velliflorwrites

[velliflorwrites]

in which i am an approximation of chinese

[velliflorwrites]

between tongue & lonely sky, 5

[velliflorwrites]

between tongue & lonely sky, 4

[velliflorwrites]

between tongue & lonely sky, 3

[velliflorwrites]

between tongue & lonely sky, 2

[velliflorwrites]

between tongue & lonely sky, 1

[velliflorwrites]

shelf life

[velliflorwrites]

sappho: fragments

[velliflorwrites]

the prophet on troy street

[velliflorwrites]

The Twilight Path

Whatever they told you, it’s a lie. The Forest loves you.

i.

Minshi was starting to think this was not her best idea.

Before her, the Forest loomed. Thick tree trunks tangled together and branches clawed at the sky, while roots snaked across the grass towards her feet.

Behind her, the lantern lights of her village twinkled in the distance. They seemed to whisper, come back, before it's too late.

But it’d already been too late for a long time, ever since Minshi found out about the Rites.

All her life, Minshi had never wanted a soulmate. She didn’t get what was so great about them, even though apparently nothing was better than having one.

As she grew older, though, her parents piled on the pressure. They asked, "Have you thought of anyone to be your soulmate, yet?" and when Minshi answered no, they'd give her a Look. Minshi hated that Look. "Perhaps you're too young," Mama would murmur. "You'll understand when you're older."

And for a while Minshi thought that she would understand when she was older, that suddenly her soulmate would materialize out of thin air, just for her. But nobody did.

Five months after her seventeenth birthday, Mama brought it up.

"You’re nearly eighteen," she said one night after dinner, "your Rites aren't far away now. You can't afford to wait any longer."

Minshi stuffed another rice cake in her mouth. Mama didn't seem to notice as Minshi pulled the whole bowl towards herself.

“Please, Minshi, just let yourself find someone—”

"I'm not stopping myself!" Minshi set her chopsticks down, eyes prickling. "I just...don't want one. Ever."

Mama's eyebrows twitched as if she were trying not to scrunch up her face. "But you must."

"But I don't."

Mama sighed, weary, as she reached across the table and put a hand over Minshi's. "You just haven't found your soulmate yet. You'll understand when you do."

"But—"

"It's best if you go to bed soon." Mama stood, then, turning away. "Think about it, okay?"

And yet, two months later, here she was. Minshi clenched her necklace’s pendant; the bag slung across her back seemed to weigh even more as she stared into the Forest's depths. Cursed, people called it. The Forest steals people. They go there and never return.

Well, that was the plan. Sort of.

"Alright," she said. She took a deep breath, steeling herself. "It's now or never."

With a single step, the Forest seemed to swallow her whole.

ii.

The leaves were silent under Minshi's feet as she walked, a cool breeze sweeping past. She shivered. She'd been walking for what felt like hours already, and the Forest never seemed to end. Sometimes things darted through the brush just out of sight, and Minshi froze, eyes flicking from side to side. But she never saw anything.

Maybe they were right, she thought, maybe the Forest really is cursed. But she couldn’t turn around now. All she could see was tangled branches, with the barest slivers of moonlight illuminating the ground in front of her.

At some point, Minshi began to make out tiny glowing specks on the trees. When she got closer she realized they were small flowers, barely the size of her nails; the purple-white petals were soft as silk when she touched them. Soon the breeze became warmer too, and she no longer shivered with every step she took.

She’d almost started to relax when something brushed against her leg and she bit back a yelp. She peered down stiffly. A fox stared back, black eyes shining on its pure white fur. It looked like it was...waiting?

After a moment it trotted a few feet away, then looked back and flicked its tail. Minshi gulped. She took a step forward. Then another. As she approached the fox, it moved forward and looked back again.

Minshi followed the fox through the trees, trying not to think about where she was going. She stifled a hysterical laugh. Maybe this was why people disappeared: they were led deep into the Forest by some animal, only to be lost forever. The fox sniffed, almost indignant, as if it knew what Minshi was thinking.

“Sorry,” Minshi whispered, then giggled. The fox wagged its tail and kept trotting.

Finally the fox stopped, sitting on the ground, and Minshi almost ran right over it before she caught herself. She looked up. Her jaw dropped.

The trees that had surrounded her the entire journey here fell away to reveal a circular clearing with a stone pit in the center, a fire roaring merrily as people flitted around. Moonlight shone down from the expanse of sky above, framed by branches lit with glowing flowers.

She didn't even notice when someone came up to her, only jolting at a touch on her shoulder.

“Hello,” the mystery person said. “You been travelling long? Also, I'm Hekait, they-them.”

Minshi blinked. “They what?”

Hekait grinned. “My pronouns! Like she or he, basically. You?”

“Uhhh...she, I guess. I'm Lu Minshi. Or just Minshi, if you want.”

She was still staring at the scene before her in disbelief. So this is where the people went.

Meanwhile, Hekait had called to someone in the clearing.

“We got a newcomer!” Hekait said.

“Oh?” There was a familiar lilt to the voice.

Minshi’s vision tunnelled when she saw the person Hekait had brought back—her sleek black hair was shorter now, and she was taller, but those eyes were almost exactly the same as she remembered. Suddenly, it was hard to breathe.

The girl gaped as soon as her gaze fell on Minshi. She glanced down at Minshi’s dragon pendant, then back up at her face.

"Minmin?" she whispered.

iii.

"Ming An," Minshi whispered back.

Ming An’s hand twitched, like she wanted to reach out. She stared at the pendant.

"I can't believe you kept that," she said. "I thought you would've gotten rid of it ages ago."

Minshi fidgeted with her bag strap. "Well, I forgot I had it, honestly. I only found it when I was packing..." She gestured at her bag. "Turns out I never lost it."

When Ming An disappeared three years ago, so did the necklace she’d made for Minshi’s twelfth birthday. They had been drifting for years, anyways. Minshi barely noticed when it was gone.

“Unexpected reunion, huh?” Hekait quirked an eyebrow.

Ming An choked out a laugh. “Yeah, I guess so. Came from the same village, so...”

Minshi just nodded tightly.

“Anyways.” Ming An shook her head. “If you’ll excuse me…”

Hekait waved as Ming An walked away, glancing back a few times and looking away every time Minshi caught her eye. Minshi tried to ignore the weird feeling in her stomach as Hekait led her into the clearing. She followed without a word.

iv.

Hekait spent the next few days showing Minshi around.

Everyone lived in a massive tree, with branches reaching so high that Minshi imagined they could touch the ever-present moon. A ladder curled around the trunk, passing several rooms, but Minshi’s room was tucked between two thick roots. Hekait told her that the Forest always made room for newcomers, and sometimes people who left would have empty rooms that could be filled.

"People leave the Forest?" she asked.

"Sometimes," Hekait said. "When you're ready. The Forest doesn't let you leave otherwise. And it's connected to everywhere—like, I'm from the City, but Ari's from a village, like you. Fion's from—actually, I dunno. You can ask him if you want. Anyways, the Forest will always be somewhere you can return to, a place to belong, but...some people leave, yes."

"Huh. Okay."

Minshi liked hanging around Hekait. They were easy to talk to, and when Minshi finally told them why she ran away, they didn’t scoff or tell her she was “too young.”

“Not wanting a soulmate is perfectly fine,” Hekait said. Minshi glanced up. Their face was serious, but still, they smiled. "It's nothing to be ashamed of."

"It's—it's not?" Minshi shook her head. "But everyone says you need a soulmate, and...if you don't..."

"There's nothing wrong with you," Hekait said firmly. "You don't need a soulmate to be whole, and you can have a perfectly fulfilling life without one. I mean, I don't have a soulmate and I'm happy like that. Plenty of people are."

Minshi nodded, suddenly filled with relief at Hekait’s words. She wasn’t weird. She wasn’t alone.

“Thanks,” she said. Hekait gave her a knowing nod before launching into another conversation.

On the twelfth night, Ming An approached her at dinner.

"Hey, Minmin," Ming An said.

Minshi looked up. She'd just sat down by the fire, waiting for food to be passed around.

"Hey," she said, curious. So far they’d only exchanged awkward glances and the occasional word or two. Sometimes she wondered if that would ever change, and a part of her felt sad at the thought that it wouldn’t.

Ming An shifted her weight. "Come with me?" she said finally. "I've...got something to show you."

They made their way up to the top of the tree where Ming An's room was. For some reason, it felt strange that their rooms were basically the same—only, on top of the wall-ledge that Minshi usually kept empty, there were two gently steaming bowls of soup.

"Uh...?"

Ming An stayed silent as she carefully placed one of the bowls in Minshi's hands, taking the other for herself and kneeling on the floor. Minshi kneeled across from her.

"Honestly, I don't think I ever expected to see you here," Ming An said, eyes on the ground between them. Minshi blinked. "But somehow, I'm not surprised, either. It just...feels right."

"Okay?"

Ming An looked up. "I'm sorry that I left without telling you," she said, solemn. "I'm sorry we drifted apart, but we went our separate ways and I don't regret it. I hope you'll forgive me for that."

Minshi stared at her soup. "There's nothing to forgive," she mumbled. "That’s just life."

"I suppose so." Ming An held up her bowl. "Cheers?"

They clinked their bowls together, trying not to spill anything, and drank.

