versusnurture | fourteen ♢ text & audio & spam

fourteen ♢ text & audio & spam

spam } open

[She wakes up screaming at what is, relatively speaking, three in the morning. It's a nightmare, the first really bad one since she died. She tries to remember what it was, what exactly, but it's all a blur; she remembers screaming in the dream, too; she remembers a lure; she remembers blood, lots of blood; she remembers a song. Ein Männlein steht im Walde . . . She remembers not being able to breathe. She remembers her mouth was full.]

[The first few nights, she calls people. She asks for help. After that, she wanders the halls, unable to get back to sleep, unwilling to lie in the dark any longer. Her hair is tied back, a scarf tucked around her shoulders, but her scar still stands out against the pale clamminess of her neck.]

audio } ben

[Night one, she calls Ben. She is crying, her voice muffled (she is using the bear as a pillow, as something with which to dry her tears).]

I'm not hurt. [She has to clarify this first, so he doesn't fear for her, so he doesn't hurt for her. This is how she protects him.] But I need you. Please. If - it's not too late.

audio } blight

[It's instinct to contact him. Maybe it's bad instinct. But it's what she reaches for the second night, once she's calmed herself down enough that she's no longer hyperventilating. Once she feels mostly human again.]

[It's midnight. She sounds as chipper as if it was noon.]

What do you know about brain chemistry?

text, filtered away from hannibal } public, april 7

who has nightmares

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

I definitely didn't get a job description with this.

[But he quickens his pace, and reaches for her hand as he does, because he smells more than Cheezits.]

[She hesitates. She still doesn't trust him. He can't possibly be real - like some kind of long-term, absurd hallucination that's trying to trick her into believing in it.]

[But she takes his hand in the end, lightly and with a touch of fear, following him towards the kitchens.]

Nobody gets a job description with their lives.

[One day she will realize that he is real and that he cares even when he shouldn't. It's his fatal flaw. For now, he doesn't know about her hesitation, thinks that it's just cause he's outpaced that that causes the gap. Eventually, he'll figure out how to smell emotions, and then maybe he'll be a little less clueless, but right now, he has no idea.]

Yeah, but it'd be nice to get one when you're life does a total u-turn.

So you don't think that what happened to you happened for a reason or whatever?

[Abigail doesn't. Her life was ruined because of flawed people; there was no reason for it, only reality. But some people are even more naive than she is.]

[His brow furrows as he looks back at her like the most uncomfortably confused puppy that ever puppied.]

I don't know. I mean, if it happened for a reason, then it's gotta be an awful reason. That just feels, like, I dunno...an excuse. An empty one. And I don't really want to give Peter an excuse.

Peter? He's the one who - turned you?

[Or whatever. She really doesn't understand the terminology here.]

Yeah. [It's okay: Scott has no idea what the terminology is, either.]

Peter Hale. He's the one who bit me.

Why'd he do it? Did he even have a reason?

An alpha is stronger with a pack. Like, actual strength in numbers. He wanted me to join his pack so he'd be stronger.

That's so . . . primitive.

Yeah. I'm not arguing. [He shrugs, and the rest tumbles out.] He tried to make me kill with him. Like, that'd make it official, or something.

[She smiles, a thin little mean little smile.]

But you didn't, I bet.

[He doesn't really understand the smile, and draws his brows together a little.]

No. I'm not a killer.

Some people would have.

[She would have.]

You're just better than they are.

I'm not better.

[He pauses and stops in the hallway so he can turn to face her.]

He was messing with my mind. I thought I was sleep walking at first, I didn't even know what was happening. he was calling me out at night, and hurting people, and trying to make me lose control and hurt them, too. I thought I did, for a little while.

[She meets his eyes sideways, instinctively protecting herself with her arms crossed low over her chest. He can't get at her guts if she has her hands in front of them - a stupid thought, he could rip through her hands just as easily, but she thinks it anyway, to make herself feel better.]

But you didn't. So you're better.

[Tossing her head, she snorts.]

Some people, if you mess with their mind, they lose their mind. But you didn't.

[He's at a loss, brow furrowed like thinking hurts. It kind of does, right now. He's tired and he doesn't want to be better.]

Would you have?

[He wants her to say no. He thinks she'll say yes.]

Yes.

[She does not hesitate at all. Absolutely.]

I would have lost my mind. I would have lost myself. I would have killed someone, so I didn't have to die.

[He has no idea what to say. Literally. Everything just comes up short, and he struggles like speaking is the most arduous task int he world right now.]

It doesn't have to be death or death. You can fight, too.

I'm not good at fighting.

[She shrugs, her lip twisting sardonically.]

At least I assume I'm not. Given that the last time I tried, I killed someone, and the time before that, I died.

What did...[He trails off, uncertain. That's not a happy smile. That's not an i did exactly what I wanted to smile. He tries again.]

Who did you kill?

I . . . killed a boy. A boy named Nicholas. After my father killed his sister. [She does not say which father.]

I gutted him. [She pantomimes the motion, not quite looking at Scott: down in the abdomen, then up to the chest.] It was easy.

Edited 2014-05-24 04:09 (UTC)

[He watches her hands, and feels sick. He swallows it back, wets his lips.]

Why did you kill him?

Because . . .

[Oh, it's so complicated. Reasons on reasons in reasons, knots and twists and turns, she doesn't understand. Her brow furrows.]

I was remembering. I was scared and I was remembering.

What...[He's not sure he wants to know. He could walk away and just. Not ask ever. But he can't, really, so he stays and rubs the back of his head.]

What were you remembering?

fourteen ♢ text & audio & spam

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