Autumn
Foreword:
It was autumn and she was halfway through sixteen
She was brave, she was selfless, she was the type of hero I could never be
It was autumn and she was halfway through sixteen
She wouldn't let them mold her into what they wanted her to be
It was autumn and she was halfway through sixteen
She had a coil scribbler in the pocket of her hoodie
And that meant everything
So she snuck onto the roof of a train
And then was never seen again
Autumn:
It's autumn
The sky is gray overcast
A lightening storm is brewing
Our POV character lies on the roof of a train
Rhythmically rocked by its movements
Hanging white-knuckled to the edge of the roof
In the pockets of her oversized sky-gray hoodie
Pressed between her and the metal car
There's a worn-edged notebook
The wind rips through her hair
Cold
Why is everything always so cold?
She hopes they haven't found her
Hopes they haven't followed her
She knows they probably hav
She'll have to climb down as soon as she finds a major station
Get lost in the crowd and and hopefully lost forever
The metal coil of the cheaply-bound scribbler digs into her rib cage
She doesn't have a plan
But she has a mission
And nerves of steel
Thunderstorm:
It's raining
Of course it is
The universe hates her
She put the notebook in a ziplock bag in a plastic bag
From her tattered backpack
The first chance she got, the first time the train stopped
In a small worn-down town
It would be too easy to spot a new face there she couldn't get off yet
The book is staying dry
That's all that matters
She normally loves cold
When it's natural cold
There's something about this windswept thunderstorm cold
That just isn't natural at all
Her fingers burn with cold, all heat seeping out of them, no amount of cellular respiration being able to ward off the rain
They slowly go numb, the most excruciating sort of numb
Then her palms
Then her wrists
Then her forearms
She wonders how much longer she can go on
If she died of hypothermia right now
Or if she couldn't hold on anymore and fell onto the adjacent rails
(Under rain-slick wheels)
I guess that would be the end of this story
And the story doesn't end until next year so
She makes it
To the other side of the storm
The sun peaks through the clouds
Shining on her strawberry-blonde hair which shines in return
Station:
Her hoodie is still damp
Her pocket is still full of blue-lined pages
She's a traveller she guesses
But this next station is large and it's crowded
Throngs of people with faces all tinted gray
She waits until the passengers have gotten off
Until there are no guards around
And she climbs down with as much agility as she can muster
She needs to melt seamlessly into this crowd
She has no money
She had had to run before she could pack anything
Stuffing the notebook into her pocket
And her half-empty backpack over her shoulder
Before she could pack anything
She'd laced up her ripped shoes
And she'd run into the woods
The woods she knew like the back of her hands
The woods that had raised her like a mother
Woods she'd be bidding farewell to
The people had looked for her in the town
And along the edge of the woods
But she crouched high in towering trees
Where they could never follow
She filled her stomach and her backpack full of berries
And she said goodbye to the forest that raised her
And she snuck onto the next train that pulled up into the station
She fled that town
Perhaps she'd be back one day to burn it down
Perhaps not
She was quite frankly out of both money and food now
But more importantly she was dehydrated
But that was a problem easily solved
If she was alright with drinking from the faucets in the public washrooms
It wasn't healthy
But beggars couldn't be choosers
She put her hands in her pocket, feeling the hard-soft edges of the scribbler under the thin layers of plastic
She smiled faintly
Sisterhood:
She can't remember her original name
It doesn't matter
She can remember the fire inside her
That is all that matters
Artemis Inciendio is who she is now
And it's what her new family knows her by
She's been here for who knows how long
In this dead-inside city
Months upon months
That shouldn't be enough to forget your own name but that name was forced upon her and it wasn't her's
So she tried her best to shove it out of her mind and it worked
She had made friends
With other wanderers like her
They were hungry together they were starving together sometimes they were cold together in winters and melting together in summers
She'd passed around the coil scribbler, and they'd all read the blue-inked words scrawled across it
It wasn't Artemis's handwriting
She had no idea whose it was to be honest but it was beautiful
They read to each other and told each other the stories until they were ingrained into their minds.
Fast forwards a few more months
It's the dead of winter
And it's an unnatural cold the cold of marginalization the cold of poverty the cold of nobody caring about you
Not the cold of Parent Nature
She's on the verge of womanhood but not quite there
She's huddled with two other girls in an alley somewhere
Under a raggedy black blanket
The tips of her fingers and her toes go frozen numb
Then her hands and feet
Then her arms and legs
It doesn't stop this time
The sun doesn't peak out of the clouds this time
They tell each other bits of the stories in the notebook
And it's like a fire it warms them
But not quite enough
When it finally is morning, a raven-haired girl untangles herself from two dead bodies, tears streaming down her face
She picks up the notebook in her thin, long, spider-like fingers
And she kisses it
And she kneels in front of her soul-sisters for a moment
And she gets up
And she walks into the morning
A worn-edged notebook in the pocket of her hoodie
Cogs in the Demon Machine
So I just had a terrifying yet potentially revelatory nightmare.
Idk how to describe it. It was all very creepy. So, it was winter. But it wasn't how winters are out in the woods or the fields or anything, with everything being peaceful and friendly and full of life, the cold stirring up your energy and the ice bringing forth wonder. Nah, I love nature-winter, just as I love nature-summer and nature-spring and nature-fall.
But no this was city-winter. It was sharp and unforgiving and tinted dark with air pollution. The buildings were gray, the air was gray, the streetlights towered and cars sped by, leaving thick trails of smoke. Candy wrappers and cigarettes littered the ground and the sidewalk was frozen hard under your shoes. It was the kind of day unhoused people dreaded. The kind of day I would have had to suffer through wearing torn shoes and a too-thin coat while waiting outside at the bus stop. It was the kind of day where you really feel the effects of capitalism, in all it's uncaring nightmare glory, beating down on you.
I had just walked out of my school and towards the crowded bus stop at the end of the street. On my way, I met these two girls. They were very pretty but there was something off-putting about them. Something dangerous. They were handing everyone free money. Three dollars, in the form of a loony and a toony. They told me it was for a birthday, which was kind of weird but okay. I put the money in my pocket, beside my bus ticket, intending to give it to someone who needed it.
I joined the crowd that was waiting for the bus. There were many people waiting anxiously for the bus to arrive. They were just as cold as I was, in pain in the frigid weather. This part of the dream actually doesn't make sense in real life since other people waiting for the bus tend to have much better and more wether-resistant clothes than me. So they tend to not be cold in the ten-fifteen minutes at most that we have to wait. But for some goddamn reason today everyone was wearing shitty clothes made more for the autumn than the winter. Anyways, it gets worse.
I was waiting for the Number 6 bus. As I usually am. So were a lot of other people. As they usually are. But the first bus sped by us. The second bus was not in service. The third bus was on route to go to all the wrong places. We kept waiting and waiting and more buses passed us by. It was starting to get dark. We were cold. We were desperate. We could see the worry in each others' eyes. We waited and waited until finally a bus came by. It was more of a van than a bus really. Small. But it it could take some of us. We all lined up, chasing the bus as it came to a stop, crowding around the edge of the sidewalk. We tried to all cram in there as much as we could. But the bus driver - a fat man with dark greying hair and amused eyes - sped away after only accepting two of us.
I was on the bus. I felt really bad that it had left my comrades behind. It wasn't fair. But there was an energy of fear in the bus, sharp and sticky and cloying. Hidden by the uncharacteristicallly plush seats and the merry mood of the driver. I look around. The other people in the bus had anxiety in their eyes. But while talking to them they assured me that the bus would take us to our destinations.
The bus driver was jovial, in good spirits, and assured us he would take us where we wanted to go. For a while we drove by, familiar buildings passing by as we went down the well-known road. But then the familiar buildings became unfamiliar ones, increasingly unfamiliar ones as we twisted and turned through the streets. I was so lost. I had no idea where we were or where to get off. Eventually the driver took us to the arena district - which was the most posh entertainment district in the city, filled with very expensive clubs and bars and restaurants and casinos and stuff I didn't even know. He made us get off of the bus into the cold, harsh, bitter and unforgiving morning outside.
His appearance had changed. He became tall and slender. The colour of his skin, hair, nails, everything, was the same colour as the winter outside. His dark eyes were full of cruelty, full of a raging, ferocious, corrupted hunger. Not the hunger of not having food, no. Not the hunger of actually being hungry. This was the hunger of wanting more, more, always more. Of never being satisfied. His nails were just a bit to sharp, just a bit too pointed, almost not human. His eyes were just a bit too dark, the colour a bit too indecipherable, and they were hungry, hungry, hungry. They were powerful. And they were raging. Inside him, you could tell, was a bottomless pit. One you could fill and fill and fill and fill and it would still be deep, and dark, and bottomless. His face was set in a cruel, severe expression. He didn't look human. Not really. But almost. You could believe that he was human, if you only glanced over him. Not if you looked at him for a while though. If you focused on him, you could tell. That he wasn't human. He was a black hole given human form.
He told us that we needed to work for him now. We needed to work to make him money. He told us that he must make money and we owe it to him to work. After all, he had so generously driven us. Never mind that he didn't even drive us where we wanted to go, I thought but didn't dare say out loud. None of us dared speak. We were all terrified of him. We were all acutely aware of the terrible and all-encompassing power he held over us. And we were all aware of the terrible and destructive rage he would fly into if we didn't do as he said. We were all aware that we were stuck. And that he had powers we did not know. Even if there were no walls, no fences, no chains binding us. Even if we could technically make a run for it. We couldn't. He would kill us. We knew that money was what he hungered for. Money was what he used to fill the ever-continuing, ever-reaching, ever-growing abyss inside him. We knew that he had a dark and twisted desire, a cold and cruel desire for money, money, more money. Consuming like some sort of demon. Which we was. No, he was worse. Demons weren't real. There was nothing not real about him.
He said that we had to do the jobs he told us to do. It was freezing and we were cold, cold, cold. But we were terrified. He told us that we had to do repairs and other maintenance around the arena district. We had to repair the tall, shining, artfully architected buildings that people spent their Friday evenings and weekends at. We had to keep the district up and running. Keep it pretty and beautiful as it shone full of metal and stone and glass. We had to serve him. And line his pockets. Nobody could see us. Nobody could hear us scream. Not unless we got away from him.
He put us to work immediately. We had to scale the large, spiralling buildings without any protective equipment. We had to work up there perching on the ridges and folds
... I'm too terrified to write any more. I don't know what about this dream scared me so much but I am so fucking terrified and I need to take a moment before I go on ...
I think I should describe the district. Most of the buildings were really new-age. They had walls and roofs that curved and folded and bent over themselves and twisted and spiralled and rolled like hills. It was all very artistic. It was all very materialistic. It was all very decadent and opulent. There were tall buildings that stretched up into the sky and wide buildings that sprawled out across multiple blocks, connected by twisting, glittering interior bridges. There were glittering and polished windows. Often the windows were from floor to ceiling. Often the windows took up the space of the entire wall. Often the walls were made of glittering metal. A very popular way to gild walls was with folded, overlapping panels of shiny silverish metal. There were also many buildings built with the straight edges and straight walls of the slightly older building style. They were all very tall, very straight, very imperious, as they stretched up towards the cloud-swamped, softly glowing sky. They were very clean. They had large windows, the bottom floors always being made of looming floor-to ceiling windows that were clear as crystal. They had many ledges and ridges. Like I said before all the metal was shining silvery-grey, sometimes more silver and sometimes more grey. But always so very clean. Sometimes it was reflecting like a mirror.
Sometimes it was had such a certain lustre that it almost glowed. Sometimes it almost had a sickly yellow tint. Sometimes it had a blue tint. Sometimes it even managed to have a pink tint. The stone, on the other hand, used in buildings, was imperious gray, jet black, shimmery brown, blood red, rich maroon, light creme, or even sometimes granite. Everything was so opulent. Everything was so rich. Everything was so oppressive.
The atmosphere was oppressive and heavy and it was dark and twisted. The surroundings held no life in them. Not any of the spark of life and kindness that lit up the kinder parts of the world. The air was polluted, polluted, oh so polluted. Everything was heavy and pressing. The world, the world around us was uncaring, apathetic, twisted, dangerous, and cruel. It was almost suffocating. An air of danger, hung thick all around. An air of terror, of unholiness, of corruption pressing and swirling in the weight of the air all around. It was claustrophobic despite - no because of - the grand scale of everything.
We couldn't take in the "beauty" of it. We couldn't notice any of the grandeur. It mattered not to us but rather passed by beyond our reach.
We were too busy being tired, sick, aching, scared, and cold in our hearts and in our bodies and in our minds. We were too busy being caught up in work, work, work. We were too busy pushing ourselves forward in the repetitive, agonizing, mind-numbing labour we were forced to do. We were too busy freezing and ignoring how we were freezing. We were too busy feeling our life force drain from us. We were too busy being tired, body and soul, and ignoring the tiredness in order to make him more and more and more money. We were too busy trying to ignore how our arms and legs and everything ached. We were too busy pushing ourselves to do dangerous work and feeling how it felt to not know if you were going to die or not. We were too busy not having anything. We were too busy being exploited. We were too busy slowly dying. We were too busy feeling pain and fear and death. Death hung over us ever-present.
He sent us up buildings, to scale walls and stand on ledges and balance on folds and whatnot, shining and cleaning and repairing without any safety equipment. We had no nets or harnesses or anything to protect us from falling. We had no helmets or any other protective gear. We had no warm clothes to protect us from the majority of the winter's chill. We had to work, work, work at a brutal, frantic pace, pressing our hands and bodies onto the cold of the stone and metal and glass.
I remember being up high, on top of the curve of a folded, new-age wall. Straddling the curving slope on either side. I had a bucket of cold, soapy water that was making my hands burn but I had to clean the building. All the while making sure I didn't fall off and die. I remember hating it so much and feeling myself die. But I was trapped in a crystal of his corrupted making. I couldn't do anything.
The people entertaining themselves and going about their day in all the bars and restaurants paid no attention to us, to our misery. They couldn't see us and even if they could they wouldn't care. They had cushy, intellectual day jobs that paid well, that they did in the safety of an office, that they pretended to hate so they could justify their lavish spending habits. Meanwhile the monster was getting richer and richer. And still he wasn't satisfied. He was never satisfied.
Every time we finished a job we had to come to him. He sat ruler-straight, imperious, and ever hungry. And we were aching and tired and we just wanted to rest. But he didn't care. He gave us no rest. He just gave us another job. And we had to go do it. We had no rest. No time to sooth our bleeding souls. No time to find some peace and calm. We only had the constant demand of filling his ever-expanding emptiness with coins that were as poisoned and tainted as he was.
We didn't want to but we were scared of him, so scared of him, so scared about what he would do to us, what he could do to us. He was unholy, and his unholiness extended out to all the world around us, choking us, poisoning us, feeding off of us. But he was all-powerful. His corruption was everywhere. His spirit reached out in all directions like electric wire, watching us, keeping us in line.
I wanted to escape, to go somewhere I could call home. We all did.
I was picking up trash from the stone courtyard of a great library/movie theatre when I figured out. I was between the slanted walls of two cold, looming glass pyramids. Despite the fact that the public sidewalks were littered with trash, the grounds of private property had to be kept clean. It almost felt protected though, between those sloping walls that provided the illusion of privacy. I realized what he was. I realized what he was doing to us. I had felt my life force draining out of me bit by bit but I had never paid attention to it. I had never known why. But now I knew. I felt it. He was drinking us. He was draining our life force and turning it into corrupted money for him to consume. He was slowly killing us and soon we would be dead. I knew I had to escape. I knew we had to escape. But how? We had no power.
He made us gather around. He told us that if any of us gave him six dollars he would let that person go. But none of us had that kind of money. At most we had three dollars from the girls on the street corner but many of us didn't even have that. I saw his offer clearly for what it was, a ploy to make himself seem good and reasonable while keeping us trapped in servitude anyways. He wanted to seem like he wasn't interested in oppressing us, only in making money. But I knew how he was draining our life force for money. I knew how draining us and oppressing us was inextricably tied to his ability to make money.
I had to think of a plan.
One time I was working near the very edges of where he was keeping us trapped. I was separated from him by two walls made of rough stone. They were also granting me the illusion of privacy. On the ground I saw some coins. A toony and two loonies as well as a few quarters and nickels. I was shot through with amazement and hope.