Minshi's first thought was that the soup was delicious. The delicate seasoning reminded her of her father’s cooking, while the heat warmed her from the inside out. Chopped roots complemented the familiar taste of rice, and suddenly all Minshi could think of was the last meal she had with her parents before she ran away.

"I know it's not really the same," Ming An said quietly. "It's only rice and vegetables but...it must be strange to be somewhere so different. I thought maybe I could give you a little piece of home."

Something plunked into Minshi's soup and she rubbed her eyes, not trusting herself to speak. Ming An put her soup down and scooted closer.

"Thank you," Minshi finally whispered. "It's really good."

Ming An smiled.

"Keep eating it, then," she said, "before it gets cold."

v.

The warm feeling burrowing into Minshi’s chest was strange: she’d felt something similar before, back in the village, and she felt it when she was laughing with Hekait and the others she’d met: Ari, Zee, Fion, Fion’s boyfriend whose name she still couldn’t remember—but mostly she felt it around Ming An. It was strange. Familiar, yet mystifying.

“What do you think home feels like?” she asked Hekait once. Hekait had taken a long time to respond.

“Somewhere you’re safe,” they said finally, “somewhere you’re loved for being you.” Their eyes turned sad. “The City...it’s not like that. Trust me.”

Minshi didn’t press.

“So how long have you been in the Forest?” she asked instead.

“Seven years, probably.”

“That's...a long time.”

“It is.”

They lapsed into silence again.

“I think I might try and go out again,” Hekait said abruptly. “It's been kinda in my head for a while. Maybe someday, I'll go out into the world again. Find something, someplace to love. Y’know?”

Minshi nodded, even though she hadn’t considered it before. She thought of her village, and all the places she hadn’t seen yet, and of the Forest, always there for her.

“I guess,” she said. She wondered if Ming An ever thought about leaving. She wondered what her parents would say if she came back—if they would be tearful, angry, overjoyed.

Even after Hekait went to bed, Minshi kept wondering.

vi.

Minshi was sure her birthday passed already, though she wasn’t sure when. Hekait’s words rang in her mind: Maybe someday, I'll go out into the world again. Find something, someplace to love. She wasn’t fully ready, she didn’t think she ever would be, but she’d made her decision.

She knew Ming An had too. They planned out the departure together. But the night before, as Minshi turned away from the trees where a path seemed to be waiting for them, Ming An grabbed her wrist.

“Wait.”

Ming An led the way back to her room, the route familiar to Minshi by now. When they reached it, Ming An made her turn and face outside, and Minshi waited as Ming An’s footsteps scuffled on the floor. She came back within moments.

“Close your eyes,” she said. Minshi shut her eyes, skin tingling as Minshi’s fingers brushed the nape of her neck.

Finally, when Ming An said she could look, Minshi glanced down. Her eyes widened.

Resting next to her necklace pendant was a simple ring carved from dark wood—only, the inside was meticulously detailed with a dragon. The scales shimmered subtly in shades of purple, white, silver and deep black, but when she tilted the ring, the shimmer became more greenish.

“Wow,” she breathed, turning. “When—how did you—”

Ming An only grinned at her. “I knew you’d like it,” she said.

“Like it? Ming An, this is—incredible.”

“Keep it, then,” Ming An said, grin widening. “It's yours.”

Minshi tackled her best friend in a hug and Ming An grunted as they hit the floor. They stared at each other for a second before bursting into laughter.

After giggling so hard that her stomach hurt, Minshi finally rolled back to look out the entrance, gasping for breath. She touched the ring, smile dimming. She was going to leave the Forest. She knew she could always come back, but still, there was a sort of melancholy hanging around the stars and the treetops.

“You know, I think I always knew we’d find each other again,” Ming An said suddenly. She was staring at the ceiling when Minshi glanced over. “Even after we separated. I just always had this feeling. I actually...made the ring a long time ago.” She looked over then, a softer smile on her face. Minshi reached out and laced their fingers together.

“I tweaked it a little recently,” Ming An said. “After you came. And I thought about giving it to you for your birthday, but I wasn’t sure if you’d appreciate the reminder, because...”

Minshi winced. Her Rites.

“So I ended up not giving it to you then. Happy late birthday, by the way.”

“...Thanks.”

“But today I thought, this is it. So here.” Ming An squeezed Minshi’s hand gently. “Your birthday would’ve been special, but maybe not in a way you wanted. Tonight, though? It’s different. Better. I think you deserve that.”

They were silent for a long time, listening to the breeze outside and the steady thump-thump of their own heartbeats.

“Thank you so much,” Minshi finally said. “I really, really love it.”

Ming An just smiled.

She looked out the entrance again, at the stars and the new moon, thinking of her village. Her first home.

“Do you think you’ll go back to the village?” she asked. Ming An hummed.

“Maybe,” she said. “If you go, I'll go.”

“I could see my parents again,” Minshi said. “Maybe. I don’t know. This’ll be...hard to explain to them, for sure.”

“Yeah, good luck with that. But if you want to, I'll be there. They always liked me anyways.” Ming An smirked at her, and Minshi laughed. Silence fell again as Minshi traced the curve of the ring.

"You're really amazing," she told the ceiling.

Ming An snorted. "I know.”

vii.

When Minshi and Ming An met in the morning, Hekait was waiting for them, face carefully blank. Minshi and Ming An exchanged a glance.

“Come on,” Ming An said eventually. They all trudged towards the edge of the clearing.

As they reached the gap in the trees, Hekait slowed. They stared at the path, bottom lip caught in their teeth. Minshi felt a pang in her chest; she’d only lived here for a few months. Hekait had lived here for years, even longer than Ming An had.

“You don’t have to do this,” Minshi said gently.

Hekait shook their head. “No,” they said, “I'm...I really want to. I wanna see the world again.”

Ming An put a hand on their shoulder. “You’ll be okay,” she said. “You’ll make it through.”

Hekait nodded, inhaling shakily. “Yeah. Let's do this.”

The journey out was much quicker than what Minshi remembered of the journey in. Slowly, the tiny flowers disappeared and darkness gave way to sunlight trickling through the branches above.

Finally they reached the edge of the Forest, where a dirt path snaked from their feet to the horizon, well-travelled and packed by the feet of hundreds before them. To their right Minshi could see a village in the distance, and for a second she let herself imagine it was her old village.

Minshi took a deep breath, touching the pendants of her necklace for a second, and then letting go.

"Alright then," she said. "Here's to the journey ahead."

Here's a lesson for you, the stone reads. You trace the carved characters, edges worn smooth by time and touches from hands just like yours, and look forward where trees await. No matter where you are, or who you are...the Forest will always be here for you.

At the end, barely legible, it says: Love, Lu Minshi.

[velliflorwrites]

The First Mother

People liked to say the world had ended long before Niko was born.

Of course, the world hadn’t really ended—in Niko’s opinion, at least, though obviously he’d never seen the world before his birth. Houses were still standing, schools still had classes, mothers still scolded their children fondly. Life went on more or less the same way it did before, as far as Niko could tell.

Niko’s mother liked to say the world hadn’t ended yet.

“The gods can be kind,” she said, “if we pay our dues.”

Niko, at six years old, didn’t understand what she meant by that. At thirteen, he still didn’t, but for different reasons. And anyways, he didn’t like thinking of his mother after she’d died. Apparently his mother hadn’t paid her dues when the illness took her.

There was a small garden near where Niko used to live, and he spent most of his time there when he wasn’t in the crowded orphanage. The garden was overgrown and ugly, stuffed behind two buildings as if to hide it from view, but Niko loved it. It was the only place he felt at home.

One day, though, there was a girl in his garden when he creaked open the gate.

“Why are you in my garden?” he asked, indignation rising. This was his spot, not hers.

The girl turned. She looked a year or two younger than Niko, with big eyes and skinny limbs. She blinked.

“Hello,” she said softly. “I didn't know this was your garden.”

“Well, it is.”

“I only wanted to take care of the plants. Some of them…” She turned back to the garden. Niko noted that parts of it had begun to turn yellow. “They don’t look so good.”

“That's none of your business,” Niko snapped. “And what’s your name, anyways?”

The girl hummed, unbothered by Niko’s outburst. “The Mother Goddess is everyone’s business,” she said. “And my name’s Alice.”

“The—who?”

“The Mother Goddess.” Alice looked at him. “You don’t know her?”

Niko shook his head slowly, anger forgotten. He felt like he’d heard of her, but that was inching too close to thoughts of his mother, so he pushed the idea away. “No.”

“She's the embodiment of Earth, the first mother to all creatures. She’s life.” Alice tilted her head, considering something. “Come with me. I'll show you something.”

Before Niko could protest, Alice had already grabbed his wrist, tugging him forward with a surprisingly strong grip. After winding through several backstreets that had Niko’s head spinning, Alice let go.

“Here,” she said. “Look.”

Niko rubbed his wrist as he looked at the wall in front of them. There was a niche carved into the wall, with a little stone statue sitting inside. The figure was old, worn so smooth by time that Niko couldn’t make out any features besides the vague impression of flowing robes and a peaceful face.

“Um,” he said.

“That's her,” Alice said. She nodded at the statue. “Isn’t she beautiful?”

“Sure…?” Beautiful was a bit of a stretch, Niko thought.

Alice sighed as if Niko were a child who didn’t understand something valuable. When Niko bristled, Alice simply flapped a hand at him. “I figured,” she said. “You’ll see.”

