do u have any random thoughts about sirius/remus?? literally anything at all- any random blurb or thought just Anything. reading ur james thoughts and i wanted to ask because i feel like any ramblings/character specificities u have about them will scratch my brain rlly good

my thesis for them is that one quote about how soulmates will eventually find each other, because they have the same hiding place

like the longer i spend with them the more i realize that i see them as recluses. perhaps not literally speaking (r & s have their own ways of attracting friends) but they are the two most isolated characters in the story to me. they’re yoked with really specific (yet opposing) burdens that nobody else is ever going to understand. they want to permanently hide their faces from the world & they have both built that kind of barren refuge inside of themselves

many other characters have stories that are built around Love, and the presence (james, lily, andromeda) or absence (regulus, barty, tom) of it, but that isn’t r&s to me. they have the Least to do with love stories because their entire lives are already so wrapped up in resolving super individual questions of freedom & autonomy & the hurt they cause & the hurt they suffered… but that’s why their love story hits the hardest, for me? they’re the least suited for it and it happened anyway.

once again my remus is like…. a city unto himself, but all internal. polite & mild mannered but also impossible to sway. i think he has the biggest imagination of all of them and it’s what lets him remain so Untouched. he’s not a ~creative~ or anything (pretty uncreative, actually) but he’s a poor german werewolf who is living a Little inside his head specifically because his life sucks so bad. he’s a boy sleeping on a shitty mattress but stubbornly imaging himself sleeping on a better one, if that makes sense, and he’ll die before telling anyone that’s what he’s thinking about.

and then sirius is a prodigal girl-son who’s part dog and still operating somewhat like an ex-cult victim after leaving their family. but they’re so beautiful & terrible & spoiled & brave that nobody can See that. sirius doesn’t need a love story because they need their brother back. and remus has so much of his own baggage, and they are both such Monoliths of independence that it’s less like they’re committed to unraveling the threads of each other’s interiority and more like they’re two cars crashing into each other then scrambling to pick apart the wreckage, holding shattered parts up to the light to examine, one crash at a time. it’s crazy.

it’s like… they make the least sense for each other, but not JUST because they’re mismatched (which they are aesthetically, but not personality-wise). it’s because they’re the two people on earth who need romantic love the least and their lives would be MUCH less complicated without it, maybe even better. but they cannot escape each other. they will never escape each other!!! because!!! they have!! the same hiding places!!!!

I’m Sure They’ll Understand pt. 3

part 1 part 2

fandom: MCU

pairing: Steve Rogers x Reader

summary: Steve’s injured on the mission. You have to help the team get him out, no matter how much they may or may not trust you.

warnings: angst, mentions of injury

word count: 1924

a/n: did y’all like the cliffhanger i left you on?? ;)

i think there’s going to be one more part to this! i didn’t want this part to get too long.

Sam’s words ring in your ears.

Rogers is down.

Before you know it, you’re on your knees. Your breath comes in gasps as you try to wrap your mind around those three words.

Rogers is down.

Bucky’s trying to tell you something but you can’t hear him. All you can hear is Sam’s voice, over and over again.

Oh God. Are you going to lose him? You can’t. You can’t handle this. No no no –

At some point, Bucky hauls you to your feet and grabs your face in his hands. “Y/N,” he barks, “Focus. We need to go. Now.”

You nod, barely registering his words. Then you’re out the door of the jet, stumbling across a snowy field to the HYDRA base. Your hands are shaking as you try to notch an arrow onto the string of your bow.

Once you’re at the doors to the base however, your instincts kick in and you swipe away the tears from your cheeks. You finally manage to notch the arrow and do a quick once-over of your quiver and knives. You take a deep breath, nod to Bucky, and follow him into the base.

There are a few bodies strewn about the floor, all HYDRA agents. You step over them carefully, bow at the ready. Bucky walks slightly in front of you, gun raised. It is eerily quiet, even though you can hear the sounds of combat still in your earpiece.

“Where are we going, Stark?” Bucky whispers harshly.

“There’s a staircase just off the main hallway,” comes Tony’s reply. There’s a pause as you hear his phasers firing. “It’s hidden behind a wall panel; it leads to the rest of the base.”

You look around the hallway and notice one of the panels juts out just barely. “Here,” you murmur to Bucky, tilting your head toward the panel.

Bucky nods and presses a hand against the panel, obviously unsure of how to open it. It slides open and a look of pleasure crosses his face, if only for a moment.

The staircase is dark and smells like old books; you’re guessing this is one of the older HYDRA bases, probably from around its founding. You follow Bucky down the stairs quietly as the sounds of fighting become evident.

“They’ve got us cornered down here,” Sam’s voice breaks through the earpiece. “I’ve moved Rogers to a secure location but I’m going to need a clear path in order to get him out.”

“We’re on our way,” you reply. You’re going to get Steve to safety, no matter what.

You round a corner and the combat grows louder. The sounds you were once hearing exclusively in your earpiece can be made out in person. You’re surrounded by HYDRA lab equipment; this must have been a research base rather than a training center. That’s good at least – you won’t find any experienced super soldiers here.

“Y/L/N! Barnes! Over here,” Sam’s voice calls out to you. You spot his form behind a lab table, close to a partially open door. He waves you over and you follow Bucky to him.

As you come around the side of the table, you see Steve’s boots sticking out from behind a crouching Sam. The full scene comes into view, and you cover your mouth in horror.

Sam has his hands pressed to a rapidly darkening stain on Steve’s abdomen, most likely from a gunshot wound. Steve is unconscious, blissfully unaware of the combat happening just one room over.

Sam nods toward the door. “The others are in there,” he says quickly. “Everybody else is tied down with agents. They just keep flooding in; I don’t know where they’re all coming from. The way you came in is the only way out.” He pauses. “And unfortunately, I don’t have super strength. So, I couldn’t get Rogers out on my own.” His eyes are pleading as he looks up at you.

Bucky nods, determined. “Y/N will get him out.”

You look at the super soldier, surprise evident on your face. You’d thought Bucky would want to stay with his friend. But you’re not complaining; this must be a sign that his trust for you is growing – or he just doesn’t want you having any direct contact with HYDRA.

“Sam and I’ll help the others hold them off,” Bucky continues, meeting your gaze. “Get Steve to the jet and stop the bleeding. We’ll try to get out of here as quickly as possible.”

Sam nods his agreement and looks to you again. “You’ll need to move fast once I take my hands off this wound. He’s probably going to lose a lot of blood before you get to the quinjet. Don’t stop on the way.” His voice is a mixture grim determination and resignation.

“Wouldn’t dream of it,” you choke out, still fixated on Steve – your Steve – bleeding on the ground.

You get in position next to Sam, your hands sliding under Steve’s unmoving form. Sam counts down and removes his hands from the wound, and you take off running.

Steve’s bulk is nothing for your enhanced strength and thankfully you have enhanced speed as well. Remembering your way through the labyrinth of hallways is easy; ignoring the trail of blood that you leave in your wake is not. You whisper reassurance under your breath to Steve, unsure if he can even hear you. Reaching the staircase, you skid to a stop when you notice a figure at the top of the stairs.

