Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

It was early September in Hometown, the start of her senior year, when the plans for her future were dashed and the curtain pulled back.

She was a tad more than three months out from her 18th birthday at that point; her and everyone else in her graduating class were coming up on adulthood (or in Azzy’s case, already there), and that meant getting everything squared away for life after graduation. For Dess, this had already been made up in her scattered mind for a long while, evident by the combat jacket she always wore about the town.

Once the recruiters came along, she was going to sign herself up to join the FRN Security Force.

Of course, as the messy-haired girl made the trek to school on that warm morning in the dying days of summer, an open house session where all she had to do was meet up and sign some paperwork, the thought did linger in her head about what exactly she would be doing. The Federal Republic of Northamer wasn’t exactly the greatest of countries on the global stage, and their Security Force was the wretched arm that carried a sword of oppressive control.

An idealistic, almost assuredly naive part of her rationalized this ideological discrepancy with thoughts of revolution. She was an ardent socialist and a hothead, she had a thirst for blood and an almost even greater thirst for imagery. She had a proposed Northamer Socialist Republic flag that she had designed herself stitched on her sleeve, right below her Ostrheinland emblem, and hopefully she’d be stationed in a plush country in Europa, like Anglia or the modern Rheinland Republic, where she could slowly work the minds of her fellow soldiers and fit them to her will. With any luck she would be flying that brilliant yellow banner of hers from atop the Capitol once her inevitable military coup was successful…

Yeah, right.

Naturally, she reasoned that she wasn’t a completely deluded mess of a girlfailure... yet. It seemed clear that such a thing probably wasn’t going to happen, although she wasn’t going to rule it out! But in the event such a thing weren’t possible for whatever reason, she knew that she could reconcile her values by joining the Domestic Service Corps. Unlike the heavy-handed militarized branches of the FRNSF, the DSC seemed almost too good to be true, as if it were hand-carved to fit snugly within the framework of her rugged socialist values. Venture off across the country with a team of like-minded folks, see the natural beauty of it all, and all the while working to serve marginalized communities and make Northamer a better place. Disaster relief, home building, park maintenance, all that sort of thing. It was tough, grueling work, but it was rewarding, knowing all of the lives you were helping. Even if it was a band-aid on the buckshot wound of capitalism, it at least stopped the bleeding for some.

Not to mention job stability. A guaranteed pension, 5-year term of enlistment, and with all of that, if she proved her worth during that time, she’d be able to continue on in a leadership role with the DSC, heading the charge for the sake of helping others. Even if her time was only enough to parlay it into a middling career, and not enough to bring about the rise of socialism, it was still something.

And that was what was most important to her about all the structure, it was something. Something that could get her out of this town, away from her, and leave her on her feet by the end of it. With any luck, she’d be able to get Noelle out as well once it came time for her to graduate.

With a sense of hope crossed her heart for the future, something that felt like a rarity to her for much of the past four years, she strolled down the last bit of sidewalk before turning in towards the doors to Hometown’s school building. Pushing past into the vestibule, she left her black baseball bat by the entryway and made her way down the hall towards the recruitment station.

The small table was set up right next to the double doors of the supply closet, with two people sitting there, boredom having taken hold of both of them. One was a muscular, likely roided-up human of fair complexion, reading a magazine and sporting a buzzcut, but it appeared obvious to Dess that his hair color was likely blonde, although a more saturated color than her own natural hair when it wasn’t dyed black with an auburn streak. The other at the table was a monster, a dark-furred anthro dog with a stack of folders sat in front of him; if he were a non-sent, he looked as if he’d pass for a Rheinland Shepherd. A… fairly stereotypical meatbag pairing, if she were honest, but that didn’t necessarily have to mean anything… right?

Struggling to get that nagging thought out of her head, she took a deep breath and continued up to the table, mentally preparing herself for the conversation ahead.

The monster noticed her approach first, but instead of acknowledging her with a greeting or introduction, spread out the folders and tapped the human beside him on the shoulder to grab his attention. Dess had seen him reading a magazine beforehand, but hadn’t made much note of it. Up close, however, it appeared that the military man had been reading Monster Girls Monthly, which appeared to be some sort of risque mag for humans, judging by the very visible shot of an avian monster posing on top of a car hood with a man in the driver’s seat.

His attention grabbed, the human peeked up from his magazine at the jostling of his fellow soldier, and at catching sight of Dess, set the rag down and slicked back his non-existent hair in an attempt to look suave.

“Hel-lo, jailbait, Garrett. 12 O’clock!” he not-so-silently whispered to his buddy, although it was clear that he had no idea how loud he actually was.

Dess was more dumbfounded than anything by the response, too bewildered to form any strong emotion other than a now-setting-in disgust, and replied flatly. “Excuse me?”

“I said good afternoon, ma’am,” he hurriedly answered, blatantly trying to put that last comment away without an apology. “My name’s Lance, and this fellow soldier here is Garrett.” He gestured over to the dog, who quietly and obediently waved, before turning back towards Dess with his hand outstretched towards her. “I’m his superior officer. And what might be your name, beautiful?” He put on a chivalric smile.

She made no move to reciprocate the offered handshake, just standing there skeeved the hell out, and now a good bit annoyed. “Yeah, and my name’s December “I’m Not Putting Out For You” Holiday, but you can call me “Dess” for short.

“I can see why, that’s a pretty long name,” Lance said. Dess could scantily tell if that was a joke or not, considering neither of these dunces seemed to be the brightest of bulbs, but the fact he set his hand down at least offered the slightest indication that he knew he fucked up. Whether he was sorry was another question. “I’m assuming you’re here to apply to our, ahem, wonderful armed forces?”

Slowly nodding, still creeped out being alone with the two more than anything else right now, Dess pulled out a few papers from within her army jacket and handed them over to Garrett, who willingly obliged and took them. In turn, Lance pulled out a form of his own from one of the manilla folders sat upon the table and extended it towards Dess. She hesitantly reached out to grab it, but decisively snatched it once it was in reach. Her stomach still churned even by just coming close to touching him.

“That there, ma’am,” Lance began with a prepared speech of jargon, “is a legally-binding contract that, if you sign, means you pledge to serve the Federal Republic of Northamer as a part of her military forces, either in one of the weaponized units, or as a part of the Domestic Service Corps, for a period of no less than five years. And what may be your date of birth?”

Dess answered succinctly as she read over the finer details of the paperwork. “December 25th, 1997.”

“1997, SIR!” Lance emphasized. “You’ll have to get used to that if you wanna make it through basic, miss!”

Greeeeat. Dess was already mentally cringing over how much hell that was bound to be. The idea of just cutting to the chase and joining the DSC was already starting to creep into her mind.

“Now, as a seventeen year old, it is optional, but recommended, that you have a parent co-sign that contract with you to gather their consent, but as someone over the age of sixteen, you are not legally required to, and may sign-”

“Uh, sir?” Garrett chimed in, handing over one of the papers Dess had given him. Her medical report.

Lance glanced at the health record she provided, before an expression of first surprise, and then of plain questioning swept across his face. “Ma’am, it says here on your medical history that you have… ah, a history of…” He narrowed his eyes as he read out from the list. “...depression, anxiety, bouts of mania, violent outbursts, and… have previously been prescribed a mood stabilizer, lamotrigine.” Flatly, he put the paper down and asked, “Care to explain any of that?”

Fuck, right. It was going a bit too quick and easy, all things considered. Dess straightened herself out as she prepared to present her prepared lie to the recruiters. “That was all noted down during my last annual physical, as you can see. My mother, bless her…” She nearly gagged at the faux-religiosity, but kept it together, knowing that it would only help her keep up the lie and calcify it. “...she’s unfortunately a bit of an… abusive figure, so to speak, and she reported a whole slew of conditions to my doctor that were completely fabricated. One thing led to another, and they ended up giving me a mood stabilizer that I didn’t need.”

She put on some jovial airs, hoping to seal the deal. “So if you’re asking, no, I’m not crazy.” Finishing with her best approximation of a cutesy smile, she could only hope it was enough to sway the human in front of her, who was looking her down with that same flat and unmoving expression he had started this line of conversation with. One that didn’t seem to communicate he fully bought it, but at the same time, one that showed he may not particularly care anyway.

That disinterested look, however, would morph into something approximate to a focused gaze, and then glare, at a certain part of her. For an uneasy amount of beats, those eyes remained eerily transfixed on her, with Garrett joining in once he figured something was amiss. If Lance hadn’t spoken up when he did, Dess would’ve likely lashed out at him to some capacity, thinking they were staring at her chest, but what was said instead sent a panicked shock straight through her spine.

“What’re those patches on your left sleeve?”

She froze, caught in the headlights of his questioning. The pair of patches, one an emblem of a hammer and drawing compass encircled by wheat, the other a yellow flag with red star and white deer head in the middle, felt as if they were giant beacons lighting the way for an enemy nuclear strike. How had she forgotten that they were on her military jacket, or that they would be seen?!?!

Squinting his eyes to check as Dess just stood there slackjawed, unable to muster anything beyond an “ummmmm…,” Garrett snapped his fingers and pointed. “That top one looks like the Ostrheinland emblem, sir!” he bleated.

“Yeah, I could tell, I wanted to hear it from her.” Lance was now working to temper a scowl. “But that bottom flag… I’ve never seen anything like it before.” His eyes stared daggers right into her own, which nervously looked away as he commanded her. “Okay, December, be honest with me about that bottom flag…”

“It’s my own design!” she blurted, finally revealing the truth. “It’s… just a concept I have for a… ahh… a socialist Northamer… sir.” That last “sir” tacked on at the end came out as nothing more than a mere squeak.

Lance held quiet for a while, before a sly smile crept up on his face. “Oh, so you’re just a vexilologist,” he said, seemingly unknowing.

Not picking up the undertones to his voice, Dess jumped on the provided lie like a bear to a picnic. “Oh, uh… yeah! Just really into graphic design, thought that socialist symbols just… totally looked cool, hahah… hah…. That’s why the deer’s on the one… because… I… uh….”

Now firmly satisfied with where the conversation had headed, Lance prodded in another direction. “And to shift gears, where and what exactly do you plan on doing while serving with us?”

Again, Dess hopped on the chance to change the subject. “O-oh! Yes! Erm… I was hoping to either go over to Europa for a tour of duty if I go down the armed route, ideally with the Air Force in Anglia or Rheinland but anything there in Europa’s fine really! And, ah… if I choose to stay domestic, then some volunteer work with the DSC would be nice, preferably still in the Northeast, though. Or if not just that, then please not the Deep South!”

Lance and Garrett just sat there for a few moments after Dess finished blabbing, the latter having struggled to take in everything with the frantic pace she was speaking at due to her nerves. The human, however, had heard enough, and smirked to himself as he decided what to say next.

“How does a desert tour sound?”

Dess didn’t understand at first, or at least she didn’t want to. “Huh?”

“We’re not gonna be sending you to Europa if you sign,” Lance confirmed, grinning as he swore he saw her soul shatter right in front of his eyes. “Monsters don’t tend to go there unless they’re cream of the crop, and you just look like cream of the crap. We have new lines opening up out east, and we need infantry out there on the Ayden Peninsula.”

He leaned forward just a bit to shatter her heart even more personally. “And you look like a good fit for the front, if I do say so myself.”

Swallowing her stress, Dess tried to press him. “I mean, are you sure front line infantry is really the place you want me? I mean, I’d make a pretty valuable asset to-”

The two recruiters just burst out laughing at the remark. “Oh, oh,” Lance wheezed. “Oh this is just too good.”

“I can’t believe you’re actually serious!” Garrett exclaimed to Dess as he tried to reign in his laughter. “Have you seen your grades?! No way in HELL are we letting someone like you pilot a fighter jet, and even no-er a way are we letting a political radical like yourself anywhere near Europa! Feck, I’m unsure if you’re even fit to serve combat at all!”

“And that’s why we’d have her on the front,” Lance said, finally under control of himself. “She’ll learn not to fuck around there…” He then turned to stare Dess down, “...or she’ll end up dead.”

Dess could feel something building in her mind, a cloud of fog creeping in at the edges as it began to burn hot. “You know what, fine,” she tersely said, shifting to her backup plan. “What about the Domestic Service Corps, then?”

Lance let off a mean and mocking chortle. “Hah! Are you serious? With your mental problems and affiliations, no way you’re fit for the DSC, either!”

“B-but…” Dess’ mind raced in a panicked babble, static starting to creep up on the edges of her mind.

“Buh buh buh!” Garrett mocked, joining in on the ribbing. “Spit it out, ya skank, you sound like a fucking retard! Hahaha!”

That was enough. Her eye began to twitch as she fought back her desire to lunge at the dog like a feral animal. “OI DOG MEAT!” she shouted through his laughter, hoping to at least assert some sort of dominance as words finally came to mind. “I woulda thought that community service oriented stuff would be just the right kinda low-drag thing for someone like me! And now you and FLESHY over here are trying to tell me otherwise? WHAT FUCKING GIVES?!”

The pair sat there silent for a moment, taken aback by the outburst. They glanced at each other, their gazes telling silently that they’d never had an encounter like this before, before Lance turned back and addressed her coldly. “Well, if you must ask, Miss December, I’ll be blunt with you. We wouldn’t consider you for any position in the DSC regardless, since you’re far too unstable and left-leaning to be suitable for the Undercover Police.”

The world felt as if it had pushed itself away from Dess at that moment. “What…?”

Lance looked at her with a disgusted sense of curiosity. “Really? You don’t know?”

“They don’t tell us monsters until we’re a part of it, usually,” Garrett chimed in, contextualizing things for the human.

“Ah, right, how could I have forgotten that?” Lance turned his full gaze back upon Dess, who was already starting to tremble with what was boiling inside of her. “The community volunteer regiment is just a PR front. They do actual work, but it’s just to provide cover for a larger secret police operation. You’re familiar with the Stasi, right? You’re an Ostrheinland fangirl, after all… you freak.” He said that last part with a hush, as if talking to himself, but with a deliberate loudness to ensure Dess heard. She did.

“But anyway, it’s like that, but we’re good, because we’re capitalists,” he said venomously, with a direct spray of spittle in Dess’ direction. “Simple work, for someone of sound mind, that is. The DUP basically just go around and keep tabs on any fringe or dangerous groups out there, mainly left-wing radicals.” He glared at Dess, again staring intently at her Ostrheinland patch. “And if they get up to any trouble, something that could cause, ahem, serious harm, we… how should I say this, we eliminate the problem before it can fester into something threatening to-”

Dess slammed her hands onto the table, cutting the bastard off. “YOU’RE KIDDING?!” She was apoplectic at the mere mention of such a duty. “You seriously think I’ll go undercover and turn in leftist revolutionaries, my comrades??? How dare you! HOW FUCKING DARE YOU!!!”

The human continued staring her down, finding it personally hard to believe such a character could even have comrades close enough to betray. “...Exactly my point from earlier,” Lance answered back, continuing as if he hadn’t been interrupted. “But knowing you specifically, there’s still no way in Jesus' name we’ll be letting you onto even the community service branch of the force. For one. Simple. Reason.”

He leaned forward on the table, staring daggers at the doe as even she couldn’t maintain her tough act any longer and began to backpedal.

“You’re. A. Duster ,” Lance said with a cold, plodding, deliberate voice. “And Dusters like yourself don’t ever serve in the community service branch. Domestic Undercover Police, maybe some in Europa, or Front Lines. And you’re only fit to be artillery fodder. Nothing. Else. Capiche?”

Dess couldn’t do anything but stand there, venomously staring down the two recruiters as her fists trembled by her sides. She silently hoped that the dog would chew out Lance for saying such a thing, or at least talk them down from the precipice, but the disdain in his gaze, the non-reaction towards a slur directed towards them and hatred towards her….

“You’re just dust on the damn heel of the FRN,” she spat out, lashing out at Garrett specifically. “Traitor, to both class and creed!”

Unable to contain herself any longer, she violently swung her fist backwards and collided it with the wall, shattering one of the tan tiles that lined it. Her breathing, frantic and feral, alerted her that it was probably best for her to leave, lest she cause too big a scene to be ignored.

“You two will pay one day!” she shouted, tearing up the crumpled release paperwork that had been in her other fist as she stormed down the hall back towards the entrance. “THE REVOLUTION WILL NOT SPARE YOU! GLORY TO THE NSR!”

Stomping out the exit, she threw the shredded paper up in the air and grabbed her bat, hesitating for a moment. Trembling, she clenched the handle with an iron grasp, a million violent fantasies running through her mind, before she pulled herself back and slammed the doors behind her. A few monsters from other open houses peeked their heads out of the classrooms to see the commotion they heard, but after being greeted with an empty hall, turned back and shut the doors, leaving the army recruitment booth quiet and alone. They both sat silently, unsure of how to process things, before the human responded first.

“Well, that went swimmingly,” Lance quipped, kicking back in his seat. For all the bluster he had put on for her, much of it admittedly legitimate in his disdain, he really just didn’t give much of a shit at all about recruitment. “She’s the only one to come in so far, not looking good for numbers, G.T.”

His compatriot, however, was a little less at ease, the whole spiel she gave at the end really getting to him.

“Should we call into DUP-HQ and tell them to assign someone to keep tabs on her?” Garrett asked. “I mean, that Ostrheinland patch and political chatter…”

“Fuck if I care about her,” Lance nonchalantly answered. “She’s too mad to ever be someone significant. I reckon she’ll take herself out before anyone else.” He lit and took a long drag from a cigarette pulled from his jacket pocket, not caring one iota that the school was a smoke-free zone.

“She’s not worth our time.”

…

“So that’s it, then? Huh.”

With a toss, Asriel hurled another stone into the lake, skipping it thrice across the surface before it sank into the blue depths below. Dess had just finished recounting to him what she’d just been through, and while the messy short-haired blonde boss monster may’ve had a quick mind himself, it was still taking a while to process.

“Yep, ‘bout all there is to it,” the doe confirmed, her body reclined along the shoreline at their secret little inlet on the lake, tucked deep into the woods off of a stray dirt auto trail. “Honestly, kinda glad to find out now, at least. Otherwise I would’ve been suckered into fighting on the front lines in one of those oil states out east… whatever one we’re at war with now.”

“Akkadia?”

“Nah, I thought we just pulled out of there once Rheinland decommitted their own forces. I’d like to think it was… Aden, maybe? Ahden?” She turned her gaze away from the fluffy clouds above and towards her fluffier (in her opinion, at least) boyfriend. “How do you pronounce that again?”

“Eye-den, spelled A-y-d-a-n.” Azzy let off a stifled chuckle. “Y’know, for someone who considers herself a political revolutionary, you’re quite shit, er, bad with understanding and remembering those sorts of things,” he playfully jabbed.

This got Dess onto her feet, springing her upright to rush the goat and lock him in a playful noogie. “Oh, shut up! You thought we were at war with Akkadia until I corrected you!”

“Alright! Alright! I yield!” Azzy jokingly surrendered, holding his arms in the air to get Dess to back off, the both of them sharing a light bit of laughter before letting things simmer down again. For all the problems she had, at least having him in her life seemed to keep her tethered to the world, at least to some degree.

Picking up a stone, and then throwing it herself across the lake, silently cheering as she saw it skip a fourth time to beat out her boyfriend, the urge to get stoned crept upon her in her mind just as quickly as the stone itself had sunk. Reaching into her right breast pocket, she pulled out a beat-up mint tin, opened it, and then began scooping some of the suspicious leaves into one of the papers she had inside of it.

Asriel noticed Dess was rustling about with something and looked over. “What are you doing, Dess- oh, this again?” He rolled his eyes and sighed.

“What? I’m craving it!” she protested, much more carefree in this regard than Azzy was. “Ugh, and I swear it takes more and more of this stuff to even feel anything anymore,” Dess lamented, rolling up the paper and licking it shut with the contents tucked inside. “One puff of a dart used to have me seeing things, now it’s just so fucking mellow I don’t even know why I bother.”

“You’ve probably built up a tolerance,” Azzy stated blankly, ever the prototypical choir boy of Hometown. “Maybe take a break if you want it to fade.”

Dess pondered for just a moment at this thought as she pulled a lighter out from the same pocket she stashed the mint tin in. “Nah.” With that, she lit up the joint, and took a puff from it, coughing a little as the smoke hit her lungs.

“Care for a hit?” she offered, sticking the crudely rolled blunt over in Asriel’s direction. He couldn’t help himself, and snorted as he stuck out his hand in refusal. “Really? After the last time you offered me some? No way in the Angel’s Heaven am I ever doing that!”

The memory of that night, dormant for so long in her mind, reignited like the tip of her joint, which she stuck under the lighter again before taking another long, smooth drag off of it. Both of their parents were out of town with Kris and Noelle, the lot of them staying the weekend at a fun fair on the coast earlier that summer. With just themselves left alone at the Holiday Manor, Dess had finally been able to cajole Azzy into trying a bit of weed with the promise of being his tripsitter and keeping it a secret from everyone else.

Now, Azzy had expected to be eased into the whole thing, but if Dess had been anything, she wasn’t a good tripsitter; the devilish side of her that surely influenced Kris’ gremlin-like behavior must’ve been brought out in full force that night. Things started off funny enough, with Dess egging Asriel on to hold in their hit, under the fake pretense that it somehow made the high better. A funny enough prank, which led to some light, good-natured teasing.

But from there, things only accelerated. Dess had managed to break into the convenience store earlier and sneak some beers out, just some Genny Cream, nothing great or noticeable. Actually, it tasted quite shitty, one of the worst beers she’d ever had to drink. Yet the intent was made well-clear by the fact they came in a bulk 18-pack: binging. And in this case, with Azzy already starting to fall under the influence, she found the idea of cross-fading him quite funny. And to pair with all that beer he washed down, Dess decided to give him some brownies to munch on, conveniently forgetting to mention that they were laced with more grass.

The coup-de-grâs, however, was the movie she put on that night for the two of them to watch: Eraserhead.

“Ah, shit, right!” Dess exclaimed, everything coming back in a surprising amount of clarity, as she usually struggled to remember her more intense trips. “You were so fucking bugged out, man, it was crazy! I think you were screaming at your radiator for half the time you were so messed up, it was… ah....”

She was going to say “hilarious,” but in a surprise moment of clarity for her, she held back. The thought of him screaming in fear, curling up in the corner of the house while having a mental breakdown and greenout, and seeing him re-live it all now with an upset grimace on his face, was it really “hilarious?”

“You know,” she confessed, “the more I think about it, the more that wasn’t actually that fun of a time.”

“Ya think?” Asriel shot back.

Sighing to herself, Dess nodded in remorse. It’d make sense that Azzy still held some resentment over that night; all the more amazing he was still in love with her, especially after what she did. It was things like that which made her sometimes think he was way out of her league, and that the only reason they were together was because they were neighbors.

A thought popped into her head. “Hey, uh… Azzy?”

“Yeah?”

She hesitated for a moment, a little bit nervous to actually say it. “Have I ever… apologized to you for that night?”

Asriel paused for a moment. “No, I don’t think so.”

Dess sat down by the water at the mention of this, and crossed her legs together as she leaned back and covered her face. She really had been a bad girlfriend, hadn’t she?

“I’m sorry, then,” she finally admitted. “That was a really fucked up thing for me to do.”

She was greeted with only silence for some time, long enough to start to worry, only for Azzy’s calm voice to fill her with relief. “I’m honestly glad to hear it, Dess. I mean it.” He sat down next to her and gave her a hug, one that the both of them definitely needed after remembering that night. “I forgive you.”

Separating, the two sat tepidly beside each other, still recovering from the recollection, before an idea popped into Dess’ mind to bring a bit of levity back into the conversation.

“All being fair, the first half of that night was pretty fun. Y’know, before it got all fucked up.”

“Hm?” Asriel played along, chuckling a little. “Honestly, I can’t recall much from early on.” He girlishly giggled at the thought of what he may’ve done. “You mind giving me a recap?”

“Aw, it was so funny, dude!” Dess exclaimed. “You were all like, ‘these eggs hold the power to the universe, yo, they’re hidden behind the tree of life,’ and ‘aw your body is so beautiful, I wish I had one like that!’ So fucking funny, man!”

Asriel had been laughing along at that first part, but the mention of the second point had him completely freeze up. He would’ve been turning a pale white in fear, if… well, his fur hadn’t already been a bright white.

Dess almost immediately recognized something was up and waved her hands across his face. “Um, Earth to Asriel… everything okay?”

He shook his head, staring nervously out towards the lake without a word spoken.

Sighing, Dess looked down at the ground. “I’m sorry for bringing that night up-”

“Don’t,” Asriel assuaged.

That took Dess off guard. “Huh?”
“Don’t apologize,” he repeated, “You didn’t do anything wrong. I just… got hung up on something. Let’s just not talk about it, okay?”

Dess really wanted to say something, anything, in response to that, but she knew Azzy would just get more strung up if she kept on. She held her tongue.

With silence once again gracing the forest, the two gazed over the lake and mused. Dess’s thoughts, in their endless drift, came back upon what had happened earlier that day. “Y’know, wearing the military jacket may have gotten me off on the wrong foot with them,” she thought aloud.

“Hm?”

“The jacket.” She pimped her olive green combat top. “I think I should’ve just worn one of my plaid jackets instead, maybe the red one?”

Asriel turned to face his girlfriend with a quizzical look. “Why would that make any difference?”

Dess turned her shoulder to Asriel, letting him take a glance at her leftmost patches. After a moment with no response, she gave up and just gave him the answer. “Ostrheinland patch, Azzy. Y’know, the SOCIALIST Rheinland, back when they were split in two.”

It finally clicked for him just like that once it got mentioned. “Oh yeah, that’d do it.”

The doe chuckled to herself as she turned back to fully face the shimmering lake once more, debating whether or not she should pick up another rock to skip. It’s funny. For as book smart as he is, Azzy can be as dull as a sack of rocks when it comes to situational awareness. Dess smiled to herself at that thought. It’s really cute, though.

Speaking of Azzy, though, another question popped up into his mind which sharply pulled Dess out of her own. “Wait… why would you want to have made a better impression with them, anyway? Seems like they were as ideologically misaligned with you as they could possibly get.”

The question froze her like a deer in headlights, which seemed ironically fitting, but Dess really hated whenever her body did that to her. Fuck. “Um… I mean, I still want to serve to make the country and world better, y’know, but….” She desperately tried to come up with an answer, blurting out the first thing that came to mind. “...theeeeee only way to do that is a SOLDIER’S COUP! YEAH!” She chuckled to herself and crossed her arms with a grin, proud of coming up with an answer on the fly like that, or at least hoping to feign assuredness. “Yeah, you know, a revolution of the proletariat, classic military coup by the common folk against their officers and corrupt leaders! What’s not to like about that? Fuck, I even got the Northamer Socialist Republic flag on my jacket, that certainly must’ve tipped my hand too early!”

She was hoping, desperately, that Asriel would buy what she was selling.

“...really, Dess? THAT was the best you could come up with?”

Welp, so much for that.

“I mean, really now, a soldier’s coup? You’ve been standing here telling me for the past half hour how disenchanted you’ve become with the common man and monster for willingly enslaving themselves to the shackles of the FRN and suckling propaganda from the teat, and now all of a sudden you’re telling me that those same ‘ideological üntermenschen’ or whatever the flip you call them are gonna be on your side and willingly raise their arms against their superiors? You’d be put up in front of a wall and shot before anything else happened!”

Dess could only sheepishly rub her hands as Azzy continued tearing her facade to shreds. Yeah, maybe busting out the big and nasty “Ü” word like that earlier made such a flip untenable.

“...Honestly just using that word makes you sound like a fascist, and I know how big you are on imagery more than anything, so don’t you think such phrasing’ll give us a bad name and ruin it? And that’s not to mention the fact they’d have no idea what your NSR flag even is if you don’t explain it to them, since you made it up! And-”

“Okay, Az, I get it! …Dummkopf.” Dess said with gritted teeth, clearly trying to hold herself back as she felt a switch flip in her mind, that strange fuzziness she came to dread fogging up her thoughts. “Fair, fair, it’s not the Ostrheinland armed forces, anyway, I’d be bound to grind up against them…”

“...and running bets on whether or not it’d be the same there,” Azzy sarcastically mumbled.

Dess chose to ignore this, although self-control was already starting to slip. “... anyways, the Domestic Service Corps was always gonna be the safest bet-”

Asriel cut her off once again. “The same DSC that, according to you, is not only a secret police with a coating of civil service for appearance sake, but also doesn’t even allow monsters like us to serve in the actual civil service program? THAT DSC, DESS?”

Her brain was lighting up like a switch board, words becoming hard to come by as the cloud in her mind consumed her. “...Yeah….” She got up onto her boots, no longer feeling comfortable seated.

Azzy pawed at his face and cringed, sighing to himself. “Feck it, mom’s not here to hear me say this. Bullshit, Dess! I know you, you’d never be so conciliatory and ambivalent to injustice, for better or otherwise. Actually acting on it, sure, you can’t keep up a boycott to save your life, but this is different! Something’s gotta be eating at you deep inside to have you out of sorts like that… er, more out of sorts than usual, heh….” Nervously chuckling to himself, the normally mild-mannered goat gave off another protracted sigh and continued. “I just… you can tell me what it is, whatever it is. I’m here.”

He could see Dess’s hands tremble into fists as she stood there looking down at the waterline, back perfectly straight; she only ever broke her slouch if attempting to look cool for Kris and Noelle, or if she was genuinely pissed off. In a flash, she picked up a rock that was sitting right beside her left boot, and hurled it with all her might over the lake with an audible grunt. It sailed with a long and high arc, before crashing down with a large splash about halfway to the other shoreline; she had made no attempt to skip it.

Hearing Dess' pants, and seeing how she was acting, Asriel had all but confirmed his suspicions. If anything, he should’ve been more confident in his intuition earlier; it seemed so obvious, knowing her.

“Is it Carol?” he prodded gently, standing up to talk to her.

He could hear Dess’ breathing begin to slow, as if the mention of her name by someone else had returned her lucidity. Hunching over again, she looked up and over at her boyfriend, pained eyes peeking out from her messy hair, and nodded. “Yeah,” she verbally confirmed with a mumble. Emotionally weakened, she crouched down by the waterside and sat back on the dirt patch they were on, curling her legs up to her body and holding them still as she fought to cool down mentally.

Seeing his girlfriend in such a state, Asriel reciprocated, seating himself criss-cross beside her and gently stroking her neck and shoulders. He could feel her muscles slowly lose tension as he comforted her.

Dess spoke up again, at a low whimper. “I’m sorry I got like that again, Azzy,” she mumbled, audibly fighting back tears. “I just… I felt a compulsion… I wanted to hurt someone, to wring their necks, the President’s, my mom’s… heh, if only I had freaked my shit out on those Army freaks, made that man bleed and turned that traitorous monster to dust, wouldn’t that have been-”

“Dess.” Asriel cut her off there, pressing down on her shoulder with a gentle, yet firm, force.

She’d done it again. “Shit… I’m sorry. I’m… sorry.” Her voice on the second sorry was noticeably weepy and strained, and the two parted physically.

The pair sat in silence, looking out at the natural scene in front of them as they let their own thoughts play out in their mind, digging for the right ones. Azzy looked up towards the sky and leaned back to peek at the clouds; Dess, curled up into a ball, could only look down towards the lake, the rocky bottom visible beneath deep blue water fading away in the inky depths further in.

She sat there, choked up on words she was afraid to say, but all the same felt needed to be said. “I’m scared, Az,” she finally confessed.

For his part, Asriel did his best to remain steadfast, although there was still an audible amount of worry in his voice. “Scared about what, Dess?”

A tremor went through her body with each passing thought. “I’m scared of myself, man.” Asriel grimaced at this, for whatever reason unbeknownst to Dess, but she made no mention or acknowledgement of it. “Like, you’re right about those army guys back there, and if I… I came so close to hurting them as I was leaving, taking a swing with my bat, and if I did….”

She struck the ground with a balled-up fist, her teeth gritted. She couldn’t go on and say it, but they were both thinking about what the military police would do to her. Interspecies violence especially was never tolerated; the mutual decision to maintain and live in fairly separate consolidations around the country meant this was no surprise at all, and such a thing against a man in uniform would almost certainly have been met with full force.

Seeing his girlfriend sniffling, Asriel gently went back to rubbing her back and tried thinking back to his psychology class for any words or subjects that may help out his lover. “It sounds like you’re lashing out at the world more than anything else,” he finally posited, hoping that his therapy-speak wasn’t too heavy-handed.

Clearing her throat, Dess responded affirmatively. “Yeah… that sounds about right… Hell, if the whole damn thing was covered in darkness, I wouldn’t even be all that upset.” Whatever sense of call Asriel hoped would come from the acknowledgement was quickly dashed when she continued to blab with an ever-growing intensity.

“I just wanna get away from here, Az. Away from her. But I have no idea what to even do! Truth be told, I was already pretty disillusioned with this country and their armed forces going up to that recruitment table, but what other options do I have?! I’ve already sunken everything into this life, this persona, and for what??? NOTHING!!!!!”

Her screams echoed through the forest; a flock of birds took flight from a nearby tree in a huff, squawking as they flew away. Azzy could tell she was probably close to boiling over completely again, so he scooched on even closer to her and wrapped his arm around her back, cuddling up to her.

The tension in Dess’ shoulders melted somewhat, but was clearly still present with how on-edge she was. “Thanks,” she mumbled, still down about the whole conversation. “Mind if I keep rambling?”

“Go ahead,” Asriel assured.

Dess took a breath and continued. “It’s just… what else do I have? Academically I’m a low-B student at best, mostly a bunch of C’s and some D’s, and there aren’t really any community colleges in the area here to take me. Not to mention how much harder it is to get into good schools as monsters.”

“Yeah, tell me about it.” Azzy kept his own thoughts on the down-low, but the application process he had been going through really opened his eyes as to how narrow-minded and human-centric many of the institutions in Northamer were, even the supposedly open-minded ones. The only colleges he had found that truly seemed to be open to monsters on equal terms were some of the art colleges, but that was nigh useless for a prospective psych major such as himself. He happened to be fortunate enough to be a straight-A student, so getting into something wouldn’t be a problem for him, but the fact his species could influence whether or not he got into a prestigious landing spot like the City College of Megalopolis certainly still rubbed him the wrong way.

But for Dess, he knew that whatever struggles he faced would only be magnified tenfold. She didn’t have the outstanding grades, athletic success, or diversity of clubs on her resumé like he did. She was a reclusive, although admittedly very artsy student, but that didn’t count for much in the cutthroat world of universities if the grades don’t carry.

Her voice continued marching on. “So nobody’s gonna take me for higher education, and as for something like the forestry corps, well they only have a limited amount of slots for monsters, similar problem to the DSC. Chances I actually get in, waitlisted or not, are slim to none knowing I have zero prior specialist training. And… that’s all I can really think of.”

She buried her head in her hands.

“There’s no backup plan for me,” she wallowed. “Lost without a paddle, completely rudderless. I’m just fucked.” The doe silently sobbed to herself.

Asriel searched for any comforting words he could offer, but Dess spoke up again before he could.

“Like, what’s gonna happen to me after I graduate?!” Her voice wasn’t even all that frantic for once, just worn down and morose. “Am I gonna have to work some menial gig in Bay City or some shit? Am I gonna be homeless in Hometown, doomed to die in some random back alley? Or am I just gonna lose my mind and end up somewhere in the system.” She chuckled morbidly. “Heck, maybe I’ll end up on the front lines after all, in one of the prison conscript units. Wouldn’t that be ironic?”

Uncupping his previously held-together hands, Azzy delicately took hold of one of Dess’ own. “Hey, as much as you may hate to admit it, nobody in your life’s gonna let that happen. Not me, not your dad, nor your mom, either. Especially not-”

He was going to say himself, but Dess filled in with the worst possible answer. “Oh ho ho, no, no way would she actually ever care enough for me to do that. Or, I guess she does care, care in the negative sense! I’ll bet the moment she finds out I shitcanned the army deal, she’ll move to kick me out come my birthday!”

Azzy held Dess’ hand tighter, hoping to drill in some comfort and sense, only for her to yank it away. “Dess,” he began regardless, “I know neither of us like her that much, but from all I’ve seen, I really doubt Carol’s the type to actually kick you-”

“OH, MISS ME WITH THAT BULLSHIT!” Dess countered. “You don’t have to live with her! Do you know how bad it’s been lately?!”

Asriel felt he had a pretty good idea, but held his tongue to let Dess vent, who took his silence as consent to continue.

“Every day I have to live under that roof with her is like seven eternities in hell! Every little act, every misstep, every word out of my mouth, gets matched by some grand chastisement.” She put on a shrill and mocking posh voice. “‘Why haven’t you showered yet?’ ‘Grilled cheese isn’t a breakfast food!’ ‘Don’t lug around that damn bat of yours inside!’ ‘Why are your grades so low?’ ‘Can’t you just be more like your younger sister?!’ ‘WHY DIDN’T I JUST ABORT YOU?!?!’ AND IF I EVEN DARE RAISE UP MY VOICE A SINGLE DECIBEL TO HER, SHE’LL GET INTO A SCREAMING MATCH WITH ME FOR AN HOUR!!!”

Covering his ears, Asriel grimaced as his girlfriend damn near blew out his eardrums. “Dang, that’s crazy.” He really wanted to tell her to pipe down some, but knew she’d probably blow a fuse if he did.

“It’s just… I’m my own person! I’m not Noelle! I’m a mess, and I’m proud to be a mess. I don’t need to bow to her whims, I don’t need those meds she put me on, ‘cause let me tell you, lamotrigine does NOT make me stable!”

Ever the doormat, Azzy just nodded along. That time on the meds did only seem to make her mania worse, he recalled. Again, something to be said about trying another mood stabilizer, or seeking a different diagnosis, but no. Didn’t want to anger her.

“I just… I don’t know how much more of this I can take! Every fucking day with her is just a trial of my sanity, a game of ‘LET’S SEE HOW LONG DESS CAN LAST BEFORE SHE SNAPS AND FUCKING KILLS SOMEBODY!’ And I don’t want it to be like that, but she… she just keeps on setting me off, and I don’t know what to do anymore… I hate her….”

Finally, Asriel found a question that seemed right to pop. “Well, and don’t take this the wrong way, but given how miserable you are, why does getting kicked out of the house scare you so much?” He tried to rationalize everything before continuing, feeling her gaze set upon him. “I mean, I can understand missing Noelle and Rudy, but beyond that, it sounds like you’d be much happier away from Carol, no?”

“Believe me, I’d love to, but…”

She cowered in shame as she confessed to what felt to be an original sin of class.

“...I don’t think I’d be able to give up my life here, with her dirty investment money supporting me. I guess it’s the ultimate irony, isn’t it? I’m a socialist, ardently in favor of wealth redistribution by militant means, but so used to the plush life the family fortune gives that the idea of being separated from it forcefully feels akin to suicide.”

Asriel nodded silently. The Dreemurrs weren’t wealthy like the Holidays were, but they were comfortable nonetheless. “There’s that disconnect, right? An incongruence between your values and your social standing, and it drives you mad.” He kept quiet about it, but in that silence he harbored similar feelings over his own father being a cop.

“To some degree, yeah, but it’s more than that!” Dess admitted. “It’s the fact I’m entirely reliant on her; I have barely any idea how to cook, keep track of money, you name it! And with how I haven’t been able to even hold a summer job here, am I supposed to somehow jump to working full-time like that?! Bullshit, I’ll end up jobless, homeless, and either dead or in prison.” Rubbing her face, she almost wished she could just melt into the earth.

“Besides,” she added, shifting gears, “I couldn’t abandon Noelle like that. As much as I hate it, with how much of a doormat my dad is, I’m basically a lightning rod for Carol’s wrath and micromanaging at this point. I…”

She nearly teared up at the thought that entered her head. “...I worry that if I’m not there, then all of that will be directed at Noelle, and with how sensitive she is, I… I’m scared for her, Azzy! She has no idea how to cope; hell, I barely do! And it’s not healthy! If she has to go through all that I have to with nobody there to guide her…”

She looked down at the water’s surface.

“I’m worried she’ll fall down an even worse path than I’m on. I’m worried she’ll take her own life… or….”

Azzy noticed her trail off, and after a good ten seconds of silence, spoke up. “Or what?”

She finally uttered some words, so deeply transfixed on the water she barely cared anymore. “...I’m worried she'll end up just… like… Carol….”

Dess looked intently at her reflection in the lake. To Azzy, she just looked like a black-haired, red-antlered, dark-furred deer with some light patterning, but in her view, she saw through the veil of dye: blonde hair, blue antlers, and fur that was turning lighter by the day.

Just. Like. Carol.

“And… I’m the same. The only thing I fear more than her wrath is somehow becoming her.” Her voice was audibly shaking.

Asriel almost spoke out, about how Dess’ anger could oftentimes reach a similar intensity to that of her mother, just at different ends of hot and cold, respectively. Knowing how such a thing would completely shatter her mind, however, he wisely held his tongue.

Dess’ own mention, however, paired with the reflection, was enough to send her into a full self-induced panic. “Tell me,” she demanded with wide eyes, frantically taking a hold of her boyfriend by the arms, “how’s the vitiligo? Is it all just in my head? It seems worse!”

Asriel gazed at the pale spots that dotted the darker fur along her girlfriend’s chest, ears, and face; each spot was the same color as her mother’s fur. “The facial cluster is maybe a little bit denser than the last time you asked,” he gently posited.

Scrunching her hair in her hands, she curled up beside her boyfriend. “Ooh, fuck, it’s only getting worse!” With my luck, I’ll look just like her come 30 unless I fucking kill myself first!”

“Or you could just dye your fur like you do your hair and antlers!” Asriel hurriedly offered, trying to be gentle this time around about the topic of suicide. “It’s… better than offing yourself.”

Looking back over at her lover, she chuckled a little, before somberly turning towards the water. “Yeah… sorry for mentioning it. It’s just… the thought of turning into her, it’s just….”

She paused, taking a rare moment to catch her own emotions by the tail and calm herself. The idea of music, some sort of despondent verse, filled her head.

“It’s just all a lot to have to cope with.”

Reclining back on the shore and shutting her eyes, she let the sound of her soul flow from her lips.

“Feel the rain like an English summer,

Hear the notes from a distant song,

Stepping out from a back shop poster,

Wishing life wouldn’t be so long.

“At the end of the day,

We’ll all fade to grey…”

Letting her eyes flutter open, she turned her head to face Asriel, who rolled over and embraced her in a tender hug.

“Sorry if the lyrics were a bit down,” she softly spoke. “Just felt like the right mood for things right now.”

“Shhh…” Asriel hushed, burying his head into Dess’ shoulder. The music clearly must’ve moved him, too. “That was beautiful. No talk, only cuddle for now.”

Feeling the warmth of his fur and the weight of his body, the smell of his floral shampoo and the beating of his heart, Dess fell into a trance in much a similar way to how Azzy must’ve been cast into one; she could feel her tail, sticking out of her jeans, wag passionately against the dirt below her. Fully giving in to his desires, she wrapped her own arms around him and snuggled up her head to his, gently kissing him on his fluffy ear flaps and running her fingers through his soft blonde hair. The sounds of bluebirds chirping off in the distance, and wind over the water, paired nicely with the placidity they shared.

Asriel’s voice didn’t break the scene, but merely added to it. “Have I ever told you that I love hearing your voice?”

“Only about a million times, Az.” she responded playfully, and just as lovingly.

Azzy answered in kind with a smile. “Well, it feels as if I’m hearing it for the first time every time, it’s just so beautiful….” He turned his head back upwards to gaze at the passing clouds above. “Y’know, I’m sounding a lot like you now for saying this, but it’s times like these that I wish time didn’t have to move forward. Just the two of us, you singing to me, maybe a guitar in your lap, and my head resting on your shoulder.”

He faced his girlfriend once more. “Wouldn’t that be a nice ‘forever?’”

Dess lovingly giggled back. “Aw, Az, you romantic! Hahah….” Her gaze dropped. “Honestly, it feels like that all the time for me. Maybe not here, somewhere off away where Carol can't see, but somewhere. Forever. With you.”

Looking back over the lake, a heartening feeling overcame her for once. “Till death do us part,” she poetically mused.

“And even then, who’s to say?” Asriel lazily lifted his head and kissed Dess lightly on the snout. “It’s times like these when, despite all the troubles, I’m glad to be your boyfriend.”

Dess nodded, and kissed him back, playfully sticking her tongue into his mouth. Asriel nearly recoiled in shock; this was a whole lot more than they usually did, and he could feel his glasses start to fog up, but despite all of that, it just felt… right. He let her toy around inside his mouth for a while, then lazily disengaged to come up for air once he felt like he had enough, panting as he did so.

"I'm glad you’re my boyfriend, too!” she finally said in response to earlier, panting too.

He couldn’t help but chuckle at the response, before another thought popped into his head. “What song was that, anyway?”

“‘Fade to Grey’ by Visage. New Wave band out of Anglia, not usually my jam, but heard them in a record store down in Bay City and it’s just stuck with me.” Dess chuckled to herself. “Now would you believe that I changed the lyrics on that final stanza to be a rhyming couplet?”

Asriel’s eyes opened wide and head shot up, a particular memory coming to mind. “Oh my Angel, you still do that?”

“Of course I do,” Dess responded semi-dismissively. “It’s almost a hobby of mine, changing lyrics to suit my mood. Hell, sometimes I even rewrite entire songs to be about something else! I swear, that derivative stuff might actually outnumber my original works.”

“No, I mean…” Asriel grimaced as the memory grew clearer. “Sorry, I was just remembering the festival last year.”

“What about it?”

“Remember that slight lyric change you made to ‘The End?’”

The mention of those two words made Dess blush; he’d found just about the only way to embarrass her. “That- that wasn’t even an intentional… I MISHEARD THEM!” she stammered.

Admittedly, seeing his girlfriend in such a state was kinda cute; it wasn’t often she managed to get genuinely flustered. Smiling at the sky, Asriel chuckled a bit and relaxed, absent-mindedly saying “It’s nice to see you like this for once, you know.”

Caught a bit off-guard by the stray comment, Dess stopped thinking about her butchery of The Doors and tilted her head. “Like… how, exactly?”

Asriel looked back over at her and answered back. “Happy.”

“Happy?”

“Even over such a sad song, to see you have genuine joy in music… it makes me happy!”

Dess sat there, ponderously, before a foul expression came about their face. But… what if I don’t wanna be happy?”

Asriel was taken off-guard by the remark. “Whuh???”

A switch seemed to have flipped back in Dess’ mind. “I mean, my life is truly fucking miserable, Azzy. This feels great, but… it’s only temporary. I’ll eventually have to leave, head back home to The Bitch, and deal with the aftermath of this morning. Why be happy, then?”

The question left Asriel dumbfounded. “Don’t… don’t you wanna be happy with me though?!”

“I want you to be happy, Azzy,” she consoled, although her own voice was growing tense, “but I just… don’t. Okay? Why’s that so hard to hear?”

It wasn’t hard to hear, but Asriel honestly could not for the life of him understand the chemistry of Dess’ mind.

“I just don’t wanna see you in so much pain, Dess,” Asriel cooed. “I hate seeing you be miserable. I just want you to be comfortable.” He had hoped those words would’ve sparked something positive inside of Dess, but it appeared as if only a candle of melancholy had been lit inside of her.

“They say sadness is a choice to a certain extent. And, well, I choose to be sad, both in life and writing. There is a certain comfort in that. Heck, with how much frightening verse I write, I might as well be the next Sylvia Plath.”

Asriel tried to divert her line of thinking. “Aw, c’mon, babe!”

“Don’t call me ‘babe.’”

“C’mon, Dess!” Asriel repeated, attempting to maintain something upbeat in the conversation. “There’s gotta be someone else you wanna be!”

Dess pretended to ponder that thought. “Mmm, nah, I’m good. Heck, we both fit the mold for her life, you could be my Ted Hughes! We get married, have a tumultuous marriage, separate, and then I kill myself!”

“Okay, no, I protest that,” Asriel denied. “Hughes was a piece of shit, er, crap, I wouldn’t be him!” He then faintly trailed off with “For… uh… a variety of other reasons, too….”

Dess paused for a moment, before nodding. “Yeah, fair, guess that example only works for me in the singular.” She then turned to face Azzy. “Doubt you have anyone better, though.”

Asriel thought for a minute, searching for a good example, before he lit up. “We could be MilkCan! You could be my Lammy and I could be your Katy Kat! Well, I guess not exactly that, I don’t think I could play bass to save my life, and Lammy’s more anxious than manic… but you get what I mean!”

Dess chucked morbidly at Asriel’s futile attempt to raise her mood, as another name popped into her mind. “I fear it’s more likely that you’ll be my Deborah and I’ll be Ian Curtis.”

The air grew heavy at the mention of his name. Asriel knew what she meant, mostly because she just would never shut up about Joy Division or how she wanted to be the next Ian Curtis, but it never stopped hurting to hear.

Dess spoke up once more, putting things much more bluntly. “I’m doomed to die, Azzy.”

“Don’t say that,” he tried to comfort.

“But I am. It can’t be stopped. Why bother fighting it anymore?”

“Dess, please!”

“Oh, quit begging!” She shot upright to bemoan, well, everything. “What’s the fucking point otherwise? Life’s fucking miserable, it’s only going to get worse, and there’s nothing after any of this anyway! Like you said, only a matter of time until I end up in front of a firing squad!”

“Dess, that’s not what I meant, or even said-”

“Might as well live up to my name and turn myself into a damn Christmas ornament the way I’ll be hanging! Mom wants me to be more festive and I’ll damn well make it festive, for her. If I’m gonna die, I’m at least gonna make it beautiful, be the next Evelyn McHale!”

Asriel wanted to refute her, but much like Rudy with Carol, having been worn down over the years, he just gave in and let her speak. Challenging her would only feed her viewpoint. Instead he just held silent, and let Dess do the talking, listening as footsteps skipped along the forest trail nearby. Must be a squirrel, both probably thought dismissively.

She breathed in, and let her shoulders drop as she exhaled. “I just… I just want life to be like one of my poems, or one of his poems, or like something out of Plath. Dark, morbid… and beautiful. For that beauty to come from the dark.”

Thinking of Ian Curtis once more, and with how much she had just been shouting at the person who was meant to be her boyfriend, she leaned back, propping herself up with her arms, and sang the song that came to her mind.

“Love… love will tear us apart… again…”

A third, new voice rang out. “Ooh, are you singing, Dess?”

The young, lighthearted call behind her startled the nervewracked doe and ripped her straight out of her self-imposed melancholy, who damn well jumped up onto her feet and pivoted around wide-eyed to see who was behind her. Not that she needed to see her to figure it out, though; her sister’s voice was as recognizable to her as the sound of rain.

“Oh, hey, ‘Elle,” she started, catching her breath as she spoke. “Ya spooked me there, y’know.”

“Sorry, Dess,” the seventh-grader said sheepishly. “You sound pretty, though.”

“Oh, it’s alright, ya know I spook easily. We both do. It’s not your fault.” She then playfully pinched Noelle by the cheek and jostled her, letting her know that it was all right. “And thank you, by the way. It’s always nice to hear that from… well, anyone, really.”

She looked around for a moment, a particular absence having caught her mind.

“Is Kris with ya?”

Noelle rubbed her shoulder at the mention of their name. “They were… they said they wanted to go out into the woods with me looking for you, only to ditch me in the undergrowth and then jump out and scare me once I noticed. Multiple times.”

Dess rolled her eyes. Of course Kris was up to their shit again. They probably loved pranking her sister more than they liked their mother’s butterscotch pie. Admittedly they could be funny at times, but mostly she felt the need to step in and “officiate” things, especially with how easy it was to spook Noelle to the point of a panic attack.

Case in point, she spotted them right then, creeping in the woods, waiting for the right time to strike.

“Hold that thought, Noelle,” she finally said as she marched on over to the treeline with a determined stride. She didn’t even bother giving Kris the chance to tear and run; she lunged over and yanked them by the collar, dragging them out into view of their brother and Noelle as the kid barked like a rabid puppy.

“Unhand me, vile woman!” they protested in a particularly dogshit Stewie Griffin impersonation, although it was clear they were deliberately hamming it up.

“Oh you asked for it!” Dess set them down and swirled her arm by her head, preparing herself to launch a viscous haymaker their way. A convincing enough act, for Kris was so paralyzed with fear they were going to get it for real that they dropped the ball they had been holding.

Swinging at them, she slowed her roll just enough to not hurt, and then lightly connected with their shoulder. Much the drama monarch they were, Kris immediately flopped on the ground and writhed in pain, howling like a wounded dog.

Kris acting out their fursona like that was enough to break Dess out of character for a brief moment, eliciting a chuckle from her. She tried to put back on the tough girl airs, but it was futile.

“That oughta… oughta teach ya… ah, who am I kidding, it won’t. You’re lucky I only brought my wooden bat, by the way. If I had the old wiffle, I’d have beat ya over the head with it and-”

Dess paused her thought, her gaze shifting down towards the oblong ball Kris happened to have dropped when she playfully swung hands at them. “Wait, Kris, what’d the football have to do with the prank?”

“Oh, nothing,” they replied.

“Riiiight.”

“No, I mean it!” Kris pleaded. “I was hoping to toss around the football with you and Noelle, get real rough with it!”

The younger doe’s ears perked up at the mention of “rough.” “Ooh, yeah! We can do a 2v2, Dreemurr versus Holiday!”

“I can’t, unfortunately,” Azzy chimed in, his voice a bit down. “I have cross-country practice in a few, our next race is this weekend, and it’s the big 7k run. I really can’t afford to miss that, especially as captain. Sorry.”

Both Kris and Noelle let out a groan. “But you’re always so busy with sports and school!” Kris bemoaned. “You barely ever hang out with us anymore!”

Asriel frowned at the mention, knowing very well that Kris was already struggling to cope with his ever-intensifying schedule; he couldn’t imagine how poorly they’d handle him being away at college.

Wanting to find a remedy for the situation, at least temporarily, he offered up a compromise. “Hey, how about the day after the race the two of us toss the ball around, but until then…”

He gave Dess a knowing look, one that he naturally expected to be reciprocated.

“...I know someone else who might wanna play with-”

“Pass.”

Azzy, Noelle, and Kris gawked at Dess, all a bit unsure if their ears were working right. “Uh… Dess?” Azzy chimed nervously with a chuckle. “Did you mean ‘pass the ball?’ Or-”

“I said pass, Asriel, as in NO” Dess confirmed, much colder this time and crossing her arms as she turned to pensively face the lake. “I just… need a moment right now. There’s just way too much on my mind to have fun right now.”

None of the other three knew what to do about this; for as much of a social recluse and outcast Dess had been in the past, it had never been to a point of turning away from those few that she loved like this. So for her to be so out of sorts….

“Hey, big sis?” Noelle finally piped up. Are you okay? You don’t seem yourself? You’re never one to turn down a chance to… play sports… with… us….”

Dess flashed her with a glare, but it lacked the mean aura so many of the glares that day had. Instead, it was pitiful, as if she was begging Noelle through her eyes not to get dragged down with her.

“I’m not okay, ‘Elle,” she finally murmured, her voice steadily straining, “but I am myself. This is just… who I am.” She looked down at her hands, bunched up in a claw grip out of stress, and buried her head in them, falling down to the ground right in front of her sister. “This is who I really am, Noelle, a broken, mentally shattered mess of a monster.”

Her sister moved to comfort her, sitting beside her and wrapping an arm around her shoulder. Azzy did the same with Kris, noticing that they were visibly shaking over the condition of the person they considered to be an older sister of sorts.

“Dess?” Noelle asked again. “Can you tell me what’s wrong?”

She was just trying to help, but unbeknownst to the younger doe, she had just flipped the hidden switch in her sister’s brain, one she had no control over, and only vaguely knew of.

“What’s… wrong with me?” The static drowned her mind in a near instant as panicked breathing came over her. Azzy knew just what was about to happen, and knew not how to stop it.

“I’m scared, sis!” she finally wailed, exposing Noelle and Kris to a weak side of her they had not yet ever seen. “I’m scared that mom’s gonna kill me mom’s gonna kill me mom’s gonna kill me for not joining the army and dying, my mind’s running at like a million miles an hour and it just won’t stop or slow down and it feels like my personality changes at the drop of a hat HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH!!!!!”

She gripped the collar of her tank top manically; nonsense spilled from her lips, as all logic fled from her consciousness. “It’s all so LOUD, LOUD, LOUD, and BUSY, BUSY, BUSY, and NOTHING, NOTHING, NOTHING, STOP AND GO, STOP AND GO, STOP & SHOP! OOPS, THAT’S THE SUPERMARKET! HAHAH! GET IT? FUCKING GET IT??? THEY SOUND ALIKE! AIN’T THAT FUNNY?!?! I’M SO FUCKING FUNNY!!! GYAA HA HA HAHHHHHHH!!!”

At this point, Noelle was on the verge of tears, Kris was simply petrified, and Asriel was straight-up panicking over the fact his girlfriend was having a manic episode in front of her own sister like this. He wanted to tell her to calm down, but knew that would only make things worse. He froze too.

“Dess!” Noelle cried out, tugging at her sister’s arm. “PLEASE! SNAP OUT OF IT! YOU’RE TERRIFYING ME!!!”

“GOOOOD!!!” Dess shouted at the top of her lungs, so loud it was as if her vocal cords caught fire. “YOU SHOULD BE SCARED OF ME, BECAUSE I’M TERRIFYING! BECAUSE I’M A DISGRACE! BECAUSE I’M SUPPOSED TO BE STRONG FOR YOU AND CAN’T TAKE IT ANYMORE! BEcause I’m… I’m…”

Words became hard to come by all of a sudden, as even thinking became an exercise in pain.

“…I’m…  a danger….”

Trailing off, and at the drop of a hat. it was as if she was never crying in the first place. The switch had flipped once more.

“...Dess?” Asriel asked, taken aback by the sudden shift.

Silently, she broke from Noelle, stood up, and shuffled over towards the woodline. Grabbing her bat, which she had left resting up against a nearby tree, she slung it over her shoulder and began to stagger off down the path back towards Hometown. 

“I’m sorry,” she mumbled back towards the group, “I just need some space. Don’t follow me. Please.” She then turned her head before she headed off into the woods and disappeared from view.

The three left stood silently by the lake for a few minutes to emotionally recuperate, the scene only disturbed by the thick tension in the air and Dess’ distantly fading footsteps, before Noelle asked a question to Azzy aloud. “Azzy? What’s wrong with Dess? I’ve never seen her like this, and… I’m worried for her.”

Azzy paused for a moment, trying to think of any concise and kid-friendly way to address the breakdown Dess had prior to their arrival, before just punting on the idea. “She’s just dealing with some… adult things, is all. Nothing for you two to stress about.”

“But she’s only seventeen!” Kris pointed out. “She doesn’t even get old like you until Christmas!”

“Yeah, close enough,” Azzy dismissed, not even picking up on the subtle dig. Out of his gaze, Kris and Noelle exchanged unsatisfied glances, before Noelle’s expression turned back to one of worry.

“I’m scared for her, Azzy,” Noelle whimpered, still clearly shaken by having her sister’s facade shatter in front of her. Even with that, she really had no idea how bad of a state her sister was really in, but Azzy couldn’t help but nod in acknowledgement of what she said, as the last of Dess’ footsteps sounded out from the forest.

“Me too, Noelle. Me too.”

Chapter Text

Home is where the heart is supposed to be. And with Noelle and Rudy, perhaps it still lay there for Dess, but the thought of the other was much enough to drive it away.

She had been absolutely dreading the “conversation” she’d be having with her mother come the time she arrived home, the walk through the woods having done very little to clear the butch’s mind. No, the “conversation” she’d have with Carol; it felt ill-fitting to refer to such a person by any such an affectionate term beyond their own name.

Deep down, Dess knew she didn’t want this. She would always carry about herself a “rebel without a cause” persona (although knowing her political leanings, there very much was a cause she rebelled for), but all she wanted was for her mother to love her unconditionally. To be able to head home at the end of the day and not worry about being scolded endlessly, or shouted at, or smacked upside the forehead with a light backhander, or compared without ceasing to her golden child sister or golden child neighbor and boyfriend; all of that seemed like fantasy to her.