“See what?”

Alice didn’t answer.

For the next few weeks, Niko saw Alice tending to the garden every now and then, and the yellow and brown spots began to disappear.

“Why do you keep doing this?” Niko asked.

“Doing what?”

“Taking care of the plants, cleaning up, whatever.” Niko gestured at the ground. Even the cans and bottles that had occupied the dirt were gone, as if they’d never been there in the first place.

“Oh. That.” Alice shrugged. “I'm paying my dues, I guess. The Mother Goddess needs us. She can’t do everything, you know.”

She looked up when Niko didn’t respond. “What?”

“...Nothing. Just—sounds like something my mother used to say.”

“Oh. She must’ve been a wise woman.” Maybe something showed in Niko’s face, because Alice didn’t press further. “Well, are you going to just stand there?”

“I—right.” Niko moved into the garden, limbs mechanical, and he squatted down to watch Alice pry two vine clumps apart. One of them was brown on the inside. She produced a pair of rusty shears, chopping the brown part off in one fell swoop. The still-green clump gave a little wriggle as it shrank back.

“Here,” Alice said, putting the brown clump into Niko’s hands. He blinked.

“What am I supposed to do with it?”

Alice shrugged. “It’s dying,” she said, “bit too late to save it.”

“I guess.”

“All we can do now is take care of the part that’s still alive.”

“Hm.”

Niko followed Alice as she moved around the garden, singing some off-key tune and checking over each plant. They waved gently as she touched them. Niko swore he could even see a flower bloom when Alice worked on one plant, and he frowned. The plants didn’t move this much for him. He was lucky if they curled around his fingers briefly, so why did they move for Alice?

“All done,” Alice said eventually. She stood up, brushing at her pants, but that only smeared the dirt more. “I'll be back soon,” she said to a vine, and it wiggled at her as she walked back to the gate, where Niko waited.

“Why do they like you so much?” he asked. “You’ve only been here, what, four times?”

Alice looked down the alleyway that led to the small shrine she’d shown Niko. “They respond in kind to what you give. Paying my dues, remember?” She smiled. “Next time, you try.”

“Hm. Fine.”

Niko stood staring through the gate for a long time after Alice walked away.

When Niko was fifteen, the first of the Storms hit. Clouds had been gathering for the past year, and thunder frequently rolled through the narrow, cobbled streets. Sometimes red lightning flashed, bright and sharp like daggers, and Niko would turn and hurry back to the orphanage. Alice never left, though. Every time he turned to look over his shoulder, even as rain started pouring down, he could see her in the garden until it disappeared from view entirely.

Niko thought he knew storms. He heard stories of towns by the piers getting overwhelmed by terrifying waves, houses carried away in an instant, but his town was more inland. Surely he was safe?

The floods proved him wrong.

The first one struck three months after his fifteenth birthday. He'd gone to bed to the now-familiar sound of rain slamming at his window, so loud that it covered the snores of the other children in the room. By the time he woke up, the town had changed overnight. He peered out the window; a river swept through the streets. Scarlet light glinted off the water like blood as lightning tore through the sky. He was suddenly glad that the garden was uphill; he didn’t think the plants could survive this.

When he opened the door, someone crashed right into him: Felice, one of the older boys.

“What's going on?” he said, stepping aside. He gestured at the crowded hall.

“Flooding.” Kids streamed into the room as Felice waved them in. “The bottom floor’s a lake by now.”

Niko squeezed his way past the crowd to look down from the balcony. Indeed, the water had managed to find its way through the door. The last of the stragglers were climbing the stairs, some throwing fearful glances behind them as water nipped at their heels, and Niko squinted to look through the windows by the door. The rain was stopping. He had half a mind to go check on the garden while no one would notice him missing, but shook his head. With the way the water was hissing and spitting as it touched the door...yeah, no.

The gods can be kind, if we pay our dues. The water was angry. Niko didn’t want to find out what’d happen if he angered the gods any more.

He was about to turn away when he saw a speck out of the corner of his eye—was that...a person outside?

“Sorry,” Niko muttered as he pushed more people out of the way. Then he inhaled sharply.

It was Alice. She was holding her arms out for balance as she trudged through the water. Niko glanced at the flooded downstairs hall again. He looked out the window.

“You’re insane,” he said, and he hurried down the steps and out the door before he could think any further.

The water tingled. Niko grimaced, sloshing towards the tiny figure of Alice in the distance.

“Have you lost your mind?” he shouted over the roaring wind.

Alice didn’t look back. Niko swore and waded faster.

“Alice!” he yelled. “Alice!”

He finally caught up to her and grabbed her arm. “Are you crazy?” he said. “You should be inside!”

Alice tried to shrug him off but Niko only held on tighter. “The garden!” she said, “I can’t just leave it!”

“It's just a garden, Alice! What about you?”

Alice ignored him. She ended up pulling Niko along as she pushed forward. “Alice!”

The water slowly receded as they climbed through the web of alleys, towards the garden. The garden’s iron gate was freezing when Niko touched it. Alice yanked it open and went inside, leaving Niko to stumble in behind her.

The ground was blissfully dry in the garden. It was relatively untouched by the floods and rain, and Niko traced the edge of a leaf as droplets dripped lightly from the tip.

“Niko,” Alice said suddenly, “what happened to your legs?”

Niko looked down. “Ah,” he said, faint. “That's probably not good.”

The skin had turned a grayish color where the water touched him. He reached down, hissing as he rolled up one pant leg, and resolutely avoided Alice’s eyes as her face slowly paled.

“Sit down,” she said, “I'll—sit down. Wait here.”

“Sure,” he said. “I'm not going anywhere.”

Alice disappeared through the gate, and Niko waited as one minute turned into two, turned into three…

By the time Alice returned, Niko had stared at the sky for so long that the clouds were imprinted onto the back of his eyelids. The gate clanged shut behind her as she fell to her knees at Niko’s side. She was clutching the Mother Goddess’s statue in her hand.

“Just stay still,” she said, skimming a hand over the affected areas. “Don’t move.”

She pressed the statue to her forehead, closing her eyes, and murmured something under her breath that Niko couldn’t hear. Something pulsed in the air around him. His skin seemed to grow warmer...and the plants began to move.

A vine curled around his ankle, snaking up his calf as more joined it. Alice stopped him when he tried to tug his leg away.

“Don’t worry,” she said, “the Mother Goddess will help you in kind, as you’ve helped her.”

“But—” But he hadn’t, had he? He couldn't remember doing anything other than…

Alice nodded at the garden. “You’ve paid your dues.”

Slowly the plants began to recede and Niko chanced a look at his legs, which looked...perfectly normal. He let out a breath.

“Thank you,” he said to the plants, now curled on the walls and sprouting from crevices like they always were. One of them waved at him.

Silent, Alice simply watched the sky above. She mouthed something and smiled.

The peace didn’t last. Two weeks later, another Storm hit. And another. And another. Sometimes they were short and fizzled out within hours. Sometimes they plagued the town for weeks. Afterwards, Alice and Niko checked on their garden, finding more and more dying plants every time. Alice pressed her lips together and Niko grimaced.

It was one of these times that they passed someone on the way back.

A man was standing where the sidewalk used to be, looking at a car half sunken into the knee-deep water. Somehow, he didn’t seem bothered by the grayness staining his fingers.

“Hey!” Alice said, waving at the man. “Are you alright?”

The man looked up. “What are you kids doing here?”

Alice didn’t listen to him as she moved closer, grabbing his arm and examining the gray skin. The shade was darker than anything Niko had ever gotten from the water, turning yellowy-green in some places, and Niko shuddered as he looked at his own hands. The water had affected him less and less after the first time. He thought it might have something to do with the garden, or with Alice, or both.

The man yanked his hand away, scowling, and Niko wondered if he could feel the water’s wrath at all.

“Your hands!” Alice said.

“What about them?” The man took a step back from Alice to peer inside his car, as if searching for something. Plastic cups and bags floated inside. Niko could hear the sticky drip, drip of an oily black substance leaking from the car and watched as it oozed on top of the water. The water steamed where it touched. A wave rose up and crashed down on the substance but it didn’t break. It just kept dripping, slowly, and Niko had the sudden thought that it looked dead.

“I can help you,” Alice was saying when Niko looked back at her and the man, “the Mother Goddess will help if you help her—”

“Mother Goddess?” The man snorted. “What’re you talking about?”

“The Mother Goddess,” Alice said, so earnestly that something churned in Niko’s stomach. He started wading closer to both of them. “The first mother, the embodiment of life, the—”

“The gods are dead, kid,” the man said. “The sooner you learn that, the better.”

Niko put a hand on Alice’s shoulder but she shook him off.

“They’re not dead!” she insisted, “the Mother Goddess—”

“Is long gone,” the man said. “The world ended years ago, didn’t you know? It was a long time coming.” He scrubbed a hand through his beard as he regarded Alice. “Listen,” he said, “forget about this gods business. It won’t get you anywhere; there’s nothing anybody can do.” He squinted at the sky, shaking his head. “It’s out of our hands.”

Alice was shaking. Niko grabbed her again, this time dragging her back before she threw herself at the man.

“It’s not out of your hands,” she growled. “Everyone has the power to do their part. Look at this!” She waved at the sky wildly. “You think this just comes out of nowhere? You think this wasn’t because of people just like you doing nothing and watching the world fall apart?”