But upon closer inspection I saw that the money had the unmistakable quality of being tinged with the type of corruption that can only come from him. The money was unmistakably his. And this was a trap. Of course it was, it was too good to be true. Just a bit more than the money I needed to get free, and then some. He wanted me to pocket his change, to bring the money to him asking to be let go. And then he would accuse me of stealing and he would utterly destroy me. He would scrape the flesh off my bones and tear into my throat and drink my blood and bite into my bones and leave nothing left. Maybe he knew I was onto him. And he wanted to consume the last bit of me that he could. But still. I had to get free. I had to get free. I had to get free.
I pocketed the larger coins, too cautious to waste my time picking up the handful of smaller ones. He could come at any second. I did not intend to give him the money. But I knew that in this world, money was hard to come by and people could use it to keep themselves alive. I intended to give the money, along with the other money I already had, to someone who actually needed it. I don't know what happened after that. Maybe the rebellious act of stealing had given me the power I needed to break out of the spell for just a little bit. But I just started running as fast as my legs could carry me. I ran and I ran and I ran through the forcefield that had been keeping us in.
I knew I ignited his anger. I felt it the moment that I was free from the force field. So I kept running. My legs were sore and aching but they felt invigorated. My lungs were sore as I fought for every bit of oxygen I could get. I kept running and running until I reached my home.
For some reason my home was my science teacher's house. Like, my science teacher from real life. I'll tell you about her or else this part won't make sense. In the "real" world, the world outside the dream, where you and me and everybody lives out their waking lives, this woman was my science teacher and now she teaches other people.
I'm not going to tell you what year she taught me because on the off chance that she ends up reading this it would be incredibly awkward for her to know that she saved me from a capitalism demon in a dream that I had. Anyways, she really likes nature and really cares about the environment and taught me a lot of what I know about climate activism and stuff. She's also really nice to all her students and she's a communist.
Anyways in the dream she was all of that and she was also my mother.
In the dream I ran to her. And she felt bright and new and green like nature-spring. I told her everything that had happened. She told me that she knew what kind of creature he was. She had travelled the world and heard many stories of what exists beyond the physical reality. He was a Capitalist, a terrifying and dangerous creature that had an everlasting hunger for money and grew fat from harvesting the life force of humanity. She told me she didn't know how to get rid of him but that I must try, and I had her support.
I was scared. But I was also full of determination. I knew I had to end him. I had to end him immediately. I knew that I had a high chance of failing. A high chance of dying. A high chance of getting enslaved again and having my life force drained out of me. I did not care. I knew I also had a chance of killing him.
I marched up to him. He looked at me with his terrifying, dark eyes, and he snarled. I told him that if he wanted money he could come get the money. I held a toony up. He opened his mouth and rushed at me. But I jammed the coin into the roof of his mouth, making him bleed. He howled in pain as I jammed another coin into the roof of his mouth and two into the floor of his mouth, under his tongue. He howled in pain as he bled to death. And then finally, he was gone. Dissolved and carried away by the wind. Into nothingness. My friends were free! They were safe! They could go home and rest and live their lives as free people. They smiled and cheered.
But I still had the coins that I stole from him, which carried his corrupted essence. I was unsure of what to do with them. It was then that I realized. He might be gone but there were so many other creatures that were just like him. That were on the prowl. That were gaining power and draining their own victims and making the world what it was. We lived in hell.
I startled awake. Out of the dream. Into real life. I was so overwhelmingly scared. I tried really hard to forget about the dream, to stop thinking about it, to put it behind me. But I could remember his sharp teeth and his empty, abyssal eyes and his hard, uncaring expression. I felt his power all around me. And my heart thudded in my chest. He was coming to get me. He was coming to get me. He was coming to get me. But then I realized. That words have power. If I could explain to the world what happened, if I could explain what he was, what he did. If people knew about him. If more people knew. Then he would have less power. Then he would be foiled. I needed to fight him in real life, just as I had in the dream.
It's true that I woke up terrified but I woke up safe. I woke up in a house that was mine despite not being the home I wished was mine. I woke up secure. So many people don't. So many children wake up separated from their families all alone in dark rooms on hard floors. They're all alone. They're young. They're small. They're uncared for and unloved by all that surround them. They have no one they could call and no-one that would hear them if they did call. They have only their fear. Only their grief. Only their aloneness. They have no-one and they have to be quiet and not wake anyone. They can't even cry. They can't even scream. They have no-one to comfort them. No-one to help them. No-one that sees them as a person. No-one that sees them as a child. No-one who holds them and strokes their hair and tells them it will be alright. They just have to lie there silently, flooded with fear, silently trembling as they drown in their terror and grief. Young and already a victim of the system's destructiveness, of the cruelty of the people who benefit from it.
And I know because I've met children like that. I've turned my nose up at them. I've stayed silent to their injustice. You don't know what happens in places that aren't the West. You don't know what gets hidden and swept under the rug and never talked about and never taken seriously even if it is. We divide the world up into meet little categories that can easily be sorted. Put strangers in neat little boxes. Think that we can learn everything important about their whole lives from just a glance. We justify our wealth however we can.
Salt Water
Salt water clung to her skin, her eyes, her lips, burning. Exhaustion overwhelmed her as she desperately clawed the chilled ocean waves, trying to keep her head above water. Her damp, cold clothes were salt-encrusted and scraped her thin flesh like barbs, dragging her down with their waterlogged weight. Her throat and lungs burned from the salt water she had swallowed and inhaled. She had no energy left. She was clinging to terror and panic and a desperate need to live and absolutely nothing else.
The sun glared down hot and burning, turning the expanse of salt water into a blindingly bright blue. She was trying so hard to keep her head above water, but she found herself going under for longer and longer periods of time. She felt like her body was a dead, screaming weight. And her mind was delirious with pain and fear and exhaustion.
Salt water from her eyes met and melted into salt water from her surroundings as she finally gave up and let the ocean take her. Her chest felt like it was being wrung dry as she sank deeper, surrounded by darkness and cold and the heavy all-encompassing weight of death. She sank deeper and deeper, and found herself surrounded by a thick, rough, cutting substance that she could not figure out what it was. And then everything went blank.
———
Five men stood on a metal fishing boat. It wasn't the largest, but there was space enough to comfortably move around. They were surrounded by crates of fish but the fresh ocean air kept the stench of seafood at bay. They were pulling their nets up, noticing that they were much heavier than usual.
"What the fuck?" a brown-haired, muscular man exclaimed as a thin, lithe, dark-haired young woman tumbled out of the ropes, drenched in salt water and tinted in blood.
"What the fuck. I don't know what this is," a man with blond hair in a bun stared down at the scene, at the closed eyelids and limp, skinny limbs.
"I didn't fucking ask for this. Did you?" another man with brown hair and a skinnier build looked at his friends.
"I did not fucking ask either." A man with black hair and a square jaw looked up at everyone else, an annoyed expression on his face.
"Well is the girl even alive?" A strawberry-blond man asked with clear irritation in his eyes.
"Well there's one way to check," the dark-haired man replied as he bent down and felt for her pulse. "Just barely."
Without asking for permission the strawberry-blond man knelt down to do CPR on the unconscious girl. After a few minutes, some broken ribs, and a bunch of water on the floor, the girl was coughing, life seemingly put back in her small form. She looked around, startled verdant eyes taking everything in in panic and confusion.
"What the fuck, Jesse?" The muscular man asked the girl's rescuer, "now we have to deal with this. You could've asked us first."
"Shut the fuck up Mike. We can still talk this over. If I had waited longer she would've died."
"So?" the dark-haired man asked, "how is that even our business? We don't know her or what the fuck she is or what she wants."
"Petey I swear," Jesse started, "we can figure out what to do with her later. Just trust me on this, once."
"You better."
"Well what are we going to do with her?" The blond one asked.
"We can discuss it later, Leo."
"Who made you the boss?"
"I did now shut up Liam."
Leaving the girl there, half-sitting on the floor supported by her arms with a bewildered expression on her face.
———
The girl sat there, completely confused as the burning sun dried her, leaving her thin blue cotton dress stiff with salt and her black hair stiff with curls. She was in so much pain, almost delirious with it. Especially in her chest, which hurt so much. She looked around. She had no idea where she was or how she got there. She felt the sun too hot on her skin and the sea spray rough inside her chest. She heard snippets of conversation from the men who had gone around to the other side of the boat and were obscured by the cabin. She tried and failed to piece together what just happened, her mind swimming with pain and exhaustion.
———
The men stood leaning against the railing or the cabin, in heated yet hushed conversation.
"Why are you on her side Jesse? We can't afford to keep her here and you know it." Petey's voice was almost patronizing.
"I'm not on her side. Do you not have eyes? Look at her, all lanky limbs and delicate features and large startling eyes and full pink lips. It would be a shame to let that go."
"So? Oh my God Jesse, are you in love?" Mike asked. "You have a girlfriend. And I'm saving up for another car. Like you have no idea how hard only having one car is. I have to fucking take public transport sometimes and it's so inconvenient."
"Exactly," Leo added, "And my daughter needs new dresses. Good quality, hand-embroidered ones, none of the cookie-cutter shit. We can't afford to keep this complete stranger."
"We won't have to afford anything."
"You know the boat can only take so much weight." Liam said. "She's thin but she still weighs a good amount. If we take her to shore, that's pounds of fish that we won't be able to catch. A whole day's trip wasted, Jesse. We'd be down dozens of pounds of fish. That's so much money lost."
"Exactly, Jesse," Petey piped up, "I need to get new runners, I've had mine for a whole year."
"We can't afford her weight. None of us are rich," Mike tried to explain.
"I'm not saying we should bring her to shore. We can just have some fun with her before putting her back into the water where she belongs. Look, she's an incredible catch. I almost though we'd pulled up a mermaid."
"Are you suggesting what I think you are?" Mike sounded intrigued.
"I think I am."
"No, no. What will our wives and girlfriends say when they find out?" Liam protested, "you do love them, don't you?"
"Of course I love my girlfriend. But she does not need to know. Neither does your fiancée."
"Intriguing."
———
The girl was still trying to make sense of things. She knew she was on a smallish fishing vessel, on the ocean. She knew she had gotten rescued, and she was incredibly relieved. She sat with her arms hugging her legs, looking at the dazzlingly blue sky above. It was beautiful. It brought tears to her eyes. She was still in pain. But for the moment she felt lulled.
———
"Heyyy stranger." Petey smiled as he approached the girl. "We saved you. You happy?"
"Very, sir. Thanks." In truth she didn't entirely trust the situation. But she was happy to be alive. And she did trust him - all of them - a lot. They dragged her out of that horrible cold water. They brought her back into the world. They let her stay on their lovely boat. And she thought maybe they'd keep helping her. She just needed to get to shore.
"Well maybe you could show a little appreciation if you're happy?" He smiled again, just a bit too wide and off-kilter.
"Oh yeah, absolutely." She smiled back, hiding the pain in her ribs.
"Here, you're caked in salt." Mikey came up behind the pair with a bucket filled with water in his hand. "Wash your hair, girlie."
"Thank you."
She strained against her broken ribs to bend down and dip her hair in the water, wincing as she stroked the salt and sand and dirt out of her hair. She was grateful for the chance of getting clean. She was feeling quite itchy. But damn, this method hurt. Her chest felt like it was being wrenched apart.
Goddamn this was so much pain. Finally her hair and scalp felt much cleaner though, and she lifted her head, catching her breath as she waited for the pain to fade, which it didn't. She looked up at the group of men surrounding her with expressions that were overly-bright and just a bit off-putting.
"Thanks again," she smiled up at the men.
"Hey, it's nothing." Leo tilted his head a little bit as he looked down at her.
"Um... would it be too much trouble to ask for some food?"
"We're really sorry. We're fresh out. When we get to shore, yeah?"
"Okay." She tried to ignore how hunger gnawed in her stomach.
"Hey," Liam started, "you should probably clean the rest of you up as well."
"Okay." She took another bucket from him, which had a white rag of cold water on it. She wanted to rest right now. But oh well, whatever. There would be plenty of time for that once they got to shore. These men were really rather nice. She was very grateful for their company. She did need a bit of privacy right now though.
"Are you guys gonna leave?" She asked, looking up.
"I don't think we are."
She looked around for an opening, but didn't find one. She was surrounded on all sides.
———
She was horrifically tired, down to her very soul. Maybe in her very soul. Tears were silently, desperately falling from her eyes as she lay in the small cot in the cabin. They had called it "payment" for transporting her to shore.
It hurt. She hurt. She hurt inside and she hurt all over and she hurt in her heart. But it's not like she could do anything about it. She wasn't in control of this situation. She didn't have power here. Her life was in their hands. If they chose to save her they would. So far, despite the hurt, they had promised they would take her to shore. That's all she needed. To get to shore and then she could work something out from there. She felt so small, so helpless, so completely out of control and weak and dying. She lifted her eyes towards the sky again, gazing at the blue before exhaustion finally pulled her to sleep.
———
A pair of pale arms lifted the small, lithe sleeping figure, cradling her like a baby and holding her to his chest. Another pair of hands slowly slipped a long strip of cloth between her teeth and then around her head, circling and layering it again and again until there was a thick wad of cloth holding her jaw open and tight around her head. He tied it and gave the knots one last tug to keep them in place. Another pair of calloused hands tied a short length of rope around her ankles, and one around her wrists.
The nets were still sunken into the water now, but strong legs carried her to a side of the boat where there weren't any nets. Silently, solemnly, a small crowd gathered around the railing, around the young woman with the bony ankles who murmured softly in her sleep. There was a moment of hush that lulled over the boat for a moment. Everyone turned around and looked at each other for a spell, meeting each other's eyes, seemingly frozen. They looked almost shaken for a moment, before Mikey flashed a quick smile. The rest of them also smiled quickly, momentarily, before steeling their faces once again.
"Three. Two. One." Someone wisphered under their breath. Her body tumbled into the water, silent as she dropped through the air, still sleeping peacefully. The water splashed around her as she hit it, wide eyes startling open. She tried to scream but couldn't through the gag.
Three. Two. One. All that was left behind were ripples in the water.
———
Panic overwhelmed her for just a moment. She tried to swim but she couldn't. Water flooded her mouth and she couldn't close it around the gag. Fear pulsed hot and electric through her heart. And then it was just a hopeless, desolate sort of calm. She felt the water fill her lungs in ice-cold twisting agony. She was being pulled under. And she didn't even care. She had no will to live anymore. No will to fight. It had been ripped from her and she didn't care for it back.
Suddenly she wasn't cold anymore. Well, she was, but it was an exhilarating cold not a cutting one. All her bonds were broken. Suddenly she could breathe, the water flowing through her as easily as air. She opened her eyes to the blue-green glow of the water, and found herself face-to-face with a woman - no not a woman - a ... she didn't really know. Nothing hurt.
The lady glowed translucent in the water as it flowed through her. Her hair was dark black, full of thick curls, and longer than she was tall. She had a kind, passionate smile, and solemn, searching eyes. You could see the outline of tears rolling down her cheeks, though the girl didn't know how that was possible since they were in water.
The mysterious lady slowly reached out a hand for her, not touching, just asking. The girl reached out and took it, and then swam further into her embrace. The older woman held her tight in her arms, stroking the girl's tangled hair and singing something in words the girl didn't understand.
Eventually they stopped embracing and looked deeply at each other. The amount of sorrow in the older woman's eyes was overwhelming. And the girl found herself crying uncontrollably.
The lady pressed a kiss to her forehead and suddenly she found herself waking up on a beach, body healed, a large bag filled with food, water, clothes and money on her hip. She got up.
———
The ocean spirit drifted towards the nets of the fishing vessel that was meters away now. She tangled herself in the nets, among the struggling fish. She changed her form, becoming solid and taking the shape and colours of the girl she had just embraced, ropes forming around her wrists and ankles. She smirked, then closed her eyes, went limp, and simply waited until the nets were pulled back up.
———
"Oh why this again?" Jesse exclaimed as the crew pulled up a familiar-looking corpse.
They untangled the limp figure from the nets. But just as they leaned down to pick the body up and toss it overboard, her eyes opened. And from them shone blinding yellow light. Suddenly a bolt of lightening arched down from the clear, blue sky, hitting the boat and wrending it to a million pieces.
Hopelessness and Tomorrow
Laughter and idle chatter drifted through the brightly-lit, pastel-coloured room. Classical music played in the background. Symphonic, lilting. The walls were painted with bright flowers, petals encrusted with jewels.
Numerous paintings delicately hung from the walls, bright colours and soft brush strokes and shimmering frames. The air smelled like lavender and fake pine needles. Warm yellow light glittered through the crystal chandelier.