Of course, part of the issue was that Carol was much the same way, desperately wishing that her daughter would shape up and stop being an “embarrassment” to the family name, as it was put. That was the problem, in Dess’ mind; they both wanted to be loved by the other and showered with adoration, but without compromise, to fit within the other’s mold. Naturally, though, Dess only saw said problem one-directionally.

As the manor gate drew ever nearer, left unlocked as it always was for her, Dess pushed it aside and trudged on through, lamenting in her heart prematurely over what was bound to happen. The yelling. The venom. The hatred. Was this the last straw, the thing that would push their fractured relationship over the edge and get her kicked out?

Finally arriving at the door of her home, Dess clenched her fists and grimaced at the thoughts running through her head. At the very least, she’d have a few hours before Carol got back home, she reasoned to herself. Hopefully she could come up with a good way of putting things and minimize the damage, something to lessen the blow.

Her thoughts bringing her some level of self-comfort, Dess took a deep breath and went through the door, hoping to head to her room and listen to some Joy Division as she brainstormed. Now, the main question was whether or not she’d listen to Closer or Unknown Pleas-

“December?” a posh voice rang out from the living room. “Is that you?”

SHIT. Dess was completely taken off-guard by Carol’s presence; one of her many “outstanding” motherly qualities was the fact she always seemed to be working late over at the town hall, to a point where she was almost a completely absent figure from her life. With how she was when she was around, maybe total absence would’ve been preferable, though.

Regardless, Dess’ heart money-shifted at the sound of her voice, since SHE WAS NEVER HOME THIS EARLY! Did she know somehow? Did she know that Dess had a fit in front of the recruiters and bailed on her plan? FUCK.

“Y-yeah, mom, I’m back,” she said meekly, feeling as if she was tiptoeing around conversational glass with each word spoken. Slinking over to the living room, she found her mother sitting in her easy chair by the fireplace, which she had converted to be an air conditioner rather than a heating element. Oddly, though, she appeared to be sipping from a glass of ice water as she peered through the Hometown Reader, instead of her typical glass of chilled brandy.

“You wanted to see me?” Dess cautiously asked.

Her mother shifted her gaze away from the paper and gave her a quizzical look. “...No? I was just asking if that was you coming home,” she said in a suspiciously calm voice.

“Ah.” Questions were firing through Dess’ brain over the interaction so far. Why was she acting so… normal??? She’d always been a bit of a cold, on-edge woman, so to see and hear her speak in such an even-keeled manner was simply jarring.

“December, dear, are you alright?” she asked; her voice was still a bit chilly, but it wasn’t the usual frigidness she was used to. “Something’s on your mind, isn’t it?”

“Hahaha, what, me? Nah, I’m fine! Just… heading to my room, heh! Gonna listen to some CDs on the… stereo! Yeah, won’t be too loud, sorry, ma’am.” She turned and was ready to high-tail it upstairs to shut herself in, only for Carol to ask the question she was most dreading.

“Oh, and how did that recruitment meeting go? Did you join?”

She dropped her bat on the floor as panic swept through her. This was a setup, this had to be a setup. She already has to know, clearly! And she’s just toying around! Dess gritted her teeth, feeling that there was no sense in even trying to lie to her.

“I didn’t,” she admitted. “I got there, felt it wasn’t for me; was even told that they wouldn’t let me sign up for the work I wanted, so it’s not entirely my choice. Just…” She sighed. “I’m sorry, mom. I’m a burden, aren’t I?”

She wasn’t even making up the excuse; they really had told her to basically fuck off with her aspirations to do volunteer work or serve in Europa, but that didn’t really matter. Knowing her mom, she winced as she anticipated the blow-up argument that was bound to come from her, for “making nothing out of her life,” or “being a quitter,” “not being more like Noelle,” or dreadfully, for “being worse off than if she had just been aborted.” That one always stung.

Instead, Carol merely let off a defeated groan, and put her newspaper down on the side table with her glass of water. “What are you even apologizing for?” she asked, less out of comfort and more out of unsureness. “I mean, you are quite a bit of a burdensome and quarrelsome daughter, I won’t deny that, but it’s not like I actually expected you to follow through with that.”

The passive-aggressive comments were all the more jarring to Dess; Carol’s modus operandi was usually just to scream insults her way or demand she do better, so this more subtle disdain was completely foreign to her. Although by the way her heart was hurting… they seemed to cut deeper than usual?

She had to say something, try to dispel the air and snap Carol back into something more familiar, more manageable. Whatever fear she had before wasn’t washing away, but rather merging into every word the icy blonde spoke. “Okay, this is just… too weird. You’re never like this, mom, you’re always shouting at me and belittling me for every little thing! Why are you… so… detached now???”

Hearing her daughter struggle to wrap her head around what was happening, Carol stared her right in the eyes and continued with a blunt answer.

“I was out of the office today for a therapy appointment, December. It’s why I’m here back home so early in the afternoon.” She took a sip of her ice water before placing it back on the side table. “She’s noted all of my own anger issues, something I know you also struggle with, and suggested ways for me not to be like that. You’ve seen me drinking water instead of my brandy, for instance, correct?”

Dess could feel her eye twitch as the mental fog rolled in. “Yeah, I guess-”

“She told me my drinking habit was only amplifying my issues, so I’ve decided to follow her advice and abstain. That was last week, and I’m already feeling much improved mood-wise, I must say. You might find it to be a helpful idea yourself; putting the hash down and sobering up, I mean. You positively reek of weed right-”

“OKAY, that’s enough!” Dess’ voice, shaky as it was, bellowed out through the otherwise empty house as her latest episode had just come on. “What. The hell. Is wrong with you?” she grunted, pointing fiercely at her mother. “I know your stupid fucking game, woman, I know what you’re trying to do to me, and lemme tell you, IT ISN’T GOING TO WORK!”

She giggled psychotically to herself as she twisted the finger she was pointing. “You’re trying to worm your way into my brain, putting on a fake act of being nice just to try and make me feel guilty about myself, hahahahaha!” There was the tiniest bit of an inflection of nervousness in that fit of laughter, yet she continued on.

“But I know you, bitch. I know who you really are, the kind of person who puts on the airs of civility and convinces Hometown she’s the nicest woman ever, only to shout at her eldest daughter in the safety of her own home and wishing aloud I was never alive in the first place. And you know what? I WISH I WASN’T!”

Her anger reached a fever pitch, only heightened by the fact she saw no response from her mother, no change to her expression whatsoever. “Do you know how hard it is for nobody to believe you? Of course not, because everyone believes YOU! But me? When I tell people who you really are, do you think they listen to me? NO! NO, OF COURSE THEY DON’T! THEY NEVER DO! Dess is just the crazy, rebellious, socialist girlfailure of a daughter who says mean things about her mommy! How could she say such a thing when Hometown is so picture-fucking-perfect! It’s basically Mayberry here, who cares about the rest of Northamer, we’re fine! That’s all that matters! Maybe if she showered more than twice a week and washed that brain of hers while she was at it, she’d actually be a respectable person who stops worrying about silly things! THEY CAN’T HANDLE THE TRUTH, BECAUSE THEY COULD NEVER HANDLE THE REAL WORLD! THEY COULD NEVER HANDLE THE REAL YOU!!”

Dess growled at her unflinching mother, staring her down like a rabid animal with how much her mouth was frothing and eyes were bulging. Her hatred had finally reached its climax.

“AND MAYBE, JUST MAYBE, I WILL KILL MYSELF, TO SPITE YOU, YOU WORTHLESS FUCKING PIG!!! ARE YOU ANGRY NOW, HUH??? ARE YOU ANGRY?!?!?!”

With that last howl out, Dess huffed and heaved with each breath, exhausted by how worked up she had become. Despite everything hurled her way, however, Carol’s expression had not changed beyond anything more than mild surprise. It was as if she had been expecting such theatrics.

“December, dear, you know what?” she said bluntly. “I am angry at you. I’m angry and disappointed in the fact you don’t like seeing me try to improve.”

Pfft, like this is an improvement, Dess thought to herself as she continued panting.

“But despite that, I feel better right now than any of the previous times we fought. All of those arguments over our differing politics, shouting matches over how you dressed, that time you threw a lamp towards my head right before you went off your meds, all of it just stressed out my poor brain and heart. But now?” Her lips remained nearly flat, but Dess swore she saw them curve slightly upward. “I feel as if I can manage myself for once, accepting that I can’t manage you. That you’re simply incorrigible, and that things like this are inevitable.”

She slowly stepped out towards her daughter, sliding right in behind her and placing one of her icy hands on her shoulder. Dess’ entire soul felt as if it just shivered, her madness coming to a screeching halt.

“You’re almost an adult now, and with that, my role as a parent is beginning to wind down. I’ve tried to steer you onto a path that I see fit for you, one of civility and proper education, but you didn’t take it. At some point, I have to let you make your bed for yourself, and you’ll have to lie in it, simple as that.”

Carol leaned in and spoke the last bit of her monologue straight into Dess’ studded ear.

“I suppose I just don’t care about fighting you anymore, December. You’re going to be you, and as much as I may honestly detest that fact, I clearly don’t hold the power to change that. So why bother?”

Backing off from her daughter, she completely disengaged from the conversation and made a turn towards the kitchen. “Don’t play your music on the sound system,” she tersely directed. “I have a work call in a few.” Without another word, she slipped into the kitchen like a cool Arctic breeze, and shut the door behind her, leaving her daughter standing aimlessly in the living room, her heart left in tatters on the floor. Kept in her trance, she picked up her baseball bat from the ground, and trudged up the stairs with it dragging behind her, hitting every step on the way up.

Finally reaching her room, she creaked open the door to her dark blue windowless abode, switched on her lights at half-dimness, and slunk in, clicking shut the door behind her. Eyes drooping and her breath strained, she set the bat down in the corner, stashed away her mint tin in its usual hiding spot, and staggered her way over to the other end of the room

Flopping on the bed, she took one of her pillows and stuffed her face into it, finally letting loose all of her pent-up emotions as she screamed her muffled heart out into its fluffy contents. Only her pillow and the stars on the wall heard her scream. This wasn’t right. SHE wasn’t right.

The words played on loop through her head: “ I just don’t care about fighting you… I don’t care about fighting you… I don’t care about you… so why bother?”

That’s what she meant. That’s just absolutely what that wicked woman had to have meant, Dess reasoned. There was no other way she could interpret that; she thought she knew damn near well enough how to read between the lines. They’d finally reached the point of no return with their relationship.

It was such an odd feeling, though. Beyond the fears of total abandonment, she should be feeling glad to not have to deal with her mother’s yelling anymore, finally being left to her own devices. But despite all of the pain she had dealt with for so many years… it felt as if this wasn’t the ending she wanted, to not have a mother at all. One that seemed happier to leave her behind than change for the better.

Happy. Oh, that word made Dess sick. Happy, happy, happy. Asriel was happy, Kris was happy, Noelle was happy, now even her own damned mother was happy! It felt like she was the only miserable person on the entire damn planet! And every time she tried to get close with someone, it was as if her mere existence would make them unhappy, like there was some inherent toxicity about her.

Something inherently toxic within her.

The little voice in her head spoke up to her, planting a dangerous seed within her mind. Why not purge out the toxin? Why not do something that would mean nobody else had to be unhappy again? Why not rid yourself of all that ills you? Why not rid yourself?

Her internal dialog took hold of her body, as if there were a pulsating black mass in her brain that was snaking tendrils down through her limbs and influencing her mind. Dark, darker, yet darker the thoughts became, as she reached into her drawer and pulled out her iPod. And then, with her music device out on the bed, she unbuttoned the left breast pocket of her jacket, the one right above her stitched-on bi flag, and pulled out her implement of cleansing.

A dull hunting knife that she had bought in secret. The blade was already stained with blood, crusty and old from the last time she sought penance.

Popping in her specialty monster-fitted earbuds, Dess took hold of the iPod in one hand and her hunting knife in the other; it was a meditative pose of self-harm. Scrolling down her various playlists, she finally landed on The Smiths playlist she had, and manically grinned to herself. What better music to cut herself to?

Pressing “shuffle,” she set the iPod down and rolled up her left sleeve, resting the knife delicately on her arm, parting her fur as she pressed down into flesh. Once the dour, self-pitying music started to play, she would grit her teeth and let the blood flow, her cleansing ritual of penance and pain. Maybe this would be the time she finally went all the way….

Impulsively making her mind, she repositioned, her blade now resting lengthwise down her forearm, perpendicular to the darkened lines of stain that already ran across. This was it. The grand, beautiful ceremony of her demise. Set to music, it would be… IMMACULATE!

It would be her finale, as the black knife cut through her soul.

The song that came on, however, was not that of somber music or angry wails she was expecting, but rather a cutesy guitar strum that opened up on a lighthearted key. “Wait, what?” Dess said aloud, caught completely off-guard by what she was hearing. Then the lyrics came in, sung merrily:

Shyness is nice, and shyness can stop you

From doing all the things in life you’d like to…

“Are you fucking kidding me?!?!” Snapped out of her self-harming mood by the playful beat of the music, Dess ripped the earbuds out of her ears and shoved her iPod off the bed. The shuffle, by luck of the draw, had landed upon “Ask,” the one song she had in the entire playlist that wasn’t either a complete and total downer or wail of anger, although Dess was certainly steamed up herself now that her placid acceptance of the possibility of death was shattered.

She put the old hunting knife back in her breast pocket; no more use for it now, since she was knocked out of the mood. Whatever desire to wallow in pain in such a manner she had prior had been sucked completely out of her, and now she just felt like an aimless, listless mess. Angry with herself more than damn near anything, she arched herself back and groaned, clawing at her face as she did so. What the hell was there for her to do now?

Sitting up, she felt the need to do something with her hands. Anything, lest they be idle again; the realization of how close she came to suicide had finally registered within her, and it was terrifying. She needed to find something safe to do and someplace safe to do it….

Peering over towards the closet, her gaze latched onto her guitar. Perfect! Something to do, something she was good at!

Except, no, she couldn’t. Her mother was probably on that call by now, no way would she let her play; Noelle and Kris were Angel-knows-where, and Azzy was busy with practice for that big race, too. There really wasn’t anywhere or anyone else she felt safe expressing herself around.

Nothing, that is, until one name in particular popped into her mind. One person she knew she could always trust. The one person she could reasonably call her mentor.

…

With quill in hand and parchment scrolled out on his desk, Gerson had been delicately putting words to paper for the past hour, writing whatever thoughts came to mind for him. His manuscript was coming along nicely; this latest Chapter of his grand saga would surely be one to please! Dotting his “i’s” and crossing his “t’s,” he gazed upon his handiwork and smiled. Brilliant prose of flowers and betrayal, jealousy and mayhem. One more page done, maybe about ten more to go, and his final draft would be ready to send out to publishers. This calls for some tea, he thought to himself.

Hearing the outside door to the church creak open, his gaze shifted upward as the familiar patter of boots on the ground filled the entryway, before a gentle knock rang out from his door.

“You can come in, ‘Cember!” he called out knowingly.

Creaking open the door, she slid into his office, guitar slung behind her back, and for once bat not in hand. “Hey, Gerson!” she greeted. “Hope I’m not interrupting you or anything?”

“Me? Nah, yer not interruptin’ nuttin’ there, Dessie. I’ve just been working on me writing.”

Setting her guitar down in the corner of the cluttered space, she spotted the work on his desk and positively glowed. “How’s that next Chapter of Lord of the Hammer coming along?” she excitedly asked. “You have anything more for me to read?”

“Nay, just finishin’ up my final manuscript fer The Field of Pink and Gold . I still got ten or so pages left, then I’ll have something for ya.” After a beat, he chucked a little. “Y’know, it’s funny,” he mused. “Even after all of these years, I still never take ya for the readin’ type. And I should know better, gyaa ha ha!”

Dess laughed along too. “Yeah, that’s for sure… I’ve been trying to slog through Dickens in class lately, and that’s been a real struggle….”

“That man was always too verbose,” Gerson mumbled.

“Not that you’re any better, ha!” Dess chuckled; the old man also shared a laugh over this. “Aye, true, I do tend to overindulge at times!”

“Yeah, but it’s… different with you,” Dess admitted. “I don’t know how you did it, but something about reading with you, for you, proofreading your manuscripts like that…” She got choked up just thinking about it. “It really makes me click, somehow. It helped me get into Plath, which has been a real big inspiration for much of my recent poetry, and hell, I think it’s about the only thing keeping me steady with Dickens right now. I don’t know how you did it, but….”

She did her best to hide it, but she was visibly close to shedding a tear.

“...You’ve done a lot to keep me afloat these past few years,” she confessed. “It’s been a real rough go, so to have you there to help me out… heh, it’s just a shame I never got to have you as a teacher, y’know, before you retired. I can only imagine how well that would’ve gone.”

Gerson nodded solemnly; he had been the senior class Literature teacher, and had retired just before Dess came up for her senior year. “Aye, but I can sense the clock ticking, and want to focus on me writing before it comes unwound…” His mood had dipped ever so briefly, before shooting right back up to assuage his young apprentice. “Besides, ain’t I already been a teacher of yours for the past few years? Consider those manuscripts your homework! Gyaa ha ha!”

Dess smiled sheepishly. “I suppose that’s true.”

“From a certain point of view!” Gerson’s quip sent the both of them into laughter, before the former simmered down at a realization. “Hey… yer mother givin’ ya some trouble again?”

The doe froze. “...Why’d you ask?” she said, playing dumb.

“I know ya well, Dessie. Feels like half the time you come to visit, it’s ‘cause of her. Am I right?”

She tried to hold strong for a moment, not wishing to drag her mentor back into family drama, but ultimately relented. “Yeah…” Dess admitted. “Although it’s different this time around.”

“Different? How so?”

Dess swallowed down the disdain that was welling up and continued on. “She wasn’t openly hostile this time. Went to therapy, and apparently she’s stopped drinking, too.”

“Well, that’s good news, isn’t it?” Gerson stroked his beard. “I would reckon that fixin’ her drinkin’ problems ought to help.”

“You’d think so,” Dess exclaimed, “but no! It’s… it’s….”

She leaned up against the wall, despondent.

“I should be feeling better. I should be happy for her, to have her so disengaged and not yelling at me, and making some sort of attempt to better herself, like when dad quit smoking. But no! Part of it’s probably selfishness, not wanting to see her happy, I’ll admit to that. But I swear, what she does say now… whispering in my ear that she doesn’t care about me, in that icy, cold voice… it hurts more than any outburst or insult ever did.”

Bowing his head, Gerson nodded solemnly. “Aye… that does sound like a difficult situation to navigate.”

Dess tugged at her necklace and the collar of her tank top. “I suppose… do you have any advice for me, perhaps?”

He took time to think it over. “So she’s being passive-aggressive with you, eh? Trying to get a rise out of ya, perhaps?”

“...yeah, maybe?” Honestly, Dess didn’t fully know herself; she wasn’t the greatest at reading emotions, admittedly.

“Aye, then,” Gerson said. “Then perhaps it’s best that you didn’t feed into her desires. I know it may be tough, but ignore her as she ignores you.”

As expected, Dess protested this. “But that’s the problem, Gerson! I’m scared she truly doesn’t care about-”

“Shh!” Gerson quickly cut her off, knowing she was just going to doom-spiral otherwise. “Look, I know it may be tough, and you’ve come to me about yer fears of getting kicked out before, but if I know ya mother as well as I think, she’s not the type to do that barrin’ somethin’ truly unforgivable. Besides, if she’s truly fed up with ya, this makes no difference. But if she harbors love fer ya deep down, then I reckon depriving her of any attention will have her fearin’ you’ve tuned her out of yer life!”

“...and if that happens, she’ll come crawling back to me!” Dess exclaimed, finally connecting the dots herself, albeit in her own twisted way.

“Not the exact verbiage I’d use myself, but sure!” Gerson confirmed. “I reckon you’ll wind up bein’ surprised by how much she loves ya when this is all said and done.”

Dess chuckled. “Fa ha ha… oh, I find that hard to believe, but sure! She’ll bow to me!”

That wasn’t what Gerson had intended with his advice, at all, and the disappointed look on his face all but confirmed the fact to Dess. Her expression dropped from manic elation to something more muted.

“Well, if that’s the case, just know that I’ll still be here for ya to fall back on, y’hear?”

Nodding, Dess sighed, her mind still racing.

“It’s funny,” she continued, unable to let go of the subject. “Like, I’ve had much more violent encounters with her before now, and they’ve never gotten at me like this has! Like that time I threw a lamp at her head after buying this Ostrheinland jacket…” She pimped her olive top for emphasis, “or… that time she got plastered on brandy and took her katana….”

“Ya threw a lamp at her head?” Gerson asked in disbelief. “I don’t think I’ve heard that one before!”

“Yeah…” Dess sheepishly confirmed. “I… may have withheld that last bit from you last year. It was just…” Her fists bunched up and shook. “It’s just that I hate how blind she is to suffering! With how fundamentally unequal things are, between Humans and Monsters, between the different human races, between the Federal States and Northern Provinces, between the rich and the poor worldwide, you’d think she’d recognize how terrible this country is, but no! She seems to really believe in the FRN, always telling me to “trust the system to bring balance and justice,” when the system is what’s caused all of the injustice we suffer in the first place!

“But who cares!” she mockingly ranted. “Who cares about some monster being beaten to death by a dust mob out in the midwest, that doesn’t fucking matter! Trans people being denied healthcare by government clinics? Not a problem! Hometown is fine, Hometown is perfect! Nothing can ever hurt you in this plasticine bubble we live in! It just doesn’t register to her that I feel guilty about never having to want when there are so many who never get what they need! She’s willfully blind to the sins of the world, and takes any evidence to the contrary as a personal affront, the worthless neoliberal capitalist she is!! It feels that leftists like myself are a bigger threat to her worldview than conservatives and fascists, it’s insane, and it just absolutely works me up all into a violent tizzy!”

She then grumbled, under her breath, “No wonder she hates Ostrheinland so much.”

“Well, I wouldn’t say that Ostrheinland was a shining beacon on a hill either, exactly,” Gerson gently pointed out. “To call them a leftist state seems to be more of a disservice to your stance than anything.”

“Oh, I’m not gonna deny that, either, the Stasi did some genuinely fucked up shit, but that was mostly due to Volgan influence… damn Volgans.” Dess shunted off into a side tangent at her own mention of Volga. “I still maintain that if their socialist uprisings after the Great War weren’t put down and Rheinland were to dictate the communist order instead of Soviet Volga, then maybe we’d actually be somewhere with socialism in this country, and not some shitty late-stage capitalist hellscape. That’s what the jacket represents to me, and it… it feels like nobody understands that.”

Gerson took a moment, then slowly nodded. “I’ll be honest, Dess, I do fear that the jacket may send the wrong message… but I think there is merit to what you say. It’s just a mighty shame the world is such a terrible place at times.”

“Exactly!” she exclaimed, glad to hear someone fully agree with her. Seemingly.

“But,” Gerson continued, “I think there is still plenty of good in the world, even in a place like Northamer. Not a lot, sure, but some. And perhaps your mother has just latched onto that however she can to cope. And can you really fault her for that?”

Hearing those words, Dess could barely hold herself back from rolling her eyes. Of course he’d try to find a silver lining, ever the optimist Gerson was. Even if that silver lining was actually just polished lead. It didn't matter.

Not that she wasn’t going to play diplomatically about it, though.

“I mean, I still do, but… I guess I understand her a bit more now,” she said, unconvinced. She stood there for a beat, pondering all that Gerson had said, her mind continuing to circle around her mother. Despite not believing a word he said, she didn’t have the heart to call him a liberal stooge, either. Unlike Carol, she actually cared about him, and frankly could excuse some misgivings from age. He was respectable.

A question came to mind for her. “Hey… you had to have taught her back in your younger days, right? Was she always… like this?” Dess asked. She didn’t know what would be worse, if Carol had always been so wretched, or if she was more like her growing up.

Actually, the latter would be so much worse , she decided.

“Ah, I’d love to say that yer mother had a rebellious streak like yerself when she was a youngin, wouldn’t that be a trope,” Gerson mused. “But if I’m bein’ honest, she was always a bit of a… stickler for order, really…or as I reckon you’d be inclined to say, she’s always had a stick up ‘er ass! Gyaa ha ha!”

That was enough to at least bring some levity to the discussion, eliciting a hearty amount of laughter from the young doe. “Alright, old man, you reeled me back in with that! Fa ha ha!”

The two eventually simmered down, Gerson’s crass comment having lightened up things for the both of them.

“But in all honesty, though, she didn’t used to be this bad,” Gerson added. “Strict, yes, but not a Stalinist… or whatever the capitalist equivalent of that is. Anyhoo, it was some time back when you were about Noelle’s age that I’d really say the switch flipped from my recollection, although the ‘why’ has always eluded me. Carol is one cagey woman, that’s for sure.”

“Yeah, she really is…” The light still remained, but was already starting to dim. Carol’s toxic aura knew no bounds.

“Say, out of curiosity, what is she doing right now, anyway?” the old man pondered.

“She’s apparently on a work call right now, came back home early after that therapist’s appointment. I nearly cu- er…”

Best not bring up the cutting.

Looking about back towards the corner, Dess remembered why she came in the first place. “I was gonna play some guitar to vent after that clash we had, but, y’know… can’t do that when she’s busy like that.

“So that’s why ya brought the guitar?” Gerson noted.

“Yeah,” Dess admitted. “Felt like a safe space for me to do so, if that’s alright with you.”

“Of course, Dessie,” he assuaged. “You’ll always have a safe space here fer ya in my study.”

“Thanks, Gerson.” An idea popped into her mind. “Maybe… you’d like to listen to me play?” she offered.

Sitting very still, he pondered the decision, before reluctantly shaking his head. “...I’ll pass fer now,” Gerson said after that moment, easing out of his seat. “I’m not too much into punk myself, just personal taste, is all. Far too loud for my frail old ears, Gyaa!” He smiled gently, as if to let her know he meant no ill will. “I’ll let you have the chair, Dessie, I need to stretch and walk, anyhoo.”

He meandered his way past Dess and towards the exit to his study. Dess thought for a moment, really wishing to continue her conversation still. “Hey Gerson?” He paused just as he was opening the door.

“I was actually in the mood to play something a bit softer,” Dess mentioned as he stood in the doorway. “If you want to hear, I think you’ll like it.”

Gerson stood there, appearing to ponder for a moment again, but in truth, he had already made up his mind at the mention. “Certainly, Dessie,” he affirmed. “I trust yer judgement.”

It’s funny; such a simple phrase was one of the reasons Dess kept coming back to hang out with the elderly turtle. Nobody else in her life, not even Asriel, would say something along those lines. But to have someone who openly said that they trusted her… well, it was no surprise then that Dess trusted him, too.

“Great!” She sat down in his chair, popped her guitar on her lap, and pulled a pick out of her pocket. “I’d love to know what you think of this one.”

Closing the door behind him, Gerson nodded affirmatively. “Is it an original of yers, or d’ja have a cover for me?”

“Cover,” she answered as she concentrated on her instrument. “I heard this on the oldies station a few weeks back. Not usually my jam, dad had it on, but something about how Gregg Allman sung it… it spoke to me.” Dess chuckled as she strummed her guitar as a tune-check. “Funny, too, since I hate that Southern Rock crap… but those softer Jackson Browne lyrics that usually seem mushy to me, they just hit right. I may be much more into punk…”

“...but it’s nice to slow down every now and again,” Gerson finished, pulling up a stool to sit on as he listened.

Dess nodded and smiled. “Yeah, I guess so, old man.” Satisfied with her tuning, she sat up in her chair and readied her finger placement. “This one’s called ‘Shadow Dream Song.’ Barely touched the lyrics, this is all mostly the original that I’ve transcribed off the radio.” 

Taking a deep breath, and shutting her eyes for a moment to steady herself, Dess began to play, first gently plucking at her string to a gentle melody, before strumming her heart out tenderly on the guitar, her fingers shifting about at the top of her guitar’s neck. As she strummed, her voice called out, not her usual loud and gruff punk rocker voice, but a beautifully melodic lament of tender sound and lyric.

“I meant to call her name

I meant to take her hand

I meant to be the same and understand

Just what was happening in the evening

Between the princess and the prince…

“I can't be bothered now

And I can't eat or drink

I can't remember how I used to think

What was the song she sang before the morning rang

About the princess and the prince…”

As Dess continued plucking and strumming away at her guitar, moving into a transition section, Gerson sat transfixed upon his stool, fully enthralled by the whimsical magic of the six-string that sang like a sad heart strumming a lament. Each gentle note rang lovingly out from her guitar, her fingers painting an audible majesty that, for a moment, made all pale in comparison to. Before he knew it, Dess’ angelic voice floated out from her mouth once more, falling gently down from the heavens like a delicate spring rain as she sang.

“It's a crystal ringing way

She had about her in the day

She's a laughing dappled shadow

Now she's a laughing dappled shadow in my night…

“If I could hear her voice

If I could see her face

If I could wish and be in most any place

It’d be where I saw her last on that evening past

Between the princess and the prince…

“Between the princess and the prince….”

With those last few lyrics parting from her lips, as the echo of strings rang out from her guitar, Dess sat back in her chair and let off a sigh of satisfaction, feeling as if a weight had been lifted from her weary soul. “It’s a beautiful song, isn’t it?” she finally said.

Sitting upon the stool, Gerson was left simply awestruck, a single tear running down his cheek. “Well I’ll be… that was one of the most beautiful things I’ve ever heard, Dess. Better than Allman sung it, I reckon.”

“Aww, really?” Dess cooed.

‘Damn straight!” the old man affirmed. “I think I’ve heard that one before, like you said, on the oldies station. Your voice really suits the lyrics well!”

“W-wow, thanks!” She blushed; frankly any compliment or ego stroke was enough to stick with her, what with how rare that seemed to be. The topic of lyrics on her mind, she continued to blab excitedly. “I’m pretty sure the song is meant to be a lament about a cheating partner, but you twist the lyrics some, and I think you can make something else of it.”

Gerson tilted his head, intrigued. “How so?”

Dess gulped, realizing she had just backed herself into a corner of her own making. “I suppose… I see it more as a lamentation of death. Of a prince who didn’t say the right things and lost the love of his life. Not to another man, but to her own hand, and memories of her become nothing more than a mere shadow upon the world.”

His soul struck deeply by what Dess had said, Gerson could only think to echo back to her.

“Her own hand… as in..?”

“Suicide,” Dess meekly uttered, finishing his sentence. “Suicide.” She nervously rubbed her hands together, awaiting a response.

The old turtle stood there for a long, ponderous moment, searching deep within his soul for the right words. He knew well enough that Dess was prone to having a switch flip if he pushed too many wrong buttons; there had been many a time early on in his mentorship where their talks had ended with her having an angry fit before breaking down into a sobbing mess, and he wished not to repeat any of that this afternoon.

“It’s a hauntingly beautiful interpretation,” Gerson cautiously admitted, at last. “Now I’m not one to try and romanticize that stuff myself, but I know you like to in yer writings. And there is a morbid beauty in all that, I’ll confess. Just… be careful, alright?” His gaze shifted towards Dess’ necklace, a metallic monster soul with a deliberate crack right down the middle of it. “Did Asriel buy that for ya?”

Dess took hold of it and looked down upon the necklace, before nodding. “Yeah, for my birthday last year.”

Gerson nodded back. “Your prince knows you well,” he said. “Don’t be makin’ a shadow of yerself now, y’hear?”

Once again nodding, but this time silent, Dess let her necklace hang limp once more as she gazed down at the floor. It wasn’t often that her suicidal ideation peeked through while with Gerson… but he knew. At the very least, he never made a big fuss about it, which is more than she could say of anyone else who found out. No sense of panic or demands to seek help, just an acknowledgement of who she was and being there to talk to. That’s all she ever wanted from anyone else.

Feeling it was time to shift gears, lest she continue to wallow in her mindscape, Gerson got up from the stool and began pacing about his study. “Y’know, it’s funny,” he mused. “With how much ya like the artistic and rebellious stuff, I’m surprised you even planned on joining up with the FRN!”

Dess found the sudden shift to be a bit unexpected, but knowing Gerson, he was probably going somewhere with this. “I mean, I already told you before about my political wranglings with that, what with revolutionary-”

“Aye, I understand the complexities, that’s beside the point,” he remarked, not dismissively, but rather as to maintain a train of thought. “What I meant is, I’m surprised the idea of leaning into yer artistic talents never seem to arise in yer mind. Seemed like a more natural fit!”

“Huh?” Dess looked at him with a quizzical head-tilt.

“Art school, Dessie!” he answered, waving his hands in a circle for emphasis. “Wit how much ya seem to like playin’ that guitar there, and that beautiful voice, and yer tack for writin’ and editin’ good lyric, I’m surprised a music college never came across yer mind!”

She pondered for a moment, before the realization hit her like a big blue pickup truck. Her mind thought back on what Asriel had said earlier in the day, right before she spiraled.

“Even over such a sad song, to see you have genuine joy in music… it makes me happy!”

Her boyfriend’s words echoed through her head, and as if on cue, thought after thought of few fawning over music. Her first guitar as a young fawn, secretly watching raunchy MTV videos over at Azzy’s place, poems scrawled out on lined paper during class, gushing over the punk act that stopped to play a live show at the Festival one year. The songs she composed, the lyrics she wrote, the words she sang, the notes she played, and everything else up to this very moment. That’s where all the joy in her life stemmed from.

It was her calling.

“Oh, oh shit, right!” she finally exclaimed, a giddyness taking hold of her. “How could I’ve been so blind to that?!”

“Don’t ask me about seein’ things, missy,” Gerson jokingly replied. “I have cataracts! Gyaa ha ha!”

A sudden and anticipatory nervousness overtook her, the grand scale of the realization and what needed to be done overwhelming her. “Do… do you really think I could do it? Even this late along with things?”

“Whadda ya mean by that?” Gerson asked.

Dess rubbed her arm contemplatively. “Well, I know the application deadline is coming to a close, and I don’t even have a portfolio assembled yet! I still need to actually record all of my work! Not to mention… my grades….”

“Pah! Grades, right.” Gerson shook his head with a smile, cutting in before her mood even had a chance to drop. “It’s music school, ‘Cember! Those places care about grades, sure, but they care much more about the portfolio. It’s art, remember!” He placed a hand on her shoulder. “Besides, you’re a bright girl, what with all the help you’ve given me with revisions and such. I reckon that if you strap down with that sense of purpose in yer heart, you can pull a few high B’s this semester, and maybe an A or two!”

Dess looked up, her eyes beaming. “You really think so?”

Gerson gave her a warm smile. “I know so.”

He backed off and let Dess get out of his chair. “And as fer yer portfolio, I reckon ya still have time to get that all sorted! Worst comes to worst, it never hurts to ask fer an extension.” Her face told him that she was still a touched nerved up as she stood. “And hey,” he added, “if it helps ya, I can be there with ya and go through this entire reachin’ out process together. How about over some tea, too?”

Putting her guitar aside, she went over and gave the old turtle a hug. “Woah there! Easy on my old bones!” he ribbed. She lightened up some, but the intention was still clear.

“Thanks, Gerson,” she muttered, smiling as a tear ran down her face. “You’re like the parent I’ve always wished for.”

Chapter Text

A few days would soon pass by, and come the weekend, Dess was already starting to feel like a whole new person.

It had been a near-obsessive stretch for her following that fateful conversation with Gerson; she had looked up every single art school in the Northeast, found the ones that specialized in music, and then reached out to every one of them about applying, with the old man’s help, of course. As if by some stroke of luck, the vast majority of them had a late application deadline option, and that gave her juuust enough time to fill out the necessary paperwork and assemble a portfolio. Three weeks to get it all done and sent out, easy as pie!

By that first weekend, she’d already gotten herself a list of songs she hoped to record, and felt the entire circumstance worthy of celebration. Fortuitously, Carol happened to be taking Noelle out on an academic trip down by the coast in Port Town, which meant she’d have time all by herself to relax and celebrate.

Specifically, celebrate with someone she felt she hadn’t been all that present with.

…

Early on that mid-September Saturday morning, just as the first few leaves started to turn, two plaid-clad black-haired deer ambled into Hometown’s local diner for a spot of breakfast. To someone unfamiliar, it’d already be clear that they were related, but to the owner of such a small-town establishment, someone on a first–name basis with everyone there, she instantly knew who they were.

“Mornin’ there, Rudy,” QC greeted in her Southern drawl, coffee pot in hand. “Surprised seein’ you here this bright an’ early, ain’t ya usually at Church around now?”

Rudy nodded affirmatively. “Morning, QC. Decided not to go today, wife’s out of town with my youngest, and I couldn’t pass up some father-daughter time with my eldest.” He playfully elbowed Dess in the ribs. “Let me tell you, she’s usually a walking corpse in the morning, so savor it!”

This elicited a chuckle from the purple rabbit, and an eyeroll from Dess. “Well, why don’t ya seat yourselves, hon, and I’ll get over to y’all after I serve this fine good lookin’ over ‘ere!”

As the purple rabbit turned to pour some coffee to a now-blushing lioness at the counter, Dess scooched into one of the booths by the window, with Rudy sliding into the seat opposite from her.

The pair sat there for a few moments, unsure of where to even start, seeing as how little Dess interacted with the rest of the family as of late. Rudy would ultimately kick things off with a softball of a remark.

“Nice day this morning, isn’t it?”

“You’re telling me,” Dess answered warmly. “It’s just about perfect outside, temp-wise.” It was unseasonably cool, in truth, but for reindeer monsters like the Holidays, that worked in their favor.

Rudy nodded in turn. “I know, perfect weather out there, and not a cloud in the sky, either. Perfect plaid jacket weather if I do say so myself. Heck, even you’re rocking it! Frankly the look suits you well, too.”

She nodded politely in response, but grumbled in her mind over the comment. It’d been so long since Dess had worn plaid, it almost felt unnatural to her. Rudy was right in a sense; for a butch such as herself, plaid with jeans was a classic combination that certainly suited her. Yet all the same, it lacked the familiar weight of her Ostrheinland jacket, both literally and in a more personal political aura. She supposed there wasn’t anything too terribly wrong with a break in routine, though, especially if it was for her father. No need to knock heads with people today, and doubly so for him in particular.

Ultimately, she looked past it, and her mind drifted elsewhere, back to happier times. “Remember when we used to do this all the time, the four of us?” Dess reminisced, shifting the point of conversation away from her looks. “I swear, this was just about the only thing that made church bearable!”

The two shared a light giggle in the booth, Rudy joining in on the nostalgia trip now. “Shoot, when was the last time we did this? I think it was before you dyed your hair.” A wistful spark flew in his eye. “I remember you and Ellie used to make a proper ruckus in here, drawing on the windows when they fogged up with condensation, playing Hangmonster with a whole slew of nonsense words like… what was one of them… oh, ‘giasfelfebrehber!’ Noelle would always play that one, and you’d get so worked up, you’d be fixin’ to swing at her with your old wiffle bat! Oh, Carol and I used to just positively laugh at the mayhem you got up to! Smiles all around! Fa ha… hah….”

Just the mention of her name seemed to sink whatever joy there was in the conversation. Rudy’s body reciprocated, relaxing back into the padded seat of his booth.

“A lot’s changed, I suppose,” he mumbled.

“Yeah….” Dess’ mood dipped in turn, thinking dearly about who her mother once was. How she used to be so much nicer back when she was young, how she’d indulge in Dess’ mischief with Noelle, indulge in her, not scold her for the slightest misstep. It actually felt like love.

Why couldn’t things just be like that again?

Seeing QC make her way back over to them, menus in hand, she tried her best to shake the feeling. Nostalgia was nothing more than a fleeting longing for the past, she thought to herself. You’re a Socialist, remember? Keep looking to the future, bury the past. It’s better this way. She knew Azzy probably would’ve disagreed with her conclusion, and could almost hear him chiding her in her mind, but she pushed it all down as the purple rabbit finally reached them.

“And here’re a coupl’a menus for the two of ya’s. Soup of the day is a New Anglia Clam Chowder, feel free to take your time!” With the ring of a bell atop the door, another customer walked in, and QC went back to serve the others, leaving Dess alone again with her father.

The comment about Church from the rabbit earlier crept back into her mind, and a small pang of guilt pinched her. She should probably say something to Rudy about it.

“Hey, by the way, thanks for taking me out, Dad,” Dess said. “I know how important Church is to you, so this means a lot to me.”

Rudy gave her a warm smile, letting her know that it was all good. “Well if I’m being honest, Dess, I’m more of a vague spiritualist than a particularly pious type,” he soothed. “I’m mostly there for Car- er, your mother. Figure that’s where you picked up your atheism from, a natural extension from how your old man is. So don’t sweat it!” he finished off with a wink.

He nearly said her name again. Carol. Just the mere thought of it sent a cascade of memories and questions rushing through Dess’ head. Instead of elevating her into a frenzy, though, it only served to depress her mood, and her expression dropped as she circled her finger atop her menu.

Sensing something was wrong, Rudy dropped the carefree and joyful demeanor, and shifted towards an expression marked by concern. “What’s wrong, sugarplum?” he asked.

Dess tugged at the collar of her plaid overshirt, nervous, before she finally responded; if she could sink any deeper into it, she would.

“Does mom still love me?”

Rudy could feel his weary soul be squeezed from within at the stray question. “Of course, Dess,” he said, attempting to assuage his daughter. “What makes you say that?”

Overwhelmed with emotion, Dess folded up her arms on the table and buried her head in them. “I mean, we used to argue so much, get into so many fights… some of them… violent…”

“Mhm…” Rudy nodded, reflectively.

“But through all of that, it still felt like she cared about me. To a negative extent, mind you, but still! And now, after this past week, it just feels like she’s… stopped. She’s given up on me, and while Gerson’s given me some advice, it all still just… hurts!”

She balled her fists as her body shook the table, exposing a certain vulnerability in self that was common in nature but rare in cause. “I just… I hate to admit it, especially to her, but… I just want her to love me, dad! And I’m scared! I’m scared that I’ve pushed things too far, and that those good times we were talking about are a thing of the past!”

Sighing pitifully, Rudy shook his head to himself as thoughts of Carol went through his own mind, the conversations they’d had over the past few weeks going through his mind.

“Dess,” he said. “I’ve been talking to her a lot lately, and while there’s a lot I wish I could say that she’d rather me keep secret, I know for a fact that Carol still loves you. I know so. Even if she doesn’t show it, or comes off as aloof, trust me on this: deep down, she still cares about you.”

She lifted her head from her folded arms and stared right back at her father. “Do you actually believe that, Dad?” she shot back. “Or are you just saying that to make me feel better, the doormat that you are?”

The effect was immediate; with the way his expression dropped, it was as if his soul had shattered right there in his chest. Dess’ heart sank at the sight of it all, and quickly mumbled off an “I’m sorry…” as she looked back away, but the damage had already been done. For a good minute, they both sat there, quiet in the booth, absent-mindedly staring at their menus.

Fortunately for the both of them, QC had just finished bringing out a parfait to one of the other customers of the diner, and turned her attention back towards them. Her warm, bubbly presence was just enough to pull them out of their funk.

“Have we decided on what we wanna order?” she asked.

Both deer looked at each other, caught in the headlights, quickly glanced at the menus once more, and nodded. “I’ll go first,” Rudy said. “I’ll have the Five Dollar Breakfast Special, coffee ice cream in the shake and two bacon strips on the side.

“Five and dine, with double B and a caff-shaker!” QC confirmed to herself in some non-descript diner code. “And you, hun?”

Dess was still hurriedly darting her eyes about the menu. “Uhh… I’ll have the… umm… erm… I guess I’ll roll with the Hoppy Hunny Bun Pancake Platter with a side omelet… and a chocolate milk.” She paused for a moment, before apologetically adding on a “Please.”

“HH-O with a choccy, gotcha, hun!” She quickly scribbled the orders into her notepad. “I’ll have those out in a jiff, you two sit tight!” With that, she rushed off behind the counter and back into the kitchen.

“Shoot, you can really tell she’s from the South,” Dess playfully jabbed, before tacking on, “Kinda cute, though.”

She expected something from her father, a quip or some spirited follow-up to her sapphic comment, but he was still only sitting there quietly opposite to her, clearly hurt to some degree by what had been said earlier.

“Hey, um…” Dess looked down at her feet, sheepish. “I’m sorry about that… doormat comment. I know you mean well, and it wasn’t right to fire back at-”

“Dess,” he responded, cutting her off. “You don’t have to worry, I get it. Heck, I was pretty much the same way back when I was your age. Always so moody and angry and pent-up with worry, it’s natural! And all things considered, you’re certainly still in a better mood today from the sound of things,” he added, stuffing his feelings down and moving on. “The way your mother was talking to me, it sounded like you were completely out of sorts after the whole fiasco with those recruiters.”

Dess nodded along as she looked back up and gazed out the window, wishing she could be spare with her words, but knowing her dad would want the full story. “Yeah, that… went about as poorly as it could’ve gone,” she said with a morbid chuckle. “Got rejected from all of my desired landing spots, was told I’d die on the front lines in the desert since there was nothing better for me, and they called me slurs!”

Rudy perked up at the last mention. “No… you don’t mean…”

She leaned over and whispered it into his ear, wishing not to upset any of the other patrons with her utterance. “Duster.”

His eyes wide and jaw just about ready to come unhinged, Rudy did his best to compose himself and nodded in understanding. “Your mother… she didn’t tell me about that part,” he admitted.

“I never told her,” Dess said bluntly.

Rudy continued nodding along. “I get that. Makes a lot of sense now why you were so cagey about the whole ordeal.”

“Yeah, tell me about it.” Dess chuckled; the event felt so far removed already, it was almost comical to her how bigoted that human was. She could scantly even recall his name.

Her father chuckled, too. “I’m honestly surprised you’re in as good of sorts as you are right now,” Rudy said. “You’d usually be all worked up and angry about this for a good few weeks after the fact. It’s honestly refreshing to see you so relatively happy!”

She smiled and nodded in confirmation. “I mean, yeah, I’d say I’m still not fully over that, you heard as much yourself earlier… but yeah, it’s definitely smoother sailing than usual.” She sat there for a moment, gazing out the window again to watch as a few leaves flew off into the breeze, before adding, “It definitely helps that it feels like I have an actual purpose in life now.”

This grabbed Rudy’s attention. “Oh? Pray tell.”

Dess couldn’t help but blab excitedly now that she had the opportunity. “Okay, so you know how I told you I went to talk with Gerson earlier?”

“Yeah?”

“Well, he got the idea in my head of going to art school! That’s why I’ve been so busy this past week; I was getting all my application information all in order to send them out, not to mention all of the phone calls and other busy work!”

“Really?!” Rudy couldn’t help but feel impressed. “Wow, Dess, I’m so proud of you for taking the initiative there, that’s so unlike you!”

“Heh, I know, right?”

“But seriously,” he continued, “I’m glad to hear that things are working out so well for you in that regard. With how much it’s seemed like you’ve been struggling lately, both with mood and life in general, I’m happy to hear you’re doing so well!”

Dess nodded in agreement, her own thoughts reciprocating her father’s.

“It’s funny,” she mentioned. All of this work on such a tight schedule, it feels like it should be overwhelming. But it’s not! For once, it feels like what I have in front of me is manageable, not just for getting done, but for getting it done well!”

She sank back into her seat, relaxing a bit as she pondered. “Is this what it’s like to be a normal person? To feel ‘normal?’”

Rudy couldn’t help but chuckle at his daughter’s comment. “Fah! ‘Normal,’ like anyone in this family is normal!”

“You know what I mean, Dad!” she playfully jabbed back. “I mean, I’m not a complete and total mess for once is what I’m saying! It’s… nice.”

Nodding along, Rudy smiled a little more at the comment, visibly happy to see her daughter in such a state. “So, anything specific yet on what you might wanna do?”

Dess thought for a moment, but ultimately just shook her head no. “Nah, not yet. I’ve looked into a lot of the programs up here in the Northeast, and I do have a few vague ideas. Guitar, singing, piano, composing, maybe even production, but nothing solid yet. I’ll probably make a firmer decision once I’ve figured out where I’m likely to end up. Hopefully I end up at Megalopolis College of Music and Arts, since I know Azzy hopes to end up at City College there, but really any of them are fine, even the one in Belford, the dump that city is! As long as I’m close to Azzy, I’ll be happy!”

“Well, it sounds like you’ve got a wide selection of things to choose from, that oughta keep ya busy!” Playing back what he had just been told, Rudy couldn’t help but chuckle to himself some. “Oh! It only just registered to me what you said about Azzy, fah! You two really are a pair of lovebirds, huh?”

She giggled gleefully. “Oh, yeah, I don’t know what I’d do without him! Fa ha hah!”

“Does he know about this plan of yours?”

She stuck her thumb up in confirmation and grinned. “Yeah, we talked about it as I was applying, he’s already applied to basically every high-tier university across the Northeast, so worst-case scenario I’d only ever be an hour by car or two by train away or so.”

Rudy nodded along. “You’re so lucky to have each other, you know that? Reminds me of…” He was about to say himself and Carol, but knew just as it was prepared to slip from his tongue that comparing Dess to her mother in any way would probably send her down into a spiral. And before breakfast could come out, too!

Dess snorted, having ignored the unfinished thought. “Yeah, more like I’m lucky to have him, fa ha ha…” She herself began to trail off, the darkness of melancholy creeping up within the recesses of her mind.

Rudy could sense the thought had brought something upon his daughter, even without Carol being mentioned. “Hey, Dess? Whatcha thinking about?”

She rubbed her arm, caught in thought.

“Nah, I mean… I’m more lucky to have him than he is to have me, right? Like, Bratty and Catty, Ember, pretty much all of the girls in our year would be crawling each other to date him. Hell, Bratty was his first kiss, and she still brags about that to this day!”

“Wasn’t she also your first kiss?” Rudy asked, completely sidetracked by the mention.

“I mean, yeah, but that was earlier, when she was still dating Catty… heh, to think that if I played my cards right, I could’ve ended up in a polycule with them…”

Dess shook her head, breaking free from that tangent. “But that’s the point! I fucked it up, played it at the wrong time, and ended up breaking them apart and ending up with nobody! And that’s what I do…” She shrank back into her seat, curling herself in her plaid overshirt. “That’s what I always do. If Azzy were to get sick of me tomorrow and break things off, he’d just go find some other girl… or guy, maybe… and he’d be set! Me, though? I’m a toxic asset, I have no friends my age beside him as-is! And even then, I’m pretty sure the only reason I’m with him now is because we’re neighbors and family friends by happenstance. If it weren’t for that, he wouldn’t give two shits about me.”

Her mood fully sunk, her body reciprocated, sliding down depressively in her booth seat. Rudy scrambled mentally to find the right words, really hoping that he didn’t come off as too much of a doormat this time around.

“Look, Dess,” he assured, “Asriel isn’t the type to break up with you. I mean, I’ve seen how that boy talks about you when it’s just the two of us at Church, and I swear I see his eyes light up every time your name comes up! He’s obsessed with you more than just about anyone… well, except for you with him, that is! Fah!”

He laughed, and hoped that Dess would too, but she still remained nervously silent.

“Ah… well anyway, I’m also sure that even if we weren’t friends with the Dreemurrs, he still would’ve become friends with you. And I think, no, I know that because he likes you for who you are. Even through thick and thin, through all of your own struggles, and I assure you, his own, too, he loves you.”

Sighing, he still held onto hope, but Dess kept her silence, now fully entangled by the tendrils of melancholy. It was starting to seem like nothing could convince his headstrong daughter to change her mind.

“You believe your old man on this, right?” He said as one last desperate comment.

A long, tense moment of silence followed, before Dess, looking down at her feet, gave a meek and tired response.

“Can we just drop the subject?”

Rudy was crestfallen by the response, but nodded back. “Okay, then.” Silence falling over the booth, they took to sitting idly and gazing out the window upon the early fall scene outside, listening to the bustle and chatter of other patrons in the diner as 80s music faintly played from a speaker in the kitchen, the sound echoing out through the shut door and service window. Dess hadn’t paid it any mind beforehand, but listening more intently now, she silently fought to keep herself from weeping as the music played.

After my picture fades and darkness has turned to gray.

Watching through windows, you’re wondering if I’m okay.

Secrets stolen from deep inside,

The drum beat’s out of time.

If you’re lost, you can look, and you will find me,

Time after time.

If you fall I will catch you, I’ll be waiting,

Time after time.

What would’ve been otherwise described as a cheesy song by her was genuinely moving her, thinking of Asriel and whether or not he’d always be there waiting for her, whether she herself was worthy of being caught in a fall, or if it were better for her to just hit the ground.

And so moved the volume dial, or so it seemed, as the door to the kitchen flew open as QC came out with two steaming trays of fresh food. “Holiday family, pipin’ hot, comin’ through!” She announced, setting the two trays down in front of the two deer.

The food was simply scrumptious-looking, as was expected from QC’s; it was as if it were straight out of a Studio Ghibli film. Rudy’s dish was the first to be set down, and the Breakfast Special sure as hell lived up to its name. A plate of the fluffiest, softest-looking waffles, adorned with melty butter, a drizzle of caramel, and one delectably crispy fried egg on top. Two long, fatty strips of bacon, cooked to a crunchy delight. A bowl of soup on the side, a positively piping-hot chowder. And for the coupe-de-gras, a milkshake on the side, loaded with a finely blended coffee ice cream to a soft, flowy consistency, with a hearty drizzle of hot chocolate fudge layered atop a dollop of soft whipped topping, crowned with a single red cherry at the peak.

Dess’ own meal was nothing to sneeze at, either. A stack of buttermilk pancakes, somehow even softer and fluffier than even Rudy’s waffles, with fresh Vermont maple syrup dripping down the sides, the whipped butter at the top slowly melting down in with the slow flow. The omelet, tucked over on the side, was a gooey delight; crispy egg on the outside, but visibly soft on the inside, melty cheese oozing out from the sides, and the internal accouterments visible from the exterior: green pepper, onion, ham, bacon, and chives. And of course, on the side of her tray, a tall, imposing glass of the frothiest chocolate milk she had ever seen.

With it all in front of her, it was like staring through a window into the past. Warm, tender memories flooded her mind once more, of Noelle and her splitting a meal together on a cold winter’s day, her parents sat across from them, smiling happily as they themselves ate.

She absentmindedly thanked QC for bringing out the food, but was so captured and enraptured by her nostalgia that she couldn’t be bothered to hear what she said. Taking her fork and knife, she delicately cut off a slice of one of her pancakes, smothered it in syrup, and then slowly popped it in her mouth.

It wasn’t merely like heaven, it simply was.

…

With the last slice of her omelet being washed down with the dregs of her chocolate milk, Dess set her fork and knife back down atop her now-cleared plate. It was funny how the overwhelming memory of the past had also brought back her appetite; ironic for her being a pothead, but she really hadn’t been eating much as of late. One, maybe two smaller meals a day, but that was about it. Food hadn’t really been of much interest to her, although until recently, it felt like not much in life was, either.

But like the rekindled inferno that was her love of music, so too had her appetite been reignited at the sight of QC’s cooking.

Rudy could clearly see that Dess was in much more elevated spirits after such a large and tasty meal; they had eaten together in silence, relaxing to the soft sound of 80s music echoing from the kitchen as they finished their meals. After paying off the check QC had left them, he slowly nursed the last of his milkshake, hoping to touch base with his daughter once more. “Feeling better with all that food in ya, Dess?”

She kept mum for a moment, before nodding back. “I suppose so… heh, so much for me being well-put-together, huh?”

“Ah, it’s alright,” he assuaged. “I told ya, I know how you are. As long as you’re feeling better now, that’s all that matters

She nodded affirmatively; there was still a nagging thought or two festering in her mind, there always was, but the food really did help some.

Rudy continued, taking a sip before speaking. “So, everything else is all good with the college stuff?”

“Yeah, I just need to get that portfolio then and submit my transcript. I should have that all wrapped up by the end of next week, hopefully.”

Rudy nodded, before a thought caught his mind. “Your grades are good enough, right?”

Those festering thoughts in the back of Dess’ mind reared their ugly head. “That’s actually the one thing that’s been eating at my mind as of late,” she confessed. “Gerson keeps telling me that what I have is good enough, and that worst-case scenario I have time to pull them up some more, but I still have this nagging feeling that my GPA and test scores are gonna be the snagging point. They weren’t good enough for the Air Force, so… who knows….”

Rudy tried to offer her some words of comfort, although he realized there wasn’t much he could say; Dess’ grades really hadn’t been anything to sneeze at, especially with how little she tried. Before he could even offer something, though, she laughed at herself and continued.

“But I shouldn’t worry!” she said, stuffing her concerns down deep in her soul. “If Gerson says I’m good, then I’m totally good. He’d never have a reason to lie to me! And if all else fails, I’ll still have my safety school in Belford to fall back on, and lemme tell you, they’ll take anyone there from the sound of things.”

She went full giggle-girl for a moment, her hands twitching as she leaned forward on the table.

“And hey! If I can’t get into there, then I might as well kill myself, since I’d clearly never be going anywhere! Fa ha hah! Ha… hah….”

Her manic fit was nipped in the bud as her father took hold of her hands, squeezing them tightly as a ghastly expression crept up on his face. There was fear in his eyes.

Staring deep into his gaze, then gazing down at her own hands, she looked down in disgust, before retracting her hands and sticking them in her pockets. “I’m sorry,” she muttered, letting off a light chuckle and weak smile as she continued. “Fuck… even at my best, I’m still just… a total wreck….”

She looked back up at her father, concern still resting on his face.

“For the record,” she added, “I was being hyperbolic there. I guess that was just… really bad taste.”

“Agreed.” Rudy’s voice, usually so full of energy, was dry and flat as he took one last sip from his milkshake, swirling the straw to suck up the dregs. “You know, Dess, I know that the last time you were on the meds didn’t go so well-”

“Dad.” She cut him off with a terse, rigid voice. “I’m fine. I’m safe. I… I’m sorry, you know how I feel about that, after the lamotrigine.”

He held his tongue, again, really wishing he could muster up the strength to push back, but didn’t wish to cause a scene. She really was just like her mother. “Okay, Dess. I’ll drop it.” Pushing aside his shake, he eased himself up from the table, hoping to maybe renew the discussion in a more private setting, although a part of him knew deep down that it wouldn’t ever happen. “Alright, then. Ready?”

Dess didn’t need a second mention to get moving, and slid out of her booth in a flash. “I’m thinking after we get back home I’ll start recording, if that’s okay with you,” she said, her mood already swinging back like a pendulum. “I already have a list of everything compiled and all the sheet music printed and prepped, just need to get it on disc to send out in the portfolio.” She turned back and waved at the purple rabbit, who was pouring coffee for a rabbit monster. “Thanks again, QC!”

“Aw, anytime, hon!” she answered back as Dess and Rudy went out the door.

…

As they exited QC’s Diner, the harmonious ringing of church bells filled the air around Hometown, creating an ethereal sense of placelessness as the pair walked down the sidewalk.

“Huh, Church must’ve just gotten out,” Dess dryly commentated, none too taken by the public display of religiosity. Yet all the same, as much as she hated to admit it, there was a sense of comfort that came with the bells, as if a part of her knew something, or someone, was tied to their presence.

A voice rang out from across the street, as if on cue: “Hey, Dess!”

She turned, instantly knowing who it was. Running down the opposite sidewalk, Asriel darted across the road, his purple choir robes flowing behind him as he ran up. “Nice seeing you so early! You’re usually dead until one!” His loving gaze shifted, and morphed into a merely friendly one as he noticed Rudy right beside her. “O-oh! Hey, Rudy! Didn’t see you at service today!”

The elder buck chuckled, a warm smile on his face. “Yeah, I was taking Dess out to breakfast, her treat for applying to art school! Hoping the choir sounded good without Noelle there.”

“Oh yeah, she’s a prodigy! She’s one of the best voices I’ve ever heard… almost.” He gave Dess a wink with that last mention. “Of course, nobody sounds better than you, Dess.”

That final bit was definitely hammed up with the lovey-doveyness, but that was Asriel’s love language, wasn’t it? She gave her dad a glance, who responded with a knowing wink.

He loves you.

