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Karl ground his teeth impatiently, eagerly waiting for the pointless family meeting to come to an end.
For reasons unknown to anyone with half a brain, Miranda had called her ‘children’ to the chapel for another gathering. He hadn’t been listening to a word she said- none of it applied to him, anyway. Besides, if it was important enough, she’d walk her ass down to the Factory and tell him herself. There was nothing for him here.
The moment Miranda concluded the conference, he had to physically resist the urge to sigh in relief. He had plenty of work to get to, and better places to be than sitting here on a dirty pew listening to his supposed ‘mother’ grouse about whatever-the-fuck. He was certain the other Lords had similar occupations to attend to, as well- Alcina had her freaky wine cellars to oversee, Moreau had the reservoir to maintain, and Donna… well. He wasn’t quite sure what she did. Aside from stitching up his clothes every once in a while, he had very little idea about what she actually did for Miranda. He’d been to her villa, seen her impressive (if fucking disconcerting) collection of handmade dolls, but what use were a bunch of porcelain dummies to Miranda?
It truly bothered Karl to say he didn’t really know her as a person, not like he did the other Lords, or even Miranda. He hadn’t even seen her face. Hell, he figured only Miranda had ever peeked beneath that mourning veil. It aggravated him as much as it intrigued him. While Donna’s reclusiveness made him frustrated that he couldn’t decisively say if she was a threat to him or not, the fact that he knew next to nothing about her meant there was nothing to hate. Of all his ‘siblings’, Donna was the one he tolerated most. As the youngest member of the fucked-up ‘family’, he’d always felt a smidge protective over her. She’d never done any harm to him personally, if anything she went out of her way to avoid the endless battles he and Alcina engaged in. She was competent (unlike Moreau), but not arrogant (unlike Alcina). Those delicate pale hands peeking out from the black sleeves of her dress seemed to tease him, as if asking him to look further, to uncover all of the woman’s secrets.
But Angie was a different story.
The freakish doll fidgeted in her position on Donna’s lap, giggling maniacally to herself every other beat. She was rotten, both in personality and appearance, and Karl had been tempted many times to mangle the fucking thing and be done with it. Only his tentative respect for Donna kept him from doing so, but even he knew that respect couldn’t protect Angie forever. As Miranda vanished into a flock of crows and flew, squawking, from the chapel, Angie cheerily waved goodbye, cackling as she did so. “Bye-bye, Mother!” She shrieked, making even Alcina turn her nose up.
Speaking of, the massive lady got to her feet and began waltzing out of the chapel, giving Karl a dirty look on the way. He only smirked at her, invigorated by the constant bickering. “Farewell, then, brother dearest,” she crooned, aureate eyes scathing, “do try not to kill yourself with that hammer on the way out. Mother would be far from pleased.” Her heels echoed on the stone floors as she left the gathering place behind. If there was one thing Karl had to give the woman credit for, it was always wearing those high heels. The fact that she managed to walk so effortlessly in them no matter the terrain would never not completely flummox him.
He barked out a laugh in response to Alcina’s quip. “Yeah, yeah. Fly on back to your belfry, you fuckin’ harpy. Tell your Samca to stop pecking around my Factory.” A huff from the gargantuan woman, and the altercation was over. She vacated the chapel, as did Moreau, leaving Karl alone, save for Donna and her doll.
Finally allowing himself to relax, the Lord of metal leaned back and extracted a cigar from his coat pocket. His lighter hovered up to ignite it, and the comforting taste of tobacco smoke washed over his tongue as he breathed in, out, and watched the fumes billow in the air. Smoking, drinking, drugging- they were so much more than mere vices for him. Part of him hoped that if he chugged enough isopropyl, if he filled his lungs with enough tar, if he fried his brain with enough crack, he’d finally close his eyes and never wake up again. It was a pipe dream, he knew- but he had to take whatever he could in this hellhole.
As the nicotine relaxed his body, Karl muttered to himself about one of the tidbits he’d actually picked up on from Miranda’s lecture. “‘No newspapers’, huh,” he huffed under his breath, scowling, “crazy bitch. Hope she has fun tryin’ to enforce that bullshit.”
