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Verona can't believe she did it.
She is standing under a big, ugly showerhead on the Hemlock, thinking a dozen of frantic thoughts at once, while dry blood is disappearing from her skin into the drain.
So, now Ash knows. Verona knows it too, this time for sure.
As if you weren’t sure of it before. You are bad at false affirmations.
Well, you cannot hide a pig in a poke (haha fucking ha), sooner or later she would give up her secret anyway, because, even though she has somewhat mastered the skill of keeping everything to herself (it's safer that way), she's weak.
So weak. And so stupid, for fuck’s sake.
Things, though, just escalated from stupid to absolute moron within 3 seconds.
It's too late, obviously, for pros and cons, risks estimations, etc (no pros, all cons, and so many risks she could drown in them and die), but she should at least analyse the possible consequences.
The first, by the way, is dying. Drowning especially is very probable, since they are headed to Kelp. Not that she isn’t in constant peril, because, well, but chances have increased. Ash is unpredictable in her attempts to make things “right”.
Oh god. Ash.
Verona briefly considers turning the water temperature all the way up or all the way down, but decides that she suffered enough today (your fault) and there's no need for punishment.
The bathrooms on the Hemlock are, funnily enough, quite decent.
The second consequence is – and this is stupid – emotional manipulation (from Ash, obviously). It’s not a consequence. It’s a presequence. All of this has been Ash emotionally manipulating Verona (mostly by Verona’s own hands).
But let’s not get carried away, I already hate myself. Everyone is to blame here if you look at it long enough (to be fair, a millisecond second will be enough).
The third one – even worse than death – blackmail. If Tula finds out…
In this case, I’ll just steal the escape pod and peace out. If I manage to do it before she kills me and does unspeakable things to my guts.
The fourth consequence is not exactly “possible”, in the sense that it’s quite real already. Her hands are shaking, and she doesn’t even entertain a hope that they will stop do this until tomorrow, or at least subside enough for her to be able to use a gun. Her breath isn’t that great, either.
The fifth is more about inconvenience and having to avoid Ash in the corridors of the Hemlock. Thankfully, when (when) they rescue Emma tomorrow, it will only be a couple of days till they arrive at Arcadia, and poor Verona can just burrow into a pile of thin, hideously scant state-produced blankets and cry her eyes out in the meantime.
She has no idea how she carries on, by the way. Like, her whole life was difficult, these last weeks of chaos – highly tiresome, but in the span of less than 48 hours she basically took command over the ship (because no one can do it right anyway) and survived whatever the shit that got into their blood. She found Emma, too.
And yet, all she can think about is the kiss. Perhaps, only because it happened (second) last.
Dont lie to yourself, at least.
She blacked out for a second there, from when she pulled away from Ash to the moment she cracked the video. In between, she has done or said either something really cool, or very, very bad, and in an absurd surge of high self-esteem (it’s called desperate belief, Verona) she thinks it’s the former. She must watch the Hemlock’s camera footage and see for herself (and also delete it for good so no one will ever know).
But it’s plans, rationality, brain.
Her heart, her lungs and all the nerves in her body scream against the droplets of the shower.
Ash had no fucking right to kiss her back.