Chapter Text
Order. The thing that kept the sectors all together. A fragile thing. One step out of line? The rest would fall like dominos. Disasters hit the very fragile order in which many lives and their fates relied on. Cookies died. Darklight still remembered their bodies. Bloody and broken like toothpicks in a child’s hands. Others panicked. The leaders wouldn’t show it outright. No it hid in their eyes with a flame so determined to hold up the order that gave them power. Order which kept this damned place together. Wether it was from the bottom of their corrupted greedy hearts or minds clouded with foolish loyalty, they clinged onto it as tightly as the could. Darklight found it interesting how it hadn’t fallen upon itself sooner. Perhaps it was the protection sector. She liked to watch the dominos fall in place as the cookies tried to delay the inevitable.
Rituals. Oh how they made her laugh. Fake as the lies she spoke to please those around her. The same ones who would chain her. Change their minds and experiment on her to no end. All in a mission the twins of right and wrong had supposedly asked. Darklight highly doubted it was to make dragons who could destroy nations, once they perfected it that is. Rituals were a mask to hide behind when the order started to fail. What the other sectors did relied on the words she spoke, pretending it was the words delivered through her from the gods they so praised. In truth she heard no gods. She instead, learned from a young age how they valued the twins. Her own caretaker would pray and pray. Spend hours filling the room with smoke and incense. Always speaking of how she wished to hear the god’s words. She always worried if she didn’t get the news soon enough. So as the years passed, she learned to pretend she heard their voices. Pretend as the pointless rituals of the damned cult. She still remembered how they praised her and spoke with such. She remembered wishing her caretaker to die. Though perhaps now, looking back, that was a bit harsh. Her caretaker was kind, compared to C&C’s unhinged caretaker.
Order relief on ritual. Ritual held onto order like the cookies held onto the same order in which their lives centered around. Rituals that kept faith up. Kept the smart from beginning to doubt and the stupid loyal as ever. No ritual, smart start to doubt, stupid follow smart in times of restlessness. The whole place was fragile like the porcelain decorating her sector.
It was always dark. Covered in shades of purple. Light purple transparent drapes. Light purple opaque curtains. Dark purple walls. Curtains blocked out the harsh sunlight. Only the drapes let in the little sunlight they got for the plants. The flowers were red peonies with dark red between the pollen and where the petals ended. Darklight always made sure they were watered. Even as a child she’d stress the importance of watering the flower if it was wilting. Eventually they would see her becoming rather stressed and water the flower. At which she’d smile and clap while jumping in happiness. She smiled and then sighed. Her mother never saw such flowers, did she? Never would be able to.
There was so many beautiful things her mother would never get to see. It made her heart ache at the thought. Her blood boiled in anger as she picked up the vase. She could feel her grasp on her form slip. Something she couldn’t let happen. She took a deep breath to calm herself. Her blood continued to boil. Her form continued to slip. Her grip tightened. The vase cracked. Darklight threw it against the wall. Her servants and followers all flinched hearing the vase shatter. Quickly at least seven or eight of them ran to her side. All of them asked what had irritated her. A few asked if it was C&C. Darklight hated the way her heart fluttered around the creation and experiment sector leader. She was a risk to her life’s mission. The very reason she was born in the first place.
“No.” She replied to those asking if it was C&C.
She put on a smile, “At least not yet.”
The servants wore black simple dresses with a black cloak that stopped just before their elbows. On the cloak was the same yin yang symbol she so detested.
The followers wore purple, white, and black nun robes. As if they weren’t in a cult and an actual church. She wore a similar outfit, although more detailed to show she was the leader.
“Shall we do another ritual my dearies?” Darklight smiled.
They nodded eagerly, like the fools they were of course.
Darklight wasn’t sure she’d ever see religion the same after this. Faith truly is blind as they say. She watched everyday as they proclaimed words they did not know the true meaning to. A meaning she knew well. Something she wished she didn’t. The truth is cruel. It’s especially cruel when you know the followers and servants you call idiots are just cookies blinded by faith they were raised into. C&C was a prime example of this. Adopted and saved, raised to become the woman she is today. A woman who will stop at nothing to fulfill her goals. As long as it’s for the cult. She pitied the woman as much as she hated her. Darklight knew C&C still had a sister out there who cared for her. She felt bad. She felt angry. Why was she the one who still had family!? Why did she get someone who still cared for her!? Someone she tossed to the side because of something as stupid as the faith Darklight breathed day in and day out. Spoke lies to satisfy those around her. Moments like this she missed her mother’s embrace. The memories are fleeting and blurry but they were warm. They were safe. She remembered the words her mother spoke with her beautiful voice. It was clear where Darklight got her beauty from. She hated how her heart yearned for such a thing. While her mind knew such a thing could never happen. She watched her mother be electrocuted just for the sake of destroying this place. It was the very reason she could not fail her mother. What worth was her mother’s sacrifice if she did not succeed? Her mother never got to see the sun, the flowers, the grass. Things even in the dark walls of her sector she had seen while her mother never saw anything besides white walls and scientists watching with sinister smiles.