“Alice—”

“You don’t get it, you—it’s not too late! The world isn’t over yet, it’s not too late if you’d just open your eyes!”

“Alice!”

She was screaming now. Niko yanked her back and steered them both towards the orphanage, while the man stared after them, jaw hanging slack. When he caught Niko looking, his expression flattened and he turned away.

“Alice, what was that?”

Alice clenched her fists and unclenched them, taking several long moments to compose herself again. She didn’t look at Niko.

“I'm sorry,” she said, barely audible. “That wasn’t...directed at you or anything. It’s just—some people, you know, they just don’t understand what they’re doing to the Earth by not doing anything at all.”

Niko stared down at his feet, dripping onto the orphanage floor. There was nobody around; everyone had retreated upstairs once the flooding started up again.

“I sorta get it,” he said. “I mean, the Earth is so big, and he’s only one man.”

I'm only one too, he thought. What can I even do?

“But look at us,” Alice countered. “We’re just kids, aren’t we? We’re still doing what’s gotta be done. That's why the Mother Goddess needs all of us. We’re only human, but together, we can make a difference.”

She looked up. “I guess I never really answered your question, did I? The first few times we met.”

“Huh?”

“I do this because I want to make a difference,“ Alice said. “Because—even without gods, Earth needs us to make that difference. To make those changes.”

She glanced at the doors now securely locked behind them. Over the past year reinforcements had been added to the sides, but water still leaked through. “So that's why,” she said. “Because together, we help. What we do matters.”

She poked Niko in the chest. “That includes you.”

“Yeah.”

She smiled as she reached for the doors again, preparing to trek back to wherever she lived. Niko still didn’t know, and he never asked. “Lots of work to do,” she said as the doors swung shut, “so look forward to it.”

It took a long time. It took almost five years for the Storms to stop, and it would take even longer for the skies to clear, where heavy clouds hung.

In front of a gate tucked away behind two buildings were two people. The gate led to a beautiful little garden, and one might think it was a shame that such a place was hidden away. But maybe that was part of its appeal.

The young man fiddled with a latch on the gate, finally sliding it shut and coming to stand by the other’s side. He looked out at the cobbled streets and narrow alleys, once filled with water and debris, and offered a hand to the woman sitting on the ground.

Alice took the hand, pulling herself up. “I think we should plant some more flowers tomorrow,” she said as they set off. “Oh, and the bushes need to be taken care of…”

Behind them, an old stone statue sat, the figure small enough to fit into a niche carved by the side of the gate. The inside of the niche glinted in the light of the setting sun, making the statue seem to glow faintly green.

Niko grinned as he turned to look at the horizon. “Can’t wait.”

[velliflorwrites]

The Blue Hour

        There’s a crack in the mirror. It snakes from just beneath the top left corner, running over my face and breaking it in two, right around the frown. Stomach—suck it in; pinch right next to my belly button before hitching my leggings up almost to my ribs. My reflection looks back at me, unimpressed.

        A knock sounds on the bathroom door. “Mira? Are you in there?”

        “Yeah.” I reach for my hoodie and pull it over my head, letting the oversized fabric pool past my hips. The door opens.

        “Do you want anything to eat?” Aimee asks as she pokes her head in. Her eyes glint and the planes of her face are painted silver in the half-light; night has already fallen, even though it’s barely seven-forty-something, and only the glow of streetlights below illuminates the bathroom through the window on my left. The light switch on the right side of the sink remains pointed down. Untouched.

        “No, I’m good.” Picking up my phone from the sink counter, I press the power button until it shuts down completely. Mother won’t be happy. I shove my phone into my pocket anyways and hope she won’t think to call Aimee’s mom instead of me. “I’m not hungry.”

        My stomach growls then, and I avoid looking at Aimee. She steps closer. Shuts the door. Silence.

        “Are you okay?”

        I slide my gaze sideways, away, but I catch my own eyes—so brown they’re black, shadows underneath—in the mirror and look the other way. “Fine,” I mumble, “and I had dinner, already.”

        Half of it, at least, before—

        I push the thought away.

        Aimee lowers the toilet seat and sits on top of it. The streetlights stain her hair as she stares at me, chewing her lip. After a moment, she stands—unlocks the window, slides it open an inch, and sits down again. “No,” she says slowly, “I don’t think so.”

        The January air brushes at my cheeks. It had been freezing outside, but I couldn’t find it in myself to regret slipping out the door the moment Mother looked away, right after my desperate five minutes, please, I just need five minutes alone, and her stare—five minutes.

        Five minutes. All I had was five minutes and the sound of the vacuum covering the tinkle of glass in the kitchen, heartbeat thudding as I opened the front door, locked it behind me, and ran.

        “What’s this?” Aimee asks as she opens her phone’s messaging app. My name appears at the top and a strip of white blurbs runs down the left side of the screen:

aimee

aimee im at ur house rn

sorry ik its suddden but I didntk nwo where else t ogo

aimee?

        “You’ve never come to my house before,” she says as she puts the phone back in her pocket. “And you don’t have to tell me everything, but...something’s wrong. You don’t have to pretend.”

        I stare at her fingers twisting in her lap as her eyes burn holes into me. She reaches for my hand suddenly and I stumble back a step before I even register what she’s done, muttering, “Sorry, I don’t—” but it’s already too late.

        “Mira?”

        “Yeah?” I choke out.

        The silence drags on. Finally she says, “If you want to talk, you can. Just so you know.” She almost reaches forward again, pulling her arm back after it moves forward as if instinctual. “I’m here.”

        An eternity burns itself into my tongue as the words bottle up in my throat. There’s so much I want to say; there’s so much I can’t say. There’s so much I don’t tell her, I think, and I don’t know if I mean Aimee or her.

        Eventually what comes out is, “I think it might be my fault.”

        My hand twitches, but the words have already settled in the air between us. Aimee’s face twists; I kind of hate it, but at the same time it almost feels...soothing. Like I’m a balloon stretched too tight letting out all the air inside me. Like I’m not alone.

        “I’m sorry,” she says. “But...why do you think that?”

        Because if I hadn’t shut the door in Mother’s face, maybe she wouldn’t have gotten so angry. Because if I had only listened to Mother more, maybe Father wouldn’t have gotten involved. Because if I was just better, maybe this wouldn’t have happened at all.

        “I don’t know.” I curl my hands into fists, crossing my arms tight. “Just...I don’t know. I think...my parents’ arguing was all because of me, anyways.”

        Look how you’re harming her—Hey, give the bowl back, I was going to eat that—Stop defending her, she needs to learn—See? It’s all your fault.

        It’s all your fault. It’s all you.

        I don’t realize I’m shaking until a hand lands on my shoulder and I hunch into myself, stuffing curled fists into my hoodie pocket, inhale, inhale, inhale, my eyes burn and I press my lips together—“Mira?”

        Aimee’s fingers are digging into my shoulders. “Mira, what happened?”

        I shake my head. Suddenly, Aimee’s standing, her arms wrapped around my back, and she’s pulling me closer and I freeze—

        Mother’s arm draped over my shoulders, a cage so loose and yet I still can’t escape—

        There’s a hand rubbing circles, slow and smooth, into my back, and I collapse forward. I pull one hand out of my hoodie and clutch at Aimee’s back in return. “It’s okay,” Aimee’s saying, “it’s okay. It’s not your fault.”

        “You don’t know that,” I whisper, but I can’t say any more over the lump in my throat.

        “I do,” she says. “It’s not your fault. It’s not you.”

        A fresh wave of tears wells up in my eyes and I squeeze them shut, burying my face into Aimee’s shoulder as she keeps rubbing circles. “One,” she murmurs, “in. Two, out. Three, in. Four...”

        Shuddering, I inhale and exhale to her counts until finally I can breathe again. “I’m sorry. I didn’t even tell your mom or anything, and...I just didn’t know what else to do.”

        “It’s okay,” she says again, “you don’t need to be sorry.”

        The half-light shines on both of us, glinting in the mirror and silhouetting two figures wrapped in each other, so entangled that I can’t tell where one of us ends and the other begins. After an eternity of silence aside from the shff, shff of my hoodie under Aimee’s fingers, her hand stops. I take a step back, but her hand clasps my wrist and she pulls me towards the door.

        “And Mira?”

        “...Yeah?”

        “You’re beautiful,” she says, firm. “No matter what anyone says.” And I almost believe her. I nod, wiping my eyes when she looks away.

        “C’mon, we can go downstairs and eat ice pops, if you want. My mom’s asleep. And then we can watch something in my room, too, if you want.”

        I touch my phone, heavy in my pocket. If Mother hasn’t tried to call me already, she’ll be calling soon, and I’ll have to answer. Aimee’s eyes are full of something I can’t quite identify; I wish I could stay the night, or something, but I’ll have to go back tonight. I’ll have to talk to her. Half of me hopes that she’ll forget by tomorrow and everything can go back to normal; the other half doesn’t want her to forget. I scrub a hand over my eyes.

        Even so, I can’t help the smile that creeps across my face.

        “Okay,” I say, and Aimee opens the door.

[velliflorwrites]

Kalztan

"It's too early to be awake," Quinn mumbled as he trekked into his dorm room's kitchenette for a bite to eat.

"It's three in the afternoon," his roommate answered from his spot at the tiny table crammed in the corner. Jason didn't look up, still clacking away at his laptop and occasionally munching on the blueberries he'd set to the side.

