*I'm still on semi-writer's block.*
*Hope you all enjoy this chapter! Confusing as usual. Duke's POV has triggers.*
*Okay, time to write...*
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FAUNA
Higher and higher, through the last of the clouds, so far away from them all. Everything below growing smaller. Everything but the wide, open sky. Flying closer, closer, closer...
With one last push, I fly through the last remaining clouds of heaven. I gasp at what I see there. Through all the white fluffiness, there's this thin layer of fog another skylength away. Taking a quick glance downwards, I easily spot heaven and Jamaa far, far below it.
I close my eyes and take a deep breath.
I surpassed heaven. After all this time, I have found what he wanted me to. The fog, the misty layer, another skylength away. I'm only halfway there, but it's in my view now. It's so beautiful. I can't believe I'm doing so much for him. But I did it anyways. He caused my death back down in Jamaa, but I'm still doing this for him. I owe him that much.
Another deep breath. Then a smile.
I have found it. Our way back home. His home, my home, our home. He was right. Even though I found it astonishing that he could actually communicate with me, he told me what to do for my part. Clarifying that the Jamaa Mist still exists.
I open my eyes and whisper out loud. "Now do your half of our vow. Do whatever it takes. No matter how much it hurts the two. Keep your promise, and I'll continue keeping mine. I won't even tell her. Be careful out there, okay? Good luck, Fierdan."
Now all I have to do is wait. For him to destroy the world we know as Jamaa. Once and for all.
Right paw over my heart, I say, "We'll be reunited in this life. The Extraordinary Others will be together again. Just like we vowed."
CALLIAH
I overhear the two of them talking. Is that worry in their voices? Did they finally realize the wrongs they've been doing?
I hear Finny speaking. "Are you sure going to the extremes is really that necessary?"
Then Sparkle. I cringe when I hear her voice. "What are you saying? Of course it's necessary! You don't want him to--"
She's cut off by Risak. Risak, I hate him more than Taurel. He's more bloodthirsty than Taurel. Bloodthirsty for torture.
"It's most definitely necessary, kid," he says, "You don't want our world to fall corrupted again, don't you? You want Jamaa to thrive, don't you? You want to make a vital difference for the better, don't you? You want to be a hero, don't--"
Suddenly, the quiet and rushed voices vanish. Someone kicking the floor, someone punching the nearest wall, someone crying. Possibly all one person.
I cautiously move down the hallway, and I dare to peek a look from behind the corner I'm hiding behind.
Sparkle, still looking calm. But the other two...
"Your plans are sick! You're monsters; you can't just do that to a person! You promised I would be contributing for the greater good! This wasn't part of the deal!"
Risak holds tighter onto Finny's wrists. "If you still have feelings for your insane friend, Fierdan, then you should go rot in hell!"
Tears streaming down his face, Finny cries, "His name is Duke, and he has done nothing wrong! Fierdan is a completely different person! There's no need for all this! There really isn't!"
Risak squeezes Finny's wrists even harder. "You don't get it, kid. Duke isn't a normal fox, there's something about him. He's dangerous; he's growing to become a heartless murderer just like his prior self! There's something about him we also want to figure out, but that's not for you two kids."
"No, he isn't! No, no, no! No!" Finny desperately shouts, trying to wriggle out of Risak's reach. Unfortunately, the older fox's strength exceeds Finny's. "I'll show you--"
Before he can finish his sentence, I watch in horror as Risak lifts Finny off the floor by his two wrists. I stare wide-eyed at the sudden look of terror on his face. A second later, he is thrown at the opposite wall.
As Finny slumps onto the floor with a thud, my hatred at Risak and Taurel grows even more. Then I look over at Sparkle, now looking less calm.
"What was that?" she says and then hurries over to where Finny fell. "Oh my gosh, is he unconscious?!"
Risak stands where he is. He looks totally calm again. It's not like he literally just threw someone at a wall. Oh right, he did. "So be it. You know just as well as I do that he deserved it."
"No, no he didn't! You're taking things way too far!" Sparkle says, desperation in her voice.
With a feeling that Risak will harm her as well, I take a breath and run into the room they're in.
"That's enough! Hurt her and you're gonna highly regret it," I say, clenching my fists at my sides. "Like you said, I've been known to be quite the abusive mother. Do you need me to show you how abusive?"
The seconds tick by in utter silence. Sparkle steps closer to me with a fresh look of fear on her face.
What have I done?
TWINKLE
I wake up in a bed shivering yet also sweating. Breathing heavily, I sit up in the bed. Before anything else, the black bird sitting on the bedside table drops to the floor.
"Nightmare?" she asks as soon as she fully morphs into a fox.
I rub my eyes, immediately noticing the concerned look on her face. It's none other than my affiliate for my ice-fire Elemental Power in the aerial ability. None other than Black Raven.
"Twinkle dear, are you okay?" she asks, deeply concerned.