You hesitate for a moment, trying to determine if you can take out whoever it is without putting Steve down. Before you can come to a decision, the figure begins to descend the stairs slowly.

“Ranger,” a feminine, airy voice says. A chill runs down your spine at the sound of your old moniker and you freeze, unable to move.

“Well done, gaining the trust of the Avengers. I’m glad to see you haven’t strayed away from your mission,” the voice continues as the figure becomes illuminated.

You vaguely recall her face, but no name comes to mind. She used to be one of your handlers, quite… aggressive in her ways, if you remember correctly.

You shake your head as visions of your time as a HYDRA operative flood your mind. You respond through gritted teeth, “Move. I won’t ask again.”

She lets out a breathy laugh, using her body to block the stairs. “Oh, I always enjoyed you. So… feisty.” A wicked smile crosses her face as she glares at you.

Through the cloud of anger in you mind, you try to think. You have to get Steve to the jet. His blood is coating your hands and you’re losing your grip on him rapidly. Putting him down is the last thing you’ll do but you can’t fight this woman if you don’t.

Before you have a chance to make a decision, a shot rings out and the woman falls backward. Her forehead has been adorned with a single bullet wound.

You turn quickly and see Natasha standing about 20 feet behind you, pistol in hand. “Heard you over the earpiece,” she explains quickly at your look of confusion. “Go.”

Remembering the task at hand, you nod a quick thank you to Nat and step over the fallen corpse of the woman. You take the stairs three at a time as you try to make up for lost time.

Once you reach the quinjet, you set Steve down in the makeshift medbay. You grab some gauze pads from a nearby shelf and press them to the wound, praying desperately that your run-in with the woman hasn’t had an immense impact.

Steve groans as you apply pressure and for a moment, you think he’s going to open his eyes. But it must have just been an automatic response to the increased pain because he makes no further movement. You let out a breath you didn’t know you were holding.

The weight of the situation hits you all at once now that you’re back in relative safety. The fear and despair that overcame you when Sam had first announced Steve’s injury reappear with full force. Here is the man that has been nothing but supportive and kind to you, dying under your hands. The very lifeforce flowing through his veins now flowing between your fingers. The serum that magnifies his strength and compassion now doing its very best just to keep him alive. And you, you are powerless to do anything about it.

The tears that you’d hastily wiped away before now stream freely down your cheeks. You sob over Steve’s motionless form as the emotions overtake you.

That woman, she’d nearly kept you from saving Steve. If she weren’t already dead, you would rip her limb from limb.

“Y/N,” Sam comes on through the earpiece, “Did you reach the jet?”

“Yes,” you manage to whisper, hoping your voice doesn’t betray your emotion.

“Good, we’re heading back to you. Just finishing up with the last of the agents.”

You offer no reply but your relief is tangible. The quicker they return, the quicker Steve will be on the road to recovery. You hope, at least.

The next few minutes seem to pass by at a crawl as you wait for the team. You think the bleeding has slowed, but you can’t be sure. At least you’ve stopped crying

Finally, Tony enters the jet, the others all trailing close behind. They all seem bone-tired but board with a sense of urgency. As they pass by you, each offers a terse nod or a look of sympathy. Bucky and Sam are the last two to board. They head over to you and Steve immediately, faces grim, as the jet takes off.

“Any change?” Sam asks.

“Um,” you clear your throat hastily, “I think the bleeding has slowed a bit. I’m not sure though.”

Sam nods and casts a quick glance to Bucky, who is sitting close by with his eyes fixed on Steve. “Good. Let’s get him back to the compound; I’m sure he’ll be fine.” He gives you a reassuring smile and pats your shoulder.

The whole ride back to the compound is silent. Each Avenger seems shell-shocked, which is to be expected. The thing that surprises you is the obvious lack of tension and spite directed toward you. You’d started this mission thinking the Avengers would never trust you, but now it seems you’ve managed to gain it in some capacity. If only it hadn’t taken Steve getting injured to earn it, you think, only slightly bitter.

Once you reach the compound, there’s a flurry of activity as Steve is carted off to the medical center. You start to follow them, but Bucky grabs your wrist and stops you. You turn and find the whole team staring at you.

“They won’t let you into the operating theater,” Bucky states bluntly. “Besides…” He hesitates and glances at the others behind him. “Best to have company while you wait for him to get out, anyway.”

“Oh,” is all you can think to say.

Tony steps forward slightly, not quite meeting your eyes. It’s the first time you’ve ever seen him look… guilty? “Thanks for, ah, coming to our aid in there, Katniss.”

A strange warmth bubbles up inside you at the nickname and you can’t stop the smile that graces your lips. “Anytime, Tin Man.”

“Come on.” Tony leads the way out of the jet. Obviously, he can only be emotional in quick bursts. “Let’s go eat ice cream and talk about our feelings.”

>>>

part 4

tags: @aspie-allie​ @ashwarren32​ @geek-and-proud​ @ilovesupersoldiers​ @thewolfgirluniverse​ @xstormiii​

The Invisibles #3

This is exactly what taking drugs isn't.