Asriel continued on, swaying back and forth with hands behind his back like he was an anime schoolgirl proposing to a lover. “Hey, so this may be a crazy question, but since you’re up so early… maybe we could take the noon train down to Port Town after I get changed out of these robes, check out the record store you like down there. How about it, De-”

Before he could finish asking, Dess slid in up to him and kissed him right on the lips, practically swooning the both of them as Rudy cackled in the background. “Easy there, now!” he playfully jabbed.

Pulling away, her arms wrapped around Asriel’s heavy robes, Dess let off an amorous chuckle as she flipped her hair out of her face. Screw her plans for recording, that could wait until tomorrow.

“I’d love that, Azzy,” she said tenderly. “I’d love that a whole lot.”

Chapter Text

Another week passed by, and Dess’ portfolio was slowly coming together. Hours upon hours worth of demo tapes would lay strewn about her bedroom by the weekend, crafted from sweat and tears, but for once, no blood; her knife lay tucked away in her jacket pocket, despite all the stress.

Come that Sunday morning, as the leaves were truly starting to turn a brilliant orange as the Festival drew ever nearer, her work was all that Dess could obsess over as she hunched over the piano deep within the confines of her house, alone with only her own company. It had been her whole life in this manic burst of hers; guitar, then piano, then singing some overdubs, then editing and splicing, and then back to the guitar. She could feel her brain begin to fry like an egg, lathered in the burning oil of burnout, yet she still pressed on; she feared that if she took a break for even a second, she would lose her entire spark, her entire sense of purpose, and end up with all of her hard work falling abandoned to the wayside.

No, she couldn’t let that happen. She’d rather kill herself than let that happen.

Strewn about her feet were wires and microphones, angled ever so precisely to capture the ideal angles for sound, and feeding through splitters into a single portable cassette recorder, her preferred method of sound production; there was something about the analog process that just tickled her. At the very least, the interest drew away from her stress, since failure was the greatest killer of her drive. She had been working her body over the grand for the past hour, having gone from tickling the ivories to demanding they work to her whim. She needed to nail this attempt.

Taking a deep breath, she pressed “record” on the tape machine, which whirred to life as the spool began to turn, advancing the audio tape as it ran by the play and record heads. Making sure to take one last glance around to make sure the microphones were really set up right this time, she exhaled, and turned towards the piano, a microphone aimed right towards her face.

“Alright, this is take twelve of ‘Don’t Forget,’” she said with soft exasperation into the mic. “Take twelve.”

She could feel her hands tremble as they hung precariously above the keys, terrified of starting off with a wrong note again, or even worse, flubbing right at the end. Breathing in deep to steady herself, she felt her shaking subside, and an eerie sense of calm washed over her.

She was ready.

Gently pressing down to ring out the opening chord of her song, she let her angelic voice flow softly from her lips once more as the equally heavenly sound of keys echoed out of the white concert grand, the lullaby wrapping lovingly around her:

“When the light is running low

And the shadows start to grow

And the places that you know

Seem like fantasy

There's a light inside your soul

That’s still shining in the cold

With the truth

The promise in our hearts

“Don't forget,

I'm with you in the dark.

“My soul may be falling dim

And your life’s becoming grim

But remembering this hymn

Fills you with the power

Determination burns bright

It will be your guiding light

With the love

The promise in my heart

“Don’t forget,

I’m with you in the dark.

“It is now my final hour

My dust floats down from the tower

To fill your soul with the power

To stay in the fray

You will win the final fight

And your soul will light the night

With my love

The promise fills your heart

“Don’t forget,

I’m with you in the dark.

“Don’t forget…

I’m with you in the dark….”

As she gently lifted her hands from the piano and let the room fall into silence once more, she heard sniffling back near the entryway to the kitchen. Turning her head to catch a glimpse, her face lit up to see who was there.

“I snuck in to see how you were doing,” Asriel mumbled, teary-eyed and smiling. “I didn’t know you were in the middle of recording, so sorry to interrupt, it’s just….”

He fully broke down crying there in the kitchen, leading Dess to hastily stop her recording and rush over as her boyfriend fell to his knees on the tile floor. “Are you okay, Azzy?” she called.

“Yeah, you’re just beautiful, is all,” he managed to murmur, his voice all warbled as he tried to regain composure. “I mean, your piano… voice… all of it, those lyrics.”

Wiping Asriel’s tears from his face, Dess couldn’t help herself but beam at the complement. Clearly this last take had finally landed for her. “Thank you, Az.” She kissed him on the forehead, all the while toying around his hair with her finger. “It’s a lullaby I used to sing to Noelle when she was younger and scared of the dark. Well, the first verse, anyway; I just wrote the latter two.”

Sniffling the last of his tears, his nose a runny mess, Azzy gave off a light, girlish giggle. “They’re all beautiful, Dess. It honestly makes the first verse even more beautiful, if you ask me. It’s just so hauntingly dark, yet… loving….”

He sniffled some more, still clearly moved by the performance. “You’ll have to play that and some of your other stuff for me again at some point,” he added. “I’d love to cry like that up against your shoulder, or with my head in my lap, or-”

“Fa ha ha! Okay I get the picture, Loverboy!” Dess exclaimed, snapping him out of his crying and making him turn beet red instead on the beat. “You can do whatever you want with your head in my lap later… but if you’re so interested, I still have some demo tapes upstairs that I haven’t transferred yet. Wanna maybe… hop in bed and take a listen?”

The last of his tears wiped away, Azzy eased himself up to his feet with Dess’ help. “Yeah, sure! I’d love to!” He completely missed the hint, but Dess seemed to miss that fact as well as they began making their way away from the piano.

“It’s nice seeing you again, Dess, it’s felt like forever, even if it’s just been a week,” Azzy admitted as held open the door leading out of the kitchen. “And so happy, too!”

“Yeah, sorry I’ve been so absent,” Dess addressed. “I’ve just been so busy holed up in here working on my music and… heh, stress relief, I suppose, that I must’ve lost track of time.” She paused on the stairs and turned to face her boyfriend, fire in her eyes. “I betcha really missed me, huh?”

“Actually, I’ve been keeping myself busy, too,” Asriel confessed, completely missing the giant flashing hints in front of him. “Lots of schoolwork, some volunteering at the soup kitchen, cross-country practice… oh! And I’m also helping to set up for the Festival next weekend!”

Dess just stood there, taken out of her amorous mood somewhat. Did he… really not miss her presence? Her BODY?? Was he really this daft??? “Hah… oh, nice. I mean, good for you!” she shifted through gritted teeth. “That’s great, y’know, you’re doing good work!”

Azzy beamed at the acknowledgement, but Dess was quietly grumbling to herself over the whole conversation. Silently, she trudged up the last of the stairs, Azzy right behind her, and ushered him into her room.

Shutting the door behind them, the dark, musty space was only illuminated by a dim light and the faint glow of her sticker stars on the wall. The entire space reeked of girlstink, weed, and some third, wholly undefined smell that Azzy could only clock as skunk spray. Clothes, tapes, empty pizza boxes, and CDs lay strewn about the entire space.

“Damn, Dess, this is…” He desperately tried to find a complimentary word, but simply couldn’t. “...suffocating.”

“Yeah, I’ve just been stewing in here the entire past week,” she admitted. “Honestly, I’m glad you came, my brain’s been all fogged up trying to work as of late. Lemme tell ya, all that ‘me’ time does not bode well for the psyche.”

“Whadda ya mean?”

She shuffled her feet and looked down. “Let’s just say it’s a miracle my wrists aren’t in tatters, FAH!” Patting her breast pocket, she let off a manic little giggle. “Yeah, the ol’ girl’s been kept safely tucked in here this entire time.”

“...Well, then. Glad to hear that… erm… you’re at least staying safe!” Asriel nervously said, darting his eyes around uncertainly as Dess watched on with an energetic grin. “So… any… uh… anything you have that you want me to listen to?”

“Yeah, I’d like to hear your opinion, actually,” Dess confided, although a little upset that he’d steered the conversation so quickly back to music. “I have some finished and near-finished demos on tape, right over here.” She gestured to an organized mess of tapes stacked in a pile next to an old machine. “Lemme tell you, it took forever to get all of this assembled.”

Asriel looked on, a dumb expression on his face as he tried to process that one word. “Assembled?”

“Oh, yeah, I’m doing everything by piecemeal,” Dess said as she pulled a list out from her desk, handing it over. “Basically I only really have myself to work with on all of this, so in order to get more than one instrument and some vocals on a track, I have to dub everything on this cassette mixer here.” She banged on a girthy piece of kit she’d pulled out from beneath her bed, probably some time last week. “Basically gets everything down into two stereo channels. And that list is for all the tracks and respective takes I plan on using. That take of ‘Don’t Forget,’ for instance, I already have the guitar portion for the latter half all set out. Just need to mix that cassette with this one, and it’ll be all set to go!”

Looking up and down the list, seeing the hasty circling, frantic crosses, and manic scrawlings down throughout, Asriel wasn’t sure whether or not he was more impressed or scared by his girlfriend’s work. “W-wow!” he finally stammered out. “That sure is a lot…”

“I know!” Dess said, nearly shouting with how amped she was.

“But… are you sure you really need to be doing all of this?” He could already see her mood turn sour. “I mean, don’t get me wrong, I’m impressed by your work ethic, it’s just… the pure simplicity of hearing you sing, whether on your own or with a guitar or piano, it’s magical! I just worry you’re doing too much-”

Dess scoffed and cut him off. “Oh, ‘too much!’ Like I haven’t done enough! What would make you think this is too much? You haven’t even heard any of it yet!”

Taking a tape out of a case with “All Night Forever” scrawled on the J-card, she waved it in front of Azzy’s face. “This is what I’m talking about, Az. You’ll see my vision once you hear it, I guarantee it!” She finished with a voice laden with the faux-machismo of an old football star, and with a gleeful smile, popped the tape into the cassette deck before pressing play, the ancient mechanism whirring to life.

The cacophony of sound came in midway through the song; Dess had evidently been listening to it before. A mess of synth and a drum machine lay playing underneath and out of sync with a much louder, more prevalent lead guitar, and of course, her own vocals, which rang out singing.

“Now that you’re here in my arms tonight,

Eternity doesn’t seem so long to me

Because it’s all night forever

With you, tonight

Forever and ever and ever and ever, it’s all night!”

Asriel tried nodding along to the music as best as he could. In truth, there was a lot of it that he liked. As expected, Dess’ vocals were on point; her hauntingly beautiful voice rang out on the tape, elevated over all else, happier than he had ever heard her sing. Lyrically it was also sound, although he merely caught the outro portion, and had no idea if Dess even wrote them. The guitar work, as per usual, was also top-notch, with Dess hitting all of the notes wonderfully.

That’s about where the compliments ended, though.

“Hey, uh… Dess?” Asriel was timid in his phrasing. “I don’t mean to rub you the wrong way, but… don’t you think it’d sound better if it were, I dunno… just you and one of the instruments playing?”

She paused the tape, and turned over towards him with a frown. “Did you really not like all of that?”

“To be honest, it sounded less ‘punk rock’ and more ‘garage synth pop,’ which I don’t know if it was your intention, but a lot of it is just… off.” Asriel nervously rubbed his hands together as he delivered his criticism, which he hoped would be constructive. “Literally, I mean, the synth is out of sync with the guitar and drums, and if we’re talking about it, I’m not exactly a fan of those presets, either. What samples did you use?”

The doe looked at him like he had two heads. “Samples? I just used the default synth and kit presets on my program.”

Ah. Well, there’s her problem. “Look, the song is good, Dess, really good! The lyrics, singing, and guitar, all great! And those are your strengths, y’know. Your voice, the piano, and guitar. Sound mixing and all that just isn’t your thing, but that’s okay! Just submit your bare demos to admissions, and use a real piano instead of synth, and I think there’s a good shot you’ll get in on that alone!”

“But do you really think that’s enough?” she answered back. Asriel nearly responded, but Dess snatched her fist shut in a sweeping motion; she didn’t care to be told otherwise by him. “How many basic white girls are gonna be submitting demos of themselves playing piano or guitar and singing some mopey lullaby? Too many! I need to stand out!”

Asriel raised a finger in objection. “Okay, first of all, you’re not white; you’re a monster, not human.”

“You get what I mean.” Dess said, all huffy.

“Fine, fair enough, Carol’s vibes are pretty WASP-y anyway. But second, you do stand out, Dess, because you’re really, really good at this! I can’t emphasize it enough, you’re easily the best singer and musician in Hometown, or frankly this entire corner of Maine! You already sound like you’re a professional, I’ve heard you in person, you just need to do what’s easiest for you, and these people are sure to recognize it, too!”

Messing up her hair in a clenched scrunch, she just shook her head, her soul necklace swaying back and forth. “Azzy, I’m not looking to get in the ‘easy way,’ I want to flex my talents! I don’t want to get in on some cheap trick that bypasses the struggles of others!”

“Wha… what are you talking about, Dess?”

She paused for a moment to ponder. “Uh… well… okay, now that I said it aloud, it doesn’t make much sense, but believe me, the little voice of self-doubt in my head tells me it’s a good idea.”

“Wait, the voice…?”

“HAHAHA, just kidding!” Dess frantically shouted, her body twitching and trembling without control. “Now, ya want something else is what I’m hearing?”

“Uhh… yeah, I would, actually.” Asriel looked on at his manic girlfriend with concern as she rifled through tapes. “Hey, Dess, are you alri-”

Cutting him off, she began to list off titles. “Lemme see here, I have a few… ‘Raise Up Your Bat,’ ‘The World Turns Without Us,’ ‘Black Knife…’ that last one’s an instrumental. And… aha!”

She flashed another cassette and popped it in the tape deck. “Here’s one you oughta like!” There was a strange spasm of techno sound, before a guitar strum and out-of-sync drum beat lead into the lyrics.

“Out where the river winds

The maple and the Mainer Pine

Metal wrecks and lumber diesels

Come to take our grand old trees

“The time has come

To say what's fair

To keep the rent

To hold our share.”

Asriel shut off the player himself this time. “Dess, besides the other issues, with you and the song, that’s just ‘Beds Are Burning’ by Midnight Oil with your own lyrics imposed over it…”

She looked at him flatly. “Yeah, duh! So?”

“After that incident? With The Doors?”

Dess froze for a moment, before slowly nodding in acknowledgement. “Okay, yeah… fair. It’s a bit too derivative. I don’t think it’s that bad this time, but… fine, I’ll find something else for you.”

Fumbling through her tapes, she yet again pulled out another, this one with some foreign language scrawled out on the j-card.

“Here we go!” Dess exclaimed, her voice now audibly exasperated. “No lyric changes, and only minimal track sync. Piano and guitar only.”

She once again inserted the tape, with Asriel just sitting there on the bed wondering what she’d pull out this time. The music that came out had better sync, admittedly; the paired down instruments made it decently hard to fuck up. Yet, there was another issue that caught Azzy’s ear whilst listening to the triumphant tune.

“…unsres Volks in dir vereint,

wirst du Rheinlands neues Leben.

Und die Sonne schön wie nie

Über Rheinland scheint,

Über Rheinland scheint!!!”

Asriel was just flat-out dumbfounded. “You… you sang over a guitar cover of the Ostrheinland national anthem???”

Dess was flat in her reply. “Yeah. So what?”

“I… uh… whatever.” He wasn’t even going to bother fighting this one; Dess would probably throw a fit if he didn’t hold his tongue on this one. “Sync still is slightly off, anyway. What else do you have?”

“Well, I still have a demo tape here,” she flashed, pulling it from her right breast pocket. “It’s just guitar and vocals to my own lyrics, haven’t gone and edited it any yet.”

Excited to finally have something, Azzy rushed to snatch the tape and pop it in the tape player. “Perfect!” he exclaimed. “See, this is the type of thing that’s your strong suit! Writing, singing, playing! That’s all you need, no need to overthink things!” He pressed play.

Like the first song Dess played for Azzy, it came in midway through, roaring guitar shredding out of the speakers as Dess’ inflamed punk voice echoed from the player, shout-singing from the deepest, dimmest recesses of her heart and soul.

“The darkness must consume the Earth

A Roaring storm, a just rebirth

A purge of those whose hearts lack worth:

Conservatives of moral dearth

“The priestess makes her body bare

Likewise myself, in love we share

Two dykes as one, hands through our hair

The bodies join, eternal pair

“The Roaring Knight, darkness our vow

The world our sacrificial cow

She is the past, future, and now

We are the god, the Überfrau!!!”

The lyrics gave way to a bone-crushing guitar solo, one that physically shook the speakers as it played. Turning off the machine, Dess turned to Asriel and looked for their reaction. “Well? Whadda ya think of that?”

Words escaped Asriel’s grasp; what he had just heard was clearly beyond such a thing. Even so, he tried to let something stumble out. “Well…” he trepidatiously began, “you definitely nailed down the sound perfectly, I’ll say that. It’s just…” He bit his hand as he slowly continued. “...I worry the lyrics may be a little… much.”

Dess stared at him flatly, but he swore he could hear a string snap inside of her. “What… what do you mean?”

“I mean, I’m not saying I disagree with the lyrics for the most part, maybe a bit violent and apocalyptic for my taste, but I’m not a liberal. It’s just… aren’t you worried that you’re gonna hurt your chances of getting into somewhere with such politically charged material?"

She stared at him incredulously. “Do you seriously have a problem with my lyrics?”

“No, not at all! I’m saying this pragmatically, Dess. Both this and the Ostrheinland anthem are probably gonna ruffle some feathers at admissions. I mean, we’ve both commiserated about how stringent they are with us monster candidates, don’t give them any ammunition to use against you is all I’m saying.”

She just couldn’t believe it. “But… it’s art school, Azzy,” she nervously chuckled. “They’ll love my left-wing lyrics, I’m sure of it!”
“Dess, they’re all still very much establishment institutions,” Asriel replied. “Left-leaning, maybe, but definitely not left wing like we are! Anything too controversial, they’re not gonna wanna touch it with a ten-foot pole. Plus, I don’t know how well calling yourself an ‘Überfrau’ is going to go regardless, feels like a politically charged word on the other end of the spectrum.”

“Pfft, like any of that’ll be a problem,” Dess retorted, now fully in denial over what her boyfriend was saying. “The music is too banging to hate, Az, no way in hell will they be able to reject me with those sick beats!”

“If you keep overediting your demos, they sure as hell are!” Azzy’s voice began to pick up some heat. “I swear, you just don’t know when enough’s enough! Are you having another manic episode or something?”

“SHUT UP!” she fired. “I’m normal, I’m… hahah! I’m sane!!!” Dess nervously twitched as she forced a grin. “Look, I’m not gonna compromise my artistic vision. End of argument, it’s gonna work out! I know what I’m doing… I think….”

That self-doubt, ever present and creeping in the recesses of Dess’ mind, finally reared its ugly head. “Why… why do you have to do this to me?”

Asriel was just confused. “Huh?”

“Why’d you have to tell me off like that?!” she screamed. “WHY??? I shared all of that in confidence, and you tear me to shreds! WHY?!?!”

“Ah- are you kidding me?!” Azzy could feel something within him begin to unwind. “Dess, you asked me what I thought of the music, for constructive criticism! I gave you that!”
“I didn’t actually mean that!” she whined. “I needed my ego stroked, a real pick-me-up, and you didn’t give me that!”

“Then WHY didn’t you just say so?!?!” Asriel, fully exasperated now, teed off on her. “Angel, you are such a petulant child at times, I swear! Worst socialist I ever damn met!”

“The only socialist, dummkopf!” Dess angrily corrected through gritted teeth. “And how the hell do you know what a good one is?”

“Oh, you want a fucking list?!” Azzy was no longer held back by prudish inhibitions with his language. “Lemme make you a fucking list! All you do is write blood and guts lyrics, about how you wanna lead a revolution against the establishment and take no prisoners or die trying. That’s all you do, and you never, ever back it up! I bet you won’t even volunteer at the food bank with me later today!”

“Well that’s because the FRN-”

“Ooh! Because the FRN has their hands in the distribution system and shows anti-monster bias!” Azzy mocked. “Have you ever considered that it’s better for some of the poor to eat than none at all?! That an imperfect or deliberately flawed system is better than nothing?!?! It’s not that you even fail to recognize that, I’m sure you’re not stupid, you’re just so damn headstrong, you think the only two political positions are ‘yours’ and ‘wrong!’”

“I swear!” she shouted. “Do you want me to be miserable hearing all of your backtalk?! Do you want me to kill myself?! Honestly, I’ll do it! I’ll even go and kill the President! How about that?!?!”

“Holy shit, if you keep talking about death like that, I’m gonna fucking kick in your face!” he bellowed in a moment of weakness. “Please stop, for the love of the Angel! If you wanna do good, you have to be alive, for crying out loud! Enough with the martyrdom talk!”

“Well have you considered that maybe I’d want to have my face kicked in?!” she moaned, deliberately. “Maybe I felt glooby today and invited you up here to soothe-say my worries away and violently fuck away my anxiety, but that clearly hasn’t happened, now has it?!”

Taken off-guard, Asriel blushed profusely at the comment all tsundere-like, huffing angrily as he did so. He only just connected the prior dots now that it was spelled out for him. “W-well, you already know my answer to that! No way in hell am I fucking you after today, or anytime soon! You know I wanna wait until marriage!”

“Fuck you, ya damn puritan! Let me play the fucking whore for once, dammit!”

“You’ve been saying that since you were fifteen!” Asriel grumbled, his body quaking as much as Dess was. “And that’s the thing, through all this time, you haven’t changed! Just a stagnant state of arrested development for you, never changing, never improving, just wallowing in the depths of your mania, refusing to ever get help!”

He was now fully grandstanding in front of her. “You could do anything, ANYTHING! Become a politician and join the Central Diet as a member of the Socialist party, go out and actually protest in a major city like Megalopolis, join a socialist special interest group, hell, become a terrorist! Fucking hell, you could grow a pair and set off a bomb in the middle of the capital and it’d be more impactful than what you actually do on a day-to-day basis. But you don’t! You don’t do anything because it’s ‘too risky’ or ‘self-defeating’ or ‘a band-aid measure’ or ‘goes against your values,’ which is a stupid thing anyway since it seems like everything is against your values! Anything except the stuff you like to do, lazing about at home and mooching off of Carol while you go off and smoke weed and complain about the world. At least I go out and do community outreach to try and better it, even if it isn’t perfect! WHAT DO YOU DO?!”

She held pause, her sense of self critically wounded by the barrage, her whole worldview hanging on by a thread.

“At least I’m not a filthy fucking consumerist,” Dess finally shot back, weakly, unable to think of anything deeper to cut with.

“Consumerist? ME??? I’m the consumerist?!” Azzy had finally boiled over, a rarity for him. “Oh, somebody call Madonna, because I’m standing in front of a Material Girl! Need I remind you that you purchased full uniform sets for TWO Northamer Baseball League teams?? TWO?!?!”

Dess’ voice billowed like a raging inferno. “THAT WAS A MANIC SPREE, AZ, AND YOU FUCKING KNOW IT!!!”

“Oh, yeah, sure, let’s blame the mania, LIKE YOU ALWAYS DO!” Azzy shot back. “Mania didn’t make you pull for both the Megalopolis Highlanders and Mont Noble Alouettes, YOU made that choice! You could stop following one, heck, stop following both teams, any time you want, but nooooo, you can’t even do that! I at least had the decency to stop pulling for the Bay City Redshirts when they got bought out by that royalist sovereign wealth fund! What’s stopping you?!”

“Baseball’s my addiction, Az!” she fired back. “Black people have crack, and I have-”

“YOU’RE COMPARING THE PLIGHT OF INNER CITY CRACK ADDICTION TO MOTHERFUCKING BASEBALL?!?!?!” Asriel was frothing at the mouth. “And assuming they’re all black?! You’re a bad socialist and a RACIST!!”

“Go fuck yourself!”

“SOD OFF WITH THAT!”

“SUCK MY MOTHERFUCKING CLIT, YOU ANGEL-BE-DAMNED BLONDE SON OF A BITCH!!!”

A third, mocking voice rang out and cut through the shouting. “Azzy’s a SOCIALIST?!?!”

Completely sucked out of his rage, fear gripped Asriel as he nearly jumped out of his fur, nearly knocking himself and Dess over in the panic. “GAH! Kris, when did you get here?!”

They stood grinning right in the now-open doorway, with Noelle by their side gripping their arm tightly, the blonde clearly shook having witnessed the pair fighting.

“Just now,” they replied, clearly lying. “Was just coming in to hang with Noelle, she scraped her knee. What’re you doing?”

Still holding tightly to Kris’ arm, she then spoke up herself, in a hushed tone. “Dess, is everything okay?”

With the sudden shock now wearing off, the both of them stared back at each other, feeling themselves cool down, although the animosity was still there. “Yeah, yeah, we’re fine,” Dess assuaged. “Just a little spat, is all, normal couple stuff.”

“Pfft, ‘normal,’” Asriel fired back.

“Dude, shut up!” she whispered through gritted teeth. “Not in front of her, okay?”

“And Kris, too.”

“And them as well, fine.” Groaning, Dess buried her face in her cupped hands and silently screamed to herself. “I’m sorry, Azzy,” she finally sputtered out.

Asriel nearly fired off another sarcastic remark, but kept his tongue held. “I’m sorry, too.” It only felt right to shoulder the blame as well, even if the reply was just as cold as hers.

Turning back towards his younger sibling, Azzy then walked up out of Dess’ room and put on an extremely serious face. “Kris, listen to me,” he demanded. “Don’t tell anybody that I’m a socialist. Not even as a funny ha-ha prank of yours, I would die if mom and dad found out. Capiche?”

Kris nodded silently, a grin on their face. In a moment of weakness, Azzy took hold of them by the collar. “I’m serious,” he whispered, wiping the smile off of them. “Not. A. Peep. Or else….”

“Azzy…” Dess placed a hand on his shoulder. No words had to be spoken, but that was enough to snap Asriel back. He let go of the shirt and turned towards the stairwell.

“I have to go,” Azzy dryly told the trio, before aiming his words at Dess. “Like I said, I have to go volunteer at the food bank, like a good socialist.” He went downstairs with Dess trailing behind, opened the door, and stepped out. “See y’all later. And Kris,” he said, staring daggers at their sibling, “keep quiet about this.”

Kris nodded as he turned away, walking off and disappearing around the bend. Dess was equally fed up with everything and moved to high-tail it.

“I’m done,” she announced as she strode out the door, slipping a can of Genny Cream that had been stashed in the drawer of one of the side tables. “Done. With everything. If mom asks where I am, tell that bitch I’m getting crossfaded at the shelter. Peace.”

Shutting the door behind, the elder pair left Kris and Noelle alone in the house, sat aimless atop the near stairwell. They waited a moment, unsure of what to make of what was just said, before Kris finally broke the silence.

“That was… a lot.”

“Yeah,” Noelle reciprocated. “They sure do love to fight.”

“Heh, I know. It’s their love language at this point. They have good patches, like last Sunday, but I swear, it’s just like watching mom and dad all over again.”

Noelle turned her gaze. “They’re really that bad?”

Kris shook their head. “Nah, my parents are definitely worse, although I wouldn’t exactly say those two are ‘healthy’ by any stretch.” Another beat, then Kris spoke again. “Y’know I was gonna play the piano, and I know I don’t usually offer to do this, but… do you wanna listen to me play?”

Noelle felt her heart skip a beat. “Y-yeah, sure, Kris,” she sputtered out. “I’d love to hear you play.”

Slowly making their way down the stairs and through the kitchen, Kris slid into place on the piano bench, Noelle timidly parking herself right beside them, blushing. They’d always been a great piano player, almost as good as her sister was, but it was so extraordinarily rare that they enjoyed the company of others whilst doing so. Usually, they’d demand to be left alone as they played, leaving Noelle to sit on the front room sofa as she listened to music echo out through the vents.

So to be here, right next to her best friend as they played… well, it was certainly playing with her heart some. And with how rare it was for them to be like this, so calm, so tender, so… romantic, almost, she wanted to savor every moment of it.

Gently resting their hands on the keys, fingertips daintily touching, Kris began to play a gentle melody. It was a warm, homely tune that rang out throughout the house as they plodded along, one that seemed to draw out all of the tension in Noelle’s shoulders. Her usually immaculate posture faltering, she slouched over onto Kris’ shoulder and lovingly nestled her head into their sweater as they continued playing, not missing a single beat. It was such a nice contrast to the coldness of the manor, a gentle song fitting for a town like Hometown.

“It’s so nice, hearing you play,” Noelle lazily murmured.

“I’m glad you’re enjoying it.” Their voice was as warm as the music.

“Are you?” she asked.

They took a moment to think as they played. “It’s a nice piano,” Kris replied.

“Well, I’m glad you like it so much!”

“...Must’ve cost a small fortune to have an authentic Steinway concert grand here, huh?”

It was just an off-hand comment, yet that was all it took to fire up Noelle’s nerves. “H-heh, yeah… yeah, it probably did….”

Kris could hear trepidation in her voice, and ceased playing entirely. “Everything okay?” they asked. “Your voice sounded kinda… weird… there.”

“Fah! Of course you know what’s weird!” she bounced back, before sliding down again. “No, it’s just… guilt, I suppose.”

“Guilt?”

“Yeah, guilt.” Noelle snuggled up next to Kris as she mumbled her heart out. “This probably did cost a fortune, and for what? A piano that sits quiet for twenty three hours out of the day? That kind of money could’ve gone to someone in need….”

Kris looked over to her, concern in their eyes. “You’re sounding an awful lot like Dess now, Ellie.”

“And so do you, calling me Ellie! Fah!”

“I’m serious.”

With Kris clearly not backing down, Noelle shrunk back herself. “Yeah, I know, it’s just… she makes me feel awful, the way she talks. I know the hatred isn’t aimed at me, it’s mostly at Carol, and to some degree herself, but it feels like my emotions get caught in the crossfire, y’know. Like… and forgive me if this sounds horribly naive, but… sometimes I wish I were just born a little poorer, y’know, so I wouldn't have all of this guilt stacked onto my head.”

She grimaced, knowing what she just said was indeed a horribly privileged take, but unlike Dess, Kris didn’t lash out, only silently nodding as they turned towards her. There was some level of comfort in their gaze.

“Noelle, we can’t decide where we’re born and who we’re born to,” they said. “I wish I was born an androgynous dog monster, and fucking look at me.”

“Fah!”

“But in all seriousness, you were born into a rich family. So what? Whether or not you’re ‘bourgeoise’ or whatever Dess insists you are, what really matters is your actions. Go into public policy, volunteer somewhere, donate, actively protest, make a difference. There are plenty of people in history who have been born rich, born into nobility, who despite all of that, still did what was best for the common man, monster, and for workers’ rights, whether a big upheaval or small act of kindness.”

They took a hold of Noelle’s delicate hand, making her blush profusely. “And your point?” she murmured.

“My point being, you don’t have to feel guilty about having resources. Your birthright doesn't damn you. You just have to do what’s best with what you’ve got, just like everyone else. It just so happens you’re fortunate enough to have more to give. Dess just has her head too far up her own ass to see that.”

That was enough levity to elicit a chuckle out of the young doe, who cackled at the mental image such a turn of phrase conjured. “Oh, Kris… HA! Err… thanks,” she said through a fit of laughter. “I really needed to hear that.”

“No problem, ‘Elle.”

“It’s funny, really. You’re not usually so… verbose on such subjects,” Noelle mentioned. “Or… or much of anything at all. Where’d you get all of those ideas from, Kris?”

“Azzy’s search history,” they immediately confessed. “He has a bad habit of not clearing it, so I like to browse it from time to time, and a lot of socialist stuff tends to come up.”

“Oh, you DEVIL!”

They grinned maniacally as Noelle gawked at them. “Oh, yeah, I am WICKED! And it’s the funniest thing you ever see! He’ll just bounce around from socialist blogs to random Wikipedia articles to just asking the search engine random-ass questions.” They paused. “A lot of… other stuff, too. I play dumb about it, obviously, can’t let him know that I know. You saw that back there upstairs.”

“Wait, what ‘other stuff?’” Noelle asked.

Kris whispered it into her ear, despite nobody else being near to hear.

“Wait, really?” she sputtered out. “You don’t think he’s…”

“Yeah, probably,” Kris confirmed. “But it’s not my case to press, he needs to figure that out just like I did.”

“Fair enough.”

The pair waited a beat, almost wishing the other would say something to continue, before Kris turned back to the piano to fill the void with music. Not that either of them minded that. The gentle gliding of their hands over the smooth ivory keys, beautiful as it was, soothed Noelle once more, lulling her nearly to sleep. Scooching over closer to their closest friend, she mumbled the last nagging thought in her mind.

“Kris?”

“Yeah?” they said whilst playing.

“Do you still… see Dess as a role model?”

They didn’t take more than a moment to ponder. “I still do,” they admitted. “I see a lot of myself in her. Although… I really do worry for her.”

“Yeah… I hope Dess gets better,” Noelle mumbled, resting her head on their shoulder. “I miss seeing her like she used to be.”

They kept playing their beautiful music, gliding their hands across the ivory surface, but nodded to Noelle’s comment.

“I hope so, too.”

Chapter Text

Autumn had fully settled in for the small town of Hometown, the brilliant leaves now at peak color and starting to fall. The eve of the Festival had come at last, and nearly the whole town was bustling in preparation.

You can probably guess who the exception was.

Quickly shotgunning a can of Genny Cream Ale, Dess crumpled up the empty can in her hands and swiftly binned it in a nearby receptacle, taking care to make sure nobody spotted her; she technically still wasn’t allowed to drink for a couple of months more, although knowing how tightly knit her family was with the police, it wasn’t like she’d face any trouble, anyway.

Despite the grand beauty of the natural scene that came about with peak autumn colors, Dess still felt driven to drink. The Festival was easily one of the most stressful times of year for her, outside of the holidays, of course. The way Hometown came to life was sickeningly saccharine, like it was straight out of an autumn Hallmark movie. Picturesque Northeastern town where some big-city lawyer chick would inevitably fall for some small-town farmer schmuck, a low-life bastard of the land, an occupation lower than the dirt they worked on. Disgusting.

Everyone, besides her, seemed to get wrapped up in this spirit. It was a shame, too, since she’d love to enjoy the beauty of the season in utter placidity. But alas, the foot traffic was a key point of ill for her. So many peering eyes, leering eyes, jeering eyes, it was suffocating. She never liked walking through Hometown much already; at this time of year, it was torturous for a shut-in and outcast like herself. She liked serenity and quiet, but the monsters that came up at this time of year didn’t seem to know those words.

And neither did the humans. Oh, how she detested the humans that came to Hometown this time of year. It was always the worst of their kind that came up, too, so determined to get photos of themselves within the serene beauty of the forests they had likely voted to turn into lumber, the hypocrites they were. Going about treating nature as their landfill, and polluting the minds of impressionable young monsters with self-loathing propaganda pamphlets, either religious or racial in quality. No wonder Kris said they were thankful to be adopted out to the Dreemurrs; the alternative would’ve been so much worse.

She’d already seen a handful today. Some were peacefully conversing with a few of the monsters, they were the “good ones” in Dess’ mind, at least. Yet she’d already seen some grandma try to pass off some pamphlets to a young dog monster, before his mother came and shoo’d away the wretched human. The Festival wasn’t even here yet, and the “festivities” seemed to have already started.

Case in point, as she made her way through town on that bustling Saturday afternoon, trudging down the sidewalk with her bat dragging across the weary concrete slabs, Dess could feel the weight of what seemed like hundreds of eyes gazing out upon her. It felt as if monster and human alike were, for once, unified in something: an abhorrence of her. She could see couples whisper in each other’s ears, hear gaggles of young children gossip amongst themselves, and could feel her heart beat ever quicker.

“Did that freak just come out of a bog?”

“Is that the mayor’s fucked-up kid?”

“I heard she has Chronic Wasting Disease!”

“You can even smell her from here!”

Picking up her pace, she briskly walked out of view, darting down a stray path into the forest and out of sight from the jeering gaze. Leaning up against a tree, she let her heart and breath settle, resolving to continue down to her destination via the back trails.

Indeed, that’s what she usually did; it must’ve been an absent mind that had led her to wander the streets of town just then. She was used to the fact people would stare at her; her dyed, messy hair, her odd gait and hunched posture, the Ostrheinland jacket, and the bat dragging visibly behind her all made her look like the living dead. But despite fully embracing her zombie looks, it still cut her soul deeply to feel so vulnerable, to lack any control over how the others in town saw her. That’s why she hid in the shadows: there was comfort in the darkness.

Feeling herself as steady as she’d get, Dess shook her head, smacked her face to wake herself some more, and strolled down the dirty, leaf-laden forest path she knew like the back of her hand, or rather like the scars on her arm, kept hidden to all but herself under her jacket sleeves. After absent-mindedly continuing down for some while, fortunate enough not to encounter some random tourist group on her walk, she finally reached her destination.

Stepping out from the woods, she was stood right in front of the Church, where a gaggle of middle schoolers were helping Father Alvin to adorn the structure with ribbon and bows, the typical fare one would be hard to miss scattered all across town this time of year. Just emerging from the woods where she did was enough to garner the stares of a few of the kids, which soon grew to include the entire congregation that was there. All except for one.

Noelle, in defiance of her peers, only looked nervously down and away. Dess could barely make her face out from a distance, but swore she could see a mixture of fear and shame laden in her expression.

It pained Dess to see her like this; things hadn’t been exactly right between them ever since that day by the lake, and it felt like things had only grown worse steadily as the weeks had gone by. The fight with Asriel especially seemed to have shaken something within her; they hadn’t spoken in the entire week since. Well, she had made a few attempts at small talk, at least; Noelle hadn’t reciprocated.

She desperately wanted to spend some time with her, and figure out where she went wrong.

Cupping her hands in a funnel to her snout, she called out to her. “Hey, Noelle!” she shouted. “Carol says it’s time for dinner!”

“I’ll be home in a moment!” Noelle called back, still refusing to make eye contact. Dess could hear Catti make some remark to her, and heard Noelle say something back, but couldn’t quite make it out. “Ah, just as soon as we finish these ribbons!” she added.

Fuck, that could be another hour with how big the church is. Dess recognized the fact it was a stall tactic, and frantically fought to come up with a thought at that moment. If she were more patient, she probably would’ve seen Gerson for some advice, but she really wasn’t in the mood. Her soul needed her to have this conversation now.

“Erm… umm… actually, mom said she wanted me to take you home early!” she hollered, making the lie up on the spot. “Yeah, wanted to make sure you got home nice and quick!” It wasn’t true at all; she’d actually have to stall for time to get Noelle back right when Carol wanted, but she was determined to have her moment. “She didn’t want your food cold!”

“But mom likes everything cold!” Noelle protested.

“Yeah, uh, well, therapy’s changed her… or something.” Dess mumbled that last part out loud, suddenly unsure of herself as she was not only caught in a lie, but also struck by her nerves as Alvin parted from the group and approached her. Fuck. The last thing she wanted was to have to converse with anyone else and risk being sent into a nervous tizzy.

“Why, hello, December!” Alvin politely called out. “Wonderful seeing you on such a fine day, is it not?”

“Ohh… hi, Father!” she managed to put out with a tremendously forced smile. “Yeah, great day today. Great, wonderful day, that’s for sure!”

Smiling warmly, he gave her a glance and nodded. “It’s funny, you’re usually never at church except for the big Angel’s Day and Christmas carol performances. And those seem like the days I’d least expect you to attend!”

“Yeah, well… I have my reasons.” She glanced back over at Noelle, who was desperately trying to appear busy with Catti. “I know it makes her happy.”

“Ah, your sister,” Alvin acknowledged. “Yes, she’s definitely one of our best singers in the whole choir, and at such a young age, too! Of course, if you were ever to join back up, I’m certain that your voice would add-”

Dess cut him off. “Yeah, yeah, yeah, look, we don’t need to do this whole runaround again. You know that’s not why I’m here.” She leaned out past Alvin and hollered once more. “HEY, ELLIE! YOU COMING?!?!”

The younger doe shot her a scared look, before falling into Catti’s open embrace.

Alvin lightly chuckled to himself. “Y’know, it’s still quite early, December,” he off-handedly mentioned, hoping to diffuse what had been lit. “I’m sure it’s no big deal if Noelle is a little late for supper. Knowing Carol, anyway, I’d be shocked if she were upset, knowing how pious your mother appears-”

The preacher was cut off by Dess taking ahold of his robes, pulling him in close with her iron grasp.

“Alvin,” she muttered through gritted teeth, her grin caught somewhere between manic and nervous as she clung to the turtle’s robes, staring black knives into his eyes. “I just need some sister time with her, desperately. PLEASE. Don’t. Ruin. This.”

His eyes wide, Alvin stood there petrified for a few moments, before gulping and nodding fervently. “Ah, Noelle?” he called out. “I think it’s best if you head off with your sister. Get going for dinner, and all that. You can help us some more later once you’re all fed, a-heh heh….”

Nervously chuckling, he breathed a sigh of relief as Dess finally let go of him, the rebel marching her way down to the front entrance of the church where Catti was protectively holding her sister’s hand.

“What do you want?” the chubby goth feline demanded, venom in her voice.

Dess was a bit taken aback by the vitriol. “Catti, I just wanna head home with my sister,” she answered, before deliberately chuckling. “You’re talking like I abuse her!”

She continued to laugh, hoping that the pair would, too, only to be met with mean glares from Catti and the other children, and a fearful look from her own sister. With the way she was huddled up next to Catti, she really did look like a battered child, fearful of someone.

And that someone was her.

The pain in Noelle’s eyes hit straight into her heart, her nervous laughter turning positively frightful as panic swept over her. Entire body trembling, she looked down at her bunched hands, and then buried her face into them. She’d never hit Noelle, hell, she never laid hands on anyone! Yet why the hell did she seem so scared of her!!!

Seeing her sister heave, likely on the verge of tears, Noelle finally acquiesced, letting go of her girl friend’s hand. “Fine, Dess,” she flatly answered. “We can go now.”

Pulling her face back up, she looked for reassurance, for any sort of warmth, only to glimpse Noelle’s face as one of unsureness and mild apprehension. One that was tired and weary from just being near to her.

It hurt, yes, but just a little bit less than the outright revulsion Catti had on display. “Noelle, are you sure this is a good idea to-”

“She’s my sister, Catti,” Noelle quickly answered, putting on a plastic smile. “I’ll be fine with her, I, heh…” It faltered. “...I always am….”

The feline shot Dess one last look of disgust, before shifting warmly back to Noelle. “Okay, then. See you later.” She went back to tie ribbons with the other children, leaving the two sisters standing by themselves in front of the Church, aimless.

“...Sooo…” Dess started, looking for anything to start a conversation with, but was interrupted by Noelle steaming off, grabbing her bag and making a beeline towards the trail Dess emerged from. “Let’s just go,” she coldly said; she knew well enough that Dess wasn’t going to wanna walk out about the town and would prefer the back trails, anyway.

Dess raised a finger and opened her mouth to speak, but words failed to come out. Her heart in her throat, she swallowed her sadness and ran off to follow along, the pair slinking off into the woods as Alvin and the other children watched along.

After walking for a good few paces, now definitively out of sight and earshot from the others, Dess broke the placidity of crunching leaves in the amber autumn landscape by speaking. “Hey, so… how’s the festival setup going? Looked like you guys were all busy back there?” It was a pathetic excuse for small-talk, but it was somewhere to start.

“Fine,” Noelle tersely replied as she trudged along, leaves crackling under hoof. “We had just finished decorating the town hall, and were moving on adorning the church with ribbon and the like.”

“Ah, cool, cool.” Dess nodded along, realizing that she’d already worn the subject thin. “And, um… how’s school?

“Good too. Grades are fine, I got an A on my last history test, all’s well.” She was even more laconic with her second response, her brow now visibly furrowing.

This was a problem for Dess, who, frankly, had no idea how to intentionally make small talk. She sucked with this kind of social stuff. Desperately searching for anything to talk about, anything morphed into anyone. “Saw you were talking to Catti there,” she said, desperately trying to maintain an aura of coolness to her.

“Yeah, she’s a great friend.” Nothing to work with was given, but Dess was desperate to force something, to put her reckoning off even further.

“Just a good friend of yours? Or is she more than just a girl friend, if you know what I mean. Drop the space, wink wink nudge nudge-”

Noelle suddenly stopped in her tracks, heel-turned back to face her sister, and stared her right in the face. “Alright, cut the crap!” she blurted out. “Something’s clearly up with you, Dess, you're never weird like this! What is it, then?!”

Dess could feel her hands tremble. Noelle was never this accusatory or angry, not with anyone! Did… did she do something???

“Heh, uhh… nothing! Nothing’s wrong, ‘Elle!” she lied. “Let’s just get back home, mom’s probably waiting for us!”

“You almost never call her ‘mom!’” Noelle poked. “I bet she didn’t even call for me to come back in the first place, did she?” Dess sheepishly gulped at the accusation. “You clearly made that up! Why?!”

She was at a complete loss for words.

“Well?! Spit it out!”

Taking a deep breath of crisp air, desperately trying to center herself, Dess reached down towards her heart and revealed the truth. “I guess… I’m just a little worried by how weird things have been between us, Ellie. It feels like shit’s just been off with you the last few weeks, you’ve just been so skittish around me! Ever since that day by the lake a while back, you’ve been avoiding me like the plague! I don’t know what to even say anymore, I just want to know why you’re acting so weird?”

“I’m the one acting weird?!?!” Noelle was completely beside herself. “ME??? Well maybe I have a damn good reason for it, Dess! Have you ever considered that?! Have you ever considered that seeing your older sister, your strong and protective older sister, seeing her have a complete manic breakdown in your arms, might just be a little traumatic?!?! Have you considered that seeing her hole herself up in the house for weeks on end, manically giggling to herself as she ritually holds a knife to her wrists in the kitchen might be scary?!?! HAVE YOU CONSIDERED THAT SEEING YOUR OLDER SISTER, WHO YOU SO LOVE AND IDOLIZE, CALL HER BOYFRIEND AND THE OLDER BROTHER OF YOUR BESTEST FRIEND A SON OF A BITCH AND DEMAND HE STICK HIS TONGUE UP INSIDE HER MIGHT BE, JUST EVER SO MIGHT BE, A SCARRING, IMAGE-DESTROYING EVENT?!?!?! HAVE YOU?!?!?!”

The young doe stood panting in front of her older sister, who through the entire ordeal slowly felt her legs turn to gelatin, before suddenly they gave out. Dess fell to her knees right in front of Noelle, trembling.

“Did I… did I really fuck up that bad?” she mumbled. “Did I really hurt you that bad?”

Noelle’s own breath was shaking. “Yes… you did… my entire concept of who you are….” She bunched her fists out of stress. “I’ve seen you fight mom before,” she acknowledged, still bitter. “But at the lake… it was just so different to anything prior. The way you just manically giggled, and babbled nonsense, and screamed it all out at the top of your lungs. You… you seemed so weak and vulnerable, it’s like I lost my innocence on that day, and with all that… I felt scared! That you were actually gonna hurt someone! Hurt me, even! Or hurt… or hurt yourself….”

Dess just knelt there, silent. Tears welled up in her eyes, much as she tried to fight it, to be strong for Noelle, to be the sister she was supposed to be. The sister she wasn’t. The sister she could never be again.

There in the leaves, on her knees, she wept; it wasn’t a wail with how stifled it was, but the tears flowed all the same, wetting her fur as she cried, her groans, sharp and deep, echoing through the woods.

“I’m sorry!” she bellowed through her sobs. “I’m sorry, Ellie! I’m sorry I’m the way I am! I’m sorry I can’t be more like you, sorry that I’m such an absolute mess!” She nearly rended her tank top she pulled at her collar so hard. “I just want to be the big sister there to protect you, like I used to be! But my mind, my wretched mind, it won’t let me! It’s just this ceaseless fog that creeps upon me, consumes my entire being, and clouds my every thought! It’s hard to write, hard to sing, hard to speak, hard to simply be anymore! Why can’t I just be NORMAL???”

As the overwhelming sadness consumed Dess, it spread with guilt over to Noelle, who suddenly felt the reckoning of having broken her fragile older sister once more. Animosity still flowed through her veins, but it was quickly dissipating and being replaced with pity. Seating herself beside her older sister, she took hold of her hand, nervously, and squeezed it as she wept, tracing an outline of a circle around her palm, hoping to steady the punk girl.

For minutes, they sat like this, Dess’ cries unceasing, but steadily slowing. That is, until the crunch of leaves behind them drew each of them away from the subject at hand.

“Oh, so that’s what the crying was coming from!”

Hearing the stray comment come out of nowhere, a voice neither of the deer recognized, they both looked over their shoulders to see an elderly human woman with curly white hair standing on the path, camera around her neck and red in the face, her skin clearly having been burned from the sun. If Dess had to guess from her accent, she was probably one of the Celtic-descent peoples from Bay City. A rather annoying sounding one at that.

“And I thought it was just some feral animal!” she jeered. “Although judging by your looks, I wasn’t that far off!”

Okay, and clearly she was a proper cunt as well.

“Look, miss,” Noelle began. “My sister’s just having a real hard time right now, we just need a moment to-”

“Aww, aren’t you just the cutest little innocent thing!” she mockingly cooed, raising her camera to snap a picture of her with a flash. “Thinking you’re sister’s ever gonna get better!”

“Hey, lady!” Dess snapped, now getting up to her feet as she wiped the tears from her face, her voice still weak and warbly. “Wipe that photo of my sister from your camera, NOW.” She growled the last bit through gritted teeth.

The woman threw up her hands and feigned innocence. “I don’t know what you’re talking about, miss! I was just taking photos of the wilderness and some animals, not of any people!” She cackled, Dess’ expression now turning dark as the human continued on with her insults. “Aw, what, does little missy doe have CWD? Is that why she’s so mad? We don’t want to have your sister put down, too, now do we?”

“Ma’am,” Noelle interjected, fearing the worst if she didn’t diffuse the situation. “My sister doesn’t have CWD, and I can’t get it, either; us monsters can’t contract that sort of thing!”

“Oh, of course you can’t contract that!” The old woman snarkily snorted to herself as she pulled out a pamphlet from her back pocket, making a move to hand it to Noelle. “I already knew that, no need to make me feel guilty. If anything, it’s dusters like you that need to feel the guilt, to fear the wrath of God!”

Dess snatched it violently out of her hands, spooking the older lady as she did so. Taking a peek at the crumpled pamphlet, her brow furrowed, before a boiling anger erupted out from her soul.

“THE ELDER PROTOCOLS OF MONSTERS?!?!?!” Dess shouted in disbelief. “You can’t even be arsed to come up with original anti-monster propaganda?! YOU ANGEL-BE-DAMNED DERIVATIVE TWAT!!!”

“Yeah, you… you speciest bitch!” Noelle chimed in, a rare case of her letting loose and cursing. Honest-to-Angel, even Dess was slightly taken aback by the display, although there was a good amount of pride still in her heart, knowing her convictions had still taken root in her.

The lady, however, was truly offended.

“Why, what a horribly un-ladylike thing for her to say! It’d be better off if your sister were raised right,” the woman spat, venom dripping. “Us humans know best, and if she keeps hanging out with the likes of you, well, she’ll be incorrigible. And it sounds like you’ve already set her on that path.”

Incorrigible. The word used to describe her since freshman year, the word constantly scrawled in report cards, spat out of her mother’s mouth, now aimed at her sister. The fire inside her had been lit.

The bitch didn’t know when to stop. “Maybe it’s best to just put the both of you down now, like the sick dogs you are, get ahead of the curve.”

Terrible words to speak to someone with reckless abandon and a weapon in her hands.

Clenching her bat in her hands, Dess felt her whole body quake. The fog she so dreaded had crept across her mind, shrouding her whole world in darkness. There were only two things in her focus now: her black baseball bat, and that vile woman’s vulnerable, unprotected skull.

She was gonna kill her.

First came out a giggle, schoolgirl-ish in nature, then it transformed into a chuckle, then a full-on manic cackle. Her eyes widened, pupils narrowed, focused intently like a predator preparing to pounce on her prey as she approached, readying her bat behind her shoulder with a swaying motion. She was just about ready to knock her block off. “Oh, THAT’S IT, you wicked BITCH!” she spat with a devilish, almost unnatural grin, baring her teeth towards the pathetic creature that stood mouth agape in front of her. The creature that stood in front of her sister.

Her sister, who was now tugging ferociously on her bat, screaming and hollering for her to stop.

“Dess, please! Stop!” she begged. “Don’t do it, PLEASE!!!”

Looking her sister in the eyes, seeing how they were on the verge of watering, pleading her to not take that final step and swing, Dess’ breath audibly shook as she exhaled, the last gasp of control in her mind fighting to hold her body back from her murderous desires.

“...Go,” she finally spat.

“Excuse me?” The woman, even in her fear, remained incredulous as she stepped back.

“I SAID SCRAM!!!” Dess hollered, raising her bat up in the air as Noelle fought to keep her held back, their bodies writhing in the struggle. Finally taking the hint, or perhaps now properly overwhelmed by the fear inside of her, the woman turned back down the path and booked it towards civilization, leaving the two sisters alone again.

Dess, however, had yet to satisfy her bloodlust.

“I SHOULD’VE KILLED HER!” Dess screamed at the top of her lungs as she swung at a nearby tree. “I SHOULD’VE KILLED THAT WICKED BITCH, CRACKED HER SKULL OPEN LIKE A MOTHERFUCKING WATERMELON!” Every swing grew with intensity and fervor, her body straining as she did so. “FUCK! FUCK!! FUCK!!!”

With one last swing, all of her burning hatred coming out from her arms in a blazing inferno of rage, she swung at the tree, and connected her tough black bat to its roughed bark surface. A loud crack emanated from the impact site, ringing out through the entire woods, as Dess’ heart and mind snapped right back into the moment.

Her bat. Her prized, precious wooden baseball bat. It had splintered.

She stood there idle for a few long moments, almost as if she hadn’t registered what she had just done. Noelle noticed this, and saw the spark of light in Dess’ eyes grow dim. Before she could move to act, her sister fell to her knees beside the tree, clung the broken bat to her chest, and wept.

“FUCK!” she cried, a loud, baritone bellow that erupted from her throat. “No… why, why, WHY?????” Her bat was broken. Her most treasured possession besides her guitar, a hand-me-down gifted to her from her father so many years ago, now lay shattered in two in front of her, a large chunk of wood having broken off from the bat and fallen amongst the leaves. It was as if her very soul had shattered in its place.

Words failed Noelle, but then again, perhaps it was better for nothing to be said. Silently, she stepped over to her sister’s side, kneeled down on the ground, and embraced her. She was quickly met with a reciprocation, Dess letting go of the main part of her bat and letting it fall to the ground likewise as she turned to hug her sister, burying her head in the younger doe’s shoulder as she wept profusely, staining her sweater with her tears.

“I’m sorry,” she mumbled uncontrollably. “I’m sorry I’m sorry I’m sorry.”

“Shhh…” Noelle hushed, gently patting her sister on the back as she cried, feeling her heave with each strained breath. “Just slow yourself down. In and out… in and out….”

“I’m sorry, I’m… I’m sorry….” Taking a deep breath in, and then another one out, Dess was still frantic, although was no longer babbling.

Noelle continued with her aid. “Just take it slow, Dess,” she gently reminded, feeling her back continue to heave. “In for five, hold it for five, out for five. Just do that for me, okay?”

Dess’ breathing slowed as she listened to her sister, who repeated her instructions as she did so. Gradually, her breathing went from two seconds in then two out, to three, to four, to holding it for a beat, then finally settling into that breathing pattern Noelle had prescribed. Eventually, with her heart settling, it was as if the whole world slowed down and came to life around her. The rustling of the wind through the changing trees, the distant calls of birds preparing their migration south, her own breathing, and the now equally calm, softer breaths of her younger sister sat beside her, eyes closed.

Faintly smiling, she gently rustled Noelle’s hair to make sure she wasn’t asleep; her eyes delicately opened, and she smiled back in turn. “Better?” she asked.

Dess nodded. “Better, yeah.”

The two of them sat up, rather content to at least remain seated on the forest floor for the coming moment.

A question came to Dess’ mind. “Say… where’d you learn to do that, anyway?”

“Hm?” Noelle didn’t quite get it at first, but quickly connected the dots. “Oh! The box breathing! Yeah, Catti taught me to do that a while back, she said it helps to calm her down whenever she gets caught in a mood swing. She learned it at therapy.”

Therapy. Ugh, that was a dreaded word for Dess, although she did well enough to hide that fact for the moment. “Oh, shoot, heh. Sorry for having to make you play therapist, then.”

“Daww… it’s nothing!” Noelle playfully cooed; she also knew full well how Dess felt, but figured that playing it off as comical would somehow keep the mood light.

Dess, however, was still somber. “Hey…even beyond all of that, I’m sorry you had to see me like that… again,” she confided. “I know how stressed out that must make you… heh, you even made that clear yourself, and I still melted down.”

The feelings of regret were mutual. “If anything, I should be the one apologizing, sis,” Noelle tenderly assuaged. “I… definitely shouldn’t have blown up at you like that. It’s just… I’ve been trying my best to bottle up my feelings, and I guess that didn’t work out well for me, at all.”

“Yeah, I feel that. I definitely bottle up a bit too much as well,” Dess admitted. “At least you seem to recognize that on your own… I never seem to get the memo unless it’s spelled out for me.” She saw Noelle choke up at the mention of her own problems, and felt her heart sink a little more. “You still feeling okay?”

Noelle nodded at first, weakly, before pausing and shaking her head instead. “I can’t lie, Dess, it still hurts seeing you like this. Seeing you break down so easily… heh, when I was younger, I used to think you were invincible, you were so tough!”

Dess chuckled, also weak in reflection. “Yeah… I used to think that, too. Before all of this shit really came on.” She paused for a moment to take in the sounds of nature once more, hearing the hum of the last bugs of the year off in the distance, before continuing to vent. “I swear, it feels like a switch flipped my freshman year. Life was so easy back before then, y’know. Never really had to give anything much thought, every day was basically the same… it was nice.”

She cupped her hands pensively in her lap.

“I miss that.”

Noelle snuggled up closer to her sister.

“I miss being normal,” she confessed in a weak voice. “I miss not wanting to kill people. Why can’t my brain just… stop….” Dess chuckled morbidly. “I hate being me,” she wept, with no tears left to cry. “I wish I could just be more like you… I’d even die if it gave me the chance of that….”

Noelle could feel her soul grow weak just hearing the thought pass from Dess’ lips. She let a truth escape her own, hoping that it would bring her comfort.

“If it helps you to hear it some,” Noelle said, “I still kinda… wish I was like you to some extent still.”

Such a comment actually snapped Dess into morbid laughter. “Oh, don’t joke around, Noelle. You don’t wanna end up like me!”

“No, I’m serious!” she protested. “I mean… I don’t want your problems, necessarily… but the way you’re able to actually stand up to mom… I envy that.”

Dess froze for a moment, before shaking her head. “No,” she replied, “you don’t want that. I’m pretty sure she hates me and all that I stand for.”

“I mean… I don’t think she hates you,” Noelle assuaged, “but I get what you mean. It’s just…” She hesitated, but pressed forward. “I feel like I’m being dragged around like a marionette by her. Hell, even dad at times, and he doesn’t even mean it! I guess I’m just so used to caving under that pressure to perform a certain way, I just… do… even if it’s not what I want to do.”

She waited for Dess to respond, only to be met with contemplative silence. She continued, grabbing lightly onto the sleeve of Dess’ jacket.

“That’s why I love you so much, Dess. I feel, or felt… no, I still feel I can be who I want to be around you! I can be weird or off-putting and rowdy! And… I guess that’s why I idolized you so much, and still do. Maybe not to the extent you take things to, but I wish I could somehow stand up to mom and dad for once, to truly be myself. I just wish I could be stronger. Like you are.”

Dess looked at her in disbelief, fighting the urge to gawk. “You still think I’m strong?”

“I do,” Noelle answered. “It must take a lot of strength to keep on living with all you’ve gone through.”

“Yeah…” Dess looked down at her jacket sleeves, knowing very well that scars lay hidden beneath. “You have no idea how tough it is.”

Noelle saw Dess staring at her wrists, rubbing them gingerly, and recognized what was up. “You wanna talk about it?”

Dess didn’t hesitate in shaking her head. “I’d rather not.”