A minute later, I realize I never answered her questions. "Y-Yeah, a nightmare. I... I..." I sit up straight in bed and face her directly. "Why is it like this? Why am I so special? Why am I being protected and all this? Who are you? Why didn't anyone tell me who I really am?!"
I take a breath and continue spilling the questions out. "Why do I possess a combination of two Elemental Powers? Why is Fierdan doing this for me? Why is he going so far in protecting me? How is every thing he did a way of keeping me hidden? Why am I so wanted anyways? Why are they after him and not me? What happened before? Who are we, subjects in a test? Why am I always hidden from knowing anything more? Why, Black Raven, why!"
"Oh dear..." she murmurs, about to put her paw on my shoulder.
I push her arm down. "No," I say, "Tell me the truth. Tell me everything you know. Now."
"Sorry, no can do," she says.
"No. Now."
She gives me a solemn look. "I'm sorry, I really can't."
If I didn't just have that dream, I wouldn't care as much. I would have more patience. But now that's all gone. My patience is gone, and I care a whole lot. I will even fight her in order to get something out of her. I won't stop until she says something.
I'm about to calmly ask her one more time, but before I know what I'm doing, I pull the tailpiece off my tail. Suddenly my mind focusing on destroying it for once and for all, I throw it on the floor.
Several stomps and punches later, the once rounded shaped tailpiece is nothing but a flat sheet. Panting, I glare down at it. I destroyed it. I grin. I feel so much better now.
"Now my tail isn't held back anymore," I say through staggered breaths. "Nothing can hold me back anymore."
Black Raven looks slightly horrified at the sight of me. It makes me feel all the more satisfied.
I tilt my head, even hearing my neck crack in the process. It doesn't hurt at all. "I'll never be like how I was in the past. I'll never be that poor, weak, pathetic girl ever again."
Then Duke's signature look washes over me. Every inch of my body gets covered in a cold blue ember, my eyes blaze intensely blue, my tail gets saturated in this blue ice-fire as well as my paws and ends of my hair, and my wings come out at full force. Once ridged wings stuck in place now move just as smoothly as Duke's. But mine are still more on the ice side than the fire side, though the blue light is still there.
When I blink open my eyes again, I notice Black Raven isn't there anymore. I look all around the room, but I don't find a single sign of her.
"Darn it!" I mutter and then kick the former tailpiece to the other side of the room.
Afterwards, I fall back onto the bed. Relaxing so only my tail and wings are the glowing blue parts of my body, I eventually fall asleep again.
Two fox figures. One simply orange and one simply blue. They have no features except for their colors. They look like they're about to kiss. The blue one has its face tilted slightly up at the orange one. Their legs are curled in the same way, toes nearly touching the other's stomach. Below that are their tails entwined together, the blue one twisting around the orange one. Their arms are bent forward in front of them, and their paws are holding the other's. The blue fox in the lower right and the orange fox in the upper left. The blue one is halfway sitting up and laying down on its back. The orange one is halfway just sitting and arching over the blue one.
Then a popping sound. A blue aura appears where the blue fox's shoulders would be; an orange one in the same spot for the orange fox.
Another popping sound, and they disappear, leaving everything dark.
But no matter how hard I try, I can't get myself to wake up.
DUKE
Floating, surrounded by a dark gray cloud keeping me afloat. Nowhere near the ground, nowhere near heaven, it's just my own hell. That's all. This place is nothing but another version of hell.
I blink. She's there. Therapy room from all those weeks ago. I smirk when she looks over me. Under this thin blanket is my body. Someone, I don't know who, stole all my clothes. Wasn't her name, Blossom? I hear her voice, she's so close, her voice is so far away.
"You need help," she says.
I continue smirking. Where are my clothes? Why is a therapist here?
"How long have you been cutting?"
I laugh. I totally forgot about those... those red lines. Why did I ever stop? Living is tortuous; life is a living hell. Blood is fun to play with. I tried to cut into my heart when I was... when I was... "Since age six," I reply.
I laugh again. Smiling, I say, "I tried to go and find it. Yeah, pull it out. When I was six. The same day, I nearly killed my family member."
I pause, no longer smiling. "I nearly sent him drowning. They all called me a murderer. Not that I can blame them. I am one. Everyone I come in contact with... yeah, they all die. You'll die. I'm a bomb. Haha, I'm no fox. I'm not a living being. I'm... just... nothing."
