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Pearl wakes one night. Bolts upright in bed and feels a fear and disgust deep in her bones.
She’s felt bloodlust before - not in the way the vampires would call it, not a hunger for food, but instead a hunger for battle, for fights, for turmoil.
Pearl takes a deep breath in and opens the covers. She swings a leg outside of the bed and breathes out. The second leg follows the first and she’s walking without a destination, carrying herself away from the others.
She feels dangerous, for some reason. She’s not meant to be dangerous, she’s meant to be kind and comforting and someone to come to. She’s a friendly wolf, she doesn’t bite, she just barks.
But now, she really wants to sink her teeth into flesh.
The night is honestly beautiful. Just beside the red crystal that is the full moon, stars glitter and glimmer. They aren’t menacing tonight, as they have been before, they’re just quiet, a certain silence that Pearl certainly would’ve noticed had her steps not been made in a daze. There is no sound, actually - the only ambience is the click of her boots on the stone, then the crunch of gravel. The creak of a gate as she steps outside of Oakhurst’s boundary, the soft folding of grass underfoot.
Pearl takes a moment to glance back at the village and is immediately hit with a wave of grief, and something that was definitely not there.
In the light of the blood moon, something seems to seep out of Martyn’s door, something dark and viscous, some fluid that she knows smells like iron and tastes like victory.
Victory isn’t something Pearl should know - not when it’s tied to blood.
She backs up. She shouldn’t back up, she should go fight, she should help. Some creature whispers to her, though, that opening a door will displace something that smells of smoke and she’ll be down another life.
Pearl turns for the woods and flees.
Her steps are rapid and her breathing swift. She knows this feeling, she’s chasing something, someone, an object of desire, a win, a bloody win. She’s chasing a win, she’s chasing the ability to live. She doesn’t have a dress on, she has a hoodie and a white shirt and a scar over one eye that perpetually bleeds. She’s not Pearl, she’s someone else, but she’s still Pearl, and when Pearl’s shoulder slams against a tree she snaps out of it.
Almost.
Her hand darts to her shoulder, and pulls away, finding nothing but a bruise. She’s still wearing a skirt, a white top, and there’s still a rose woven into her hair. She sits down and leans against the tree.
She removes her hands from the rose and raises them in front of her eyes.
They’re bloody.
They’re
covered
in
someone’s
blood.
She stares for a moment.
Pearl’s never killed anyone.
She thought she hadn’t.
The memories come back all the same. It’s quick and it’s painful and she sees familiar faces die too many times to count.
There’s these frogs made of wood on a tower and she remembers being oh, so, so mad when they were burnt. She remembers breaking into pieces on the stalagmites of a trap, but doing so with relief, because beside her is a man’s body, twisted and unrecognisable. And, she remembers waking up from that, with a thrill alien to her now.
She remembers two faces who she doesn’t know. She remembers a lighthouse and bodies brutally snapped on the ground around a pillar of sand. And the orange-haired girl is kind to her and a manipulator, and the dark blonde man leaves too much unsaid, so he doesn’t even have to lie. She remembers letting them down and their broken voices and watching the girl fall because the man pushed her, driven by greed. And she doesn’t remember being angry at them, at that meaningless death, she remembers feeling disappointed.
She remembers Scott. She remembers Cleo. She remembers joking with them and she remembers killing them. Hell, she remembers Ren killing her. She remembers dying, dying and dying and dying and dying, killing and killing and killing and killing and a shred of mercy dancing at her fingertips.
She remembers throwing herself into the fray, hissing and spitting and hurting, taking, blaming, ruthless and driven to madness. She remembers being tired, she remembers being the beginning of a war.
Pearl remembers Scott.
She remembers him with bright blue hair.
She remembers him without pointed teeth, in a light shirt and a blue jacket and happy.
She remembers him saying she isn’t needed.
She remembers him at the end.
She remembers screaming.
She remembers the scent of gunpowder, burnt flesh. She remembers a sense of control, and a sense of connection, being ripped from her heart like claws tearing out her vital organs.
Pearl remembers eternity passing in a second and a second passing in an eternity.