Our world is composed of geniuses and not-geniuses. That's the kind of statement a not-genius makes because it's so fucking obvious. Do you ever have to say anything that pretty much says "All of the people on the world are either this or that"? Anyway, the point I was making wasn't that I'm one of the not-geniuses even though it's the point I accidentally made. The point was that in the non-genius camp, we have those who are smart enough to recognize genius and those who sit grumpily in their pee-puddles whining about how the high-falutin' elites are trying to make things different. Different, in this case, generally means better but if you're a non-genius who can't recognize geniuses, you're just mad that somebody said french fries might not be the most nutritional side dish (even though you could still live in a world where you acknowledge that french fries are both not even close to nutritional and also the best food on the planet. I mean, you have that choice. But I guess the pee-puddle you're sitting in (which is slowly leaking into your gun cabinet) has probably distracted you from rational thought). Again, that wasn't the point I was going to make (about the french fries!) but I have a problem staying on topic. Partly it's because I've never been able to stay on topic (you should read some of my college essays which I'm not going to release to the public so even though I suggested you should read them, you won't be reading them. Ever) and partly it's because of another reason that I forgot while typing the college paper parenthetical statement. My point might have been that you can recognize a genius because they can state plain what other people are obfuscating in their pronouncements. If you're not smart enough to recognize the genius, you might think the genius is spreading propaganda, mostly because you really want to believe the thing that isn't true because it shields you from guilt or blame or repercussions stemming from following your own selfish desires at any cost. The genius is reviled by people who can't recognize genius and viled by people who can. Or unviled? Previled? Maybe I should have just gone with lauded. You might think I'm saying all of this in regards to Grant Morrison but you'd be wrong. I'm actually saying this about A.R. Moxon, the author of The Revisionaries, whose Twitter handle is @JuliusGoat. He did not pay me to point out that he's a genius although he probably should have. I suppose it's not too late. Being that he's a genius and knows the smart thing to do, I'm sure he'll buy my RPG when he Googles his name and/or Twitter handle and finds me sticking my tongue way up his asshole in this post. I mean, I'm basically saying he's smarter than Grant Morrison! Getting back to Grant Morrison, is he really a genius? I'm not so sure. I think maybe he's just a libertine who did a lot of drugs and traveled to a lot of sort-of-spiritual places (not to be more spiritual but to get his hot genius take on spirituality in a place that smells of burning corpses and goat semen while he shits his guts out back at the hotel high on hashish). Sometimes when you've done acid and other illicit substances, you feel the need to think you've risen above the flock by doing a thing most people will never consider doing. Maybe Grant doesn't exactly feel this way but some of his stuff sometimes comes across as that. I mean, sure, if you've ever done LSD or the like, you've definitely experienced a sort of melding of yourself with the profound and the mundane and the timeless in a way that usually only schizophrenics experience. You have done something that has changed you from the person you were before. But thinking that it has somehow made you different or better than those who haven't done it just means that you've never talked to people who went to high school in the flyover states. I've known some really boring and backwards people who did a lot of acid simply because there wasn't anything else to do out in the cornfields. It really did surprise me, a resident of the San Francisco Bay Area, to discover how prevalent psychoactive drugs were in the Midwest and Plains states. I thought that was just the hippies and children of hippies! What I didn't think, though, was that it made me a non-sheep (like the guy in my San Jose State creative writing class who once wrote a story about how he had broken from the flock because he dared to try LSD. The teacher loved his take and luckily for me, she was blind so she didn't see me rolling my eyes and making jerk-off motions from the back of the class. I mean, wow, dude. You dared to try LSD. I was probably on LSD while listening to the teacher read that stupid ass story!). Okay, maybe my whole take on "Grant Morrison thinks he's better than everybody else" stems from my envy of the idiot jock who wrote a stupid story that the teacher loved while she mostly just reacted to my stuff with "WTF? I guess I see how nostalgia can seem like a dream and the pop culture death of Superman can sometimes be more powerful than the death of a close family member but why did you choose to make none of this linear and what the hell do your Star Wars figures have to do with your future death? Also, the baseball game between Heaven and Hell where Heaven wins because Hitler snarls 'Jew' and then beans Jesus with the pitch to push in the last run was decent." Now that we've resolved some of my issues (I mean, maybe not "resolved" but at the very least "put out there in the open so you know where my biases are coming from"), let's get on with The Invisibles #3. When we last left our homophobic pouting white suburban "my mother doesn't hug me enough" anarchist protagonist, he was about to be hunted to death by a mystical group of human fox hunters in the secret London hidden beneath the one everybody thinks of as the "real London." I sort of hope the kid gets murdered. But then we won't get to see him learn his lesson which allows viewers to also maybe a learn a lesson. It's sometimes why you need characters like Mrs. Oleson from Little House on the Prairie. Although it was kind of enough to have Laura Ingalls who was a selfish devil child who was always learning lessons from humble and righteous Pa (who probably only killed one or two Native Americans, making him a stalwart saint of the frontier). I suppose the audience didn't need an over-the-top scurrilous villain like Mrs. Oleson. Although without Mrs. Oleson, how could the show have glorified the true saint of the frontier, Nells Oleson? The patience and kindness of that man were a testament to, um, patience and kindness!

I'm assuming Dane spends the next twenty pages snot-crying into a used coffee filter.

Dane continues to hang out with Tom of Bedlam because Dane can't survive on the street on his own and he knows it. He's not hard at all. He's a little wanna-be suburban gangster who read half of a book on anarchy and now thinks he's better than the slack-eyed populace going about their normal day-to-day bullshit. But he also thinks he still needs money and a place to live. He's not really great at the anarchy thing. But maybe if he listens to Tom, he'll learn a little bit about life and his heart will grow three sizes. Not because he suddenly cares more about everybody; it'll be a side-effect from learning the Dark Arts. Tom casts a spell so that Dane can look through the eyes of a pigeon as it flies about London. While Dane is seeing the hidden, creepy monsters lurking behind reality that pigeons can see (just as Pigeons can enter the afterlife in Moore's Jerusalem. I'm sure there are other urban horror stories that tell of the magic of pigeon vision. Did Lovecraft ever right any pigeon poems?), Tom tells Dane the secret history of cities. They're a virus that has propelled man from small villages which barely change across the centuries into huge population centers that use up the life force of the hosts as they build more and more and more, bigger and bigger, until, one day, they can build a rocket to propel the city virus into space and onto a new planet. Tom has seen, in visions, other planets affected by the virus, dead planets where the buildings stand as gravestones for the previous used-up races that contracted the virus. It's all very Lovecraftian. Not in the racist way but in the visions of other realities that change the nature of your own reality once you realize their existence. Hmm, that can actually kind of describe racism. I suppose Lovecraft's xenophobia was what made his stories about strange, unknown terrors so compelling. After teaching him loads of magic, Tom decides to teach Dane the most important lesson:

It's a really good lesson but also it's just Tom's attempt to get Jack Frost to appear.

