wingsofmelete

[wingsofmelete]

reblog and make a wish! this was removed from tumbrl due to “violating one or more of Tumblr’s Community Guidelines”, but since my wish came true the first time, I’m putting it back. :)

#please

[wingsofmelete]

keen an eye on the time

I looked around. No blood. No fire. The hell? “Um…” I twisted the bed sheets in my fists. “Right, okay, I’m lost.” I couldn’t feel my knives, which was bad. I also couldn’t feel any of my scars, which was worse. I thought about jumping up and screaming, but considering I had just had half my ribcage torn out of my stomach, that probably wasn’t the best idea. Except it looked as though I still had all my ribs. The room wasn’t bad; the walls were a faded green, the bed was done up in a soft blue, and there was dark carpet lining the floor. A small bookshelf that was pretty much empty, a stereo system on a chest of draws, and a white inbuilt wardrobe lined the far wall. I twisted around for a bit, blinking. This was…clean. Right, okay, clearly I was in hell. “Hello?” I called out, cringing instinctively as I moved my ribs. Only, no pain. Which was good. I disliked pain immensely, so the lack of it was a nice surprise. Grimacing, I lifted the white fleece shirt I had on to stare at my stomach. My whole stomach – no scars. No blemishes. All my ribs. Maybe I had burned to death in the fire, and my soul was now in hell. This place was quiet enough for it; I couldn’t stand not doing anything. Drove me crazy. My own personal pocket of horror. Gee, wasn’t that a nice thought. There was a light tap, and I glanced up to see a small door open. A thin, tall man approached me with kind eyes, clipboard in hand. His black hair was streaked neon green, and his small mouth was twisted into a smile. “Holy shit!” I stared at him, scrambling around desperately for a knife. “You!” “Yes, me,” the man nodded sagely. “I’m glad that you can still recognise me, Megan. We had problems with that last week, didn’t we?” “I…” I lunged at him and tried to wrap his arms around his stupid chicken throat, but he just stepped aside, and I crashed into the floor painfully. “Now, Megan, what have I told you? If you keep attacking me, I’m going to have to put you back on medication.” Medication, huh? I’ll show you medication, you two-bit no-good snot-nosed asshole – Wait, Megan? “Who’s Megan?” I stared at the man who had cheerfully butchered my family right in front of my eyes. “I’m Astoria. You’re William Sanders.” I paused, tilting my head to one side. “And I’m going to kill you.” Sanders made a note on his clipboard, face sad. “Megan, I thought that we had gotten over this. You were making so much progress!” The hell? I considered questioning him some more, but I could only control my homicidal urges to much, and I really wanted to kill him. So I experimentally got to my feet, just to make sure that I could, and spun on my heel to deliver a snapping side-kick to his midriff. Sanders, once again, simply dodged out of the way, a small smile on his stupid-looking face. “Megan…” “It’s Astoria, you shrivelled piece of shit. We’ve been trying to kill each other for the past five years; at least give me the decency of using my name.” “Oh, Megan…” Sanders shook his head. “I’m afraid this is really going to hinder your recovery time. This is your third relapse this year.” Riiight. “Mhm,” I looked around for something to stab him with, but – unfortunately – nothing seemed to come to my attention. Everything looked like it was made of plastic. “I don’t suppose you’ll let me suffocate you with my forearm, would you?” I asked, bouncing from one foot to the other twitchily. “No? How about I just smash your skull into the wall?” “So graphic, Megan,” Sanders sighed. “I suppose I’ll have to go over the basics once again. Your name is Megan Andrew, you are seventeen years old, and your hobbies are painting and martial arts –” “Ha!” I snorted. “Like I’m going to believe this. Are you going to let me kill you or not?”

#welcome to my world of words #unfinished #archiving purposes #alternatively titled: Dimension Hopping Revolutoinaries (of a kind) #will probably never finish this #siiiigh