“Okay, then.” Noelle knew not to push it, lest she push Dess over the edge again. “I love you.”

In Noelle’s embrace, Dess leaned into it, and rested her head against her sister’s. “I love you, too.” She paused a moment, before adding, “And thank you, by the way. For being here for me.”

“Thank you, too,” Noelle copied. “For the same. And also for standing up to that old lady for me.”

Dess chuckled thinking back on it; it had only just happened, but the memory already felt so distant in her sister’s arms. “Honestly, you deserve the thanks for deescalating that. I was just about ready to knock her block off.”

Noelle playfully waved her off. “I mean, let’s be honest, I didn’t wanna see ya catch a murder rap, but it would be hilarious to see that woman squirm!”

Dess was genuinely caught off-guard, and gawked at Noelle with a big dumb smile. “Noelle, you for real?!”

“I mean, have you seen my Cat Petterz save! All of them somehow wind up with their heads knocked off! Fah!”

The two of them shared a good, hearty bout of laughter between them, setting aside the strain of earlier to embrace elation. “See, this is why I love hanging out with ya,” Dess giggled.

“Ditto,” Noelle replied. “I really enjoy spending time together.”

They let the sound of the woods settle for a moment, before a thought popped into Dess’ mind. “Sorry if this seems off the cuff, but… you know what I’d love to do with you someday?”

“What?” Noelle asked.

Dess smiled warmly as she leaned up against her younger sister. “I’d love to go to the big city with you. Not with mom, not even with dad. Just the two of us, seeing the shining lights of the skyline at night as we take the train in. And not some small potato place like Port Town, or even Bay City, but something truly magnificent. I’d love to go to Megalopolis with ya, at night, and see all the sparkling lights in the city square, maybe catch a game at the Garden Arena or Highlanders Park.” She sighed wistfully, closing her eyes as she let the dream wash over her. “Wouldn’t that be nice, Ellie?”

Noelle gave it some thought, the mental image being drawn up finding a newfound place within her heart. It was as if the closeness between the two of them had transferred the desire from elder sister to younger. “Yeah,” she finally murmured, a smile now coming about her own face as she snuggled up against Dess’ thick combat jacket. “That would be nice. Maybe we could even go to one of the art galleries there, too. I figure you’d like that as well.”

Smiling and nodding, Dess reciprocated. “I would, I think,” she said. “Together.”

“Yeah, together….” The forest fell silent besides the breeze that rustled through the leaves once more, the pair nearly falling asleep in each other’s company. Eventually, the bright blue sky up above began to fade, blue turning to orange as the day neared its end. But the sisters paid no mind to this; they were too at ease to care as they blissfully daydreamed in peace.

Hearing the caw of crows up above, eventually Dess was lulled out of her calm repose and lazily gazed at Noelle’s silver watch. “Oh, shit,” she absentmindedly mentioned. “It’s half-past six.”

Noelle was just as lackadaisical coming back to, yawning and stretching before she spoke up. “When did mom actually say dinner was?”

“Quarter-to,” Dess answered, propping herself onto her feet before offering a hand up to her sister. “We probably oughta actually make our way back home now.”

Noelle took a hold of her hand, bringing herself up with graceful ease, and was readying to turn and head home before something black in the corner of her eye caught her attention.

“Wait, your bat!”

Dess’ gaze snapped to match where Noelle’s was aimed, and her expression fell. The breathing exercises must’ve really worked, since she’d almost completely forgotten about the shattered bat that was left split apart on the ground. “Oh, right….”

Thinking quickly, her sister thought up an idea. “No need to worry, sis.” Reaching deep into her bag, Noelle pulled out a roll of adhesive gauze. “It’s not a permanent fix, you’ll probably need to glue that thing back together to really get it nice and presentable, but for the time being…”

She trailed off as she took the two pieces, fitted them together, and began to roll the gauze out tightly around the bat.

“...this ought to hold it together well enough!” Winding round and round the bat, slowly a thick white mass formed along the thick end of the wooden instrument, contrasting well with its black painted exterior. “And bing-bang-boom, we’re set!” Tucking in the tape and tying a knot with the frayed ends, she lifted the bat and lightly toyed with it, before handing it back to Dess. “Here ya go! Right and fixed!”

Taking hold of the neck of the bat, Dess shifted her grip to its natural position and held it in her hands, admiring Noelle’s impromptu handiwork as she did so. It obviously wouldn’t hold up to a proper beating in this state, but looked as if it could still be used for its intended purpose. Playfully taking a swing, and noting how it held up to the force of that, she rested it over her shoulder and smiled. “Thanks, sis,” she finally said.

Noelle nodded. “Shall we?”

Dess mirrored her. “We shall!” With that, the two strolled off down the wooded trail once more, keeping up a lively conversation as they went.

“So, you have any plans for tonight?”

Noelle didn’t skip a beat. “Oh, probably watch that… one werewolf movie again.”

Dess noticed Noelle was starting to blush. “Oh, Blood Moon?”

“Blood Moon III, actually,” Noelle corrected, desperately fighting off a stammer. “The one where the woman is the one that… turns… guh….”

Dess’ face lit up at Noelle’s embarrassment. “Oi, does somebody have a cruh-ush!”

“Shut up!” she protested with a gleeful smile. “Werewolf women are hot, okay?! Who wouldn’t want to be gored by one?! Just… have her pin you to the ground with her thick furry, muscular arms… and just… absolutely tear your face off and innards out!”

Her sister couldn’t help but cackle, with Noelle joining in the laughter. “You’re a freak, Ellie, you know that?”

“Where do you think I got it from, mom or dad?!” The two maintained their gleeful giggling, eventually disappearing far out of sight from where they were once sat, where the tree’s bark was bashed.

Better for them to leave all of that pain behind.

…

Gentle knocking rapped against Dess’ door later that night, just as the elder doe was preparing to turn in. Well, not exactly “turn in,” but rather strip down to her sleepwear and browse music forums on her desktop until she passed out at about 3AM. Close enough for her; the festival didn’t start until noon, anyway.

“Hey, Dess?” a gentle voice rang. “Can I come in?”

Dess grimaced ever so slightly, mostly out of exhaustion; she’d just finished up her portfolio, and was really feeling the past two weeks of work crashing down on her. Lazily, she slipped into a robe before opening the door. “The dark scaring you again or something, ‘Elle? Or was it that monster movie, fah!”

“No, it’s… well…” She shied away from looking for a moment, before revealing something that had been hidden, held behind her back. “I wanted to give this to you.”

She presented a CD, offering it up to her sister, who paused for a moment before taking it from her hands. On the disk was a hastily scrawled title done in sharpie: “Dess’ Happy Mix [From Noelle] =)”

Holding the jewel case in her hands, gazing at the sketch of a happy flower smiling up at her, Dess felt her breath be taken away. “Noelle,” she finally stammered. “You made this for me?

The blonde nodded. “Yeah, Catti and I like to burn CDs for each other, it’s kinda our thing, y’know. And I figured you’re probably all stressed out over, well, everything, so I made you a little mix! Now whenever you’re in a bad mood, you can have something to listen to and calm down with!”

Dess could feel her heart pounding out of her chest. Nobody had ever given her such a heartfelt gift before. “So did you stalk my collection and pick out some of my faves, or pick out your own stuff?”

“It’s a mix of both, really. Some from bands I know you like, some that make me feel happy myself… I hope you like it….”

“Like it? I love it, Ellie!” she said with a warm, tender smile as she held the case up to her heart with one hand and pulled her sister close into a hug with the other.

“Thank you. For everything today.”

Chapter Text

Festival day had dawned upon Hometown, and the true depths of the daft frenzy was set to reveal itself.

Frenzy, however, was not where Dess’ day started, for by 11 that morning she was still groggily laying in bed, regretting her life choices. Maybe staying up until 3 in the morning wasn’t the best of ideas when she couldn’t afford to wake up at 1 in the afternoon.

With the speed of a tortoise, she lazily slid herself out of bed once the fifth alarm on her phone began to ring. A small voice in the back of her mind asked why she was even bothering with this, knowing how much she detested the festival and everything surrounding it. Especially after last year.

But finally standing up, stretching her arms skyward, and letting out a vicious yawn, she peered over to her side table for the reminder she needed. There, a framed photo of her and Asriel, the only picture she had of them together, sat collecting dust in her ill-kept room. Seeing them together in a tender embrace at the festival the year prior filled her with determination. Not just to go, but to do something unusual for Azzy.

She was going to take a shower.

Lightly smacking her snout to wake herself up some more, she lifted her Ostrheinland jacket off of the chair it was draped across, fished through her nightstand for a bra, jeans, and a shirt (her Unknown Pleasures graphic tee), and meandered her way out the door and down the hall towards the bathroom.

Now, showering was something Dess rarely ever liked doing proactively; she would prefer if she could just rot in her stench for months on end, or be absent self-care at all for the rest of time, but someone would always come along and demand she shower. Usually it was her mother, but even Asriel would get fed up with her if it went on for too long. So to actively take care of herself like this was unaccustomed to. Maybe she did wanna put out for the festival after all.

Locking the bathroom door behind her, she made sure everything was in order. Clean clothes in a pile by the door, towel draped on the hook on the wall, her bottle of specialty Fur and Body Works shampoo placed in the shower, all ready for her. The last thing she needed was hung on that hook, which she nabbed when she placed the towel on.

Her shower cap.

It was just about the only thing that kept her sane throughout her bathing ritual. She only liked to shower hot, and if her hair or antlers were to get wet, then all of her dye would run, and she’d be stuck looking like Carol. And she would frankly rather kill herself than be like Carol. The shower cap was the only reason she even showered at all; it had been a week since she’d last washed her body, which was absolutely laden with sweat and musk from a hot early autumn, but the last her hair was washed was over a month ago, when she last had it dyed.

Once the cap was affixed, she made quick work of washing herself, making sure to really rub in her fur shampoo this time, and stepping out all before the mirror could even fog up with condensation. Slipping on her clothes, and clipping on a bra for once, a rarity for her, she binned the rest in the hamper and stepped out into the hall once more, ready to greet the day with breakfast.

Marching downstairs, she quickly realized from the eerie placidity of the house that nobody else was there; only the sound of the A/C greeted her in the kitchen. “Ah, must’ve already run off to the festival,” Dess mumbled to herself. No big surprise, with her mother being the mayor and all that; they were probably off busy preparing for the big ribbon cutting and all the other saccharine ceremonial junk. She didn’t mind missing that.

She also didn’t mind the fact she could make whatever the fuck she wanted for breakfast.

Reaching into the fridge, she grabbed for herself some pastrami, cheese, and dressing, before taking some bread out from the cabinet and pulling out a loaf of bread. In a flash, she assembled for herself a reuben for breakfast, popping it in the toaster oven to warm up a bit. With how she ate, it was a miracle she wasn’t 300 pounds or something like that, especially with how much weed she smoked, but then again that was one of the reasons she got off of her mood stabilizers. No need to relive that dysmorphic hell again.

Still feeling groggy, she decided that the only thing worth pairing with such a meal was an ice cold Bepis Max from the fridge. “Mmm… caffeine….” She gargled in delight as she swiped the can from the fridge, cracking it open and taking a sip as she made her way over to the dining table with her sandwich fresh from the oven, already feeling perkier as she sat down to eat.

Wasting no time, like the animal she truly was, she scarfed down her reuben in about a minute flat, taking no time to reflect on the overwhelmingly greasy taste of it in the slightest, before chugging her can of Bepis and crushing the empty can in her hands. With a loud, rumbling burp, she got up from the table, bussed her plate over to the sink, and kicked her can into the recycling bin.

She was finally ready to start the day.

Foregoing her bat for once, she strutted out the front door of the manor and made her way down the drive, before pivoting and making a beeline down the road towards the north end of town past the gate. Finally reaching the Dreemurr household, she went up to the door and playfully knocked out the tune to “She’s Lost Control,” her favorite Joy Division song.

She could hear a flurry of footsteps in the house rapidly make their way toward the door, and in a flash, Asriel was there to open it.

“Ready?” she asked with a knowing look.

Excitedly, he bounded out the door and gave her a kiss on the cheek, before the pair turned and made their way back down into town. “Lemme tell ya, Dess, you had me waiting for a while there. I was almost worried you weren’t gonna show up!”

“Yeah, sorry about that… and sorry about being absent for so much of the past week…” She held off on the last part, but decided it needed saying. “...and sorry about that fight last week. This whole portfolio’s just got me wound the fuck up.”

Asriel tilted his head. “You’re still working on that?”

“I just finished it, actually,” she said excitedly. “The post isn’t running on Festival Day, so I’ll slot it all in the mail tomorrow.”

Nodding, Asriel turned back forward as they walked. “You don’t have to worry about the fight, by the way. I forgive you.”

Dess couldn’t believe he was so ready to move on and forget. “Really? After all of that?”

“Yeah,” he confirmed. “No sense in letting things linger, I got pretty heated in all of that myself. Let bygones be bygones, y’know.”

But Dess couldn’t let well enough be in her mind. She recalled how hurt Azzy was in the days after their fight, how they barely talked at all in class. Was he really just going to move on like that? Was it right to accept that?

One look at his infectious smile, however, made all that moot; no way could she ponder that today.

“Anyway, any plans for what you might wanna do today?” he asked.

Dess pondered the question, before a long-held idea came to mind. “Probably perform,” she said matter-of-factly. “With all the music I’ve recorded for my portfolio, I’d love to get up on stage for the amateur contest and blow all of those other schmucks out of the water! Fah!”

She chuckled to herself over this, and expected a laugh from Azzy, too, but was met with a questioning silence. “Uhh… Dess?” he finally asked. “Are you sure they’re gonna let you… y’know… perform?”

“Why wouldn’t they?” She was dead serious in her questioning of him.

“Well, it’s just… after last year’s performance, I woulda thought they’d blacklist you, right?”

“Oh, right,” she grumbled. “The Doors incident. Yeah, look, I’m the mayor’s kid,” she sassily said while pimping her Ostrheinland jacket. “There’s no way they’d stop me! Hell, I’d even sing ‘The End’ again if I felt like it.”

“Unless Carol tells them to put the kibosh on that,” Azzy reminded. “Remember, the controversy started because of what you implied about her.”

She looked at him quizzically. “Um… the ‘kill, kill, kill’ segment? Guess a sixteen year old singing that was a little much…”

Azzy facepalmed. “No, Dess, I mean the family annihilation segment, and how you butchered the lyrics to make them worse!”

“How was I supposed to know what Jim was singing?!” she protested. “It was hard to make out his voice with how gruff it was with the mic feedback!”

“I dunno, the liner notes?!?!” Azzy was just gobsmacked with how nonchalant Dess still was over this whole thing even a year later. “Morrison didn’t even sing anything there! He was just howling incomprehensibly!’

“See? That’s the point! Incomprehensible!” Dess raised her hands and voice in junction. “All I did was fill in the gaps some!”

Time for Azzy to pull out the specifics. “Did you never consider how bad of an idea it was to sing ‘mother, I want to rape you’ IN PUBLIC, AND IN FRONT OF YOUR MOTHER?!?!?!” Azzy wasn’t even angry, he was just so unbelievably beside himself over how incredibly daft Dess was being right now.

“It was meant to be dark and edgy on purpose, Azzy, shit!” Dess moped. “How was I supposed to know it would end so badly…”

“How??? The hell do you mean ‘how???’ It was obvious that was a bad idea from the start! THAT’S NOT EVEN WHAT HE SANG!!! Heck, if you asked me to listen, it sounded like Jim sang ‘I want to… oh I hate you!’ That actually would’ve worked well for you! It would’ve gotten your hatred across in a way that would’ve still been palatable to the town at-large. You picked literally the WORST option out of the bunch!”

He waited for some sort of snappy response from Dess, but was merely met with a guilty, somberful silence. Sighing, he rubbed his face and went on. “Look, Dess, I’m not looking to fight again now, I’ll drop it. Just know that if you are blacklisted, I won’t at all be surprised.”

“Okay,” she meekly replied; another apology right now just felt like it would ignite things further.

They spent the last quarter mile of the walk to the site in silence, both quietly stewing over the fact their conversation had descended into an argument again. By the time they reached the place, however, both had mellowed out, and excitement had taken hold once more.

Turning around the corner, and met with a mob of people, they both knew that they had arrived. And peering down the center aisle of the main drag, and seeing how ramshackle the entire operation was, Dess felt whatever excitement was in her body deflate.

That was one of the things, probably the main reason, actually, of why she hated Festival day. She could maybe stomach the entire thing and all of the social pressures if the festival itself were a truly gargantuan extravaganza. But instead, it was just some lousy, typical small-town festivities, maybe even lamer than other similar towns in Maine. Even when she tried to amp herself up, it always fell flat. The fact that everyone, Asriel included, seemed to delude themselves into thinking it was just as good as a night in Megalopolis just made the lackluster sight even more egregious.

Front and center was, of course, the main drag of Carnival Row, where a slew of shoddily set-up booths and games were set up, cheap prizes lining their walls. Stuffed animals, mostly, but there was also some other cheap novelty faire at the fair, such as some plastic whiffle balls and bats to win.

Azzy’s eyes immediately gravitated towards one of the booths, a bottle-knocking game, where there was a giant stuffed deer plush prominently displayed out front.

“Ooh, Dess,” he excitedly pleaded, “you’re good at baseball, you should totally play that game for me! I’d love it if you could win me that deer plush, it’s almost as cute as you are!”

With how smarmy he was over the whole plush, you’d think Dess would take the hint and show out for her lover. Instead, she acted in the cold way that was typical of her. “That thing was probably made for fifty cents over in the Far East,” she dryly commentated, before cruelly joking. “Dollars to donuts some poor schmuck kid worker lost their fingers in the sewing machine that made that thing. Fa ha hah!”

Azzy didn’t laugh at her joke. In fact, nobody was, and the stall manager was giving her a nasty stink-eye for putting that image into the minds of the youngins around.

“Err… I mean, it’s all cheap crap, anyways,” she pivoted. “You could probably get that online for, like, not even a dollar. Not that I would; that’d be such a horrible thing for a socialist like me to-”

“Okay, lady, we get the point,” the manager scolded. “Either buy a ticket to play or move along already! You’re killin’ business here!”

Sheepishly, she sighed and turned away, dragging Asriel along with her; now wasn’t the time to pick a fight. “Fine, we’ll find something else,” she mumbled, completely oblivious to the longing look Asriel gave towards the deer plush. Eventually, though, he too looked away, and turned his attention back towards his girlfriend.

“Any of the other games at least look fun?” he gently prodded, hoping for some sort of affirmative response. “I mean, hey, there’s a bobbing for apples tank right there! No cheap child-made plastic junk there! Just good old fun!”

The sight of an overweight human man dunking his entire head, messy beard and all, into the tank really turned her off. “I really would prefer not to contract oral herpes today,” Dess joked, hoping that the curt response would be received as well as she found it to be. The awkward silence spoke otherwise.

“...Right,” Asriel nodded, sighing to himself as they walked along. “How about the dancing pavilion? We both like music, that seems like a good time!”

Dess took one glance over towards the flat pavilion, where scores of couples, both human and monster, were getting down to a hootenanny. Her face scrunched up in disgust. “If they were flash dancing, maybe, but hell if I’m gonna be caught dead doing a damn square dance.”

“What’s wrong with square dancing?” Azzy asked, now clearly annoyed with how little Dess was interested in any of the day’s festivities. “Is it too ‘old-timey’ for you or something? CCR and Lynyrd Skynyrd aren’t even that old!”

Rolling her eyes, Dess crossed her arms in a huff. “Azzy, first of all, you know I hate Southern Rock, so drop that. But beyond that, you really think I wanna square dance? Who do you think I am, a conservative?’

Asriel grimaced over her reaction, mentally preparing for another diatribe. “Whuh… Dess, how is square dancing conservative?”

“It’s the dance of the country bumpkins, the rural fools, the ideological üntermenschen of this country,” she monologued, eliciting an eyeroll from Azzy over the use of that “Ü” word once more. “It’s not a cosmopolitan, metropolitan, superior dance like flash mobbing. Intellectuals don’t square dance, Azzy! And I’d be remiss how it only grew popular due to a car manufacturer back in the day hating jazz so much that he-”

“Okay, I give up,” Azzy admitted, sticking his arms up as he shouted his surrender. “You clearly aren’t having much fun here, I’m starting to faintly see a point in all of this if you’re just gonna bitch about everything.” Waving his arms in the air for emphasis, he continued, “Is there anything here that tickles your fancy?”

Dess lazily gazed around, admittedly not really awe-struck by anything around her. That was, until one giant thing caught her eye.

Well, admittedly it wasn’t giant. The ferris wheel the town had rented out for the festival was actually quite small as far as rides go. But compared to literally everything else there, it was enticing nonetheless. Plus, the sight of the big wheel gave Dess some nostalgic butterflies in her stomach; she used to ride with Noelle all the time back when they were younger, back before she became so jaded and cynical. Back when she was happy,

A warm smile crept out over her face. “Y’know, a ride on the ferris wheel wouldn’t be so bad,” she admitted, turning her head towards Asriel. “Wanna give it a spin? For old time’s sake?”

Relieved to hear those words, Azzy nodded in kind. “I’d love to.” With that, the pair strolled down the promenade of the fair, down past all the carney stalls and knick-knack displays…

…only to reach a sign that read “closed.”

“Are… you… kidding me?!” Dess was incensed; the one thing she wanted to do at the festival, the one thing, and it was closed. “Hey, carney!” she shouted out to a worker. “Why ain’t it open?”

The worker wolf turned back with a wrench in hand, and oil speckled all over his fur. “This thang’s down for maintenance,” he replied. “Issue with the bearings. Don’t worry, though, we’ll hopefully have her up and running by tonight… maybe.”

With the wolf turning away, Dess turned back towards Asriel, profoundly dejected. “I was actually excited for that…” she mumbled. “And I don’t even get a chance to ride it!” She kicked the dirt beneath her in a furious huff, pissed at how the world itself seemed to mock her as the dust blew right back into her face.

“Are you okay?” Azzy asked.

“I’m fine,” she tersely replied, wiping the dirt out of her eyes. “Let’s… ugh, let’s just go get something to eat. I’m just about done.”

Quietly, the two slowly made their way over towards the concession stand, with Dess hoping to drown out her sorrow and boredom with some soda and fried food. Unfortunately, as the world spat upon her one last time, the line for the sole stand was backed up by a good half-hour’s wait. She had had it, she was probably gonna break down crying right then and there.

Asriel could see her emotions begin to unravel, and gently wrapped his arms around her. It was a small gesture, but a well-informed one, as she fell limp into his embrace. No words had to be spoken, but he knew that she was thankful for him at least.

“Hey, Dess,” he gently said, “I’m sorry this whole day’s been a bust for you. I know festival day isn’t your favorite…”

“Why’re you apologizing?” she asked right back. “You didn’t do anything wrong.”

“I know that, I just… I feel bad, y’know. I hate seeing you so miserable, even if it’s self-inflicted.”

She took minor offense to that. “Self-inflicted?”

“Yeah, I mean, you’re not exactly going out of your way to make your own fun, which is… kinda draining, admittedly,” he said, eyes wandering, before a certain thing caught his eye. “Hey, wait, there’s something you might like!” Asriel pointed at a photo booth right next to the concession stand. “You did say you wanted to have more pictures of us together earlier!”

Well, she did say that, about a month prior on one of their dates. She didn’t expect Azzy to actually collect on that, but hey, a few more pics wouldn’t hurt.

“Yeah, sure,” she shrugged, brushing off the slight from earlier. “No line, either. I’m down for that.”

“Great!” Azzy was practically dragging Dess into the booth, who herself shared very little of the excitement, but at least didn’t actively detest this idea. It was something that she could tolerate.

Sliding past the curtain, the pair sat down on the wooden bench inside of the booth, where Azzy then slipped a dollar into the slot and the old machine whirred to life.

“Okay, so we’ve got four photos,” Azzy said matter-of-factly as he read the instructions. “All I gotta do is press the button and it’ll snap one five seconds after.” Now turning back, he asked Dess, “Do we wanna do a normal one first?”

Dess just nodded along, going with the flow of whatever was being asked. “Yeah, sure.”

Pressing the button, Asriel assumed an upright position with a polite smile, Dess following his lead as she did the same. Looking at the camera, there was a flash, and then a ding to let them know the photo had been made.

“Alright, can’t wait to see how that one turned out!” Azzy was clearly trying to ham up his excitement for Dess’ sake, although his attempt to get her all-in on the fun was clearly falling a bit flat, what with how she wasn’t responding to him at all. “Now how about a silly one?”

Nodding along again, Dess pressed the button this time and reached into her breast pocket. As Asriel made a goofy face with his tongue stuck out, and stretched out his cheeks with his fingers, Dess pulled out a blunt and stuck it in her mouth, pretending to light it just as the camera flashed. Azzy seemed to recognize what was happening just at that moment, and a bit of shock showed on his face.

“D-Dess!” he stammered. “Really?”

“What?” she protested, stuffing everything back into her pocket. “You wanted silly, so I gave you silly,” she sneered with a mocking grin.

“Ugh…” Asriel grimaced. “I meant like old-school ha-ha funny, like when we were kids, not this cynical- you know, whatever, we can do it again.” Pressing the button once more, Asriel prepared another silly face. “Do something classic!” he said.

“Classic, eh?” A wry thought crept into Dess’ mind. If he wanted a classic gag, then he’dd damn well get one. In one fluid motion, she snagged his glasses straight off of his face and donned them herself, putting on geeky, mocking airs as she grinned. “I’m Azzy, I’m a big fluffy nerd who’s in love with a manic depressive! A-hyugh hyugh!”

Azzy, for his part, blushed at the mockery and made a play at frantically grabbing his glasses back. “Dess! I need those to see!” he protested, unable to get a hold as Dess pushed him away. In the middle of all of the ruckus, the camera flashed, the ding of it registering snapping the two right out of it.

“Dammit!” Azzy cussed. “When I meant classic, I didn’t mean second grade shenanigans!”

“Hey, you wanted a classic funny picture,” she said slyly. “You should’ve been more specific, fah!”

He crossed his arms, clearly peeved by the whole ordeal, more than mildly so. “I’m serious, Dess….”

“Serious about being funny? Fa ha hah!” She could see he clearly wasn’t amused by the jab. “Okay, okay, I’m sorry, geez…” She trailed off, a bit hurt by the fact her boyfriend was so clearly not having fun the way she was, but quickly bounced back with an idea. “Hey, though, we still have one photo left. And I may have something in mind for this one!” she said all cutesy-like.

Asriel perked up at this; at the very least, he was elated to hear that Dess was willing to actively do something today, for once. “Aight, what’cha got?”

Her lips curled in anticipation. “A kissing one!” she excitedly said. “Like all the couples do in these things!”

He pondered for a moment, but his face betrayed the fact that he was very much on board with the idea. “Alright, sounds like a plan! Only if you give me my glasses back, though!” Asriel said, still a tad bit chuffed his silly photos didn’t turn out the way he thought they would.

“Sure thing!” Dess started, before another sly idea crept up into her brain. A little bit of playful humiliation still seemed in order, the type of devilish streak both she and Kris shared. “I’ll give you back your glasses… IF you agree to let me practice my makeup on you! I need to get some more work in before Noelle’s big choir concert, she needs to look tip-top for… that…..”

What she was expecting Asriel to do was reluctantly agree in a huff, where they’d exchange the glasses in turn for a kiss in the booth and some dignity lost later. Instead, his face lit up like a Christmas tree. “You promise?!” he excitedly blurted.

“Uh… yeah, sure. I’m honestly surprised you’re so on board with-”

She didn’t get the chance to finish her sentence. Jamming in the button, Azzy swiped back his glasses, donned them once more, and then in a properly amorous display of affection, took Dess by the shoulders and pulled her right close to him, jamming his tongue into her mouth just as their lips touched and the camera went off.

This was a total shock; Azzy was always a bit more of a passive, timid romantic, one that preferred to express adoration through words rather than physical action. So for him to be so domineering, so forceful, for him to be the one to initiate with the tongue for once…

Well, it was the hottest damn thing she ever felt.

Finally pulling apart, both of them were a blushing, giggling, blithering mess. They each were stunned; Dess by Azzy’s active, passionate display of love, and Azzy by the fact he had actually just done all of that to Dess.

“W-wow, Azzy,” she finally said, stumbling through her words in a flustered manner. “I didn’t know you had that sort of thing in you!”

Azzy was somehow even more flustered, despite being the one to initiate. “...Neither did I…” he finally stammered. He quickly turned to face her. “You do promise to do my makeup later, right?”

“Yeah,” she answered, still unsure as to why he was so excited by the prospect of having that done to him.

Nodding gleefully, he scooched himself out of the seat and past the curtain, with Dess following. Outside, they found two sheets of photos printed out just for them, each grabbing a copy and gazing at it.

“Wow… you… *cough* …you really went all-out with the kissing,” Dess remarked. Asriel silently nodded in agreement; that one photo was the only one they were staring at, fully enraptured by the image of such a passionate kiss.

Dess, for her part, couldn’t get that moment out of her head. She desperately wanted to feel that again, to feel… more. She wanted something deeply sensual. Her lips curled as her eyes fluttered, a floozy of an idea coming to mind. “You know, I really enjoyed that, Azzy,” she started. “If you’re up for it, maybe the two of us could head down by the lake, find a nice quiet corner for us to, heh… ‘take a quick nap.’”

Asriel tilted his head. “...A nap? Are you really that tired?”

Shaking her head, Dess mentally cringed at how daft he was. “You know… take a ‘quick nap,’ ‘sleep together,’ feel the warmth of your body pressed up against mine.” She leaned up right next to his ear and whispered seductively, laying her wishes on nice and thick to break on through to the other side. “And hey, maybe we can both get naked and see how good that tongue is between my other pair of lips.”

In an instant, Asriel shot back, the breath taken right out of him and his face overcome with blush. “D-Dess! That’s… no! I’m not doing that!”

She didn’t wanna hear “no” for an answer. “C’mon, Azzy! It’s like that one movie we watched earlier said, the one with the vampires: the quickest way to a woman’s heart is licking that button right towards the top-”

Asriel grimaced at the visual description. “Ew, ew, ew, ew, ew, no! I’m not getting naked for you, Dess! For anyone! Not… not now!”

Great, she thought. More of THIS shit again. “Oh dammit! Why? You better not give me that ‘wait before marriage’ crap, Az!”

He was insistent. “I said NO!”

“That ‘How To Draw Dragons’ book gets more action than I do! I know you know what it looks like down there, and you LIKE IT! You LOVE IT!”

His eyes shot wide open as he yanked her by the jacket collar and pulled her close. “SHHHH! SHUT UP!” he said in a panicked whisper. “You said you wouldn’t talk about that!”

“Oh, I’m sorry!” she shrieked sarcastically as footsteps drew near. “I’m sorry that you fucking led me on! That you’ll happily masturbate, but you won’t let me see! I WANT MY SEX! YOU NEVER FUCK ME!”

“There’s a reason, Dess! OKAY?!?!”

The echoing sound of a third voice cut right through between them from behind. “Oh ho ho! Sounds like there’s trouble in paradise!”

Hearing the mocking voice ring out from across the fairgrounds, both Dess and Azzy turned and saw who had interjected. A gaggle of teenage monsters their age, the group straddling the gulf of adulthood, made their way over to the pair, headed by a tan feline at the front.

“Wazzup, my man!” the cat greeted, dapping up Asriel, who reciprocated, much to the annoyance of Dess.

“Ah, not much, Pizzapants,” Azzy said, taking the earlier comment in stride as a joke, and making one of his own; whatever animosity was in his voice had faded.

“Ugh, for the last time, the name’s Josh!” he insisted. “Drop a pizza on yourself one time and it sticks with you!”

“Ironic, since you can’t get a girl to stick with you,” Dess spat, still visibly upset, before addressing the group as a whole. “What the hell do you all want, anyway?”

“Dess!” Asriel chided. “They’re my friends, it’s all cool! Just a little bit of ribbing!”

“Yeah, zombie,” Josh poked, “just a little bit of ribbing, we’re totally not looking to hurt your feelings… and for the record, I do have a girlfriend!”

“Oh, you do?” both Asriel and Dess said, although Dess was more out of bland disbelief and disgust rather than Asriel’s excitement.

“Yeah! She… uh… lives in one of the Northern Provinces,” Josh replied. “Yeah, Mont Noble, I think.” Dess rolled her eyes at the obvious lie, but Azzy fell for it all - hook, line, and sinker.

“Oh, dude, that’s sick!” Asriel congratulated. “Tell me more!”

“Ah, well, ah… I haven’t actually met her yet, it’s all been long distance so far,” Josh began, slowly leading Azzy away from the photo booth. “She says she works for the Alouettes, I’m guessing as a ballgirl or in concessions….”

Eventually, the pair fell out of earshot; Dess tried to follow, but was cornered next to the booth by the rest of the gang: Bratty, a flame monster, and a tentacle monster.

“Aw, why’re you so in a rush?” Bratty mockingly asked. “We haven’t even talked yet!”

Dess fought back the urge to just spit in her ex’s face right there. “We broke up on bad terms, and I know you haven’t moved on from that… and neither have I,” she sheepishly admitted at the end.

“Aww! Tenta, Ember, look! She’s still a mess for me,” Bratty faux-gushed. “How sweet.”

The trio cackled as Dess continued staring them down, now starting to get frantic as she saw Azzy and Josh vanish off into the distance, out of sight.

Tenta picked up on this fact pretty quickly. “And I think she’s already missing her man!” he sneered. “Y’know, for such a punk rebel, you sure as hell act like a traddy with how joined at the hip you are with him. I mean, what does he even see in someone as clingy as you!”

“Yeah, between you and Kris, I guess the poor sap just likes being surrounded with freaks!” Bratty chimed, eliciting another round of laughter from the group.

This was a bridge too far. “H-hey! Leave Kris out of this!” Dess shouted. “They’re barely even a teenager! Let them be weird!”

The rest of the group chucked at her insistence, but the flame elemental appeared to show some mercy. “She’s right,” Ember concurred, seemingly standing up for the soul-stricken deer, only to take the knife out and twist it right back in.

“Fight the real enemy.”

The trio encircled the dark-haired doe, staring daggers at her as they made their perimeter. The jabs weren’t even close to being done.

“What the hell are you all doing?!”

“Oh, Dess… Dessie, girl… you genuinely might be the most misanthropic person I’ve ever had the displeasure of dating,” Bratty snarled. “Like, for real. Everything you say or do is just in the service of making people more miserable! You literally don’t know how to have fun!”

“B-bullshit! I know how to have fun!”

“Do you?” Tenta questioned. “Seriously, do you? Because whenever I talk to Azzy, it seems that you’re one of the most miserable people he could possibly be with! Every time he suggests something for you to do, some grand romantic escapade, it seems like half the time you turn it down to whinge about it not being ‘socialist’ enough, or whatever you say!”

“I bet you were whinging to him just now about the funfair!” Ember interjected.

“And I bet you’re not even a real socialist, you bourgeois bully!” Tenta finished.

“Look who’s calling me the bully,” she mumbled under her breath, before continuing. “But okay, I’m sorry, you’re right, I have been a bit of a whiner today, and for the past while. I’ll do better!” The fog was creeping in from the recesses of her mind already.

“But will you?” Bratty asked cutely. “Will you grow and be a better person? Or will you forget everything we told you by next week and regress back to where you are now. Because let’s face it, that’s what you do. That’s what you’ve always done.”

Her grip on reality began to loosen. “N-no, that’s not true, you brat!”

“But it is!” Bratty asserted. “I put up with dating you for three months, that kiss we shared formed a rift between me and Catty that’s never healed. I CHEATED on her, for YOU, at YOUR INSISTENCE! And what did that get me?! Sweet, sweet nothing! Less than nothing, because I had to put up with YOU. The constant whining and bickering and yelling, the threats of physical violence, an attempt to choke me out in a blind rage that you claimed to somehow not even know was happening! And what was it all for? You brought next to nothing to the table, NOTHING! I don’t have the faintest clue what Azzy even sees in you besides childhood nostalgia, you blazed, chronically wasted freak!”

Freak.

That word. That one, singular word, she thought, that’s what sent her over the edge. Because it was all true. She really was just a freakish bastard, a waste of a life, a waste to love.

She broke down.

Right there, in front of them all, she fell to her knees and wept, pathetically, head in her hands, full-on whimpering and crying. Frankly, she shocked the three of them by how quickly she folded; they had expected, and were prepared for, a violent outburst, but instead were met with a blubbering mess of a doe. Turns out regression really might’ve been the word of the day for her.

After a pause, Bratty nodded; there was no more sense in staying, they had already whittled her down more than they could’ve hoped for. She and Tenta turned back, heading out to find Azzy and Pizzapants. Ember, however, stayed back to whisper one last blow into Dess’ ear, kicking her while she was down.

“Remember, you musty skank, Azzy boy is so far out of your league, don’t be too surprised if he comes back from college with another girl, cuz you sure as hell aren’t going with him!” Ember then smiled cruelly. “And hey, maybe it’ll even be me! Hue hue hue!”

With that, she turned away and rejoined the rest of her friends, leaving Dess alone by the photo booth to clutch her print dearly and weep.

…

Hours passed, and the late afternoon was firmly established as the sun began to dip further in the sky.

Dess had spent most of that time alone by the lake; she had run off earlier soon after her ego was blown, not wanting to be publicly seen having a mental break. People had probably seen, however; she figured that the gossip mill was likely already running, how the crazed daughter of the mayor had another fit again, the mess that she was.

Most of the time she wasn’t crying, she was looking at the photos she had taken, those four snapshots of their love in succession, how it dipped from polite smiling, to a mockery of Asriel’s desires, and then of himself, before snapping back to passionate smooching.

Why did he even put up with it? That was the thought that swirled her mind like water in the drain for much of that lonesome time on the shore. It wasn’t even a cold acceptance, but a warm radiance that he carried himself with around her, despite all of the squabbles and misery she had inflicted upon him. Was he just a masochist? Was she just abusive, and he too battered to speak up? Or was it something else? Something that defied even her imagination?

Whatever. Pondering wasn’t helping; the wallowing only amplified her misery. She needed to distract herself somehow, find a way to get her mind out of the rut she was in.

And if there was one thing that could do that, it was music.

Finally back at the festival, she caught sight of the amateur music competition, and strolled right up to the booth, confidence flowing in her every step. Surely, this would be the thing to kickstart her heart today.

Up at the sign-in table, she spotted a bear in a black tee looking down at his phone, and ran up excitedly, preparing herself for the mental toll of having to converse with a stranger.

“Hi, I’m here to sign up for the music competition!” Dess excitedly said with a plastic face.

The contest manager looked up from his phone and, seeing who it was, immediately responded in a gruff voice. “Oh, hell naw! After last year? We ain’t lettin’ you into this shit again!”

“Come ON, man, you know I didn’t actually mean any of those words!” Dess protested. “It was just me being edgy, like normal!”

“If that’s your definition of ‘normal,’ then I’m thinkin’ that you need to be sectioned in a mental ward, girl.”

The cold reply was really messing with her head. Was Azzy right? Did she really fuck herself out of music in Hometown forever with that past performance?

There was one last thing she could do. She hated to play this last card she held, but there wasn’t really much of an option, now was there? “Um, I should probably let you know that I’m the mayor’s daughter, m’kay, and she said-”

“-that you’re not allowed to participate,” the manager filled in, a smug grin on his bearded face. “Yeah, she already spoke to me, December. Nice friggin’ try.”

Dess was flabbergasted and struck down by the reply. “She… she already spoke to you?”

“Yeah, dawg. Already did. And fuck you, by the way. I lost my piece because of you.”

This segue just confused her more than anything. “Wait… what?”

“You know that firearm ordinance your mother passed not too long ago? The one that restricted access to the police and militia members?”

“Yeah, vaguely.” Truth be told, Dess was just rolling along with the conversation; despite being the daughter of the mayor and an ardent socialist, she rarely ever paid attention to local politics, ironically enough.

“Well, it wasn’t out of the kindness of her heart, that’s fo sho! She did it because of YOU.”

She actually chuckled at this so-called revelation. Yeah, no surprise there, then, what with all the violent arguments they’d had up until recently. “What, did she think I was gonna kill her or something? Or someone important, like our senator?”

The manager shook his head, then glared straight into Dess’ soul. “No, there’s only one person your mother was scared of being hurt, Dess. YOU.”

“Me?!?! That can’t be right, Carol doesn’t give a shit about my well-being!”

“Bullshit,” the manager spat. “My father works in the town hall and overheard your mother’s own admission at the water cooler. She’s afraid you’s gonna blow your own brains out, and now nobody can own a piece in this town, not even me for huntin’ ferals. And it’s all. Because. Of YOU.”

Dess could only stammer in disbelief. No way this dude was telling the truth, he just had to be lying to get under her skin, right? There was no way, just NO FRIGGIN’ WAY Carol actually cared if she lived or died.

Knowing the conversation was dead regardless, she just stared the organizer down and turned away. “Fine, then,” she muttered. “Whatever, fuck the contest anyway, I’ll just dance along to it.”

“Not in those clothes, you ain’t,” he chimed in as she stormed off. “Carol says there’s a strict dress code for the 80s Semiformal tonight-”

“Angel-be-damned, I already know!” Dess spat out as she turned around violently. “I live with that bitch! I’ll just… go back and change….” Sulking, she turned away for the final time, and began the long trek back home just as the sun really began lowering.

…

She wasn’t going.

There was no way in hell she was going.

Staring herself down in the mirror, she felt just about ready to vomit as she gazed at her body in disgust. There was a reason she never wore dresses, or even skirts, but especially dresses like this one. She hated the way the air flowed up and through her legs; she felt naked and exposed despite being covered up and wearing biker shorts underneath. The vibrant orange color and frills of the dress also looked disgustingly femme on her butch body, and with her black hair, she thought she looked like a pumpkin. Not to mention the exposed shoulders meant her vitiligo was even more visible.

The worst was the arms, though. She couldn’t bare herself to look, but she knew her scars were fully visible now. Her wretched, jagged scars that ran up and down her arms. Even if she liked the dress, she’d probably be sectioned if someone spotted her like that.

No, she couldn’t go out. Fuck all of that….

…And yet, she felt guilty. Guilty that she was staying back home, guilty that once again, she had to be antisocial vermin. Yes, Bratty was right, she was a misanthrope that ruined things for everyone, especially Azzy, but the thing she hated the most and hurt first and foremost was always herself. She was just a miserable mess of a monster that didn’t know the first thing about fun. She wished she could, for Azzy’s sake especially, but feared deep down that was impossible.

She was pathetic.

Hearing a knocking at her door, she quickly stomached her concerns and slipped on a robe and rushed over to answer. She had no idea who it was, but best not to let them see the scars.

One peek through the peephole, however, assuaged whatever worries she may’ve had. She opened it without hesitation.

“Azzy?” she answered, gawking at his fresh appearance. He had on a brilliant three-piece suit in sky blue, which matched well with a pair of white dress boots that covered his paws, and a white rose pinned to the outer jacket. He looked positively sharp, straight out of a disco flick. “Come in! You look great in that suit!”

Oddly wincing at the compliment, Azzy nodded as he stepped into the Holiday Manor, the cold air blasting him as he crossed the threshold. Shutting the door behind her boyfriend, Dess stood trepidatiously by his side, before sighing and undoing her robe. Before he could even comment, it fell down lightly by her feet, revealing the brilliant orange dress she had on beneath.

Asriel couldn’t help but stare, overwhelmed with passion as he looked on. “You look beautiful,” he finally muttered.

Dess could only look down sheepishly. “I don’t feel beautiful.”

She felt Azzy take ahold of her hands. “Hey, I know you’re sensitive about your scars and vitiligo, but I just wanna say there’s only one other person in the world you need to care about when it comes to that: me. And I still think you’re beautiful, however you are. Don’t let the others get in your head.”

Weakly, she smiled back, but ultimately pulled away and held the sides of her dress tightly. “I’m glad you like it so much,” she confessed, “but… that’s the problem. Beautiful.” She ruffled through her hair. “I don’t wanna be ‘beautiful,’ Azzy! I wanna be hot and sexy, but not femme! I just… hate how un-butch I look in this thing.”

Her expression fully dropped, and her body matched with a depressed slouch.

“I don’t think I’m comfortable going out dancing tonight, Azzy.” She wiped newly formed tears from her face. “I’m sorry I’m like this!” she bellowed.

He paused for a moment as his girlfriend was about to cry, feeling that the pain in his own heart was matched for once, before an idea popped into his head. “Hey,” he said, taking hold of her hands once more just after he wiped the tears from her face. “You don’t have to go in that dress, y’know. If I found something else for you to wear, something more butch or masc, would you go then?”

She pondered for a moment, her breath bated as she put two and two together as to what he was suggesting. “Are you saying we…?”

Asriel only smiled. “I think I have an idea….”

…

The scene on the main dance square was bustling as dozens of monsters, and some humans, milled about on the pavilion, grooving out to the sick beats of the ‘80s cover band up on the stage. The scene had been just as wily as it had been since the end of the amateur music show that had wrapped a half-hour prior, where Kris and Noelle had just won best in show for their performance of “Piano Man” (Noelle singing and Kris on piano, of course). As lush synth sounds filled the air, a gaggle of monsters near the edge of the pavilion were standing about, gossiping rather than dancing in their throwback attire.

“...and he’s just run off?” Tenta asked.

Josh nodded. “Yeah, dude apparently saw his girl fuck off towards her place, and that was that.”

Ember butted in. “What does he even see in her, anyway?” she lamented. “She’s a total wreck!”

“Well if I had to guess,” Tenta posited, “dude just might be into goths or grunge-types.”

Ember continued grumbling as Bratty now chimed in. “Azzy needed to change, anyway; like, I think he forgot his suit.”

“Oh yeah, right!” Josh noted. “He wasn’t already decked out for some reason. He seemed… weirdly hesitant once I mentioned that fact, actually. It was really weird….”

As the band finished up their cover of “Rebel Yell,” announcing that their next song would be a deep cut from The Cars, Bratty spotted movement out of the corner of her eye. “Oh, like, I think I see them off in the distance,” she exclaimed. “And it looks like… OH.”

“OH.”

“MY.”

“ANGEL.”

The quartet were all blown off their feet as, just as if on cue for the music, the pair rushed out from the darkened evening streets and crashed the dance floor. It was just like it was out of an ‘80s teen drama.

Except Dess was wearing the suit, and Azzy was wearing the dress.

The four stood mouths agape at the sight for a good few moments, silent as the opening lines of the song rang out over the brilliant synth lines. Dess, much to their shock and dismay, actually looked quite sharp in the three-piece. They were expecting, silently hoping, actually, to be able to mock her for her failure and femininity, but that seemed to be off the table for once.

Azzy, surprisingly, also looked great in that dress. Sure, he barely fit into it, and wouldn’t if it weren’t so elastic, but with the way he was smiling, it was almost… natural-looking? Like he was truly himself for once. The group couldn’t pin it down, but they knew light ribbing could still be in order.

“Hey, Azzy!” Tenta shouted. “Nice dress! Where’d you find it, the closet you came out of?!”

“Dess!” Bratty hollered. “You pull that suit off of a corpse or something?”

“Oi, Dess!” Ember jabbed. “I can see your cameltoe through those pants, you whore!”

Everyone in the quartet laughed at the jabs, playfully at Azzy, and cruelly at Dess. Yet, despite their cackling, and the clear flash of a grimace Dess flashed, a whisper from her dress-clad lover seemed to bring a smile back onto her face.

“Hey, uh… did youse hear us?” Josh called out. He got no reply, though; the pair only continued on dancing in joint ecstasy as the lush synth transitioned into the second verse.

Walkin' on the footbridge

High above the clouds

Listenin' to your yesterday

Didn't make a sound

Dazzled by your sweet lips

Touchin' on me

Here comes trouble

Can't you see?

The pair twirled around each other as the chorus rang out once more.

Why don't we go?

Why don't we go?

Why don't we go away?

Why don't we go?

Why don't we go?

Why don't we go away?

The beautiful sound of synth picked up in fervor as a short solo began to play, Azzy and Dess spinning playfully around a pivot, arms outstretched as they moved. Gleeful smiles sat upon both of their faces, and for once, Dess cared not what others thought of her. She in his suit, and him in her dress, it only felt right.

Seeing the happiness abundant between the two, the quartet just gave up. Josh made his way over towards the snack table first, followed by Tenta and Ember as a pair. Bratty was the last to leave, giving a disgusted glance over towards the joyous pair, before also retreating just as the song was wrapping up its third and final verse.

Well I think of you when I dramatize

The things we never did

And I think of you when I'm flyin'

Or when I'm feelin' just like a kid

Why don't we go?

Why don't we go?

Why don't we go away?

Why don't we go?

Why don't we go?

Why don't we go away?

As the band hit their last few notes and ended the song, Azzy and Dess slowed down their spinning, giggling with dizziness as they each came to a stop, leaning on the other in order to stand upright. It was funny; the dress was a hair too tight on Azzy, and the suit a hair too baggy on Dess, yet both would probably admit that they felt more comfortable wearing the other’s clothes than they did their own. It felt of them, it had their scent, it was as if they were caught in a neverending embrace with their lovers. And for Asriel especially, he was living it and loving it. For as much as he smiled on the daily, he never smiled as much and with as much pure euphoria as he had now.

This was what he wanted to be.

The band announced that the next song would be the last of the night before the firework show would start up. A slow dance. Commanding the couples in attendance to take the floor, Asriel and Dess looked at each other knowingly, before nodding.

Their moment had arrived.

As the opening guitar chords ushered in the climax of the night, the pair walked out towards the center of the pavilion, hand in hand. Parting for just the briefest of moments, for their own spectacle, Dess bowed and, as the woman wearing the pants, offered her hand up to Asriel. In a heartbeat, he accepted, and their slow dance began.

I never meant to cause you any sorrow

I never meant to cause you any pain

I only wanted, one time, to see you laughing

I only want to see you laughing

In the purple rain

Purple rain, purple rain

Purple rain, purple rain

Purple rain, purple rain

I only want to see you bathing

In the purple rain

With the second verse kicking in, their rhythm held firm, swaying back and forth, their steps in unison as they stepped back, left, forward, and right, slowly starting to spin as they kept up their motion. It was like a dance between planets and stars, their coordination unmatched by anyone else on the floor. They didn’t notice, and they’d scantly mind even if they did, but the eyes of everyone else fell upon them for that one shining moment.

As they danced, and as the chorus came in once more, Asriel leaned his head and whispered into Dess’ ear. “It’s a beautiful song, don’tcha think?”

Dess nodded along as she swayed. “Mmm hmm.”

Chuckling at the thought about to pass from his lips, Asriel’s smile somehow grew further. “It’d be better if you were up there singing, playing guitar. You’d kill it up there.”

Her own smile also grew, and she could feel her face begin to blush. “Well, then, maybe once we’re in uni together, you’ll have to come and visit me at a party sometime. And I’ll make sure to do this at the climax.”

She leaned in and kissed him right on the lips. He didn’t fuss even for a moment. Their tongues touched, and it felt like the fireworks began early.

Honey, I know, I know, I know times are changing

It's time we all reach out for something new

That means you, too

You say you want a leader

But you can't seem to make up your mind

I think you better close it

And let me guide you to the purple rain

Purple rain, purple rain!

Purple rain, purple rain!

If you know what I'm singing about up here

Come on, raise your hand!

With the final chorus coming in, and the song reaching a climax of howls and wails, the two parted their lips and tongues, readying themselves for the big finale.

“You wanna lift me up, girlfriend?” Dess playfully asked. She meant it as a joke, over the fact he was the one in her dress, but with the way his face lit up, the tides of euphoria seemed to completely send him out awash.

“W-with pleasure!”

As the lead singer reached a crescendo with his wails, and the guitar began to scream from the stage, Dess felt herself get grabbed by the waist as Asriel lifted her up and over his head, spinning around in a slow circle as she stuck her arms and legs out like a star, fully basking in the moment. Up there, with the final glint of sunlight bouncing off her eyes, and the crowd transfixed around her, she couldn’t help but laugh.

It really was some kind of magic.

Eventually, Asriel’s strength gave out. Gracefully, Dess was set down in a spinning motion, and as the song came to a loud, thunderous end, the pair slowed their orbit around each other and met in the placid middle, where as the last chord was strummed and the last drum beat was hit, they united in a kiss once more.

The entire pavilion erupted into applause; whether any individual was cheering for the band, or for them, who was to say. They didn’t care; the only person who they cared for at that moment already gave them the adoration they each craved from the other.

“Thank you so much!” the lead singer cheered from the stage, taking a bow to the deafening cheers of the Hometown crowd. “That’s it for us tonight, but the firework show is just about to get started! And I’ve just gotten word that the ferris wheel is now up and running, so make your way over there, couples!”

As the band stepped off the stage, and the opening synth lines of an MGMT song began to blare over the speakers, Dess’ eyes opened wide as her face lit up. Pulling away from Asriel, and without a word in the gleeful excitement, she yanked him by the wrists and pulled him straight out of his placid state, sending him into a sprint as she dragged him over towards the big wheel.

Just for a moment, she felt like a kid again as the first verse of “Kids” started to play out. It was like it was 2007, the music playing, her dragging Azzy along to do something, the ever-gazing eye of her mother nonexistent, and a genuinely carefree attitude.

Well, there was one care in the world: getting in line for the ferris wheel first, so she and Azzy could have some alone time as the music continued on.

You were a child crawlin' on your knees toward it

Makin' Mama so proud, but your voice is too loud

We like to watch you laughin'

You pick the insects off plants, no time to think of consequences

Control yourself, take only what you need from it

A family of trees wanted to be haunted

Control yourself, take only what you need from it

A family of trees wanted to be haunted

Finally reaching the ferris wheel, she darted to-and-fro past other couples and children making their way over, and rushed all the way to the front of the queue, first in line, just as the ride operator undid the rope leading in. Without a moment of wait, she darted into the area and jumped into the first ride carriage.

Now having a chance to finally relax, she realized that Azzy was in the middle of a giggle fit as he eased himself into the seat, careful not to leave himself too exposed from maneuvering with the dress. “Wow…” he finally managed to get out and say with a bright smile, “...you’re sure as hell excited for this!”

His attitude was infectious, and Dess began laughing, too.

“Huh, I guess I am! Fa ha hah!”

As the old ferris wheel creaked to life and began spinning, the sounds of both the screams of kids playing and the synth of Kids playing grew ever so slightly more distant as the carriage slowly raised skyward. The fireworks show, as if on cue, began in earnest; sure, it was on a much smaller scale than whatever there was in Megalopolis, but given the fact she had her lover by her side, that seemed to matter less and less to her.

Fun. This is what it was like to have fun. To excitedly run towards the ferris wheel, Azzy sat beside her, nostalgic music playing as a lights show rang out above. For that moment, she knew what normality was. And even if it was just for a moment… she would revel in it nonetheless.

Yet, like all things, there was that creeping doubt in the back of her mind, the wayward voice that made life a living hell, echoing the words she had heard earlier at the photo booth. Gazing longingly over at her boyfriend, in that dress of hers, it soon became overwhelming.

She had to know how he really felt.

“Hey, Azzy?” she finally asked.

“Hm?”

She choked on her words in the moment, almost afraid of what the response may be, but his infectiously warm aura soothed her just enough. “I was talking with Bratty and the rest of your friends earlier, and… I kinda realized I’m pretty miserable to be around.”

Asriel immediately went into damage-control mode. “No, Dess, you’re not at all.”

“Oh, please,” she snorted playfully. “How many things did you suggest today that I shot down? The carnival games, the apple bobbing, the square dancing… heck, I managed to even ruin the photo booth with that squabble!”

“You didn’t ruin anything,” Asriel assuaged, now tenderly taking a hold of Dess’ hand. “Look, the carnival games were lame, anyway. Even I thought so, but I guess I thought you’d like to do them with me. Now, I was wrong, but there’s no shame in that! There’s clearly stuff you like doing for fun still! I mean, you were literally dragging here! And the photo booth? Fah, we get into petty squabbles all the time. I still had fun in the booth itself. No harm done.”

But Dess couldn’t get Bratty’s words, Tenta’s words, Ember’s words, any of them out of her head. She struggled to believe what Azzy said could be true. Her mind was back at the lake, in her sty of a room, at the photo booth, and all the other places they had fought in their past. “But I mean… I guess I’m just still a little unsure and self-conscious… even through all the times I do make people miserable and we fight, how can you still love me then?”

Asriel pondered the question for a moment, not out of any internal debate, but rather just searching for the right words.

He finally spoke, calm and tenderly. “Dess… I fell in love with you because of who you were, and even through thick and thin, even as you’ve slipped, I still hold out that the person you could be, like in moments like this, is the most wonderful person in the world. And yet even when you’re not at your best, that doesn’t matter to me. I’ve fallen in love with both sides of you, Dess. I want to see you get better, I fight to see you get better, but even if you never do, I’ll still forever be in love with you.”

The doe swore she could feel her heart melt. “You… do you really mean that?”

Asriel nodded affirmatively. “I do.”

Without a moment’s hesitation, Dess latched onto Azzy, giving him a death grip of a hug as all her fears were washed away for that night. Her love was reciprocated, just as Azzy promised. Together, they stayed like this, lovingly in the other’s embrace as the big wheel spun round and round. Eventually, the pair parted, but only to watch the fireworks display up above, which had really started to pick up.

Thinking back on the day’s events, and their past conversation, a strange thought popped into Dess’ head.

“Say… back at the photo booth… I know that there was the whole wait-until-marriage thing, but… I swear, it felt like there was an undercurrent of something else there….”

She trailed off as Asriel completely froze up; if he didn’t already have bright white fur, he would’ve well turned pale right there.

“Oh, I’m sorry….” Dess was just about set to drop the topic, before Asriel waved his hand towards her, to signal he wasn’t done.

“A… a lot of it is definitely still… prudishness,” Azzy began with his admission, “but… that’s just masking the real problem. It’s mostly something else. I’m… just… really uncomfortable in my own body….” He cowered in his seat, taking a deep breath as he fought to calm his nerves.

Dess was completely taken aback by the comment. “B-but Azzy… you have a great body! I’ll be the first to say it, and the most passionate in doing so, but you have a very handsome body…” She thought she figured out the reason. “...even if you put on a little winter weight after cross-country season, you’ll still be my man!”

She was wrong, and he blurted that fact out. “But I don’t wanna be yo- er…” He held his tongue, figuring the phrasing would sound awful. “...I don’t wanna be handsome,” he admitted, “I wanna be… pretty…”

The pair sat quiet in the carriage for a good couple of beats, just silently watching as the fireworks burst up above. Azzy was too fried from stress to offer any more words, and Dess was so utterly lost as to what was the problem with her boyfriend that she didn’t know where to go with the conversation.

She finally offered up something. “You can be pretty,” she said. “There’s nothing wrong with that. Hell, if anything, you look pretty bonita in that dress there!”

That seemed to do the trick. Azzy slowly nodded, before warmly smiling back. “Yeah… thanks, Dess.” He playfully kissed her on the cheek, to which she playfully waved in a flattered manner.

“Daww, you cutie!”

The two sat there together in the carriage, both blushing profusely over the whole interaction as fireworks burst overhead, the wheel coming to a stop with them close to the peak of the ride. If they had let things leave off there, things would’ve been just perfectly serene.

Asriel, for once, was the one who couldn't let enough be enough.

“Would you love me if I were a worm?”

Immediately shooting him a look, Dess burst out in open laughter at the comment. “I’m serious!” Asriel begged, hoping his girlfriend would take the question seriously.

“Oh, I’m sorry,” she chuckled, wiping a tear from her face. “That was just so abrupt that I… fah!” She settled herself with some breathing, the technique Noelle had taught her yesterday, as a matter of fact, before continuing on. “I mean, yeah, sure. I’d love you if you were a worm. Would get you a nice big terrarium with all the appy slices you’d want,” she said cutely.

Asriel smiled, but clearly wasn’t satisfied. “What about an eldritch horror?” he asked.

Dess chuckled again. “You’ll have to be more specific with that!” she playfully added.

Giggling as well, Asriel pondered, before thinking of something. “Ohay, um… how about that weird Knight OC you drew way back when, the one you paired with my God of Hyperdeath.”

