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It didn't take Kris long to drag their way to the bathroom. It didn't take long for them to slam that thing into the garbage can, or for their blinding, white-hot rage to overwhelm them.
Slam!
This was for Berdly.
Slam!
This was for Noelle.
Slam!
This was for using them to hurt them both!
Sometimes, they could hear it. It was faint, yet always there. Hovering close to their head. A soft hum just behind the ear. A floating buzz that always persisted, pulling and tugging them along. But now, through the rage, Kris could feel it more clearly than ever before.
It was amused.
No matter what Kris did, the presence remained- unshaken, entertained. The hum stayed near, as if it was observing.
With every slam on the trash can, it swelled, pressing closer, sharper. Kris couldn't reach it, but for this moment, neither could it reach them. Yet, it reached Noelle. It reached their friend.
It did something to her. Something cruel and unforgivable. It stole her happiness, dragged her back into the nightmare that Kris had tried to spare her from. Her innocence, shattered like glass. That damned thorn...
A line had been crossed. It did something that couldn't be fixed.
All while wearing their face, their body- like a costume it had slipped into without permission. Using her trust in them to hurt her, to break her. To control her.
Images flashed across Kris’s mind- fragments of a lost past still clung to, a past Noelle hadn’t let go of. A hope that refused to die.
A picture of Noelle with her family. Rudy's face filled with life, his tired and strained look a distant future. Carol, with a smile so bright it could warm the harshest winters.
Dess, with her cracked bat she carried with her everywhere. Wearing that smirk, glistening with mischief.
Kris as a child, the image blurred, but still there.
They didn't want this.
Noelle didn't want this.
She would never want this.
So why...? Why...?
"Didn't you... want to... protect me...?"
Something pierced through the heat- sharp, splintering. The rage didn’t stop. It just twisted, turned in on itself. And underneath it, something darker stirred. Heavy and cold.
If only they could just end it-
A knock on the door pulled them out of their rage. Words filtered through, but they barely reached Kris's ears.
It was their father letting them know that Carol was home. She wanted everyone to leave the house immediately. Who knew she would be here so soon...
It was only a matter of time.
Begrudgingly, Kris pulled the soul out of the trash and forced it back inside of them. Their teeth ground against each other as power surged through their veins, and the strings that pulled them regained vitality.
They hated it. Hated how empty and weak they’d felt without it. Hated how much they needed it.
A step. Then another-
The body stumbled, knees crashing to the floor. The adrenaline had vanished, and the soul had weakened. A moment passed before the body was able to stand tall again.
A message, a warning. To remind it who was in control here. Despite that, the ever-present hum buzzed near, stronger than ever before.
A whisper, barely audible, slipped through. It murmured- playful, as though it already knew the answer. Beneath that levity lay something colder, a dark curiosity with the detachment of something that didn’t believe what it had done even mattered.
A new, incomprehensible fear gripped Kris's chest as the words danced freely in their mind.
I wonder what else changed.