[wingsofmelete]

dreaming the world away

I dream of a friend who died in a war. She is tall and slender, with too-long pale hair and cold green eyes that I have never seen thaw. She always wears black in my dreams (though I have seen her wear other colours, in real life); the dark jeans and black jacket that which she wore when I first met her. She stares at me, in my dream, like she always stared at me when alive: coolly, without emotion – the impartial judge of one who determined the worth of others on a daily basis. The Executioner. Around us, the trees sing hollowly against the undying wind. The knee-length grass rustles like a thousand angry voices around us: “You promised” “You lied” “Just die”. Her mouth moves, forming words, but – as always – I am unable to hear them. This is a dream, I think. A cruel dream. She is dead. Stop. The word echoes around my mindscape, blowing back the wind and the trees and the grass as though a physical force. “Stop?” I echo, turning slowly in a circle. “Stop what?” I know what she means, of course. I just want her to say it. To remind me of why I must not go down the path I am preparing to take. You will lose. I close my eyes and savour her voice. It has been a very, very long time since I have heard it; this is a reconstruction, a thousand tiny images that I have pieced together to make a single, incomplete picture. This is all in my head. I find, somehow, that I do not care. “I won’t lose,” I say, spreading my arms out wide. “Do you hear me, Keira? I’m going to win!” Foolish, to talk to a dream (to talk to myself), but I have talked for years and years to the Executioner. It is not something I can just…stop. You will lose. I close my eyes and allow my arms to drop to my sides. “I’m going to bring you back,” I whisper. “Even if it kills me.” The wind dies down, and so does the voice. Then I wake up. A dream, of course. Just a dream.

#welcome to my world of words #dreaming #0.4k #small drabble #alternatively titled: going through That Emo Phase that everyone has

[wingsofmelete]