Tom teaches Dane not to be a sheep or, in Tom's words, a robot. It's one of those weird lessons that everybody thinks they learn but nobody really learns it. Like when people read just that one Frost stanza on some poster in their English Lit class from "The Road Not Taken". Everybody gasps in air as the profundity of that single stanza (extracted from the context of the larger poem, much to the detriment of all of us) washes over them and they suddenly believe they've seen what life really is. Life isn't doing the thing you're supposed to do! Life is living to the fullest! Carpe diem! But the feeling of that moment erodes. It is eroded by the path we all take as we pretend we've taken the other path. We stop seeing that their weren't just two paths but many. And we get a job and we get a spouse and we get a house and we get a child and we occasionally think of Frost's single stanza and we decide, "You know what? I'm going to find the time to jump out of a plane!" or "I'm going to climb Everest!" or "I'm going to sleep with somebody of my same sex because I've always wanted to and hopefully my wife won't find out!" And sometimes we do and sometimes we don't; it doesn't really matter. Because the thing about taking the path less traveled is that it's still a path and it still represents the path you took and, you know what, there's that other path over there that I never got to experience and it's just shitting all over the path I'm currently on. Some people somehow block out the phantom possibilities and they're the lucky ones. The ones you can claim they have no regrets and maybe they're speaking truth when they say it. But mostly they just try not to think about it. Because once you start peeling at the wallpaper of your current life because the wallpaper, which others upon first glimpsing might think is beautiful and extraordinary, but which you've looked at every day for thirty years, you're done for. And you don't do it to find the beauty of what's underneath; you simply do it to see something different. And the new thing hasn't been scrutinized and deconstructed and critiqued; there's been no time to obsess over it. It's imaginary and if you happen to be like most people, imaginary must be better because why imagine the worst?! Okay, okay. I've just outed myself as not an anxious or depressive person! But I also don't go peeling at the wallpaper, so who knows? Maybe I do imagine the path less traveled was an intense tragedy?! The Invisibles #3 Rating: A. It's still pretty good and I'm still upset that I only have a few issues. Recently, I was thinking of writing an essay about how the worst thing about growing up is how you stop feeling things. Not that you stop feeling anything at all! Just that you stop feeling feelings that were once overwhelming and all-important. Like the crush you had in junior high. Can you imagine if, at forty, you still felt those feelings so intensely (among all the other ones you've felt across your life)? I understand that feelings must abate over time or we'd all be fucked up from not being able to get over our first crush while simultaneously not moving past the death of our closest grandparents. I get it. And some would say it's a mercy. But lately I've been wondering, "Is it?" Maybe I want to still feel those seemingly inexhaustible passions. I was reminded of wanting to discuss this because Tom says in this issue, "They made you forget how to feel, eh? Remember it now? Like everything new and the sun itself spinning behind your ribs, filling you up with silver. Like the way it was before they made robots of us, sentenced to a life behind bars we're trained to set in place ourselves." Now, that Tom speech was more about the whole "we're the shepherd of our own sheepdom" thing but in a robot and prison analogy. But the other thing about feelings made me remember how I was recently lamenting not feeling all of the things I once felt. Like the basket case from The Breakfast Club says, "When you grow up, your heart dies." And while you can argue whether that's true in the sense that you just stop caring about things, I think it's absolutely true in that it just slowly winds down and isn't capable of feeling how it used to. It's like a rechargeable battery that can no longer keep a charge. When I was in my late teens and early twenties, every single one of my friends, at one time or another, wound up weeping in my basement apartment about something in their lives (usually a woman!). I can't even fucking imagine that now. Maybe they'd be a bit upset or hurt or depressed but hardly disconsolate. I thought I would never get over the sadness at the loss of my grandfather or (and this might sound ridiculous to some but others will understand) the loss of my first cat as an adult, my precious little Judas. And while I obviously won't ever "get over" them (my eyes tear as I write this), I am no longer destroyed by the mere thought of their non-existence. A week after my Judas died, I saw Guardians of the Galaxy in the theater. Judas was always my Raccoon Boy so I almost broke down near the end when one of the characters put their arm around Rocket to console him. I made it out of the theater before absolutely losing it and snot-crying all the way back to the car. And so I can see how retaining that level of feeling over anything would be counterproductive to actually living, I absolutely miss it. I profoundly miss it. I want to be kicked in the stomach until I can't breathe by my feelings. I want this every day even if I know it's the cursed wish of a Monkey's Paw. How can anybody feel everything so palpably for their entire lives? And yet, how can we not?!

Amelia - Chapter 5 - Part 2

★

After a few minutes sitting back on the bed and another two cupfuls of water Amelia feels more like herself again. Katya explains that sometimes stress can cause the horrible feeling of imminent death that Amelia had just experienced and its supposedly not all that uncommon. Amelia wouldn't believe it if it hadn't just happened to her. Still, Mattie's absence is troubling in a way she's never had to consider before, especially in light of the way they'd been separated.

Lovino has pulled the chair by the door up to the side of the bed and Katya has returned to her seat on the other side of it. Natalya has taken to sitting in the open window, watching nothing in particular happen outside.

"Better?" Katya asks, taking the empty cup back from Amelia.

"Yeah... Thanks." Amelia replies unable to hide her embarrassment. Thankfully Lovino restarts the conversation.

"You were saying that you and your brother were attacked?" he says and Amelia nods, latching on to the subject.

"Yeah. We were traveling to Ransen and we had to sneak through some unfriendly territory... We almost got through it but someone must have spotted us. A whole bunch of them came out at us when we hit the river… I guess… maybe I fell in somehow?"

"Where did this happen?"

"You know the village set up on the mountain sides up in the northwest?" Instead of rising, Lovino’s eyebrows fall even farther and his eyes widen below them.

"Karo? Where the hell were you coming from that you needed to go through Karo to get to Ransen?"

" Uh... farther north of there?"

"North?? There's nothing north of Karo except cursed lands! What were you even doing up there!?" Lovino’s bafflement is starting to look a bit like anger. Amelia returns a confused gaze of her own. This is the first time she’s ever heard such a thing about her birthplace! She blinks a couple times, waiting to see if he’s being serious but it seems like he is.

"...Well, that's where our home is." Amelia says slowly. “Uh. Was, I guess. We grew up near the coast up there, but we had to leave recently because of the Void.” Lovino seems to be unable to form a response to this, with his mouth hanging open as it is, so Katya takes the opportunity to join in the conversation.

“I do not know area. What is it that makes these lands cursed?” She asks Amelia, who can only return a shrug. If it was cursed, it’s nothing she knows about. Lovino takes a few short moments to process before he continues.

“I’m sorry… I didn’t realize anyone lived up there. I admit, I’ve only heard rumors about it, but they’re widely believed. Cats don’t come and go there very often.” He looks mildly ashamed of himself for insulting her homeland and Amelia smiles at him, appreciating the sentiment.

“Nah, and you’re not totally wrong. As far as I know, Mattie and I were the only ones living up there and this is the first time we’ve been so far away from it. We didn’t exactly get a great number of visitors, either.” The thought of rumors about her home being widespread tickles something curious inside her. “Why do cats think it’s cursed?”

“Something about a witch living there and cursing it to be overrun with monsters to keep cats out.” Lovino replies. “So much for that story, I guess.”

“Oh. Well I don’t know about a witch, but there’s plenty of monsters up there! Even though there were no other cats near our territory, Mattie and I still had to keep up regular patrols just to keep their numbers in line.” Amelia says grinning with proud memories of her and her brother’s exploits bubbling up in the back of her mind. This time both Katya and Lovino stare at her slack-jawed. Which is all well and good, but she’s now reminded that her first priority is figuring out how to find Mattie. “Yeah, so… anyway. The Void cut off a direct route to Ransen and forced us to pass through… Karo, was it? Something was really… off about those cats, and there was… something there.”

Amelia remembers the chills she felt from the eerie, feral energy the cats exuded. The heart-stopping vision of absolute blackness forming the outline of a standing body. Lovino leans forward, putting his elbows on his knees.

“I’m aware of the situation up there.” He says, as if relieving Amelia of the necessity of explaining the horror she witnessed. She is grateful for it and she nods at him to show it. Katya looks curious but Lovino continues before she can question it. “So, you and your brother crossed through their territories and made it to the river and then you were attacked. What else?”

Amelia sighs, looking down into her lap. She curls her tail around herself and takes hold of it. (It’s tangled. She’ll have to brush it tonight.) “I don’t know.” She says finally. “I remember trying to get back to Mattie’s side after they separated us, but then I bumped into something… and then I blacked out.”

A concerned look crosses Katya’s face. “Excuse me, dear.” She says and leans across the bed to gently hold Amelia’s face and run her other hand through Amelia’s hair and over her scalp. Amelia holds very still, unsure of what this is about, but Katya finishes her inspection soon enough. “Hm. As I thought, there is nothing. It is strange that this would happen if you have no head injury.”

“Really?” Amelia looks up at Katya, surprised.

“Katya knows a lot about injuries and healing.” Lovino explains. “So, you don’t remember anything else?”