Her face lit up. “Fah! You call that eldritch? That thing was barely even horror!”

“It was like a symbiote, though!” Azzy protested. “All drippy and gloopy-like, it basically had no solid mass, yet had that jagged form, and- HEY, why’re you laughing?! I’m serious! It always freaked me out when you drew her with an open ribcage!”

Dess, again, wiped a tear from her eye, smiling. “Oh yeah, I forgot about that part… damn, that was freaky cool! But, uh… yeah, no qualms there, would definitely be down bad for you as the Roaring Knight. Real question is, would you still love me like that?”

“Oh, of course!” Azzy said without even a moment’s hesitation. “I’d love you no matter who you are…” He thought for a moment, gazing longingly at Dess as she smiled, before tacking on, “...even if you were a guy!”

“Hah, right!” Dess chuckled, unsure why Azzy felt the need to tack on such a weird addendum to the subject.

“No, I’m serious,” he pronounced. “If you came out as trans tomorrow, I’d still love you!”

Freezing up in the moment, Dess had no clue how to respond to that. It was such a seemingly off-the-cuff remark to make, and Azzy seemed almost… frantically nervous in how he said it. She needed to at least say something to clear the air. “Look, Azzy, I can tell you straight from the source, I’m not a boy.” She laughed a bit, genuinely unsure why Azzy was being so weird about gender right now. “I appreciate the gesture, though,” she politely added.

The blonde sighed a little, as if on cue, then continued on. “Okay, yeah, silly train of thought, anyway. I have one more scenario, then.” He waited a beat, doing his best to mentally prepare himself, before finally asking the real question.

“What if I were a girl… like that?”

There was no laughter from Dess this time around; she found the question honestly a bit underwhelming compared to the absurdity of the other two. “A girl? Um… yeah, I’d still love you.”

Asriel’s breath shook. “...and?”

She had no idea how to follow up to such a question. “...and what? I’m bi, I don’t mind chicks. Kinda lame question to finish with, Az, you should already know this!”

Taking the lackluster response as disinterest, Azzy nervously laughed it all off as he got choked up. “Hahah… yeah, right. How… how silly of me! I’m sorry for even asking!”

She may not have known exactly what Azzy was going after, but Dess could certainly tell that his feelings seemed to be hurt some by what she said, whatever it was that set him off. “Oh, don’t be sorry!” she cooed, hoping to assuage the goat from whatever it was that was ailing him. “Look, I don’t know what I said to get you all bent like this, but I really did mean it when I said that I’d love you if you were a woman. I’ll love you no matter who or what you are, Azzy. That’s a guarantee.”

Asriel looked over and nodded with a weak, warbling smile, although he was clearly still nerved up from the entire past discussion.

Leaning over, Dess draped her arms around Asriel’s shoulder and kissed him lightly on the forehead, hoping that would at least be enough to diffuse things. “Wanna cuddle?” she softly asked.

He paused for a moment, taking a deep, contemplative breath as he stared out over the fairgrounds below, before nodding. “Yeah,” he said. “That’d be nice.” Shifting his body around to slide his arm behind Dess, the pair held each other tightly as they gazed out over the crescendo of the fireworks show from the zenith of the ferris wheel, regularly turning to gaze longingly into the others eyes and kissing as they did so.

For all the bustle below and around them, up there alone with their tender lips locked, there was peace.

…

It was nearly midnight when the pair finally stumbled down the street back towards the manor, making their way over to the gate where they each paused to stare at the full moon and stars above. That was the one really nice part of living in such a small town; there was barely any light pollution to draw away from the natural beauty of the nighttime sky now that the fireworks were done with.

Holding hands, the pair gazed on upward, nary a thought entering their minds as they did so.

“I had a lot of fun with you tonight,” Dess finally mused.

“Same,” Azzy echoed, holding tightly to her hand as clung to the skirt of her dress with the other, enraptured by how it felt on his body. “I’m glad we were able to let loose and have some fun there at the end, even if the start was a little rocky.” He paused for a moment. “Hey… this may seem like a silly question, but…” Asriel hesitated, thinking the question would draw a sour reaction, but went on with it, anyway. “...can I keep this? The dress, that is?”

Dess was more perplexed than anything, but just shrugged it off. “Yeah, sure, I never cared for that thing, anyway. Can I keep the suit?” she added.

“Oh, yeah, sure, no problem there!” Azzy let off a chuckle, slight nervousness laden in the undercurrents of it. “I guess we can call it a trade, then. I… heh… never really liked wearing suits, either….”

His smile dropped away, and Dess noticed. “Are you sure you’re okay, Azzy?”

“Yeah, just…” He choked up on his words once more, fear gripping his throat. “I’ll tell you at some point later, okay?”

Dess wanted to press further, really wanting to figure out why Azzy was acting so weird… but deep down, she was tired, and didn’t wish to stress him any further.

“Okay, then.”

The two stood there aimless for a good few minutes, before Azzy let out a loud, long yawn.

“Eyugh… Well, it’s late, anyway. I should probably be heading off.”

“Oh, alright.” Dess tried to find some other, greater parting words, but came up empty. “Goodnight, Azzy.”

He gave her a kiss on the lips, soft and tender, but fleeting, before parting ways back towards his place. “G’night, Dess.” With that, he turned and made his way down the dark lane, slowly fading off into the distance, before disappearing down the road.

Alone at the gate, the chirping of crickets the only company she had, she quietly turned towards the lock, clicked it open, and stepped on through.

Later that next morning, she would submit her portfolio in the mail, the various copies being shipped out to all of the colleges and universities she applied to. In time, they would get back to her. And in time, Azzy would tell her the truth.

But that would be a long wait.

Chapter Text

Months passed, and before she knew it, winter had come. With chilly air moving in on Hometown, the spirit of Dess’ namesake was in full swing, both among her own family and around the entire town.

It was just a shame that one big day was also her birthday.

Having a Christmas birthday was already bad enough for most people, whether or not they believed in the human Christ’s birth or the power of the Angel of the Prophecy (although both were equally meritless religious bullshit in Dess’ mind). But for someone literally named “December Holiday” in a family as obsessed with the day as her own, it turned a moderate annoyance into a pure living hell. The endless festivities that ate into her time, ceaseless Christmas carols that filled the house from Carol’s sound system, a marathon of smarmy, sappy movies that the rest of the family demanded they binged together. She frankly couldn’t even give a damn about the fact they rolled up holiday gift-giving in with her birthday, that was just a drop in the bucket. She just wanted some recognition, some acknowledgement of her existence as a person, devoid of any of the holiday superlatives that fit her in name only.

This was, of course, always ignored by Carol, the holiday freak that she was. She’d given up trying to fight her on this years ago.

No surprise, then, that Dess took up celebrating Saturnalia as some sort of joke years back to mock her family’s fanatical celebration of Christmas. She didn’t actually believe in the old pagan gods, but to see her mother slighted was a gift in its own right. She’d have her birthday to herself, even if it was recognized by only herself, the rest of the world be damned.

Well, the rest of the world sans Asriel.

He still believed in the Angel, the pious golden-child choir-boy he was, but whether it was out of a sense of pity for her, a minor act of teenage rebellion against the institutions that raised him, or a slipping devotion that he refused to reckon with fully, Dess didn’t know, and she knew better than to ask. What he did for her was already more than she could ever ask her family for. Not even Noelle; as much as she loved her, it felt like the young blonde was still just as enraptured by holiday nonsense as the rest of the family, although she did have a penchant for the more horrific side of things. Dess could at least respect the fact Noelle enjoyed Krampus more than just about anything else in the spirit of the season.

So it was at the Dreemurr’s house on that cold 25th of December evening where the pair, with candles lit, snuggled up on the sofa to watch MTV as the rest of their families were over at the manor partying up. They had just finished up their own little gift swap days before for Saturnalia, and on this unofficial final day of the holiday, it was all-Dess all the time.

Truth be told, even with the fact she still wished the rest of her family would celebrate her birthday independent of the holidays, she deeply enjoyed moments like this whenever the day rolled by. Alone in a darkened house, illuminated only by the flickering of flame and the television glow alike, raunchy music blaring out of the speakers as alligator bikini babes danced on-screen, entertaining the couple on the couch as they watched along.

Asriel snickered as a blonde gator in particular leaned over the lead singer and began grinding on him. “Doesn’t that one remind you of Bratty?”

Both of them taking a sip of their beers simultaneously, Dess struggled not to spit out her drink at the comparison. “Shit, you’re right, she kinda does! Fah!”

The beer had been Dess’ idea, but one that Asriel actually went along with for once. Neither of their parents would likely approve if they found out, what with how stuck-up they both were, but it was technically legal for them to drink. Unlike many of the prudish Southern states, where it was still 21, or even 25, 18 was the legal age to drink up here in the North. And Azzy, for what it was worth, showed up for it. No crummy cans of Genny Cream like Dess was used to sneaking from the convenience store, no. He bought for them a nice case of a local craft brew, and Dess was absolutely savoring it. Or, well, she would be if she wasn’t damn well shotgunning her beers down.

“I’m surprised you’re holding your own so well,” Azzy remarked as his girlfriend downed her fourth can of the stuff. “Although knowing how much you already drink, I guess I can’t be too surprised you built up a tolerance.”

Letting rip a loud burp, Dess giggled and smiled in agreement. “Yeah, but are you really gonna stop me from taking this all in? First time ever I’ve had a legal sip, I’m gonna make the most of it!”

Azzy chucked as “Darling Nikki” faded out over on the TV. “What, like with how you demolished that cake earlier?” he jabbed, playfully.

“What can I say? I was hungry!” she protested. “I smoked a whole bowl earlier, you know I got the munchies!”

The two shared a laugh at the remark, both members of the pair well past the point of being tipsy by now. Even Asriel, the choir boy that he claimed to be, figured that he could let loose for one night.

“Oh, Azzy,” she laughed. “This has probably been the best birthday I’ve had in years!”

“I’m glad you liked it!” he said, blushing. He hadn’t been able to afford much in the way of gifts this year, but it seemed like the case of good beer and time spent was fine enough for her. She’d already made him well aware of that. “Anything else you wanna do?”

“Well, I am a bit bored…” Looking back at Azzy, a devilish grin crept up over her face. “...Say, how about I practice my makeup again!”

Azzy’s face lit up at this request, just as she came to expect. “Ooh, can I go grab my dress?”

“Oh, uh… sure,” she replied, arcing her back as she stretched getting up. “You slip into that while I go open up my makeup kit.”

As Asriel scampered up the stairs to his room, Dess shut off the television, reached down into her daybag, and pulled out a chunky makeup kit. Truth be told, she still had no idea why Azzy was so enthusiastic about having his makeup done, especially in that dress she had given him, but she wasn’t one to question. She needed the practice, anyway; Noelle had a big performance for New Years’ down in Port Town with the Hometown choir, so she needed to make sure her sister was looking sharp. Anything to hone her skills.

Fishing through, she pulled out an eyeliner pencil and some mascara from the kit, just in time for Azzy to slowly make his way back downstairs, fiddling with the back of his dress.

“You good?” Dess asked, setting her instruments down on the coffee table.

“Yeah, fine,” Azzy replied, sucking in his chest as best he could. “Hey… you mind helping me to close this? I’ve put on a bit of weight since last.”

Dess hurried over and inspected the zipper, realizing that the dress was so stretched out, it was probably a lost cause. “Ehh… I dunno, Az. You’re barely fitting into this as-is. I think the dress would probably tear if I zipped it up any further.” She circled back around to face him, an encouraging look on her face. “But hey, that’s no problem! You can keep that on how it is, the zip is more for tightening the chest area, anyway, and you don’t have anything rocking there! Fah!”

It was just meant to be a joke, about how Azzy didn’t have a massive rack, because why would he? But despite that fact, and the clear tone of her voice, he still looked… hurt, somehow. “I’m sorry,” she quickly added.

“It’s okay, you didn’t know- eep!” Azzy’s hands shot to his mouth, covering it.

“Didn’t know what?”

“NOTHING! A hah hah… I mean, nothing. I'll tell you later, Dess.”

Again with the whole “tell you later” thing. What was his deal, anyway? He wasn’t a woman, he shouldn’t care whether or not he had a large chest. It’s not like he wanted to deal with having tits, anyway.

Wait, did he want tits?

Dess shook her head as Azzy sat down on the couch, preparing himself for the procedure. What a silly question, she thought to herself. Of course he didn’t, guys don’t want to have tits, they want to look at them and grab them! Azzy was just… probably being weird, is all. Maybe he didn’t feel comfortable about the winter weight he was putting on. Yeah, that was it.

Grabbing her makeup, she plopped down right next to her boyfriend and scooched over nice and close, the pair now kneeling on the sofa, facing each other. “Now, I wanna try something a bit different this time, if that’s okay with you.”

“O-oh! Yeah, sure!” Azzy replied, his voice unsteady and unsure of where Dess was headed with this.

In earnest, she began her routine. It was a nice, quick, and simple routine. First she took her eyeliner pencil, tipped an inky black, and dragged it out around Asriel’s eyes, making sure to create a nice thick wing at the end of each lid before she swooped right back in underneath. Then, with a mascara brush dipped in dark ooze, she curled Azzy’s lashes up to make them pop, creating a large, sweeping curl to the lash that was dark and defined.

“I need you not to twitch so much, Az,” she said bluntly as the goat’s eye spazzed out. “I don’t want to fuck this up.”

“Sorry,” he quietly murmured. “I’m just not used to this.”

“I know, hun,” she cooed, reveling in the dominant hold she held over her boyfriend as she worked on the second eye. “I’m almost done, though. Just hang steady, the worst of it’s already passed.”

Pausing for a moment, she quickly ran the brush through his eyebrows, darkening them in goth accordance, and then grabbed one last thing out from her makeup kit that she had forgotten: eyeshadow. With a delicate brush, she rubbed in some black powder, and then gently stroked it into the lid of Azzy’s eye, him having closed them for the final procedure. Slowly for each eye, she circled outwards, letting the shadow dissipate until it made a nice smokey haze around the edges.

And with that, she pulled away, finished.

“There we go!” she said excitedly. “All done! And let me tell you, you look like an absolute goth diva right now! Ooh, I love it!”

Proud of her handiwork, she grabbed a handheld mirror she had in her bag and pulled it out, practically shoving it in Asriel’s snout she was so excited over the whole thing. “Well, my Prince of Darkness, whadda ya think of that?”

He gazed into the mirror, excited anticipation quickly turning to a deep, mournful longing the longer he stared at his reflection.

It was like he wasn’t seeing himself in the mirror. Someone else was there, some man that wasn’t him.

“Hey, Dess?” Asriel meekly asked.

“Hm?” She gave him a tilted glance. “Don’t like the look? I did go a bit heavy on the mascara-”

“No, no, I love the goth look!” Azzy assuaged. “It’s like my old ‘God of Hyperdeath’ OC! I love it!”

Dess chuckled at the reference, old memories welling up; she still fondly remembered hers, a menacing, angular black knight. Of course, that was off-topic, and she could feel it.

Azzy continued, voice soft and nervous. “I just... well… maybe want a little… more… done, y’know. Like your past work, or maybe even beyond that. Maybe something a bit more…” He froze, tense and fearful of finishing his sentence, but swallowed his nerves and carried on. “...something more… femme….”

Something femme. He was always asking for something femme. Dess couldn’t help but think back to that night at the Festival, how Azzy seemed so happy to be wearing her dress, like he was now, how he was so excited earlier on to get his makeup done, so weird about asking if she’d still love him if he was a girl.

Wait, that last part….

No, he couldn’t be… could he?

Her gaze locked with Azzy’s face, she could see the terror in her eyes, the quivering of her lips, the panic that was setting into her heart. Wait, her? It was still him, right? Nevermind. She didn’t want to send her lover into a nervous fit from a stray mention. Best to play along for now. Making Azzy happy was her number one priority.

“Alright,” she said with a gentle, yet cheery tone. “I can femme you up nice and good. Figure I oughta put those skills I learned for Noelle to good use.”

She felt a warmness in her heart as relief swept over Asriel’s face, and tension dissipated from his shoulders. “Oh, Angel, thank you,” he sighed, readjusting himself on his knees in preparation once more.

Rifling through her makeup kit, Dess pulled out all of the accouterments she would need for the upcoming labor. Lining them all up in a row, she went down each one by one. First was reapplying some of the eyeliner, adding crows feet to the ends of each streak for some feminine flair. She brought out the wings even more to boot, really hamming up the femininity of the look.

Next came some more eyeshadow, but this time, a brighter color. Wiping away the black with an alcohol wipe, she reapplied with a soft sky blue, following the same strategy she had done prior to make the edges blur.

While she had the wipes out, she wiped away the mascara from his eyebrows, and reapplied with a clear variant this time, taking the time to ensure that his brows were as demure and skinny as she could make them. She could sense that Azzy wanted something traditionally femme, anyway.

Finally, came the blush.

“Now for this, Azzy, I need you to pucker up your lips,” Dess asked of him. “It helps with the application process.”

“Okay,” he mumbled, nigh incomprehensible with his lips already prepared. “I’ll trust you on this.”

With his cheeks now more defined, Dess took her brush and lightest hue of blush and began to gently stroke it into Asriel’s cheeks. “Now, I’m having to go lighter on you here than I do with Noelle, since your fur is so light,” she said as a matter of fact. “Just need to do the other side… and done!”

She contemplated for a moment, before letting her desires get the better of her, and kissed Azzy right on the lips. He jolted in shock, but happily leaned into it, before the two parted.

“Aww, Azzy-girl, you look so diva right now!” Dess complimented. “You’re positively bonita!”

He froze up a nervous smile creeping over his face. “Y-you really think so?” The thoughts of being called “girl” raced through his mind.

“Yeah, you should look at yourself!” She pulled out her handheld mirror and held it up again. “Well, whadda ya think?”

Looking in the mirror again, nervous anticipation quickly faded away, euphoria taking its place. It was like another person was staring at him in the mirror, someone beautiful, someone well-defined.

Someone… womanly.

Womanly. Despite all the work that had been done, he didn’t feel womanly. The dress, the makeup, the hair he’d let grow out down to his shoulders, it all should’ve made him feel more like a woman, more happy, more his true self.

Then why, despite all of that, was he on the verge of tears.

“I love it,” he finally murmured. “I love it, Dess.”

She could hear how strained his voice was. “You don’t sound in love, Az…”

“No, I am!” He protested. “I am… I’m just… it’s a lot, okay?” He nervously rubbed his arm as he looked away. “I just… I love it so much, but it’s only temporary. It’ll all wash off after tonight, and I’ll just have to go back to being a man again. I… I wish I could be femme forever!”

There it was again. She was certain of it now.

“Hey… Azzy?” she finally asked, gently prodding with her voice.

“Hm?” His voice still shaking, there was trepidation in the way he carried himself.

“I don’t mean to pry but…” She hesitated for a moment, still unsure whether or not it was right to press on and ask it directly, but she just needed to know. Her curiosity was far too strong for her own good.

“...Are you… trans?”

The question left the room silent, neither of them moving a muscle as they let the question ring out. For a moment, it felt to Azzy as if he had fallen out of his body, that his soul, his spirit, had somehow departed, and left him a hollowed husk that was staring at Dess.

Then, the weight of everything set in.

All of a sudden, Azzy’s heart began to beat faster and faster, quickly picking up in pace and ferocity until he felt as if he were having a heart attack. Feeling it nearly beat out of his chest, he gripped the collar of his dress, nearly rending the garment as he clung to it, taking a hold of chest fur and damn near pulling that out as well. His breathing matched his heart in intensity, going from a pant to full-on hyperventilation, every short and terse breath a frantic wheeze. His eyes widened, pupils narrowed, and his entire body trembled in pure, primal fear.

Dess was ill-equipped to deal with such a tremendous task; Azzy had helped her out of many such messes throughout their relationship, and even in the time before they dated, but never had she needed to reciprocate. She was completely stranded and lost for words or actions.

The only thing she could think to do at that time was to hug him, to hold him tight and damn near swaddle him, to squeeze the panic and worry out of his system and let it all out in a big, healthy cry. She scooched close to him and began to wrap her arms around, only for him to immediately backpedal, scurrying backwards across the sofa, his eyes widening further as his panic only deepened.

Undeterred, she continued to slide down, inching ever closer to her partner with each passing second, whose breathing continued to quicken until it couldn’t get any faster. Scampering back, they eventually reached the arm rest of the sofa, impeding them from scurrying back any further, their eyes as wide as pie tins. Unable to move any farther, they resigned to their fate, and curled up in a ball on the sofa, holding their knees to their chest and violently shaking, scared for their life.

There was nothing stopping Dess now; in an instant, she wrapped her arms around Asriel and held them tight, gently stroking their long, fluffy ear as they quaked.

They just wouldn’t stop quaking, though. Their entire body trembled as they were held; Dess squeezing them tight only seemed to make the problem worse. Now able to feel their heart beat through her body’s contact, she feared that it would damn well burst. She wasn’t used to this; she was always on the receiving end of one of these hugs, with how often she would have a mental break. To have to sit in their shoes for once… she worried she was ill-equipped to act. Thinking quickly, she thought back to what Azzy would do for her when she was in such a state, and threw together some sort of loose action plan.

Taking a hold of Asriel’s hand now, she gently traced around their palm with one of her fingers, gently rubbing it in a circle along the middle, in the hopes of being able to center them. Then, just as calmly, she leaned in as close as she could get to Azzy’s ear and whispered soothing words into it.

“It’s okay,” she muttered, her voice quiet and as smooth as the most placid of lakes on a windless day. “You’re allowed to be scared, you’re allowed to cry. But just know, I’ll always be here for you. You don’t have to be alone in this.”

As if by magic, the effects of the words washed over them like a wave. Their tremors slowed, and then ceased, their breathing deepened, and their heart rate dropped back down, still elevated, but no longer worrying.

And then they cried.

Azzy, unable to hold it back any longer, loudly wailed, Dess holding them even tighter as they did so, feeling their teared stream down their face and soak into her hair. But she didn’t care about getting a little damp; she only continued to hug him and whisper soothing words. “Shhh… it’s okay, let it out. You’re safe here… you’re safe….”

The crying seemed to have an infectious effect on her, as she herself could feel tears begin to well up in her eyes, pained to hear and feel her lover in such a miserable state. She did her best to hold firm, as firmly as she could handle, but it was no use; she cried right alongside him, their tears flowing together as one.

“Oh, Azzy,” she wept, “I didn’t want to hurt you when I asked that question… I was just curious! If I had known… I never… I never would have….” She couldn’t bring herself to finish; it was all too much, all at once.

She felt Azzy’s crying subside into mere sniffles. “Do you really want to know?

Holding mum for a minute, she gently nodded, afraid of setting them off again. “Only if you’re comfortable saying it.”

Taking a deep breath in, still absolutely terrified, Azzy turned away, unable to look Dess in the face as they confessed.

“Yes,” she finally mumbled, meekly through her tears. “Yes. Dess, I… I just… I wanna be a woman like you so fucking bad, and I just… I’m scared, Dess! I’m scared you won’t love me like this, that you’ll hate me for hiding this from you! For not being the boyfriend you fell in love with!”

It all felt so blindingly obvious to her now that it had been said aloud. Why she had been so cagey at the Festival, why she winced whenever she called Azzy “her man,” why she was so insistent on keeping the dress even after the big day, why her smile was so warm and genuine when she was like that on the dance floor. Because for the first time, she was herself.

And despite all of that, despite her now knowing, it only seemed to Dess like it had scared Azzy to come clean. Perhaps it was her lazy answer to the question she asked on the ferris wheel that set those fears in motion, or perhaps it was a long-held, deeply-seated fear that had only just now reared its ugly head now that it could be hidden no longer.

Whatever the case, it wouldn’t stand. Dess knew, deep in her heart, that she was supportive of her now-girlfriend, and she needed to make sure that Asriel knew this just as well.

“Azzy…” she murmured, holding on tight to her hand as she did so. “Can you look at me?

She didn’t respond, only continuing to whimper to herself; it was all too much at once for her to process.

“Azzy,” she said again, much firmer this time. This seemed to snap her to attention. “Look, Azzy,” she gently broke, “do you see this patch on my jacket?”

She pointed towards her bi pride flag on her combat jacket.

“Mhm…” Azzy quietly mumbled.

“You know what this means, right? That I love both men and women?”

“Yeah?” she sniffled.

“Well, that includes you, too. It’s like I said back on the ferris wheel, Azzy, I’ll always love you, no matter who or what you happen to be. Cis man, trans woman, something else, like Kris… I’ll always love you.” She threw her jacket off behind her, leaving her arms exposed in her tank top, scars and all. “Until the day I die.”

Holding Azzy close, and pulling her own face right up to hers, she halted for the briefest of moments, wiping the tears from each of their faces, before putting her lips up to Azzy’s as tenderly as she could. Greedily, she stuck her tongue in as well, slowly dancing it into Azzy’s mouth, feeling it press up against the goat’s own, before gently licking the roof of her mouth. It was soft, loving, and tender; the whole exchange melted their hearts and melded them together, at least for that moment.

Pulling apart, Dess could feel that Azzy’s heart had slowed to a reasonable rate, and smiled warmly. “Feeling better?” she gently asked.

Azzy pondered for a moment, assessing her own feelings, before tepidly nodding. “There’s still just a lot running through my brain right now, but….” She paused, smiling. “It’s better knowing I at least have you.”

The tone of her voice was indeed truthful, as she did sound at least a little relieved, although Dess could clearly tell that there was still a lot weighing down on her mind.

“Is there anything in particular that’s troubling you?” she asked.

Slowly, after a pause, Asriel nodded. “Oh, so, so many things. Too many things, it seems. There’s just so much fear, so much paranoia, I don’t know what’s a real concern and what’s just delusion! It’s all just so much, I don’t know how to cope!”

Dess squeezed her hand a little tighter, cupping around her cheek with the other. “Okay,” she said, taking a deep breath and exhaling slowly. “Let’s take this slow, Azzy. Work through your fears, all that sort of thing, if that’s alright with you.” She chuckled. “Fuck, ain’t this the type of thing that you’re usually doing to help me?”

They both had a short laugh over that fact; indeed, with how much Dess had broken down before, Azzy hadn’t ever expected to be on the receiving end of such a deal of impromptu therapy, much less from someone as disheveled as Dess was. Yet here they were. And truth be told, she was doing well for herself, for once.

“Okay, then. I’m fine with that,” Azzy confirmed. “But, I need you to promise me not to tell anyone about this. Not my parents, not your parents, not even Noelle. I just…” She rubbed her arm gingerly. “Fuck… I’m just still so nervous, I only want to come out when I’m ready. Like… I’m glad to know you care for me, and I’m pretty sure they will, too, but you saw me back there. That was…”

“... A lot.” Dess finished, Azzy having trailed off herself. She raised her hand as she made her oath. “You have my word, Az. Nobody else has to know until you say so.”

Her face beamed at the knowledge her secret was safe. “Thank you, Dess.”

She smiled back, just as warm. “No problem, girl. Now, what is it specifically that scares you so much?”

Rubbing her arm gently, she thought of all that ailed her.

“I guess… heh, how do I put this…” She pondered, before finally continuing on. “I guess for the longest time, I’ve always been the golden child, the choir boy of the family, y’know. Always doing well in school, volunteering, being active in church, you get the picture. And I guess… with all of that on my plate, I’ve never focused on what’s right for me, what I really want. My existence has been, well… pretty much constantly working to be for the best interests of others. And I suppose my biggest fear with all of this is no longer being seen as a “golden child;” sure, people around Hometown are all supportive of the trans people in our community, I’m well aware of that, but if people find out I’m like this, then… they’ll worry for me. And I don’t want people to worry for me. I just wanna be Little Miss Perfect, but… I’m not sure that’s even possible….”

Letting off a long sigh, Dess shook her head. “It’s not possible,” she said, “but it wasn’t possible when you thought you were a boy, either. And take it from me. Remember how I used to be when I was young? Like around Noelle’s age?”

Azzy chucked at the recollection. “Oh, do I? You were a gremlin even back then.”

“Yeah, maybe I was, but… not like I am now. Kris is probably more extreme than I was at their age, I was a real mother hen for Noelle, a real people-pleaser. I didn’t believe in the Angel even then, but I still went to Church for appearance’s sake, for Carol’s sake. And you know what happened to me after trying to keep that up for so long?”

The answer was already on Asriel’s tongue. “You cracked.”

Dess nodded. “I cracked. I couldn’t take it anymore. It was like my mind just shattered at some point in Freshman year. I couldn’t take being a goody-two shoes anymore. That’s when I started dyeing my hair, smoking pot, all of that, when my mental issues really cropped up. Do I regret that…?”

She planned on the question being rhetorical, to say “no” but continue on with her point for Azzy. Yet, that question… it weighed down on her mind a lot more than she expected. There was nothing wrong with who she was… but the reasons why she did that… were they…?

“...Dess,” Azzy asked. “What were you gonna say?”

She shook her head, lightly slapped her own snout to attention, and pressed on again. “My point is, Azzy, don’t bend yourself to a breaking point. We can’t all be a perfect image of the expectations of others. Sure, Toriel may see you as a little perfect choir boy still, but now’s the time to assert who you really are as a person! It doesn’t have to be the gender stuff all at once, but push some boundaries. Live for yourself for once, not others. Besides, what you said earlier about them worrying… why would they be?”

That last point seemed to steer the conversation. “Oh, plenty of reasons,” Azzy explained. “Not so much for here, you know what I said about Hometown being supportive, it’s just… the rest of this country isn’t so.” She curled back up, knees to chest, as she went on.

“I’ve read up on what the prevailing attitudes around trans people are. I’ll probably never be able to run a race ever again, they don’t let trans women compete with other women, and harass those who compete with the men. And without that outlet… I’m gonna be so fat… like, I’m already starting to fill out like dad after only a few months out, how am I ever gonna be a pretty woman? People are gonna easily be able to clock me with my broad shoulders and belly.”

She sniffled at that last point. “And beyond that, there’s also a good shot the colleges I’m applying to wouldn’t want the headache of setting me up with proper housing accommodations and just lump me in with the men again, and that’s if they’d even care to offer me scholarships or accept my applications if I were forthright.”

What she had said was a lot for Dess to take in all at once, the weight of it all on her shoulders being overwhelming. A lot of it was, admittedly, the fact that much of her specific worries were completely out of her wheelhouse, to the point where she didn’t even know what advice to give. But another facet of it all was, in contrast, how strikingly similar much of it felt. The fact she was so overwhelmed with fear, with misplaced guilt, the feeling of having an entire persona crack and collapse through her fingers: Azzy her choir boy image, Dess her military girl one… and another one prior. And of course, the fear. The paralyzing, horrifying fear that the whole world was crashing down, with her at the center of all the pain and misery.

It was like she was staring into a mirror.

Sickeningly, she realized that in a way, she had won. For years, she’d pestered Asriel for her optimistic view of the world, for how she’d always try to find the best in the worst. And here she was now, thinking in the same doubtful, fearful manner she herself saw things. Yet despite that, despite finally having had the spread of her worldview come to its fruition, it felt… well, miserable. It was horrible having to deal with such a mopey, defeatist mess. For a moment, she questioned her own existence, whether or not it was worth sticking around if she was such a negative, toxic person.

No, she thought, she had to be there for Azzy, now more than ever, to help her dig out of that hole. She may not have dug it herself, but she sure as hell gave over the shovel.

“I know how you feel about weight issues,” she started. “It’s… why I’m not on those mood stabilizers anymore. I may not have any advice I can give you there, but just know you’re not alone on that front; it seems like a common thing for women to worry about their weight. I suppose if there’s anything I can say, it’s that Tori’s pretty large, and she’s still pretty.”

“You think my mom is pretty?”

“N-not like that, dummkopf! But…my point is, being large won’t make you any less of a woman. Nobody questions that Toriel’s femme, and once you’ve gotten everything figured out and you’re on hormones for long enough, neither will they question you.”

She could tell Azzy was likely to protest this, so she put her finger on her lips before she could get a word out.

“Look, how about after this, we go out dress shopping in Bay City or Port Town, find some stuff that fits you well. Sound good?”

Finger still over her mouth, Asriel nodded.

Dess continued, knowing there was still much to be said. “And as for the other things, you’re smart and strong. I know for a fact that even if they know you’re trans, colleges are still gonna be crawling all over you hoping that you accept their offers. You’re a hot commodity. And as for the other points, the college point ties in with those, too, on a base level: we’re in the Northeast. Our local governors have all pledged their support for trans causes on the news. I reckon that where we’re at is probably the safest part of the country to be trans in, if not the world, if Hometown is anything to go by. And besides, what else is there to scare you here?”

It was funny; she was usually a complete doubter of those on the liberal wing of the political spectrum to do the right thing according to her leftist ideals. Whether out of genuine belief for just the briefest of moments, or out of a sense of wanting to comfort Asriel with a soothing lie, not even she knew what she was herself saying.

Azzy held silent, eerily silent, as more worries filled her mindscape. “I mean, you’re right, but the bathroom bans alone scare me. I know that they’re pretty contained to the South, but for how long? Even without them… I’m scared of physical retaliation from others, independent of what our governments pledge....”

She choked up at this mention of her own. “Did I ever mention to you what happened to me in Bay City over the autumn break, after the festival?”

Dess shook her head. “No, I don’t think you have.”

Nodding, Asriel addressed it. “I was feeling… confident, I guess, after that night in the dress. So when I saw some clip-on earrings for sale down there after my big final Cross-Country meet, I thought to myself, ‘why not pick them up?’ And they were the cutest things on me, too. Just these large, green orbs of ceramic attached to a gold clamp, I loved them!”

Her face lit up for the briefest of moments, before falling grim once more. “Someone spotted me near Back Bay with them on, and… well… let’s just say he didn’t take too kindly to me wearing those.” Her eyes dimmed. “He called me a “faggot,” smacked me down onto my knees with a shot to the temple, plucked my earrings, and… I dunno what else he was gonna do. I’m scared to think what he was gonna do. I honestly think if a woman hadn’t spotted me and ran in to mace that bastard, I’d be… well….”

She folded over, fighting back tears once more.

“...Dust.”

The image that word conjured up was enough for Dess’ heart to get caught in her throat. The image of her girlfriend, laying in a back alley deep in Bay City, Fallen Down, and then turning to dust in the wind, her remains scattering and her fate never being known to anyone. She wanted to vomit at the mere idea of such a horrid thing happening, it made her sick.

“Yeah, I feel ya there,” Dess confided, the situation Asriel described being all too relatable. “I had a mean run-in with a human right before festival day, she told Noelle that with how much she was taking after me, that she needed to be put down. What a loathsome bunch, I tell ya.”

Azzy just looked at her incredulously, sidetracked by the stray remark. “I… I don’t think you do, Dess,” she said. “It was a monster who tried to beat me, not a human. The woman who actually broke up the situation was a human, a fellow trans one at that! It… makes so much sense now, heh.” Her expression soured once more, though. “But… why did you assume he was a human, Dess? Did you really think only humans are capable of evil?”

Dess opened her mouth to speak, only to hold silent; there was nothing good for her to say, only confirmation, especially knowing how much Azzy cared about Kris. How much she herself cared about them, too.

“Oh, sweet Angel,” Azzy murmured to herself. “Dess… I know how many bad run-ins you’ve had with humans, I get that. The recruiters, that woman, all the politicians you decry, I get that. But you do realize that the Conservative Party is about half-and-half monster-human, right? The reason the monsters around here seem so much better than humans isn’t because they’re monsters, or they’re from the Northeast specifically, it’s because-”

“...because they’re all decent people.” Dess nodded along, head hung guiltily low. She knew even that wasn’t true; Bratty and her posse were cunts to her, but then again… maybe someone else was the real problem there….

“Yeah,” Asriel confirmed. “We’re just lucky, is all. I’m pretty sure you’ve told me yourself before, how we basically live in Mayberry, and that’s damn well the truth.”

The doe remained hunched over, searching for penance. “Perhaps the reason those monsters were so friendly to humans was because the humans were nice to them back?”

Asriel nodded.

“I’m sorry, Az,” she said. “I should’ve known better, especially with… y’know…”

“Gerson?”

Dess was snapped out of her pitiful wallowing by the remark. “No, I meant you with Kris. What about Gerson?”

“You didn’t know?!” Azzy was flabbergasted by the response. “Dang, with all the time you spend with him, I’d have thought you’d know!”

“Know what?!”

“That he was married to a human!” Azzy exclaimed. “Amber was their name, I think. They were Father Alvin’s mother through a soul bond. Way, way back, I think they died around the time we were born.”

Shoot, now Dess felt guilty all over again. How the hell could she have not known something so important about the man he treasured as a mentor. How could she feel such a way towards the people he and Asriel loved?

Another thought crept up. “But wait a minute… What about Mrs. Boom? Doesn’t she live with him?”

“MS. Boom?” Azzy corrected. “His sister??? You thought that was his wife?!?! PFFFT! HAHAHAHAHA!” She burst out laughing over the whole confusion, holding her sides as she fell over on the couch. Dess looked away in flustered embarrassment, but truth be told, she was happy to see her girlfriend in better sorts. She joined in the laughter, before things naturally died down for the both of them.

“Feeling better, at least?” Dess asked.

Asriel paused for a moment, realizing that all the pain and guilt from earlier had been washed away, before nodding. “Yeah, I think you did a great job of recontextualizing things… and also getting me to laugh!”

She beamed at the knowledge she hadn’t completely fucked things up any more. “Well, I’m certainly glad to hear you’re doing better!”

In passing thought, an important question came to mind.

“So, I’m guessing she/her pronouns?” Dess asked casually.

Azzy nodded. “Yeah.”

“And any ideas on what name you’d like?”

This question gave her pause. “Y’know… I haven’t given that much thought, admittedly. I mean, I know for a fact I don’t wanna be Asriel, but as for what instead… I haven’t got a clue.”

Dess chimed in immediately, a wide grin having spread across her face. “Togore?”

Azzy playfully slapped her in response. “Fuck off I’m not gonna be Togore!” she shouted with a smile, unable to hide the fact she was giggling. “But I mean, no… I don’t wanna just mash up my parents' names into some amalgamation again. I don’t wanna be Togore, or Ralsei, or any other combination. I want something original.”

Her girlfriend giggled, too. “Original? I can work with that. Mind if I just rattle off a few names, see what sticks?” Dess offered.

“Sure.”

She began in earnest. “How about Vivian?”

Azzy pondered it, but shook her head. “Nah, too old sounding. Plus, I’m pretty sure there’s already a trans character in one of those Paper RPG games named Vivian, I don’t wanna be seen as some sort of damn geek!”

“But you totally are, though!”
“That’s besides the point,” Azzy protested. “How about Sally, though. Do you think that’d be a good name for me?”

“Maybe…” Dess pondered, “although it’s a common one, people are totally gonna think you’re naming yourself after the astronaut or the actress.”

“Fine by me,” Azzy said. “Those two aren’t even the Sally I’d be naming myself after, but that sure sounds better in polite company!”

“Wait… then which one are you…?” It quickly dawned on Dess who she was talking about, and a grin crept up on her face again. “The chipmunk?! You’re seriously naming yourself after a cartoon character?! You dweeb!”

“Sh-shut up!” Azzy was beside himself, pouting and blushing profusely. “She was my first crush as a kid, and… y’know… maybe my gender awakening….”

“Okay, fair,” Dess acquiesced, “but I thought you wanted to avoid sounding like a geek, and naming yourself after her is probably one of the geekiest things somebody can do.”

“Yeah, yeah, fair,” Azzy admitted. “Maybe… do you have any other ideas?”

Truth be told, Dess was struggling. “How about Nicole?”

“Sally’s girlfriend, bad idea.”

“Katy?”

“Mmm… I’m not jiving with it.”

“Ooh, what about Berlin! That’s a good name!”

“Like the New Wave act? Nah, pass. Fuck!” Azzy and Dess both leaned back in frustration. “See, this is what I’m talking about, Dess! It’s so damn hard to choose something when it’s gonna be the new me, y’know.”

“Ditto. Anything in particular you might want, like a first letter? That might be a good start, would help narrow things down some.”

That seemed to do the trick for Azzy. “Yeah, actually, that’s a good idea! Maybe try something with an ‘A’ at the start, something similar to my old name.”

She labored over the prompt given for some time, rubbing her temple as she strained to think of an idea. A name that starts with “A,” hmm…. Thinking back to Berlin, she recognized that it was the old name for Rheinland’s capital, back before the Great Reorganization. That could be a trail, she thought, and sought to think of any ideas for old city names that started with “A.” Anaheim… perhaps Ana for short, or maybe Aberdeen? Athens… or Athena…? No, no, no.

Another name, however, danced its way into her head, and with how hard it was to shake, she felt that it could be the one.

“How does Adelaide sound? Addy for short?”

Her partner pondered the question deeply, but her face betrayed her true feelings. Not feelings of disgust or unsureness like before, but rather, feelings of elated curiosity and intrigue. “Could you use it in a sentence? Lemme hear how it sounds.”

Dess took great pleasure in doing so, a warm smile creeping over her face as she slid on over and atop her newly-minted girlfriend. “Why, Addy, the way you smile just fills my stomach with butterflies. I just want to kiss you so bad, to feel the warmth of your lips upon mine.” She leaned in real close to her snow-white face. “Whadda ya think of that, Adelaide?”

Burning up, the goat bleated in lustful amusement. “That name… the way you say it…”

She leaned into it, and kissed Dess passionately, sticking her tongue deep into her mouth, dancing around her cervine snout and pressing against Dess’ own. Their saliva mixed together as one, and the blonde could feel her face dampen, probably from a few wayward tears of pure, passionate joy. After the briefest, steamiest of moments, she pulled back, panting heavily as she stared deep into Dess’ soul.

“...I want to hear you say it again,” Addy moaned. “Say it again for me.”

Dess was happy to oblige. “Oh, Addy… Adelaide, darling… your fine, long hair… and the way it matches your dress…” She ran her fingers through her blonde locks and tousled them, letting off a rare buck-toothed smile as she refused to hold back. “They’re the most beautiful things ever.” She pinned Adelaide to the couch, her usually ice-cold grip now burning red hot with passion.

“More!” she moaned, arching herself back.

“You’re the most beautiful thing ever, Addy!”

Her whole body was quaking as Dess pressed down upon her. “MORE!”

“It makes me want your body so fucking bad!” she bellowed.

Addy’s arms surged out, grabbing Dess by the back of her tank top and pulling her even closer. “Then come and take it!”

Nigh all inhibition had been left at the door; that was as well dead as the old Asriel was. She wanted to be loved, to feel the love, and Dess was more than able to provide. Cuffing her to the couch by the wrists, Dess leaned her head in and stuck her tongue in deep, as deep as her body would allow, and tangoed with Adelaide’s as she slowly began to gyrate her hips atop of her orange dress; both knew that sex was off the table, but felt ready enough to push things as close to the line as they could.

Dess pulled back and slipped off her top, leaving her in just a bra, and pulled back in, this time aiming high to give Adelaide a faceful of cleavage.

“You want this, you nasty girl!” She clumsily shook her chest in Addy’s face, swaying back and forth as she felt the heavenly hot breath of her girlfriend expel heavily between her boobs.

“I do!” She could feel her back arch further without input as her body began losing control.

“You want this so bad, to have a rack of your own someday!” She squeezed her boobs in her hands, lifting them and letting them plop back down on Addy’s face as she kept on grinding.

“I do!” Addy could feel herself spasm, the sensation of Dess continuing to gyrate her ass atop her trembling body, the tits in her face, and the ideas she was getting in her head, only aroused her more and more.

“And when you do, you’ll have the fattest, most rocking tits alive, and we’ll motorboat each other, just like this all the while I moan your name: Addy!”

“I… I will… AUGH!” Adelaide began to pant heavily, the hyperventilation having returned suddenly, but this time out of pure, lustful pleasure. It was too much for her to handle. “Off, Dess, now!”

Doing as told, Dess fully engaged and scooched back, with Addy popping upright on the couch as she struggled to catch her breath. Truth be told, Dess could also feel her own run hot and fast; the entire thing had only lasted a few seconds, but it was probably the steamiest the pair had ever gotten together. It was new, completely foreign for Addy, but as modest as she may be, her face revealed her true feelings of enjoyment, if not also paired with bewilderment.

“Was that… too far…?” Dess asked, panting.

Addy didn’t respond for some while, still struggling to catch her own breath, but eventually shook her head. “Right up to the edge… but not past it… lemme tell ya, Dess… I could feel that in my whole body….”

Dess couldn’t help but smile, hoping that she would reciprocate. “How did it feel? Good?”

“...good,” Addy replied shortly, admittedly shocked that she had enjoyed that as much as she did. “But… tiring. Both mentally and literally. I think I’m just about… *yawn* …ready for bed.” Laying back down on the couch, she stretched her arms out wide, before settling in properly. “Lemme tell ya, after all of that, and all the other partying we did tonight, I’m bushed.”

Slipping her tank top back on, Dess eased herself in a comfortable position on the other end of the sofa, stuffing a pillow between her head and the armrest. “I can only how fucked up everyone else is getting right now.”

A tired chuckle escaped from Addy’s lips. “Yeah, you’re telling me. You think your drinking is bad, at least you can hold it. When mom gets fucked up, she gets fucked up!”

“At least she’s a happy drinker,” Dess said, expression wavering out of self-pity and drowsiness. “It feels like half the time I drink, it’s to numb the pain of living…” A bit of self-reflection led her to another revelation. “Shoot, I guess my mom’s the same way, or I guess, she was. I don’t know how she’s handling herself sober in that mess.”

Adelaide held silent for a good, long minute, ruminating over how to respond. She wanted to say something insightful or comforting, but truth be told, she was just too damn tired to think.

“Best not to think too hard,” Addy yawned, looking over to see the clock had just about passed 1 o’clock. “It’s late, don’t hurt your brain… Dess?”

No response. Peeking up, she saw that Dess had already conked out. Guess that made sense; she’d apparently been woken up at 6:30 by Noelle to open Christmas presents, way earlier than she was used to. Exhaustion must’ve kicked in hard.

Seeing her placid like that, so calm, and pretty…

Letting her impulses take control one last time, Addy slid her body over and draped herself over Dess’ body, cuddling right up to her. With a gentle smooch, she kissed her face, and felt her lazily drape one of her scar-riddled arms over her as she dreamt.

“Happy 18th, Dess,” Addy whispered with a yawn, before she herself fell under the spell of the sandman.

…

The golden rays of the sun shined on through the front window of the Dreemurr household late that morning, dancing their way across the sofa as the day began in earnest. Creeping, they eventually did the tango over Dess’ face, gently lifting her out of her golden slumber. With a yawn, she opened her eyes, expecting to see Addy on the other side of the couch, only to be greeted with her body atop of her own, arms draped around each other.

She couldn’t help but chuckle; that past night sure had been… a lot, and she couldn’t blame Addy for wanting a little bit of cuddle time. It was cute, actually, the way she was delicately snoring atop of her, her breath hot, but light as she slept. The full force of her body atop Dess’ felt like a weighted blanket atop of her, relaxing all of her muscles as she leaned into the embrace.

Raising up a hand, she gently cupped Adelaide’s face, debating whether or not to wake her from her slumber as well. With a graceful touch, she ran her fingers along her cheek fur, reveling in the warm, soft sensation of their texture; it was like a plush shag carpet covered her whole body, a body she one day hoped to see in full.

Moving down for a moment, she felt the sensation of a flab of fat beneath Addy’s jaw. She had always said that she hated how chubby it made her look, and how it didn’t seem to go away no matter how much she dieted or exercised. In hindsight, it felt obvious that part of the issue was how masculine it made her feel, what with her dad being the same way; he at least had a beard to cover it. Yet, Dess enjoyed toying around with it; the more she looked on at Addy, the cuter she looked with that chubby face and long snout of hers.

She disengaged her hand from Addy’s face and briefly tousled her hair ever so gently. It was unkempt after a night of sleep, riddled with knots, yet also fine, almost like a beautiful golden silk that ran down from her head. Dess continued to shift her hands upward, curling Addy’s hair in her fingers as she slowly did so, before reaching her horns. They were magnificent things, not as large as her towering antlers, but significantly more massive as they jutted back; their girth at the base was almost as thick as her arm. She rubbed them gently, feeling the cool, smoothed texture of them beneath her fingers, before she smiled, satisfied. Raising her other hand to Addy’s other cheek and gripping her horn with her right, she leaned right in, and put her lips up to Adelaide’s.

It was a gentle kiss, the one a prince gives to a sleeping princess in those fairytales of old. Not sexual, but sensual, the type of calm domestic embrace married couples know all so well. She could feel Addy’s breath briefly spasm, before returning to a steady rate, as her eyes gently fluttered open. Taking a moment to regain her surroundings, she too smiled, in time, before the pair pulled apart, gazing merrily into each other’s eyes.

“Good morning, beautiful,” Dess started, bringing her hands down to Addy’s back for a more traditional hug. “See you couldn’t stand to sleep by yourself last night.”

Addy chuckled lightly, admittedly a bit flustered to have been caught. “I was cold, I suppose.”

Dess took a hand and toyed with her girlfriend’s cheek fur. “Funny, I could’ve sworn you had thicker fur than me.” She let off a giggle, reciprocated by Addy, before sighing wistfully. “I’m glad to see you coming out of your shell like this.”

Sitting up and sliding to make some room, Addy offered up a hand to her girlfriend; she took hold and propped herself up on the couch.

“Hope you slept well,” Addy said. “I know how finicky things can be with those antlers of yours.”

“Well, it definitely helps to have you atop of me like a blanket!”

They both giggled playfully at this remark, each still giddy from the night prior. “I’m glad I was so comfy,” Addy remarked.

“Yeah, I don’t know what was comfier, your fur, or that soft dress of yours that you slept in. Lucky thing you didn’t ruin it!

Realizing she was still in her dress, Addy let off a long, wistful sigh. “Well, high-time then I start getting ready for my folks to get back. I’m gonna go take a shower now and get changed out of this,” Addy said, now sniffing the air. “And if you ask me, it might be a good idea for you to take one before the rest of the gang get home, too.”

“Fair,” she said, admittedly tepid. “Guess it’s best that I’m presentable for your mother. Especially if Tori’s… drunk…”

Addy nodded. “She’s gonna be, I know her well enough.” She didn’t drink much, but when she did, it was always to excess. Ironic that someone as usually uptight yet warmly motherly as Toriel could be a bawdy party girl all the same.

Getting up, she rustled her hands through Dess’ hair, before giving her girlfriend a peck on her speckled cheek. “I’ll only be a moment,” she assured, “then you can have it.”

Nodding, Dess watched as Addy temporarily disappeared upstairs to fetch a robe and towel, before she then came back down and retreated into the bathroom. True to her word, the shower was quick; she was in-and-out within five minutes, enough for Dess to smoke a joint if she wanted, but despite her nerves, she refrained. As much as she was craving, she knew the smell would linger, and didn’t wish to have Addy explain all of that to her mother. Hearing the door creak open, she got up from her seat, watched as Addy disappeared back up the stairs, and made her way towards the bathroom, apprehensive.

With Adelaide having marched off upstairs to bin away her dirty laundry and change out of her robe, that left Dess standing all alone in front of the bathroom door, hesitant to cross the threshold. She knew that without her specialty shower cap left at home, or a very well-done towel wrap, the dye in her hair and antlers was bound to run out and expose what was beneath. That horrible, hideous icy blonde hair and equally disgusting blue antlers, the ones her mother had damned her with.

Negative thoughts clouded her mind as she stood there, a towel left for her by Addy in one hand, the other shaking as it held onto the knob. Images of herself, older, more weary, the vitiligo slowly worsening as the years tacked on, until when she was whittled away by stress and age, and all of the color in her fur had drained, there in the mirror was her mother staring right back at her. The disdain and hatred swirling in her heart made her seethe. She loosened her grip on the knob.

But there was also another thought there, another part of the picture just out of frame. Adelaide, also having brushed against the grains of the sands of time, but still as loving as ever, ill-defined feminine features hazy in her muddled mindscape. But all she needed to picture was the face: warm, caring, understanding, and still coming over to kiss her on the cheek.

The feeling of a tender snout pressing up against her cheek shook her out of her daydream; Addy had indeed been standing there, with her hair still wrapped in a towel, although she was now wearing something more akin to the old version of her. She had on a pair of slacks and one of her old striped shirts, although both were obscured by one of her mother’s old aprons, a frilly thing with lots of pink and gold. The makeup had long since been washed away, but the warmth of her true self still shined on. She smiled warmly towards Dess, who couldn’t help but reciprocate with a light giggle and smile of her own.

“Worried about your hair?” she asked.

Dess twirled it coyly. “Yeah, and my antlers… how’d you know?”

The goat took hold of her girlfriend’s hand. “We’ve been dating for over a year and change now, Dess,” she softly replied. “I probably know you better than the back of my own hand.”

The doe blushed at this, knowing deep down how true that was. “I guess… even with all I’ve done to try and get her out of my mind… the thought of looking like her… it still terrifies me….”

Nodding along, Addy gently stroked her fingers through Dess’ messy, darkened hair. “I know how much you don’t like her,” she began. “But you’re not her. You’ll never be her, if you don’t want to be. Sure, the dye helps distinguish and makes you feel better, but what really sets you apart is your personality, who you choose to be intrinsically. If you stopped dyeing your hair tomorrow and let the vitiligo take over, you still wouldn’t look like her, Dess. Because unlike her, and her cold demeanor, there’s a warmth in you, a warmth in your smile. And that’ll show through physically just as much, if not more, than whatever your hair color or fur hue is. Believe me.”

For once, for at least that moment, she did.

“Besides,” she added, “you can always dye it again later. It’s just for this morning, if you want. Just for you and me to share together.”

Just for this morning… together….

That was enough convincing to get Dess to nod along. “Yeah… I think I can live with that,” she murmured, a weak smile sat upon her face.

“I’m glad to hear,” Addy nodded back, smiling delicately in turn. “Also, just a head’s up, the hot water’s a bit finicky, you have to turn the knob all the way on and then back lower in order to get it to work.”

“Aight, thanks, luv,” Dess noted, turning towards the door, before a devilish thought entered her mind. “Hey… since you know how… *ahem* …to work things in there…”

“...Go on…” Addy inquired, looking on as Dess did a seductive heel-turn in her direction.

“...any interest in coming and taking another one with me?”

Addy stood there for a dumb moment, her brain fighting to process what she had just heard, before the both of them audibly wheezed in unison.

“Pffffft… shit, you’re already jumping to… hah!” Adelaide cackled, only matched in intensity by her doubled-over girlfriend. “I may be loosening up, girl, but in no way am I loose!”

The candidness of the response sent Dess over the edge, who was struggling to stand with how intense her laughter was. “I… I… *wheeze* …I knew you’d probably turn that down, but hey! Fuck it! Might as well shoot my shot! Especially after last night!”

“I mean, fair enough! We did come close!”

“Shit, you nearly came, plain and simple!”

She and Addy continued to giggle for a few moments more, before Dess gestured towards the door.

“I think I’m gonna get washed up now,” she said, her voice still light.

“Ah, ah… that’s good,” Addy managed to get out on the comedown, still trying hard not to burst out laughing again. “I’ll start prepping up breakfast in the kitchen for us. Hopefully we’ll still have a few minutes to ourselves before the horde arrives.”

Dess had already crossed into the bathroom, but had to double over in order to contain herself from laughing again. Her girl sure knew how to make her laugh.

“Love you, Addy,” she said with added whimsy, moving to close the door.

“Love you too, Dess,” she replied back with warmth.

…

Even with all the mental preparation and levity, looking at herself in the mirror was still a shock to the system. The paleness of her blonde hair, the vibrant blue of her antlers, the worsening of her vitiligo as it continued to spread across her face, making her paler and paler by the day, it seemed. She didn’t want to admit to it, but when she looked in the mirror, her soul just couldn’t deny it.

She was becoming her mother.

Great care had been taken to not look at herself once she had gotten out of the shower, after having let the black and red dye wash over her tender, naked body and scrubbed it all out of her fur. She hadn’t even wiped down the mirror to clear the condensation off, having blow-dried her hair completely by feel and physical sensation, her instincts, really. But curiosity got the better of her, and she just had to see, just had to know, and she wiped the condensation away to stare at herself.

And yet, despite the small shock… she didn’t feel depressed. She didn’t feel anxious. She didn’t feel suicidal. She felt… oddly at peace.

Yes. This was her. This was who she would become in a decade’s time, most likely, her natural state. She could dye her way out of it somewhat, but that was only masking the truth. It must’ve been Adelaide’s kind words from earlier that put her at ease.

That’s not to say she wasn’t at least a little nerved up, however. She could say all of those nice things about her, to try and bring about some level of comfort. But would she really be able to stand by it?

Taking a deep breath in and shutting her eyes, she knew there was only one way to find out.

Making her way over to the door, she undid the lock and slowly, trepidatiously, turned the handle, creaking the door open ever so slowly as she slid out from inside the foggy bathroom. The sound of boiling water from the kitchen immediately drew her attention, and she looked over to find Adelaide standing next to the stove, apparently preparing a kettle.

It had to happen at some point, might as well be now

“Well, how do I look?” she meekly asked.

Adelaide looked over from the stovetop and paused for a moment; it had indeed been a while since she’d last seen her girlfriend in such a way, what with the icy blonde hair and vibrant blue antlers contrasting greatly with her darker, if somewhat spotted, fur. Almost instinctively, she began to respond with “You look a lot like-” before cutting herself off and letting it trail, having to catch herself from bringing up Carol’s name or existence. “...you look beautiful, sweetheart,” she said with a warm smile.

Dess wasn’t sold. “Do you really mean that?”

“With all my heart, I do.”

That was genuine enough, Dess could tell it. Feeling a weight lift from her shoulders, a playful reply came to mind. “You just like seeing me with blonde hair, huh?”

Addy remained steadfast in her seriousness. “I love seeing you comfortable with yourself. I love seeing you happy. It wouldn’t change a thing whether or not you have black hair or blonde hair or gray hair. I’ll always love you, Dess, no matter who you choose to be.”

As saccharine as it was to hear, it still made her heart melt all the same, to get that sort of confirmation from her. To know that no matter what, Addy would always be there by her side. Gazing longingly into her eyes, a realization dawned upon her.

“Stealing that turn of phrase from me, huh?” Dess joked, thinking back to earlier the night prior.

“Hey, what can I say? It worked on me!” Addy chuckled.

“Fair enough…” Dess’ gaze wandered over to the lit flame on the stovetop. “What’cha boiling the kettle for? Making tea?”

“Oop! Forgot about that!” She twisted the knob of the stove and unlit the burner. “Yep, tea’s just about done! Had it steeping for a good while to really infuse the flavor, and I also chucked in an ice cube for each to cool them some, and an extra for yours. It’s what dad always does, keeps me from scalding my tongue, and I know how much you like chill.”

Dess picked up on the fragrant aroma, and already began to feel relaxed some, even more than Adelaide had done for her. “Mmm… What'd you put in it? Chamomile?”

Addy shook her head. “Nope, golden flowers and some honey! It’s my dad’s signature. They don’t tend to sell it outside of specialty tea shops, but it’s so much better than anything else. Soothes better than chamomile, and goes down nice and smooth with a sweet flavor to it.”

“Speaking of sweet…” Dess leaned in and kissed Adelaide right on the lips as she finished infodumping, the latter leaning lovingly into it. “Thanks for making that for us,” she murmured, barely even pulling away from the liplock to say it.

“My pleasure,” Addy replied. “You want some milk or sugar in yours?”

“Some milk sounds nice, actually.” Dess let her hand drift down her partner’s body. “I always do like a bit of a… creamier… taste and texture, anyway.”

She grinned devilishly as Adelaide couldn’t help but chuckle back while she made her way over to the fridge. “Okay, you’re starting to win me over to the idea, Dess.”

This took Dess aback; did she actually just say that? Her unwavering smile, however, remained steadfast. “Wait… you’re serious?!

Addy nodded. “I mean, if I’m being honest… a large part of my apprehension was due to the trans stuff,” she admitted as she poured. “The idea of it just repulsed me, knowing I’d have to… y’know… do things with my body. But now, I mean, the mood would have to be right, but… knowing that you’ll be right with me, and now that you know how I want things to go with my own body… I may be willing to give things a try.”