Strongest of all, she remembers falling in a void.
Being forced to face her wrongdoings.
And coming to terms with them.
Pearl hates this.
Pearl hates it.
Pearl doesn’t hate herself, because she looks up from her hands and is greeted with the other her.
The other her who looks much too comfortable in this red light - who looks too unapologetic for what she’s done.
Pearl’s Moon speaks.
“Pearl, you ought to let loose.”
Pearl shakes her head. She’s terrified, she’s disgusted, she’s going insane.
Moon reaches out for her, hands curled and curved like a sickle.
“You should let loose, they deserve it.” Moon’s voice is like a thousand worlds colliding. It hurts to hear, let alone listen.
Pearl stares wide-eyed at the ground, trying to ignore the bloodshed around her. She makes no movement to get up.
“You did kill them, you know? But it was justified.” Moon’s words cut deep.
“No, it wasn’t. No, it wasn’t me and it wasn’t justified.” Pearl mumbles, flinching away from the other her.
Moon only smiles.
The girl takes a step closer, and another, and leans down to put a hand on her shoulder.
Pearl freezes up.
“You’re going to do it anyway. Justified or not. You’re just like that. Just like them. You fix this little issue, this ‘vampire’ problem, by killing someone, and you’ll want more. You live on battle and distress, little Pearl. You can’t deny your nature.”
Moon inches closer with every word, and slowly, steadily, their skin begins to meld. Pearl feels her body’s awareness expand, feels two different heartbeats, feels something becoming a part of her that she doesn’t want.
She starts to shake. Pearl tremors, Pearl begins to move. Her claws are tearing at the joining point, but it hurts like all hells.
She’s scraping flesh off and chucking it aside and part of her likes the pain.
Pearl’s nails are sharp. Sharp and swift. They rake at her skin, at the base of her neck and down her legs and on her jawline and across her shoulders.
She’s writhing as much as she can, eyes darting everywhere.
She’s shrieking, screaming. Moon’s laughing, cackling. It’s in her head - the not-her is in her head - she screeches and scratches, slashing at this body, this blood, that isn’t hers, isn’t hers, isn’t hers, isn’t hers, isn’t hers, isn’t hers, isn’t hers, isn’t hers, isn’t hers -
Something breaks.
The air is cold in the woods outside Oakhurst, and Pearlescent Moon can feel it in her wounds.
Blood pools around her legs. Her shirt is well beyond bloodied, it’s soaked garnet, stained crimson.
The world spins, and she knows she deserves it. The lacerations sting, enough to bring tears down her cheeks, and Pearl knows she deserves it.
Pearl knows this is the price for killing.
She’s still leaning against that trunk. She doesn’t understand why she isn’t dead, but her body refuses to run out of sustenance, refuses to run out of blood. Pearl’s consciousness is swaying, she can feel it slipping.
What good is she, if she does nothing in the face of injustice?
What good is she, if she is the purveyor of said injustice?
Pearl can’t tell.
Pearl doesn’t know.
Pearl only knows she must live on.
The adrenaline high and shock is enough for her to root bandages out of a pouch and wrap the wounds on her legs tightly, and then her arms, and then her clavicle and her neck and shoulders. The wounds aren’t fully gaping but they’re certainly deep. Pearl knows she’s gonna regret that. She knows the Doc is gonna ask questions. She can't bother to care right now.
The only emotion that ripples through her as she works is some grim dedication, telling herself to grit her teeth and do it. Even if not for herself or for her bloody past, even if just for Cleo and Oakhurst. It’s that thought that gets her standing up, but it’s not enough to lean on while walking. The jolt of jarring agony is almost enough to knock her back down again, but she strikes forward.
Needless to say, she doesn’t get very far. A few meters from the clearing is where she collapses, crumpled in a heap in the dirt. Pearl curls up - even that causes extremely torturing stings - and drifts her eyes closed, trying to ignore how quickly she knows the bandages are soaking through.
Pearl hurts.
Her head aches.
There are silent tears on her cheeks.
But she’s going to drift off soon, and even if she sees nightmares, it’s better than being awake.