“No.” Amelia answers. “I mean. I had a nightmare after that, but when I woke up… well, I saw you and then immediately knocked out again, but then I woke up here and that’s all I’ve got. If it wasn’t Mattie that got me out of there, I have no idea how else I could have…”

Amelia watches as Katya retrieves a small book from the side table and writes some notes in it with a stick of charcoal. Amelia’s about to ask what’s up but Lovino speaks up again.

“What can you tell me about your brother? How do you think he would have acted?”

“Oh, uh. Mattie… Matthew, is my twin brother. He’s bigger than me, but we look a lot alike and he’s way more rational than I am. I wouldn’t put it past him to do something really stupid to keep me safe, though.” She doesn’t let this thought sink in too deep. Mattie is definitely alive somewhere, the alternative is simply unthinkable, but she can only hope he’s also ok. What if he’d been knocked out too? What if he ended up in the river like she did? … What if he didn’t?

“Alright.” Lovino says, standing from the chair. “I’ll see what I can find.”

Amelia’s heart leaps. “Oh! I’ll—”

“You should stay here and recover.” He cuts her off. Amelia frowns at him but she knows that she’s not going anywhere far in her condition. “I know the area and I can cover more ground by myself. Plus I’ll be able to ask around.”

Lovino turns and Amelia catches his shirt before he’s able to walk away. He stops and looks back at her quizzically.

“Hey, uh…” She says, faltering when she realizes she can’t really put her feelings into words. So instead she pulls him into a hug. She’s still short and sitting and he’s standing so she can’t reach his shoulder for a proper exchange, but his abdomen is good enough, she thinks while bumping her head into it. After a moment she mumbles, “Thanks.”

He’s gone very still and rigid and it takes him a long time to reply with a strangled “Yeah. Sure.” before he detaches himself gingerly and crab walks out the door, closing the door behind him. Amelia watches all this with rapt curiosity, then turns back to Katya.

“Did I do something wrong?” She says. She’s lived alone with her brother for a long time with only visits from close friends… Maybe she doesn’t actually know all that much about greeting unfamiliar cats.

She sees that Katya is once again trying desperately not to laugh behind her hands. But Katya shakes her head.

“Well… No, I think not.” She says amidst her giggliness. “It is rare for cats to be so forthcoming with strangers but it is not bad. Lovino has, ah… strong personal rule to never touch too familiarly here at Sanctuary.”

“Why’s that?” Amelia asks but Natalya interrupts suddenly. Amelia had forgotten she was even there!

“I will call when dinner is ready, Katyusha.” She says plainly before jumping out the window, not waiting for a response. Amelia gives Katya another uneasy look.

“Do not worry, I think she likes you. This is unusual. Very auspicious!” Katya says conspiratorially. Well… she would know her sister best, Amelia guesses, but it sure doesn’t seem that way. Katya continues, “Amelia, you have grown up without village, yes?”

Amelia nods.

“And your parents?”

“Um. I never knew our dad and mom died when we were little.”

“Oh…?” Katya gives her an expression that looks halfway condoling and halfway curious.

“We were lucky and someone stumbled across us not long after that.” Amelia explains, “He taught us how to survive up there and he visited us a lot after that!”

This seems to explain enough for Katya to continue.

“I see. Then I think you do not have very much contact with other cats. You are aware of Sickness?” Amelia nods again. “And you know that we who have female body are most in danger and our numbers have become so few it threatens entire ribika race, yes?”

This, too, Amelia knows. Gilbert, Ludwig, Tino and Sven have all talked about it and stressed the importance of Amelia keeping herself far away from the Void. In retrospect, its not so strange that Mattie developed such a strong complex, but being perfectly healthy and, as Ludwig put it, “absurdly robust,” Amelia never grasped the concept very well. Why the heck should she be more susceptible anyway? Katya seems to pick up on her complicated feelings.

“Well… you may not see effect where you live, but near Ransen we do not talk with strangers. We do not even walk outside where other cats are. It is too dangerous these days.” Katya says. And, as if to counter Amelia’s obvious bafflement, she adds, “It is not this way everywhere, of course! Some villages honor queens as equals to chief because they are precious! It is this way where I am from.”

There are so many concepts here that confuse her, Amelia can’t decide which to respond to first so she is silent for a moment to process them.

“Wait! I thought Ransen is the only place where the Void hasn’t reached yet. Why would it be dangerous?”

Katya’s expression looks complicated and sort of sad, not unlike the one Mattie had when he’d come to suggest they leave home.

“Amelia, most cats are good, normal cats. Lovino is unusually good cat. He helps us stay here in safe place, far from Void and Sickness. But… some cats are… ah… They want to hurt other cats.” Amelia nods. She has dispatched many of these. “Since Ransen is safe from Void, many, many cats gather together. When many cats gather, bad cats also gather and cause more trouble. And, since females are precious, we are popular target for bad cats who want profit. Does this make sense?”

“Ohh, ok.” Amelia says, finally picking up the point Katya is trying to make. “So, since there are so many cats in Ransen, it’s more dangerous just because there are more jerks hanging around. I guess it’s harder to fight all of them if they’re all working together?”

“Yes!” Katya says, smiling once again. “This is why we stay in Sanctuary; we are near to Ransen but hidden. It is also why we work hard to keep secret. Please help us to keep our Sanctuary secret, Amelia.” 

★TBC★

Ok, this isn’t quite the end of the scene but I am so gosh danged sleepy and I wanna post it. I haven’t even proofed it yet so sorry about quality, lol...

I am excited to get into some meat of the story though :D

Crit and Comments please! Thanks for reading!

hgnnn fuckkkk wisdom teeth suck

sorry I haven’t been doin this much, I found a cool new thing last Wednesday and kinda got hooked so if you wanna see me put a mini version of me through various universes, here’s some of my writing! https://forums.spacebattles.com/threads/jumpchain-multicross-si-crossing-via-field.826356/

Anyway. Time to do this. Caps are being used, grammar is activated, I’m ready to be professional.

Last time on Pact: I like Blake and he’s seeing magical visions, Paige is the good cousin, Molly’s ded.

This time on Pact!

I was dressed and heading out the door in less than a minute, a plain black toque pulled over my hair.

Good hustle my boi good job.

Mirror people, visions of talking dogs and stretched faces, vampire hunters or witch hunters or whatever they were.  It was unbelievable, impossible to wrap my head around.  So I didn’t believe it, didn’t try to understand it.  I didn’t disbelieve it either.  I was processing it, really, filing it all away for future consideration.

I’m really happy to see a protagonist that didn’t just discredit the crazy stuff. He saw weird dreams, but he doesn’t feel they’re dreams. It’s a nice breath of fresh air.

Molly and Paige had been the ones to greet me with smiles on their faces, to hug me instead of offering an informal handshake.  We’d played together, laughed, and bridged the gap between being family to being friends.

Ooh, I really hope Paige stays okay. At least one of the good cousins needs to make it out alive.