A Word to the Wise

Annette was lost. “Great,” she sighed, looking around. The ally walls loomed over her menacingly, shadows painting themselves across the dirty ground like hungry teeth. There was a dustbin outside the only door, which was old and cracked with age, and the feint smell of sulphur permeated the air. Okay, okay – think. Where had she made the wrong turn? Grumbling, Annette pulled out the creased map from her messenger bag. She stared at it for a long moment blankly, and then glanced around at her surroundings. Nope. Still lost. “Right,” Annette folded up the map, and the stashed it away. She turned back the way she came…only to find a solid brick wall. Yeah, really lost. Mentally, Annette shrugged. She must have come in from the other side, then – this wasn’t the first time she’d gotten lost on a straight path, and she doubted that it was going to be the last. Giving into temptation and whistling, she cheerfully started forward (or was it backward?) towards the mouth of the ally. Something gave a shuddering creak behind her. Annette whirled around, eyes wide, heart hammering. Her fingers began to slip towards her messenger bag, shaking almost imperceptibly. “Um…hi?” she called out, trying to make her voice sound non-threatening and hopeful. “Anyone there?” Nothing. Of course not. “Stupid imagination,” Annette sighed and began backing away towards the exit, conscious that turning around now would be just stupid. Still nothing. She was completely alone. Annette turned around and hurried out of the ally. The street connecting to it was rather busy, and cars whizzed by with the detachment of gods; the road was almost flooded with the heavy rain that had fallen over the past few weeks, and wheels skidded dangerously over the water-slicked asphalt, mere seconds away from dangerous crashes. Annette pulled her cardigan closer and shivered futilely against the rain, clutching at her messenger bag with white knuckles. She had never liked the city, for all she had been born here; she craved the open air of the countryside that she had grown up with. “Map,” Annette said, squaring her jaw resolutely. “Right.” It took her almost three hours to find the place; a dingy bar outside a small, out of the way street that didn’t seem to have a name. Annette sighed. No wonder she had gotten lost, trying to come to a place like this; she had had to plead with seven separate people, once she had gotten over her initial nervousness about actually talking to people – and none of their directions had made the least bit sense to her. It had only been god fortune that had allowed her to spy the out-of-the-way establishment as she had been ready to give up and burst into tears. Still grinning slightly, Annette went up to the door and knocked, licking her lips nervously. She should have been here hours ago – what is Cas had already left? What if he yelled at her for being late? She hated being yelled at – maybe this wasn’t a good idea. She should just give up and hurry – The door swung open, with a board-looking teenager giving her a sleepy once-over. Annette stifled her embarrassment at her gaping expression and hurriedly cleared her throat. “Ah…” she started to say, but the words just kept getting caught in her mouth. She had used up her people-quota for almost a week, and having one more stranger that she had to talk to was almost too much. “…Cas…” she managed to choke out. The teenager’s green eyes brightened almost imperceptibly, and she gave a shallow nod. “Yeah, he’s expecting you,” she said, stepping out of the way. Chains and charms rattled from every available corner of her body, and Annette found herself wondering vaguely how much all that silver had cost. “Thanks,” she whispered, pitching her voice low. The door opened into a narrow hallway that veered sharply down, with steps placed so sporadically along the brick that they were almost a hindrance rather than a help. Blindly, Annette moved forward, heaving the door click behind her in an almost ominous sort of way. There was a brief shuffling, and then she heard the click of a lock. Annette whirled around. The teenager stood at the top, light casting an eerie shadow over her face, keys dangling from seemingly limp fingers. Annette swallowed, throat suddenly dry, as the girl shoved the keys into her jeans and then turned to disappear into an alcove beside the door. Then Annette was alone. Fingers tapping nervously against the strap of her messenger bag, Annette cautiously started back downward, conscious that one wrong step could mean a broken neck. Cas wasn’t taking any chances, then. Fair enough. It seemed like Annette stumbled through the darkness for hours (which, considering her sense of direction, was an entirely possible and valid concern), and the moment she finally saw light she almost broke into a sprint. Common sense warned her to slow down, though, and – having always been a firm believer in being sensible – Annette sauntered through to the light without her steps betraying how eager she had been to get out. The room was low, lit wit only candles. There was a shiny bar to the far side, and small tables with seats that, considering the amount of chairs surrounding them, held an average of two people. It was completely empty, save for the tall man slouched next to the bar, distinctive by his stunningly white hair and spidery black tattoo that reached from his shoulder to his eye. He – quite predictably – wore dark jeans and a long leather jacket, with dark buckled boots that disappeared under the denim of his pants. His face was curiously pale, with large glassy eyes and killer cheekbones. “Cas,” Annette said with a smile, hurrying over to him and planting a kiss on his cheek. “You’re late,” Cas said, colourless eyes flicking up and down as he checked her over for any injuries. Annette’s cheekbones painted themselves red. “I got lost,” she admitted, sliding in to sit opposite him. “I never would have guessed,” Cas said, the candle-light causing his translucent skin to look eerily like a skull. “Sorry,” Annette mumbled, sliding her arms forward so that she could bury her face in them, dark hair flicking over her skin and onto the tabletop. “Well, at least you’re here,” Cas pointed