Reymi's vision was on the verge of swimming but he held it still with sheer terror. He was hungry. Starving. It clawed at his gut and his chest and his arms and his legs. Constant. Inescapable. With every breath his lungs felt weak and empty. The back of his throat turned with nausea and he felt light and off-kilter. And he was miserable. Scared and trapped and like his insides were being wrung out. He was too miserable to even cry, and too terrified as well. Storms were battering at every part of his soul. He felt like all he could hear inside himself was vast, all-consuming thunder, and screaming. He felt like all the tears he longed to cry but couldn't were distilling into crystals of pure poison and settling in his throat and chest.
But he had to keep working. It wasn't an option not to, no matter how much his body and mind ached for him to stop. His senses were screaming at him as he took rushed steps on his almost-trembling legs into the brightness of the large dining room. The world around him was both blurry and in focus at the same time. Both overly-sharp and completely faded all at once. He was focused on balancing the white gold tray that was piled high with lemon finger cakes. This act carried so much anxiety with it because he had to be efficient and precise and perfect, absolutely perfect. He wasn't likely to fall. If and only if he kept all his concentration. He wanted to collapse. Collapse and die. But that didn't matter.
His silent, ghostlike steps reached the large, carved mahogany table that shone a dull red, and he quietly set the food down before turning back to the kitchen, the one place in this overly-large house that was sparse, cold, and completely utilitarian.
Karria's eyes flicked over to Reymi for a moment. He was such a loyal and hardworking young thing, she thought, lucky we were able to find one like him. It's so incredibly difficult to get good help these days.
She turned her mind back to the lively conversation that was happening around the dinner table. Which contestant on Moonlight Dance Night Solaria was the best. Before that they had been talking about bars. And before that about how well their dear sweet genius children were doing in school. She turned the music up a little.
Reymi was in the kitchen pushing his tears down. He was succeeding. The twelve-year-old boy hadn't cried in years. It was far too dangerous to. He had no time though. He had to keep on working. His reached out and took a serrated-edged knife into his hands, and a block of thick dark chocolate onto the cutting board. He got dizzy for a moment, grasping the edge of the metal counter for balance. Wait, shit was it time to get the drinks actually.
He opened the door to the 5 degree fridge, and reached in for the multicoloured crystal tray filled with elegant curved glasses. He knew he had to be careful with this. His heart pounded in his chest but it always did that, this was nothing new.
He set it on the counter and then he closed the fridge door gently. Walking into the dining room again, he made effort to be as quiet and invisible as possible. If nobody noticed him nobody could yell at him. Thankfully nobody even looked at him once. That was good. He was used to being a shadow. He hated it. It tore at him from the inside. But it was better than getting yelled at.
He walked back in complete silence to the kitchen. He didn't remember if he had spoken at all that week, besides of course the constant yes ma'am and yes sirs that littered his life. He wanted a person to hear him. He had so much to say. He wanted a person to listen to and care about his thoughts and feelings and hopes and dreams and experiences and fears and jokes. He would listen to theirs back. He wouldn't be like Missus Karria who made him listen to her long rants while only giving him a chance to nod his head.
He'd be a good friend. If he had someone to be friends with.
He had to stay focused, working, staying on top of things. That didn't mean he felt his grief less strongly. Just that it was also mingled in with panic and strain.
His body was ready to die, so it felt. Either way, the chocolate took precedence over him and he had to prepare it. He cut it into fine pieces, tossed it into the pot to boil. He had the recepie memorized by now he didn't really need reference. He poured in heavy cream, letting himself lean against the counter. He sprinkled in a cup of coffee powder, ignoring the way the counter dug into his hip. He didn't have the energy to stand. He added a few cups of sugar, and a pinch of salt to even it out. His throat and mouth felt like a poison mesh where all the tears he wanted to cry and all the words he wanted to say caught and festered and corroded at him. He used a cheese grater to sprinkle a few sticks of cinnamon in, and he threw in some cadmium. Throwing in some caramel and some peanut butter, he started stirring the contents. He honestly didn't have much time. He hoped he wouldn't be late.
Finally though everything settled into a thick, flowing homogenous liquid. He put the heat to low and then checked the timer in the oven. The velvet cheesecake wasn't done yet. He had a moment. It was a small mercy.
He leaned against the counter. Let his mind and body both collapse against it for a moment. Sheer exhaustion. Everything blacked out, and he let himself fall into it. But then he pulled himself back into the world of the living, internally screaming. He couldn't go yet. Even if he wanted to.
He pulled out a heavy, intricately-carved bowl from the cupboard. A few matching bowls. A silver, green, and blue circular tray with a similar colour scheme, and the matching plates for that. A large bowl with frilled edges and smaller ones. That should be enough.
His bones and muscles protested, everything in his mind wanted to rest, wanted to sleep, wanted to run away, wanted somewhere soft to fall into and a kind smile and loving arms to be in. He wanted to die. To not have been born. To have a friend. He wanted so much and he could get none of it.
Either way, the table needed clearing.
He rolled a large metal tray towards the incredibly long table, and set about taking off all the plates and glasses and rolling them back to the kitchen. He had no idea how he could keep going on but he thought maybe he could.
He didn't know why he wasn't strong enough to just give up already. To just end his useless life already. He didn't want to keep living. He was just too much of a coward not to.
Back in the kitchen, he set everything on the counter. There were left over bites of food he could eat, plates he could lick. It wouldn't be much at all but it would be so much better than nothing. Added onto the stuff from dinner and lunch and breakfast, it would almost be a full meal. But he didn't have any time at all to eat now. He had to keep working.
He poured the chocolate into the large bowl, placing it onto the tray. He placed all the smaller cutlery neatly piled onto each other on the tray. His pace was dizzying for his worn-out mind. It would be dizzying for any mind. He took the cheesecake out of the oven, wincing as he burned his finger. It wasn't the worst he's faced. He transferred it, oh so carefully, to the glass tray. And finally he got some ice cream from the -10 degree fridge.
He kept telling himself, he just had to get this over with and then he could come back and lick all the plates. He could rest. He could talk. He could eat. He could be left alone for a bit. He just had to set this table and then he'd be home free. Home free with icing and gravy and turkey bones and dressing an ends of vegetables and peace and quiet, until it was time to clear everything up and wash the dishes.
He kept that thought in the back of his mind as he carefully set the table with desert, proper desert. Glasses were already on the table, along with the large bottle of champagne that has been there the whole night and was running low. He supposed he should get another one. Sigh.
He wheeled back into the kitchen, and then carried in another bottle of champagne in his aching hands.
He turned to leave.
"Reymi!" The voice was cold and hard and full of hatred and contempt and disgust. It was the only way anyone ever said his name. Swallowing down the desire to cry, the desire to run, he turned and faced the owner of the voice.
"Yes?" His voice was small and he could almost hide the grief within it.
"You need to clean up a spill in the sitting room!" He didn't know why there was always so much venom in her voice for him and only him.
"Yes ma'am." Honestly, some variation or another of yes ma'am was all he ever said to other human beings it seemed. Anyways he got some rags from the supply closet at the end of the hall and marched into the sitting room.
The speakers were blasting. The television that took up half of the vast, stretching wall was playing something he didn't have time to look at. Something 3D if everybody's dark glasses were anything to go off of.
There was some dark cocktail spilled out across one of the glass coffee tables. Thankfully none was on the thick, soft carpet. That would've been a nightmare to get out.
As much as he didn't want to, he heard snippets of the television program. It seems like some high-faluting political types are giving speeches.
"The threat these crazed lunatics posed on the well-being of our glorious nation is no more."
Who? Whatever. He sprayed down the table a little bit to get rid of the last sticky bits.
"Haynenne Drayle and Azera Hermann are in a top security prison. The two women will be publicly hanged tomorrow at sundown."
Oh. Them.
Reymi finished up and headed back.
In the soft dull light of the kitchen he took some time to scarf down leftovers and lick plates like a crazed beast. For the past few days all he'd had to eat was what he could salvage from what everyone else didn't eat. It was the summer solstice, a national two-week holiday. Days of all-day parties meant that money was tight and they didn't want to spend money on him. Whatever bits he could sneak from ingredients or leftovers was all he had and it wasn't enough.
But still, he got to rest right now, to eat right now. This was usually the best part of the night for him.
But despite all this, for the first time in many years, Reymi was crying.
He knew about Haynenne and Azera. He's been able to read a bit of a newspaper article about them once, during a stolen bit of precious downtime. Nobody knew that he could read. Haynenne Drayle and Azera Hermann were respectively three and four years older than him. They were in love. Azera worked at a school, Haynenne in an orchard. They'd taught themselves how to read and write, much like his mother had taught him when he was still young. Haynenne was sold to a man miles away from her beloved. Azera carefully stole and forged papers, at great personal risk. But she was able to use them to run away. She found Haynenne and together they burned down the house of the man who had her trapped there. And they escaped into the night.
Reymi has felt a spark of hope, a drift of cold, fresh air, on hearing their story. Maybe it's possible to win against Solaria after all. But apparently not. Love, defiance, cleverness, rage, hope, nothing was enough against Solaria's wealth and military strength and power.
Solaria was everything. Solarians were everything. Haynenne and Azera were powerless. His mother and father were powerless. His people were powerless. He was powerless.
Whatever was keeping him clinging to life fell away.
He got a knife. A short one with razor edges. He held it up to his neck. And pulled. One quick movement and he was fine. It burned. But he felt himself gratefully sinking into the afterlife.
Karria call for him in a few dozen minutes. And threaten to kill him when he didn't answer. She wouldn't know how useless a threat that was. How he'd never have to answer to her again. She'd walk in to see blood everywhere, and the soulless body of a twelve-year-old lying across the floor.
She'd scream. More because she didn't like seeing blood and less because she cared about the fate of the boy. She'd rant about how she'd have to find a replacement right in the middle of solstice season and she did not have the time. She'd rage about the huge mess that was all over the kitchen, how it couldn't just sit there and fester all night.
She'd have to clean up the mess herself though.
And Reymi would be in a Green Place where everyone was equal and no child was ripped from their family. He'd be welcomed by Azera and Haynenne. And the trillions of others whose lives were cruelly cut short. And together they would train. They would forge themselves into an army and they'd would kill whatever twisted god allowed Solaria.
All is Fair in Love and War
Azalia focused on her breathing. In. Out. In. Out. She focused on gently rocking baby Lohan in her arms. She had no idea why, but it was imperative that the baby didn't cry. She cried, though silently. Did Mac and Kaliaa make it? She hoped against hope that they did. Would Lohan be able to see them again? He was too young to be an orphan. The sky was heavy and dripping with a torrent of explosives.
She was crammed in the basement of a small yet sturdy church along with six of her neighbours. Netha, the old woman whose presence she was glad for. Allie and Juneka, twins that were two years younger than her. Dio and Eren, who were in love and who she shared her house with. Sami who flirted with her and she could never tell whether the other teenaged girl was serious or not. She could almost hear the war raging around them. For some reason there was abject silence around her. But people were clutching each others' hands, leaning against each other, crying into each other's shoulders. She held Lohan in her arms. She had been looking after the infant boy while his parents were out in the fields. He was teething, meaning that he was especially fussy. But now he had went still with terror. That was good. Even if they did survive this bombing, it was almost certain that this was the last holdout before the entire fucking town fell. And she knew the rules of war.
Hours and hours passed. Lohan was asleep for a lot of it. Thank the gods. But he woke up hungry and fussy and crying like all eight-month-olds who missed their parents and were hungry would be. Azalia literally did not have any food. Nobody did. She gave him her finger to suck on and kept rocking him and prayed that he'd feel some sense of comfort but she knew what the boy needed and she knew she was an abjectly powerless poor young peasant girl and if she walked out of this church right now she'd just be delivering the boy to enemy soldiers.
Eventually she couldn't ignore the child's hunger any longer. As much as getting bombed or shot would kill the kid, starving would also kill the kid. Loud crying that drew attention to their hiding spot would get literally everyone captured including Lohi.
"Aunt Netha can you take Lohan? I need to get some food." Her voice was hushed as she spoke to the old woman beside her.
"Sure. Good luck. Stay safe." The tired old woman gently took baby Lohi from her and Azalia slowly arose and quietly walked towards the heavy metal door.
"Be careful," someone whispered to her but she didn't know who.
The day has melted into twilight when she stepped out. She started in the shadows of bombed-out rubble. Not that it provided much cover. All the buildings in their farming town were barely taller than her anyways and now they were mostly dust. For the past four years people had crammed themselves into the increasingly dwindling living space like the story of the little pigs. She loved the small, simple one-room huts she shared with her family and neighbours. But that was back when they were six to a hut now it was frequently fifteen. And her family was gone. She stayed near the few still-standing walls and near broken trees. Off in the distance soldiers were concentrated, she could tell by how laser fire lit the darkness with an eerie yellow.
She found a tree that was full of soft, sweet jili fruits. Thank the gods. Ignoring her own fatigue she hoisted herself onto the higher branches. She had no basket to put them in, Fuck. She was really unprepared. She slipped off her shirt, ignoring the cold of the night, and tied it into a sort of bag.
After she had filled the worn threads of her shirt she climbed out of the tree, careful to not spill anything. She walked quickly back to the church, ready to collapse the moment she got there.
And really she should have been more careful. It was, it was cloudy, it was moonless, it was starless when the unnatural glow of a laser bolt zipped dangerously close to her, briefly illuminating her terrified slight figure. She stood there frozen before she ran off into the cover of a pile of rubble.
"Hey! What's a young lady like you doing in a war zone like this?" Azalia couldn't breathe. The words were kind but the tone was seeped with haughtiness, with predatoriness. What the fuck, what the fuck, what the fuck?
The tall, hulking form of a man dressed in a uniform strode up to her, backing her into the brokenness around her.
"Please let me go. I have a baby." Her voice was shaking. He charged up his blaster, so that the barrel was lit with a soft glowing light, too dark for the fighters in the distance to see. It glowed pale against her olive skin, dim against his camouflage. She hated all the soldiers equally regardless of what side they were on. She hated this whole war and the governments in their palaces that started it. But she could see that this guy was an enemy soldier. And that made things worse for her right now.
"And who's the lucky father of this baby?" He staked a step closer, leaned in until she was lying against the sharp prices of clay. She shook her head, terrified.
"What, did he die? Did one of our guys kill him? I suppose I should thank that comrade for making you available." What the fuck? If she wasn't two moments away from literally getting raped she would've laughed at this idiot soldier. She didn't have a dead husband or a living husband or even a boyfriend. She had her friends' child who she loved as her own. But that was the thing. Zohan was getting weaker by the moment and his survival was more important than anything that happened to her. This man might for all intents and purposes kidnap her. And then how would she deliver the much-needed food? She needed to think. The man was straddling her hips but making no attempt to get any of her clothes off, instead hovering his weapon on different parts of her body, idly looking over each piece of skin he illuminated. She was panicking more than she ever had, desperately digging with her hands through the rubble for any sort of weapon at all.
"You're by far the most beautiful woman I have ever laid my eyes on.
Though I suppose you're not quite a woman yet. And I found you which means I get you by the way. I can't believe my luck. You're going to like it in Zirunika you honestly are. There are buildings that soar to the sky and shine in the sun. There are marble monuments to our glory. Bright gardens. It's beautiful there much more beautiful than in these backwoods villages. I'd be taking you away from this squalor and drabness."
"Sir just let me go." She squirmed under his roving hands.
"You're too pretty. Prettier than anyone I've seen. Prettier than anything I've seen. I'm never letting you go. I'm taking you to civilization with me." His words were heavy and thick and pressed down on her throat and chest.
Finally her hands clutched around a shard of clay pottery. It was easily sharp enough to tear through flesh. But so much of the soldier was covered in thick fabric. Through the haze of horror, worry, and disgust a plan pulled itself together.
Striking quickly, she brought the shard up to the skin of her neck and started pressing down, hard enough to draw blood. It was a risky move. But it worked. He stopped, looked at her in... maybe it was confusion?
"I promise to come back to you. But first I have to drop this stuff off. Do not follow me. Or else I will kill myself. And then where would you get your perfect little war prize? Let me drop this off and then I swear I'll be back."
"Stop this madness."
"Take me to your beautiful civilization just let me do this one last thing as a free person."
"You'll come back?" There was something almost childish in his words.
"I promise."
"Fine." He got off her. And everything inside her screamed at her to run. But she knew better. She has to sell the lie. She's been poor for long enough to know the value of lying to power. But now it was more important than ever that she succeeded at deception. She walked calmly into the night.