Molly’s death wouldn’t have been random.  There had been a reason, and that reason had driven my grandmother to do what she’d done.  All of the fallout from that, the divide in the family, the animosity that had driven me from home to a cold, hostile, unfriendly world, shared that same root cause.  It was hard to pin how much of my haste was self preservation and how much was my desire to get answers. 

I have a feeling that the grandma killed Molly not out of a deliberate choice, but out of inaction. She dumped this on Molly, Molly wasn’t ready to handle, somebody killed Molly. 

The door opened, and my bear of a landlord stood in the way, leveling a stare at me.

HE’S EVIL I’M CALLING IT

“Yeah?”  He switched from annoyance to concern in an instant.  “Need a ride?”

Or??

“I think my cousin died.  It’s two hours away, so if you needed the car, I could bring it back in a pinch, figure a way to get back, or-”

“Shhh,” he interrupted me.  I made myself stop.  Very calm, soothing, he said, “It’s fine.  I’m so sorry about your cousin, baby.”

I shrugged, breaking eye contact.  I wasn’t good with people being kind to me.  Not without some warning.  “I’m not sure it’s true.  It doesn’t make sense.”

“Go, do what you need to do,” he said.  He extended his hand, keys dangling from the ring that was now around his middle finger.

Nah, he’s evil. I have bad vibes. Idk why, but he’s givin me bad vibes. I want him to just be a nice landlord but come on, he’s a landlord in a Wideboy book. 

“Speaking of… weren’t you going to set things up for Goosh’s show?”

I winced.  My job.  “I didn’t think.  I don’t- shit.”

“It’s fine.  I’ll explain to the others.  We’ll use the Sisters.”

Immediate flashbacks to Skyward Sword. Also, these sisters sound ominous.

I could see movement behind Joel.  The girl in the mirror, moving her arms.

The girl in the mirror raised her arms.  Forearms crossed against one another, forming an ‘x’.

“Go back to bed.  Sleep.  I’ve got a bad feeling, and I’m not sure if it’s just because I feel like you’ll never get back to bed if you go now or if it’s something else.  But I’ve got to go, and I feel like I’d be a lot happier if I knew you were in bed, instead of wandering around a dark building alone.”

Blake is a smart protagonist, not in the ‘I can build cool sci-fi tech’ way, but in the genre-savvy, ‘takes things as he sees them’ way. I guess I mean Wisdom wasn’t his dump stat. I’m so down for that.

“Gut feeling?” he asked.  “That’s not like you.”

“Gut feeling,” I said.  “Instincts.”

Oh my gosh, if a gut feeling is a kind of magic in here, I’m gonna be sad and happy. I literally use that in my own grimdark supernatural horror whatever story. Stop taking my ideas, good authors!

The girl in the mirror looked nervous, pacing back and forth, occasionally peering around, as if she could get a different perspective.  A moment later, she strode out of view, stepping beyond the boundaries of the frame.

My guess? She’s Molly, but something magical is keeping Blake from recognizing her. Calling it.

I unlocked Joel’s Corolla, a car old enough that the only way to open the door was to actually put the key in the lock, and then stopped.

COROLLA DRIVERS REPRESENT!

I moved the rear-view mirror until I had a view of the girl in the back seat.

“Answers,” I said.

“Go, and I’ll give you answers,” she responded.  She sounded even fainter and more muffled than before.  “You think the lights went out by coincidence?”

I wonder if this mirror girl is gonna stick around through the book. That’d be a cool companion.

“Rose.”

“Rose… who are you supposed to be?  My grandmother?”

“No.  I think I’m you.  Your- our parents named me after her.”

Of course. Mirror world. Alternate dimension. Alternate timeline Blake! Also, I knew before but it’s nice to see confirmation that the grandma is named Rose so I can call her that. Except... now there are two Rose people so I still have to say grandma. Actually, maybe I’m paranoid, but what if Rose is full of shit here and not actually Blake at all. She did slip up on the parents line...

“I’m you, with one fundamental difference,” Rose elaborated.  “I’m a girl.  I think grandmother is trying to game the system somehow.  A failsafe or trap or something, that kicks in when Molly dies and the inheritance turns over.”

That’s terrifying and brilliant if grandma could just change a whole reality like that just to make a failsafe.

“Not the time consuming kind of complicated.  This stuff was explained to me.  I crashed into existence, with only a few places I could go.  I’ve got a lifetime of memories, but I get that I’m a fake.”

I keep getting immediately proven wrong. Rose isn’t from another world, she just kinda popped into existence for all of this. I think. Who explained it to her? Grandma Rose? But either way, this description of how she exists is really unnerving. Living in the mirrors would suck.

“The lawyer, Beasley, he was cleaning up.  Picking up books and stuff that Molly left lying around.  When I asked what was going on, he said you were next in line, for custody of the house.  After you, it’s Kathy, then Ellie, then Roxanne, then Ivy, then Paige.”

Huh. I wonder why Paige is last. Unless what Peter said really fucked the grandma’s opinion of Paige up, there’s foul play here.

“How do your memories line up?  Molly got picked, but… you were at the house?”

“I was home, with mom and dad.  They’re mad, you know, obviously, because I didn’t get Hillsglade House, and they thought it was as close to a given as you could get.  Mad at me, especially.  I was in bed, mostly asleep, and then I was at the house.  I remember everything about my life, but I don’t feel like I experienced any of it.  You know?”

More Rose knowledge. So she has her whole life’s memories until some point after grandma died. But that was all downloaded into her instead of actually living it, then she was brought to this mirror dimension. Creepy.

Amelia - Chapter 5 - Revised Part 2 and Part 3

After a few minutes sitting back on the bed and another two cupfuls of water, Amelia feels more like herself again. Katya explains that sometimes stress can cause the horrible feeling of imminent death that Amelia had just experienced and it’s supposedly not all that uncommon. Amelia wouldn't believe it if it hadn't just happened to her. Still, Mattie's absence is troubling in a way she's never had to consider before.

Lovino has pulled the chair by the door up to the side of the bed and Katya has returned to her seat on the other side of it. Natalya has taken to sitting in the open window, watching nothing in particular happen outside.

"Better?" Katya asks, taking the empty cup back from Amelia.

"Yeah... Thanks." Amelia replies unable to hide her embarrassment. Thankfully Lovino restarts the conversation before the silence drags on too long.

"You were saying that you and your brother were attacked?" he says and Amelia nods, latching on to the subject.

"Yeah. We were traveling to Ransen and we had to sneak through some unfriendly territory. We almost got through it but someone must have spotted us because a whole bunch of cats came out at us when we hit the river up there… maybe I fell in somehow?"

"Where did this happen?"

"You know the village set up at the foot of the mountains up in the northwest?"

Instead of rising, Lovino’s eyebrows fall even farther and his eyes widen below them.

"Karo? Where the hell were you coming from that you needed to go through Karo to get to Ransen?"

" Uh... farther north of there?"

"North??” Lovino’s bafflement is starting to look a bit like anger. “There's nothing north of Karo except cursed lands! What were you even doing up there!?” Amelia returns a confused gaze of her own. This is the first time she’s ever heard such a thing about her birthplace! She blinks a couple of times, waiting to see if he’s being serious but no one’s laughing.