out. “Sit up straight, Nettie. We’ve got work to do.” “I guess,” Annette dragged herself from the lovely cool table and glanced at her boss. The candles were doing funny thing with the temperature, and her face felt flushed and hot, while her shoulders and back felt chilly. “Who am I going with?” “Jay.” “Oh.” Annette inwardly cringed. Something of her discomfort must have shown on her face, before Cas’s eyes narrowed almost imperceptibly. “Is that going to be a problem, Annette?” Annette started having a hard time breathing. Her face burned, and angry tears welled in her eyes. “No,” she whispered, staring at her clenched hands. Cas only called her ‘Annette’ when he was angry at her, and she hadn’t even done anything, this time. “Good. You work well together, Nettie. He keeps you safe.” Annette wanted to say, Because he feels guilty, but she didn’t. For one thing, Cas didn’t know what Jay would possibly be guilty about – for another, if she ever told him, he would probably yell. A lot. Annette didn’t like it when people yelled – especially at her. “Anyone else coming?” she asked, fidgeting her fingers nervously. Tap, tap, tap… Cas blinked slowly. “Just Kara, of course.” Annette’s smile lost a bit of its strain. “Of course.” She liked Kara; the one downside of hanging around her being that she was usually in her brother’s proximity. “I think that’s it, then. You want anything to drink, Nettie?” Annette hesitated, then shook her head. “I can’t drink,” she reminded him. “Not alcohol – god, no. Coffee? Tea?” Cas cracked the barest hints of a smile. Annette found herself smiling back. “I’m fine, thanks. I’d better get going.” “Have Stormy take you home,” he ordered absently, eying the bar. Obviously, his alcohol ban didn’t include himself. “Stormy?” Annette asked politely. “Yeah, she should have let you in. She’s the newest recruit; she’s smart and she’s quick.” Annette recalled the green eyes full of sleepy intelligence. “You’re going to take care of her, then?” she asked, tilting her head to one side. “Like you took care of me?” “God, no,” Cas shook his head impatiently. “You’re different, Nettie. You should know that by now.” Something small and fragile died in Annette’s chest. “Of course I do,” she said, getting up from the table. “I’ll see you next month, Cas.” He nodded. “Later, Nettie.” At the exit, Annette paused and turned back to face him. He had moved to behind the empty bar, humming softly to himself as he poured himself something clear. Her sensitive nose wrinkled at the feint smell of alcohol that had suddenly permeated the air, and Annette clutched at her bag tightly as she hurried away. Stormy was waiting for her at the top of the hall, clutching at her keys. Annette stared at her sadly as the teenager opened the door for her. “Thanks,” she said, brushing past her. “Casper…” Stormy started to say. “Is getting very drunk downstairs,” Annette said as firmly as she could manage. She shifted from one foot to the other, flexing her fingers in agitation. “Would you please stay here and take care of him?” There, she had done it. She needn’t worry about anyone else, now. It was very dark, and sometime in the past ten minutes it had started to shower. Annette once again tugged her cardigan close and hurried forward, head bent in a futile attempt to protect her face from the pounding rain. Ten minutes later, she was lost again. “Why me?” Annette demanded tearfully to the cold brick wall. “Why do I always get lost?” She looked around the ally and wondered why she had even walked into the side-street. Her apartment was on a busy intersection, which was why she had got the place so cheap, and while she could have been going for a shortcut, she had found out long ago that with her sense of direction, that course of action was iffy at best. A dustbin sat innocently next to the only door in the street, and the feint smell of sulphur – Wait a minute. “You’re very subtle,” Annette said, voice shaking. She reached for her messenger bag. “I didn’t feel a thing.” A low, deep chuckle echoed around the confined space. Annette felt the hair on her arms stand up. Something slammed shut behind her. Annette whirled around, breathe coming out in gasps, to find that the creature had somehow boxed her into the ally by sealing off both sides. Where she had walked in only seconds before now stood a solid brick wall that looked impossibly large. The sides of the street seemed to stretch until they disappeared into the distant sky, towering above her. “What are you?” Annette called out, bouncing nervously on the balls of her feet. “Fear.” Something icy whispered against the back of her neck, and Annette gave a shriek and lunged forward, heart hammering a million miles an hour. “Despair.” Something icy and wet licked down her cheek. “Terror – urgh!” “Terror is just synonym of ‘fear’,” Annette whispered, watching as the demon slid to its knees, blood pouring out of the wound she had just inflicted upon it. It splashed around her knife and spattered onto her shoes, but Annette continued to stare as the demon scrabbled at it with an increasingly weakening grasp. “What…?” it howled, hunching forward. Annette knelt next to it, patting its hair soothingly. It was small – almost the size of a young child – with a humanoid physique and shark-like jaws. Its tongue, large and welted, lolled out as it groaned out both obscenities and pleads in equal measure. “You’re not going to recover from that wound,” Annette crooned, stroking circles around what she presumed to be its head. “Such…an easy…mark…” it hissed. “I suppose so,” Annette smiled daintily, watching as the last of the blood spilled from where its gut would have been, had the thing been human. The skin immediately hardened and shrivelled, like a prune, and then it disintegrated into dust right under her fingers. Annette ran her fingers through the silky texture a few times, humming in contentment, before getting up and brushing off her jeans. As expected, the ally had turned back to normal, as soon as she had killed the demon. Despite being still lost, Annette couldn’t stop the smile from stretching across her face as she slid the knife back into her messenger bag. Killing things always made her feel better.