He was startled from his musings by Angie’s bitter, shrill laughter. He growled inaudibly under his breath at the interruption. She and Donna were seemingly on their way out, but the idiot doll couldn’t resist opening her mouth. “Oh, yeah,” she sang, “without those, how will anyone remember how to do anything? I bet they’ll even forget how to speak!” Donna, as ever, was unreadable behind her layers of black cloth, but waited for Angie to finish before moving. Karl took another hit from his cigar to calm himself.
As he blew out the smoke, he glared at Angie from behind his shades. “I was talking to her, not you,” he sneered. In reality he was talking to no one, but neither of them needed to know that.
Angie tilted her head, clicking, giggling yet again. “You’re so funny! I am-“
She was cut off by Karl’s power, his ‘gift’ from Miranda, humming in the air, dragging the metal bits in Angie’s body up and towards him. She shrieked in surprise and anger as he forced her towards him, grabbed her by her withering veil, and hurled her at the wall as hard as he could. Shards of shrapnel pinned her there by her filthy dress, though she squirmed valiantly.
“Angie,” Donna spoke, and though it wasn’t loud enough to be anywhere close to a scream, it was easily the loudest Karl had ever heard her. Her shaking hand reached out to her companion, but Karl spun on his heel to take hold of her wrist. His gloved hand, much larger than hers, gripped her arm with bruising force, only further angered that the only thing she’d said was Angie’s name. Her terrified gasp as he gripped her arm did nothing to calm him.
“What the fuck is your problem, Donna?” He roared, uncaring of the way her body shook before his rage, “Sitting here with your thumb up your ass? You’re just as much of a freak as the rest of them! Alcina eats people, Moreau’s a fucking fish, and you-
“You let that stupid fucking doll be your voice? Your face?!” Karl grew angrier with each word, finally venting the building frustration that had been gathering below the surface. Even he hadn’t truly realized the full extent of his fury, but once he started, he found he couldn’t stop. Not that he wanted to. Donna tried to pull away, but Karl was faster, grabbing her other arm and pinning her in place. She let out a pained, shuddering noise, but he couldn’t care less. If anything, her cowardice only incensed him further. “No! You don’t fucking get to shy away! No more secrets, Beneviento! Let’s see what you’re really hiding under these mourning rags!”
The terror-filled sound that left Donna, on any other day, would have made him stand down, but today, it only made him want to unmask her more. With a single hand, he held her wrists together, preventing her from stopping him. Her own strength was laughable, and the waifish Lady was unable to resist when Karl’s free hand grabbed the cap of her burqa and yanked.
A moment of silence passed. Even Angie was motionless, soundless. Then another moment. Karl’s expression of rage morphed into one of dumb shock as his mouth fell open.
Only one silver eye peeked up at him, because the other was overtaken by the writhing, hideous mass of the Cadou. That singular eye, huge and wide, gleamed with terrified tears that threatened to spill over at any moment. Her lips, pale and soft-looking, were formed into a frightened gasp, mouth open and panting shakily as the seconds ticked on. The veil, once tightly clutched in Karl’s hand, fell to the floor in a crumpled heap.
“Fuck…” he breathed, softly, quietly. Her potent terror froze him in place, and his stomach turned uncomfortably to know that such terror was his fault and his fault alone. And on one of the few people he actually tolerated, the expression made him nearly sick. His grip on Donna’s fragile wrists loosened almost instantly, though she was too shaken to pull away. Her entire body quaked, and Karl swore he could hear her heart pounding from where he stood.
And yet, despite the horrific disfigurement upon her face, Karl could not deny that Donna was easily the most beautiful woman he had ever seen.
Mentally, he found himself comparing her pale face to that of the other women in his life- Alcina, who was obviously objectively radiant, had a harshness to her features, one that spoke of years of hardened will and a life defined by cruelty, on her part and others. Her daughters were much the same. Like their mother, Karl knew they were objectively attractive, but their eyes were too wild, too bright to fool anyone into thinking they were normal girls, if the blood and ruined mascara on their faces didn’t do it. Miranda, too, Karl supposed could be classified as beautiful, but not like a person. She was beautiful in the same way the mountain range that cradled the village was beautiful, the same way a statue of an archangel would be beautiful. She was too cold, too impersonal, too harsh. Perfect for admiring from below, or from afar, but no further than that.
