freaks.
She reached a hand out. “C’mon, just trust me.”
I pushed myself away from her. “You like popsicles? You’d make a good cherry flavor, once I cherry you—no, slush you into a slushie.”
“Am I a popsicle or a slushie!?”
“You’re gonna be shaved ice instead if you touch me one more time!”
“You’re such a child…it’s a cast. A little cast, for a little bit until Erna treats you. Can you calm down just a little? I know you’ve been through a lot, but—“
How hard was it for her to give up already? Her deal—her stupid deal, treating me like a pity case, while all I could do—like always—was sit there, do my stupid little song and dance like a caged fucking monkey until it satisfied them. To satisfy her.
Fine. Whatever. Nothing ever changed, and of course it wouldn’t be different now. I knew who had the power.
I bared my teeth in rage.
“Fine, just—I’ll help, if it shuts you up!”
…She rubbed her face. After being buried for a few seconds in (hopefully) annoyance, she looked at me again. “Thank you. It’s not so hard, see?”
She hovered her hand near my broken ankle, and I closed my eyes. I could feel the resistance—the battered state of my soul meant calling upon those thin connections pricked my nerves with an unfamiliar itch, but if I didn’t do it, Serena would probably try and strap me to a gurney. Then I’d snap her neck and make a run for it—
Ah, there.
I felt a chill up my spine. I opened my eyes to see her hands glow with shimmering light, frost radiating from the powerful gleam. Ice grew over my ankle and encased it in a frozen shield that had more sheen than I’d seen from even the most pricey, stupid-showy diamond rings.
“There,” she said and pulled her hands back. The dissipated connection brought a weight off my chest which let me breathe again—fuck, this was barely worth it. It looked cold as a bitch stuck there, at least I didn’t have to feel it too.
Regardless, I didn’t want to thank her for doing the bare minimum. She should had just patched it up faster instead of messing with me—and besides, what’d she need my help for so badly? Was crystilare really that fucking sturdy? Gods, I wish. Maybe then I wouldn’t’ve gotten caught.
“So, you really are…”
She didn’t look at me. Her eyes fixed on something behind me, though I knew nothing else could catch her attention. Serena wanted to act stupid again, probably. No—everything she did looked stupid. Stupid, slushie, snowcone….
Maybe I’d bite her leg off. See how she felt about it. Gnaw at it, snap it off and suck on it like a popsicle…with syrup. Cherry syrup.
“Huh? Speak up, or you’ll look like a moron,” I said instead. Ugh, Bella existed. Like I could do anything otherwise.
“Ah!”
She sat up straighter. “I mean…I knew about your situation. Being turned into a living weapon—it’s a miracle you’re still alive.”
“Wouldn’t call it that,” I said. “I’d rather have bit it than live a life as a lucky corpse ‘cause of the society.”
“The…society?” Serena’s mouth fell open like her jaw broke, and her cheeks flushed with the smallest tinge of red. “Of Xaviais, right?”
I bit on my tongue in shock. How did she know? “Did Erna tell you this?”
“Oh!” Serena glanced at one of the security broadcasts. “Yeah, she did! A while back. You know, ‘cause I always help her out. Plus, you kinda yelled about it when we fought Cheiri? I might’ve been half puddle, but I could still hear you.”
…Sure, whatever. Erna already blabs about a bunch of insane shit on a daily basis, why not add private fucking business to the list too? I followed Serena’s gaze to the hologram, but all the moving images which entrapped us made me dizzy, like I got lost in a dumb mirror maze where every turn morphed and the exit hid somewhere way behind me.
Maybe I should just break every one of them. Fuck consequences. Fuck rules.
Instead, I opted to close my eyes and not bother anymore.
In the silence, Serena hummed.
“It’ll be okay,” she said in a voice so quiet I thought I hallucinated it. “We’ll be waiting.”