"— wait." She turned back, just as he latched a thin band of metal around the base of her neck. He pressed his thumb into it and, goddamn, she felt like she wanted to die right there. But she hid the feeling.
"This ensures you'll come back to me, and that you'll stay with me all the days after."
"Alright sir."
She walked through the active war zone back to the little church where she'd see her people for the last time. She was extra vigilant that nobody followed her. She didn't want to lead them to the rest of her people. Lohan was to young to be west away from his world, and honestly nobody deserves it. She felt like her entire soul was flaking apart. She felt like her humanity was being drained from her. The collar was smooth and left plenty of room but it felt like a barbed wire noose. She was used to terror. She was used to hunger. She was used to weariness that settled into every corner of her being. She was used to grief that was insurmountable. She was used to physical pain. She was used to cold, to sickness. She was used to mourning, she was used to constant anxiety. And it all hurt terribly and she hated all of it but at least she had her friends and neighbours to get her through it. But now this was goodbye. This was farewell. And she wouldn't even get to say it to everyone.
She silently descended into the basement of the church, and pulled herself in, She passed the fruits to Sami. And then collapsed in her arms crying. Sami held her and cried with her.
"I'm glad to have known you," Sami said softly.
"You too."
Azalia stayed there for a while, in the embrace of her people. Holding baby Zohan, feeding him one last time. Telling him how much she loved him, how much she hoped he had a good life. She fell into the arms of Eren and Netha and Dio and Sami and Allie and Juneka. They told her how much they loved her. How glad they were to have known her. How kind she was. How strong she was. How interesting her thoughts were. How much she helped them and protected them through the horrors of the long war. How much they enjoyed raising her or playing with her before the war started. How much they would miss her. How they wouldn't forget her. How they would think of her and would hope things were at least a little bit kind for her. She told them how much she loved them too.
Hours passed. The fighting died hadn't down around them. It wasn't safe to leave yet. But Azalia knew that she had to. With tears in her eyes she hugged everyone one last time and stepped out of the door. It was still dark.
She walked past the rubble that was all anything was these days. She didn't take precaution to avoid getting killed. She turned to see that the tree she had picked jili fruits from has been killed in the bombing. Nothing good lasts. She had her shirt on now and it felt like a small bit of protection. She waited near the same rubble pile where she first "met" the soldier. She didn't even know his name. She let her tears flow freely.
Another hour or so passed. The fighting died down. A military glider zoomed up to where she was standing. Headlights shone through the darkness. It was emblazoned with the seal of presumably Zirunika. It could fit a lot of people, if they sat close, but only for people stepped out of it. One of them was that man. With great effort she kept her body absolutely still.
"Oh gods, she is a fine thing. It's not fair that you found her first Patton." The soldier's tone was jovial.
"Well maybe Lord Aldura favours me. Because she is mine."
They bantered back and forth a little bit. Azalia couldn't pay attention to any of it, her mind was screaming. Patton slung her over his shoulder and got on the glider. He positioned her onto his lap as he sank into the plush seat.
"You'll love it there. I have so much to show you." He traced the hemline of her pants.
As they zoomed away Azalia kept her eyes glued to her village until it faded into the night.
———
If you like this piece check out my Mastodon my account is FSairuv@mas.to and I po about human rights, social justice, and the environment.
Ruby
It's nighttime. It's dark. And I'm alone. And I'm rotting from the inside out like I always am. It hurts. Not me. The people. The masses. It hurts. Them. They hurt.
And I'd like to live a virtuous life, I think. But the truth is I'm honestly too wrapped up in sin.
It's nighttime. It's dark. The moonlight glints on the water, low and dull and slimy. I can see it from my arching, clawing window. Not that I care. I'm too far gone to care.
I hate the river and everything it's come to represent.
Death is really the only way out of this bullshit is what I'm trying to say. We hate ... we do absolutely hate those who didn't take up La Causa and that includes us but the promise of a better world is just as out of reach as the promise of justice is.
He comes to me when it's late at night, one night. Beautiful, beautiful, beautiful. Angelic. Enticing. Entrancing. My knees are weak. And I know I'm a disappointment to him. But I want to know him. I reach out to touch (to taste) but I'm stopped by ... by something clutching at me with waves of smoke. Just a few millimeters away from falling out the windows into the depths of his arms.
Milimeters. I think about him sometimes when my mind lets me. Dear God he's beautiful. Pitch-black (raven-black) wings darker than the sky around him, feathery. If he but touched my hair I could perhaps learn not to sin. If he kissed me roughly, desperately, I would melt into the ground in the best possible way. Emerging from the shadows of the cave of ignorance and ego, into the light and freedom of equality. Kiss me, kiss me, kiss me, part of me thinks of saying. But I can't or maybe I don't.
The words I love you don't mean I want to touch you. The words I love you mean I want to die for you.
I want to die for your cause. I want to die for your well-being. If my death is what it would take for you to get the respect you deserve then I forfeit this life. And I want to die for someone's cause. For his cause. I want to burn all his demons, crush all his enemies. I want to help him emerge victorious. But I also don't want to. I'm a cog in a machine and I'm too young to fulfill my place on it, young enough to have some rebel left in me. But that will change if time finds me alive in two years' time.
I want to die for you, I want to die for you, I want to die for you. And I don't want to die for him, but part of me does. And if he wanted me to touch him I would, I hope.
I'm dreaming. I'm standing in front of a boy that shimmers like moonlight. Magical. Not pretty how a painting is pretty but pretty how a blizzard is pretty. Powerful. Potentially devastating. But a part of nature in all it's glory. A force of nature. Necessary. To be respected, feared, and admired all the same. His hair shimmers like dusk. My knees are weak. I cut open my palm with a small dagger. The blood is beautiful, burning, red. So red. I bring my hand to his cheek, caressing, leaving trails of red as I make my way to his lips. I hover over his pink lips gently, not touching, waiting for him to move.
He's buzzing with electricity and moonlight and hope and brightness. Need. Dear God, he's everything that belongs in the world. My knees are weak, weak, weak. His whole being is overwhelming. Hope and anger. Hurt and desperation. Love and confidence. He's the Katniss to my Peeta and he knows it.
He holds my hand in his, and presses my bloody palm to his lips. I smile, my eyes lighting up. He presses hard, longing kisses into my palm and it hurts and I love how it hurts. Suddenly heavy, invisible arms try to pull me back but he keeps me there, the light from his eyes banishing my demons. He looks ... he looks imploring as he asks me to ... to stay. I do.
His lips, his chin, his cheeks, the tip of his nose. All smeared a wild, wild crimson. He shoots me a playful, almost childish look. I shoot one back. He takes hold of the back of my hand again, moving it down his face and licking my fingers with an exaggerated, unapologetic expression. I laugh. Quietly. We honestly can't be found out.
Like ... I mean we can ... but not by ... not by anyone society would take seriously. So if like a little girl walked in on whatever this is we'd be fine.
His spit and my blood intermingle on his face as he pushes his tongue through my fingers. Smiling, I press one on my fingers into his mouth. He looks delightfully surprised, and sucks softly as I press my still-bleeding wound onto his chin, his cheeks. He leans into it, and my hand throbs with pain. I press two other fingers into his mouth. He pulls a fourth one in.
Blood has started to run down even his neck now. We stay like this for a while, my fingers dancing in and out of his mouth, like threads being woven by his own slender fingers. my blood dripping all over him.
The lock to my door starts turning. We gasp as he opens his mouth and I yank my hand away, behind my back. Whoever is behind that door is not a little girl.
"The world pulls, you pull back harder." He whispers, barely whispers, and I have to strain to hear. And I think of all the people that are unheard in this world. This is who the song is about. And I remember. But my hand is still bleeding. I hope it never stops. I kiss it, tasting his sweet, bitter saliva. And I drift off to sleep.
I awaken with a large, gaping, scabbed-over cut on my hand. And I cry tears of joy.
Mountains and mines and factories and plantations and houses still exist. But butterfly wings also exist. Firework people also exist. And obviously something deeper, more all-encompassing, fairer, more equal, more motherly, exists. It exists beneath the surface, aching to be let out. Rich people have their own God. Revolutionaries have a different God.
———
If you like this piece check out my Mastodon my account is FSairuv@mas.to and I po abo human rights, social justice, and the environment.
Of Girls and Kings
Crown. It felt like a crown of thorns. Wide, startled green-flecked eyes. Always wide. Heart. Beat. Her heartbeat overwhelmed her ears. So loud, so loud, so loud. Surely others could hear it. But they weren't listening. They never were. But the constant metronome pounded in her head and she tried so desperately, so so desperately, to ignore it.
A young, sweet, child knelt before her. Or, more accurately, a young sweet child knelt before her husband. A small peasant whose body was ravaged with hunger. Tall, male, armoured guards flanked either side of the child, holding her down harshly.
She couldn't listen to what her heart was saying about this child.
Because she had to ignore it. She had to. If she wanted to be worthy of the attention, the affection, the validation he gave her, she had to ignore it. She had to be quiet both inside and outside. If she wanted to be worthy of him, to be worthy of this world, to be worthy of anything at all.
He might decide to kill her. Or torture her. Or maybe both. But she had to trust him.
She couldn't breathe. She couldn't anyways, the grip of the corset constantly, silently painfully embraced her. But she definitely couldn't breathe now. Everything inside her was screaming at her, that this wasn't how it should be.
And she couldn't be thinking that. She couldn't.
Her long, silky hair framed the sides of her vision with blood red. The dark mahoganies, raging golds, plush pinks, creamy yellows and unnatural greens of the arid hall pressed, pressed, pressed into her. Blaring. Glaring.
Suffocating and terrifying yet keeping her still, trapped in place. Reminding her of how Phillipe's body pressed into her at night when she knew she had no reason not to welcome it.
This is wrong, this is wrong, this is wrong. She was desperate to speak those words but she kept silent. She .... she had to. She had no business talking in the matters of the court. Not if she wanted a place there. Not if she wanted a place anywhere. Not if she wanted a place with anyone. Not if she wanted a place in this world.
Her heart pounded faster.
Girl. The tiny, scraggly, terrified being in front of her was a girl. She was a girl too, albeit an older one. They were two girls. There was a difference though. This girl was thin to the point that it was worrisome. Dark, curly hair matted in a scraggly mop over her head. Thin. Aching. Eyes welling with tears. Eyes full of pain. Full of hunger. So much hunger. Her eyes were full of me sores that threatened to destroy her from the inside out.
She looked over at the tall, gold-haired man sitting across from her. His ornate, twisting crown and his hair melting together. Tall and plump and looking like someone who'd never had to work a day in his life and never had to go to bed hungry even a single night. That's what he was though.
This man is my light. My life. He was the key to my virtue. She reminded herself these lessons. She so desperately tried, these past few years, to make herself believe this was true. But it wasn't, she knew this somewhere in the back of her mind. But he was her man. Her man. And what was a girl without her man?
The polished floor in front of her glowed softly like ice in the twilight. Like ice both she and the younger girl were trapped in.
The commoner girl in front of her had dark brown eyes, the slightest bit of red in her hair. And dear Lord she had curls. She was being held down by the two armoured guards beside her, forced to kneel. And yet she was trying to get up. She was struggling. Defiant still. She was a commoner standing before the king, looking him in the eye, and holding her head up. Defiant still. In the face of certain destruction. Her eyes burned with unbreakable confidence. Confidence that was so strange because it made her feel more confident too, not the other way around. Common people ... maybe they weren't so low after all.
A servant woman, thin and blonde and in pearls and terrified, handed King Phillipe a sky-blue bowl of creme brûlée topped with raspberry flavoured cream. His pace was slow and controlled, greedy, as he plunged his thick-handled, solid spoon into the soft and delicate flesh of the creme brûlée which soundlessly parted as he pushed in, ravenously.
The child-girl stared yearningly, longingly as the sent of sugar wafted through the room. She was starving, and this was food. Right in front of her, so close. Her wide doe eyes were overcome with hunger as she fixated on the bowl. It was the type of food she could never hope to afford in her life. She seemed so so so hungry at that moment, so so longing, and the sheer unfairness of it all nearly broke the red-haired girl on the plush silver chair. The curly-haired youth was trembling almost, at the sight of how easily, how greedily, the king was allowed to eat. And yet, though everything inside her seemed to be panting, she didn't lose the sense of power she had. This child was utterly powerless in front of the king and yet held a deeper, stronger power than the queen knew was possible.
The red haired girl so desperately wanted to say something. Something deep inside her, deeper than her bones, ached to do something. It was wrong. She wanted to wrest the bowl out of Phillipe's hands and kneel beside the child and make sure she fucking ate. She needed this. She was a young, starving, third-estate girl. And it wasn't fair that he should be eating creme brûlée when others couldn't afford bread.
But no. She couldn't let her emotions rule her. It was not her place. Not her place to do anything. It was his place to pass judgement. But she did cast a wide-eyed, pleading, almost desperate look towards her man. Please let her go, she silently begged him.
He looked at her with accusing eyes, clearly unimpressed at this show of opinion. She reminded herself to be demure, unassuming, ladylike. To not have opinions.
His lips twisted around the gilded silver of his spoon and the desert vanished into his dark maw, bits of syrup dripping onto his chin as he stared contemptuously.
"So. Little low-born, squalid peasant bitch. You think you can steal from the Royal fucking granary and face no consequences? You don't know your place, you rebellious little maggot. You don't know your goddamn place." The king spoke with the type of authority in his voice only kings can speak with.
The girl with the curly dark hair stared him dead in the eyes. The girl with the blood-coloured hair wondered how the young, dying child could find so much bravery within her. Unimaginable bravery. Yet not only had this child imagined it, this child believed in it and embraced it. And the child inspired the older child to be braver. She sparked something in her that made her soul yearn for the type of unbreakable courage the other girl had.
But no. Her loyalties lied with her husband, not with this peasant. Unless...
"You are down here." He stomped the floor with his fur-trimmed shoe.
"And I am up here!" He raised one arm to the ceiling.
"You! Down here! Me! Up here!" He repeated those words and gestures a few times.
The red headed girl with lips stained a similar red shade fixated on the scrawny, tiny person in front of her. So defiant. So brave. So strong. All of the things the wilder part of her longed to be. She had no power whatsoever in this situation, yet the way she held her head high anyways was more powerful than anything she could've imagined.
"I'll let you live until Christmas. Then, I'll lock you in the walled garden outside. And I'll just ... watch ... you ... freeze."
The queen's hearts stopped in her throat. She couldn't believe his cruelty. But honestly, part of her wasn't surprised. Her heart wasn't. Her soul wasn't. But so, she continued to suppress those parts of herself.
The younger girl was shaking violently now.
"Please no," she begged. Tears fell from her eyes and ran down her face. But she had been a theif and an outlaw, and Phillipe had passed his judgement, so surely this was what should be. Unless ... unless it wasn't.
"Take her to the dungeons."
"Please!" the child desperately cried out. She looked, not at the king, but at the queen. Desperately, yet hopefully, as if the younger girl she was waiting for the older girl to save her. Why? the redhead thought. Why does she think I could possibly save her? Why is she pinning her hopes on me? But she was. The other girl was pinning her hopes on her in the way only young people could.
And the older girl's heartbeat was deafening in her hears. And she listened to it. For the first time in her life she listened to it.
"No!" the young woman stated, loudly and surely and authoritatively. The king was so surprised, he didn't know what to do. The guards were surprised. She swept down from her throne, skirt bunched up in her fists in the most unladylike manner. She picked up the child and strode into the kitchen. Everyone just stood, awestruck.
"Don't worry. Don't worry." The child clung to her and she stroked her tangled hair. She set the child down on a plush downy sofa and gathered the heartiest stews and steaks and set them down on a plate in front of her. She got a tall glass of warm, honey-infused milk and did the same. Finally, she got a large slice of sweet berry pie so the child could have a burst of energy after that ordeal. It was a meal so large society would never have given it to a peasant. It was a meal so large society would've never given it to a girl. But this starving, dying, rebel child deserved it.
"Eat. You must eat."
"Thank you." The girl dug down with desperation and dedication. After licking the silver plate clean and draining the last bits of milk, she stared at the redhead, terrified. They both stared at each other with the type of fear only those who know they're damned feel.
"Um.... what's your name?" the child asked.
"Anne. You?"
"Lillian."
This castle was too cavernous and crawling with guards to escape. Anne knew this because part of her mind had always been looking for escape routes these past few years.
Lillian was going to die no matter what. But Anne was going to die with her now. But Anne was happy. Because Anne was going to die free and defiant and utterly herself. And Lillian would have a hand to hold and kind words and someone to cling to and the knowledge that she was supported. And though they didn't know it, their act of bravery and defiance would one day stoke the flames of a revolution once thought impossible.