Quinn made a face at his Jason's productivity, before turning to the counter and picking out a mug to fill with the godly elixir known as coffee.

Quinn's stomach rumbled as he poured water into the ancient coffee machine. Ignoring it, he leaned against the counter, watching the liquid fall into his mug drop by drop. He scrubbed a hand over his face, waiting.

Ugh, I'm hungry but...coffee first... 

Quinn had priorities.

"There's omelettes on the stove for you," Jason said, sounding almost like it was an automatic response. He shut his laptop and stood, the chair screeching against the once-white tiled floor. Jason and Quinn both winced.

"Anyways," Jason said, once their ears had recovered, "I'm going to classes now. Don't burn down the dorms before I get back."

He grabbed his bag from its hook by the door and left to a chorus of Quinn's indignant squawking -- "It was one time!" -- though Quinn didn't miss the teasing tilt of Jason's lips as the door closed behind him.

"It was only some pasta anyways," Quinn muttered mutinously. Granted, it was pretty difficult to set off the fire alarms when one was only cooking spaghetti. Quinn preferred to consider it a talent of his.

Finishing off his coffee, Quinn dropped his mug in the sink, on top of the already precarious pile of dirty dishes, and wandered over to the stove. He grabbed the plate of omelettes and a fork, before squatting and digging around the snack cabinet for some chips -- as a side, he told himself.

Quinn stood, an almost-empty bag of family-size barbeque flavored chips clutched triumphantly in his hand.

And he blinked.

That definitely wasn't there before.

On the counter lay a journal, bound in leather and tied with a single string. It was clearly crafted with the greatest care, despite its simplicity, and the pages' edges were rough with age. But, as far as Quinn knew, journals -- no matter how well made or how old -- did not just randomly appear on kitchen counters. Especially not in dorm rooms stationed on university campuses as bland as his.

Quinn looked out the tiny window and sighed. From his spot, all he could see was a pathetic little patch of dying grass in the courtyard far below before the other side of the dorm building rose up again, framing a perpetually dreary sky.

Shaking his head, Quinn looked back at the journal sitting on his kitchen counter. Where had it come from, and how had it gotten there? How had Quinn not noticed it, even though he swore there was nothing in its place seconds before there suddenly was? The journal sat innocently before him, taunting him with its mystery. It was incredibly suspicious, to say the least.

Being the impulsive idiot he was, Quinn picked it up.

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

"I'm back," Jason called as he stepped inside the dorm room. When there was no desperate beg for food, Jason set his bag down and frowned.

"Quinn?" Jason checked the kitchenette, then the bathroom, then the closet Quinn generously called a living room, only to find them devoid of any coffee-addicted roommates. "Quinn?"

Jason was just walking back into the kitchenette when he spotted a sliver of light peeking out from under the bedroom door. He crossed the hall, wondering what Quinn was so engrossed in -- he had to be, if he wasn't crying out that he was starving. Jason smiled at the thought as he pushed open the door.

Quinn was lying sideways on his bed, propping his head up with one arm as the other held a book in front of his face. Jason blinked at him as he stepped further into the room, wondering when the last time he'd seen Quinn reading a book was. He came up empty.

"Whatcha reading?" he asked, curiosity getting the better of him.

Quinn startled, glancing up at Jason for a moment with panic in his face. Quinn stuffed the book under his pillow, before freezing and slowly turning around to face Jason again. Jason raised an eyebrow, and Quinn sagged back to lean on the pillow, offering Jason an awkward grin.

"Uh...n-nothin'?" Quinn said, failing to meet Jason's eyes.

Jason eyed his pillow and said nothing.

Quinn cleared his throat and Jason's gaze snapped back to him. Quinn fidgeted as he asked, "So, uh...didja need something?"

Jason's eyebrow ticked higher. "Do I need to need something to come into my own dorm room?" he deadpanned.

Quinn stared back, silent. His shoulders were tense, even as his posture seemed languid.

Jason shrugged as he turned and headed for the door. "Fine," he said as he walked out, "I'll leave you alone for now." Pausing as a thought struck him, he added, "Don't forget to eat something."

Quinn never forgot to eat, but there was definitely something off about him. And, there was a first time for everything. Jason hoped that wouldn't be today.

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

Quinn held his breath as Jason closed the door behind him, heartbeat ricocheting like crazy as the door thudded shut. Carefully, slowly, he pulled out the journal again and flipped it open.

Tracing the golden letters, watching them pulse and shiver under his touch, Quinn began to read.

Minutes passed -- or were they hours? -- and still he read on. His arms started feeling heavy, but his eyes were wide open, so he turned onto his side and propped his elbow on the mattress. He pulled up the blankets after a while, even though the heat of the sun outside beat down through the window. But it wasn't hot. In fact, it was still cold, so he pulled the covers a little higher.

The room had gotten dark, but that was okay. The slight glow coming from the page -- and wasn't that interesting? -- was enough for him to see the words just fine.

Over and over, he slid his finger across the shimmering words, mesmerized, and turned the page.

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

Jason yawned.

He hadn't gotten as much done on his essay as he'd hoped, but he was feeling sleepy and he had early morning classes the next day. Rubbing his eyes, Jason trudged into the bedroom and sat down heavily on his bed, before pulling out a compartment under the bedframe and taking out his toiletries. Quinn had an unfortunate habit of accidentally -- or so Jason hoped -- knocking his things off the sink counter and to the ground, and Jason would really rather not have his toothbrush on the less-than-pristine bathroom floor.

Yeah, no thanks.

Looking up, he saw Quinn turned on his other side on the other side of the room, still reading whatever book he'd been so absorbed in earlier. Curious, Jason squinted at the book, trying to make out any details despite the text being too small to read from his distance. All he could see was that the pages were yellowed and rough with age, and the cover appeared to be made of leather. The words were a vaguely golden color and Jason squinted harder as they seemed to waver.

Jason shook his head. He really should get some sleep.

After trekking back from his short journey to the bathroom, Jason slid into bed and turned out his light. Quinn still had his bedside light on, illuminating the book's pages as he read on. Jason tried again to think of a time that Quinn had ever been so captivated by something that wasn't his phone. In the three years that Jason had known the other, he couldn't recall a single instance where Quinn had done anything -- besides browsing the internet, or whatever Quinn did on his phone at ungodly hours of the night -- for as long as he'd been reading today.

It's been literal hours. When's he gonna stop?

"Don't stay up too late," Jason called quietly. Quinn didn't seem to hear, and Jason frowned, but put his worries out of his mind as he settled into a more comfortable position.

Maybe it's just a really good book.

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

Jason awoke to the sight of Quinn asleep on the other side of the room, the journal splayed across his face with one arm and one leg hanging off the side of his bed. Quinn's hair was still tied up in its usual short ponytail, half of the brown strands loose from the hair tie and sprawled messily across his pillow.

He smiled softly at his roommate's snoring, even as he couldn't shake the feeling of wrongness that had been hanging over him since the day before. Crossing the room, Jason pulled up the blankets that were bunching around Quinn's feet, and tried to pry the book away from Quinn's fingers in order to put it on his desk. But as he started to lift the journal, Quinn's grip on it tightened, even as the boy himself didn't stir. Jason pulled harder, and Quinn's fingers clamped down even more.

The feeling of wrongness hit Jason again, waves of unease crashing over his head as his mind flurried for an explanation.

Jason's phone started to ping on his desk and he jumped, having forgotten that he had to go to class soon. Throwing one last anxious glance at Quinn, Jason pulled on a fresh set of clothes and made his way to the bathroom.

By the time he returned, Quinn had shifted, curling into himself as he clutched the journal close to his chest. Klaxons were going off in Jason's head even if he couldn't figure out exactly why, but it was almost 7:15 and he really had to go.

Thinking fast, Jason pulled out a dish of leftover pancakes from the mini-fridge and left it on Quinn's desk, hoping the other would eat it when he woke up. With only a granola bar for himself in hand, Jason left the room, his heart weighing heavily every step of the way.

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

Quinn knocked on the door, hefting the cardboard box in his arms up as he waited for a response. When no response came, he knocked again. Still nothing.

Deciding to take a chance, Quinn opened the door carefully, peeking into the room as he struggled to keep a solid grip on his belongings.

There was another boy in the room, sitting on a neatly made bed with a suitcase on the floor at his feet. He was typing something on his laptop, dark eyes focused on the screen as he sat with near perfect posture. Quinn wondered how he did it. He could never sit straight.

"Um," Quinn said hesitantly, "I guess we're roommates?"

The boy's eyes flicked up, scanning Quinn quickly before returning to whatever he was working on. Quinn smiled awkwardly, trying to figure out how to proceed. He wasn't sure how he felt about this rooming arrangement, but he definitely didn't want to make a bad impression this soon into his first year at university, especially not on someone he'd be living with.

"I'm Quinn," he said as he stepped further into the room, heading for the unoccupied bed.

The boy said nothing for a long while and Quinn started unpacking, sneaking glances at the other as he heaved his blankets and sheets onto the old university mattress.

"Jason," the boy said finally. Quinn looked up, but Jason kept his gaze resolutely focused on his laptop.

"Huh," Quinn mumbled. "Jason." He mulled the name over. "Alright, Jason, it's nice to meet you."

"...nice to meet you too."

...........................................

