First ||| https://scratch.mit.edu/projects/1331674161/ Prev ||| https://scratch.mit.edu/projects/1335580758/ Next ||| https://scratch.mit.edu/projects/xxxxxxxxxx/ Tw || Minor gore I sat there, in my room once more. I couldn’t reverse what they had said, nor could I reinnovate myself to be someone else. But I was at my desk again, tired, ink-stained hands wrote the same French-English gibberish I hadn’t written since I was a young boy. I rotted here. I swallowed down the sickness before it had time to excuse itself from my system. “Penn?” I heard her whisper from outside my door. She knocked again, her voice calming like the lifeblood of every living thing. Except for me. “Penn, may I come in?” “Yes, ma’am.” I watched as the voice of Orchid turned the door, poking in her head. She glanced me over once, and let herself in, as she would usually do. She wrapped her arms from behind me, movements tranquil like a river. She plucked a feather from my chin, knowing the stubble was something I always seemed to dislike. I didn’t really notice, as the ink was now pouring like blood from a vessel, I placed it down. My stomach couldn’t contain such a mess. She glanced down at the lack of things I’ve written, just ink on the page. It didn’t even make sense, nor did it have proper conjugation. She scratched at the base of my wing, watching it stretch and flutter. “You’re always so cute when you do that.” She commented. “Do what?” The rush of the possibilities really was enticing, especially since she could have ripped my wings out any moment. I would have let her. “You always react in such pleasing ways.” She continued to scratch the base of my wing, watching the loose feathers fall as the plume reacted in a pleasant way, at least in her eyes. Then she tugged. Not Orchid, no, her hands didn’t have nails that felt like claws. I felt something rip, but it didn’t feel bad. It felt like a release. Now dislocated, my wing laid limp by my side. “Look at that, that’s adorable.” She stroked the plume once more, the calm presence seemed to be back. “Hocus, when will you understand that I can’t put my wing back in place alone?” I felt the wing lock itself back into its socket, a crack sound resounding in my skull. “Thank you.” I didn’t look back to the lepus, I just heard her shuffle in my room. “You’ve been boring lately.” She complained from my bed. I had yet to remove the feathers from my bed, it was more like a nest than anything else. “Like you’re just bleh, bleh, when people like you should be having a good time! You’re still alive! Live a little!” “Hocus, that’s not how this works.” I sighed, folding the paper like the ink was already dry after 3 minutes. “Unlike someone, my purpose isn’t immediate.” “My purpose wasn’t immediate either. You know this.” She inspected a feather from my bed, her legs kicking like a high school girl. She did act quite like one occasionally. “It wasn’t until I got Akali to listen is when I finally realized what they wanted me for.” “And where is Akali now?” I stood up, the chair falling from behind me. I pushed it over, basically. I didn’t mean to do that; it made a loud clatter sound against the hardwood. I nearly jumped out of my skin, literally. It felt like my skeleton was going to rip apart my muscle and fat just to get away. “Apologies, I got a bit carried away.” I set the chair back up and sat back down, now looking the red-eyed lepus in the eye. Her rabbit ears twitched. “No, no, don’t apologize, we all get angry sometimes.” She fiddled with the feathers left on my bed, glancing me over again. She noticed the fraying plume almost immediately. “Awh, you’re going grey from stress.” She whispered condescendingly, now holding my head in her hands. “Not that you were never grey.” “Is this an age joke or is this a depression joke?” “Why can’t it be both?” She gently kissed my nose, her performer’s smile never leaving that face. “You always chatter on about keeping an open mind, so open your mind to the ‘&’ variable, Mr. Pennsylven Raphael Blanc-Johnson.” She’s weird. I knew it since day one, but no one knew me quite like she did. I let her stay. “Again, with the full name, just say Penn or Penny or something shorter.” I rubbed my temples, putting a foot on the armrest of my chair. “Just nothing that takes up 10 seconds of my time.” She was already looking through my records, just musical vinyl I had accumulated from the times I went to Earth as a man. Times I wasn’t well. “Tally Hall? What the hell kinda name is that?” She looked at the two fabloo albums, laughing a bit at one of the covers. She opened the empty Good & Evil record, looking at my record player as it spun absently in the corner of the room. “That’s a band.” I answered, watching her become slowly hypnotized by the record. It made sense, she was as stupid as a rabbit anyways, might as well be the most interesting thing to see a disc spin. She walked over to inspect it.
“It looks high quality.” She turned her head back to me, now pulling me up. She then… sat down? I cleared the confusion from my head and for once in my afterlife, humored her. I sat down next to her. “It is.” I agreed. She rested her head on my shoulder, fiddling with the rings on my finger. “Tally Hall’s a very nice band with great composition.” “It sounds like the Beatles.” She mentioned, biting her tongue absentmindedly as she said it. I flinched as I could just taste the blood she drew in my mouth as well. “They’re inspired by the Beatles, yes.” I confirmed. Her hair was soft and pristinely white, it didn’t contrast at all with some of my feathers. But she didn’t seem to care, just fiddling with my ring and listened to Misery Fell. She didn’t say much of anything else. Didn’t need to, she looked calm, and at peace. Her usually sharp, red eyes dimmed in my presence, like something in me sparked something in her. Her head lulled a bit, now fully slumped against me. I couldn’t help but chuckle, watching her struggle to stay awake. I picked her up. “Do you need to stay here for a nap?” I asked her tired body, which looked up at me. Her eyes narrowed with a fake sense of coldness. She didn’t complain verbally. She didn’t have a proper room in here, at least not anymore, so I set her down on my bed, pushing a thin blanket over her. I watched as she fell faster than a light. It was funny. I watched her for a moment, the gentle rise and fall of her chest and features that softened with the calm of sleep. I started packing away the Good & Evil vinyl, placing it back in the box with the dozens of others. I then went back to my desk and sat down once more. Something still clawed at my brain, threatening blood. The shadows softened around my room for a moment. The darkness shifted and retreated. I thought I wouldn’t make it out without being poisoned, but now, with the fang marks in my neck and spider in my bed, I realized that I wasn’t necessarily tainted with her death. I laughed at her original guise. I couldn’t believe that I thought she was Orchid when she first entered. She did such a good job. It was weird though, as I hadn’t received punishment. Did I do nothing wrong? I thought I deserved her sickening scythe. But then again, her breathing was quiet. She looked tired, but not necessarily in the way I’ve seen Cupid or Orchid after a long day. This is a level of tired I knew well. The kind of tired that pools in your eyes to force them as white. I brushed my hand against her hair, then started scratching behind those rabbit ears of hers. They twitched instinctively. I always got a little rush out of the instincts of people, how some threatened to run, some threatened to pounce, while some, especially when blissfully unaware in sleep, just twitched. Much like Hocus. Enough dilly-dallying. I have something to write. Then I looked at the ink-stained hands. I looked at how it almost clotted like blood. The sick feeling returned to my stomach. I think I’ll wash my hands before continuing my work. And when I exited my bathroom, the lepus was gone without a note or hair. A ghost of a smile made its way to my face. There was another knock on the door, this time, it was Angler, judging by his voice. “Hey, do you want to take a walk, maybe? I kinda need it.” “I’ll be there in 10.”