The Daughters of Zeus and Poseidon
I sat on the cold, hard steps of the stairwell outside the large mansion that wasn't mine. The night was all around me. My worn-out, tattered dress did little to stop it's chill. I was crying. I had no-one. I had no-one. I was no-one. I was only a skinny, orphaned, seventeen-year-old. I was less than human. Everyone seemed to think so. Certainly including the people I ended up having to work for to make ends meet. And they were the people I had to spend most of my time around. I could feel life sucking my spirit from me. But pain created new spirit.
I gasp as suddenly, almost like magic, another face appears in front of my own. Where did she come from? It seems like she melted out of the shadows. She had dark skin like mine and striking blue eyes. Her mouth though. In the moonlight, I see dark red smeared all over her lips and running down her chin. It looks exactly like blood. I would have been scared. If it hadn't been for the way she was looking at me. She was sitting on her knees on the stair directly under mine. Her eyes were filled with fire, but it was the fire of caring and concern. It was the fire of protectiveness.
"Who are you?" I ask.
"A woman who doesn't belong," she replied.
"Are you going to hurt me?"
"No, Miss. Absolutely not. I saw you sitting there, and I saw how the moonlight draped itself over you like a trusting lover. The moon admires your beauty, Miss. He would ask for your hand in marriage if he could. I've never seen him love someone so beautifully. I thought I'd just let you know that." I smiled. I laughed.
"I'm not that beautiful," I told her.
"Oh but you are. Whoever told you otherwise? There's magic in your eyes, the sort of magic that's pure and good. I would ask for your hand in marriage myself if you liked girls." I smiled some more. Nobody ever told me words like these. Words so empowering.
"And I see you crying," the woman continued. "I see you with your arms around yourself, in your own embrace because no-one else is here that will embrace you. You're a dark-haired, fiery-eyed youth somewhere between girlhood and womanhood. I see your pain. I feel your pain. We all do.
"I have a story to tell you though. Have you heard the story of Icarus and the Sun? I'm sure you have. It's about a young boy who was a prisoner all his life. One day his father crafted a pair of wings for him and they left their prison. But he flew too high, towards the Sun, and the wax holding his wings together melted and he fell to his death."
"I know that story," I tell her. Greek myths were for some reason passed down amoung the Abrahemic people of this town. Perhaps because they were both entertaining and easy to remember.
"Everyone says that he was mesmerized by the Sun." The mysterious, bloody-mouthed lady was speaking to me again. "Everyone says that he was in love with Apollo, the Charioteer Olympian that stood on it each day. But we don't know that for sure.
"Icarus lived in a world that cared about him not. In a world that cared about mortals not. He lived in a world where his people were entertainment or bedwarmers or sources of praise. He lived in a world where they were immortal and he would be thrown away once the use was bled out of him. Like the rest of his people.
"Maybe his last act was not one of wonder. Maybe it was one of defiance. Maybe he looked upon Mount Olympus where the Gods would revel in revels no mortal could partake in. Maybe he looked upon the Sun in it's brilliance and how Olympian boy Apollo was the only one that could touch it, that could get near it. Maybe he saw all the glory reserved for the gods alone. And he remembered how the gods had stayed comfortable in their homes through numerous deaths and wars, how they had lengthened numerous wars, how they had killed mortal women for the sake of trying to touch them. And he decided that he would defy the gods.
"Maybe he wanted to fly higher than anyone would allow him simply because he deserved the soaring heights of the sky as much as the tall and mighty Zeus did. Maybe he wanted to touch the sun chariot simply because he deserved to as much as the entitled Apollo did. Maybe he wanted to show the Olympians that he was just as good as they were. Maybe he wanted to show the Olympians that he would not follow their rules. That he would not be the subservient creature they wanted him to be. Maybe he let go of his desire to live. He let go of his desire to hold onto food and water and air and sleep. Maybe he embraced the hard pull of gravity and the cold waves of the sea.
"Maybe he flew higher and higher. And he touched Apollo's chariot without permission.
"And he scared Mount Olympus. He made the gods tremble in fear at the boy who would never become a man. He made them tremble in fear at the boy who dared to defy them, who dared to fly through territory marked only for Zeus and touch the chariot made only for Apollo. Maybe they feared the boy who cared no longer about life. Who cared more about protest and defiance.
"And here I am Miss. I am only a young woman who wants to burn the world down. And we're only mortals in a world run by gods. Even if we're half gods. Even if your father is Zeus and my father is Poseidon. We are but mortals and we don't count. Metaphorically of course. But non-metaphorically, we don't get the things they get. We die. We fade away. We suffer. We suffer and we suffer and we suffer under their wrath.
"The blood all over your mouth. It's your own. You got that from when they hit you for breaking a vase. Why do you kneel to worship at their temples? Why you you smile meekly and keep your eyes downcast? And the world will know. And the journals too. Andre I fucking love you. Is it because you're afraid? Is it because you fear death? Is it because you fear falling into the sea?
"If you do, that's okay. That's understandable. It does not at all in any way make you a coward. But I'm here to tell you something.
"The blood all over my mouth is from a man I killed. He was a pale, square-jawed, fine-suited man with a rolex watch who I seduced in an ally. As I was kissing his neck I bit down on it. I watched him bleed out. I murdered an Olympian.
"And I'm going to kill all the gods. I'm going to do what they thought no mortal could do. I'm going to touch the sun. And if they hurt me for it I'll hurt them back. I'll kill all the gods, they'll all die at my hands. I'll kill Zeus and Poseidon and Apollo and Ares.
"And when you finally pass through the tunnel separating girlhood from womanhood, when you finallly emerge on the other side fully-realized, you are welcome to join me though you don't have to." She squeezed my hand a little bit.
And with that she faded into the night, no longer visible in the cool darkness. Like a warrior of shadow and moonlight. Like a black cat gliding through the streets.
"Wait!" I called out after her.
"Yes Miss?" she asked with some curiosity and some warmth.
"I want to go with you."
"Alright. But are you sure? It's dangerous out here. You're just a child. A demigod with a bleeding mouth and the beloved of the moon but just a child. Think about it some more and make the choice later."
"No. I want to go now. I want to kill all the gods. I want to do this not because you told me to but because I saw how my people suffered under them for so long."
"Alright but be careful." She took my hand.
And we were off. Two stray cats in the night. The person who made me bleed never saw me again. Until the night I made him bleed.
The Water Screams in Protest
—Background Information—
So this is all a dream that I had one night. It takes place in a dream world that of course is different from the real world. An alternate world. But like most alternate worlds, this world perhaps mirrors our world in some ways.
It takes place in somewhere that looks like a mixture of Antebellum America, Victorian England, and the wilderness. It takes place in a country - Marissileccea- whose economy basically runs on slavery. Most people are slaves, a few people are unbelievably rich, and a very small number of people are free but poor, scraping by on just what they need to live. They have some plants that we don't have and they don't have some plants that we do have. They have magic forces interacting with their world that our world might not even understand.
But the way their world is the same to ours is that both worlds have beautiful nature, beautiful people, suffering, greed pride apathy, change, and learning.
I will be honest with you, this work is far from perfect. I don't entirely understand what I dreamed or why I dreamed it. I don't think I did a perfect job of conveying the dream to you on paper. But I'm not any more perfect than you or anyone else, all that I have going for me is my constant and unwavering effort to make the best decisions I can and know how to make. So if it inspires you, great. If you hate it, great, that's your opinion that you're completely entitled to. But I hope that I can improve your experiance on Mother Earth's beautiful world. And yeah. :D :D :D Onto the story!
—A Light so Faint and Distant:—
Thomas is coming home to Carolivia from studying abroad. He was supposed to study business and politics, which would mean having to continue the slave trade in Coralivia and other places. That's because for any business to be even slightly viable it needed to have slaves because of the massive profit margins slaves generated. And only wealthy people could vote so to get into politics you had to be pro slavery. Now slavery those days, in those lands, wasn't really about race at all, it was more about getting crazy rich off the suffering and poverty of your slaves.
Coralivia was a beautiful place with amazing, breath-taking nature with sandy beaches, tall evergreen forests, bright deserts, peaty loam, jagged cliffs, and the river that ran through everything. But the citizens' minded were unnatural due to their greed and exploitativeness and all manner of other vices, and partly due to the presence of the Roaring King who made sure nothing would ever change.
Now Thomas was a pretty intelligent guy. He was a young man from a very rich slaveowning family with a bit of power and a huge mansion. Huge, ornate, architecture and made from stone. It caught your eye. It was very far removed from the nature around the manor. Thomas always had the shine of the idea that slavery was wrong somewhere in his mind but didn't understand how to follow it and mostly just went along with what his parents wanted in his life, growing up.
Going to college, those views quickly began to change. He had to live humbly, as a student, in small, quite small, simple tents, by nature, with simple food, with his only form of entertainment being talking to his fellow students, all young people, in their early twenties, really young. He had no slaves. He realized he liked this lifestyle. He didn't need all that extravagent stuff, he was okay having just what he needed. Also, it was so peaceful for the soul, spirit, and conscience to not have slaves. It was so great to not have slaves, to not be waited on by slaves, to not have the source of your lifestyle be someone else's suffering. It was also good to not have a lot of stuff, becasue that meant people were being cheated out of their fair share, suffering, so you could get that much stuff.
But he wasn't perfectly good yet. He still didn't know how to live without his parents' blessing. He didn't know how to or think he should live without his parents accepting him and being okay with him so he consigned himself, reluctantly, to going back to his life of being a slaveowner. He also, while he was okay with being lower middle class, he wasn't okay with being poor and not having the stuff he needed to live and be healthy. He knew that without his parents no-one would give him money and you needed a bit of money to get started on a career. So even though he didn't like having slaves he didn't want to not have slaves enough to fight against it.
During the whole time he spent in school and changing he also really got into theatre and playwriting. He loved making stories and acting them out and potentially changing peoples' thoughts, though at this point his stores weren't too original because he wasn't too original. Plays could be very elaborate and extravagant with flashy costumes, sets, and props if sponsored by a rich patron. They could also be very simple, with just a bunch of people in you tent and you and your friends acting it out. Thomas liked the latter type much more. Writing plays was very hard word but he and his friends liked it. Thomas liked it a whole lot. The feeling he got was incomparable. A constant push foreward met by a constant buzzing sense of harmony.
Playwrites never made more than a little money so he could tell his parents wouldn't want such a career for him. But playwrites never had to use slaves so that was a huge plus. His friend Alexander, who was from a different, better countrym encouraged him to go professional in his passion. He eventually decided he wanted to, but he still wasn't okay with potentially not having enough to live. So he decided to ask for more money from his parents under the guise of it being for something else, and use it to sneakily start his playwriting career.
But he didn't ask soon enough and soon it was time for him to go home. His stint at college may have been ended prematurely by his parents catching whiff of his plans. He could've tried to say longer but he didn't since he was so against being abandoned and poor.
Anyways, dark things were at work, always had been at work, (for a while) in his home state of Coralivia.
A spiritual weapon that would help him on his future journey of redemption was that he had talked sincerely (respectfully, listeningly) to a few slaves and therefore the thought that people experiancing slavery had their own thoughts and emotions was more strongly within him.
—Forwards Into the Sunrise—
One of these slaves that Thomas talked to was a seventeen-year-old (and therefore, you know the key word, YOUNG) stableboy named Leonard. Leonard had hair as golden as sunlight and eyes light blue like the daytime sky. (Author's note: I'm not implying that "Aryans" are prettier than other people, truly all people and all peoples are equally beautiful. I'm trying to symbolize his connections with daytime and the daytime sky.) While this may be hilariously bad in context it's meant to represent daytime and how it's good for people and how day always comes after the oppressive night.
And to further symbolize the fact that he represents the changing from a painful situation to a positive on, his spirit name was Golden Dawn, after the liminal, emotionally mixed, and dynamic time between night and day. He was a quiet, thoughtful, passionate boy.
This is the scene I was witnessing from the world inside my dream. Leo was riding through the outskirts of Coralivia on a horse he loved. He had just escaped his old master and he was filled with brightness, happiness, lingering sadness, and hope. He was excited and ready to start his new life in place where he could be free since no-one knew he was a slave. He was anticipating all the great things just across the horizon like respect and dignity and being a part of and accepted by society and being able to work in a dignified and humane work environment and not feeling trapped to be with people he hated and not being hungry and sick all the time. He really thought he could make it in the world as a free person. He was a firm believer that things could get better, that peoples' lives could get better, that the world could get better, though he wasn't really thinking about that last one right now, yet. He felt great changes, great power, great inspiration, alive and at work within him. He felt like very important events, not just for him but for the whole world, were taking place.
But he also felt and almost supernatural sense of fear, that something dark, something corrupted, and oppressive was coming to get him and hurt him, supernaturally. Now Leonard didn't beleive in magic yet, so he wrote it off as paranoia, which was especially ironic he WAS magic, he just didn't realize it yet.
While he was riding he also remembered his life as a slave, which was very painful and depressing. His master was a very rich nobleman who really enjoyed plays. He would fund a lot of really extravagant plays, often with very pro-status-quo stories, and sometimes Leo was brought along to the performances to take care of his master's horse. Being a stableboy was an incredibly lonely job as he had to spend all of his days in the stable, cleaning it, getting hay, feeding and brushing the horses, etc. He didn't really get to see the other slaves, and the loneliness was agonizing. He did develop a close relationship with the two horses though, especially the roan horse, Hacombe, who was being mistreated just as Leonard was. Leonard also didn't get enough food or warm clothes from his master, which meant he was sick a lot of the times, which meant the work was agonizing a lot of the times.
One day, though it's never explained how, Leonard stole a bunch of supplies, and rode off to Coralivia with Hacombe. During the ride from there to here both lives got considerably healthier and less sickly, on account of Leonard being able to take care of them properly. Leonard was the first escaped slave in the entire country's history, bestowing him quite a legacy to have. Amazing things were unfolding.
By the time they got to the town - a small, sprawling town compared to the city they were used to - supples were running a bit low so Leonard knew it was imperative that he get a job and settle down (no more constant traveling). He was very excited to have a real job where he could be respected and part of free society. He was, yeah. Happy. But he knew it would be kind of hard.
—Heinous Claws—
During all this time the Roaring King was looking for Leonard. The Roaring King was the embodiment of lines, of metaphorical lines, but not in the same way Leonard was. He was enraged at Leo for escaping. He was also enraged at him for plotting to help other slaves, who couldn't, of course, escape on their own but are beautiful souls deserving free lives, to escape.
Now Leonard was going around town trying to land apprenticeships but he hadn't landed anyand his stuff was running out. In his desperation he went to the estate of a slaveowning family to see if they had any jobs for him. He was scared of them and uncomfortable in his interactions with them but took comfort in knowing he was a free man as far as anyone knew. There was a dark, unsettling, corrupted, and almost infectious atmosphere over the estate. The manor house was huge, and towering, and the ladies were in very frilly dresses with frilly umbrellas. They said they didn't have any work for him and Leonard left a bit sad.
But mostly he had a feeling of something dark watching him.
What happened next was a nightmare. The author doesn't quite know how to write it down. There was a man behind Leonard. Not a man, a thing. A grotesque, disgusting, horrific thing. But as frightening as it was to look at what was ten times more frightening was his vast, deafening aura. The immense feeling that rode with him like an outstretched peacock tail of a thousand snakes. The being had long, rough, white hair, and sunken dark eyes embedded in what seemed like an ocean of wrinkles. His face seemed to be a wrinkled, saggy, loose, pale gray mass of skin loosely draped over a fat, deformed skull. His body was fat and pale and wrinkly. But the feeling he carried, like an immense, deafening, rabid, raging, grating, yet silent scream, was beyond proper explanation.
Leonard beleived in magic now. Whatever that thing was, it could not possibly be human, it had to be a dark, powerful force.
It rode behind him, sometimes on a black horse with red eyes and sharp teeth and sometimes on a motorcycle, which was an alien device to Leonard. Hacombe galloped fast but could not get away.
The aura of the inhuman rider was all-encompassing, all around Leo. It was smothering and oppressive, grasping to reach him and hold him down and suffocate him. It was roaring and screeching and powerful and corrupted, and inspired terror and disgust. It was angry and raging and furious. It fell over him, all around him, and blared through his mind. It was strong and proud and tangible. It was choking him.