#welcome to my world of words #unfinished #2.1k #demons #original work #not very interesting #alternatively titled: An Attempt At Character Development (that didn't really work) #i have such trouble with characters that aren't really obviously crazy #goddamn so annoying

[wingsofmelete]

Burning Food for the Gods

Esme watched in quiet fascination as her house burned down.

Oh, she thought, looking as flames engulfed the wood that had kept her safe for the past thirteen years: Oh, oh, oh…

Her mother sat somewhere else, crying her eyes out. Esme couldn’t dredge up the energy to go and find her; she was feeling the after-effects of a bit of shock herself, and couldn’t be bothered to be the comforter.

I’m the child, she thought, a little mutinously, as ash brushed past her face, I should be the one comforted.

Still, her mother was – at best – eccentric, and – at worse – utterly incapable of logical reasoning. She had once walked onto a busy street because she had forgotten to check the lights. She had contracted a nasty rash across her arm when she had forgotten she was allergic to dogs.

She had almost starved to death after she had forgotten to eat for a month.

Yes, Esme thought, She needs a keeper.

The fire continued to burn, bright against the darkening sky, despite the firemen’s best efforts. Esme clutched at her blanket tighter and tried not to cry. Somewhere in there, her lovely china-doll collection was melting; somewhere beneath the blanket of fire, her bedframe was cracking and her posters were curling against the heat. Her stuffed rabbit, which she had treasured dearly for all her life, was turning to little more than ash. Her computer would be exploding.

“Hey, kid,” a hand pressed down on her shoulder, and Esme looked up. The boy who looked down at her was lovely, with dark eyes and hair the same colour as the flames that were destroying her world. His face was delicate and fine, but not the least babyish, and Esme found that she wanted to reach out and poke him to make sure that someone who looked like that really existed.

“What do you want?” she asked, subconsciously straightening her shoulders in response to his perfect posture. He was wearing strange clothes; everything was black, a sharp contrast to his snow-pale skin.

“You should be dead.”

Esme felt herself freeze up. Oh, oh dear…

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she said, defiantly sticking out her chin at him. He couldn’t prove anything…

“I saw you. You walked out the back of that building without a scorch-mark on you.”

Esme clutched the blanket tighter. “I didn’t.”

“You were in the middle of that. You should have burnt to death,” he smiled, then – and it wasn’t a nice smile. He still looked lovely, but Esme suddenly found that she didn’t want to poke him anymore. “At least, you shouldn’t be able to sit here and talk to me.”

“It’s very hot,” Esme said. “I barely got out before it really caught on.”

“No,” he said. “You should have burnt to death.”

Esme felt tears start to sting. “That’s a horrible thing to say!”

“Is it?” he looked startled for a second. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it that way.”

“How was I supposed to take it?” the tears started to spill over her cheeks, and Esme quickly tried to wipe them away in horror. She didn’t cry – she hadn’t cried in a very, very long time. “You think I should be dead!” her voice rose to a wail.

“Shh!” the boy suddenly looked panicked, glancing around. “They’ll hear you!”

“Who?” Esme started up at him, sniffing rather pathetically.

“The humans! If you draw attention to me, I’m going to have to leave.”

“Stay,” Esme urged, though she couldn’t have said why. “No one wants to talk to me.”

“They’re trying to put the fire out,” the boy said. “They won’t have much luck. It’s going to burn itself out.”

“I hope it doesn’t spread,” Esme said anxiously, glancing to her neighbours houses. Though she had never been particularly fond of Mr. Blake and his enormous family (they always seemed to insist on bringing around badly-cooked meatloaf, for one thing, and trying to set her mother up with Mrs. Blake’s brother, for another), she had developed quite an attachment to little Faith Brandt on the other side of the hedge.

“It won’t,” the boy said.

“How can you know?”

“I know,” he said, like she was stupid not to take his word. Esme scowled, but just couldn’t be bothered to argue with him, so she let it go.

They settled into a comfortable sort of silence; her sitting, him standing next to her. His had had yet to move from her shoulder, but Esme found that she didn’t mind the contact as much as she did with most people. The heat from the house-turned-bonfire singed at her cheeks and made her sweat, while her back felt uncomfortably chilly.

“I should go find my Mum,” she finally said reluctantly. She didn’t want to move; she wanted to stay here and watch her world burn, because she was never going to able to see this again. Her house was gone. Her paintings – the ones she had spent hours agonizing over – were gone. Her computer, her desk, her bed…

Gone, gone, gone…

“Stay,” he said.

“I really should go…” Esme bit her lip, but made no move to leave. Her mother would be fine, for the moment; there were so many people, someone would notice if she ‘forgot’ not to run into the burning wreck of their home.

“Stay,” the boy repeated, tightening his grip on her shoulder.

“Ow!” Esme tried to jerk away from his grip, but it was too strong. A tendril of unease began to worm its way into her belly. “Jeez!”

“Sorry!” he said, quickly releasing her. “I’m sorry!”

He sounded genuinely apologetic, but Esme hesitated to forgive him. She had never been a particularly tolerant person – unless it came to little Faith, but she seemed to be the only exception – and her shoulder really ached. There were probably going to be bruises.

“It’s okay,” she finally said, grudgingly, when it became obvious that he was waiting for her to say something.

“Good,” the boy exhaled, running his now-free hand through his burning-red hair. “I’m glad,” he added at her scornful look.

“I’m going, now,” Esme said, scowling. “I need to make sure Mum’s okay.”