Donna was so painfully unlike them all. The lack of makeup on her face did her no disservice, only allowing Karl to get a better look at her, unlike Alcina’s girls. Donna’s features were soft, a little supple, but still subtle, not harsh or hardened like Alcina. Donna was far more youthful, of course, with her only blemishes being the Cadou and the thick, dark bags under her eyes that spoke of sleepless nights. And perhaps most strikingly of all, unlike Miranda, Donna felt warm. Her skin was soft and pale, imperfect in its shape like all natural faces where Miranda had made herself resemble an idol to the point of being uncanny. She felt, above all, real. Human.
Karl wasn’t a verbose man, or at least not a very articulate one, but he suddenly found himself running through all the synonyms he could think of for beautiful. Radiant, lovely, stunning, gorgeous, pretty, vibrant-
But his silent admiration did not stop reality from making itself known. He had just forcibly unmasked Donna, revealing her greatest shame, laid his hands on her, and done serious damage to Angie. If Alcina were still there, she would have grabbed Karl by the throat and slammed him into the floor until he made a crater, and for possibly the first time in his life, Karl knew he would have fully deserved it.
Silence fell over the chapel, empty except for Karl, the lady, and her doll. No longer gripping her wrists or her veil, one of his gloved hands came up to cradle the apple of Donna’s cheek. He winced when he saw her flinch and squeak quietly, but visibly forced herself not to pull away. As though if she did, Karl would hurt her. One of her lithe hands, slender and small, rested on his arm, the very same that cupped her cheek. Karl’s unoccupied hand pulled his shades off his face and tucked them away, giving him an even better view of Donna’s tragic beauty. The same hand came to rest upon the woman’s shoulder, as gently as he could manage. Cautiously guiding her, Karl began to slowly move down, until both he and she were kneeling on the hard floor of the chapel. His eyes never left her own.
His chest tightened with a kaleidoscope of emotion. Pity, sorrow, self-loathing, anger, shock, admiration, sympathy. His brow furrowed as he looked upon Donna not with indifference, or rage, but with sympathy and sadness. The intensity of her terror seemed to have abated, leaving only a palpable despair and shame that radiated from every pore on her body.
Miranda had done this. Miranda had done this to Donna. She had taken the Cadou and disfigured the youngest of her children. She had mutilated her, just as she had Karl, and Moreau, and fuck, even Alcina. And for all that, what had Donna gotten in return? No super strength, no hyper-healing. All she had in the wake of her ‘gift’ was a handful of flowers and a few sentient dolls. The injustice of it all nearly made him furious again, but he restrained himself in front of Donna. She was already fragile enough thanks to him- if he sent her over the edge, he’d never forgive himself.
With no idea what else to do, Karl pulled her in, pressing her to his chest, gently but firmly. He was largely unfamiliar with hugging, but he’d seen it done plenty, and it couldn’t be too hard. Holding Donna to his own body proved that theory, because it felt like the most natural thing in the world. Like she belonged there, in his arms. Safe.
Donna’s body froze in surprise and fear for a few moments, but second by second, the tension vanished. Her arms, shaking and unsure, wrapped around Karl in turn, accepting his embrace. He rested his scruffy chin atop her head (he could weep for just how sleek and soft her hair was), tucking her face snugly against his sternum. He felt the flutter of her eyelashes against his skin as she closed her eye, followed by something soaking into his shirt and the gentle shaking of her chest. Listening closely, he could hear her muffled weeping as she buried her face in his coat and clung tightly to him. Unsure of what exactly to do, he hugged her tighter. “…I’m sorry,” he whispered after a while, the words unfamiliar to him, “I’m so fucking sorry, Donna.”
She didn’t respond. He would have thought she didn’t hear him at all, if not for the way her grip tightened, clinging to him like a frightened child with a teddy bear. The shrapnel pinning Angie to the wall had long since fallen away, allowing her to scurry up to the pair unimpeded. Other than her clicking footsteps, the doll was uncharacteristically silent. It seemed even she, repulsive creature that she was, understood the sanctity of the moment. She stood on the sidelines, merely observing, not intruding on the Lord comforting her mistress.
It was there, on that cold afternoon, on the unforgiving floor of the chapel, that Karl felt something akin to peace. Everything was still fucked, but Donna was safe in his arms, and he’d shred anything that tried to hurt her, even if it meant going toe to toe with Miranda herself. He allowed himself to sit there, offering nothing more than his touch, and allowed Donna to take as much of it as she needed.
Against his better judgment, his eyes drifted to the veil laying on the ground. Silently, Karl swore to himself that he’d never touch it again.
And anyone else who dared to try would have to go through him.