He tried so hard to escape the rider. But the rider was gaining momentum. Leonard was terrified and, as the rider came up to him, the last thing he saw before passing out was Hacombe galloping away, and he was at least happy the horse escaped.
He woke up and the dreadful rider was standing over him. He felt a cold, weary sense of dread. The rider had a gruff voice. It said it was going to hurt Leonard. It introduced itself as the God of Lines, as the god of lines society said were not supposed to be crossed, of the social structures, behaviours, lifestyles, and attitudes that the status quo said must be maintained.
Leonard was scared because it was going to hurt him, but he also couldn't help but feel a sense of connection to the beeing's affinity with lines. He recognized the magic in himself and that a big part of him is to see the lines set by society and to analyze why they're there and what they're for and what they're about and then he crossed those lines and broke those social codes. Lines, and specifically crossing them was intrinsically a part of him, was tied to him, and was the constantly burning star within him.
Now, he saw he was on the ground beside a tend and in the tent was a dark-haired teenaged girl strapped to the bed. He knew the girl was there even though the tent was closed and he couldn't see into it. He was scared for this mysterious lady just as he was scared for himself.
The dark rider, who was, in fact the Roaring King, knew he would torture and kill Leonard for being an escaped slave and therefore challenging the status quo of slavery, which no-one had done before. But he saw the fear and tentative, confused respect Leonard helps him with and thought he could use that to control him into aiding the King with something. He told Leonard to go inside the tent and hold his daughter down and attach a drip containing the King's blood into the girl.
So Leonard learned from that that the girl inside the tent was this mysterious entity's daughter, and probably he was trying to somehow hurt her. This confused him. Shouldn't magic things, especially family-related magic things, get along? Well, he didn't know too much about magic. He could tell though that having the dreadful rider's blood but into her would corrupt her and weaken her, and having the corrupting, corrosive, locust-ridden force in her would really hurt her.
He didn't want to do it. But the suffocating, oppresssive, corrosive, scary force in the air was still around him and choking his mind and forcing I'm forwards. But as he got closer to the tent he felt a different force. A kindly free, comforting, warm, airy feeling that made his mind feel free.
He took that power and inspiration and used that power and inspiration to escape. To get out of there. He thought he was free from the dark rider, that he could live free and the way he's wanted to as long as he stayed out of that rider's way. He knew though that were forces at work within him and within the world that he had not known before.
—Light on the Water—
Reuniting with Hacombe, Leonard set out to find work. He saw Thomas in town briefly, a man he remembered as questioning his own place in life, and Thomas gave him a few small silver coins which would tide him over for a few days.
Eventually he considered asking the rich people for a job again. He was outside the gates of an estate, sitting in the grass looking in and pondering if he should go in or not. They were outside their big whitewashed house, sitting in designed chairs and drinking tea from delicate, colourful china cups on glass tables.
Leo was thinking on how the dark rider was, or called himself, the God of Lines. How did that relate to the power or meaning of lines that was working inside of himself? And why was this being so angry at him? And why was his line affinity so oppressive while Leonard's line affinity was so freeing/kind/warm? Leonard realized that the dark rider was the God of Not Crossing Lines, of seeing what the status quo was and keeping it there, while Leonard's power was crossing lines, of triumphing over status quo. He realized more than ever that he'd have to help as many slaves as he could get to freedom.
He, on an unrelated thought, resolved to go into the estate and ask about employment. What he didn't know was that becasue of the Roaring King's influence the slaveowning families knew that he was an escaped slave and would jus enslave him again if they found him. Before he stood up he felt a finger over his lips.
He looked over and saw a girl, fifteen or sixteen, lying on the grass crouching like an antelope. She had dared hair darker than the night and pale skin paler than snow. And she had one hell of a gaze. He was lost in it, it seemed to hold him, and he could see her looking into his soul, connecting with him, trying to understand him, trying to protect him. It was so powerful, and so friendly, and so kind.
Leonard had no idea who this girl was he didn't know who she was or what she wanted. Some strange part of him trusted her though, and another part of him was questioning, and another part of him was rebelling against the sheer strangeness of it all. She was motioning to her helmet, which was similar to the helmet he saw the dark rider wearing. How would she get that helmet? It it even the same helmet? These thoughts were rushing around Leonard's brain. It couldn't be a different helmet because literally the only other time he saw a helmet even similar - black with a white, thin animal skull, weirdly shiney, made of strange material - was on the dreadful rider.
Why did she have it? Was she some kind of helper for that being? No, she seemed too protective/nice and too ... rebellious for that. Was she this daughter he'd heard about? Maybe.
She put his hand on her heart and then started beckoning him towards the river. He followed, unsure, but trusting her.
—Alliances—
Suddenly ther monsterous rider burst out, explosively, and just as terrifying as he was before, maybe even more so. He was attend horseback on each side. Men in shimmering, multicoloured, silken suits and top hats. Women in large, voluminous, silken dresses of variou shades trimmed with lace-like material. They looked human but Leonard could tell that they werern't. He suddenly knew that these were his attendants, his cronies. And they were about to capture him for crossing the "sacred" line of slavery, for changing who was and wasn't allowed to be free.
Everyone should be free from Leo's previous torment, no questions asked.
Leonard and the young teen started running, as fast as they could. Away, far from those guys, towards freedom and safety. They kept running, on foot, exhausted and full of energy at the same time.
The crowd chasing them was rambunctious and rowdy, yelling insults at Leonard for being a slave, shouting profanities and threats at him for running away, chiding the girl for being so rebellious and not listening to them. They chittered about how superior they were and how superior they were and great they were. The girl was running hard to get away from the noise, from the ones bent on making her the perfect complacent daughter. The boy was running for his freedom.
The riders, the ring of screeching flame, always carried a deafening loudness which was silent with it, as the lone Roaring King also did. This loudness though was filled with haughtiness and judgement and contempt. Rage and superiority at Leonard for being an escaped slave. Contempt towards him because of his perceived inferiority. Superiority and control over the girl for being so rebellious, for thinking differently, for being so contrary.
Their force and the tangible power of their rage tried to reach the youths and writhingly wrap around them and hold them. They wanted the two youths back. They wanted them in their proper place. They wanted to entangle them and keep them down and keep them in their place forever. Their deafening silent loudness was viscous and clawing.
Leonard could feel it, feel their ferocity and their aggression as they tried to get him. He felt the sting of their words, the sting of the emotions they conveyed to him. He felt their scrutiny breaking him down, tearing at his sense of self-respect, making him feel like a little bug under their gaze. This was not as bad as how he felt as a slave, because the human masters while not as blatant as these attendants in their hate, made their feelings more than clear. But he could tell that if they ever caught up to him, if he ever fell into the heavy, bitter air that was around them, it would be unimaginably horrible.
He felt a soft fire within him though, that was keeping that heavy air at bay as long as her ran. He could feel an energy from the girl too, strong and fresh like river currents keeping him safe. But the closer the riders got, the more his defence faltered.
The girl was getting weaker, and was increasingly stumbling and tripping as she ran.
He reached a fence, a fence with a hole in it. On the other side of the fence was a blue lake, deep blue with waves that reflected the sunlight. Det couldn't swim. He looked around and couldn't see the girl.
He faced the riders. Their horses were whinnying like feral wolves. The air around them was bussing with aggression and pride and corruption. And they. Looked. Terrifying. Leonard knew that drowning would be better than this so he slipped out of the sugar field he was in and into the water, through the hole of the fence.
—Homeland—
Leonard thought for sure that he was going to drown. But as the cool embrace of water led him down, he felt ... not dead. He felt himself navigation through the water like a bird through the air. He felt himself not needing to breathe. He glided to the river.
The river was beautiful. Heavenly sunlight came flooding in though the top layer of water. THe water was cool and fresh. Flowing constantly forwards as humanity flowed constantly forewards as one generation made way for the next. Some fo the water bent, swirled, and beat against the edges. The cool ribbons of liquid caressed him.
There was a girl in front of him. No, a mermaid. No, it was the very same girl as before. Her pale skin was blue in the light underwater, and her dark hair and lips looked navy-blue. She had a long tail that also liked navy-blue tipped by translucent fins. She had a simple dark strip of cotton around her chest. She looked so healthy. She looked so at home. She looke so one with the river around her, like she understood it perfectly, like it was a part of her, like they were intrinsically tied.
She seemed full of spiritual energy.
The river teemed with life. Beautiful, magical full of energy and spirit and harmony and nature, shining in the sunlight as it constantly moved and shifted.
She beckoned him to follow her. So he did. She was so wild, so lively. Wild and free and untamed like the water that constantly rushed to sea or the fish that followed their instincts and their nature or the rocks that jutted in and of put of the river bank. She showed him through the nature of Coralivia. The intrinsic energy that flowed within it was the intrinsic energy that flowed within us all, that flowed through us all.
She was constantly moving, constantly wanting to improve, constantly wanting the world to improve. Progress. Improvement, Positive change. It's what she ached for. What she burned for. What she wanted intensely with the whole of her entirety. He longed for it too. He longed for positive change, panged for it. So maybe, very likely, his powers and her being were tied. Yes, she agreed.
They communicated not by words but by feelings. By overwhelming, joyous, hopeful feelings. She beckoned him to her, trying to show him the way to freedom. She really really wanted his freedom, he could tell, it meant a lot to her, to them both.
The river danced with the dance of life, with the dance to nature too. And he felt it all go into him and strengthen him and heal him and he felt that magical flame inside him grow stronger and healthier. The nature, the nature was so wild and free and harmonious. Everything inside it followed it's nature, followed it's instincts, did what it inherently felt was right. It flowed into him reminded him to always follow his instincts and be kind and generous, let his life and his love flow undisturbed by things like things and objects and money.
The river maiden flowed in it and with it and as it and by it like the river's - like nature's - daughter and sister and mother and baby all at the same time. Her love pressed onto him. She wanted him to be free. She wanted him to be respected, healthy, treated fairly, not exploited or seen as a source of gain but seen as human. She ached for it. For all the slaves. This was a positive change that needed to happen.
She was so in tune with the river, everything in the river was so intune with each other, worked in perfect harmony and understanding. It was inspired/reminded him to always respect and try to understand people. To understand that they were pockets of love and life and beautiful spiritual energy. He had to respect and understand and value them all as pieces of spiritual energy and glory. Just as every life form and environmental aspect was part of each other people were all part of each other. Just like ever twist and bend of the river brought with it new question on the nature of life, Leo knew that life itself and love itself and humans and relationships between humans and the inhuman were infinite and there were infininities of question you could ask about them.
The River Maiden, she was intrinsically tied to youth itself, to the very concept of youth and to youthful rebellion. So she questioned everything. Every action, every idea, every aspect of life and the world and existence, she questioned it. If she found that an idea was good she accepted it, dedicated herself to trying to protect it. If she felt an idea to be good, if it resounded within her spirit as natural and right then she railed for it. It was almost dangerous, how much she questioned everything. Almost dangerous, but not quite.
Leonard felt thrilled to be travelling down the river with her. Thrilled and energized and inspired.
The ecosystem was always breathing, always intermingling. Every beautiful aspect was sharing it's energy and being with every other beautiful aspect. It reminded him to be as kind and generous as he could and always try his very best to help people. To share as much as his own sacred energy with other people as much as he could, to share his love and his care. Light pooled over the river. The maiden was smiling. The river was so kind, so caring, so wanting all people to be well, physically emotionally, and spiritually. Leonard reflected that it was good for him to do the same.
The river gave him hope that the greedy, excessive, proud, dehumanizing face of Coralivia wasn't the real one. Hope that the natural state could be returned to. That a kinder, simpler, more generous time could be reached where people saw each other as people and that view wasn't marred by desire for illicit gain.
The River Maiden eventually dropped him off at shore, where Hacombe and a bag of supplies were waiting, at the edge of Coralivia. She told him to get out of here, that it wasn't safe with her father around.
—Thistles and Sparkling Souls—
Leonard didn't want to leave though because he felt that if he left he'd have have failed at becoming a normal citizen. Now this wasn't true, he was a normal citizen no matter what. But while he knew very well how to be kind to other people he hadn't quite mastered how to be kind to himself yet. So he went back into town, bumped into Thomas again briefly, job hunted for a while, and also spent his time spying on the esttunities for him to free any of the slaves.
HIs folly caught up with him though as soon some of the slaveowners captured him for being an escaped slave.
He found himself again sleeping on the bare ground, working long and strenuous hours in sometimes extreme weather, and generally suffering. He was put to work picking crops, so he had the company of the other slaves at least. That was a fact that we was grateful for.
Sometimes the sun was searing down on him and he was incredibly overheating, making his head throw horribly. Sometimes the evening chilll bit into him. He had to work fast, incredibly fast, inhumanly fast, and it strained his mind and his arms and his focus so much that by the end of the day he felt like a bundle of frayed string. The constant fear of being punished weighed on him, terrifying him. And each day seemed more painful that the last. They didn't give him enough food, didn't give any of them anough food. Leonard quickly lost a lot of weight, became as thin as he used to be before he escaped for the first time. The hunger made the work so much more painful. He cut himself on the more thorny branches at times.
He knew that whatever he was experiancing wasn't any worse than what the other slaves were experiancing. He knew they all suffered together. There was a sense of oneness, of camaraderie and brotherhood amongst the slaves. He loved that feeling. He wouldn't trade it for the world.
But that didn't mean he wan't in a lot of pain. The experiance was harsh, unforgiving, terrifying oppressive, grating, ad melancholy. The worst part was when he was seeing one of his comrades die.
He didn't give up hope though. He knew that there was some power working within him stronger than he himself, that no-one else had. It was that flickering light he'd noticed before. Separate from but tied with the River Maiden's power. It was the act of crossing lines, of emerging into a better situation, of creating a better situation. He knew he had to use his power to help his friends. He knew he had to use it to help them emerge into a better situation, to free them. After all, that's what the power was for. He couldn't selfishly keep it that would be treacherous. He'd learned by this point to by kind to himself too, by the way. He didn't know how but he would go about freeing people.
—East Wind—
One day, on a cloudy day in August, he found himself by the river again though. How he got there is not shown. Hacombe was there though, and Leonard was overjoyed to see him again and embraced him. He saw the River Maiden with her head out of the water, looking deeply, longingly at him, smiling a bit sadly.
She let him know, without speaking, that one of the things she is a spirit of is desiring for positive change. Desiring for it with all of her being, incredibly, intensely, needing it, longing for it, supporting it wholeheartedly.
She tried her best to make change happen. But she wasn't the spirit of making change happen directly, she wasn't directly the spirit of change happening. So she couldn't always make change happen. Change happening was made even more impossible by her father, the spirit of keeping things the same, and his cronies. But Leonard was what could perhaps change that.
Leonard had the spirit of change happening, of situations improving, inside of him. That might be why he was the first escaped slave ever. Wanting change, panging for change and hoping for change is what powers change and drives change into happening. But it's not all-powerful. Sometimes, only sometimes, there's a lot if can't do. Leonard's spirit though was the actual phenomenon of change occurring, which of course, needs her spritit, the spritit of wanting change. Together they could be incredibly powerful.
She gave Leonard a bag of supplies and money. She said that food was magical and was extra nourishing and healthy. There was an extent to which the food and money in the bag could replace itself once take out, but this couldn't happen an infinite amount of times. It was she best she could do.
She told Leonard to meet Thomas, who had been changing his own life a lot lately, in a tent near the town by the river and evergreen forest. She gave him a pale stone from the river and told him to hold onto it, as it would prevent her father or his cronies or even the estate owners form finding him or recognizing him.
Then the group would work on freeing as many slaves as they could together.
Leonard took Hacombe and the magic supply bag and walked into the river. The currents were soft and cool and deep as the River Maiden transported them to Thomas's tent.
—Friendship with Living Redemptio—
Leonard and Thomas became great friends. Thomas had been living on his own in his small, sparse tent for a while. He had finally gotten the courage to leave his parents and was content, he explained to Leonard in one of their many talks. While Thomas definitely would like to have enough food, everything else was okay. The tent was small but it had all the space he needed. He had no furniture and just a few tools, a mattress, and some bedding, but he had everything he needed to write his plays and be happy.
He didn't go to grand places anymore and that was okay as he had a lot of peace being here and hanging out with the less affluent denizens of the town.
Leonard told Thomas of his own history too. Of his adventures in town trying to build a life, of his adventures galloping away from his old master, across the country. And of course he told him about all the terror and misery of his time in slavery, and the dark horror of the River Maiden's dad. And he told him of all the fantastical things he experienced with the River Maiden and his glorious journey through the river.