“Is that what you want?” the boy moved in front of her, kneeling so that his face was just below hers. He looked older than her, maybe sixteen, and Esme suddenly felt very uneasy. “Really?”

“Yes,” she snapped, leaning backwards. “Really.”

He stepped backward and straightened up, giving her an almost mocking bow in the process. Esme’s scowl deepened.

“You died,” he said, still bent at the waist. His left arm was twisted behind his back, while his right was clenched over his heart. He should have looked silly; somehow, Esme found that he didn’t. “In the fire. It covered you from head to toe and tickled at your skin like an old friend.”

Esme stared at him, frozen.

“It lapped at your face,” he continued, not blinking. “And you screamed and you screamed when you realised that you were going to die.”

“I didn’t die,” Esme whispered.

“No,” the boy agreed, finally straightening up fully to tower above her. “And don’t you find that at all strange?”

Esme hugged herself tight.

“There have been an awful lot of explosions recently, don’t you think?” the boy smiled at her. He meant it to be nice, but Esme found herself shrinking further back. She looked around, but no one seemed to be paying much attention to them. “Three down in Penshurst. Five up in King’s Cross.”

“You did it,” Esme breathed, body trembling.

The boy smiled again. “I like you,” he said. “I don’t like many people. I’m glad you’re one of us.”

“One of us?” Esme repeated.

“My baby!” someone wailed. “Where’s my baby? Where’s Esme? Esme! Esme!”

Esme felt her eyes widen as though she was a million miles away. Her head whipped around, desperately searching for where her mother was. “Mum!”

She felt lips brush against her cheek. “I’m Fox,” the boy said quietly into her ear, before pulling away.

Esme watched him with wide eyes.

“This isn’t the last time we’re going to meet,” the boy – Fox – gave her a quick, informal salute with his right hand, and then scampered back. “You’d better hurry. Your Mum sounds worried.”

“Y – you!” Esme lurched to her feet and tried to grab onto his jacket, but he was too quick.

“See you, Esme!” he called cheerfully, and then melted almost abruptly into the crowd. Esme tried desperately to follow him with her eyes, but it was as enough he had simply disappeared.

“Esme! Esme!” her mother cried again, voice raw and low and desperate.

“Mum!” Esme whirled around. At the moment, it didn’t matter who that boy was. It didn’t matter, because her mother was worried, and Esme was frightened, and she wanted nothing more than to run into her mother’s arms and hug her. “Mum!”

All in all, Esme concluded, it was the worst birthday ever.

#welcome to my world of words #unfinished #fire #1.5k words #titled: That phase I went through where I wanted really REALLY badly to burn things down

[wingsofmelete]

I was twelve when the Society started openly killing people.

I still remember the day we came to school and saw the body. It was displayed carefully on the front gate, swinging harmlessly against the metal bars of what would soon become our prison.

“Don’t look!” My Dad shouted as soon as he realised what it was, grabbing both me and Melissa and roughly turning us around – but not before I had caught a glimpse of the horrible bloated face; or the wide, unseeing, glassy violet eyes.

“Readers,” I remember whispering at the time. “They’re killing Readers.”

Melissa went white under her olive skin and gripped her book tightly.

Dad floored the accelerator and shoved hard at the wheel, screeching away from the school and back down the road.

“No,” he practically snarled. “I’ll be damned if my girls go there!”

Of course, he had no choice.

The very next day, he took both Melissa and I aside and crouched down in front of us. Melissa’s older brother, Sebastian, sat off quietly to the side.

“I want you to promise me you’ll take care of each other,” he said quietly. “You have to go back. To school.”

Melissa was pale and trembling, but there was a stubborn look in her eyes as she squared her shoulders determinedly under her denim jacket.

“Why?” I burst out, not nearly as composed as my best friend. “Why do we have to go back? They’re killing Readers!”

“I know.” Dad said solemnly, taking my chin in his rough hands and looking squarely into my eyes. “I know. But you have to go.” He hesitated.

“What?” I snapped, my twelve-year-old mind in no mood for playing games. “What’s the matter?”

“If you don’t go, they’re going to take you away from me,” Dad admitted in a soft voice. “They’re already rounding up kids who won’t go to school and shipping them out. I can’t…” his voice broke slightly, and I reached out hastily to pat him on the head (well, I tried to. His head was too high for me, so I ended up settling on his shoulder.