It was a little awkward coming out, but it was just the sort of confirmation that made Dess’ day, hearing her girlfriend actually reciprocate her lustful feelings to some extent for once. With this, the night prior, and the conversation by the bathroom, it felt as if, for the first time, they were at least on the same chapter, if not the exact same page.

“So…” Dess flashed with an eyebrow flex. “Wanna… you know….”

“Maybe next time we meet up, if we’re in the mood,” Addy said with a giggle. “I’m pretty sure my folks’ll be back over soon, so best we hold off unless you wanna join me and Toriel in Church for my forced pennance. But if you’re so interested…”

She leaned in nice and close.

“I’d love to take you by the antlers next time we really get into the kissing,” she lustfully admitted. “How about that, mon amante?”

Face turning beet red, Dess covered her mouth as she blissfully giggled. “You better ride me well, then, meine Geliebte.”

Adelaide chuckled as she handed Dess her cuppa. “Deutsche?”

“Well, you started it with the romance language, you knew I had to put my own spin on things.” She pimped her donned combat jacket, playful.

Taking a sip of her own tea, Addy sat down at the dining table and beckoned Dess to join her with a smile. She obliged.

Cupping the mug in her hands, she felt the radiant warmth of the beverage inside escape through the sides of the ceramic, passing through her palms and emanating through her body. The heat of the drink was visible from above; wisps of steam evaporated off of the surface of the tea, billowing through the air, whilst leaving a fine layer near the surface of the liquid that looked as if it were a fine blanket of fog covering a placid lake on a cool autumn morning.

She took a sip, and burned her tongue; despite the ice cube, it was still piping hot, although that may have just been her propensity for the cold taking effect. Nonetheless, she blew on the tea, rippling the liquid’s surface as she did so, before taking a slower, longer, more relaxed sip.

The sensation of the tea passing down her throat had its intended effect almost immediately, as she could feel her muscles relax as they were soothed by the warm, heavenly nectar. It tasted leafy, as all tea did to her, but there was a rich aftertaste to the concoction that simply delighted her. It was floral, just as she imagined the aromatic scent of the tea tasted like, with a hint of some other flavor beyond the honey and milk Adelaide had added. It was minty, almost, or at least the smell of it was minty; perhaps it was some ginseng, or bergamot oil, or perhaps it really was a little splash of mint.

Feeling first her shoulders relax, then her entire body detensing, she leaned back and smiled after her first sip. It felt good to do this, to share a hot drink with her lover. Addy coming to mind, she stole a glimpse of her sipping away at her own mug, before she herself picked it back up, blew on the contents again, and took another sip.

After a while, the tea cooled down to a point where blowing was no longer necessary. Yet despite this fact, she didn’t rush to finish her drink, as she normally might do, but instead continued to slowly sip away at it. Her mind felt relaxed, free from the usual stress that clouded it, willing to actually let things play out slowly for once. She felt small, but instead of panicking over insignificance, she found comfort in sharing such a small corner of the universe with Addy.

Eventually, most of the tea had been finished, and Dess relaxed back in her seat momentarily, before leaning forward over the cup and sticking her finger out. Carefully circling the rim of the cup with her finger, slowly as she did so, she gazed deeply into the amber dregs of her drink, dregs that she would likely leave undrunk not out of distaste, but rather for a placid, almost hypnotic meditation of peering through them, and letting them peer into her mind. The fog within her brain, ever-present to some degree, seemed to pull back completely for a moment, leaving her to think for herself truly for the first time in ages.

Was this what quiet domestic life was like? Normalcy? Peace of mind? A sense of calm? It all felt so foreign to her, yet at the same time… distantly familiar. Like an old memory, tinted in amber, welling up in her mind. This is how she felt in the before times, when every day was a happy day, when her anxieties and mania remained far-off distant prospects.

She never wanted a moment to last forever more than this one.

Seeing her girlfriend sniffle and shed a tear, Addy reached over and took her hand. “You okay Dess?”

Looking back off, she let off a weak smile to let her know and assuage her concerns. “Hm? Oh, yeah. I’m fine.”

“Sorry for asking, you just looked lost in thought over there.”

Truer words had never been spoken. “I mean, I’m definitely lost in thought right now. I just… don’t feel panicky about it all for once.”

Adelaide held mum for a moment, before the motherly instincts she picked up from Toriel kicked in. “Wanna talk about it?”

Dess remained steadfast in her silence, unmoving, before she slowly nodded, her gaze still deeply fixated on her tea dregs. “...I guess I’m just worried,” she started. “This past day, all things considered, was pretty good. Great, even! No major blow-ups or arguments, that horrible brain fog I have hasn’t been a bother, all that sweet, tender time I’ve spent with you… fuck, this honestly may have been one of the happiest days of my life, at least since primary school.”

“Well, isn’t that a good thing, then?” Addy asked, a touch perplexed as she tilted her head. “You had a good day, and I’m happy to hear that! Honestly, you’ve been doing better the past couple of weeks as a whole. I’m just… not sure why that’s such an upsetting thing to you?”

Looking up, she grasped at the collar of her tank top, nearly rending it. “I’m worried this is just a mirage, Addy!” She stared right back into her tea, emotionally ponderous. “I’m scared that this is my peak, just a brief respite in my downslide. That I have a taste of the life I want to live, a glimpse at who I could be and what I could have, a mere hint of stability, and instead of being able to capitalize, I’ll just… continue degrading after today. I fear that the mood swings will come back, and that they’ll be worse! That I’ll have one last break and descend into a full bout of psychosis!”

She was too well put together to cry at the moment, but she sure felt like she wanted to, and her voice grew weak in correspondence. “And I’m just worried, Addy. Worried that I’m only going to hurt you, that I’m gonna fly off the handle again someday, and that when it happens again, if not the next time, then maybe some time after, it’ll be one time too many, and you’ll be done with me!”

Waiting for a response, she hoped to be cushioned with words of comfort, only to be blessed with nothing. Adelaide remained silent, sitting there pensively staring at the dregs of her own cuppa. What was taking her so long? It was an easy thing to assure wasn’t the case… right? RIGHT?!

Feeling her fingers instinctively curl, panic slowly began to seep into her mind with every passing moment. It should have been an easy qualm to dispel, so the fact she wasn’t… did she… NO!

A sigh snapped her out of it, however. Addy could sense the growing tension, and cut through it before it could emulsify in the air.

“That’s not gonna happen,” she assuaged, her voice soft, tender, and deliberate. She took hold of Dess’ hands. “I know that’s not gonna happen. No matter what happens, Dess, no matter how much you may struggle, no matter what we have to do to make this all work… I’ll always still love you.”

Her bated breath now dispelling, Dess could feel her shoulders detense. There was enough genuine sentiment in her voice for it to have been truthful. She just… must’ve been searching for the right words, is all.

Adelaide continued. “Hey, can I ask you something?”

Dess nodded, meek. “Sure.”

Taking a deep breath, Addy prepared herself. “I know that you’re… not the most receptive to getting help for all of this, and I’ll respect that if things continue like that.” She looked deep into Dess’ eyes, checking to make sure she hadn’t lost her; they were still dutifully attentive during this conversation, for once. “But since you’re feeling so better now… maybe it’s the right time to look into getting some help, meeting up with a therapist before things go off the rails again.”

Dess remained attentive, not a hint of begrudging emotion on her face. She nodded slowly, looking down to her hands as she pondered the point. Perhaps, it was time she got herself some help, once and for all.

“Yeah… maybe we can-”

Cruelly, before she could finish her sentence and acquiesce, the front door slammed wide open behind her, spooking both Adelaide and Dess by the suddenness of it all. In came streaming the rest of the Dreemurr family; Kris first, who crashed over on the couch, followed by Toriel and Asgore, who stumbled through the front door, the both of them off-kilter, but Tori especially so. Apparently, the past night had involved quite a bit of drinking, somehow even more than what Dess and Addy had gotten up to.

“Mornin’ you two!” Asgore shouted out as he plopped next to Kris on the couch, switching on to the Christmas special episode of his favorite cowboy program. The cacophony of cartoon noises that filled the room truly marked the point of derailing Dess’ thoughts of self-improvement, dragging her right back down into the pit of darkness that was her life.

Asgore. Dess couldn’t help but glare at him as the bumbling father playfully jostled Kris’ hair. It wasn’t that he himself was particularly a bad guy individually; for all she had known him, he’d always been a caring, light-hearted, and sweet father-figure throughout most of her childhood. He was much like her own father; the two were so similar, Dess swore that they must’ve dated in college or something.

The only separator being, Asgore was a cop.

Chief of Police in Hometown, in fact. And that fact boiled her blood to no end. How dare a cop be so nice, so caring, such an Andy Griffith type. He gave a good name to cops everywhere, and that pissed her off supremely. Cops were bastards, all of them ideological üntermenschen in her mind, so for one of them to stand there so defiantly and appear to prove her wrong, and for it to be the dad of her best friend, no less? Disgusting. How dare he be good.

But of course, he couldn’t be. Sure, Hometown may be a perfect, quaint little place, but he perpetuated the position of institutional violence that so blighted other communities in Northamer, monster and human alike. There was nothing stopping him from resigning, or demanding more community oversight for the position, or the establishment of a community-led watch instead, but every time she protested this fact, she was scolded by her mother with cries of “we have no need for such things here,” and “this town is already safe, no need to rock the boat,” and “you’re responsible for more than half of the petty crimes in this town alone.” Bastards, all of them.

And then, of course, there was his wife. Even more wasted than he was, probably to a chronic degree, or perhaps she was just a lightweight. Regardless, she stumbled over and slurred some words over in Dess’ direction.

“Carol… you dirty woman, you, what’re you *hic* doing in my house… and why do I wannakissyousobad.”

Dess grimaced, cruelly reminded of the reason why she dyed her hair and antlers, and choosing to ignore the fact she wanted to apparently kiss her mom. Maybe both her parents were gay for the Dreemurrs back in the day….

“Tori, it’s… uh… me, Dess,” she gently said, mindful of the fact she was utterly wasted and not the typical warm, homely mother she usually was. “I washed my dye out this morning.”

“Oh… December?! Ah, shit, hahah! I didn’t recognize ya there, with the blue hair, RHYME! FAH!” She literally fell beside herself. “I mean blonde… and blue antlers, silly me!”

“Riiight…”

“Oh, Dessie, you, you look so much like your… *hic* like your mom when ya actually clean up yourself and don’t play such a smelly girl, I don’t know what my son sees in you at times, *hic!*”

Both Addy and Dess grimaced at the slight, for varying reasons. Addy especially took poorly to the ‘son’ remark, but knew she damn well didn’t have the heart to tell her now.

“Butcha clean now, and that’s… that’s good! That good thing,” she drunkenly mumbled. “Oh, also, Azzy dear, sweet baby, I have has mail for you!” She pulled out an envelope with a fancy seal on the back. “Mailperson was just outside to deliver it to us when we came back. Go on… open it!”

The trio made their way over to the front room by the sofa, Addy sat down in the easy chair and peeled back the seal, opening up the envelope and gently pulling out the letter. Disengaging from the show, Asgore and Kris joined in to see how the eldest Dreemurr sibling would reach. She unfolded the letter, held it close, and read it silently to herself.

“Well?” Asgore asked.

Slowly, Addy’s face lit up, fully beaming by the time she got to the end of her letter. Setting it down, she was smiling widely, the excitement palpable. “It’s from Bay City University!” she exclaimed. “I got in!”

The entire room erupted into pandemonium, both Asgore and Toriel hunching over to embrace their child with a hug in the big chair. “Oh, Azzy, I’m so proud!” Toriel exclaimed.

“That’s my son!” Asgore echoed. “I knew you’d be able to do it!”

She recoiled slightly, the unknowing misgendering cutting her, but not as deep as usual; the elation helped to mitigate that. In truth, she was too happy to care. Asgore was too happy to realize, and so was Toriel. Even Kris showed some mild excitement over the whole shebang.

The only one there not excited, the one who stood there with her nerves now flaring up, was Dess.

Because she hadn’t gotten a letter back, and she worried she never would. She worried that she’d somehow be left behind when this was all said and done, that Addy would go off and never come back for her.

Only time would tell if those fears of hers were well-founded.

Chapter Text

The major downhill slide wouldn’t have to wait long.

Early one January morning, just at the start of the month, Dess received her first letter back from one of the colleges she applied to. It was from her dream school, in Megalopolis, the perfect landing spot for her considering Adelaide was also likely to attend her own dream school there. Deco Art Academy.

Rejected.

No problem, Dess thought to herself. True, it stung, but that was always a reach school of hers. The odds of her making it in there were slim to none with how competitive it was. It certainly put her a bit off-kilter, but she was still riding the high of her birthday with Addy, and kept positive for once in her life. She’d get into another one, eventually.

Later that week, she got a letter from Oaklee College of Arts in Bay City, another reach school.

Rejected.

River Haven Art College, one of the schools she’d reckon would be a safe bet to get into.

Rejected.

Ridgemont Art School. A community college, one of her safety schools. Surely, she’d at least get into that….

Rejected.

Rejected, Rejected, Rejected. A constant stream of letters, from the dozens of schools she applied to, all rejects. It seemed like every other day that January, there was a letter that came for her in the mail, and without fail, it would read something along the lines of: “Dear December Holiday, We regret to inform you that we have rejected your application to our Art College. We know this isn’t the answer you were hoping for, but rest assured, yada yada yada some bland platitude about success, we hope the best for you.”

Each letter was like a stake to her worn heart, slowly whittling her down to the nub, destroying what little will she was predisposed to have. Addy was there to soothe her each and every time, but eventually her platitudes grew numb; there was no way to mask the pain, and if anything, hearing such soothing words from someone who hadn’t gotten back a single rejection only seemed to breed resentment.

Eventually, she was left with only two schools that had yet to reach out to her, some reach school she was bound to be rejected from, and Belford Arts Academy. BAA was the ultimate safety school, damn near everybody got accepted there, at least according to Gerson. If she couldn’t get in there, then she wouldn’t get in anywhere.

Surprisingly, though, the big final blow that sent her circling the drain came not from any college rejection, but rather from politics.

It was late in the month, the third weekend of January, when the recounts for the past election were finally being announced. This was a formality of the Northamer system by this point; someone would win the Presidency, the opposing party would demand a recount, and then months and months would be spent on a procedure that would ultimately result in the prior candidate’s win being upheld. A big, dramatic waste of time that Dess didn’t bother to follow; despite being an ardent socialist, she cared not for the machinations of politics itself, believing it to be a waste of time when the only candidates that won were “milquetoast shitlibs.”

When Addy broke her the news, though, it felt as if their whole world had shattered.

She strolled up to the frozen lake where she was seated, solemnly poking her finger through the holes of the picnic bench. Bat slung over her shoulder, she slid up next to her with a doofy grin, jabbing her in the shoulder. “Why so glum, chum?” she joshed. “Get a “B” on your math test?” Her own face dropped. “I really studied hard this time, and I still got a D….”

Addy turned to her girlfriend, fear in her eyes, and took a hold of her hands, knowing that she was going to react poorly before she even spoke. “Dess, Farraday won.”

The words zipped right past her ears, for they simply couldn’t be true. “Huh?”

“Neilson Farraday won the recount, Dess. The Patriot Party’s gonna hold government.”

Her entire body went numb, and it wasn’t from the cold. “No… No… NO…!”

Words could not describe how bad this was for the both of them. Neilson Farraday’s Patriot Party were the archconservatives, people that made the actual Conservative Party blush. Sure, the Liberal candidate was unpopular, and there was no way in hell the Socialist Party was going to win, but for it to be the Patriot Party…

“Addy,” Dess whimpered, “You know how bad this is, right?!”

“Yeah….” Her expression was morbid.

“They’re gonna come for us,” she shook, “they’re gonna take us away, put us in a death camp! We’re FUCKED!”

Adelaide felt the breath get taken out of her as Dess violently took hold of her arms and shook her in a panic. “W-wait, what?! Dess, I was thinking anti-trans bathroom laws and increased power being bestowed to the federal government! Slow ramp-up stuff, they’re not gonna turn full fascist that quickly, right?!?!”

Dess was already twitching, her spell of sanity now firmly broken. “No, Addy, NO! It’s gonna be quick! Think of what happened in Rheinland back in the Thirties, it’s gonna be like that!”

She pulled back and started tugging at her hair, frantic. Addy tried to reach over to comfort her, but Dess turned to face her and bared her teeth, growling. She swore she saw her girlfriend foaming at the mouth.

“Are you gonna commiserate, comfort me physically, or speak some shitlib drivel about how ‘this isn’t the end,’ HUH?!?!”

Wanting to go in for a hug, but terror still stuck in her mind as Dess heaved, Addy froze. She knew damn well to which violent end this conversation was likely about to go, but as much as that made her want to drop it… she also didn’t want to let Dess stew in those thoughts silently, lest they boil over at some other, more critical time. Best to try and soothe her with something now and naively hope for the best, she rationalized.

“No shitlib drivel,” Addy assuaged, leaning over and embracing Dess with a warm, if not slightly exasperated, hug. “I know this is scary, I’m scared too. I’m just… trying to find whatever silver lining I can to stay sane right now. I don’t think I can be productive just staring into the abyss, y’know.”

Her girlfriend morbidly snorted. “Pfft, whatever ‘silver lining’ you find is probably the irradiated lead lining of a mushroom cloud,” she weakly quipped. “I mean, what positive can you even find with this? You’re trans, they’ll be coming after you first, anyway!”

Sighing, Addy nodded in agreement. “That’s true,” she replied, searching for whatever words could bring comfort, “but I don’t think we’re going down without a fight.”

“‘We’ specifically, right? Because we’re probably gonna be in this alone.”

Addy shook her head. “No, Dess. I trust the people who run our institutions to try and hold back the tide as long as they can.”

Dess pulled away from the hug and shot Adelaide a nasty look. “You said no shitlib bullshit, ünterfrau!” she spat; Addy particularly looked hurt at having that word hurled in her direction. “You know damn well that this shit is gonna end in genocide!”

“I mean, I’m not disagreeing with you that the end-state of all of this isn’t gonna be good! I’m… honestly not even sure if there’s gonna even be another election for us to vote in.” Addy choked up for a moment, but went right back to putting on a strong face. “But it’s a slow process, Dess! There were still a few years where people were able to flee fascism in Rhineland before the steel vice there shut, maybe it’ll be the same here! The institutions are gonna try their best to slow things down, and we’ll have plenty of time to try to flee to Europa or across the Southern Border. It’ll be miserable, sure, but it’s not gonna go full-tilt and death camps within six months!”

The doe was on the verge of snapping. Time for another tactic, another appeal….

“Besides, there’s no way that you’re mom is just gonna idly sit by and let them come into Hometown and-”

“FAH!” Dess cackled at the mere mention of her. “CAROL?! REALLY?! Surely you’ve lost your mind, right?!”

“I’m serious!” Addy protested. “She really cares about you, Dess! I know she’s been a lot colder to you in person, but think! The gun ban, the increase in mental health services available through our hospital, the fact the cops around here don’t ever seem bothered to arrest you for petty crimes, she throws her weight around to try and make this place a safe haven! That’s why this place feels so much like Mayberry, because she loves you-”

“SHE HATES ME!” she shouted, “THAT WICKED BITCH HATES ME! YOU HAVE NO IDEA WHAT’S SHE’S DONE TO ME IN HER DRUNKEN STUPORS, I CAN’T EVER FORGET THOSE!!!”

Huffing and growling once again, she clawed at her face like a rabid animal; Addy knew better than to protest.

“Besides!” she continued. “Civilized politics only goes so far! You can’t rationalize with a fascist in the marketplace of ideals, that’s bullshit! They’re ideological üntermenschen, the lot of them!” She grinned salaciously as the logical conclusion reached her lips, the prospect of what she was about to say outright arousing to her. “And you know what the only way to deal with people like that is, right?”

Adelaide grimaced, pawing her own face, knowing what was coming. “Dess, please, stop!”

She actually listened and paused for a moment, a brief lapse into lucidity overtaken her, the realization as to what she was about to say pounding through her mind, heart, and soul.

“I need to get into uni, Addy,” she muttered, a wry, psychotic smile slowly beginning to overtake her. “That’s my last grasp for sanity, fah! If I can get in, hopefully get a degree or at least a presentable transcript, then we can fuck off to Europa together! But if I don’t, and I’m stuck here, it’s just gonna be a dead end for me, no escape. And well, if it’s a dead end, then… hell, may as well prune some of the ‘dead ends’ here while I’m at it!”

The goat pleaded with her. “Dess, let’s not talk about it, please!”

“And I mean that in the most literal way, Addy,” she cackled. “By KILLING them! ALL OF THEM! DEATH TO FARRADAY, DEATH TO THE PATRIOTS AND CONSERVATIVES OF MORAL DEARTH, DEATH TO THE LIBERALS WHO REFUSE TO STAND WITH US! ALL OF THOSE ÜNTERMENSCHEN WILL BE PURGED FROM THE WORLD, AND A NEW ORDER SHALL ARISE, ONE DOMINATED BY THE MORALLY JUST, THE INTELLECTUALLY RIGHTEOUS, THE ARDENT SOCIALIST! YOU AND ME, ADDY!”

She stood up on the picnic table, an overwhelming sense of grandiosity swamping her as she raised her bat towards the sky. “RAISE UP YOUR BAT FOR THE BURNING FIGHT, MEIN FRAULIN! THE STREETS WILL RUN RED WITH THE BLOOD OF THOSE WHO WISH TO MAKE THE WORLD TURN WITHOUT US! IT WILL BE A REVOLUTION, A REVELATION, A ROARING!!! IT WILL BE THE ROARING, AND I THE ROARING KNIGHT THAT USHERS IN THE DEATH OF THIS WORLD AND THE BIRTH OF THE NEXT! THE LEGACY OF OSTRHEINLAND SHALL PREVAIL! ICH BIN DIE ÜBER FRAULIN, ICH BIN DIE ÜBER FRAULIN!!!”

With that final outburst, Dess stood there panting on the table, bat raised triumphantly as if it were a sword, waiting for Adelaide to erupt with rapturous applause and join her standing.

Clearly she had lost her damned mind.

“...I need some space,” Addy flatly said. With that, she pushed off from the bench she was sitting on, and began to trudge her way deeper into the woods.

“Wait, what? WAIT!” Dess hopped off from the table and gave chase, “where the hell do you think you’re going?! Was it really something I said?!”

Adelaide finally lost her cool. She turned around on the spot and fired off an angry, downright menacing glare. “YES!!! I’m sick of all your talk of mass murder and ideological genocide!” Addy shouted back. “You sound exactly like the fascists do, from the terminology to the bloodlust! You’re no better than the Volgans you claim to hate so much, the terrible excuses for socialists they were! You’re… you’re a tankie!”

The word sent Dess reeling; an offended look shot up on her face as she shot back. “Bullshit I’m a tankie! And even if I were, at least I’m not a worthless fucking liberal like yourself!”

“For the last FUCKING time, me not wanting to kill people doesn’t make me a liberal! ‘Don’t Kill and Don’t Be Killed,’ is that mantra really at odds with socialism?!” She continued firing back with a newfound fervor, tearing Dess ideologically apart, limb from ideological limb. “Why do you think it’s your responsibility to kill these men, anyway? Farraday, the members of his party, so-called ideological subhumans, why? We’re barely adults, Dess! We’re barely adults, and you’re putting the whole weight of the world on your shoulders!”

The doe fought hard to come up with something substantial to fire off with, but could only muster a stammer.

“Besides,” she continued, “these problems run deeper than Farraday and his party, they’re just scape goats. However many of them, of the liberals, of their respective voter bases you kill, the lingering issues are societal and will remain rooted. You can’t kill them all! All you’ll succeed in doing is teaching them that preemptive violence is the answer, and they’ll annihilate us, because they simply outnumber us! Violence is an answer, Dess, I’m not denying the usefulness of the stick, but it’s not the only one, and it can’t be the first. There has to be a carrot to go alongside it. And as long as you think violence, gratuitous, genocidal violence, is the only option you have, you’ll be doomed, since you’ll have already implicitly accepted the fact that you are as such.”

Dess’ limbs hung limply from her body as she stared her girlfriend down; her brain had fully been consumed by the fog, but she had been completely exhausted of rage, too busy picking up the shattered remains of her ideological incoherency. Addy waited a moment, hoping for some sort of response, but eventually just sighed and pressed on with her heart.

“I just wanted to be able to vent and commiserate with you over this… I should’ve known you would twist it like that…” She looked back over at Dess, sorrowful. “Will you at least change your mind? For me?”

She stood there, anticipating an answer, hoping desperately in her heart that it would be one of penance and acceptance.

She knew in her heart, though, that Dess was too headstrong in her ways.

“I can’t,” she choked out; as far as she was concerned, Addy was already lost. “I don’t see any other way. I can’t see any other way… I’m sorry.”

Addy looked down at her feet, let off a protracted sigh, and relaxed her tense shoulders, giving up. “Then I just need some space to think. See you at school tomorrow, Dess.” She turned her back, and strolled off down the lane and into the woods. And that was that. Not a kiss, not a hug, not anything more. Nothing.

Not even an “I love you.”

…

So with all the stress of the world weighing down upon her, it was no surprise that Dess turned to drink. There was a soothing comfort to it all, the way it numbed the pain of her mind, made the world a happy place for once. It seemed that the more she drank that cheap piss beer, the happier life became, until life itself blacked out and she could enter a restless slumber before the day would start anew.

This was nothing new; she’d had depressive bouts of binge drinking before, way before she was legally allowed to imbibe. But now, with all of the liquor in the world at her legal disposal, and with Carol no longer keeping watch on the manor’s liquor supply in her abstinent state, she really started to go off of the rails. Brandy, bourbon, whiskey, and vodka. Especially vodka. It got her fucked up so easily, especially when she mixed it with a can of Bepis, it was like a nectar from the gods. The spirit of Dionysus seemed to overtake her every single night; no more worrying about college rejections, no more worrying about death camps. With liquor, and especially mixed with some weed, she was safe, she was giddy, she was happy.

Naturally, Addy was the first to recognize this downward slide in her affect, which was clear as could be when she came over to the manor to hang out after Dess missed school one day, only to find her piss-drunk wasted in her bedroom, giggling to herself in a stupor.

“Ohhh, heyyyyy there, Addy-gurl,” she slurred. “You came… you came to see yer favorite fuck toy! The community whore!”

“Dess, you’re a virgin,” she replied flatly, unimpressed and a little concerned. “We both are.”

“Guil-ty!” She pointed innocently to her face, before a wry smile crept across her. “Wanna change… that…” A loud burp escaped her lips. “Oops! Ex-cuuuuse me, princess! Fa ha hah!”

Adelaide took stock of her room; empty bottles of Genny Cream lay strewn about the floor, as was a half-drunken bottle of vodka, leaning up against a pile of soiled clothes. She sighed, knowing the answer to her question wouldn’t be a good one. “Were you home all day getting drunk?”

Dess nodded with a grin, rolling her eyes as if to say “did I do that?”

“And how much did you have?”

Slowly, Dess focused hard on her fingers and began to visually count upwards. One… two… three… four… five…. “Yeah, uh… that many cans, and half of that bottle there….” She lazily gestured towards the vodka, which Addy was quick to swoop up at the mention. “Hey… don’t take that! …Unless, you’re looking fer a taste!”

“Not now, Dess,” Addy sighed, pawing her face out of stress. “And you shouldn't be drinking so much, either! It’s tearing you apart!”

She pushed back at him, literally. “Pfft, intervention, shmitervention, I’m fiiiiiine!” She tried to stumble her way out of her room to prove so, only to trip on her own two feet and fall face first on the ground, vomiting as she did so.

“Shit, Dess, are you okay?!” Addy panicked at the sight of her girlfriend about to Hendrix herself, and flipped her onto her side as she continued to vomit all over the carpet, hacking up chunks of half-digested pizza that she had nearly choked on. For a solid two minutes, she just lay there spewing chunks, and slowly began to tear up as the process turned from a mere process to a physical pain. “Addy…” she moaned. “My stomach hurts!”

“That’s because you’ve drank enough to kill an elephant, Dess,” Addy gently pointed out, stroking one of Dess’ ears gently as she soothed the still-vomiting girl. “Look, I know the past month or so’s been a real challenge for you, what with all the rejections and the Farraday news…”

“And you…” Dess whimpered.

This took Adelaide by surprise as she was interrupted. “Huh?”

“I’m scared, Addy. I’m scared of losing you… what Bratty said, what Ember said… I’m a shit girlfriend-” She vomited again midway through her sentence, clutching her stomach and crying, before she continued on. Addy continued stroking her. “I just… I’m such a girlfailure!” she sniffed. “And you’re so well-put together, and so are they… why are you even wasting your time with me?”

Addy had to pause and think, pondering over what to say as Dess wept on the floor, cradling her belly in pain. Truth be told, the past few months had been… grating, to say the least, even with their peaks. Dess had always been a bit of a high-maintenance girl, but this was a new low, even for her, and from the sound of things, she’d probably never forgive her if she went over her head and got her the help she needed. At least, that’s what she thought.

Seeing the doe writhing on the floor, though, Addy couldn’t help but feel bad for her. It was her fault she wasn’t getting help, sure, but it wasn’t her fault her brain was such a miswired mess. She genuinely felt bad for her, even if it was getting harder and harder to find the good in their relationship as the fun moments grew ever more distant in the past. She’d never say it, but she was starting to reach a breaking point.

“Dess, baby,” she cooed, “I could never stop loving you. No matter what, even if you’re a struggle. It’s just…” She sniffled. “...Sometimes it’s hard to manage you, I don’t know how much longer…”

She looked up at her, fear in her eyes.

Addy flashed a warm, affectionate smile back, burying everything deep down. “Nothing, dear, nevermind. I forgot what I was gonna say.”

Relieved, Dess let off a sigh, wiping the vomit from her face. “I really need to take a piss right now. I’m on the verge of wetting my pants! Fah!”

Easing Dess up to her feet, Addy, kept ahold of her hand and threw her other arm under the opposite shoulder. “You need me to walk you there?” she asked.

Dess lazily nodded. “Yeah,” she murmured. “Like, I’m feeling better after yakking, but my legs are like… still weak and shit.”

“Okay, then.” Together, they started making their way down the hall, slowly. Addy continued on with speaking. “I’m glad that throwing up helped you, Dess, I was worried you had alcohol poisoning there for a moment.”

“Me, too,” she added, hoping the conversation would end once she hit the can.

“But you still need to get clean,” Addy added. “You can’t keep missing school like this if you’re really looking to get ready for… life….” Fuck, she thought, was she basically Dess’ second mother at this point?

“Yeah, yeah, I’m aware,” Dess blabbed, rolling her eyes as she did so. “Look, I’ll be fine, can we drop this whole thing? I have a headache right now.”

“That’s probably because you’ve been drinking so much,” Addy chided. “I swear, with how bad you are when you’re drunk, you’re really reminding me of my mom…” She pondered if she should add on to that, and made the grave mistake of doing so. “...Hell, you’re just like your own mom, too, only less angry I suppose-”

Twisting around in a flash, Dess slapped Asriel broadside across the face, the echo of the contact reverberating through the house.

“DON’T YOU EVER DARE COMPARE ME TO THAT WICKED BITCH!” she shrieked. “OR I’LL FUCKING TAKE THAT KATANA ON THE WALL AND, SO HELP ME ANGEL, I WILL FUCKING GORE YOU WITH IT!!!!”

Trembling, huffing, and puffing, it took her a while to realize how hurt Adelaide was; clutching to the side of her face, she lay spread on her knees upon the floor, cupping her face at the point of impact, wheezing as she was about to cry.

It all hit Dess at once like a sack of bricks.

Just as quickly as the rage came, it subsided, replaced with a frightening panic as Dess tore at her own tank top collar, literally rending the wife beater as she did so. She threw herself to her knees, took a hold of Addy, and wept, shaking her as she did so.

“Addy, baby, I’m so sorry!” she wailed. “I didn’t know… I didn’t know what I…” Her eyes opened wide. “Hit me back! HIT ME BACK! GIVE ME WHAT I DESERVE!!!”

The weight setting in for Addy now as well, her brain immediately entered a state of primal fear and, without a second of thought, she darted out of Dess’ grasp and, with tears spilling from her eyes, down the stairs and out of the house. The doe tried her best to follow, but tripped on her two legs, and fell to the ground. She didn’t bother to get up, laying alone on the floor, in nothing but a bra and pants, pants which were now soiled with her own urine, just as much as her face was soaked with her tears.

She really was just like her mother.

…

No surprise that she drank again that night. She drank even more than she ever had before in her life, desperately hoping to erase the events of that day in a blackout haze, a haze she hoped to guarantee with blaze. A whole bowl of weed was smoked by her in the wee hours of the morning, just as she went to bed. It was a miracle she didn’t throw up in her sleep and drown in her vomit, although with how she was feeling, that would’ve been preferable to what actually happened.

Waking up late that morning after a restless few hours of sleep, Dess peeked at her phone and recoiled at the date and time. She was already running late for school, but unlike the day before, where she bagged, today was exam day in her math class. Shouting at the top of her lungs, she hopped out of bed in a panic, threw on whatever clothes she found on the floor, and darted out the door towards school, panic setting in as the bell rang to start the day before she could even see the building in the distance. It was hard to run with how much she was swaying, still feeling the lingering effects of her booze and nursing a splitting headache.

Eventually, she burst through the doors and dashed through the empty halls as fast as her weak legs would allow her, eventually spilling through the door to her math room, panting. The entire class stared at her, the sweaty, unkempt, drunken mess that she was. Even the teacher.

“Good morning, December,” she said, coldly. “You’re late. And after you didn’t even show up yesterday.” She looked the mess of a doe up and down. “Your shirt’s on backwards too… erm….”

Dess broke out into a panicked sweat as the bluebird started to sniff the air around her, shifting her gaze over to Adelaide, hoping she’d make some sort of distraction. Their eyes met, briefly, before she buried her head in a math textbook, averting her gaze. Dess’ heart sank, just as the teacher piped up again.

“December?” she calmly asked, too calm. “Do you mind stepping out into the hallway with me?”

Shit. “Um… yeah, sure thing, Mrs. Chirper.” Trepidatiously, she gave one last sorry look over to Adelaide, before turning back and stepping out into the hall. Her teacher shut the door behind her, and gave her a stern look, wings crossed.

“You’re drunk, aren’t you?”

She kept mum.

“Answer me, December.”

With a sigh, she acquiesced. “Yeah… hungover, maybe, at least….”

“And were you drunk yesterday? Was that why you missed class?”

“Drinking. Yes.”

Sighing to herself, Mrs. Chirper literally clutched her pearls as she grimaced. “Dess, I’m going to level with you here. I’m disappointed in you. You have so much potential, and if you only applied yourself, you’d have a ‘B’ in this class, easily. Everyone else does; hell, I’m pretty sure my son Berdly could even pass my class, and he’s only in the seventh grade.”

Dess was on the verge of tears at this assessment, something atypical of her usual demeanor towards her studies. “But Mrs. Chirper… I have been! I’ve been studying as much as I could for the past month, I’ve given it my all, and I still only got a ‘D’ on the last exam! I just… I don’t know what I’m gonna do! I don’t know what I can do anymore!”

The older woman took off her glasses and rubbed her eyes, tired from the whole conversation and knowing she was pressed for time. “Look, you’re clearly in no condition to take this exam regardless. I’m sending you home early to sober up, you can retake it during lunch on Monday for partial credit. In all honesty… fuck, I’m not supposed to tell you this, but I will anyway, I think you need to hear it. It doesn’t matter anymore, Dess.”

She couldn’t make odds or ends of what Mrs. Chirper was saying, but was soon answered when that quizzical expression was read from her face. “What I mean is, you’re not in line to graduate no matter what. You shouldn’t be, at least. Your math grade just isn’t there. But that’s not gonna stop you, since your mother damn near has a totalitarian grip on this place, and she’ll somehow find a way to fuck with your transcript and get you to pass. It’s what she’s always done. So take the test, or don’t, it doesn’t really matter anymore. I need to proctor for everyone else.”

Turning her back to the pupil, she raised a wing and waved her off, before sliding through the door and disappearing back into the classroom, leaving Dess all alone in the hallway. The revelation was a punch to the gut. Had it… really never mattered? Was she always doomed to be a bad student? And why… why did her mom do those things for her? It couldn’t be out of love… right…?

Slowly, she picked herself up, stumbling to her feet, and made her way towards the double-door exit to the school. Pushing through, she had her freedom, and on a beautiful sunny midwinter’s day, but she didn’t feel free at all. This wasn’t right. None of this was right! It was as if her reality was starting to tear apart at the seams; nothing felt real anymore. Was her life fake? Were her relationships fake? Was this entire damn town fake?!

Mouth hanging open in her haze, she couldn’t bring herself to think; her drunk, hungover, whatever-state mind wasn’t able to. All she could do was plop herself against the brick wall of the school, lay in the dead grass, and gaze up at the passing clouds above.

This was gonna be her life until she died, wasn’t it?

…

It had been maybe an hour or so of that, just absentmindedly staring at the clouds, letting life wash over her, as well as the crisp midwinter breeze, which felt comfortable in her fur. It was then, as she was just starting to sober up, when the sound of a creaking door and footsteps caught her attention. Someone had come out early, probably to see her.

Lowering her gaze, she panicked and dropped it even further, down to the ground, when she saw who it was.

“Are you okay?” Addy asked, her voice as soft as it ever was.

Dess just looked down at her own two feet, unable to bear looking at her face. “I could ask the same about you. I probably should. After yesterday, I don’t know how you could bear to talk to me.”

There was a long, tension-filled pause, Addy not knowing how to reply to that. Truthfully, though, she needed to, but figured she’d at least ease into it. “After hearing what Chirper said, I figured you needed a pick-me-up.”

She got down on her knees and put a hand on her girlfriend’s shoulder. “You were drunk, Dess. I’m not gonna hold that against you.”

She could hear the resentment peeking through her calm demeanor. “You should, Addy,” she mumbled. “That doesn’t excuse what I did.”

“It doesn’t,” Addy replied, taking a seat beside her girlfriend. “It… it doesn’t. You really hurt me yesterday, Dess. I just…” She bowed her head. “I’m just struggling to figure out where to go from here. I don’t want this to be the end, either, but… that was just so much….”

Dess just didn’t understand why Addy was being so nice. “Addy, there isn’t much to struggle with! I abused you! And you better not give me something about how you brought it on to yourself because you mentioned my mom, that’s a lousy thing to say! What I did was inexcusable, Addy! I don’t deserve your forgiveness!”

The pair just sat there silently, letting the winter winds do the talking for them. What Dess had said had come from the heart, and both knew it. What she had done, smacking Addy broadside like that, had crossed a line. Sure, they’d been heated before, they were damn near famous in town for their patented shouting matches, and Addy’s friends gave her shit for it, but never had it gotten to the point of physical violence, alcohol-driven or otherwise.

Ideas of taking a break floated through Dess’ mind, if fleeting. She truly didn’t deserve Adelaide, she was damn near convinced of that fact now, but at the same time, she knew deep down in her heart that she needed her. Addy was water to her; she was the only thing keeping her alive in this inhospitable desert of a world she lived in. She was her artistic muse, the person she leaned on for emotional support, the person she thought of when the knife was in her hands and pressed against her wrists. She was the reason she only cut sideways, and not down the length of her arm instead. She was the reason she hadn’t killed herself yet. If they took a break, even for a few weeks, that could very well be the last time they ever talk to each other.

It was decided, no matter how much of a danger she posed to Adelaide, she’d make sure she never escaped from her grasp. She’d be wrapped around her finger, and herself around Addy’s, even if it killed her.

“I don’t deserve your forgiveness,” she repeated. “And yet all the same, I’d do anything to make things up to you.”

Adelaide perked up at that mention.

“Anything?”

Dess knew the trap she had just sprung; Addy was probably about to suggest therapy for her again, or maybe a stay at a hospital. Fat fucking chance she’d let that happen.

So she lied. “I’ll even go to therapy,” she murmured, trying her best to sell it as a laborious and nerve-wracked answer. “I’ll start looking for places that’ll take me and… book an appointment at some point soon.”

It was a perfect lie. Vaguely committal in scope, but completely non-committal in time. She could drag that on for as long as she needed until Addy inevitably forgot. Speaking of which, she bought the lie hook, line, and sinker.

“I’m glad to hear that, Dess,” she said with a weak smile. “I’m proud of you for admitting you need the help. I’d be more than willing to give you a second chance knowing that.”

She nodded, pretending to agree, before a legitimate question entered her mind.

“Why did you even come back to me, anyway? I mean, I’m glad you did, it just seems… odd that you’d forgive and forget so fast.”

“I have my reasons, my… my fears.” What she admitted was technically the truth, but Dess could tell from her voice that she was hiding her true feelings from her.

“There’s something more than just regular old fear, isn’t there?”

Addy nervously gulped, before nodding; no sense in hiding it. “I don’t wanna see you do something drastic, Dess,” she admitted. “Even if it’s a risk… I’m willing to take that if it means I know you’re safe.”

They were on the same page. The exact. Same. Page. Dess could hardly believe it.

“Besides,” she said, almost as if to assuage herself of the decision she was making, “this too shall pass. This is just another one of your rough spells, and once you’re through it and you start therapy, you’ll be on the path to being well again! So why not, y’know?”

Dess sputtered out a simple “Yeah,” to which Adelaide nodded back.

She looked at her watch, and stood up. “Looks like I gotta be heading on back to class,” she said. “Stay safe, sugarplum!” She sweetly said, giving her a quick peck on the cheek as she leaned down, before she dashed back through the double doors, leaving Dess alone once more.

Too easy.

It felt too easy, and Dess knew it. That shouldn’t have gone down the way it did. Addy was a fool for trusting her, for being so willing to let such a serious infraction fall by the wayside. If the roles were reversed, she didn’t know if she would be able to be as forgiving.

She nearly thought that was the reason Addy was a better person than her, but truth be told she clocked it as the flaw it was. It was that same naivete that she had always had, for years, what Dess called the “liberal forgiveness.” That sappy, saccharine, feel-good attitude towards life that involved trying to see the good in people. But there were some people in the world without light, whose insides were dark, darker, yet darker. Dess had always known that, but perhaps now she finally felt comfortable enough deciding that she was among those wretched many. And there was only one way to purge the dark from one’s body: blood.

Looking down at her arms, she smiled. She knew that punishment would soon be at hand. And it would be more deserved this time than ever before.

Silently, she trudged home, ready to go under the knife’s blade once more.

…

As fate would have it, the knife was not Dess’ fate that evening, for the words of her mother would do all of the cutting for her.

She was shocked to see her mother back at the manor so early once she arrived home; she had grown used to her therapy schedule by this point, and could usually at least plan around her presence. As far as she was aware, though, her reciprocal cold-shoulder treatment had done little to change her mother’s demeanor, contrary to what Gerson had assumed.

The scowl sat upon her face right now, though, seemed to suggest otherwise.

“I heard from Mrs. Chirper and the principal today, December,” she spat, staring daggers into her daughter. “You showed up to school drunk?!”

The raised tone of her voice, billowing out like a gas stove, just waiting to be lit by a spark and turned into a raging inferno. It wasn’t fun, but it was familiarity, it was the anger of someone who cared. Dess leaned into it, feeding her anger, pushing for retaliation. “Damn straight, ya nasty whore,” she fired back with a snicker, pretending to take a swig of an imaginary bottle as she mocked her. “I even raided your liquor cabinet to get the good stuff, not that you’d need any of that anyway, you goddamn teetotaler. Whatcha gonna do about it, bitch!”

Here it comes, she thought, the big blow-up she was looking for, the sign that she actually cared about her!

She took delight in seeing Carol’s fists shake, her entire body trembling over the mocking of her sobriety. A twitch of the eye, the biting of her lip, the snarl of her breath, it was all coming together…

…for a sharp, stressed-out exhale. Carol closed her eyes, sighed, and rubbed her face.

Nothing.

“I should’ve expected this,” she mumbled, her voice as icy and dissociated as it ever was. “I really should’ve expected you’d go full hog-wild the moment you turned 18. If I had any sense, I would’ve pushed to make this place a dry municipality.”

She removed her hand from her face, staring Dess down, who herself was now starting to feel a slight tremble in her legs. “But that wouldn’t have stopped you, anyway. Nothing ever does. You’re incorrigible.”

So direct, so sharp, it cut right through Dess’ heart more than any shout ever could. She could scantly even muster up a stammer; Carol was so detached, her voice so exasperated, that Dess felt something within her shatter. That woman truly didn’t care about her anymore.

“Honestly, December, if you’re going to be like this in public, and clearly don’t give a shit about your education, maybe don’t bother going to school anymore. You’re already 18, anyway, they can’t legally make you anymore.”

Clearly don’t give a shit. She didn’t know, she had no idea how hard she tried. “But wouldn’t you make me go, anyway, for appearance’s sake?!” she pleaded, demanding attention, desperately hoping Mrs. Chirper was wrong. “Isn’t having a dropout eldest daughter a blighted mark on your parenting?!”

Carol huffed at the remark. “To be truthful, I don't know if it even makes a difference with who you are and how you act. No matter what you do, it’ll be a terrible look for the entire family. So why bother anymore? With how little you seem to try, I don’t see why I oughta put any more effort into raising you than I have….”

…

“...You’re an adult, so fail on your own time. I’m done babying you.”

Solemnly, Dess finished her recount of the prior conversation to Gerson, who sat at his desk across from her, stroking his beard. “It’s just… all this time, I’ve legitimately been doing my best work in school! I’ve been studying, I’ve done my homework, I’ve done all that you’ve suggested of me, both there and with her, and despite all that… it feels like I’m failing at life right now. My grades have only continued to plummet, it feels like my mother’s on the verge of kicking me out of the house, and on top of all that, not only has my portfolio sunk me, it feels like my relationship with Azzy is sinking, too!”

She started visibly weeping. “I guess… I don’t know what to do with myself anymore, Gerson! The idea of having to get a job around here, just being stuck alone in a dead-end forever, it… it scares me! Honestly, I’m not even sure if college can help me, either, it just feels like something to delay the inevitable. The idea of being a non-artist, or an artist that has to go commercial, and without Azzy there by my side… it scares me, Gerson. It scares me, because I can’t see it as anything other than pure misery. It scares me, because I’d legitimately rather die than keep on living if that’s what life’s like!”

She curled up in a ball in her seat, her whole body trembling. “I’m not ready to grow up…” she admitted. “I just wish life could be frozen where it is now, forever.”

The old turtle sat by, a nervous, pensive air surrounding him. “Dessie,” he murmured in a hushed, calming voice. “Not everything last forever, y’know. Places, relationships… people you hold dear… all fade away to the sands of time eventually.”

The doe wasn’t buying what he was selling, moodily wallowing on. “Frankly, I’d rather see the world blanketed in a neverending night than let the sun rise on a day without Addy, er, Azzy. Without Noelle. Without you.”

Gerson choked up at the mention of his name; he looked down at his arm, knowing that beneath the sleeves of his coat, the scar left by a recent IV drip remained. “So, it’s Azzy in particular yer worried about, hm?” He said, shifting gears deliberately.

This elicited a brief wince, then a nod. Dess hadn’t bothered to tell him about her planned transition, true to her word, but it still stung to hear her deadname from someone not in the know, especially from someone as supportive as Gerson would be. “It’s just… I know I was drunk at the time, but that’s no excuse! And I know he has to know it deep down in his heart, and I worry that his forgiveness is either gonna get himself hurt… or selfishly, I fear more that it’ll run out. It… fuck, it honestly makes me wanna drink even more.”

“Aye,” Gerson mused, “you’ve got yerself quite a pickle there, Dessie. I’m sorry to hear that you’ve been… struggling so much…” The old man then began to hack up a lung, seized by a vile, phlegmy coughing fit, one that had been plaguing him all day.

Dess looked on with a great deal of concern. “Hey… Gerson? You okay? You haven’t been sounding a hundred percent today…”

“Aw, it’s just me bein’ old, ‘Cember,” he weakly assuaged. “Natural at my age to be like this, don’t give it any worry.” He noticed the mood in the sour air turning for the worse, so shifted over to what he was best with: advice. “Now then, I figure yer lookin’ to figure out how to fix yerself up, I figure,” he rambled. “Well, if ya ask me, I reckon that Azzy’s yer main priority at this point. Sounds like despite what’cha say, yer mother still cares enough about’cha to fix ya a diploma, so you can coast if ya like there, and no sense stressin’ about college until ya get those last few letters in the mail. Worthless to fret over somethin’ you don’t know the outcome of yet, gyaa ha… *hack* …heh….”

He cleared his throat after yet another cough. “Anywho, I reckon some sorta apology and act of penance oughta straighten up the ship!” Noticing Dess shutter, he let out a hearty laugh, not knowing that the word brought back vivid memories of herself at knifepoint. “Ah, don’t’cha worry, Dessie, it ain’t that bad, don’t gotta be a grand gesture or anything like that. Azzy seems like the forgiving type if what you’ve told me is anythin’ to go by. Hell, I used to get into hot water with my sweet Amber for way less… course, I never descended into physical violence.”

It was just a musing, but for Dess, it might as well have been a scolding. “Yeah… maybe I oughta put the bottle down….”

“Good call… *wheeze* …Dessie.” His breathing was strained, and he reclined further back into his seat, sliding down some. “Sheesh, at this rate, I’ll be dead within a year-”

“DON’T YOU SAY THAT!!” Dess suddenly blurted out, taking the both of them by surprise from the spontaneity of it all. “I mean… please don’t joke about that, Gerson,” she meekly followed with. “I… don’t wanna think about you dying just yet….”

Gerson gave her a pitiful, sorrowful look, nodding as the doe bowed her head in an effort to mask her tears.

“Promise me you won’t die, Gerson. Promise me you’re not going anywhere anytime soon.” She sniffled, and then added on something that froze his heart solid with an icy panic. “I honestly think I might kill myself if you were to drop dead tomorrow.”

Those words struck him to attention. He went into damage control, suddenly growing deathly serious as he grasped Dess by the hand. “December,” he sternly spoke out, “I need you to make a promise to me. I’ll promise ye that I won’t drop dead tomorrow, and I’ll keep on fightin’ and kickin’ but I need ya to swear to me that you won’t go off doing somethin’ so rash when the time does come. I don’t care if you need to find comfort in Asriel, yer sister, yer father, anyone. But please….”

He clasped his hands together and shook them, begging.

“Please, don’t kill yerself, December. You still have a whole life ahead of ya, and it’s worth living. Don’t let your book go unwritten because of me, please!”

It was a side of Gerson that she had never seen before, the calm, often jovial airs surrounding him shattered for just a moment, as genuine fear gripped the old man. Knowing his heart needed to hear it, she nodded, and put on the most convincing face she could. “Okay. I promise.”

“Do ya?”

She gulped, nodding once more, serious this time as the weight of his worry crushed her shoulders.

“I do.”

“...Okay, then.”

He found the tone of her voice satisfactory. His shoulders easing of tension, and shifting back in his seat, Gerson relaxed somewhat with the confirmation, his typical demeanor returning to him. “Anyway, Dessie, my point from earlier being, seeing as yer not interested in a break from Azzy…”

“...Not at all…”

“...Then my advice would be some sort of gesture of goodwill towards him, somethin’ to remind him why she’s so in love with ya. Doesn’t have to be anythin’ grand, but something sweet that’ll get the point across, some sort of make-up gesture, y’know. Any idea on what he’d be into?”

Dess thought long and hard, laboring over the question. There were a lot of things Adelaide liked, but in the moment, everything seemed surface level to her, nothing that was representative of the affirmations of a deep bond between two lovers. Letting her mind wander to past conversations, a certain conversation from the day after her birthday weaseled its way into her recollection. It’d be an almost selfish way of making things up to her, but with how open she had been to the idea back then, there was always a chance it’d work out perfectly if the right preparations were made. 

Wryly, she smiled. “I think I may have something in mind.”

“Good, good, glad to hear you… *hack* …have a… *hack* …plan… oy vey….” Once again, Gerson found himself in the middle of a coughing fit, wheezing and wincing in pain with each cough that escaped his throat. “Oh, Angel…” he murmured, pushing himself out of his chair, legs wobbling. “I need to get over to the hospital, have some tests run….”

Tests… Dess shot up with fear in her heart, the prior conversation holding no more weight to her. Noticing how much he was struggling to stand, she took hold of him, grasping his hand and propping the old man up. “Are you sure you’re okay?” she asked, a fearful frown sat upon her face.

“Yeah, I am,” he replied with a weak chuckle. “The Boom genes run strong through me, I just… need to maybe see the doctor… get some more tests run. Damn winter cold….”

Dess hesitated, refusing to let go as they walked. “Lemme go with you, make sure you arrive safely.” She expected, no, she hoped that Gerson would reply with a hearty laugh and tell her he was strong enough to walk on his own, but instead he only meekly nodded with a faint smile.

“Aye… thanks, December….”

Seeing him so frail, it damn well broke her heart.

…

Noelle was desperate.

She had just ran over from Catti’s house, having been in the middle of doing her makeup for a CD cover, when they both realized she had run out of eyeliner. They’d have asked her older sister for more, but she was out of town that weekend with all of her makeup utensils, meaning that there was only one person Noelle could go to to get more.

Dess.

Yet despite all of the calls she’d made, Dess hadn’t picked up the phone. In fact, even when she called her name inside, Dess hadn’t responded. The sound of music thumping from upstairs told her well enough that Dess was still home, and not out and about, so she certainly should’ve been…

A horrified thought entered Noelle’s mind. What if something had happened to Dess? What if she had really done it this time?

Darting up the stairs, hooves clanging against the hardwoods, Noelle skidded to a stop right in front of Dess’ door. She knocked, awaiting a response, before knocking again and talking through the door.

“Hey, Dess? It’s Noelle! I’m… I’m really worried about you! I was hoping to borrow some eyeliner for Catti, and… I know things have been rough for you lately, but I… I just hope you’re okay in there.” She paused for a moment, before adding, “Please, just say something!”

No response came from the other side, only the sound of thumping bass echoing out from the door as muffled lyrics rang out from within.

Relax, don’t do it,

When you wanna go to it!

Relax, don’t do it,

When you wanna come!

Relax, don’t do it,

When you wanna suck, chew it!

Relax, don’t do it,

When you wanna come!

When you wanna come!!!

Desperately needing that makeup bag for Catti, and now seriously worried about her sister, Noelle banged on the door again and put her ear up to the side of it. She could make out faintly a conversation happening inside; at least it made things clear Dess was still alive, but it was a strange one, at that.

“Are you sure about this?”

“Of course I’m sure, ya big doofus! Trust me, it tastes good!”

…

“...And if you do it, I’ll make sure to give you a blowie in exchange!”

Addy blushed at the mention. “You’d really… erm, can I keep the dress on?” she excitedly asked.

Dess pulled her onto the bed, right atop of her, and gave her a long, sensual tongue-dancing kiss. “I wouldn’t want it any other way,” she seductively assured.

That was all the encouragement Addy needed; she nipped a hair tie from the nightstand she had set her retainer on and began to set her hair back, preparing herself for the main event. “Can I… heh… pull them down?” She gestured towards Dess’ jeans, sat loose around her waist with the belt unbuckled.

Leaning back against the wall, Dess smirked to herself, proud of having pulled just the right strings to get here. From the thumping, sexy music, to the dim mood lighting, and the dress, a fine black skater dress she’d bought just for her girl, she had managed to lull Addy right into her seductive grasp; it was as if the intimate violence of the week before was all but forgotten. All was forgiven, and after this brief peak of pleasure, she would pay her back tenfold. Make-up sex, even if she was the one on the receiving end to start.

“Go ahead,” she nodded. “It’s hotter that way when you do it.” It went unsaid, but Dess took great pleasure in the domineering of her partner.

Licking her lips, Adelaide did as she was told. First, she slipped off the belt and tossed it aside; no need for that now, so it clanked off against the wall and fell harmlessly to the ground. Next came her blue jeans, which she unbuttoned with a pop, and taking them by the waist, slowly began to slide them down Dess’ legs. She wiggled to and fro as her girlfriend stripped her, helping to ease along the removal, but also just for the mere pleasure of feeling the article slide against her fur.

With her hooves finally peeking out from the pants, Addy had finished her job, and tossed the jeans aside in the laundry heap by Dess’ desk. Now the only clothes on her lower body were her panties, a delicate black pair of frilly lace with an angel’s face covering the prize. So exposed were her legs, the vitiligo of her thighs was even visible.

“Wow…” Addy mumbled, already entranced by what she saw. “I didn’t know it even spread that far down.”

“Yeah, I don’t really like to show anyone,” Dess admitted, “...but with you, well, I guess you could say I feel safe.” She leaned back in and locked tender lips once more. “Now, what’re you waiting for? Your prize awaits, my princess.”

Spreading her legs apart, Addy salivated as a visible cameltoe bulged through the tight panties as Dess spread her legs wide open, presenting herself to her partner. Hesitating for the briefest of moments, not out of trepidation, but out of sheer awe, she eventually came back to her senses, and dug a thumb into it, wedged right between Dess’ nethers and the lace of her panties. With a tug, they slid right down her legs, Dess giving another wiggle to help things along, before they too had come off.

There she was, spread open for Addy, exposed for all to see. Matted fur surrounded it, but there, bare, were her darkened lips, already wet in anticipation.

“Go on,” Dess cooed. “It’s all yours.”

Her tongue hanging limp from her mouth, her gaze star-studded, Adelaide damn near dove right into Dess’ lap, wedging her snout between her thighs. Frantically, she kissed every square inch of matted, damp, sweaty fur, each small kiss moving ever so closer to glory. Dess sat there in anticipation, wondering at this point if Addy would go too hard and too fast in her excitement.

The first brush of the tongue, though, left no doubt in her mind that she knew what she was doing.

Pressing a kiss right on her center, Adelaide licked it once, before letting her tongue roll deep inside her. It was just the right amount of pressure; not too fast and hard, but not limp either, just like licking a cone of ice cream on a warm summer’s day. And Adelaide went to town like she was dying of heat stroke.

Dess gripped her sheets in a frenzy, scrunching them between her hands as her head arched backwards in delight. “Oooh, FUCK! Just like that, Addy-girl!”

Unintelligible mumbling sounded out from Addy’s stuffed mouth, although it would be immediately clear that it was an affirmative one. Licking all around, she put pressure right atop of Dess’ clit and held it there, before flicking her tongue and circling back again. Dess was already starting to convulse from the arousal of it all, and gritted her teeth to hold back a pleasurable moan. It was futile; it escaped her lips all the same, with how powerful of a bellow it was.

“Oh my Angel, keep going! KEEP GOING! RUT ME HARDER!!” she hollered, her breath short as she panted, each breath a moan that only gained intensity with each passing moment as Addy’s horns rubbed against her thighs. She had no idea where she learned how to do this, but she was a damn natural. The tension building inside of her, she was gasping for air as her tail twitched and body pulsed, Addy having to bob her head in a rhythm in order to avoid getting her snoot booped.

On the verge of an eruption, the whole bed started to shake. “I’m almost there, Addy, almost… ALMOST… GYAHHHHH!!!”

With one particularly strong lick of her center, the whole damn burst wide open. A feral moan escaped from Dess’ lips as she gushed all over Adelaide’s face, squirting into her fur as the goat continued to lick her insides clean. In fact, she continued to rub her tongue along her sensitive, primed spot, until Dess’ moans turned to cries. “Too much! That’s too much!” she wailed, squirming on the bed as her whole body suffered a spasm.

Finding it was just about time to call it, Addy lapped up the rest of Dess’ love juices that had spilled forth onto the bed and into her matted pubic fur, before raising herself up and joining Dess face-to-face. She let the squeamish doe catch her breath and regain composure over her body. Then, with a nod, they locked lips once more and did the tango with their tongues, Addy’s saliva carrying the odd, tangy taste of Dess into her mouth and down her throat. She had always been curious as to how she tasted, so to finally feel that on her buds, it was an odd, heavenly delight.