Thomas said he knew the River Maiden, that she helped him leave behind the corrupt side and be who he was and find purity.
Leonard liked how Thomas talked to him. With a quiet, constant, unquestioning respect that was as strong as stone. Leonard was just another person to him, just another human being, just another pocket of love. He was not something to be used, he was not a pathway to some end, he was not valued for what he did. He was simply valued because he was a human trying his very best to help people. He was simply a friend, to be respected and helped. He was simply seen.
Hacombe was the happiest out of the three of them. He was able to wander though the meadow and the grass, running and grazing to his hear's content. He was the only one with quite enough food, as Thomas's theatre hadn't taken off yet and Leonard had yet to find work.
They had the magical bag, but even though they were hungry they knew it wasn't infinite and they didn't want to take too much from it. But even though they were hungry they were respected and that was much better than being a slave. Also, the work they did was uplifting and not degrading, which was a major difference from Leonard's old life.
Leonard asked Thomas one day, while they were sitting on the untreated wooden floorboards of their dark blue canvas tent, how he got the courage to leave home. Thomas said that at first he was iffy about slavery and materialism but he didn't wanna leave his parents becasue he didn't wanna be who knows how hungry for who knows how long. He got to his parents estate and saw how big it was. How big and towering and ornate their harsh stone mansion was. He'd seen it before but this was the first time he saw it with his eyes open. It was so distant from nature, so far removed from it. It was a wound on nature. He felt a heavy, suffocating poisonous force around that place. And he couldn't get used to all the wealth he was around either, it was so far removed from nature. And what he coudln't get used to most of all was having slaves around. It was such an abomination. It was so corrupt and unkind and disturbing. He realized he couldn't live like this anymore.
He was alright if he starved. He was alright if he died. Dieing was preferable to this scheisse. He could feel the threads of corruption in the air. So he packed a couple of things, some money, and left. He'd been living in his tent and trying to start his theatre career ever since.
Leonard agreed that the wealth of the estates was really far removed from nature and of course slavery was an abomination. They talked about how in contrast their hut seemed so in tune with nature, how it seemed huddled up against nature like a child on it's mother's lap. It didn't seem to be hurting nature. It seemed to be in harmony with it. Small and humble and nestled by the forest.
They worked in their respective fields for the next few months. Leonard got an apprenticeship as a carpenter. HIs place of work wasn't extravagant. Just a few tools and some wood. He enjoyed it, it was peaceful, he felt respected. He did his best. More people eventually came to see Thomas's shows too, and he started earning a steady income from that.
Most of his stories were subtly anti-slavery, and he made them especially for the young children of slaveowners, who often came by to see his shows. His theatre was pretty simple and in his tent, but children preferred love over a bunch of stuff, like kids do if you let them be free and without pressure.
The two youths also spent much of their time scouting estates and trying to free any slaves they could. They made instant and warm bonds with all the wonderful slaves they tried to free. The rescue missions were terrifying and exhilarating and filled them with with such a lovely, perfect, sense for purpose.
But they never went well. Even if they did succeed at freeing someone, and they often didn't, that person would often be found again and returned to their places of torment. Leonard and Thomas knew that something was wrong. This wasn't the mission they were brought together for. They had to know what was going on.
—Riverside Conspiracie—
They realized, though they hadn't noticed it before, that every time they freed a person corrupted, invisible stings were gathering around that person and pulling them back. Leonard instantly recognized what this was, this was the work of the same evil force that had gone after him.
Leonard's spirit and the River Maiden's spirit and Leonard and Thomas all felt pulled to each other, and in a small while the three ... whatever's ... found themselves face to face, with the Maiden's head bobbing out of the water and Thomas and Leonard on the bank.
The River Maiden was frustrated, enraged, despondent, and overall going crazy that her father was still too strong for the brotherhood of change. She had been fighting against his dark magic with her own passionate energy.
But he was too strong and it was unbearable for her that nothing was still happening. She called him the Roaring King, said that was his title, and that his reach as vast and powerful in Coralivia.
Thomas said that maybe they should all go together and confront the Roaring King, head-on, and perhaps they could weaken him. Leonard remembered how weak the River Maiden had become the last time he'd seen her and the Roaring King face-to-face. He wondered if it wasn't a good idea but thought about how they had another person no their team now and he himself had gotten much more connected with the spirit inside of him so she thought it worth a try. Especially if it could help free other slaves.
The River Maiden said she was intrinsically tied to nature and would get weaker the longer she was away from it so the faster they got the mission done the safer it would be for them and the likelier they were to succeed.
But whatever happened, they agreed, they had to give it their best go.
—Running At It—
They put sprigs of cedar in their hair, behind their ears, to bring a bit of nature with them, even though that wouldn't help much. They wrapped their arms around each others' waists so they'd be closer to each other, and they walked all in a line, in sync. Leo brought his stone of protection, clutching it tightly in his hand. THe spirit inside him, Golden Dawn, was much more tied into the world now, on account of being better shared and understood, and therefore stronger. There's fear, hope, and confusion as they press forwards in the soft post-sunrise light.
When the Roaring King saw them coming at him he ran. Leonard thought this was incredible as this time the Roaring King feared them as they had feared him before.
They chased it back to that first tent where it had first taken Leo. When it w inside the tent they used their collective power to knock him down. They were scared, determined, and they felt the corruption getting stripped off and vanishing as the Roaring King's form diniminshed. Try as they might though they they couldn't make it vanish entirely.
They realized that they weren't strong enough to take away all it's power, and the Roaring King was strong enough to persist still, probably for years more.
Realizing that they did all they could, they scattered and ran back to the river.
They realized that though they could not defeat him yet, they had weakened him and could use this opportunity to free as many slaves as possible. The The River Maiden burst into a rush of waves and Leo clutched his stone tight.
—Blooming Springtime Cascading Twilight—
River spent the next years wildly, ragingly, fighting the Roaring King in confrontational magical battles, aiding escapees and giving them tailsmans for protection, and doing whatever she could to progress the cause.
Leonard and Thomas also freed and helped free person after person, giving them protective stones and helping them be happy in their new lives.
Thomas's plays also helped bring a couple of people from the new generation of overpriviledged snobs onto the good side.
Escapees in turn helped other people escape.
It was like emptying the ocean with a cup but at least it was something.
They were a very tight-knit community together and always helped each other out. Yes, there were a lot of things in their lives and their relationships they could improve upon, but they were willing to find and work towards progress.
Change, in Coralivia, was moving slow. But people believed in it. And everyone was doing everything they could. And Leonard could feel the gentle summer breeze of change slowly picking up speed.
He could feel the threads of corruption laced through Coralivia weaken and fray. The King's power was weakening.
Coralivia, in all it's beautiful natural glory, had hope. The whole country had hope.
—Extra Information, Loose Ends, and Clarification—
The state Leonard used to live in was called Macomica. It was very urbanized. It had a lot of manufacturing, textiles, stuff like that. Coralivia was much more rural. They grew, sugar, tea, spices, flavourings, herbs, fancy fruits, cotton, silk, fabric dye, stuff like that. They also had ranching and some mining.
River stole that helmet she was wearing in that one scene from her father the King. She wore it when meeting Leonard because she couldn't communicate too well at that time, probably because she was too weak, and she thought that wearing the helmet would help Leonard figure out that she was the daughter that he helped save.
Thomas's mother, who liked to wear large dresses made of colourful, textured velvet, particularly red, was the one who pushed him to conform most, and who put the most pressure on him.
In case it wasn't clear, Leonard was a human with a good spirit or some kind of thing (think of it was a mixture between a good spirit and a good force) "living" inside of him. This spirit was kind of similar to the River Maiden in that they were both benevolent and magical but very different in many ways as well.
A corrupted, dark, heavy, and terrifying ambiance could be felt all over Coralivia, which was tied with the Roaring King and his hold over the place. The only places this wasn't present in were as follows: the blue canvas tent by the forest and later the part of town the escapees lived in, the fields in the estates where there were lots of slaves and mostly just them, and parts of nature humans hadn't really built over. As the Roaring King's power slowly faded this ambiance faded too.
Leonard and Thomas both developed short-lived crushes on the River Maiden at one point in their lives, after the main conflict with the Roaring King got resolved. But she, being a benevolent spirit or whatever and all, is asexual and aromantic. Like super asexual and aromantic. She's not going fall in love any more than the river itself is going to fall in love. She's not going to want to kiss someone any more than the river is going to want to kiss someone. But Leo and Thomas both understood that once she explained and weren't creeps about it. Also Leonard is straight and Thomas is either bi or pan, though I don't know which. Which means that while they're best friends and partners in abolition and they stay best friends throughout their life, no romantic stuff happens between them. I don't know if either character gets married in the future of their lives but I'm thinking they probably do. So, yeah.
Finding Stars Despite the Urban Light Pollution
Part I: A Polluted World
"That was FUN," I lie. I'm sitting in the back seat of a very expensive car. It's warm and has leather seats and smells like leather, perfume, and some other stuff. But I can't enjoy any of that right now because I want to throw up. I want to forget this experience so badly. I want to kill the snake that's disguised as a man in fron of me. I wonder if he sees it in my eyes. I smile.
Hopefully he doesn't look too deep into my eyes, but I know he won't. But I guess he already knows how much I want to scrape his skin off with sandpaper. And to top it all off I'm so hungry. My head hurts and my stomach feels like it has a black hole in it. But that's a familiar feeling, I'm always hungry.
"It's really refreshing to be with someone so young and fresh," He hisses. I can't hold back a wince as he runs his fingers through my hair.
"Do you prefer it that way?"
"Honestly it doesn't matter as long as they know how to do it properly." I shudder. I hate being talked about like this. But I have to do it.
"It just surprises me a bit," he continues. "How old did you say you were again?"
"Fourteen, sir." I swear to God above that I will murder this person one day.
"Anyways, where's my money? I'm not doing this just so I can walk away as broke as I was before."
"Let's see how much you deserve. You are a bit of a delinquent. So you probably..." he takes his time getting his wallet, probably just to torture me for longer. "One, two, two dollars and ten, two dollars and twenty, two dollars and thirty, two dollars and fourty, two dollars and fifty cents." He hands it over to me. What? That can't be it. That's barely anything. It's not going to buy my baby sister a meal.
"Please sir." I don't know what to say that won't offend him, because doing that would only make my situation worse.
"Well maybe I can double it you give me double the services." Kill me. No I'm not the one who deserved it. Kill him. And give my sister food. And give me food. And make the world different. And make my sister happy.
Harmony is so freaking young and so sweet and perfect and she deserves every happiness in the world. If only I can make enough money in time. But what if I can't? How will I explain it? Was Santa just extra busy this year and didn't have time? No but why would he be? He never normally is, she'll see through that. She'll think Santa disapproves of her now like the rest of the world does. She'll think on of her her idols thinks less of her. She'll think she actually is less. She'll think she's less important. She'll give up. She'll lose hope. She'll let people go around treating her like dirt. And she won't rebel against that in her head. She won't hold onto her pride and her sense of self-respect. I can't have that happen, I just can't. She needs to keep believing, keep dreaming, keep fighting.
"HEY!" I'm transported back into the world with that harsh yell. "Girl! Are you even listening to me?"
"Sorry sir." I'm so hungry.
"What do you say to my proposition?"
"Sure." I get up onto his lap. "But this time give me the money first okay?" He hands it over to me. I count it. Two and a half dollars. Making five dollars in total. The most I've gotten all month. I start unbuttoning my worn-out, ripped shirt. God help me.
———
After we were done I was crying. He looked at the tears drowning my eyes and said it suited me well. I got out of the car an into the fresh air and freedom and biting cold. That's where I am now, with the snow smothering my body like an anti-blanket. I hug my knees to my chest and cry. He was so selfish, so apathetic, so horrible. I'm a person goddamnit. And I deserve to be treated like one. He's not better than me. He's just a selfish, stingy, greedy, infidel who just sees everyone as tools for him to use. My hatred at - at his attitudes, not him - is keeping me warm in this cold though, washing the filth from my skin, giving me a bit of my peace back. And that's because I know who I am. I know what I deserve, And those thoughts can push back the thoughts given to me by him about what I deserve, and reconquer my mind. And I need to make sure Harmony always has the strength to do that too.
What if I tell her Santa gave her a less cool gift because he helped us get food and stuff instead? But if she knows Santa can do that, bring things other than toys, then won't she want Santa to give us enough stuff to actually be safe? Why would Santa give us less than we need? Why would he so abandon us? Thinking that would break her more. The "only can give toys" rule needs to stay. No I needed to make the money. So far I only have fifteen dollars saved. I'll need more.
———
I walk into the shack we live in and am greeted by a warm hug from my baby sister.
"How are you Msitu?!" The eight-yer-old excitedly asks.
"Not the best baby girl. But I'm so much better now that I see you. How are you?"
"Work was hard. I was hungry. I when I was walking home I saw Alika from school last year and she had a big chocolate bar. And I asked her if I could have some. And she looked at me scardly. And she said no. And I told her, 'don't worry, it's me Harmony, I used to be in your class we used to be friends.' And she still looked at me the same way. And she said no, it was her's. And I told her that I was really hungry and my tummy was hurting from how hungry I was. And she said that wasn't her problem, I should learn to work harder if I wanted more food. And it made me really really sad." She looked at me sadly, almost brokenly. I was so angry. I wanted to watch the world burn. I wanted to burn it to the ground and have it just be people like us - people who are impoverished and hungry and desperate - left. So that we could make it better, and make it a world worth living in. Actually no I don't want that. I want people to listen to our cries instead of labelling us as dangerous
"Baby she just said that because she doesn't know any better. She's not right. You're a beautiful and amazing little girl and of course you deserve food. You deserve to be fed and warm and you deserve a proper home. You deserve a family and an education and you deserve to feel safe and protected and valued and free and you deserve everything that anyone else deserves. She just said that because she didn't know any better. She just said that because her mom told her to think that way. And her mom only told her because she wants to think she's better than everyone and not care. She's wrong."
"Okay. I think you're right. I know who I am. But it hurts, it freaking hurts."
"I know baby girl." I hug her close.
"I really like it when you're here. I really like it when anyone's here who I can feel myself around."
"Harmony you're really everything. You're happiness and you're necessity and you make me so overwhelmingly happy in every part of me in a way that I just want to proclaim to the world."
"Thanks Msitu.. You're everything too. You keep me safe and make me feel free and you make me feel like I'm important and you make me feel like I'm needed. And you're the most perfectest person."
"Darling everyone who says you aren't a beautiful soul are only saying it because they don't know anything besides how to be shallow."
"I don't think we can teach them. Do you?"
"I don't think so too. But maybe one day that will change."
"Msitu you're sad. Why?"
"Because I had to do some things with someone who was really mean."
"That's horrible. Why did you have to?"
"Oh the same reason as a lot of things. Money."
"Msitu that sucks. Don't feel like you have to hurt yourself for me okay?"
"Baby I don't feel that way. But I'd have nothing without you. I don't ever want to lose you okay?"
"I miss mom and dad."
"Me too. But I'm sure they're watching over us."
"Well why can't they help us?"
"Because there are dark forces all around and they make it harder."
"I know I've felt them. The air smells kind of weird and you can't see stars anymore and the water is all dirty and plants don't grow that much."
"Exactly."
"And the people. They look like they're stuck behind some kind of glass."
"Yeah. But there's hope. There's us. And there's your friends from work. And there's the knowledge that we have."
"Yeah. And it's Christmas soon. And Santa's going to be coming around."
"Yeah." I sigh.
"Are you scared?"
"No."
"If we had a magic wand how would that be?"
"Amazing." We kept talking until it was time to sleep. I cooked a little bit of rice, and we had some beans to go with it. I was still hungry after the food. Harmony wasn't though. And we kept talking. She believes in magic so strongly. If that keeps her going, that's good.
————
I'm walking to work. And Harmony is beside me. I'm clutching her hand and she's clutching mine.
My feet hurt. Partially because they're frozen and partially because my shoes are too small. I shiver. And of course hunger is there. It's my constant friend, my husband really seeing as how I'm spending my whole life with it. Hunger sleeps with me, wakes with me, and kisses me good night every night. It walks with me, and keeps me wrapped in it's hard arms every moment of my life. It always talks to me. But unlike a loving partner, it constantly degrades me and beats me down. Hunger is an abusive, over-possessive husband. It keeps saying that I'm not good enough, that people don't care about me, that people don't care about me enough to want me alive, that I'm just a tool to them and they don't care how I feel. No, most of that is true. Maybe my dear spouse Hunger just doesn't want me to forget who I can and can't trust. But it does it in a very mean way.
