VS. Simurgh's Scream

"Sorry."

"Wash."

"Umm."

Like my dad's voice, trying to get into the habit of talking to me again after going a while without visits. Sorry, he said.

The nurses at the hospital. Before a chore I had dearly wished was unnecessary and, self-contradicting myself, constant at the same time.

Something Sveta had said, during one of her visits, after a lingering moment of eye contact, when even she had taken in the full reality of what I'd been and found herself momentarily lost for words.

"Fuck you, Simurgh."

The statement was marked by others looking at me.

Oh, I'd said that out loud.

"Do we need to worry?" Clockblocker asked.

"Addendum to that thought," I said. "Fuck her, and no, it's not working like she wants it to. She's poking at obvious weak spots I've been dealing with for years. I can take it."

*****

"Reality check," Rain said. "Scale of one to ten, who's above a seven or below a three?"

"Below a five," Byron said. "Below a five is a slippery slope."

"Sure," Rain said. "No judgment."

"I'm fine," Damsel said, annoyed.

"Is it even possible to be above a seven?"

"I-" I started. "I'm fucking annoyed with this. I'm spooked about what comes next, and if we can even beat her. But I don't feel like she's getting to me. It's distracting and there's probably a point to it. Put me down as a seven."

***

I thought at first that it was just a psychological tactic. Telekinetically controlled dust, to scare us, remind us we weren't safe anywhere here.

Then it screamed.

The sound in my head redoubled, rattled, became words. The words were accompanied by mental images.

"I never had a trigger event," Dean's voice.

"I had to abandon you for my own health." Jessica's.

"I'm sorry. I was selfish. It wasn't your fault."

Each was a fragment, a thing that had never been said, as much as they should have. A slice of a world that would have made more sense, gone to better places. Seductive.

Floating in the air, I curled up, knees to chest.

Fuck that. I straightened, tall, eyes wide.

***

I'm not who I was when Ophion got me.

I'm changed.

The words rambled through my brain, pushing through a fog of noise and screaming. Change. Metamorphosis. Cocoon.

Cocoon.

The scream latched onto the memory. Me, wrapped in a cocoon of stray dogs, cats, bugs. The cocoon had become a coffin, encapsulating me, after Crawler had eaten into me with acid.

But that coffin had opened. Ribs with flesh strung between them had parted, revealing me within.

I held onto that image, pushing out, trying to capture it.

- Last 20.3