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sometimes, you don't know how to notice things until you identify the source: the persistent hum of her old dormitory's fridge; feeling different only after she saw another woman nude; her head spinning, growing up, when she was out too late under the echoes of the moon god's light.
("aren't you scared, marina? it's the third day.")
a shivering black figure in her peripheral vision. the inescapable feeling of being watched.
it's been a week, in valland, and that sensation is the one thing marina seems to have brought with her from home.
which is strange.
for a number of reasons.
(the train's wood flooring drenched enough to be stained almost black. samarie pawed weakly at marina's ankle with one hand, grasping at the blood bubbling across her throat with the other.
"...mari-- marina...."
the yellow mage was still just sitting there, flicking between some book and the murder scene happening in his booth like he was weighing which was more interesting. interfering had clearly never even crossed his mind.
"... love you... luh...."
probably because he knows how little time is left as well as she does.
"...lugh you, mar.............."
politely waiting for marina to turn on him, next.)
it's impossible.
(a half-formed levi, deep in the sewers. a tanaka's head doing a 180 degree turn in the tunnels. an olivia running through the forest on two healthy legs, babbling like a broken record. her own face looking back at her.)
it should be impossible.
(faces twisting into a horrid mouth as soon as you looked too close)
the most impossible thing of all, though--
(the letter detailing her mother's passing left abandoned in her old dorm. the pillar of flesh marking all thats left of her father unburied in the moon's world. her birthplace twisted into some unrecognisable beast, cutting her loose for good. breathing for the first time when she boarded the train out of town.)
--is that the reminder doesn't bother marina too much.
prehevil is behind her, and valland feels more like home than it ever did. she didn't take anything but the clothes at her back and the knife she brought with her, and she hasn't once looked back.
she doesn't need ties to that town. frankly, any bridge trying to bring her back there - whether physically, emotionally, through memory - should be burned beyond recognition.
(as samarie went still, her hand falling limp by marina's foot, her essence flowed into marina's chest. glowing, shining--
radiating.)
she's at the door to her new apartment building, and sure enough, there's a dark smudge in the corner of her eye. a smudge she couldn't see in the vatican, a smudge that became form in prehevil, and a smudge that should be a ghost in valland.
the thing following her looks enough like samarie, acts enough like samarie, and is imitating pitch-perfect her shaky but unyielding, barely blinking gaze, permanently fixed on marina.
(marina gawked at the perfect recreation of her own face, relaxing in the bookstore as she did just the night before, watching it for just a moment too long; cracking in two as it opened into a hungry maw, all pretences of humanity falling away.)
and so, she doesn't look the double in the eye as she turns to face the alley it stands in, holding out her hand.
"come on. you don't need to hide any more."
"k-ka! m...marina......." it's hunched over, trembling, clinging to the brick wall of the alleyway like marina's attention would be enough to bowl it over without the support.
like samarie, it's a good deal taller than marina, but is still gives the impression of being incredibly small. meek.
("SWALLOW.")
"...d-do you mean it...? marina..." marina doesn't meet it's searching gaze. she can almost feel it poking at her mind. like samarie does. or, did. or, had done, for years, even. she doesn't need to read its thoughts to feel (the facsimile of) weak hope emanating from her.
radiating from her.
("SWALLOW YOU WHOLE.")
she doesn't have any weapons with her. she hasn't prepared to do any magic. she survived up until this point, and is now utterly defenseless.
"are you coming in, or not?"
"i'm, um, allowed? c-can i come in?"
"well... yeah. that's what i said."
the creature approaches her hesitantly, eyes fixed on marina's outstretched hand, increasingly unbelieving as the distance disappears. shaking like a wet dog as it reaches out in return.
it lets out a shuddering breath as their fingers brush. marina's the one who tightens the grip, and she's pretty sure the thing that looks like samarie isn't breathing anymore.
"ka! u-um. ok. ok... m-m-marina?"
(samarie's body had stopped moving before her mouth, the last vestiges of her life being poured into the frantic, silent movement of her mouth.
love you. i love you. i love you. i-)
it looks her in the eye, and this time marina can't refuse the implicit request to meet its gaze.
"love you."