She let her eyes flutter open, gently gliding about the room in ecstasy. Everything seemed as it should be. The stars on the wall, Adelaide’s soft, tender face…

…And Noelle, standing in an open doorway, mouth as wide as she had ever seen it.

“FUCK!”

With a start, Dess pulled back from Adelaide and practically shoved her off the bed, covering herself with the stained blankets as she hid her shame. “N-Noelle!! What the fuck?!?! Close the damn door! Get… GET OUT!!!!”

The young girl didn’t move a muscle, frozen like a deer caught in headlights. The scene was pure chaos; Dess screaming at the top of her lungs, getting angrier by the minute, Adelaide in a dress, writhing on the ground, and Noelle petrified having witnessed it all.

After damn near blowing out her vocal chords, Dess had had it. Throwing modesty to the wind, she slipped out of bed with the blanket still draped over her body, tied it in a makeshift toga around her, and marched over to Noelle, yanking the poor girl by the hair as she dragged her out the door. Finally outside of her room, she shut the door behind her, leaving Adelaide inside, and unloaded onto her sister.

“How much did you see?!” she bellowed. Noelle held silent, her entire body shaking uncontrollably. “HOW MUCH?!?!”

“...Most of it,” she fessed. “Dess, what were you and Azzy doing? Why is he in a dress? Why were you screaming so much when his head was in your lap?” She sniffled. “And why are you yelling at me now???”

“Those questions aren’t for you to know,” Dess spat back. “Now you don’t tell anyone about this, OR I’LL WRING YOUR NECK! AND WHY DID YOU THINK IT WAS OKAY TO ENTER WITHOUT MY PERMISSION?!?!”

“Because I needed makeup, sis!” she protested through now-welling tears. “I was doing my makeup with Catti, and I needed some eyeliner! I didn’t think it would be a problem! I just… I just wanted to look like you! I just wanted to be like you!”

This sent Dess off the edge. She took a hold of Noelle and shook the poor child. “BE LIKE ME?! BE LIKE ME?!?! WHY THE FUCK WOULD YOU WANNA BE LIKE ME, YOU DAMN IDIOT! WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU!!! I’M… I’M….”

Her mind, clouded by fog, finally had some clarity as Noelle began to cry, weeping openly there in her grasp. The darkness at the recesses dissipated, and as realization took hold, an overwhelming, aching guilt flooded her heart and soul. Tears began to well up in her own eyes, and Dess too cried for her sister.

“I’m sorry, Ellie,” she wailed. “I’m sorry I’m such a horrible sister!” She tried to lean in for a hug, but Noelle cowered back, eyes wide and afraid of the beast that stood lumbering in front of her. “I’m sorry I’m sorry I’m sorry….”

“Dess?” The door creaked open behind her, and Adelaide stepped out, still wearing her dress, mild panic in her voice. “Is Noelle okay? How much did she see?”

She looked over at her girlfriend, and the darkness swamped her once more. “Get out,” she mumbled.

Adelaide gave her a concerned look. “Dess, I was just asking if Noelle was-”

“What, do you think I’m gonna blow you now that she’s seen us?! Get out!”

“But that’s not what I-”

“GET THE FUCK OUT BEFORE I SLAP YOU AGAIN, YOU GODDAMN WHORE!!!”

Dess’ hands immediately went to cover her snout; even she was taken aback by the outburst. The three fell silent, Addy stunned and Noelle appalled by what she had heard.

“I’m… I’m… I’M SORRY!” she blurted, running off to hide in her room. “I need some alone time, don’t bother me!” With that, she slammed the door behind her, and slid her amp against it, blocking herself out from the rest of the outside world, leaving Addy and Noelle to reconcile what had just happened with themselves.

Addy turned to Noelle, saw her shivering in fear, and gave her a comforting bear hug. The young doe, traumatized as she was, accepted Adelaide’s embrace, and reciprocated. “Thank you, Azzy,” she mumbled.

She winced at the mention of her deadname, but kept on a strong face for the girl she could almost call her sister. “No worries.”

“Is Dess gonna be okay?”

Looking back at the door, Adelaide wanted to find any sort of comfort in her words, but came up blank. She shook her head, unsure.

“I don’t know, Ellie. I hope so.”

…

Penance.

Penance was what she needed right now. She needed atonement, absolution, forgiveness for what she had done to her sister and Adelaide. But she didn’t need a church or priest for such things, that was just another cold, hard iron shackle others kept themselves chained on. What Adelaide kept herself chained on.

The only metal she needed on her arms was that of her knife. That was not her chain. That was her freedom.

Without play, the knife grew dull. Blood was the only thing that could bring back its sharpness. Blood and tears, blood and dust. This was her grand apology to the world, to those she had wronged. Slowly, she drew forth the hunter’s blade from her breast pocket, and unsheathed it from its blackened leather case. The dim glow of her lamp light bounced off the cool metal and gave it a brilliant sheen; she admired the beauty and craft of her favorite utensil, recently cleaned of her prior handiwork, catching a glimpse of her teary reflection within.

A teary reflection that smiled back at her, knowingly. It told her to do it. Do it. DO IT!

The words echoed ceaselessly through her head as she slid off her Ostrheinland jacket, baring her arms to the world. Her arms, long-since allowed to heal, still bore the scars of past trauma, buried deep beneath her fur. Knife in her right hand, she took a deep, preparatory breath, and moved it so that the blade sat delicately perched across the width of her arm; the wrist was too risky a cut, and to pull lengthwise would surely be fatal. This was just for penance, she told herself, just for penance, just for cleansing, not for total absolution.

And with that reminder, she began to play.

Pressing the sharp tip in, she dug around her flesh and reopened old wounds, a spurt of blood already starting to gush out. She winced, equal parts pain and pleasure; it had been months since she’d last cut, she had been doing so well; she ruminated this as she then dragged the blade across her arm, leaving a deep incision in place, just barely shallow enough to not completely sever the veins running through her. Hot, steaming blood gushed forth from her body as she panted, her entire being overcome by a trembling sensation. It became too much, for a moment. She had to pause, let her hand grow steady again, and then she repeated: digging into the flesh with the tip, creating an incision, and then pulling across.

Her breathing quickened, and so too did her cuts. No longer was there any deliberate act to go deep, only a burning desire to scour her arm, to render it as war-torn as a battlefield. Rapid slices as her heart pounded out of her chest, just barely enough to draw blood. The pain was almost orgasmic, she felt herself grow moist and swore she was going to gush again over it all.

And then, just as suddenly, she swiped her blade over one of those deep open wounds.

There, the fresh flesh was tender, unlike the hardened, scarred flesh of the rest of her arm, where there was also still fur keeping herself somewhat intact. The pain was no longer orgasmic as a major dam burst of blood spilled forth; it was a burning, searing, purely overwhelming wound.

She dropped the knife, and instinctively grabbed ahold of her arm where she had cut, holding back her lifeblood from spilling over. A howl escaped her lips; the exercise was over. She had pushed things too far.

Wincing, doubled over, the narrow world suddenly opened up wide to her, as her focus shifted away from herself and around her. There was nobody in the house besides herself, no one to hear her screams, or her cries, her guttural roaring, her pathetic wails. If she dusted right there, nobody would be any the wiser until they saw her pile of it. Tears streaming down her face, she gently unclasped her hand from her arm and inspected the damage. The blood still dripped, but it had slowed tremendously, already starting to clot. She had been lucky not to sever herself any further.

Knowing she had very narrowly averted death, she fell back onto her bed, letting her rusty blood spill the sheets she slept on. She didn’t care. It didn’t matter. None of this mattered. An overwhelming post-cut clarity consumed her. Her life was spiraling down the drain, she was pushing away all of those that loved her, Gerson was sick, Addy probably hated her guts, Noelle had seen her have sex and was more scared of her than ever, every damn little thing was going wrong! All of the progress, all of the tiring, thankless progress she had been making these past months, to try and be a better person, for everyone in her life… it had been all for naught. She even began to doubt if she had even been improving in the first place, prior to this recent slide.

Briefly, clasping to her wrist, she entertained the thought of actually seeking help, of meeting with a therapist and getting medicated again. But the big, gaping wounds in her arms spoke for her. No, she couldn’t, if people saw what she did to herself, she’d be sectioned for sure in some far-flung mental ward, probably to be forgotten by Adelaide and all those she still loved that maybe loved her back. If that were her fate, she’d rather die.

But then… what was there to do?

Sinking deeper into a depressive state, Dess could only shut her eyes and lay prone on her bed, letting the music of her newly-curated cutting playlist lull her off to some sort of mental purgatory.

Can we really lose everything

On a matter of pride?

Is this really the end of our love?

How am I to decide?

Are you ever coming back?

Thoughts of Adelaide streamed into her mind. Thoughts of helpless abandonment, and all she had done to wrong her. She wanted to reach out, to scream, to bury her head in the sand and have everything magically become better.

But all she could do was cry.

Chapter Text

As desperate and lost as she had ever been, and her scars aching fresh, Dess went to find the one person she knew she could confide in for sage advice.

Stepping off the sidewalk and onto the pathway leading into the church, she couldn’t help but chuckle to herself a little, a brief peek of levity shining through her clouded mindscape. If somebody watching her were none the wiser, they’d probably think she was the ultra-pious type despite being anything but, heading to church while out-of-service in the middle of the midwinter break from classes and all that. Especially on a day that was seemingly so nice, with how unseasonably warm it was. Not that she ever wore a coat, since she was a deer monster built for the frigid cold, but she had seen Kris out in the yard earlier playing a prank on Noelle, and they were only wearing their sweater.

It was disconcerting for it to be like this in February, but then again, what wasn’t like that in her life right now.

Finally pulling open the heavy wooden doors and stepping into the vestibule, Dess made her way to Gerson’s office, expecting to see the old man right at work writing the next chapter of Lord of the Hammer, or maybe just enjoying a spot of tea for himself.

Instead, she found the room dim and empty, nobody sat inside the warm confines of the homely space.

This isn’t right, Dess thought to herself. He’s usually here this time of day, even if he’s not writing. Truth be told, she had been over to see him so often over the past few years, the past few months especially, that she’d been able to mentally map out his daily schedule. So for him to not be there in his study….

…No.

No, no, no. Dess wasn’t even going to attempt to entertain that thought. Surely, there had to be some sort of explanation for why Gerson wasn’t there.

Stepping out of the room and back into the entryway, Dess figured that if Gerson wasn’t here, then maybe Alvin knew where he was at, where he was safe.

Already having made up her mind, she pushed forward and pulled open the door to the sanctuary hall. “Hey, Alvin? Do you know where your old man-?”

She had already nearly finished her question, but the sight inside already answered it. There was Gerson, standing in the middle of the center aisle, back turned towards her. She couldn’t see his face, but she could tell that he was gazing at the brass organ at the front of the hall.

For whatever reason, Dess felt something come over her. Maybe it was the strangeness of the encounter she was having right now, or perhaps it was the ethereal atmosphere of the sanctuary, but however it may be, a solemnness swept over her. With a delicate sense of her own presence for the first time in what seemed like ages, she set her bat down by the doorway and carried herself over to where Gerson was standing, trodding along the carpet with gentle footsteps as she passed each pew. Without a word, she stopped right next to Gerson, and just stood there, hands in her jeans pockets, unsure of what else to do or even say.

“It’s beautiful, ain’t it?” the old man finally muttered, acknowledging Dess’ presence. “I usually don’t spend so much time in here, you know how I am, like you are.” He bowed his head with a sense of reverence. “But sometimes, in the golden hour, I like to just stand here and take it all in. ‘Specially when it feels like somethin’ important is bound to happen.” He breathed in slowly, and breathed out even slower; Dess could hear that his lungs were labored. “Just take a moment, Dessie. Let everything wash over ya, and then move forward with a clear mind.”

The words coming out of Gerson’s mouth seemed… unnerving, to say the least for Dess. It wasn’t the crass and often brashly energetic cadence and flow the old man usually spoke with, but rather one that seemed ponderous and poetic, much like his writing. On one hand, she desperately wanted to ask what was wrong, sensing deeply that something had to be for him to act like this.

But on the other, his words made her feel strangely compelled to let go for a moment, as he had said.

Truly taking a moment to slow her mind, as much as she could get it to stop racing, at least, it felt as if the great hall was gradually springing to life around her. The silence that surrounded them was so incredibly placid that it felt like her sense of place was nigh nonexistent, as if she were on a greater plane of reality than which she inhabited. Early evening light shone through the stained glass windows; she had previously found them to be worn and tired looking, but in that moment, she swore they were sparkling. Brilliant shades of orange, red, and green twinkled all around her, the light cast through each pane tinted with the golden touch of the sunrays passing into the sanctuary. It felt warm, it felt ethereal, even if it was merely ephemeral. But the greatest spectacle of all was indeed the grand organ by the pulpit, its grand brass pipes showing a brilliant sheen as the rays of the sun bounced off of it, as if it were glowing, just begging for some sort of performance to be played on it. It was the focal point of the whole room.

Dess could feel it beckoning to her; for an even briefer moment than the one she was in, she wished that Kris was there with her to see the beauty of it and play with her, to have Noelle and Adelaide watch from the frontmost pew and listen along. She so desperately wanted to be overwhelmed by that joy, the joy of playing not for a job, or for college entrance, or for her livelihood or for her life, but for herself. Herself and those who she loved. If the placid quiet of the room carried on forever, so would her thoughts.

“Heaven knows the story that we’ve born from our hearts,” Gerson murmured, his recitation breaking the almost-holy silence Dess had been reveling in. “Of the shadows cutting deep, and the heroes that save us. Heaven knows the beauty of the soul, and we weep to the majesty, and pray we not forget the tale… the tale of Deltarune.”

He raised his head and opened his eyes, finally turning his gaze over to the young doe standing beside him, who only now broke her own trance from the grand organ. “That always was my favorite hymn,” he confessed with a weak smile. “Never was much the type to believe it, per se, but lemme tell ya… something about it just… gets me, y’know. ‘Specially when there’s a choir singing it.”

She couldn’t help but smile back, feeling the warmth of his emotions radiate off him. “Yeah. I’m not much for choral singing, but I’ll admit, hearing you speak it in a beat like that… I think I like it, too.”

Gerson’s smile turned to one of wry joy. “Gyaa ha ha- *hack!*” A coughing fit interrupted his laughter, but he went right back to grinning afterwards.

Dess wished she could go back to smiling herself after that, but the sight of the old man hacking a lung, some sort of weakness starting to take him… well it just completely ate her up inside. She’d even forgotten why she came here in the first place; Gerson’s health was the only thing on her mind.

“Missy?” Gerson asked, still smiling as always through it. Her attention got snapped back to the actual man in front of her.

“Huh?”

“You looked like you’d just seen a ghost, gyaa!” he chuckled. “I swear, yer face was almost as pale as your mudder’s! Gyaa ha-!”

He stopped mid-laugh seeing Dess’s face turn truly mortified at the mere mention of Carol.

“Ah, right… sorry about that, ‘Cember,” he repented.

“Nah, it’s okay, Gerson. It’s, ahhh....” Dess fumbled about in her mind, searching for something to talk to the old man about. “Ahh… oh, right! Your writing, how’s that next chapter of Lord of the Hammer coming along?”

Beyond steering away from the mothers talk, she was also hoping the mention of his book would put Gerson in a lively and talkative mood. Her concern, still bubbling away, turned to a boil when even the mention of his book produced only a wistful sigh and turn of the head back towards the organ and shimmering glass behind it.

“G-Gerson?” she stammered. “Is everything alright?”

He bowed his head and silently nodded, hands cupped together in contemplation. After a moment more, he finally spoke. “I have a decent draft of Chapter 6 on my desk, Dessie dear. First one I’ve got for it that’s from start to finish.” His cane trembling, he gave up the goose and finally took a seat in one of the pews near to him. “But I’ll admit this to you, friend. That means very little to me now.”

Dess was blindsighted by the admission. “You… you’ve really lost your passion?!”

He weakly smiled back. “In a way, I suppose. Not in a sense that I’ve come to find it arduous, far from it; I still enjoy picking up the pen and writing out beautiful prose, just as I always have. It’s just…”

He paused, sensing that Dess wasn’t quite ready to hear or accept the truth, but that it needed to be said anyway. “...It’s just that as far as where I’m at with life, with how much time I have left, or rather how little, stressing myself over those finer details of my work doesn’t seem like the kind of thing I feel like I oughta be doing.”

True to his reckoning, Dess wasn’t willing to accept it. “Gerson, no…” she begged, her own voice now growing weak. “Say it isn’t so….”

The old man looked on apologetically, and then bowed his head down as some sort of penance, either for himself, or on her behalf. “Dess, dear?”

He never used that name. HE NEVER USED THAT NAME!!!

“...I don’t think I’m going to be getting around to finishing Lord of the Hammer. I’m sorry.”

Those words echoed out through the empty sanctuary, as if the heavens had stopped the world to make the weight of those words land entirely on Dess’ shoulders, crushing her spirit like a hydraulic press upon her.

She couldn’t help but nervously, nigh, manically giggle as the realization overwhelmed her. “Hehehee… hahah… HAHAHAH… NO, GERSON! NO! You’re not gonna stop writing, you’re not gonna quit, you still have time! You’re going to finish that book and keep on fighting for life, ya hear?!?! You can’t let those books, your work, go unfinished!!!!”

This perked his head up, but frustratingly to Dess, it only made him chuckle some. “Ah, unfinished work, eh? That’s all you care fer about me?”

Dess felt a bolt pierce her soul. “N-no, Gerson!” she said with panic now seeping into her voice. “That’s not what I meant by-”

“Gyaa ha ha!” The old man let out a booming cackle, catching the doe off-guard. “Ohh, Dessie, I gotcha good there, didn’t I?”

She sighed, relieved to hear she hadn’t been taken the wrong way.

“...but, you do got me thinking now,” he said, scooting over on the pew, before patting the spot on the bench where he was just sitting. “Go on, kid. Take a load off and let me talk some.”

With hesitation, Dess stood there for a moment more, unsure of if she should, but when Gerson patted the seat again, she finally caved and rested herself on the pew, sitting right beside him.

Content with getting Dess’ attention and calming her some for the time being, he turned forward towards the brilliant brass organ and commenced his oration. “Dess, what you said earlier, about worrying about work going unfinished and unsaid, what was it about that which so concerned you?”

She actually had to ponder this point for a beat, but Gerson let her take her time. “I suppose, I’m just worried that all the thoughts in your head, your story, your plan… if they’re not written down, then… they’ll never be complete,” she finally said.

Gerson mused over what he was told, or at least appeared to. “Don’t ya reckon someone else could come and finish it? From my drafts and manuscripts?”

“I mean, I suppose so, but it wouldn’t be the same,” Dess rebutted. “I know you haven’t even touched Chapter 7 yet, you’d said you were gonna wait until you were done with 6 to even start pondering the end, but even with 6, it’s just your rough manuscript! Yeah, someone could piece it together, but it wouldn’t be your words anymore! It wouldn’t be your story!”

At this final point, Gerson couldn’t help but smile wide with a warm aura about him. “Ah, so that’s your trouble, then. You’re worried about unwritten ends, unwritten beginnings, and things left written by a pen other than mine.” He chuckled lightly, coughed a bit, and then chuckled some more. “December,” he said, knowingly using her full name, “lemme tell ya something…

“Does life have a clean beginning and end? Does it have a clear narrative structure with a hero’s journey throughout? Nay, it just happens. Sometimes it ends in poetry, but very rarely; it’s often abrupt, even when it’s slow. Anticlimatic, if someone were to write it as some grand epic, and life starts abruptly just as often as I said it ends, in much the same way. And the path you take? Twists and turns with no clear pattern.

“Where am I going with this, though? Well, I reckon what I said is true for the individual; a life on a microscopic scale such as that rarely amounts to much.” He nodded his head and cleared his throat. “But for others? Well, for that I’d reckon something different. Your actions in a vacuum mean nothing, none of them; you’ll just die someday and it won’t matter, it doesn’t for any of us alone. But how you affect others, how you change the world and make people hundreds or thousands of years from now live lives under the shade of the forest you planted in your youth, well that matters a whole lot, I tell ya. And they’s affects ya a great deal back.

“Dessie, when you die, when I die, we’ll still live on through the stories other people tell of us. Our memories and work will be carried on by those who loved us, and those who loved those people, and so on. They’ll continue to add to our stories; they’ll detail how the world and people were before us, how our actions changed the world for those after us. Heck, they may even rewrite how our lives actually were to some extent, add some narrative flair to it where it may otherwise have been lacking and make it sound better. More romantic, more thematic, more dramatic than it ever really was, but that’s okay, we’ll be too dead to care by then! Gyaa ha ha!

“...But as I was saying, if that’s the case with life, then why not with the things life is about? Why not with our writings?” He stroked his beard in a mock-pensive manner. “Finishing them, adding to them, making it better, perhaps, or at least a joint effort. Giving a sense of finality that may have been lacking organically. And I have a feelin’ about what yer likely to say about all that, about how it won’t matter because it ain’t exactly the same, but to that I say this: Sure, what may be written won’t be exactly the same as what the original person might’ve said or done, but you know what it will be? Something. It’ll be something, and ain’t that somethin’ worth somethin’ to someone? I think so. I truly think so, Dess. Hold that in your heart, that’s all I ask.”

As the hall fell ethereally placid once more, the holy nature of the place brought forth by Gerson’s sagacious speech, Dess couldn’t help but sit there silently; no words could be enough to justly follow what he had said, at least in her own mind.

She desperately, oh so longingly wished she could do as she was told, to take what was spoken and hold it tight to her, to embrace it. But she couldn’t. She still couldn’t jump over the hurdles she had set up for herself in her mind, and she didn’t have the heart to admit it to her mentor.

Cruelly, as if the universe itself had spat on her fate, Gerson didn’t notice this, and took her silence to be her coming to some sort of acceptance with what he had just said. With that, he closed his eyes, propped himself up by the cane, and stood to shimmy out of his seat, talking as he moved past her. “You know, Dess, I would love for my son, Alvin, to be the one to finish my work. I adore him, and the work he does, even if it isn’t exactly my style, and I’d be the happiest old man in the world to see what my own kid does with my work.”

He shook his head apologetically, however, as he finally returned to the center aisle. “Yet, I fear that may never come to pass. He fears too much, fear of never living up to expectations. Expectations set by readers and fans, expectations he sets for himself, and most of all, expectations he imagines me to have for me own work. I’ll have to remember to write to him after you depart, Dessie, I want him to know that he has nothing to fear, that whatever he puts to paper from his pen will most certainly make his own man proud, just knowin’ that he tried. Besides… I have some regrets of me own, not going to see more of his sermons and whatnot. It never was my thing, but I feel I should’ve been there to at least support him some….”

He bowed his head silently, holding that position for a good many beats. Eventually, Dess couldn’t take the silence anymore, and approached him.

“Dess,” he said, knowingly. “You’ve read my manuscripts, you’ve given me feedback, you’ve been as invaluable of a tool as I could ever hope for as a writer…” He held silent again, almost certainly preparing himself for the pushback he was bound to receive, before pressing onwards. “If you ever so want to, Dess, I want you to continue my life’s work. Finish Lord of the Hammer for me.”

She went totally slack-jawed at the pronouncement. “G-Gerson… you don’t actually mean that, do you?”

“Gyaa ha ha! Of course I mean it, Dessie!” he assuaged. “It don’t gotta be in an official published manner, either. I mean, I have it in me will that all of the work will enter public domain upon my death, so it could be, but you don’t have to pressure yerself. I know how wrapped up in yer head you can get. So publish it on some fan site somewhere, publish as you go, listen to their feedback, or don’t! Gyaa!” He turned with a smile and placed a hand gently on her shoulder. “I trust ya, Dess,” he said, his voice showing a serious side through the gentle intonation. “I trust ya, no matter what you decide to do. Just do something, and someone will think it to be the most magical thing ever.”

With nervous breath and a quickening heart, she brushed off his hand, worries now flooding her head. “I… I… I’d love to, Gerson, but I’m not a great writer! I’m barely passing my English classes right now! You’re probably the only reason I’m not outright failing, honestly! You trust me to get all of your syntax and grammar right?”

He shook his head, still smiling. “No, Dessie, I expect you to write how you write, to make it yer own. It’s your story just as much as it is mine!” He stroked his beard. “Now, what specifically be troublin’ ya? Something else is clearly eating away at you.”

“I mean… uh…” Dess fumbled her words. “...What if I make it too dark? You know how deep and moody my lyrics get, how nihilistic and grim my writing is! Your work is earnest beauty! I wouldn’t wanna taint that!”

Gerson shook his head once more, sighing. “Dess, I can’t believe I’m actually having to repeat myself here, since yer usually such a good listener. But did you hear nothing of what I said before? It’s a collaboration, sweetheart! You don’t gotta worry about matching me, what matters is tellin’ a story that’s true to you… Heh, you’re honestly sounding a whole lot like Alvin now! Gyaa ha ha!”

Turning his gaze towards the stained glass windows, another thought crept into his head. “And if it’s inspiration that’s yer hangup,” he mused, “I have a confession to make… The Prophecy, The Legend of the Deltarune… our town’s religion… the religion of our species… that was my inspiration.”

Dess couldn’t believe it. “But… but you’re an atheist, you said…”

“And who’s to say I’m not! I still am… I still am…” He fell somber, the grim reality of death washing over him for just a moment, before he pressed on. “But the point is… it makes fer a good story, right? A great story, even, perhaps one of the greatest ever told if it were treated like the fiction it is, like the old pagan gods of yore. So I made it so.” He turned back to Dess. “That’s as good a jumpin’ off point as I can think of fer ya, huh? Just riff off of it like I did, but with yer own spin on it! Damn whatever the critics think, they didn’t like the Third Chapter all that much anyway, and that was my favorite! And as fer it being ‘too dark,’ well…”

A somber wave washed over him once more. “Perhaps it’s due for a dark moment. The world’s a scarier place than it was when I first started writing, Dess. We both know that, so perhaps a darker finale fits the moment. And with the grand climax coming up in the narrative… well, that’s up to you to decide where to go, how much pain you think is right. What sacrifices to make. Who lives, and who dies, it ain’t a good story without stakes, I suppose! Gyaa!”

He tried putting on a happy face, but Dess wasn’t buying it. The somberness, the sadness, the embracing of the dark. He knew. Deep down, she knew, too.

But she just couldn’t accept it.

“So that’s all yer worries out of the way, right? You should have no obstacles stoppin’ yer creative juices from flowing!”

She couldn’t.

“Gerson!” she finally blurted. “I can’t because… you’re not finished yet! You have to live and finish it!”

The church fell silent. The two locked gazes, Dess’ growing teary-eyed as each moment passed, and Gerson’s eyes were tired and weary.

With a long, mournful sigh, he sat down at one of the benches. Dess knelt beside him. “Dess,” he confirmed, “I’m dying. There’s no other way around it. I can feel it in my bones, in my blood, in my soul. My old man always told me that you can feel yer soul begin to split apart when the end is near, and I didn’t believe him then, but now….” He bowed his head. “I can feel it now.”

He leaned over and cupped Dess’ cheek, holding her head up high and looking straight into the weepy eyes she was fighting to keep dry. “There’s nothin’ I can do to stop it, and there’s nothin’ you can do to change that. What you can do, though, is carry on my legacy.” He clenched his fists and shook them with conviction. “Write, Dess,” he said. “Tell yer stories. Make me proud.”

It was such a straightforward thing. It was so clear, so concise, there wasn’t any way to mistake it, only ignore it.

Dess ignored it.

“Ha… hah…” she nervously chucked, standing up. “No, no, don’t fuck with me…” She smiled. “I can’t even remember why I came here, Gerson. I was gonna ask you something, but I guess… we got sidetracked.”

She looked back. His eyes were pitiful. She chose not to care, to buy into her delusion. It was the only thing holding her together. “I’ll see you soon, old man. It’s about high-time I get some dinner, and right now? I’m thinking QC’s.” Turning away, she made it to the door leading out into the front atrium, before Gerson’s call halted her for the last time.

“Dess,” he begged. “I reckon that once we part ways here, we may never speak again. I can feel it. Is there anything you want answered, anything you want to say… any sense of closure that you want?”

She turned back, only to shake her head frantically. “Closure? What closure? You’re not gonna die, Gerson! Just get that out of your head!”

Standing up from his seat and waddling over with his cane, Gerson stared deep into her soul, pleading. “Can ye at least sing fer me, Dess?” he begged. “Some closure fer me? My favorite hymn… a last goodbye… please?”

As much as she wanted to sing, to grant him his wish, she couldn’t bring herself to accept the truth. “Gerson,” she chuckled, “this isn’t goodbye, it just… can’t be. I’ll sing to you the next time I see you, okay?”

She turned away, unable to face him. “I’m sorry,” she murmured. “See you around, old man…” She paused at the door, before tacking on one last thing. “I love you.” It was her soul’s way, faint as it was, of making some sort of peace, even if her mind wouldn’t admit it. With that, she strolled out the door, letting it shut behind her, and leaving Gerson alone in the quiet of the Sanctuary.

He stood there for a moment, still and morose, his soul growing ever wearier with each passing moment as the gravity of Dess’ actions sunk in. Not for what they meant to him, though, but knowing what they would mean to her, when the rapidly-approaching time came.

He needed someone to talk to.

Feeling a breeze pass through him, though, he shuddered, before letting off a soft chuckle as a thought passed through his mind.

“Aye, I suppose I’m not one to talk, dad,” he mumbled to himself, feeling as if some spirit had come to visit him. Perhaps it was just his decaying memory flashing before him, or perhaps something really was there; he didn’t feel like pondering anymore. “I was much the same way when I was a young lad… yes, I shoulda listened to you, but she’s young… she feels invincible. She hasn’t had to deal with loss before. But she’ll learn… and I hold no ill will towards her fer that. It’s the same mistake I made with you.”

A part of him wished December was there to hear, to know that she need not feel guilt, but that was her battle to fight, and one he could not fight for her, as much as he may wish to be able to.

More memories came flooding in, one last push of energy from the old man’s mind.

“Amber, you always said you’d come back,” he murmured, smiling as he felt a human presence in his soul, one that he had long since wished to feel again. “Such a pretty sunset in here, shinin’ through the glass… reminds me of you. Heck, maybe it is you… you sly magician.”

Fitting, really, he thought to himself. As the beautiful rays of the sun’s dying light shone through the windows, he knew deep down that his own light was dying. How poetic that his own sun would set just as the real one did, letting the darknesses of both night and eternity take him likewise. “Hmph, maybe some lives do have a neat little endin’ to them, I suppose. Wrapped up in a bow! Gyaa… ha… haa….”

The time was drawing near, he knew it to be so. Taking one last gander around the great hall, through the stained glass, and over to the shimmering organ, he let off one final, weak chuckle to himself as he turned towards the door. He needed to make it back to his study and compose that note to his son, anyhow.

He thought about how he would start off his letter, the one he knew his son needed to read. “Dear Alvin, my beloved son, some kind words from your old man….”

The words lay fresh on his mind as he made his way out the old wooden door, shutting the beauty of the inner sanctum away for the last time. The closure was indeed like poetry.

…

“Here’s yer supper, Dess,” QC said, passing the plate and drink down onto the table beside her. “Lucky you came in when you did, too, we’ll be just about closing shop for the night once you’re finished with your meal.”

Nodding silently, Dess took a sip from her Bepis as she gazed out the window, watching the sun finally disappear behind the treeline that surrounded Hometown, plunging the entire locale in darkness sans the stray streetlights dotted about.

She couldn’t get him off of his mind. Nothing could. As she took a hearty bite out of her burger, Gerson’s words floated about in a sea of chaos and doubt. She wanted to believe what he had said about her potential, how she could be the one to tell his stories, to carry on his legacy. But she couldn’t. She couldn’t move past the fact he was dying. For once, she didn’t want things to fade to grey, for dust to fall; she wanted to be frozen in this stage of life forever. No worries about anybody dying, no worries about her worsening vitiligo, no worries about being left behind while Addy went out into the world and grew up.

Frankly, the whole thought of his mortality was starting to sour her appetite. She took another, lackadaisical bite out of her burger, but couldn’t stomach it.

“Somethin’ wrong, hun?” QC asked. “You don’t seem yourself today, you’re usually jonesin’ for that Double Stack burger of ours.”

Crumpling up a napkin and tossing it onto her plate, she pushed it back halfway across the table and stood up, taking one last sip of her drink as she did so. “Yeah, just a lot on my mind,” she mumbled. “Gerson’s not doing so hot.”

“Oh….” QC fretted a little at the mention. “You think we oughta mention somethin’ to Alvin?”

“You can do that, Q.” Dess fished around her pocket and yanked out a tenner, handing the bill over to the rabbit. “Here’s a tip, sorry for not finishing. I lost my appetite.”

“Aw, it’s nothing, dearie,” she assuaged. “You run along and get some rest, I’ll make sure to let him know, hon.”

Nodding slowly, Dess stumbled towards the door like a zombie. “Thanks….”

Pushing it open, Dess stepped out of the diner as QC flipped the sign on the door to “Closed” behind her. The air was unseasonably warm for February; slightly crisp, but that felt positively steaming for someone like Dess. Not an ounce of snow on the ground, either, although the weather report had forecasted some flurries in the coming days.

Taking a long, protracted sigh, she turned to head home, only to jump back at the sight of a ghastly, hooded figure standing beside her.

“Shit! Oh, hey, Mailperson,” Dess exclaimed. “You spooked me… heh….”

“Apologies… December….” they mumbled. “I have some letters, letters….”

Fishing around their bag, they pulled out two envelopes and presented them to the doe. She took them, still off-kilter; Mailperson always had a way of giving her the heebie-jeebies.

“Oh, shoot, more college letters,” Dess mused. “I think these are my last two, then. Thanks, Mailperson!”

“Don’t mention it,” they said, truly meaning it. They began to wander off, before stopping and turning around to face the dark-haired woman. “I had a bad dream last night.”

Dess didn’t pay much heed as she rifled through the two envelopes; one was West Megalopolis School of Arts, the other was Belford. “Yeah, cool, I mean, that’s a shame….”

Mailperson was persistent, making their way back over close to Dess, staring them in the face. “It was about you.”

This was enough to spook Dess to attention, although it was the attention you give to a homeless man with a knife rather than an esteemed peer. “Uh… huh…. What exactly did you… dream of…?”

They began their tale. “I saw you, in a darkened void, nothing but a tree beside you. The branches wrapped around your neck and dragged you upward, before you became one with the tree. Your flesh and fur turned to bark, and your hair became the leaves, with a great, white eye emerging from your mouth as you silently screamed, darkness consuming you whole. And then, at the very end, was a man. I don’t remember his face, other than that he was smiling. He spoke to me, and I also don’t remember his words, but I do remember one ghastly thing about him… his voice came from the holes in his hands, like whispers in the wind.”

The pair stood there silent for what felt like an eternity for the both of them, before Dess piped up. “Riiiight… I’ll keep that in mind whenever I… find myself lost in an endless void. Thanks?”

Clearly recognizing that their warning was just written off not as a premonition, but rather as rambling, the Mailperson merely nodded and turned back, mumbling one last piece of odd wisdom as they disappeared into the dark. “Tra la la… beware the man that speaks in hands, December… for the holes in his hand may become the holes and yours, and you may very well find yourself his willing puppet….”

Sufficiently perturbed by their odd demeanor, Dess shuffled over to be under the light of a lamppost, feeling safer basking in its glow. She quickly tore open the West Megalopolis letter, and read it.

Rejected, once again.

Sighing, defeated, she tore it up and stuffed it in her pocket, leaving her with only the one letter remaining. The Belford Letter. Her final chance. Hand shaking, she pondered opening it, but before she could break the seal, pulled back.

She couldn’t do it, she couldn’t bear to look. This was the lowest of the low, a bottom-of-the-barrel institution. If she somehow couldn’t get into there, then… then….

Clenching the envelope in her hand, she shook her head. No, she couldn’t be alone when she opened the letter, it was too likely that she’d do something drastic if the news was bad. She needed company, someone to hold herself back if need be. And there was only one person in the world she’d want to have with her, if the moment truly was that low.

Determined, she set off running towards Adelaide’s house.

Chapter Text

The loud knocking of pebbles being pelted at their window startled Kris out of their slumber.

The zombie they were, they had gone to bed relatively early, maybe sometime around seven or eight or so. So to be awoken from their sleep so early, well, it made them quite cross. Sliding out of bed and falling to the floor with a thud, Kris picked themselves back up and stumbled on over to the window, where they creaked it open and peaked their head outside. The whole world beyond was an inky black void to their eyes, too obscured to make out who it was pelting rocks. They made an educated guess, anyway.

“What do you want, Catti?” they groggily called out with a yawn. “It’s, like, eleven at night. Can’t you go pester Noelle instead?”

“Wrong person, Krismas!” a voice called out.

Kris’ eyes immediately shot open; there was only one person who called them that name who would knock on the window like that. “Dess?” They asked.

“The one and only!” she replied, a nervous twinge to her voice. “You mind, ah… waking up Addy- er, Azzy?” She covered her snout, nearly giving up the ghost right there.

With a yawn, Kris shook their head, oblivious to the fact. “He’s not here, Dess.”

This surprised her. “He’s… not?” Addy was always at home by this point in the night, unless she was helping Asgore to set up his apartment across Hometown. “Is he at your dad’s place?” she asked. “And why does your dad have another place, anyway? Are you guys moving?”

Grimacing, Kris shook their head again. “He’s gone with Toriel down to Megalopolis, doing a tour of the place. He hasn’t even gotten an acceptance letter yet from the CC, but he’s still checking out their open house. Just dad and I are here tonight.”

Dess’ face fell at the revelation. “Aw, bummer…”

“What were you planning on even doing with him, anyway? It’s late, everything’s closed by now.”

“I just…” Dess choked on her words. “I just really needed someone to talk to, Kris. There’s a lot of shit going down right now, and I… I really wanted to get some perspective from him.”

“And also to smoke some dope?”

Kris read her like a fucking book. “Yeah, and to smoke some dope, too,” she sighed. “Am I really that one-note? That I’m just his weed-smoking girlfriend?”

Kris chuckled lightly at this. “Not one-note, just predictable. Don’t tell him I told you, but he’s called you his ‘manic pixie dream girl’ a few times before. You fit the bill.”

“...yeah, right.” Dess considered herself neither a pixie or dreamy enough for that, but she supposed a lovestruck Adelaide would probably have told her otherwise, before shit went south to roost. “Look, I’m sorry to have bothered you, you can go back to whatever you’re doing. I’ll just… figure out something to do….”

She began to trudge off, unsure of what to do. There really wasn’t anyone else in town that she could confide in at this hour; her sister was sleeping still, and she would rather not vent to her so soon after… getting caught like that, and Gerson was definitely too frail to be awoken this late.

The only person left to talk to, it seemed, was the human staring at her from their upstairs window.

Selfishly, she entertained the idea that popped into her head. It was a stupid idea; Kris was just a kid, no way in hell should she subject them to the terrors of her mindscape, they were way too young to play her therapist. Yet at the same time, she couldn’t quite bring herself to care anymore. Her life was already circling the drain, anyway. Why not ruin one more relationship for good, strike out and earn herself a platinum sombrero? Fuck whatever Kris wanted, she needed this more.

She turned back to the window with a smile, piping up just as the young teen was about to shut it. “Hey… since Azzy’s not around, you wanna come out and hang instead?” she floated.

They stood there idly by for a beat, before rubbing their eyes in tired disbelief with a yawn. “Dess, it’s almost midnight, I really wanna go back to sleep.”

“Okay, okay,” she replied, throwing her hands up dismissively. “I get that, loud and clear.” A smile then twisted its way around her face. “I guess you’re still not one of the big kids, anyway.”

She smiled as Kris’ eyes shot open, their body freezing in place as the words registered. “N-nuh uh! I’m a big kid!”

“But are you?” she asked, hamming up her performance as she sauntered about outside, back towards the window. “Only little kids complain about being tired, y’hear.”

Hearing nothing but silence from upstairs, Dess pressed on with a carrot instead of the social stick. “Hey, how’s about I give ya a big bottle of cola to keep ya awake if you come join me, deal?”

Perched at the windowsill, Kris stood there pensively, weighing the odds of them getting caught sneaking out, before silently nodding back and shutting the window as quietly as they could. Alone in the dark once more, Dess figured she’d light a joint right then and there; she didn’t want to smoke around Kris, what with how young they were and all that, so best to get her fix in then, she thought.

The dim burning light from her spiff faintly illuminating her worn cervine face, she stood there for a few minutes, alone in the dark, slowly taking in a faint high, when she was interrupted by the sound of a door creaking behind her, long after she expected to hear it. Kris then stepped out and joined her.

“Geez, what took you so long?” Dess asked, slightly annoyed as she flicked her blunt away, before noticing a red pair of horns jutting out of their hair. “Aww, you still have that horned headband, too! How cute!”

They blushed and turned away. Dess sensed she struck a chord. “Still feeling rough about… y’know….”

They nodded. “Was looking for it, lost it behind the bed. It’s tough… being something you don’t wanna be.”

Their dysphoria and dysmorphia struck a chord with Dess. “Hey, I know that feeling,” she muttered mostly to herself, before pressing on. “Maybe that’s something we can talk about… once we get to the place.”

They nodded again, but as Dess started to walk off, they stood rooted, trepidatious. “C’mon, you scared?”

Kris looked at her, their gaze a serious one. “I’m only doing this because I trust you,” they mumbled, before falling behind Dess in step. “Where to? The lake?”

Dess shook her head. “I figured some place with a bit more… solitude, y’know. You’ll see when we get there.” She waited for Kris to complain, only to be met with a quiet nod. Whatever, it’s easier this way….

Marching off, the pair made their way down the streets of Hometown; unlike Megalopolis, Hometown was a place that very much did sleep, every road vacant and every house unlit, the people inside sleeping. It was just about the only time Dess could wander about without fear of ridicule or judgement, so she would frequently take these midnight walks with Addy to blow off steam.

Speaking of steam, she was positively cooking, panting with each step. “Phew… is it me, or is it hot out here?” she murmured.

Kris kinda shrugged in response, half-hearted. “I mean, I guess it is kinda warm out… I’m only wearing my sweater. Last I checked the low was supposed to be around 50 for tonight.”

The number was a shock to Dess. “Fifty?! In FEBRUARY?!?!”

Again, Kris could only shrug. “It’s a bit warm, I know, but nothing too crazy I suppose-”

“NOTHING TOO CRAZY?!?!” Dess was absolutely beside herself as she picked up the pace out of frustration. “Kris, when I was a little kid we used to get two or three feet of snow on the regular around here, the mercury would scantly ever climb above freezing. And now we’re talking about a low of fifty as just a fact of life?!”

“Well hey now, I also heard on the weather channel that we’re due for the storm of the century sometime in the coming days-”

“Oh, great! Crazy temperature swings, just perfect!” She threw her hands up in the air out of frustration towards the universe and both humanity and monsterkind as a whole. “I swear, people keep telling me that we only have so long to stop some impending climate crisis, but news flash: it’s already here! We’re fucked already, the ball’s rolling and there’s no damn way we’re gonna be able to stop it! We’re fucked, I say, just absolutely-”

Kris chimed in, cutting her off. “Could we, like, not go into one of your political rambles, Dess? I’m not in the mood right now.”

She felt a twitch pulse through her, but unlike with Adelaide, she couldn’t bring herself to yell at Kris, especially when they were already doing all of this for her, no matter how in the right she may have been to be upset. “Okay,” she tersely replied. “I’ll stop.”

The kid held silent for a moment, shocked that Dess had actually listened to them. “Wow, I’ve never seen you cave in like that,” they lightly ribbed. “You high or something?”

“Dude, shut up!” she said with a smile, turning around to face them as she did so. It was all in good fun. “And no, I only had the one joint earlier.”

“...Huh. With how Azzy described it, I woulda figured you’d be blazed out of your mind with just one.”

“Well, that’s twofold. One, the time he did it, I crossfaded him and fed him some laced brownies after,” she admitted, the old shame welling up once more. “But beyond that, I have a tolerance to the shit now. It quite literally takes a whole bowl to get me fucked proper, or if I crossfade….”

“Fucked proper? Like how Azzy fucked you proper in front of Noelle?” Kris replied with a devilish grin.

Dess froze in place and shot a panicked look in their direction as they cackled beside a tree. “WHO TOLD YOU?!” she whisper-shouted under her breath.

“Noelle,” they giggled, fighting their best to regain some level of composure. “You really rewired her brain with that stunt, that’s for sure! I… honestly feel real bad for her….”

She fell crestfallen at the revelation, knowing that the bond they were slowly rebuilding had shattered once more. “Me too, Kris, me too…. Heh, and to think that was supposed to make-up for what I did to Addy, er, Azzy….”

Kris chimed in again, seemingly unaware of the slip. “When you slapped him?”

This made Dess fall deathly quiet. Addy must’ve told them, must’ve vented to them. But all the same, hearing the fact come out of someone else’s mouth stung her more than it otherwise would.

She stopped in place; not that she needed to move, anyway, she was already at her destination. Kris realized it too.

“Oh, hell no,” they protested, shaking their head. “I’m not going in there! Are you nuts?!”

The doe cackled at Kris’ skittishness. “What, you’re really scared of this old place?”

They nodded shallowly, a grim expression coming over their face. “I mean… it brings up some bad memories. And beyond that…”

Both swore they could hear something creak from within the old shelter, something metallic.

“...it just spooks me.”

Dess paused for a moment, trying to recall why Kris would be so frightened, before a long-distant memory played back in sepia tone. “Oh, right! You tried to play a prank on me by jumping out to scare me, and I locked you in the damn thing! Fah!”

“That wasn’t funny!” Kris shouted back. “I swear, there was some strange man in there with me, I could feel him….”

This only made Dess laugh even more. “Dude, it was probably just, like, a broom that jumped out and scared ya. It was dark in there, you didn’t even know where the lantern was.” She could still tell Kris wasn’t buying it, their shoulders tense.

“I don’t like this anymore. Can we go home now?”

Sighing, she took a hold of their hand, and looked down at them. “Kris… it’ll all be okay. There’s nothing scary in the bunker. It’ll just be you and me in there, no scary old man. You’re a big kid, right?”

Kris hesitated, before weakly nodding an affirmative, their gaze shifting from Dess to the red double doors as they did so.

“And big kids like you and me don’t get scared,” she said. “We’re not allowed to.” Her smile returned, but more forced this time. “Now c’mon, it’ll be warmer for you in there, and I know where they keep the soda in stock!”

They at least seemed to perk up at the mention of some cola, like they were promised. Adjusting the horned band on their head, they kept a grip on Dess’ hand, nodding for her to move forward. “Okay, then. We go together.”

Her smile turned genuine. “Together.”

Stepping forward, she input the code to the bunker, the one she had swiped from Carol years back. 1-2-2-5. Her birthday.

With a click, the electronic lock popped open, and the old metal doors roared to life as they grinded open. Dess could feel Kris’ grip tighten around her hand; she tightened hers affirmatively, letting them know things were going to be okay.

Stepping into the dark, damp space, Dess grabbed an old electric lantern from the wall and turned the knob on it, bathing the entire space in a dim light. It wasn’t much more than a hollow concrete space in the ground, with stocked shelves lining one wall and cots lining the opposite. The entire space was decked out as it was near the end of the Cold War, back when Ostrheinland still existed. She swore her jacket always felt a little heavier each time she entered the place.

Turning her gaze down, she gave Kris a comforting smile. “See?” she said. “No scary monsters… other than me! Fa ha hah!”

Comforted by the light, and by Dess’ presence, they felt safe enough to let off a light chuckle of their own. It’s actually… not so bad in here, now that I see it all.

Dess nodded, her smile faltering. “Yeah… there’s a reason I like to come here often, usually alone. We’re not technically supposed to be here, but nobody ever seems to check. It’s… safe, y’know….”

“Well, I’d hope so. It’s a shelter, after all!”

The two cackled in chorus at the remark, the pair stepping in and Dess shutting the door behind them, propping it open a crack with a lone cinder block for ventilation. Placing the lantern in the center, she ducked behind one of the shelves as Kris sat by the light, eventually coming back with a six-pack of Bepis and a can of Genny Cream for herself. “Figured just one wouldn’t hurt,” she remarked.

Kris remained uneasy, knowing full well what Dess had done to her partner, but too meek to raise a fuss over it. They just took a can of cola from the pack and began to guzzle it down in earnest, happy to be caffeinated at such an unreasonable hour.

Relaxing opposite to them, Dess’ mind wandered over to what Kris had been talking about earlier, with their headband. “So… dysphoria kicking your ass again?”

Taking a long, dragged-out sip of the Bepis, Kris then set the can down and slowly nodded back. “I just… I hate my body so much! Both… because of what it does to me… and the fact I feel so out of place.”

Dess nodded along, attentive; whatever was ailing herself could wait until this was all sorted. “Out of place… you mean in the sense you’re not a monster?”

Twirling a finger through their messy hair, Kris looked at her affirmatively. “It sucks, y’know… like, the gender stuff isn’t easy either, but at least I can do my best to bind my chest and all that. But this shit… knowing that there’s nothing I can do to have the body I truly want, to really be a part of my family the same way Azzy is, it… it really stings. I just… feel so alone in all of it.”

Seeing Kris wipe their eyes with the sleeve of their sweater, Dess felt completely torn up inside. She knew it had been bad, what with them still wearing the headband on the semi-regular even in middle school, but not to this extent. It… actually reminded her a whole lot of how Adelaide was when she first came out to her. A part of her desperately wanted to mention her struggles with dysphoria, to let Kris know that they really weren’t alone, and that their own sibling was much the same way… but she knew she had to stay true to her word.

Instead, she went with her own experiences.

“Hey… you’re not alone with this,” she consoled, scooching over and gently wrapping her arm around their shoulder. “I… may not be the exact same way, but I know what it’s like to be someone you don’t wanna be.”

Kris looked up to her, a bit shocked. “You… you do?”

“Yeah, sure,” she said, continuing on with a gentle smile. “You know, when I was your age, I was wearing skirts and dresses half the time, remember? Carol used to make me wear them whenever I went to school or somewhere even semi-formal. And let me tell you, I hated it. Never felt right wearing anything other than pants. It’s why I was wearing that suit at the semiformal and Azzy had a dress on; that was my old dress, and it didn’t feel right on my body, it didn’t feel like me.”

Taking a swig from her Genny can, she turned back to Kris and gave them a comforting grin, hoping it was an empowering one. “I know it’s not the same, since I’m only butch, but I hope you know that you’re not alone in this!”

Silently, Kris tried to force a smile, but that soon faltered and gave way to a meek frown, much to Dess’ dismay. “Heh… I’m sorry,” they said. “I should be thankful, really… but it’s not the same. And I don’t mean the gender stuff, but….”

“...The other things?”

They nodded. “It’s just that… what you did there, that’s impossible for me to do. I can’t become a monster, no matter how hard I try! It all just… it all just hurts, y’know….”

This struck a chord with Dess, one she had buried deep inside of her, a truly repressed note. “Impossible, eh?” Her face fell as she shifted how she was sitting, now criss-cross on the bare floor. “...I think I can still relate.”

Confused, Kris shot her a weird look. “...You can?”

She nodded. “I can.” Pensive, she cupped her hands together. “It’s not a dysphoria of any sort, but… the general feeling’s mutual. I just wish that I could feel… normal, y’know. No psychotic breaks, no manic episodes, just good ol’ December Holiday, a sane woman.”

Now it was Kris’ turn to take hold of her hand. “You… don’t feel sane?”

She gritted her teeth and sighed. “Nope! Not at all, not at all… and frankly, I don’t think I can ever be sane again. Like, that’s the worst part of it, I feel like I was sane, when I was your age, younger, even, back when mom still seemed happy and approachable to some degree. But now…” she sniffled. “I don’t know if I’m ever going to regain that! It’s like if you were born a monster and transformed into a human! At least with how you are now, you don’t know what you’ve lost….”

Kris gripped her hand even tighter, eliciting a sigh from the both of them. “Heh… sorry…” she mumbled weakly. “I… shouldn’t have put down your own issues like that. I guess I just got a bit… heated, I suppose.”

They both sat there, silent for a good minute, just taking in everything she had vented, before Dess asked, “Can I… still talk about it some more?”

A beat passed, before Kris gave them a silent nod. She pressed on with a sharp exhale. “It feels like for the past few years, I’ve already lost my grip, even if it hadn’t been showing. I was probably starting to really go early my Freshman year. But… I care an awful lot about you and Noelle, so I tried my best to remain strong, to remain the same cool, confident girl you always saw me as… and now that’s shattered, too!”

Scrunching her hair in her hands, she leaned forward and curled up. “After all I’ve done, the blow-up by the lake, the argument at my place, Noelle… catching me… it feels like my whole world is coming apart, that the last bit of control I had, how you two see me, is shattered… heh. Guess you guys probably hate me, knowing who the real me is, or at the very least traumatized.”

She well and truly expected a confirmation of her own mind’s eye, only for Kris to surprise her.

“...You know, I still look up to you,” they admitted. “You’ve always been a bit of a role model to me, and-”

“Kris, no offense, but I’m a shit role model, and you’d have to be a bit crazy yourself to think otherwise,” she interjected. “I mean, have you seen the things I do? The constant screaming, the physical violence, the sheer off-the-wall insanity! You shouldn’t ever want to be like me! Be more like Noelle, or Azzy, be like Azzy!”

Her breathing went shallow as she turned inward once more, unable to accept what she had heard.

“So despite all of that… why?”

Taking a deep breath, Kris gave her an answer. “Despite everything, I suppose I still see a lot of myself in you. I’m… not in as bad of sorts as you are, admittedly, but all the same….” They rubbed their sleeve. “I’m not well, either, Dess. So seeing somebody who’s so like me and, despite it all, still alive and kicking… it means the world to me. It’s a reminder that no matter how bad things get, all you need is a bit of determination to push through. Because that’s what you are, Dess. Despite how much you struggle, you’re determined, you’re strong.”

They paused, seemingly finished, before adding, “And hey, maybe someday I can be there for someone like you’ve been here for me.”

Dess held her tongue, on the verge of tears herself. Kris rarely ever spoke out like that, but they sure as hell took from their brother to some degree, clearly. She certainly didn’t feel strong, the wounds on her forearms aching anew, but at the same time… she was alive, wasn’t she? That certainly had to count for something.

The human could she was wrestling with her emotions, and chimed in, hoping for the best. “Feel better now? Kris asked.

Dess paused, a part of her wishing the answer was “yes,” but she reluctantly shook her head. “Thanks, Kris. I mean it, those words meant a lot. But they can’t solve everything.” She looked downward, before sipping the dregs of her Genny cream and tossing the can away. “When there’s so much wrong with someone, like there is with me, it takes a lot more than one good monologue to solve things. If that was all it took, Azzy or… Gerson… probably would’ve solved things by now.”

Kris pondered what to do, before chiming right back in. “Wanna talk about it, then?”

“Hm?”

“Just to get it off of your chest. Figure it might do some help.”

She really didn’t want to bother Kris further with her troubles and make them play as her therapist, but at the same time, she really did want to process all that ailed her mind. “I guess we’re already talking,” she mumbled, lightly chuckling, “might as well go all the way then.” Spreading back out and laying on her back, she let her frayed mindscape spill forth from her lips.

“I think I’m bipolar,” she admitted. “I… don’t really like to tell anyone about it. Never been officially diagnosed, and I don’t plan on getting help anytime soon, but I was put on mood stabilizers once. Remember that one time in Sophomore year where I was acting really weird out of the blue and went on and on about how I had a demon in my head?”

The memory came flooding back to Kris’ mind. “Yeah, I think so….”

“Yeah, lamotrigine’s fault there.” She sighed, the memory being a painful one for her. “I didn’t actually believe it, but I wanted it to be true. And I got so caught up in it, that… I don’t even fucking know. That entire time is hazy. All I know is that the mood stabilizers only made things worse, and so I stopped them. They wanted me to stay on to some degree, hop onto something else, but I was having none of that.”

Shutting her eyes, she sharply exhaled, letting it all off her chest. “I think that’s why I’m so scared to get help,” she admitted. “I’m worried that the docs or whatever are going to fuck things up for me again, or force me to be on some drugs that turn me into a lobotomite, just losing myself, or worse….”

Kris took note of the trail-off. “Or worse…?”

Dess choked up. “...Or maybe I discover that I can’t be helped, that whatever’s wrong with my head is so severe, medications’ll do nothing. I’m terrified of being institutionalized, Kris. I’m worried that Carol’s just gonna be done with me and have some mental hospital lock me away and toss aside the key, and that nobody’s gonna come for me. That’s why I’m so paranoid, so on-edge. It feels like it’s only a matter of time. A matter of time before she does that, or is forced to do it. What if I hurt someone? What if I seriously hurt Addy again… or worse…..”

She covered her face and sighed. ‘Ah, fuck… sorry, it’s just a whole lot to handle… hell, I usually don’t ever tell people about this, ever.” She uncovered her eyes and looked over at Kris, tenderly, like how she looked at her own sister sometimes. “But I feel safe telling you, y’know. Maybe it’s because of what you said, about how similar we are. I feel like… our souls share a similar, painful wavelength, and there’s some understanding there. Understanding that something like this stays a secret, right?”

They nodded back affirmatively.

“Thanks.” She felt a lot more comfortable now, and that comfort led to loose lips. “Damn, it’s funny. I don’t even bring this up to Adelaide, and when it does, we usually get into a big fight about me not getting help….”

It was just a faint murmur, but as Kris let it stew in their mind, the dots connected, and their eyes shot wide open. “So I was right on the money, then?”

Dess’ ears perked up. “Hm?”

They let it spill. “Azzy’s trans?”

The two, simple words sent Dess into a panicked spiral. She had broken her promise. She had let it slip. “I… I mean no, she’s… I mean he… yes… ah… FUCK!” The doe curled up into a ball and screamed into her covering hands. “Dammit!” she swore. “Scheiße!”

What Kris had said, the specificity of it, finally registered to her. “Wait… right on the money…?” She turned her gaze over to them, uncupping her hands from her face in shock. “You knew?!”

Kris nodded. “He… er, she leaves her computer on and unlocked, and I may… or may not have… checked through her browser history for funsies. Lotsa cunnilingus stuff, shockingly… or I guess not… but also tons of ‘am I trans?’ stuff there, too. Besides, her mannerisms totally gave it away.”

The doe was left absolutely flabbergasted by the entire revelation. Were the signs really that clear, out in the open? Of course, every little stray tick from the past was reanalyzed after she came out, and things made a lot more sense in hindsight, but were they so obvious that someone could just randomly guess with confidence and be right? Was she just daft?!

Seeing Dess bluescreen, Kris coughed and got her attention back. “So… I take that her new name is Adelaide, then?”

Clearing her own throat, Dess nodded, but with a serious expression on her face. “Yeah,” she bluntly answered, “but only I’m supposed to know that. If she figures out you know too, then she’s gonna assume the worst from me, since I promised to keep it a secret until she came out herself.”

Pre-emptively, Kris raised their hand to pledge. “Not a word from me. Believe me, I know how it feels the most out of either of us here.”

Dess breathed a sigh of relief. “Oh, thank fuck.” she muttered. “Although if I had to figure, you’ll probably be one of the first people she’ll tell, especially if something were to happen to me.”

It was an offhanded remark, that last bit, but it hinted at something much deeper than the deer was letting on to, and Kris could tell immediately. “Wait, what do you mean ‘not there to support her?’ It’s not like you’re planning on breaking up, right?”

She went silent, her scars now aching more than ever, as if they were burning a hole through her jacket the guilt weighed down on her so much. Her relieved expression faltering, and then falling outright, she unbuttoned her breast pocket and pulled out her knife, keeping it sheathed as she toyed around with it in her hand.

“Oh,” Kris simply replied.

Dess could only meekly nod in reply. “Yeah….”

Taking a deep breath in, she figured it best to explain herself, continuing to fiddle with the protected blade as she did so. “Kris… the reason I wanted to talk to Addy tonight is because I’m scared,” she began, her voice growing weaker by the minute as tears slowly started to well up. “Gerson’s sick, and… he’s the one adult that I truly see as a mentor figure, someone who I can confide in for advice, and….”