Jason was panicking. At this rate, Quinn was worried he was going to tear his hair out.

"What do I do?" Jason hissed, hunched over his laptop and eyes glued to the screen like his life depended on it. He ran a hand through his hair for the millionth time, the dark strands longer than usual and falling into his face. He brushed them out of the way with a huff, before falling back into his deadline-induced anxiety.

Quinn hovered, chewing his lip as his mind spun through the possibilities of how best to help Jason deal with his situation. It had already been several months since they met, but they still were on rather awkward terms, seeing as Jason didn't talk much and Quinn had no idea how to handle their relationship. Was it okay for Quinn to help Jason with this kind of thing? They were roommates, so it should be, right?

"Calm down," Quinn said uncertainly, "you've still got time. You said it's due Thursday, right?"

"How am I supposed to write an entire essay in two days?" Jason shook his head and swore. "God, I'm such an idiot. I've had a month to do this, why didn't I do more of it earlier?"

Quinn grabbed him by his shoulders and shook him. "Jason, listen. It's not your fault you got sick. It's not something you can do anything about. At this point, just focus on your essay, and get it done."

"I am focusing!"

Quinn shook him again. "No, you're not. You're too panicked about not getting it done to actually think about what you need to do." Gently, he pushed the laptop closed. Jason looked up at him, wide-eyed.

"Breathe," Quinn said. "Just, stop thinking about your essay for a minute. Just breathe, and calm down."

Jason's chest heaved as he took a shaky breath in, and let it out. Took it in, and let it out. Again and again, until the frenzy left his eyes and the tension left his body.

"Okay," Quinn said, once Jason stopped looking like he was in mortal peril. "Now think about your essay. You had an outline, right?" Jason nodded. "And sources?" He nodded again.

"Okay, then." Quinn opened up Jason's laptop and let Jason type in the password, bringing him to the essay document. "One paragraph at a time. Look at your outline for the first paragraph. Okay?" Jason scrolled, mute. "Your outlines are usually pretty detailed, so just start stringing them into sentences." Jason hesitated as his fingers twitched on the keys. Quinn waited for him to start typing, and eventually he did.

Minutes passed, then hours. Throughout it all, Quinn sat by Jason's side, reminding him to focus when the panic returned.

Finally, Jason closed the laptop. He immediately flopped back on the bed they'd been sitting on since noon, and whispered, "Oh my god."

Quinn let out a giddy laugh, exhausted but nearly hysterical with relief -- and it wasn't even his essay. "You did it," he said in wonder. "You did it."

Jason smiled up at him. A real smile, not the tilt of Jason's lips that he usually did.

"No," he said. "We did it. Thank you."

There was a burst of warmth in Quinn's chest as he smiled back. "Anytime," he said, and he meant it. After all, wasn't that what roommates -- no, friends -- were for?

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

Quinn woke to a pounding headache.

The pain chased away the last wisps of his dream, and he groaned. He squeezed his eyes shut and pulled the thing in his hands over his head...what was it? What was he holding again?

Oh right, the journal.

Quinn cracked one eye open and winced as the headache spiked, waiting out the pain before opening his other eye. He blinked groggily at the room.

Vaguely, he could make out the shape of a plate of pancakes sitting on his desk, even as the room pulsed in time with the throbbing of his head. He twisted up into a more upright position and squinted at the pancakes, wondering if it'd be worth the effort to climb out of bed to eat them. After a moment's consideration, he concluded that he'd rather stay in bed. He wasn't hungry, anyways.

Falling back against the pillow, Quinn frowned at the little nagging feeling in the back of his mind. He felt like there was something he needed to do...had he forgotten something? He had that essay due next week, but he still had time...

Quinn remembered suddenly that he still had the journal in his hands as it seemed to grow a little heavier. Right! He wanted to finish reading the journal. Fingers tightening on the cover, Quinn flipped it open and peered down at its pages, breathing out a sigh of relief as his headache seemed to recede a bit. Why that was, Quinn didn't bother to question.

Flicking through page after page, Quinn finally found the page he'd left off on. He settled down, and began to read.

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

"Quinn, you need to eat."

"...not hungry."

"What do you mean you're not hungry? You're always hungry!"

Flip. Shhffff. Flip.

"...no."

"Quinn!"

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

Jason was getting seriously concerned. How many hours -- how many days -- had it been since he'd seen Quinn eat anything? All Quinn had done over the weekend was hole up in their room and read that journal -- which seemed way longer than it logically should be, considering its slim volume. But the more pressing issue was still the fact that Quinn wasn't doing anything besides reading, and Jason had no idea what to do about it. Had the other even slept?

He shook his head, scrubbing a hand repeatedly through his hair, as he walked into class. He'd have to figure something out. Hopefully he could force Quinn to eat something once he got back, and maybe give him a couple sleeping pills or something.

Jason sighed.

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

Quinn stared at the blank page. Flipped back a page, then forwards, then back again.

Is that it?

He closed the book and opened it again, as if that would do anything. He stared harder.

That can't be it...there's no way.

Quinn tore through the journal, searching, searching...for what exactly, he didn't know -- only that there had to be more.

There was a sharp pain in his fingertips and he hissed, reflexively trying to drop the journal.

But...he couldn't.

Quinn bit down on his lip as the burning feeling increased, the journal stuck to his skin even as he shook his hands viciously, trying to get it off.

That's-- that's not supposed to happen. I can't--

Quinn's breath hitched as his heart pounded, breathing faster and faster and faster--

I can't let go, I can't let go, I CAN'T LET GO--

The pain spiked and Quinn screamed, flailing so hard he fell off the bed. He barely felt the impact as he hit the floor, too consumed by the agony of the journal burning him.

His vision started to blur, but Quinn could still see as words in blood-red ink started to shimmer and curl across the blank page.

Quinn Pandora

The words vanished, and Quinn blacked out.

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

"Quinn?"

The dorm was completely silent as Jason let the door close behind him. He frowned, dread nagging at him as he made his way quickly to the bedroom without bothering to hang up his bag and threw open the door.

Jason froze. His bag dropped to the floor with a thud.

"Quinn?"

Jason scrambled to where his roommate's prone body lay on the floor, sprawled haphazardly. Absently, Jason wondered where the journal had gone. There was no leather-bound book in sight.

"C'mon," he mumbled, "c'mon..." He shook Quinn's shoulder, trying to get him to wake up, though the other only flopped around lifelessly. Panic gripped Jason like a vise as he shook harder, anxiety welling up the longer Quinn didn't move.

After ten minutes, Jason finally called the campus nurse. Hands shaking so hard he almost dropped his phone, Jason dialed the numbers and shoved the device up to his ear, waiting for the nurse to pick up.

"Clariene's T--" Jason tuned out whatever the receiver was saying as he struggled to gather his words together. "Help--" he managed to choke out. "My-- my roommate's passed out on the floor, and he won't wake up, and I don't know what to do--"

The voice on the other end turned abruptly brusque as it said, "I'll be right there. Don't do anything." They hung up.

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

Jason yanked open the door as soon as the knock came. His first thought was, that's not what I expected.

He wasn't entirely sure what he had expected, seeing as he barely remembered what the nurse looked like, but the woman standing before him was definitely not it. Even with high heels, she was shorter than him, curly ombre hair tied back into a messy bun that was at odds with her serious face. Bright silvery eyes stood out against her dark skin, accentuated by the white dress she wore. Jason squinted, wondering if the slight blurriness around her outline was a result of shock.

The woman stepped inside with a polite nod to him and Jason stood aside numbly, before remembering what he'd called her for. Without a word, he led her to the bedroom and through the open door, gesturing at Quinn as he struggled to explain.

Luckily, the woman didn't need an explanation.

"I'm Clariene, but you can call me Clare," she said as she dropped to the ground and checked Quinn's pulse. She measured his breathing, lifted up his eyelids, and otherwise gave him a thorough examination that Jason didn't understand, but he wasn't the nurse, so he figured it was fine.

"So what's wrong with him?" Jason asked anxiously once Clare sat back.

"It's a curse."

Jason's mind screeched to a halt. "A what?" he gaped.

"A curse." Clare's expression was grave, but...that wasn't possible, right?

He shook his head. He must have misheard. "Look," he said, "can you just tell me what happened to him? You're a nurse, right? So how-- how do we get him to wake up?"

He winced at his bluntness, but he really couldn't bring himself to care too much, not when Quinn was lying on the floor, vulnerable and unconscious and looking so, so wrong. Clare, however, simply blinked at him.

"Nurse?" she said blankly. "I run a tea shop."

"What?"

Clare stared at him for another second, before sighing and turning back to Quinn lying on the ground. "We don't have time right now, we can figure it out later. For now," Clare grabbed Quinn's hand and turned it over so his palm was facing up, "I need to fix this."

Jason peered down. On each of Quinn's fingertips was a black question mark. Clare let his hand drop to the ground.

"Do you know what this is?" she asked. Jason stayed silent. "It's the mark of a curse. Every curse leaves some physical marking behind. And," she grimaced, "each marking is unique to its curse. This...it was the Kalztan, wasn't it? The Journal?"

"How did you know?" The words slipped from Jason's mouth before he even had a chance to really process what she'd said.

Clare sighed again. "It's a pretty legendary artifact," she said. "Nobody really knows how it works, or where it came from, but it's ancient. Legend says that it's the result of a magic experiment gone wrong." She shrugged. "Who knows how much of that is true?"