That's why I'm glad I have my sister to give me all the reassurance she can, to balm the effects of the abuse I feel at my Hunger's hands. I hold her hand just a bit tighter and feel her love wash over me. Calm and soothing and energizing. But like most people who try to help you through an abusive relationship you're stuck in, she only helps to an extent. She helps me immensely and makes me feel so beautiful inside and sometimes she takes away all the pain. But a lot of the times there is still quite a lot of pain left.
Cars zoom by, making the brown sludge that lines the streets part to the side.
The people inside seem more fortified. They have jackets, even in the heated interiors they're in. Their eyes are cold. They look past us. Every once in a while there is a really posh car. The men inside those always wear shiny coats that were quite sleek. The women always wear copious amounts of make-up.
So much make-up. Like the girl driving a motorcycle right now. She drives quite slow and her nose is in a book, which is quite dangerous if you think about it. I don't want us to get run over. So I ask Harmony if she agrees with us cuting closer to the buildings. She does. We are aware that we're on private property. But we don't want to die. Well too bad.
Just then another man in a car sees me. His car is red and brown and really quite shiny. It's one of the most impressive cars I've seen. He saw us and he came closer to us, parking beside the curb. I quickly pull us back to the public sidewalk. But it's too late.
"What do you careless kids think you're doing?" the immaculately-dressed man with a polished beard asks.
"Sorry sir we were just trying to be safe." I reply. Harmony hugs me.
"Do you think safety is more important than the laws of our nation?"
"No sir," Harmony says timidly. I hate the way the word "sir" sounds on her tongue. It's a word that doesn't belong there or in anyone's tongue.
"We won't do it again sir. It's all my fault I pulled her towards the building she had nothing to do with it sir."
"She let you pull her," he says, ignoring the obvious size difference between me and Harmony.
"We won't do it again sir I promise," says Harmony, hugging me.
"Damn right you won't. Because I'm going to make sure you girls get taught a lesson." Forcibly separating us, he puts us in his car, a luxury I'm actually thankful for, and drives us to the police station.
Harmony is shaking. And I am too. If we get long sentences we'll lose our jobs. If we lose your jobs who knows how long we'll have to wait for new ones? And in the meanwhile, how will we deal with the hunger, the sickness? This is a potential death threat. This is one of the most frightening moments of my life. Harmony is curled in a ball silently crying into my chest. I hug her close and run my fingers through her hair. I can't say anything through because that will anger the man more.
Finally we arrive at the ominous building. Surprisingly enough it's not that big. We get dragged inside, and there are only two cops sitting behind desks and a cell full of mostly skinny-looking people. People like us. I'm crying. Harmony is too. I look at her. Her big eyes are full of so much. Terror, sadness, surprise, hope, anger, it's heartbreaking. But there's hope there at least. Please please don't let us die God please. The police officers look up sternly.
"Dr. Starless, it's an honour to be in your presence, why do you grace us on this fine winter day?" He seems bewildered.
"I caught these two miscreants trespassing on private property."
"Well thank you so much for catching them sir now we can bring the the justice they deserve." Dr. Starless shoves us at the desk and leaves. Me and Harmony desperately make for each other.
"So," the police officer starts, "it seems like you two have been misbehaving. The penalty for that is three days."
"Sir. I understand," I say. Three days is a death sentence. I might be able to get out of it though. "We're really horrible kids and we need to learn to be grateful for what you great men have given us. I kept making excuses before because I wanted it easier. I wanted to feel safe and have food and shelter. But I realize now that I didn't deserve that. I realize that I don't deserve to be having it easy when I'm not giving myself what I need legally instead of just wanting it. I realize now that my anger towards the great people of this nation should actually be directed at myself. I'm not worth their attention, I'm not worth their mercy, I'm just someone who doesn't care about being a good citizen. If I can pull myself up by myself then I'll deserve to be treated the same as them. Otherwise, I deserve what I get. I need to be able to deal with the world as it is not ask it to be any different for me. I'm a horrible kid and I realize that whatever punishment I get is justice." The police officer looks taken aback a little. But then he snarls again.
"Do you really think that?" He asks.
"Yes sir I really do." I bow my head deeply. Harmony looks at me in surprise, eyes filled with tears. I hate having to make her watch me like this. I'm lying though, my head doesn't think what my mouth is forced to say.
"Come into my office," he says. We follow. "No, just the older one. Officer Kenneth get the other one into the cell." Harmony gets put into the cell and goes to the corner to cry. As I walk through the doors I turn and see some people moving to console her.
The office is surprisingly small. I wonder if I'm gonna have to fuck this guy. I hope not.
"Kneel," he says (author's notes: we're all people. I'm a human being, you're a human being, everyone involved is a human being. We all feel pain. We all feel joy. We all feel hope and we all feel love. So, we have to help each other. There's nothing that's just someone's fight. We have to help each other.
Everything is everyone's fight. Regardless. Because on the inside we're all made of love, the only thing worth fighting for.) I oblige. I keep by head low but glance up at him with my eyes.
"What's your name?" he asks coldly.
"Msitu Ametsenya, sir." He grabs a fistful of my hair, not too hardly, and I already don't like the direction this is going.
"None of that 'sir' nonsense. I'm very highly ranked compared to you and you'll address me as 'your honour.'”
"Anything you think I need your honour," I say, trying to sound sincere.
"Now tell me what you are."
"What?"
"Tell me you're a blood-sucking maggot and currently a waste of space."
"I'm a blood-sucking maggot and currently a waste of space."
"Say that you don't care about anything. Say that you're just a little brat who doesn't care about her place in the world." He seems to be
"I don't care about anything and I don't care about my place in the world. Your honour."
"Kiss my shoe." Tears are welling up in my eyes as he stares at me in such a hard and and piercing way. I have to remain "sincere" though.
"Absolutely your honour," I say meekly and lean over to do it.
"Now say that you're not anything compared to the successful people of this world."
"I'm nothing compared to the successful people of the world."
"Say that you're eternally grateful to heroes like us." He pulls my hair forcing me to look him in the eyes.
"I should be eternally grateful to heroes like you. I'm eternally grateful to heroes like you."
"Say you don't know anything."
"I don't know anything." He smirks.
"Lick my shoe." How fucked up is this guy gonna get? I oblige. "Tell me you don't deserve anything unless you're successful like them."
"I don't deserve anything unless I'm successful like them."
"Like me."
"Like you."
"Say they deserve your utmost worship. Say that unless you stop being such a pathetic weak little worm you deserve nothing."
"Yes your honour, you and your people deserve my utmost worship. I'm a pathetic and weak worm and unless I stop being so pathetic and weak I deserve nothing." My voice is shaking.
"Now say ..."
This continues for who knows how long, it seems like days but it's probably just a few hours. I am so incredibly broken by the end of it.
"Now make sure your pathetic little friend knows this too. Make sure she knows what she is."
"Yes your honour." My voice completely breaks at this. Never. I'll die before I let her spirits break. But lying is how you win against these guys. Or at least, not lose. He grabs me harshly by the shoulder and pushes me out of the room. My steps are shaking. I'm thrown into the cell.
"In the morning you can leave." He says coldly and hardly, his voice like an barbed wire fence on a winter day.
I curl up onto a ball on the cold floor and bury my face in my arms. People come closer to me, asking how I am and what I need. Harmony hugs me. She's like the rainforest loam. So different from that cop. But I know if I accept the kindness and love I'm getting now the cop will know I was faking.
"Leave me alone. Don't talk to me." I snap. "I need to think." I'm broken.
No. I'm bent. I'm not broken. I'm almost broken. It hurts though. My thoughts are like a swirling whirlpool of pain, pain, and more overwhelming pain.
Hunger punches me in the gut, reminding me of his ownership over my body. Hunger was with me during that whole terrifying session. My dear companion was adding more sting and bite to everything that happened because He was obviously happy that someone else was helping Him put me in my place.
——-
Once me and Harmony are back into the frigid coldness of freedom, she turns to me.
"Why did you say those things?" He clear green eyes are filled with confusion and worry.
"I was lying. What I said wasn't true at all but I had to say it because that's what they want to hear. It's not true though."
"But it still hurted though didn't it?"
"Yes."
"What happened behind that door?"
"He hurt me."
"Well he's just a mean, horrible, selfish man who thinks he's more important than everyone because of his title. Don't listen to him he's wrong. Fuck him. He's very mean, and that's all he is."
"Thanks." This heals me just a bit.
We ended up missing a day and a half of work. Meaning we had to make it up by working a day and a half for free. There goes my savings. Fuck.
Part II: Try to Wash Away the Poison
It's cold. Really freaking cold. January is coming up and whatever this abandoned shack is made of is not well-insulated. Still, it's better than being out in the open where there is wind and snow. I shiver in my thin, worn jacket. More of a fall jacket than a winter one. But winter jackets are expensive. And I'm stronger, I mean I don't know why I'm stronger but I just am. And the money I have - which isn't much - has to go to buying the stuff we need to live. And that means I need to get Harmony a warm jacket, so her younger, frailer body won't get sick and die for want of a doctor I just couldn't afford. I haven't been able to spend much time with Harmony this holiday season. This holiday season seemed like hell actually.
I miss mom and dad so freaking much. And I miss being safe, feeling like I'm not going to get sick or die. I miss not having the constant twist of Hunger and cold banging against me. I miss feeling like my baby sister is safe, and comfortable, and happy. I miss feeling like we were part of society and not just an unwanted burden to it. I miss our parents. I miss our human dignity.
I miss my sister's safety. And my own. And my baby sister's. And I miss the rest of my family.
I have a mission this Christmas though. I have to make sure that Harmony know Santa didn't forget her. I have to make sure she doesn't think Santa thinks any less of her because of her new status. She must already think society thinks less of her now. But if she thought that Santa Claus thought less of her than he did before, it would break her heart. Yes, she has a hard time stomaching the fact that humans don't care about her, but humans are imperfect, and misguided sometimes, and their opinions don't necessarily reflect her no matter how much they affect her.
And she still has light in her eyes and a sense of self-respect in her steps and hope and rebelliousness and energy.
But if Santa puts any less thought and care into her present than he did with the other kids', Santa who is magic and perfect and knows what he's doing, then it would mean that she's just a little bit less important, and there was no denying that fact. That knowledge would break her. It would break her spirit, and I don't know what else. And I don't want that.
I think of the extra hours I've been working, which were taking a toll on my health. They don't pay much and honestly there aren't many extra hours being thrown my way. I think of the less savoury things I've done. Not just for gift money but for meal money as well. The thought makes me want to die. Because this "perfect society" is a world where fourteen-year-old girls are desperate enough resort to that kind of stuff in order to feed the people they care about. Yeah this is exactly what a perfect society looks like. And I've been desperately saving every bit of money I could so that I could make sure Santa meets his previous standards. But there's been no luck so far, and a polished carved doll or bundle of colourful ribbons or something is impossible too get with the wages I'm currently making. So I've missed the deadline, December 25th, but the one good thing about our situation is that Harmony doesn't know it's not yet Christmas, and as long as I can get the money somehow in the next few days ... which I don't know how I'm going to do by myself ... she won't think Santa thinks less of her. And the spark in her eyes won't' fade.
I'm hugging Harmony close to me trying desperately to give her the energy from the cellular respiration that my body is doing so that she can star warm, and healthy, and alive. The photons released from the organic carbon compound combustion that my biological processes undergo need to go to her. To keep her healthy.
"Msitu?" Her voice sounds so sweet.
"Yeah Harmony?"
"Santa forgot me this year." My heart falls.
"No, beautiful soul, he didn't."
"Yeah, Christmas went by and he did nothing."
"It's not Christmas yet."
"Yeah it is. There was this boy whose clothes were all clean and shiny and his hair was shiny. It was the same colour as your's."
"And?"
"And he was in this shiny motorcycle. And he went up to me and said that Santa got hm this two weeks ago for being such a good child. He said if I was good Santa might get me something too, but only if I'm good. And then his mom told him to not talk to me because I'm probably a bad influence." My breathing gets shallower. Honestly I don't know how I'm going to salvage this situation.
"How do you know he was telling the truth? He might just be toying with you."
"What if he's not?!" She starts to cry. Okay, think hard. How do we solve this? I hug Harmony closer to me.
"Harmony I have a secret. Santa isn't around anymore. Well, he's alive, but he's been captured for a long time. There is a fake Santa who everyone thinks is the real Santa and everybody writes their letters and stuff to him, but he's the opposite of what the real Santa used to be. The old Santa used to love every child equally, regardless of every single freaking factor, and the real Santa used to make sure every child was provided for. To the kids who were hungry he'd give food. To the kids who were cold he'd give a jacket. To the kids who had no family he'd help them find a family. He gave everyone toys.
And to the kids who were taught to be greedy and prideful he'd teach them not to be. But that caused problems. Problems for the rich people at least. All the new generations were learning how to love and help each other, and there were less and less people to be prideful. People weren't worshipping the wealthy businessmen anymore, they were more focused of everyone. And people weren't going along with the "make money for myself" model of doing things, they were banding together and helping each other and that made it harder for the ones at the top to maintain their hold. The daughters and sons of the people who were dissatisfied with this newly-forming world were very mesmerized by it. They were leaving behind their old lifestyles and using their souls to benefit everyone equally and humbly and they weren't concerned about the meaningless stuff like shiny cars and make-up. And obviously the bosses thought their children were being corrupted and shying away from the life they were supposed to lead, they life they 'deserved.'" I make air quotations. "These people were infuriated. What was also bad was that people didn't have child labour anymore because the children didn't need to spend their time working in dangerous factories when they could be in school and playing afterwards." Harmony looks at me with her big, clear eyes filled with sadness and wonder and anger and amazement and ... hope!!!
Yes!!!!
"Msitu what happened? Why did they win? Why do they always win? They always win and they always shape the world in their own creepy image and they keep taking and taking everything from us." Holy crap I didn't expect her to be so angry. But then again she's freezing and hungry and the world doesn't do anything to console her.
"Harmony my baby they won't win forever. This is just temporary and if we keep fighting and if you promise to not ever think someone is better or worse than you and if you keep hoping for things to get better then we will win."
"Get on with the story."
"It's not a story it's a historical account. Anyways, they were building a huge machine to fight against Santa's magic. When they finished it, they brought it into the North Pole. Santa, the elves, and the reindeer saw it and were very scared. They knew this day would come though. They all came together and started to sing their magic Christmas carols and that created a defensive force field around the North Pole which kept it safe from the attackers and weakened them. But the dark powers of the machine was sucking in the magic and polluting it. The machine was getting weakened too, and it was almost destroyed. Unfortunately, this time it was just a little bit too powerful.
When the Christmas team saw what happened they all got on the sleigh and started running. But the attackers had a blimp and they shot the sleigh down. They were falling into the sea. And everyone thought that was it, they drowned in the freezing cold water. But no. Because they used the last bit of magic they had to freeze themselves into the ice. Now they're in hibernation and thier magic powers are growing stronger. And eventually they'll be able to return to their previous job of helping kids everywhere. But there's one more thing. The only thing strong enough to break the ice is the magic of the world finally becoming harmonious. So when the world changes, Santa, the elves, and the reindeer will be back." Harmony is smiling. I give her a hug.
"Msitu thanks. I'm so glad that I know that. How did you find out?"
"Once it was a really clear day. There was this section of the sky that was so dark and filled with stars. It wasn't the faintly-orangish starless thing urban light and air pollution causes. And the stars were swirling around and forming pictures. They told me this story. And they told me to be sure I told it to my baby sister, because the story was for her just as much."
"Holy crap. We need to tell everyone." Her big green eyes are so full of promise it's breaking my heart.
"Maybe not now, because if the bosses hear it they'll kill you."
"But Msitu I wanna tell everyone."
"Follow your heart then baby. But make sure you only tell children, and not children with high-ranking parents."
"Msitu get me out of here please just get me out of here I hate it here. I don't want to live like this I don't want to be treated like this. I want to be more than a piece of machinery. I want to matter." I feel so angry. I want to murder everyone who designed this city. But I can't. I really really want to. But the reality is I'm a young, hungry, girl who can't always feed her family in a world run by rich, powerful, well-educated, landowning, tax-dodging, nature-hating, apathetic, self-absorbed, powerful, wealthy men.
"Harmony you darling soul God loves you always and nobody can take that away from you. Whatever the hell they take, whatever they give or don't give, they can't change the fact that God loves you."
"Can't you do something?"
"We need to all do something together."
"I agree. This is our song now."