I take a breath. "It was so freaking stupid of me to try and pull it out. To get it out successfully, I'd be dead. It's lodged too deep inside. If I could live without a heart, the organ I mean, then I would be the happiest person ever. All I want, ever since I can remember, is to get rid of that thing or my entire heart. That's how they're controlling me. I'm such a melancholic puppet. The thing's like a battery. It's why I'm alive. I need it out. I could comprehend that when I was six. I'm fifteen in a few months. What is it now? July, August..? Then I started wrists a few years later. I couldn't fully stop. No, not until that day. Well, I moved out. Slept on this one skyscraper. Sixteen stories but that building was tall. We called it the Tall Tower. I don't care about heights though. The higher, the better. Some days, yeah, I thought about jumping. But actually over the barrier. That girl, she's a life saver. Finally someone to live for. You know? The first few nights we were together, back when she didn't sleep with me, I would... take some things. Haha."
She never spoke when I was talking. I shrugged and continued. "I never really wanted to live. I'd take drugs. I'd cut. All I wanted was to destroy my heart. But that made my brain messed up real bad too. So, you know, I was screwed. So why not just die to make it easier? The first night we slept together, same place I mean, I gave us both alcohol. Well, kinda. I mean, wow, thoughts weren't straight. Tossed those cups over the edge. They shattered. Then I thought my mother said she murdered my father for no reason except she's a cruel, old vixen. When I lived with her, she abused me. You know? Because I'm a puppet bomb. Good for her. I love her. I really do. Wanna kill her too. Yeah, fun. Thought she was in a relationship with this arctic wolf at one point. Drugs, they get to you. About that girl, I love her. I screwed up so many times. So, so many times. She's different. She's kinda like a sister to me. Like we're destined to be in each other's life since... I don't know when, but it's written in the stars. I rejected every other girl that wanted to go out with me. They're all the same, all fake. But that one girl? She's different. I don't exactly remember how, but she saved my life so many times I can't count them all. Because I'm screwed up. When she told me she felt similar to how I felt underneath my fake coolness, I had to play the motivating role. That they have a reason to live, that they're beautiful, that someone out there cares... then I realized that for myself. And yeah, she's amazing."
I look up at the ceiling. "I screw up everything. I love her, I really do. Kissing her was a million times better than that other one. But, wow, I couldn't stop. The mint is like my new drug. I got addicted to it. I screwed up. I hate guys like that. That don't care about their partners. But... I'm not thinking clearly. I hallucinate sometimes. Like, that last one. I told her to run. Those guys were mad. Wanted to shoot her, kill her, who knows what. I ran at her side, but they only wanted to shoot her. I was confused because everyone wants to shoot me nowadays. Haha, fun. They wouldn't stop though. We thought we outran them. But then she was shot. Because I was a fool and stopped. I shouldn't have. I wanted to die. But I wanted her to live. I couldn't tell if she died or lived. I... I really hope she survived."
I turn my head towards the therapist. "Does that answer your question?"
She just nods. What kind of therapist only nods after you give them your life story about how you're such a screw up? What kind of therapist disappears when you--
Wait. I blink again. The dark gray cloud replaces the hospital bed again. That therapy room was weird. I miss it though. Her too. All of them. I miss those good days. Oh wait... what good days? Those days when Soulless and Fierdan didn't occupy my brain. When I didn't know I was... evil. Everything got so dark.
Oh gosh, I miss those days. I miss home. I miss those easier days. I miss it. I can't stand it. I miss it way too much. More than I should. I never apologized. I never apologized for being me.
I'm sorry I'm such a disaster. I'm sorry you were forced to hate me, to hurt me. I'm sorry I hurt you. I'm sorry I hurt myself. I'm sorry I'm so lost. I'm sorry I cheated. I'm sorry for everything, including being me. I'm sorry my name only brings up death. I'm sorry for being this dark gray cloud.
But I miss you. I miss you. Come back. You don't even have to be happy. I miss you so much, darn it! I can't stand being alone like this! I need you! You are your own person, but I need you. Little kid, teacher, therapist, parents, friends... I miss all of you so much. I hate not being able to communicate anymore. I hate being so cruel. I'm not okay, okay? I never was. But you made it better.
Thoughts... thoughts.... thoughts. I left everyone behind. And Twinkle, oh gosh, I am so sorry I'm a fail. I know they're looking for me. I don't care if they shoot me down. I just want to go back. And apologize for being me. To every single one of you. Especially you.
I keep my eyes open. Then I start falling.
When I reopen them, I'm back on the ground. I get up with a start, my heart beating so fast in my chest; it feels like the bomb finally started ticking. And it hurts. All over, it hurts.
I rub my eyes. Then I see Dawn there.
"Nightmare?" she asks.
I just stare at her, unsure if I'm breathing or not. I can't even tell anymore. I don't even know what that was. It was just... the truth.
I never told her all that. It was all a dream. That started when I flew into the sun's horizon. It was all fake.
Still staring at her with no emotions, I say, "No, not a nightmare. Nightmares don't hurt as much."
She never asked what happened in my dreams, nightmares... whatever they were.
I'm not even sure if that's good or bad.
This must be it then. When I start breaking apart, even when I'm having my own thoughts.
It was all true. Every single part of it.
And knowing that hurts the most.
