we, the greatest pretenders // halycons

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the girl who broke[/b][/size][/color][/font][/center]

"M-Meela?"

"Please, are you... are you listening?"

"I-I'm scared, Meela."

(What are you afraid of?)

"...so many things, Meela."

(Not death, surely?)

"No."

(Are you lying, Little Bird?)

"P-please, I-"

(You promised you wouldn't lie again.)

"I never meant to hurt anyone, Meela."

(Are you afraid of death, Sierra?)

"Perhaps."

(What else?)

"H-hurting... being hurt- becoming something I'm not."

(You chose this.)

"I- I know. I just... I don't want to forget."

(Dying isn't forgetting, Sierra.)

"Are you sure?"

(I would know.)




Sanity says that the voice does not belong to my sister. This is irrelevant, for sanity's opinion was overruled the moment we stepped inside the arena. I was Sierra Birdbrook, always the cleverest, her nose in a book and her mouth filled with facts. I never did know enough; not enough to stop dreaming, anyway.

Now, I can't decide if my spinning mind and crazy thoughts are due to the inevitable grasp of lunacy or the pulsing of poison through my veins. (Which is worse?) I blink, disorientated. The entire world sways beneath my feet and I let myself slide down the trunk of a tree until my chest makes contact with the ground. A hand strokes my sweating forehead, soft and kind.



(It'll be alright, Sierra.)

"No. It- it hurts, too much."

(For Ripred's sake, you're stronger than this.)

"I- I was. Not anymore."

(You're still the same little girl who broke her ankle and kept climbing until she reached the top.)

"I... wanted to see the view"

(And now?)

"Now, Meela, I'm seeing dead people."

(You need to keep fighting, kid.)

"For what?"

(For what? Surely finding the answer to that question is answer enough in itself?)




I don't understand. Something about the way Meela is smiling at me tells me I don't need to. I am consumed with the sudden urge to pick myself up, but I am not sure if I can stand. My heart throbs, more unsettling than comforting. Each breath is shaky and unsure, as if my lungs are not entirely certain it is worth the effort. "You are very, very sick," I hear my mother's voice saying, a frustrated undertone masked with the pretence of concern. I can't blame her. "Mama. I'm always sick. Please, let me go out." I watch her shake her head, check my temperature again and tuck my covers up under my chin.

Frequent chills plagued my childhood, the result of an immune system with little exposure and a countless list of allergies I never cared to memorize. I glance around, trying to find Luci and Aka - are they plagued with nightmares so quickly? (All I can see is a swarm of wasps that wants to sting me over and over and over again until I cannot breathe, and a table a chairs set for tea, and my sister - only she is no longer my sister, she is the Jabberwocky and I cannot imagine up six impossible things.) Everything is possible, and I am not Alice.



"H-help me, please, someone!"

(Help yourself.)

"What- what are you?"

(Does it matter?)

"Where did Meela go?"

(She's dead. Has been for a long time.)

"You're lying. She was here!"

(We're alone, Sierra.)

"No. My sister- she... she was here. Did you- did you hurt her?"

(Did you?)

"I would never hurt her. Or... or- or anyone."

(What did Mama tell you about lying?)

"Tell me what you want!"



Somehow, I find the energy to stand. My body sways beneath me. All at once, I am a giant. Never before have I ever felt more than four feet tall, and yet now I tower over the entire world. For the slightest of seconds, it is everything I ever wanted. But then the world topples out from beneath me and I am alone, more than I have ever been and biting down on my lip. Every inch of my being hurts, and even that is many more times than it has ever been.

I don't think I can do this anymore. Not live, not breathe, not think. Meela is gone - was she ever here to begin with? The monster before me is all I have left. (I just want to know everything. Every fact, every moment, every answer.) Perhaps, though, like Mama once said, it's best that I don't know all. The monster in front of me morphs into her frame. She is short, like me, but her face is not as I remembered it. She looks angry, fierce, hurtful.

"Mama."

(How dare you, Sierra?)

"How- how dare I?"

(Give up. Run away. Let me down.)

"No... no, Mama. That was never it."

(It - it was my fault, wasn't it?)

"Never, Mama."

(Again, Sierra. You're lying. I did this to you.)

"It's more complicated than that."

(Because of me, you gave up living and came here to die.)

"You have it all wrong, Mama."

(You were the only little girl I had left.)

"I am not your little girl anymore. I- I can't be."

(How could you hurt me like this?)

"It's - it's not about you! I came here for me?"

(To die?)

"To die. To live. Isn't it all the same in the end?"

(Sierra.)

"May I ask you something, Mama?"

(Always curious, Little Bird.)

"Why did you do it?"

(Do what?)

"Keep me trapped."

(It was all for you, Sierra. Everything was always for you.)

"And now?"

(And now, I can't keep you safe anymore.)

"I suppose not."

(Is that how you want it?)

"Mama- Mama, I'm tired."

(Of living?)

"I can't know for sure."




My mother twists and contorts, rage shaping her features into a snarling beak. I have run out of questions, and now my feet move without my asking them. I do not want the beak to pierce my skin, I do not want to see my blood. Blood is only for the living, and the last thing I need in this moment is a reminder of that. As I stumble forwards across the forest flood, I remember the scratch that let toxicity flood my veins.

Is that what death feels like? Is this life? Fear? A nightmare? The truth, after all? I turn to face my demons, a creature I am quite sure is fabricated from my own web of misfortune and unhappy endings. (The line between the inside of my head and the outside is unclear, broken, snapped clean in half like a bone never splinted properly.) I lunge forward, desperate to put an end to my own twisted version of self-torture.

The birds are mocking me
They call to be heard
The birds are mocking me
They curse my return

How am I gonna get myself back home?

[/i]



[Sierra receives anti-venom from sponsorship]
[Sierra uses anti-venom]


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