Jason thought of the journal, and suddenly found that he couldn't quite remember what it'd looked like. Was it thin, or thick? What font was it written in, what color was it? His head started to pound as he tried to dredge up the memories, and he stopped. 

Clare was holding a necklace that Jason swore hadn't been there before, and she brought the green pendant to her lips. She whispered something, in a sound beyond Jason's comprehension, before pressing the crystal to Quinn's chest, right over his heart. The crystal pulsed, the color fading slowly each time. When Clare finally lifted up the pendant again, the crystal was completely clear. She took a shaky breath and wiped the thin sheen of sweat off her forehead.

"I hope that works," she said, seemingly more to herself than to Jason.

"What did you do?"

"Transferred some of my life force to him." Clare slipped the necklace over her head and Jason went cross-eyed as he tried to focus on it. It seemed to disappear as he shifted his gaze, but Jason decided not to think about it too much. Clare, meanwhile, continued on. "The Kalztan does this thing where it drains the life force of anyone who reads it. It varies from person to person, how much is drained." Clare grimaced. "Most people don't recover from that. But," she gestured to Quinn, his pale skin seeming the slightest bit pinker, "he's still got a bit left. Barely, but with the life force I gave him, it should be enough to spark his own so he can recover it."

Jason stared at Quinn for a few moments, before asking, "So what now?"

"Now we wait." Clare pulled out her phone and dialed 911, and it struck Jason suddenly that he couldn't remember if he'd punched in an eight or a nine when he'd been panicking and desperately calling for help. He must've called the wrong number. Lucky him. "He's got coma-like symptoms," Clare explained, pulling Jason out of his thoughts, "so he should go to the hospital. I don't know how long it'll take for him to recover--" an unspoken if he recovers hung in her slight hesitation -- "but it'd be good for him to be in a place that can take care of him properly. I'm just a curse specialist, I'm not really medically qualified."

And with those words, Jason felt that a lot of things suddenly made a bit more sense.

"Alright," he said at last. He sat down on the floor, and he waited.

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

Quinn woke to a world of white.

He groaned lightly, squinting and blinking as he took in his surroundings. He was in a room he didn't remember being his bedroom, the walls sterile and bare as a strange beeping came from somewhere next to him. He could feel cool sheets under him and Quinn clenched the thin blanket, fingers twisting in the cloth as he tried to figure out where he was and why.

"Quinn?"

A voice came from the side of the bed he was lying in and Quinn turned his head, finding himself face-to-face with Jason.

"Yeah?" he croaked. He cringed at the weakness of his voice. He realized there was something over his mouth and nose. Jason's eyes focused briefly on the oxygen mask before flicking up to meet Quinn's.

"You're awake," he said quietly. He almost sounded like he couldn't believe it.

"...yeah."

"Do you remember..." Jason trailed off, and suddenly the shadows under his eyes and the weary lines of his face were crystal clear to Quinn. "The journal?"

Quinn blinked at him slowly. "What journal?" he said. He didn't remember ever owning a journal.

Jason stared at him, before shaking his head and looking away. "Nothing."

The two of them sat in silence for a good while, before a thought struck Quinn and he exhaled sharply. Jason glanced at him, an unspoken question in his eyes.

"It's-- it's just, I've still got that essay due next week, and I haven't even started on it, oh God--"

There was a funny look on Jason's face that Quinn couldn't really describe. "What?"

Jason kept staring at him with that strange, confusing face. "I don't think you have to worry about that essay anymore," he said. Quinn said nothing, uncomprehending. "It's been four months," Jason continued after a moment.

Quinn lay there, stunned. His hands slowly unclenched from the hospital sheets.

"What?"

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

Jason shut the door behind him, keeping out the winter wind, as he called, "I'm home!"

"There's dinner on the stove!" was the answer, and Jason hung up his coat with a "Thanks!"

There was a patter of small feet on wood, and his daughter came barreling around the corner. "Daddy!" she cried, launching herself straight into Jason's waiting arms.

"Persephone!" he laughed, picking her up before setting her down again. "How was school?"

Persephone made a face. "It was okay..." She started to prattle on in that way only six-year-olds could, describing her day in great detail. Jason ruffled her hair and she brightened, seeming to think of something. She pulled out something from behind her back. "Look, Daddy! Look what I found when I got home! It was on the kitchen counter, it was just sitting there--"

Jason smiled at her chatter as he glanced at what she was holding, and--

No.

The smile abruptly slid from his face.

It's been fifteen years...

And even if he'd forgotten the details -- Jason couldn't believe they weren't etched into his memory, but no matter how hard he tried he couldn't quite remember -- the item his daughter held with childish carelessness was unmistakable.

In Persephone's hands was a simple, leather-bound journal.

[velliflorwrites]

Phoenix Sun

They'd known it was coming.

They called it the Phoenix Sun, the Day of the Rising. They called it the end, they called it a new beginning. They called it Rebirth.

When Mysos had first heard of it, his first question was, "Why?"

The elders just shook their heads. "It's just the way it is," they'd said. "It's the way it always has been. It’s the Phoenix Cycle. You can't stop it."

"But the world is going to burn!" He couldn't believe this. The sun would set the world aflame, and all he could do was watch. Watch, and hope, and pray that he'd survive.

"It's for the best," the elders had said. "It's like a forest fire, young one. The fire razes everything, and gives it new life. It's like the phoenix from which the day is given its name: the phoenix burns to ashes, and rises again."

Mysos didn't want to believe it. He didn't want to sit and wait for the world to crumble in a furious storm of scarlet. He coughed as he inhaled a bit of the gritty smog that tended to hang around recently, and he thought that he didn't want to wait for the world to crumble before the fire even came.

"It's for the best," the elders repeated. "Look at us, look at the world. We're destroying it." They sighed as one, some looking off into the distance wistfully, some covering their eyes. "It's too late now. There's no going back. We can only hope that the world will be better after the flames."

Mysos had been angry. Bitter at the elders, bitter at the world, for doing nothing but wait. He was frustrated. And he was scared.

He did everything he could. He warned his sisters, his mother, his father, his friends. He was careful, making sure to leave as little a mark on the land and air as he could, cleaning up after others when he could. He tried so hard to reverse the damage, to prevent more damage that only brought the world closer to its end. He tried so hard, but it wasn't enough.

The day still came.

The sun still rose on that fateful day, growing bigger and redder as the sky bled crimson. It rose higher, impossibly high, burning far too bright and far too hot.

Mysos huddled in the underground bunker with his parents and sisters, waiting, hoping, praying. The room was boiling, but he hunched into himself more, eyes squeezed shut as he tried to ignore the wetness trailing down his face. This wasn't the end, he told himself. Just a new beginning.

The air burned and he clenched his jaw, refusing to make a sound even as the pain made his vision go white. He didn't know when he’d passed out, but when he woke up, everyone was gone.

The bunker was completely decimated, scorched walls broken on the concrete ground with Mysos just barely shielded by a particularly large chunk of rubble.

Slowly, he peeked his way out from behind the wreckage, only to find the wasteland before him devoid of anyone besides himself. Where were his parents? His sisters? There weren’t any charred bodies around, so they must’ve survived (Mysos tried not to think about the alternative), but the question remained: where did they go?

Mysos turned over every single piece of the shattered bunker, but there was nothing. Where was everyone? He didn’t think they’d just leave him like that, but...what other answer was there?

(He didn’t know that, just over the nearest hill, his sisters were trying to find a trace of him in the rubble too. The bunker had collapsed in the middle, separating them, but none of them knew that. They called his name, but he never heard their desperate voices through the static buzzing in his ears. Minute after minute, the siblings moved away from each other, searching for something they were leaving behind.

The parents, on the other hand, would never move again.)

Mysos looked for hours, looking for his family, his friends — anyone. He picked through the debris, wishing for someone to find him, lamenting how the world had burned around him as he hid in the stone. Despairing the fact that, for the first time in his life, he was truly alone.

Finally, he sat on the ground with trembling legs, oblivious to the dirt and grime. He put his head between his knees, and took a shaking breath. Then another, then another, until he was staring as teardrops hit the metal scrap he was sitting on with a plunk, plunk, plunk.

He missed his parents. He missed his sisters. He missed his friends.

After a long while, when he’d run out of tears to shed and he’d run out of emotions to feel, Mysos tilted his head back. He watched the now-dark sky, a starless expanse of black. He hoped the world wouldn't make the same mistakes it did before, this time.

He hoped the people could take better care of the world, this time.

He hoped the world would survive, this time.

[velliflorwrites]

creak

The door creaks.

The hinges shriek and groan as the door slowly opens just a crack, revealing a sliver of the black nothingness beyond.

You turn on your side, facing away from the door, burying your head under a pillow to try and block out the noise.

Stupid old house, you think. Always making weird sounds at inconvenient times.

Squeezing your eyes shut tighter, you burrow deeper under the covers, grasping at the tendrils of sleep slipping away like sand through clasped fingers.

Sigh.

You shift onto your back and glare at the door, then the ceiling, restless energy now drumming through your veins. The dark of your room seems to press down, and you close your eyes again.

You…

You freeze.