"...Well, that's where our home is." Amelia says slowly. “Uh. Was, I guess. We grew up near the coast there but we had to leave recently because of the Void.” Lovino seems to be unable to form a response to this, with his mouth hanging open as it is, so Katya takes the opportunity to join in the conversation.

“I do not know this place. What is it that make these lands cursed?” She asks Amelia, who can only return a shrug. If it’s cursed, it’s nothing she knows about. Lovino takes a few short moments to process before he continues.

“I’m sorry… I didn’t realize anyone lived up there. I admit, I’ve only heard rumors about it, but they’re widely believed. Cats don’t come and go there very often.” He looks mildly ashamed of himself for insulting her homeland and Amelia smiles at him, appreciating the sentiment.

“Nah, and you’re not totally wrong. As far as I know, Mattie and I were the only ones living up there and this is the first time we’ve been so far away from it. We didn’t exactly get a great number of visitors, either.” The thought of rumors about her home being widespread tickles something curious inside her. “Why do cats think it’s cursed?”

“Something about a witch living there who cursed it to be overrun with monsters in order to keep cats out.” Lovino replies, shrugging. “So much for that story, I guess.”

“Oh. Well, I don’t know about a witch, but there’s plenty of monsters up there! Even though there were no other cats near our territory, Mattie and I still had to keep up regular patrols just to keep their numbers in line.” Amelia says with a grin. Proud memories of her and her brother’s exploits bubble up in her heart. This time both Katya and Lovino stare at her slack-jawed. Which is all well and good, but she’s now reminded that her first priority is figuring out how to find Mattie. “Yeah, so… anyway. The Void cut off a direct route to Ransen and forced us to pass through… Karo, was it? Something was really… off about those cats, and there was… something there.”

Amelia remembers the chills she felt from the eerie, feral energy the cats exuded, the heart-stopping vision of absolute blackness forming the outline of a standing body. A ghost of those chills raises the hair on her neck and arms. Lovino leans forward, putting his elbows on his knees.

“I’m aware of the situation up there.” He says, as if relieving Amelia of the necessity of explaining the horror she witnessed. She is grateful for it and she nods at him to show it. Katya looks curious but Lovino continues before she can question it. “So, you and your brother crossed through their territories, made it to the river and then you were attacked. What else?”

Amelia sighs, looking down into her lap. She curls her tail around herself and takes hold of it. (It’s tangled, she notices. She’ll have to brush it tonight.) “I don’t know.” She says finally. “I remember trying to get back to Mattie’s side after they separated us, but then I bumped into something… and then I blacked out.”

A concerned look crosses Katya’s face. “Excuse me, dear.” She says and leans across the bed to gently hold Amelia’s face and run her other hand through Amelia’s hair and over her scalp. Amelia holds very still, unsure of what this is about, but Katya finishes her inspection soon enough. “Hm. As I thought, there is nothing. It is strange that this would happen if you have no head injury.”

“Really?” Amelia looks up at Katya, surprised.

“Katya knows a lot about injuries and healing.” Lovino explains before pressing on. “So, you don’t remember anything else?”

“No.” Amelia shakes her head. “I mean. I had a nightmare after that, but when I woke up… well, I saw you and then immediately conked out again, but then I woke up here and that’s all I’ve got. If it wasn’t Mattie that got me out of there, I have no idea how else I could have…”

Amelia watches as Katya retrieves a small book from the side table and writes some notes in it with a stick of charcoal. Amelia’s about to ask what’s up but Lovino speaks up again.

“What can you tell me about your brother? How do you think he would have acted?”

“Oh, uh. Mattie… Matthew, is my twin brother. He’s bigger than me, but we look a lot alike. You know, blond wavy hair, long whitish fur. And marks under his eyes, kinda like yours Katya, except under both eyes.” She points and moves her fingertip across both of her cheeks. “Mattie’s way more rational than I am but I wouldn’t put it past him to do something really stupid to keep me safe.” She doesn’t let this thought sink in too deep. Mattie is definitely alive somewhere, the alternative is simply unthinkable, but she can only hope he’s also ok. What if he’d been knocked out too? What if he ended up in the river like she did? … What if he didn’t?

“Alright.” Lovino says, standing from the chair. “I’ll see what I can find.”

Amelia’s heart leaps. “Oh! I’ll—”

“You should stay here and recover.” He cuts her off firmly, but not unkindly. Amelia frowns at him but she knows that she’s not going anywhere far in her condition. “I know the area and I can cover more ground by myself. Plus I’ll be able to ask around.”

Lovino turns to leave and Amelia, fumbling, catches his shirt before he’s able to walk away. He stops and looks back at her quizzically.

“Hey, uh…” She says, faltering when she realizes she can’t really put her feelings into words. So instead she pulls him into a hug. She’s still short and sitting and he’s standing so she can’t reach his shoulder for a proper exchange, but his abdomen is good enough, she thinks while bumping her head into it. After a moment of composing herself enough to talk, she mumbles, “Thanks.”

He’s gone very still and rigid and it takes him a long time to reply with a strangled “Yeah. Sure.” He detaches himself carefully, gingerly grasping Amelia’s arms from his back and placing them back at her side. And with that he crab walks out the door, closing the door behind him. Amelia watches all this with rapt curiosity, then turns back to Katya.

“Did I do something wrong?” She asks. She’s lived alone with her brother for a long time with only visits from close friends… Maybe she doesn’t actually know all that much about greeting unfamiliar cats.

She sees that Katya is once again trying desperately not to laugh behind her hands. But Katya shakes her head.

“Well… No, I think not.” She says amidst her giggling. “It is rare for cats to be so forthcoming with strangers but it is not bad. Lovino has, ah… strong personal rule to never touch too familiarly here at Sanctuary.”

“Why’s that?” Amelia asks but Natalya interrupts suddenly. Amelia had forgotten she was even there!

“I will call when dinner is ready, Katyusha.” She says plainly before jumping out the window, not waiting for a response. Amelia gives Katya another uneasy look, but she only holds a knowing gleam in her eye.

“Do not worry, I think she likes you. This is unusual. Very auspicious!” Katya says conspiratorially. Well… she would know her sister best, Amelia guesses, but it sure doesn’t seem that way. Katya continues, “Amelia, you have grown up without village, yes?”

Amelia nods.

“And your parents?”

“Um. I never knew our dad and mom died when we were little.”

“Oh…?” Katya gives her an expression that looks halfway condoling and halfway curious.

“We were lucky and someone stumbled across us not long after that.” Amelia explains, “He taught us how to survive up there and he visited us a lot after that!”

This seems to explain enough for Katya to continue.

“I see. Then I think you do not have very much contact with other cats. You are aware of Sickness?” Amelia nods again. “And you know that we who have female body are most in danger and our numbers have become so few it threatens entire ribika race, yes?”