Incense filled the room and Darklight’s sensitive nose. She breathed it in with a smile. Though she loved the smell, it was a bitter reminder of the life she lived. Dark halls of the religion sector. Unstable dominos that always required balance. Not yet, she had to remind herself. Not yet. You can’t kill them just yet. Wait til the dominos fall one by one. Slowly yet perfectly. Too soon and they’d just bounce back. Uncomfortable and complicated robes. She could feel the scales get caught in the fabric whenever they fluttered with her emotions. They were always pestering her. Tight robes were not made for scales, that was for sure. The risk of the protection sector’s leader being a dragon. Gold guardian. All though created by the cult, that wasn’t the part that she hated. It was the fact Gold guardian could control any dragon, including Darklight herself. It was bad enough the two often got into fights over who was protecting the cult. The last thing she needed was her carefully hidden secret being exposed. Each day, she walked a life of lies for the sake of those who sacrificed their lives for her. A mission she did not wish to do. Why did it have to be her? Couldn’t she be normal? Couldn’t she be anywhere else but here?
Once again she breathed in the incense as she swung the source side to side gently with a slight movement of her arms. Followers prayed and chanted as servants hurried to give more incense to keep the smoke spreading throughout the sector. This was something she had done many times. Watched even more times. Each step was engraved in her heart. A bitter and burning reminder. It hurt. It always hurt. Hiding a part of herself killed her from the inside. She missed the warm arms of acceptance everyday. She closed her eyes and stopped swinging the incense. A signal for the followers to be quiet. She was listening to the god’s words. So she claimed and spoke. For them it was a miracle. A moment of glory to prove their fragile faith right. For her, it was darkness and silence because in truth she never heard them. She waited as if she heard a voice speak to her. In truth she channeled what they wanted to hear. What the other leaders desired. Then she smiled and signaled to them she heard the gods words. All of them excitedly asked, like children in a class eager to answer the question. She ‘shh’ed them and told them she would tell them when the gods instructed.
In truth she was tired. Each day was a toll. A heavy burden she carried on her worn and tired bones. She wasn’t even that old and she already felt like they’d crumble underneath the weight of her responsibilities.
She forced a smile and told them to put out the incense. As much as the dark halls of her sector helped with the migraines, and delaying them, the incense eventually made her head ache. Her mind hurt. It always did. There was no rest for the wicked. Always working and running, even when she slept.
Hold your form together, she’d tell herself. Light the incense. Smile. Speak with your beautiful voice like you don’t hate everything. Like she didn’t hate everyone. Like she didn’t detest how the cult blinded her followers. They would all die. She knew it. They didn’t. She hated them, they were blind. They were foolish to follow something their mind always doubted without rituals to prove their doubtful mind wrong. At the same time, she loved seeing them smile. Seeing the way they would jump up and down with excitement to hear their god’s word. It pained her to lie to their eager smiles. Each day her heart ached, it cried and begged for what she desired. Desires she’d ruthlessly stomp on. She didn’t want to be what would kill them. She didn’t want to ruin their pure happiness, unaware of the truth. Each and every day she didn’t even want to get out of bed. It was tedious to get up. It was tedious and draining to act. To smile everyday. She envied other’s happiness. Envied their happy lives. Wished it was her in their position.
Her life and its purpose was a chore. A chore she wished would end already.
She sighed and closed the door behind her with a light slam. The doors were made of stone, not slamming it was impossible unless she deliberately took the time to close it herself. She didn’t have the energy to do that. With a sigh she took off the veil and tossed it to the side. For a moment, she stared at her bed. Light purple sheets decorated with dark purple lilacs embroidered into the soft satin sheets. Her bed and pillows where white. Pillows covered in dark purple pillow cases. She took off her robes and stared into the full body mirror framed by dark oak wood. In the barely lit room it looked purple. Her room was often dark, only having a candle to see herself in the mirror. Even then she blew it out most of the time before burying her face in the pillows and locking the doors. If there was a fire she’d smell it. In truth she hoped there was.
Her robes fell to the ground with a soft thud. The floors of her room were carpet, per her request. The carpet was softer to fall onto when forcing herself out of bed in the morning. She stared at her robes. Robes she hated as much as she needed them. She wished she could burn them. Darklight knew she couldn’t, there would be no explaining that. Her eyes caught her fleeing reflection in the mirror. Along her sides were dark purple scales. Along her arms. Along her thighs. And She… she just stared at them in the mirror. They were beautiful, truly the cult’s work of art created by luck of a few mutations. She didn’t know it’s full effects, that was something she never touched. She buried all dragonic parts. This was one of the few times she didn’t. Her tail swished behind her.
Did she hate her form?
Did she love herself?
She didn’t know. It ached to hide herself as much as it did to keep up a tiring facade. She hated the scales she had to hide. Her body was a cage. A beautiful cage. Like a golden cage holding its owner’s most beautiful bird.
She snuffed the candle. Opening her closer she stared at the various religious robes and nightgowns. She grabbed a nightgown to hide the scales and laid onto the bed. Exhaustion weighed heavily on her as it did everyday. With that she buried her head into the pillows and drowned out the noise of followers and servants with their clack clack shoes.
Oh how she hated those shoes. She hated this place.
No wonder her name was Darklight.