“It’ll be all right,” I told him. That’s what he always told me when things were bad, and I felt as though someone needed to tell him that. “I promise,” I added – just like he always did.

Dad managed to crack a smile.

“Here, Lissa,” he stood up and pulled something out of his pocket. “These are for you.”

Melissa eyed the small, brown box that would soon become her world suspiciously, taking it from his hand.

“What are they?”

“Contact lenses,” he said, voice reassuring. “They’ll change the colour of your eyes.”

“Why?” Melissa tentatively opened the small box and stared at the twin lenses with weary fascination.

“Because Isa was right. They’re killing Readers.”

Melissa clutched at the box convulsively as she stared at him.

“Why?” I said, unable to get the (glassy, staring, dead) eyes out of my head. “Why? Why? Why?” I suddenly shouted, fighting the urge to be sick. “Why would they kill people like Lissa?”

“Because they are afraid.” Dad grabbed my shoulders and pulled me into a crushing hug.

Sebastian watched us all impassively.

“I don’t want to die,” Melissa said softly, swallowing.

“You won’t.”

I almost jumped as the familiar-yet-unfamiliar voice invaded the sudden silence. Sebastian barely spoke around me; I got the distinct impression that he didn’t like me. That was fine – I didn’t like him, either.

“You won’t die, because I won’t let you.” Sebastian stared at his little sister with grave eyes. “I won’t let them get you.”

Melissa nodded, lip trembling as she stared at him.

Then she gave a small cry and launched her lithe body into his arms, hugging him so hard around the neck that his eyes bulged slightly.

“We’ll protect you,” Dad added softly, for my benefit. “Okay?”

“Okay.” I nodded.

And so we went back to school.

It was deathly quiet during the day, with the teacher’s afraid to raise their voices. Some of the kids tried to be normal, but the stink of the rotting body that was still strung up on the front gate – no one had been brave enough to take it down – made it impossible to keep up the act for the long.

During our break times, Sebastian stuck to us like a dark, comforting shadow. If someone approached us, he’d growl and bare his teeth like an attack dog.

No one bothered us after that.

Melissa found the new contact lenses itchy and uncomfortable, but the only time she dared to take them off was when she was at my place.

“They sting my eyes and make me want to cry,” she admitted to me one after a particularly trying day. A member of the Society had come – once again – to oversee the education that we were getting. We had spent most of the day avoiding her, with Melissa not taking her eyes (her beautiful, lovely, large eyes) from her shoes.

“Then they don’t fit right,” I said.

“I know, but I already told your Dad. He said that it’s too dangerous to try and get another pair.”

I licked my lips nervously and nodded.

It took a while to realise what was happening – almost a year, in fact. At the time, the only people I really cared about were my Dad and Melissa. Sebastian was thrown in by default – if Lissa’s brother got hurt, she would be hurt.

That was unacceptable.

So when Dad stayed up late, listening to the news, I was always trying to distract my best friend.

What I eventually pieced together was this: a key member of the group that called themselves ‘The Society of Revealing Light’ had been elected as Prime Minister of Australia – and had then proceeded – though careful, subtle subterfuge – to take over the government. Over the course of almost ten years, seemingly inconsequential laws and bills had been passed.

The Society slowly but surely began to gain more power.

By the time anyone had bothered to connect the dots, it was already too late.

People had fought back against the sudden onslaught of arrests and murders; of course they had. They were Australians. By then, though, The Society had already controlled most of the police force and military; any rebellion had been quickly crushed with ruthless efficiency.

The Society preached that there was only One True Way; that Readers – people who drew mesmerising power from books – were agents of the Archfiend, and must be burnt at the stake. That some people were ‘above’ others, that those who chose the Way were ‘pure’ and that those who did not were considered ‘lesser beings’.

Of course, it was okay to kill lesser beings. They didn’t qualify at humans, after all.

Agents of the Society – called Priestesses, since they were almost always female – were sent out to almost every corner of Australia with one message: kill anyone who stood against the Society.

What followed was a bloodbath of historic proportions.

Since my family had lived in a small, well off part of the Blue Mountains, things weren’t as bad for us as it was for the people in the larger cities. It’s said that the streets of Sydney flooded with blood, and that the body count in Melbourne reached so high that they had had to stack the bodies in the gutters.

Perth was turned into a ghost-town.

Only three people were killed in my town – three courageous, tragic people – who had protested when members of The Society came to collect and kill the most powerful Reader we had.