This, too, Amelia knows. Gilbert, Ludwig, Tino and Sven have all talked about it and stressed the importance of Amelia keeping herself far away from the Void. In retrospect, its not so strange that Mattie developed such a strong complex, but being perfectly healthy and, as Ludwig put it, “absurdly robust,” Amelia never grasped the concept very well. Why the heck should she be more susceptible anyway? Katya seems to pick up on her complicated feelings.

“Well… you may not see effect where you live, but near Ransen we do not talk with strangers. We do not even walk outside where other cats are. It is too dangerous these days.” Katya says. And, as if to counter Amelia’s obvious bafflement, she adds, “It is not this way everywhere, of course! Some villages honor queens as equals to chief because they are precious! It is this way where I am from.”

There are so many concepts here that confuse her, Amelia can’t decide which to respond to first so she is silent for a moment to process them.

“Wait! I thought Ransen is the only place where the Void hasn’t reached yet. Why would it be dangerous?”

Katya’s expression looks complicated and sort of sad, not unlike the one Mattie had when he’d come to suggest they leave home.

“Amelia, most cats are good, normal cats. Lovino is unusually good cat. He helps us stay hidden here in safe place, far from Void and Sickness. But some cats are… ah… They want to hurt other cats.” Amelia nods. She has dispatched a handful of these. “Since Ransen is safe from Void, many, many cats gather together. When many cats gather, bad cats also gather and cause more trouble. And, since females are precious, we are favored target for bad cats who want profit. Does this make sense?”

“Ohh, ok.” Amelia says, finally picking up the point Katya is trying to make. “So, since there are so many cats in Ransen, it’s more dangerous because there are more jerks hanging around. I guess it’s harder to fight all of them if they’re all working together?”

“Yes!” Katya says, smiling once again. “Maybe they do not all work together, but that is gist of problem we have. This is why we stay in Sanctuary. It is also why we work hard to keep secret. Will you help us to keep our Sanctuary secret, Amelia?”

Amelia is surprised at how slow she’s been to catch on.

“Oh, gosh, of course!” She gushes just a bit, accidentally. “I wouldn’t let any bad guys anywhere near such an important place!”

“I am glad to hear it.” Katya says. “We can begin with this. I will explain to you important information about Sanctuary, yes?”

★ Part 3 ★

After that, Katya began to explain how this two-cane’s ruin is hidden behind a waterfall and an ancient, half-collapsed sinkhole, and that it belongs to Lovino and his brother Feliciano. (Katya says that Feliciano is busy cooking dinner and she will be meeting him and the rest of the house soon enough. And the rest of the house is all female!!)

Years ago, when Lovino and Feliciano learned about the increased breakouts of the Sickness, they went looking for some kitten-hood molly friends of theirs to make sure they were ok. This evolved into taking in any molly cats, or “queens,” who wanted shelter. Amelia deduces from context that “queen” does not refer to royalty, but seems to be a term specifically for an adult female cat. It is not a meaning she’d ever read in any of her books, at least not that she remembers, and certainly not one she’d heard in conversation before now.

Later, the brothers took in younger mollies, too, when the population started to plummet and it became dangerous for them simply by virtue of being a “rarity.” Amelia is not much of a collector, but Mattie is, so she’s familiar with the concept. She’s not sure why someone would want to kidnap and fight over rare things (and cats!?) just to have them, but she knows it happens and it is irksome to say the least! Do they really not understand the inconvenience it puts on a fellow cat??

She supposes that’s what all those bounty hunters were on about when they got a look at her back home. She knew they were up to no good to begin with, but now that she knows the context, Amelia’s quite sure she’ll be coming down a lot harder on these adversaries in future.

It isn’t much longer before they hear a knock at the door.

“Come in!” Katya calls. The door opens to reveal a fairly harassed looking Natalya and two new cats looking in over her shoulders with curious excitement.

“Katyusha, I am collecting you. These two insisted on bringing this one’s dinner to her room. They will keep her company, so you should come with me and rest.”

“Oh…!” Katya looks surprised and glances at Amelia, but Amelia has just realized that Katya must have been on alert for a good portion of the day while taking care of her. She gives Katya a nod and a smile. “All right then. I will be back to check on you later, Amelia. Enjoy your dinner!”

Amelia watches as Katya follows Natalya and sees that there are even more curious faces lingering outside her door. Most of them look so much… softer (like Katya and Natalya, like her own reflection in a pool of water) than she’s used to seeing.

“No way, you’re gonna, like, leave without dishing?” Amelia hears from the hallway.

“Yes.” Replies Natalya’s dangerous voice before it leaves the doorway.

One of the cats, who had sidled in past Natalya, walks over to Amelia carrying a tray of something steaming.

“Good evening! Lovi tells me your name is Amelia?” The cat says with an accent like Lovino’s, though his demeanor is much more buoyant. Amelia sees a reddish brown shade of hair and a familiar looking flyaway curl. He looks so much like Lovino it’s hard to mistake him. This must be Feliciano, she thinks, remembering her conversation with Katya.

“Yup!” Amelia says. The cat places the bed-tray beside her and her eyes nearly fall out of their sockets. “Wuh-WOW—” she covers her mouth (she sort of accidentally shouted, there.)

“This is for me…?” Is all she can say. She’s never seen such a meal in her life, and the aroma. Meat and sauce and vegetables and things she’s never even seen before. It’s been so long since Mattie and she had had anything more than nuts and grass and dried fruit to eat that seeing and smelling something so scandalously appetizing is actually making her eyes water, not to speak of her mouth. Oh… Oh, she wishes Mattie were here…

Amelia sniffs and looks back up through blurry eyes. The second cat, a tall blonde with green eyes, must have closed the door to the room and come to stand with the first. Amelia sees the excited, conspiratorial smiles slipping off of both their faces as they realize she is crying.

“Ooohh nooo, I’m sorry! Do you not like pasta??” Says Feliciano, waving his hands about in distress. “No, that can’t be right, maybe you don’t eat meat? It’s not as popular these days…” Amelia shakes her head and rubs her eyes, unable to respond. The second cat pats Feliciano on the head.

“Feli, don’t worry, I’m sure she likes it.” She says, “Amelia, take your time. My name is Emmaline; this is Feliciano.” She gestures to him. “We can leave you be if you need some time to yourself?”

“No…!” She sniffs loudly and shakes her head again. That’s probably the last thing she wants right now. She takes a couple of deep breaths. “No… I’m ok.”

Emmaline sits down in the chair Lovino abandoned over an hour ago and Feliciano sits on the side of the bed. He seems to be a lot more comfortable here than his brother was.

“Then, you should eat. You will be wonderful.” Emmaline says, lifting the tray and setting it across Amelia’s lap. Feliciano picks up the fork and hands it to her.

“I promise it is very good! Lovino made the sauce tonight!”

Amelia holds the fork for a moment, feeling as though their eyes are watching her rather closely, but she is, in fact, starving, and she’s never turned down a meal before, regardless of how spectacular it is. She digs in.

It takes another full minute or two before she stops crying again.

★End Chapter 5★ A/N: I made some significant enough additions, I thought I should post up Part 2 again along with Part 3. Nice job calling Belgium, anon. xD 

As always!! Comments and critique are welcome! Thank you for reading!