You… dare…

The unknown voice is coming from everywhere, seeping into your ears and coiling around your mind. Your heart clenches suddenly, thumping faster and faster under the intangible, inescapable pressure,

tha-thump

Tha-Thump

THA-THUMP

You can’t move, can’t speak, can’t think,

THA-THUMP

THA-THUMP

The voice is icy, slithering into your consciousness like poison, devoid of all emotion except for rage. But not hot rage, not fury that burns like wildfire, no, this rage is so cold that you feel numb to your core.

… you dare… defile this sacred place…? Insolent… human… 

The shadows creep closer, and you silently gasp for air, realizing you hadn’t been breathing.

You…

You can almost see hands reaching from the shadows – oh wait, those are hands, and – oh no, oh heck, you’re so so screwed, and –

Monster.

The shadows close in.

You sit bolt-upright in bed, chest heaving with huge gulps of air. Cold sweat sticks to your skin, and the sheets are twisted from where you must have thrashed in your sleep. Your throat feels dry, and maybe a little sore, and, oh, was I screaming?

It was just a dream. A pretty scary nightmare, all things considered, but still.

It was just a dream. It was just a dream.

It was just a dream… 

The door creaks.

[velliflorwrites]

dark

It’s been a long time.

How long has it been?

The darkness isn’t totally black, letting you see just enough to fear how much more blind you could be. You cling to the last remnants of your vision, hoping that it won’t get any darker. You don’t remember how you got here -- what had you even done? -- only able to recall the bright outline of a door closing and then promptly vanishing before your eyes, gone without a trace by the time you manage to crawl the few feet to the door.

You curl back against the wall, needing to touch, to feel, to make up for not quite being able to see. The corner is reassuring, in a way, letting you know that you aren’t totally lost, that you still have at least one sense you can rely on. You can’t hear anything, haven’t heard anything in a while, so you don’t even know if you’ve gone deaf. Even the sounds of your feet scuffing the floor and your clothes rustling against each other, or your shuffling as you try to will yourself out of this void are swallowed up by the silence.

You don’t move. You don’t want to admit it, but you’re scared that once you move, once you stop touching these walls, they’ll disappear and you’ll be even more lost in a barren plain of literal nothingness. You’d tried, once, right after that door of hope had shut, to feel your way around, to get a sense of where you were now, but the emptiness had stretched on forever and you could only feel fear, the primal instinct driving you to the corner where you huddle now.

Who are you?

At first, you don’t even register the fact that you’re not alone. You can only feel crushing relief, that thank God, I can still hear.

A pair of...are those eyes? A pair of just barely visible eyes appears in front of you, and you shake your head. The eyes are gone when you look up again.

Am I seeing things?

You take stock of your state of being, trying to discern if anything’s wrong besides the obvious. Maybe you were drugged at some point?

But the voice remains, just a faint whisper lingering in the air. You can’t tell where it’s coming from -- maybe from the endless dark spread before you.

Who are you?

You frown. Who’s asking? you want to say, but the words don’t seem to come. You press your lips shut, resolute on not giving anything away. This… this sense of privacy, of having your identity to yourself, is comforting for some reason. 

Stranger danger, right?

But clearly, your mouth has other ideas. Despite your efforts, the words come tumbling out. You introduce yourself in full, stating your name, your age, your likes and dislikes -- and wow, you never do that, what gives? -- your school; a whole lot of information that you really wouldn’t want to tell some random person, especially not this… entity that’s here with you. After the absolute torrent of speech that suddenly burst from your mouth, you clamp it shut just as quickly as it’d opened, still shocked at yourself and what you’d just done.

The voice does not respond, although you can still feel its presence. It’s a buzzing, tingly feeling that has the hairs on the back of your neck rising, heart uneasy even if you don’t know why.

Somewhere in your subconscious, the feeling registers as danger, warning of a predator on the prowl: beware. But in your current state of mind, you can’t recognize the instinct for what it is. All you feel is a slight chill in the air, slowly making its way down your spine.

Seconds tick by, or are they minutes? Time passes, and the voice stays silent, but it doesn’t leave.

You continue peering forwards, searching for the source, for something -- anything -- that might be here.

Anything to prove you aren’t going insane.

The almost-black seems to grow a little darker.

Finally, the voice speaks again, seemingly stronger this time.

Who are you?

You don’t say anything, confused and now a little more suspicious. Why are they asking again? You just said who you were.

“...who are you?” Fortunately, speech seems to cooperate with you this time.

Nothing.

You suddenly realize you’d been pressing your fingertips into the ground as the silence stretched on. The sharp scent of ozone is present now too; when did that happen? Idly, somewhere in a distant corner of your mind that knows nothing of fear, you wonder if this being can actually say any other words.

Who are you?

“I already said!”

You introduce yourself again the exact same way, but the explanation is… shorter this time.

You pause.

You feel like the words had been right on the tip of your tongue, but--

Oh no.

You… you don’t even know what you’ve forgotten, but you know it was important, and the only words that you can think of now are,

How could I forget?

Who are you?

Panicking, you scramble for a response. You don’t notice that the voice’s tone has changed.

It kind of sounds… excited?

You blurt out the first things that pop into your mind, reciting your name, your…

Wait.

How old are you again?

What day is it today?

When was your birthday?

The darkness presses down even more, an intangible weight forcing you down, dropping your heart into your stomach and making your mouth go dry. It’s suffocating, and yet at the same time you feel light-headed. You can’t breathe, but there’s also too much air; you feel dizzy and distant, but also far too grounded in this place you call reality, though at this point you can’t decide if that’s true, can’t decide if this is just a nightmare that you can’t wake up from, can’t decide if this is all just in your head.

Not for the first time, you wonder if you’re losing your mind.

Who are you?

You almost shout your name to the presence, desperate to hang onto this last bit of identity you have left. You search for more-- for any information that you can remember about yourself, the tension holding your shoulders and back rigid mounting higher with each moment that you can’t find what you’re looking for, facts and old opinions blending together as they slip even further out of your grasp.

Abruptly, you notice that the voice is definitely stronger now, resonating with multiple pitches and a strange echo as eager inflection threads through the sound.

Who are you?

“My name is… I’m--!”

You can’t remember.

You can’t remember your own name, your age, anything about yourself; all your memories are gone like they never existed in the first place, and you wonder if they were ever real.

You can’t remember where you were before you were here, stuck in this endless void that you know you’ll never find your way out of, this oblivion that will swallow you up.

(Perhaps like the many that had been here before you?)

The voice sounds like it’s laughing.

Who are you?

You don’t have an answer; you really don’t know--

And that on its own is so terrifying, that is the only thing filling your empty mind...

Besides one question.

Who am I?

The dark is the blackest it’s ever been.

[velliflorwrites]

V is for Vendetta

Tick. Tock.

Step, step.

Breathe in.

Breathe out.

Freeze.

I peer around the corner, eyes darting around the dimly lit room, trying to locate the object of my mission.

There.

Entering the room as silently as possible, I reach out…

Got it.

For a moment, I almost hesitate.

Is this really right? Should I be doing this?

Is there a better way to do this?

I shake the silly thoughts away.

Of course I should be doing this. It must be done.

They deserve it.

I give the room one last sweep, making sure no trace is left behind.

Not that it matters much, anyways. They’ll know it was me. They’ll know I’ve come back for revenge.

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

Flames lick hungrily at the walls, and a scared young girl cowers in a corner, her red eyes mirroring the fire surrounding her.

“Momma…?” she asks, her voice shaking.

“...Jocelyn…” A wisp of a voice seems to drift past.

She tries again.

“Papa?”

No answer.

Panic flooding into her voice, the little girl wails.

“Momma! Papa! Help!”

Slowly, the tears she’d been holding in fall, and her voice quivers before dropping down again.

“Momma...Papa...please…”

Her cries are swallowed by the inferno.

“...please help…”

Hours (perhaps even days) later, she awakens to a barren wasteland. What had once been her village, her home, was now an ashy graveyard.

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

The burn scars on my back sting, almost as if in response to the memory, and I sigh.

Stuffing the memory down, I concentrate on the motivation behind my mission.

Fiery hatred rises up within me, hatred pointed at them, at the horrendous acts they’ve committed.

They burned my entire village to the ground.

They took away my home, my family, even a part of myself.

All because we knew.

We knew what they’d done. We knew their secret.

By day, they were a prosperous business that was supposedly known for its generosity, always donating to various philanthropic organizations.

But in the shadows, they pulled the strings that controlled the world.

And if anyone found out about them, they were immediately eliminated.

But now that I’ve got this, now that I’ve gotten evidence of your crimes...you’ll pay for what you did.

I’ll expose your secret to the world.

It’s your worst nightmare, isn’t it? With no one to support you, your income collapses, bringing your nefarious power down with you.

Good.

Arriving at a door, I reach for the handle. I’m almost out. Just a few more turns...I’m almost free.

The sound of approaching footsteps, however, has me frozen in my tracks.

Clutching the documents I’d stolen, I hold my breath, counting down till the footsteps arrive in front of the door.

I don’t want to fight, but if I have to, I will.

Thankfully, I don’t have to, as the footsteps continue away, down the hallway.

Slipping out the door, I head in the opposite direction.

Once I’m outside, I escape to a nearby alleyway, where I’d left my coat.

Putting it on, I stash the documents inside, then walk out the alley to blend in with the rest of society’s oblivion.

I don’t care if no one believes me now. The truth will be revealed in time, and when it is…

Tick. Tock.

Your time is running out.