They were slaughtered and strung up around town.

No one protested much after that.

“Do you think people still remember what I am?” Melissa whispered one day after class, just before Dad came to pick us up. It had been almost

“What?” I hissed back, eyeing the rest of the school’s population wearily. They all bunched together uneasily, like they could sense something was amiss with us.

The final bell rang – the one for older kids – and Sebastian tore out of the classroom with his jacket still half done-up and his bag held in one hand.

“Hey,” he puffed quietly as he came to a stop in front of us.

“Hey,” Melissa beamed at her older brother, while I just watched on impassively.

I had never liked Sebastian, strange as it may seem. He made me uncomfortable to be around; maybe it was the way he dressed. Always in black – never a hint of colour, from his heavy jacket to his scruffy sneakers. Ironically, his hair was a pure, startling white that seemed to burn at my eyes every time I looked at it. Or maybe it was his height – I hated how he towered over me, even though he was only fifteen; just three years older.

The only reason we even communicated – infrequently as that may have been – was because of our mutual love for Melissa. He adored his little sister almost as much as I did.

So I just watched impassively and silently begged my Dad to hurry up.

“So? Do you?” Melissa said once she turned back to me.

“Do I what?” I asked blankly, my mind still focusing on the hostiles around us.

“Think that they remember that I’m a Read –”

Sebastian grabbed his sister and shoved his hand in front of her face, so that her words were cut off abruptly.

I had never seen him so furious.

Or so terrified.

“Never,” he hissed, voice shaking, “Ever say that again. Okay?” his eyes darted wildly around, like he was frightened that someone had heard our whispered conversation.

Perhaps he was right to be worried. Already, people were giving us strange looks.

“Idiot!” I slapped Sebastian’s hand away from my best friend. “Calm down! You’re just drawing more attention to yourself, nitwit!”

Sebastian glowered at me, black eyes burning, but he reluctantly nodded.

“Okay,” he said, allowing me to draw Melissa away from him with inscrutable eyes.

“You brother is a psycho,” I muttered as I scanned around for Dad’s car.

“Isa…” Melissa sighed.

“What? He is!” I turned to glare at him. He was watching us, of course – making sure that I didn’t get Melissa into any trouble, most likely. “His hair makes him look like a demon.”

“Isa!” She cried, horrified. Fat tears welled up in her eyes. “Please don’t talk like that. He’s my brother! I can’t understand why you don’t like him.”

I nodded, guilt already clawing at my stomach. It wasn’t just hurting Melissa – if the wrong person had heard my comment, they might just have dragged Sebastian off to the Priestess for no other reason than to claim he was a demon.

He could have been killed because of my petty rivalry.

Dad’s broken-down black car came slowly into the school parking lot – past the newly-barbed fence that still held the bones of the Reader. The body had long-ago decomposed away, and the bones had been individually attached to the gate. Now, it looked like some hellish apparition of a horror movie; sometimes, I just stared at it as we drove (despite the many warnings of Dad and Sebastian) thinking: this couldn’t be real.

“Get in,” he said tersely, gripping the steering wheel with white knuckles.

We all obeyed instantly, Sebastian grabbing my bag when I fumbled with it and shoving it into the back with almost no hesitation.

Around us, people were doing the same thing; it had become common practice for the school to be deserted in under five minutes.

“What’s going on?” Sebastian demanded as soon as we were out of sight of the school. “What’s the matter?”

“As soon as we get home, grab the shovel,” Dad said without taking his eyes from the road. “You’re going to help me dig.”

Silence filled the car as we all turned to stare at him.

“Y-you haven’t – ah – k-killed someone, have you?” Melissa asked tentatively, instinctively cringing.

“What?” Dad was startled enough to turn to glare at her. “Of course not!”

“Okay, then,” Melissa said in a small voice.

We all lived in a small cabin in the Blue Mountains, as far away from the town as possible. The road was all dirt, and every once in a while a tree fell down and blocked us off from civilisation.

I loved it.

When we pulled into our house – a lovely construction of wood that blended in perfectly with the surrounding trees – Dad slammed on the brakes and hopped out, Sebastian not far behind him.

Then they started to dig the room that would, one day, serve as Melissa’s crypt.

#welcome to my world of words #unfinished #old work #the dangers of reading #2k words #titled: That phase I went through where I was convinced the world hated me #(then i figured out it was nothing personal haha)