She sniffled, and wiped her face with the sleeve of her jacket, getting tears all over her homemade patchwork. “...I worry that he’s not gonna be here much longer. And my life is already shit enough even with him helping me, steering me in the right direction, but without? Shit, I don’t know how I’m gonna navigate university without him to bounce ideas from. And it… it…”

There was a pause; she knew that the next line was probably going to scare Kris. Besides, there was something she needed to show them, something equally as horrifying.

“...It makes me question if I even wanna live anymore….”

She slid off her jacket and let it fall behind her, baring her scars for Kris to see. She could hear their breathing cease for just a moment, before picking up in intensity out of sheer shock.

“I’ve been doing this for years,” she confessed, now thoroughly in the throes of weeping. “But now, with Adelaide seemingly on the outs with me, Noelle terrified of me, Carol probably itching to kick me out, and now Gerson on his deathbed, I….” She buried her face in her hands, scrunching her bangs. “I’m terrified I’m gonna do something drastic, something… permanent.”

Kris felt their heart shatter; seeing the person they looked up to more than damn near anyone else break down crying and admit to wanting to die was weary on the soul. Especially when it hit so close to home. Sliding over, they embraced Dess with a hug, before whispering into her ear.

“It’s okay,” they murmured. “I know how it feels.”

Dess shook her head. “No you don’t… you don’t cut yourself….”

Sighing, Kris rolled up their sleeves and bared their own arms. “I do, Dess,” they whimpered, now on the verge of tears themselves.

That snapped Dess out of her rut, bringing her sharply to attention and abruptly cutting her tears short. She looked on, weepy-eyed, gazing at Kris’ wrists. The scars were all superficial; she could tell that they barely ever broke the skin. But nevertheless, they were still faintly visible, indicating a level of persistence familiar to her.

Gently, she took hold of their hand, the tears coming back, but no longer for herself. “Kris,” she wept, “you’re too young to be doing this!”

They bowed their head in guilt, nodding. “I know… I’m sorry.”

She embraced them with a tight bear hug. “Don’t you ever say you’re sorry for that, Kris. You have nothing to be sorry for. It’s just… it’s just the pain we each have to carry. Just please… stop doing it. I don’t wanna have to tell Toriel.”

“Good,” they replied, wiping the tears from their eyes. “I wouldn’t wanna tell Carol, either.”

Carol.

Carol, Carol, Carol. Just her name alone snapped Dess out of her depressive funk, a manic spark lighting up her eyes as her fists trembled. “You wouldn’t dare…”

“Oh, I would,” Kris lightheartedly jabbed, only then realizing how serious Dess had grown. “I mean… er… just as a reprisal, we don’t actually have to bother with-”

Too late; she had been set off. “Angel damn her, why must she be the way she is?!” she bemoaned, hopping up onto her feet and angrily clutching the knife in her hands, the sheath slipping off as she did so. “That frigid bitch, that frigid, icy bitch! WHY DOESN’T SHE LOVE ME?!”

Angrily, she kicked away the lantern, shattering the glass and knocking the light off; only the faint glow of moonlight from outside kept the inside of the bunker even faintly illuminated. “She’s always so wrapped up in her work, so… distant and cold. It’s like I’m just a sideshow in her life, a permanent thorn in her side! Does she love me? People claim she does, but I don’t fucking believe them!”

Kris slowly began to scooch away from the raving doe, petrified inside as she manically wielded her knife. The rant had no fixed direction, only wherever her manic mind happened to flow. “Ooh, and her drinking. How could she ever claim to love me after what she did with the katana?! And to think, now everyone’s celebrating her sobriety and pretending like the past never happened?! FAH! I COULD NEVER FORGET WHAT SHE DID TO ME, HOW SHE HURT ME!!!”

Desperately searching for words, but nothing coming to mind, Kris could only continue to backpedal as they swore Dess’ eyes started to glow red as she clutched the knife with increased ferocity, the blood stains on it now visible to them. “And yet, all the same, I miss the past… I miss when she hit me, when she at least pretended to care, none of this cold distance like we have now,” she wailed. “What I would do to get that back, or how things were when I was young, when things were warm and she actually seemed to love me. I WANT IT SO BAD! BUT IT JUST FEELS… JUST… FEELS… IT FEELS IMPOSSIBLE!”

She raised the knife above her head, aimed directly at the floor.

“IT MAKES ME FEEL LIKE I WANT TO KILL MYSELF, AND EVERYONE WITH ME!!!”

In one grand-rage-filled motion, she jumped up in the air, eyes glowing with determination, and jammed the knife into the floor in a fit of anger. She had expected the knife to bounce back, or break, or maybe even kill her somehow, but she couldn’t quite seem to care. What shocked her, and then quickly came to terrify her, though, was the fact the knife just kept going. It plunged into the solid concrete as if there were nothing there, and then with a flash, the entire room was bathed in a blinding white light. Both Dess and Kris recoiled at the sight of it, too bright to stare at directly, and Dess pulled out her knife as she did so. With that, however, came darkness. Not darkness, no, darkness. Darker than dark, and yet somehow even darker. A black, eerie smog arose from the ground, spilling forth from where Dess had plunged her blade into the earth, rapidly consuming the entire space and the pair of souls within it.

Before they knew it, light had ceased.

…

Dess came to by herself, alone in a dark void. The sky was an inky black extending out across the horizon and beyond her field of view. It was so dark, she could physically feel the weight of it on her back. The ground, too, mirrored the sky, although still firmly solid, just like the concrete she had been standing on just moments before.

The only thing she saw was herself, and yet her body felt strange, felt… powerful. Gazing down at her hands, she noticed her entire body had changed. Her jacket was black. Her pants were black. But her fur… her fur was lighter and paler than it had ever been, a faint violet hue tinging it.

She had to be hallucinating, she rationalized. Hallucinating, or dead. She must’ve sprung a gas leak somehow.

Turning about to get a hold of her surroundings, she came to realize, very quickly, that she wasn’t alone. For behind her, there was a tiny little sapling, just barely poking out of the inky ground, its few leaves brilliant shades of pink and magenta, in contrast with its dour black bark.

And behind the tree, there was a man there.

He appeared to be a feeble old man, with a white face and hunched over body, draped in a black cloak. His hands appeared to be held pensively behind his back, and his eyes and mouth shut. So shut, were they, that Dess swore he didn’t have any at all.

She really needed to get the fuck out of wherever she was, but with no exit in sight, figured it best to ask for directions. “Hey, uh… excuse me,” she called out. “Do you happen to know how to get out of this place? I think I opened a gas leak here, and I’d really prefer not to die….”

What the hell was she saying?! She was hallucinating, for fuck’s sake! None of this was real, the man wasn’t real! She just needed to figure out where the exit door was, wherever the light of the outside was, and get out before she succumbed.

She prepared to turn away, but before she could, the mystery man’s face finally revealed itself. It was as if he didn’t blink and open his mouth, but rather as if the features melted into his face. Inky black holes where the eyes should be, and a devilish grin for a mouth. She could see inky darkness drip from every orifice.

“December…” the man called out, his voice slow and disconcerting, but also muffled; Dess froze in place, alarmed, but unable to move.

“I’ve been… expecting you….” He moved his hands out from behind his back, and revealed them to be detached and skeletal, balled up into fists. “The experiment is about to begin… and it requires your presence.”

He opened up his hands, calling Dess to come forward and join him.

Hands that, she realized, had holes in their palms.

Just like the dream.

The wretched hands shot forward, beckoning Dess to step forth as the doe began to backpedal. “Come, my child,” he called, his voice now clear, “there’s no escaping your fate. Join with the bark of the tree… and become one with the darkness….”

Dess could feel her heart begin to beat out of her chest, her breath as frantic as it had ever been in her life. The call, it was so alluring to her… and that fact terrified her. Something about the man’s mere presence sent alarm bells clanging through her skull; she knew not why, but felt in her gut that if she were to become joined with that tree, however it may be, that would be the end of her life as she knew it, or in its entirety.

She turned around to flee, and spotted her salvation; a thin, narrow band of light. The doorway to the shelter that she had left open. As fast as she could book it, she high-tailed it towards the shimmering beam, and before the hands could so much as touch her, dove straight through it…

…

…and right smack into Kris’ back.

Colliding outside, the two writhed in pain on the ground, Kris especially after having taken the blow of Dess’ antlers square to the center of their back. “Ah… feck…” they cried. “Dess, what the fuck did you do?”

Slowly easing herself up, the thought of those two hands still chasing her dashed through her mind, and she frantically shut the door to the shelter, locking away the billowing smoke and whatever it was that happened to be inside. Panting, she fell back against the door, finally relieved.

“I… don’t know,” she admitted. “I think we… may have sprung a gas leak in there, or something….”

Gently propping themselves up onto their own feet, Kris looked up at the sky and noticed the colors start to shift.

“I think, Kris… we just keep what happened tonight to be out little secret-”

“Dess, it’s morning.”

It was so matter-of-fact, so flat in delivery, that it didn’t register to Dess for a few good moments. “Wait… already?!” She checked her watch. 5:45. “Shit, Kris, you need to get home, like, now! Don’t want your folks to find out you were with me all night.”

Their eyes shot open wide at the revelation. “Shoot, you’re right!” They paused a beat, before giving Dess a tight hug. “I love you, Dess. Like a sister. Please stay safe for me….”

Her heart stopped for a moment, before she reciprocated. “I love you, too. And likewise.”

As Kris parted and turned to walk away into the woods, a thought crept into Dess’ mind. “Hey, Kris?” she asked.

They turned around to look at her. “Yeah?”

“I was wondering… when I was talking with Gerson the other day, I couldn’t help but notice the big organ there in the church. Maybe… we could play together again at some point. You on that, and me on guitar. Like old times.”

She smiled, and they smiled right back as well. “Yeah, like old times.”

With that, the human turned back and trudged on into the woods to make their way back home, leaving Dess by her lonesome next to the bunker. The entirety of the past night, cathartic as it was, felt as if it had lit her nerves and brain on fire. She hadn’t even gotten around to venting about her portfolio, or sense of musical inadequacy, but that could wait until Addy got back. Now, she needed to take the edge off.

Pulling out her mint tin, she rolled herself a spiff, and lit it, pocketing the tin once more next to her unsheathed knife in her breast pocket. Taking a drag, she let the smell of marijuana permeate her nostrils as she took in the brilliant sunrise through the dormant tree line.

It was gonna be a long, long morning.

Chapter Text

The day was just beginning, but for Dess, it was close to ending for her.

She had completely fallen off the wagon, however short of a time that she may have been on it. Multiple joins of weed, and a full six-pack of piss lager, just the most foul cheap-o brew she had stashed away in the woods behind the shelter, all of it in her system. Blitzed and blazed out of her mind, the cross-faded cervine stumbled down the streets of hometown in the bright dawn light, not giving a single flying fuck about who saw her as the townsfolk gawked and gossiped about her disheveled presence.

That included the pale woman standing in front of the gate, getting ready to lock it on her way to work that morning. She caught glance of her first before her daughter spied her in turn, as she was slurring through some old drinking song she used to like whilst stumbling about:

“Driving like a fool out to Hackensack

Drinking his dinner from a paper sack

He says ‘I gotta see a joker then I’ll be right back’

Dooo… do dooo… doooooo….”

Dess trailed off, having finally found Carol in the corner of her eye. They both paused, each standing perfectly still as they stared each other down. Carol, prim and proper in her blue suit, matching with her antlers, a scowl on her face. Dess, disheveled in her socialist combat jacket, antlers dyed, an equally potent glare emitting from her fiery drunk eyes. She reeked of weed, booze, and the general stench of malaise; Carol could smell her from even a few feet away.

Shutting her eyes, the elder doe took in a deep, pronounced breath, before exhaling and looking at her daughter again, this time her glare lacking care. “December,” she dryly acknowledged.

The ratty punk responded tersely, likewise. “Mother.”

Nothing else was spoken between them; Carol merely opened the gate to let her daughter in, who obliged, before locking it behind her. With that, she gave not even a second look, and continued down the sidewalk to the town hall, leaving Dess to her own devices.

The younger doe, for her part, was far too tired to care by this point; normally such a cold reception would be met with a one-sided shouting match on her end, but after twenty hours awake, she just wanted to collapse into a pile and sleep.

Stumbling, she shambled up through the doors of the manor, clambered up the stairs, and fell through the dark door to her room, stuffing her weed away in her usual hiding spot. Without even kicking off her boots or taking off her jacket, she collapsed onto her bed, and let the sandman drag her off to a restless slumber.

…

She was back in the void.

Back in the void, in those strange clothes again, with her fur paler than it had ever been. There was the man again, and the sapling, now having grown to be just about her height. The man gazed intently at her, that twisted, unmoving smile dripping unnervingly as they spoke out through the wind passing by their hands.

“Ah… you’ve returned….”

She tried to run, but found her legs rendered immobile, as if her feet were weighed down with stones; she looked down and saw black tendril roots crawling around her ankles, locking her in place. Panic struck her, and she screamed; a hand went to cover her face, but the hole in the palm did nothing to cease them, only transmuting them into a demonic roar.

“Yes… my Knight…” the mystery man commended. “Roar for me… roar for me….”

Dess stopped, feeling the whole world start to spin around her vision as the tendrils crawled up her thighs and slipped inside of her. The only constant was the mystery man’s hands, ever present and speaking through to her in her twisted vision.

“Excellent… the tree hungers for you… longs to bond with you… become one with your soul….”

Her chest burst open, the roots bursting forth in place of her ribs. Her screams returned, bestial in nature through the man’s warped hands, as her very body contorted, growing to become a hulking, beastial monster.

“The tree shall grow to size in due time… fed off of your blood and dust… and then…”

Dess’ eyes cried tears of blood; a black, toxic ooze spilled forth from her mouth as the feral beast she was becoming hollered.

“...the experiment… will truly begin.”

…

She shot upright, panting, with a cold sweat, her clothes positively drenched through as she came to her senses. The dream had felt so visceral, so real…. She knew exactly what Mailperson had been talking about now. But it had to be fake, it had to be her imagination. She was just delusional from being without sleep. She was just… hungover. Yeah, that’s what it had to be. She was hungover.

The raging headache she had only confirmed this fact to her. “Damn… partied too hard this morning,” she half-jokingly mumbled to herself; in truth, she was shocked she hadn’t choked on her vomit in her sleep from cross-fading, having passively accepted death as she drank earlier in the day.

Speaking of which, what time was it, anyway? Peering over at her alarm gave her the answer: 6:27. She had slept for nearly twelve hours.

Yawning and rubbing her temple, she grimaced from the headache and decided she needed to fix this pronto. Addy was probably back by now, so she’d head over to her place and open the letter together later in the evening. But as for right now, she needed to hydrate and try to fight her hangover, and probably fix herself some dinner while she was at it; she was absolutely starving.

Meandering her way downstairs, she quickly realized neither of her parents were home. Odd, she thought, usually dad was back by now, and so would mom if it weren’t a busy day. She shrugged it off, though; there was probably some explanation she didn’t quite care enough to probe for.

Finally getting downstairs and opening the kitchen door, she spied Noelle sitting at the dining table, finishing a bowl of soup she had prepared for dinner. She had been visibly startled by the opening of the door, and was petrified at the sight of her older sister.

“H-hey, Ellie,” Dess nervously started; they had barely talked since the incident. “Got yourself some dinner?”

She meekly nodded, standing up to clear her bowl and spoon over to the sink.

“Ah, great, nice… say, er… where are mom and dad at?”

“They had to run out,” Noelle bluntly stated. “Urgent call, didn’t tell me what it was about. I fixed myself some soup, so I’m all good.” With that, she made her way out of the kitchen. Dess tried to hug her at the door, but Noelle just pushed onwards, recoiling at the proposition of physical contact with her sister.

Dess’ face fell; things had regressed to how they had been after the breakdown at the lake, all of those months ago. It broke her heart to see her like that.

Dejected, she couldn’t be bothered to even assemble a proper meal like her sister had done. Fishing through the fridge, she pulled out a can of Bepis and a pack of pastrami; that was all she needed. Sitting down at the table where her sister had been sitting just moments prior, she unzipped the bag, popped the top of the soda, and began to guzzle it down while shoving fistfuls of sliced meat down her throat, barely taking the time to chew. Binges like this could hardly be considered struggle meals with how well-off her family was, but to her, life itself was a struggle at this point, so nearly every meal felt like one to her.

After going through an entire pack of the pastrami, Dess finally felt somewhat full; she hadn’t eaten in nearly a day, after all. Not knowing when her parents would get back, she hastily scrawled a note letting them know where she was heading, patted the letter in her pocket, and made her way out the door, strolling down the path to the Dreemurr household as dusk settled down upon Hometown.

…

Oddly enough, both of the Dreemurr parents were also out of the house that night, for reasons similarly left unspecified, although it was known that Kris was staying the night at Asgore’s apartment, so the dots seemed easy to connect. Fortunately enough, Addy had returned from her open house down in Megalopolis.

So with the house left entirely to themselves, Dess and Adelaide felt comfortable enough in letting loose. As was always the case with these nights, Addy was wearing a dress, this time her favorite skater dress that Dess had bought for her. It fit snugly against her now-widening frame, which may have played a part in her odd mood; the doe had personally noted that Addy had been quite cagey for most of that night, as she had been generally ever since that afternoon they shared in Dess’ room. She had floated around the idea of paying Addy back and “finishing the job,” but prudish hesitancy had seemingly returned to her.

Having just finished a sappy romance movie, which they both agreed was a touch too cheesy, Dess shut off the telly and turned to her girlfriend. “So…” she started, “...anything new in your life?”

Addy yawned, stretching out as she wrapped an arm around her girlfriend. “Not much. Got some stuff in the mail. Kris apparently signed me up for a Drag Queen magazine as a prank… I can’t help but wonder if they know about the trans thing….”

Dess knew that if that were an accusation, it was a baseless one, since Kris already knew before she told them, but she still felt nerved up over the whole conversation. “Anything else?”

She knowingly smiled. “Ooh, yeah! And I also got…” Adelaide reached into her dress and pulled out an envelope. “This!”

Dess immediately noticed the seal on the letter, and felt her heart flutter. “Is that the letter?”

“Mhm!” Addy excitedly confirmed. “CCML finally got back to me, and perfect timing, too. Lemme tell you, the campus there is even better than in the promotional material. The classrooms are state-of-the-art, every student has their own school-provided laptop, the psychology department is world-renowned, so getting a job after I graduate oughta be easy….”

As Addy continued to gush on and on about the City College, Dess wrangled with her own emotions. Logically, she knew that she should be more excited for her girlfriend, what with being on the precipice of getting into her dream school and all of that. But at the same time, the pace at which they were already planning to put Hometown behind them… it was disconcerting. Surely, she’d at least wanna be nearer to her, and wouldn’t abandon her the same way, right?

“...and, like, I can’t believe I’m saying this, but you were so right about how much cooler Megalopolis is compared to sleepy old Hometown, Dess! Hell, once this is all said and done, I may not even wanna come back!”

Her girlfriend’s naive excitement punched a hole in her heart. Well, that answers that question….

“Say, didn’t you also get something from Mailperson the other day?” Addy suddenly dropped. “They’d mentioned how I wasn’t the only one getting college letters….”

She saw Dess shrink in her seat, and knew the answer was yes, but not good.

“I got two,” she mumbled as she rifled through her jacket pockets. “One of them was for West Megalopolis, which was another reject….”

Addy, seeing how despondent Dess looked, slung an arm over her shoulder and smiled. “Hey, that was a reach school anyway, right? You still have Belford!”

“But that’s the thing!” Dess said, now waving a crumpled envelope in her hand. “This is the last college I applied to, Addy. Nobody else has accepted my app.” She looked nervously at her letter, a pit forming in her stomach. “If I open this, and it’s a reject….”

The doe fell completely silent, the worst possible thoughts flowing through her mind. Addy could tell she wasn’t in a good place, and took hold of her hand. “Dess,” she assuaged, “it’s not gonna be a reject. I know deep down in my heart, you’ve got this. Belford’s gonna accept you, CCML is gonna accept me, and we’ll only be an hour and a half apart on the Commuter Line. We’ll be able to see each other on weekends, go on dates! It won’t be the same as things are here, but that’s okay! We’ll still be close enough to have each other!”

Dess forced a weak smile to let Addy know she understood, but both knew she was still feeling deathly nervous. “Hey, Addy?” she asked. “Can we… open yours first? And then mine… together…?”

That was an idea Adelaide was more than amicable enough to entertain. “Sure,” she said with a smile. “Together.”

Handing Dess the envelope in her hand, Adelaide beckoned her to be the one to open it, lest she hog the spotlight all to herself. Silently, Dess slid a nail into the fold and unsealed it, revealing the neatly folded letter on fine print stock. Sliding it out, she unfolded it, flipped it right-side-up, and read out the message on the letter. Her face was beaming for Addy just having glanced at the first few words.

“‘Dear Asriel…’ er Adelaide, that’s what the letter says, not me…. ‘We’re excited to inform you that we have reviewed your application and will be welcoming you to the City College of Megalopolis for our fall term!’”

The two both squealed in excitement, Addy especially so. “Oh my Angel, I didn’t think I’d actually get in! And fully in, too, not on a waitlist or anything like that!”

“Pfft, you doubt yourself too much!” Dess ribbed, her mood elevated at least temporarily by the sharing of good news. “With your grades and extracurriculars, you could’ve gotten into one of the Laurel League schools if you applied!”

Addy blushed at the comment, before taking the still-sealed Belford envelope from Dess’ hands and unsealed it herself, in a move much less delicate than Dess’ due to her short nails. Yanking out the folded letter, she paused for a moment, before handing it back to Dess. “Here,” she said. “I want you to read it.”

The dark-haired girl was all of a sudden very unsure. “Wait… but I read your’s out, shouldn’t you….”

“Dess,” she insisted. “I know how much you doubt yourself, you make me look like the queen of confidence in comparison, and I’m a bit of a wreck myself!”

“Well that’s not true, you are confident, Addy!”

She pressed on, anyway. “My point being, I want you to see for yourself, with your own eyes, how good you really are. That you can do good things, you can succeed, that life isn’t just a constant downhill fall.”

Her words, as moving as ever, touched Dess in her soul. With a trembling fear, her shaky hands took hold of the folded letter and snatched it from Adelaide’s grasp. Here it was: her future, her final judgement, held in her hands. Entire body quaking, she tried to take a breath to steady herself, but it was no use; the panic was too intense.

She couldn’t take it anymore. In one fell swoop, she pulled open the letter, nearly tearing it in half the action was so violent, all the while looking away, too terrified to peek. Heart in her throat, soul trembling within her, on the verge of splitting apart, she finally ceased to avert her gaze, and peered at the letter.

In an instant, reading the words on the paper, an overwhelming sense of calm, sweet nothingness washed over her.

Addy excitedly looked on, assuming a giddy smile as Dess’ panic faded away. “Ooh, I take that the news is good!”

Dess didn’t move.

“It… it is good news, right? You got in?”

Dess didn’t move.

“...Waitlisted?”

Dess. Didn’t. Move.

The realization finally hit Adelaide. “Oh… oh no….”

A single tear trickled down the still deer’s face, her body still unmoving.

And then, the whole dam burst.

Tearing the letter in half, she threw the shreds into the air and let out a scream, frying her vocal chords at their limit as she hollered, pulling at her hair as she rocked back and forth. Addy moved in to give her a hug, to which Dess turned and grasped him tightly, shoving her head into her shoulder and weeping profusely, her voice hoarse as she wailed.

“RECJECTED!” she cried. “THEY REJECTED ME, ADDY! MY LIFE IS OVER!!!”

All Addy could do was stroke her hair, gently cooing as she kissed her all over; there wasn’t much else she could think to do, but to let her cry.

“OH, ADDY! ADDY! ADDY!” she bellowed. “WHAT AM I GONNA DO?! WHY?! WHY?! WHYYYY?!?!”

“Shhhhh…” Addy whispered into her ear, softly kissing her piercings. “Just breathe… I’m here for you now….”

Dess sniffled, snot dripping down sloppily from her snout as she continued to cry. “But you won’t be….” she murmured. “You won’t be… you’ll be gone to Megalopolis, and I’LL NEVER SEE YOU AGAIN!!!”

“That’s not true,” Addy soothed. “I’ll always come back home, I’ll make sure to see you as much as I can.” She paused, sighing at a passing thought, before adding on. “If it makes you feel any better, I could always go to a college in Bay City, that’d be closer to home.”

“But… but CCML was your dream, Addy! I don’t want to see you give it up for me! You… you shouldn’t have to give it up!”

Her grief was quickly starting to morph, her depressed nonacceptance transforming into a blame game as she uncurled. “Maybe there was anti-monster bias in the decisions! Yeah, that has to be it! Those wretched humans, they… they must’ve conspired against me! They… they must’ve thrown my applications off to the side, rejected me outright once they saw the “M” on the species marker on my paperwork! They… they must’ve… must have….”

She sighed, her shoulders dropping before she could even gauge Addy’s reaction. “It’s all silly, isn’t it? You got in,” she accepted. “You got in, and I didn’t. That can’t have been anti-monster bias, then… I’m just… just….”

Addy took hold of her hand, looking her in the eyes. “Dess, you were an edge case. That’s exactly where anti-monster bias hurts the most, those on the periphery. You may not be wrong here-”

“But I am wrong!” she protested, yanking her hand back. “I’m always wrong! Remember that rant of mine on my birthday?! I said all of those nasty things, nasty things about humans like Gerson’s wife, and you proved me wrong! It can’t be the humans this time, it… has to be me….”

She curled her legs to her chest once more and hugged them tight as the anger turned self-directed. “I’m just a shit musician,” she dejectedly mumbled.

“Well, that’s certainly not true,” Addy pushed back. “You’re probably one of the best musicians I know, Dess. At least, you’re certainly my favorite!”

“You’re just saying that to be nice, since I’m your girlfriend,” she hurled back. “If I were a good musician, I wouldn't have been rejected by fucking Belford of all places! Fuck, KRIS is a better pianist than I am at this point, have you heard them play?! They’re a fucking prodigy! I’ve been outdone, BY A MIDDLE SCHOOLER! How am I supposed to compete with actual collegiate-level talent when a fucking MIDDLE SCHOOLER does a better job than me?!”

Pulling at her hair, she rocked back and forth in self-directed fury. Addy, for her part, only shook her head. “Don’t be so hard on yourself, Dess.”

She stopped her rocking. “...What do you mean?” she replied. “I deserve this, no?”

Searching for some sort of wisdom in her words, Addy took hold of her hand and spoke her honest mind. “Well, if you ask me, I still think your music talent’s enough to get into just about anywhere. You just fucked up with the application process, is all. Poor recording quality and mixing probably did you in, like I warned you about, but those are fixable problems! Nothing you can’t go give another shot at!”

It was a bit blunt, but she still expected Dess to look back over at her with a mutual understanding of her mistakes, to own up to them and find a newfound resolve within herself. Instead, her gaze slowly turned over, her rage now aimed squarely at her, a sudden heel-turn on the horizon.

“Really?!” she spat. “REALLY?!”

A confused expression cropped up Adelaide’s face. “Wha… what’d I do?”

“Oh, nothing!” she sarcastically fired back. “Nothing except INSULTING MY MUSICAL TALENT!”

Addy’s face scrunched up at this. “In… insult?! Dess, YOU were the one doing that, not me!”

“Yeah, but you’re supposed to soothe-say me and tell me everything's gonna be alright, not criticize me over every poor choice I’ve made!”

“Gee, I’m sorry!” Addy fired back, the two of them becoming equally heated. “I figured you would be more accepting of the truth! If you had actually tried to make something that hit your strengths, and not something way out of your league like Neue Deutsche Welle, then maybe you’d have actually gotten in somewhere? Didn’t I warn you about this?!”

“I- I mean, yeah, but… SHUT UP!” Dess stammered out.

Adelaide palmed her face, exasperated. “Look, Dess, I’m not trying to put you down-”

“BUT YOU ARE!”

“LET ME FINISH!” she protested. “What I’m trying to say is that you’re a really good singer! A really good guitarist! A really good pianist! On par with Kris, but that doesn’t take away from you! You’re still really fucking good, and if you took your time and made another portfolio to submit, you could probably land somewhere for spring semester-”

“IT’S NOT HAPPENING!” she bellowed. “I HAD MY SHOT, AND I BLEW IT!”

“It’s not blown completely!” Addy attempted to assuage, although their mutual anger was too red hot for it to be of any effect. “This is fixable, Dess!”

“NO IT ISN’T!”

“WILL YOU STOP WALLOWING IN YOUR OWN SELF-INFLICTED MISERY FOR JUST A DAMN MINUTE AND ACTUALLY THINK FOR ONCE?!”

“NO, SHUT UP!”

She had fully fallen off the rocker now, her manic mind now drifting away from the point at hand. “Besides, who gives a flying fuck what happens here, anyway?! So what if I don’t get into college?! Even if I did, would that actually fix anything about me?! No! I’d just flame out in Belford or Megalopolis instead of this podunk-ass town we live in! The whole world’s going to shit, anyways!”

Fully uncurled and up on her hooves, the doe began ranting and raving, her arms swinging wildly about as Addy looked on from the couch. “What’s it matter, huh?! What’s it matter?! What’s it matter when evil’s already won?! Ulra-conservatives control our government, we have a climate crisis on our hands that nobody seems to acknowledge, anti-monster and anti-socialist sentiments are at an all-time high, and we’re gonna be lined up and SHOT within a year at this rate! Who gives a single flying fuck about whether or not I get into college?! It’s only gonna end the same way! With me, and a gun, shooting up the Northamer Central Diet!”

Addy was fuming. “OH, WILL YOU JUST SHUT THE FUCK UP ABOUT THAT FOR ONE DAMN MINUTE! What good do you think that’s going to do?! Do you think we’ll magically be living in the socialist paradise we’ve dreamed of with a few stray bullets in the right places?! NO! All you’ll achieve is getting yourself killed, and likely giving them the impetus to actually bring about the death camps you so fear. Because news flash, Dess, IT’S NOT GONNA HAPPEN!”

“Miss me with that shitlib fuckery!” she shrieked. “You sound just like Carol, with your damned faith in institution. A purge is the only path forward, and I must become the instrument of terror! Do you know how badly I want to plunge the world into darkness?! To kill everyone that so much as breathes the wrong way?! THAT is the only path towards peace I see!”

Her girlfriend was beside herself. “You’re… you’re deranged,” she stammered. “You’re actually deranged!”

“Yeah, I am!”

“NO, YOU DON’T GET IT! You constantly spew out a desire to bring about the doomsday from The Legend, like a damned lunatic! Do you think only the unrighteous will be purged?! NO, YOU FOOL, EVERYONE WILL DIE, INCLUDING US!

Adelaide was fuming. “But you don’t care! You don’t care about selflessness and community aid! You’ve never cared about logic and sanity! You’re not a socialist because you believe in the core tenets of it like I do, you only do so because you fantasize about killing people and have a desire for left wing aesthetic flair! That’s why you wear that stupid fucking jacket around everywhere; Ostrheinlad and the Stasi would’ve locked you up for your music tastes, your blue jeans, your non-conformity, but you’re so detached from the reality of history, you just put it on because it looks cool and it’ll piss off your mom!”

“WHY DON’T YOU PISS OFF, THEN!” Dess grabbed the TV remote and hurled it at the wall, breaking the back cover and sending batteries flying out. “I’M MORE A SOCIALIST THAN YOU’LL EVER BE! I’LL BE THE ROARING KNIGHT, THE VANGUARD OF THE REVOLUTION-”

“WILL YOU STOP THAT TALK FOR TEN SECONDS?!”

DO YOU WANT ME TO SLAP YOU AGAIN?! THEN SHUT THE FUCK UP!!!!”

Addy covered her snout in shock; if she weren’t already light-furred, she would’ve turned pale. And most frightening of all, Dess didn’t even bother apologizing. She didn’t seem shocked herself. She was all too wrapped up in rage to care, towering over her, her body heaving.

For a few beats, they each stood perfectly still, the realization finally dawning on Dess, but the severity of it still lacking. Taking a deep breath and then sharply exhaling, she sat down on the couch next to Adelaide, who couldn’t help but instinctively scooch away.

“You know… maybe I was… going too far there,” she admitted, albeit with a great amount of difficulty. “I should… really stop and think before I scream so much. You’re right… if I act like that in front of a police officer… other than your dad… I’m properly fucked. I don’t have much… in terms of support, not many people who would back me up there.”

She turned to face her girlfriend, who remained still and pensive on the couch. “But hey, at least I have you, y’know,” she admitted, now gently gazing at her girlfriend, her voice suddenly wistful, but turning a tad bit melancholic with a manic twinge still remaining. “The world may go to shit, we all may die, but if we do end up in a gas chamber somewhere, or up against a wall, it at least brings a little comfort to know you’ll still be loving me until the day we turn to dust.” She waited for Addy to say something back, but she just stared right back at her. 

A little bit of worry came across Dess’s mind. “Heh, sorry… being a bit melodramatic again, I guess… heh.” The second chuckle was weaker, and much more forced. Why wasn’t she responding???

“It’s just… I worry about us being apart. What happens if something happens to one of us, and we can’t get to each other? What happens if I need you and you’re not there? What happens if… if….” She trailed off; the quiet was suffocating her, and she desperately needed to hear something back.

Adelaide didn’t respond. In fact, she just sat there, looking down at her lap, silent for a worrying long pause. Dess couldn’t take the suspense anymore. “W-well? What’s the problem, Addy?” she asked, her heartbeat hastening as a panicked twinge inflected her voice. “C’mon, spit it out already!”

Looking contemplatively and nervously at her own cupped hands, the goat sighed and looked back up at her girlfriend, her own breath shaking. “Dess,” she uttered, “I was just thinking… maybe it’s… for the best that we’ll be apart. A break might do us some good, actually. Not for forever, but just for a while.”

Dess swore she could feel her soul shatter deep inside of her. “Wha… what do you… NO. No no no, please don’t tell me, Addy…”

“...I’m sorry, Dess!” she blurted out, throwing her hands into the air in every which way as she spoke. “I just don’t know what to do anymore! Your mood swings have only gotten worse since I’ve come out to you; every other conversation with you ends up with you shouting at me or smashing something, or… or hitting me! And despite all of that, you refuse to get any help!” Tears started to well up in her eyes, the white fur along her face growing damp as she wiped them. “I still love you, Dess, but I… I don’t know what else to say. I’m scared, Dess. I’m scared you’re gonna hurt someone, hurt someone in the worst possible way. Me, your mom, someone else…”

The next thought shook Addy to her core, and she stressfully tugged at her shirt collar. “...or yourself,” she finally said meekly, her voice growing hoarse as she tried her best to stifle her tears. “I’ve exhausted myself trying to hold things together, Dess, and I don’t know if I can take it anymore! I don’t want to see you in pain, hon. I want to see you get the help you need, get on some meds for your bipolar or anger or psychotic issues or whatever the thing is, or at the very least see a doctor to figure out what’s actually up with you. But you need to help yourself. You need to be the one to take that step. And if you can’t do that, if you’re just gonna keep acting like your mother…”

The words that Dess most dreaded to hear from Addy finally drew from her mouth. “...then maybe the two of us need to take a break from dating each other.”

Panic finally escaped her heart and spread out through every inch of her being. The static, oh so familiar to her, had already been building up in her head, but now it felt so dense that it seemed as if her skull was about to burst and spill out onto the floor. The noise, the whirlwind, everything… she swore she could almost taste the crunch of the static it was so pervasive. Reality slowly faded off into the mist, the world itself becoming a cage, a farce, a delusion. With that last chord strummed, the final cord had snapped. NONE OF THIS WAS REAL!!!

Panting turned to short, rapid breaths as a manic smile spread over her face, her left eye twitching and her limbs spazzing out as she twitchily got onto her knees and shunted towards her girlfriend with a heartstopping aura. “Heh… so that’s it? I’ve become too much, and in the face of that, you’re gonna run away and hide? Heh heh… hahah… HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAH!” She clawed at her own face and tugged her messy bangs as she positioned herself over Adelaide, who cowered under her domineering posture. “I CAN’T!” she shouted in a heart-rending sing-songy voice that froze her girlfriend in sheer terror. “I CAN’T LOSE YOU, ADDY-GIRL! YOU’RE MY EVERYTHING, YOU’RE MY ONE AND ONLY, YOU’RE MY WORLD!”

She jammed her hands into Addy’s broad shoulders and squeezed her grip around them, her manic falsetto turning into a menacing baritone. “YOU’RE THE ONLY THING BESIDES GERSON THAT’S KEEPING ME SOMEWHAT SANE ON THIS FORESAKEN ROCK, AND HE’S EVEN SAID HE DOESN’T HAVE MUCH TIME LEFT, THE BLITHERING OLD COOT! YOU’RE PROBABLY THE ONLY REASON I HAVEN’T GONE AND KILLED MYSELF YET, DARLING!”

Adelaide’s eyes shot wide open as Dess tightened her grip upon her shoulders, feeling them slowly begin to creep up her body. “Dess, stop!” she weakly begged, to deaf ears, as the accompanying mind was busy bouncing off the walls.

“AHAHAAHAH! MY WRISTS, MY KILLING FIELD!” She briefly let go of Adelaide, who would’ve made an attempt to move herself out of the way, only to be paralyzed at the sight of her girlfriend’s mutilated arms as she pulled off her combat jacket. “GAZE UPON MY GLORY!” she maniacally shouted. “MY PAIN, MY SORROW, MY JUSTICE!”

She jammed her iron grip right back onto Adelaide’s shoulders, now dangerously close to her tender neck as she went right back to shouting in her face. “MY ARMS ARE THE SOMME OF MY BODY, MY VERDUN! TRENCHES OF BLOOD THAT RUN ACROSS MY WRISTS AND STAIN MY FUR, AS I FUCKING DESERVE! AND THAT’S WHY I NEED YOU, ADDY!” Her twisted smile now grew truly demented, sending a fearful shock through her girlfriend as she felt the hands finally creep up onto her neck without Dess even seeming to realize it. “Dess, please!” she once again implored in terror. “Don’t-”

“YOU’RE MY ROCK, MY GUIDING LIGHT, THE ONE THAT CROSSES EVEN THE TINIEST MODICUM OF HOPE ONTO MY HEART! I CUT MYSELF FOR YOU, BUT YOU’RE THE REASON I HAVEN’T YET KILLED MYSELF FOR ME!” Her vice grip on Adelaide’s neck only grew more ferocious, as if she didn’t even know there was one there within her grasp, sharpened fingernails digging deep into her fur and pricking the flesh underneath like little black knives. Addy could feel her throat begin to tighten as Dess let out an anguished roar. “WITHOUT YOU, I’M NOTHING, ADELAIDE! NOTHING!!!!!!!!!”

Panic turned to frantic survival instinct for Adelaide, who desperately clawed away at Dess’s back, hoping somehow to grab her attention through pain, only for her mania to reach a hellish crescendo as her mind split apart every which way, comprehensible focus no longer existent.

“NOTHING IS EVERYTHING AND EVERYTHING IS NOTHING! GLORY TO ME, GLORY TO THE REVOLUTION, GLORY TO OSTRHEINLAND AND THE NORTHAMER SOCIALIST REPUBLIC! I AM GOD, WHO SHALL SMITE ALL! ICH BIN DIE ÜBER FRÄULIN, ICH BIN DIE ÜBER FRÄULIN, ICH BIN DIE ÜBER FRÄULIN!!! JA, JA, JAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH!!!”

As Dess’s voice crackled and cackled, her mind melting and turning to a cranial soup, with each passing second an eternity, Adelaide made one last desperate play. Pulling her dark hair from the back as hard as she could muster, she summoned whatever strength she could to vocalize through the crushing pressure on her windpipe, and let out a pleading shriek for her life.

“DESS, PLEASE, DON’T HURT ME, DESS! YOU’RE HURTING ME!! I DON’T WANNA DIE, DESS, PLEASE!!! I DON’T WANNA DIE!!!!”

The words echoed off the walls of the living room, the mood now just as dim as the faint lamp glowing in the corner. It was as if a switch had flipped off in Dess’s head; just as suddenly as the episode had begun to peak, it ceased, and reality collapsed atop of her body and crushed it like a soda can. The fog in her brain dissipated as she felt her hands again.

Wrapped tightly around Adelaide’s neck, primal fear caught in her eyes, frozen in terror like a deer in headlights.

In an instant, Dess let go and recoiled, scurrying backwards to the other end of the couch and curling up into a ball, shaking with intensity over the realization as to what she had just done. Addy responded likewise, retreating to the opposite side and breathing deeply, her chest heaving up and down as she slowly began to regain some level of composure.

Composure, however, was something neither of them could regain after what just happened, after the Rubicon had been crossed. Especially for Dess, who pulled at her hair with raving intensity.

They were on her shoulders, she thought to herself, over and over and over again. They were on her shoulders, they were on her shoulders, my hands were only on her shoulders! THEN HOW DID THEY GET AROUND HER NECK?!?!?! The thought ate away at her mind; she really had no recollection of choking her, only that one moment she was screaming over him with her hands atop her shoulders, and then in the next breath Addy was begging for her life, her neck wrung tight with her hands, as if her brain had shut off and reconnected.

Her hands.

Her hands, her hands, her hands. Her wretched, vile hands. She pulled her face out of them, and gazed at them with disgust. These twisted, clawed, evil things, only capable of mangling what I love! She grimaced with each passing moment, the world around her fading away once more, but this time she truly was alone in her bubble of misery. I oughta put a hole through these foul things….

Her gaze then crept downward, and a new spark lit in her mind that quickly erupted into an inferno. Her arms. Her arms, her arms, her arms. Her wretched, twisted arms. Arms already caked in dry blood, dry blood that stained her fur like tiger stripes along the insides of her forearms and down right up to her wrists. She could feel her scars ache, beckoning her to open them back up again, to let the blood flow once more, to let her essence run free.

She suddenly felt the urge, the need, to purify herself.

One last grand act of penance, a grandiose finale that would keep Adelaide safe. Nobody else had to get hurt. Nobody else had to die. There was only her. Her and her knife.

Slowly, she reached back towards her discarded jacket and unbuttoned the left breast pocket, revealing to herself the instrument of deliverance. Her hunter’s knife. Stained in the rusty color of dried blood. Perfect for the task at hand.

Her breath deepened as she mentally made her amends, her final preparations. Unsheathed, the blade slowly, shakily, made its way to rest with tip pressed into her forearm, aimed to make a beeline towards her wrist. She pressed in, and shuttered as she felt blood gush from her opened wound, having dug right into an old, previously open vein. One motion, one swift motion was all she needed. Down to the wrist, dug in as deep as she could muster, and then Adelaide would be free.

It was then when a firm, trembling hand placed itself on her shoulders, ceasing her thoughts at once.

“Dess,” she heard; it was a low, forlorn whimper that broke her from her trance. She looked back up and saw Adelaide beside her once more, visibly shaking in fear, a beckoning hand outstretched towards her.

“Give me the knife, Dess,” she softly muttered with pleading eyes. “Please.”

Dess’ brain was screaming at her not to, to hold onto the blade and to finish the job. But her soul, the last vestige of self-preservation left within her, was too caring to push through. She couldn’t do it, not in front of Adelaide. She couldn’t leave her to cradle her dead body like that.

Delicately, she took her other hand and held the knife by the blade, ever so careful not to accidentally grip the edge. Then, slowly, she extended it out, handle-first, turning her head away to face the wall in meek shame.

With a sigh, and a slight twinge of relief in her vocals, Adelaide took hold of the handle and gently slipped the tool towards herself, Dess’s fingers sliding across the cold, flat surface of the blade as their touch parted. Now firmly in control, Addy got up and wandered up the stairs; evidently, she was going to stash the hunting knife in her room, leaving Dess sulking alone on the sofa, the ground floor now completely still and silent.

She had almost done it. She had very nearly almost done it. The blade on her wrist, she was just one slice away from ending it all, right in front of her girlfriend.

Her girlfriend….

No, it wasn’t right to call Adelaide her girlfriend anymore. Whatever trust, whatever desire she probably had to continue the relationship, it had probably been crushed in her grasp. There was no way, just no possible way in her mind, for what she did to be forgiven. It was funny; the fears from before, now seemingly so distant and small in comparison, came back to mind, and now detached from them, she could read them in outstanding clarity. Perhaps the lack of self-harm or physical violence as an answer forced her to reconcile the noise within her mind.

Was Addy out of her league? Yeah, probably. Almost definitely. Yet in the entire time they had been together, through all of the trials and tribulations she had put her through, she had always, and she meant always, stuck around. Part of it was probably the whole neighbors things Bratty and company had mentioned, but was that truly a bad thing? Was that actually a sign of weakness, or simply the source of all, a firm bedrock of an old friendship to serve as the base for the entire time they spent together?

No wonder they were so similar, with both of them being socialists, even if she herself was a lousy one; they had been influencing each other for years, melding and molding their personalities to match. It was why, despite Addy being such an open prude for so long, she was so ready to take that next step when it came; like Kris said about her search history, she was just as much a freak as she herself was.

Not to even mention the support she had given to her throughout her transition. Buying her dresses, doing her makeup, being a safe person to confide in. There was trust there, and for good reason. She was dependable, and for all her faults, until this past week or two, a genuinely good and caring girlfriend.

And so was Addy in kind. Her fears of physical distance causing a slow death to their relationship seemed trivial. Hell, she was willing to move mountains to stay nearby! Giving up the opportunity to study in Megalopolis, at her dream school, to accept something closer to home, only four hours away by train….

She couldn’t dwell on it for too long. It hurt too much to think about how much she threw away. Those day trips out to the city, or perhaps a weekend stay at her dorm, lost forever, lost in a future that would never be.

Then again, would that future have lasted? As much thought as she gave to the physical distance that would be between them, the growing distance in maturity and life stages was certainly weighing down on her mind, and unlike all of the other things she thought about, she had no rebuttal to that lament. She reasoned this one had to be the root cause.

It was inevitable. It would happen even if she went to college, a different one than her, but it would only accelerate knowing that there was nothing waiting for her. Addy would head off to uni, see the world outside of Hometown, while she would only continue to rot away in a state of permanent arrested development deep in the backwoods of Maine. She’d grow ever more distant emotionally, meet new people that actually cater to her needs, and then when she’d come back, if she came back, would they even have anything left in common? She doubted it, and doubted she would even care to remember her after a few years of that; she was just another friend to Adelaide, but Addy was quite literally her whole world.

That was it, her mind was decided. Whatever relationship she had with Addy was irreparably harmed, and would only continue to degrade the longer time went on. Might as well get things over with and get out of her life now, let her move on.

Propping herself up from her seat, she fixed up her jacket and sighed to herself, but before she could make another move, she heard the sound of footsteps coming from behind her. Adelaide had returned, knife no longer in her hands, and keeping a healthy distance away.

“Hey,” Dess mumbled.

“Hey,” she echoed, her voice wrought with fear. “You… you okay?”

“...No. I… I need to take a walk, clear my head. I’m sorry, Addy…” she mumbled, her eyes and voice devoid of any spark as she grabbed her bat and shuffled towards the door, like a walking corpse. “I didn’t know… I didn’t know I was doing that….”

“Are… are you serious?” Adelaide was still gobsmacked by what she was hearing. “Dess, you were choking me. You hand your hands around my neck, for Angel’s sake! How the heck could you not have-”

“I SAID I DIDN’T KNOW!!” She turned back at the doorway to face her once-and-maybe-still lover, tears now flowing down her face. “I don’t know what’s happening to me, it’s like I’m losing control of my own body, my own mind, IT FEELS LIKE I’M GOING INSANE! BECAUSE… because….”

Her shoulders dropped as all tension evaporated from her body in an instant, and a stream of sorrow poured from her mouth.

“...Because I am,” she finally mustered, which felt like a self-admission of a truth to herself. “You’re right. I’m not well. I have no control over myself. In that moment, when I said I didn’t realize I was choking you, I meant it. My mind feels as if it just glasses over sometimes. Nothing seemed real, my body doesn’t seem real, my hands don’t seem real. It feels like they don’t exist, or have holes burned into them. I know you want me to get treatment, but… I’m scared! I don’t wanna go back on the meds, I don’t want to be hospitalized, I’d rather kill myself than do that… I’m pretty sure I’d die anyway if I were put in one. I fear they’ll kill me. I’m… I hate to admit it, but I’m not safe to be around.”

She looked Adelaide in the eyes one last time, her sad sapphire eyes locking on pitifully with her own sullen emerald pair. “I’m beyond help, Addy. I don’t think anything’s gonna fix me. And frankly, I’m surprised you haven’t kicked me out for what I tried to do.” She paused, her heart feeling as if it was struggling to keep beating. “I abused you, Addy. You shouldn’t show me any mercy. I’m… I’m sorry.”  She felt there was so much more she wanted to say, so many thoughts rushing through her mind, but words were failing her.

Adelaide tried to offer up some words of her own to soothe her, something, anything to comfort her and calm her mind. But she had nothing, either. Her own mind had run blank, and her heart had turned weak. She broke eye contact, and mournfully looked down at the floor.

One line of thought managed to well up and come out in the silence, but that was all: “Dess… a part of me thinks you should leave… because I’m scared you’re gonna hurt me. But….” She choked on her own words. “...but I think I may be more afraid of you leaving and hurting yourself!”

Her gaze now aimed back up at her girlfriend, her eyes pleading, for what she feared would be the last time if she were to walk out that door. “Are you sure about this? Are you sure you don’t want to stay?”

Dess bit her tongue, a grimace spreading across her entire face. Whatever desire she had to try and be better for her girlfriend had been overridden by an overwhelming fear of herself. “I can’t, Addy,” she finally whimpered. “I can’t. I don’t trust myself around you. Around anybody. I just… want you to be safe, no matter what I have to do to make that happen. I’m sorry….”

Adelaide was on the verge of tears, but stymied them long enough to grip at her shirt collar, look down, and let out a snivel of a reply. “I love you, Dess. I don’t want you to die. Just… don’t hurt yourself, for me. Promise me that, please!”

Pausing for just a moment longer, in a morose way wanting to savor this moment, deep in her heart she felt it may be the last, however it may be. Dess finally looked away and back towards the doorway, pulling open the door and letting in the unseasonably warm, yet still crisp, winter air. Adjusting her jacket slightly, she stepped outside, and once past the threshold, took a hold of the doorknob and sighed to herself.

“I love you too, Addy,” she muttered, just loud enough for her to hear from inside. “Goodbye.”

With that, she gently shut the door, and with a click, shut herself out of her life.

Chapter Text

As she ran tearing through the woods, tears streaming down her face, Dess felt truly alone for the first time in her life.

There was very little she felt that she could even do; not even killing herself seemed to be on the table, now that Addy had her knife kept safely stowed away in her room. She didn’t want to bother Kris again, and Noelle had clearly been icy with her, the psychological wounds from that one afternoon still stinging.

In her mind, there was only one other person she could confide in.

She had no idea whether or not Gerson was actually there at the church as she came tearing out of the woods and slid on through the double doors. At the very least, she hoped to loiter in the safety of the Sanctuary until he came by once day broke.

Slowly opening the door to his study, she found the room empty, and immediately felt a wave of self-bashing wash upon her. How stupid was she? It was, like, one in the morning. Why the fuck would he be awake and working at this hour? And who knew if he’d even be by until some time late in the morning. Especially with how frail he had become….

Before she could turn back to leave, though, a stray paper on the desk caught her eye. Strange, she thought. Gerson never left his papers strewn about like that…. She made her way over.

Finding the paper left alone on the desk, left crinkled where it lay, she picked it up and took a glance at the contents of the letter.

“Dear Alvin, my beloved son, some kind words from your old man. I know that-”

The pen smeared in a messy line past this point, as if whoever was writing had suddenly been forced to stop. As if Gerson had lost whatever strength was keeping him going.

It was then where she noticed the tears that stained the note.

“Angel, NO!!!” Dess shrieked. IT couldn’t have happened yet, IT had to be just some fears lingering in her imagination. Gerson was fine, he was probably… somewhere… like he was the day prior. In the Sanctuary! Yes, he had to be musing in the Sanctuary, trying to figure what to include in his letter.

Rushing out of the study, she burst through the double doors leading into the main worship hall. There, at the altar, was a turtle kneeling in prayer.

“Gerson?” she called out to the figure hunched over in the Sanctuary. “Is that you? Please tell me that’s you….”

As she drew nearer to the turtle, the sound of weeping grew audible to her. It dawned on her then that it wasn’t Gerson she was speaking to in that darkened hall, but rather his son.

“Alvin?”

The turtle looked up, breaking his mournful prayer, and weakly waved in Dess’ direction. “Ah, December,” he beckoned. “Have you come to pray with me?” Tears were rolling down his face.

Like a truck, it hit Dess as to why, no longer escapable.

Rushing over and taking hold of the priest’s robes, Dess shook the turtle in a frenzy, almost frothing at the mouth as her eyes widened in terror. “Alvin!” she repeated, deep in her worry. “Where’s Gerson?! I need to see him!!!”

Hearing the panic in Dess’ voice, Alvin looked on weepily, and solemnly nodded his head. “I’m afraid… he’s already passed on,” he shakily mumbled through his tears.

Dess couldn’t accept it. “No… NO…!”

Alvin could only nod affirmatively. “I’m afraid it’s true, December….”

She just couldn’t get over it. “But… but… he was okay yesterday! I saw him! I spoke with him here! What happened?!”

“He Fell Down late last night; QC told me he wasn’t feeling well, and I found him slumped at his desk in the middle of writing a letter, and… well… that was that, he was already gone.” He choked up as he recounted that night’s events. “He didn’t even get a chance to finish whatever it was. We took him to the hospital as soon as it opened up, and I spent the whole day waiting for him to dust. Your mother and father were there when I gave him his final rites, as were the Dreemurrs, but… heh, I guess my old man’s a strong one. He was still holding form when the hospital closed for the night, so… I’ll be going over to collect his dust tomorrow morning.”

Letting go of Alvin, Dess was left in stunned silence, fighting off tears of her own. She just couldn’t believe it, not from hearing it. She needed to see it with her own eyes.

A desperate idea came to mind.

“Alvin,” she begged. “C’mon, we need to go see him!”

The turtle only shook his head. “December, I wish to see him again too, one last time. But I’ve already made my peace. The hospital is closed; I pray to the Angel that I may hold him as he goes once the sun rises, but I find stability in asking for his soul and spirit to go peacefully if his time is sooner.” He hesitated as a thought crept into his mind, before he pressed on with it. “I know that prayer isn’t for you, that you don’t hold the Angel and the Prophecy in your heart, and I not only respect that, but understand that. I just pray you can find some way to make peace with your own inner self, however that may come.”

Dess cackled at this instruction. “Why pray, when we can do?” She clutched her bat and turned around, beckoning Alvin to join her. “I’m going to see him, NOW, and I’m going to say goodbye. If you really care for your old man, I suggest you come, too!”

There was no response from him, only teary eyes.

“Well?! I’m waiting!!!”

Alvin froze, clearing his throat, before he wiped the tears from his eyes. Shaking his head, he turned his shell to Dess, got back onto his knees, and bowed his head down.

“I can’t join you in that,” he said. “But I know that Gerson cared deeply about you, and you must care deeply about him. Whatever you plan on doing, December… I wish you the best of luck.”

With nothing further to add, he resumed his prayer, reciting some old rites Dess cared not to reflect on. Knowing his mind was already made up, Dess clutched her bat and high-tailed it out the door and out of the church, her boots thumping against the pavement as she sprinted down the road into town, towards the hospital.

It couldn’t be… it just couldn’t be…. She needed Gerson to still be there, waiting behind the doors, cackling at the realization she had been so worried over nothing. She needed him to be alive, so that his soul would at least know she had said goodbye.

Rushing the hospital doors, she ferociously banged on them and pushed with all her might, only for them not to budge an inch; like Alvin had said, they were locked for the night. Desperate to get in, she continued slamming against them, making no progress. One last idea came to her mind, and with how much she needed to get in, she wasted no time in entertaining it. Grabbing her bat and readying it, she swung with all her might, and shattered the glass doors with a loud, clanging crash. Shards exploded out and spilled onto the floor of the hospital, but in her frenzy she paid no mind; she just darted right on in, crushing the glass beneath her boots as she fumbled through the dark and made a bee-line for the patient rooms, letting the cool winter air stream into the building.

Breaking into the first room, she found him. Placid, at ease, hands resting delicately upon his chest. It was like a scene out of a movie; his rest was far too perfect.

“Gerson? Are you still… there?” she called out.

No response.

Tears welled up in her eyes as she approached. “Gerson!” she repeated. “It’s me, Dess! Don’t you… don’t you hear my voice?”

Desperate to be seen, to be heard, she reached out, took a hold of the old man’s hand…

…And felt it crumble to dust within her grasp.

Her breath shook, watching the wrinkled green hand turn white as it fell apart and collapsed into a pile, slipping through her fingers. “N-no…!” She tried to grab the other hand, only for it to also disintegrate at the slightest touch. “No, NO, NO!!!”

In a frantic panic, Dess tried to grab a hold of any bit of Gerson she could. His chest, his leg, his face, but each time she did so, his dust only scattered more and more, until Dess was perched atop of his bed and clothes, covered in his dust, crying to herself. His entire body was gone, and half of his face had caved in, leaving behind a cross section of his dust-composed head in front of her. It would be the last time she would ever get to look upon Gerson in death, his once placid form now mangled beyond recognition.

As the tears streamed down her face and seeped into his dust, she sobbed pathetically, each mourning moan a bestial cry of grief. A memory of their last encounter, his final wishes on his lips, lips that were now mere dust, came to mind for her. The hymn that he wanted to hear so badly, that she had shunned, was now on her mind. It only felt right to sing it now; if there were spirits, or if a fragment of the soul still lingered on after death, then she wanted him to hear it, wherever he was. Choking back her tears as best she could, Dess opened her heart and let the song flow from her quivering lips:

“Heaven knows

the story that we've born

from our hearts

“Of the shadows cutting deep

and the heroes that save us

“Heaven knows

The beauty of the soul

and we weep

“To the majesty and

pray we not forget…

the tale… of… DELTARUNE….”

With that final stanza uttered, Dess completely broke down sobbing. Cupping the last vestige of the old man’s face, she watched and felt it crumble to nothingness in her hands, passing him along to be amongst the sands of time. Wrought with guilt, guilt over never saying goodbye, over their terse final conversation, over her rejection of his desires, over no longer having him in her life, she buried her face into her dust-covered hands and wailed. She pulled at her hair, nearly rended her tank top, and then collapsed amongst his dusted remains. He was gone. He was truly gone. At least she had the solace of being able to mourn him in solitude.

The distinct sound of hooves and boots crunching on glass, however, snapped her out of her grief.

She was no longer alone.

The shining of a flashlight into the room revealed all. She couldn’t make out who was on the other end, but she herself was clearly visible for the first time in that darkened hospital room. Her entire body - jacket, pants, fur, hands, all of it - was covered in the white of Gerson’s dust, which lay in a heap with his clothes below her.

The flashlight’s beam turned towards where the lightswitch was, and the entire space was illuminated by harsh fluorescents, revealing who was there to greet her. With no more need for the electric torch, Asgore switched it off and stowed it in his utility belt, his cop uniform hastily thrown on. A grimace lay on his face, not out of disgust, but out of pity, for he knew what was in store for the poor young doe.

Turning back, he addressed the others behind him. “It’s your daughter, Carol,” he slowly uttered, sending Dess’ heartrate into the stratosphere. “I’ll step aside and let you and Rudy handle this.”

Retreating back into the main atrium, he gave way to the death glare of her mother, and a disappointed gaze from her father, both of them in their night robes. Whatever desire there was for getting a rise out of her mother was long distant now; the burning hatred in her eyes was enough to remind her why she had always hated these moments.

“December,” she commanded sharply, flicking her hand towards the ceiling. “Go on, up.”

Dess remained frozen in place, too paralyzed with fear to move.

“Are you deaf or something? Get off of him, NOW!”

Her breath shaking, Dess slid off of the bed and stared down her parents, covered in dust, her fists trembling.

Rudy now spoke up, his voice tender and worried. “Dess, sugar plum,” he muttered. “What happened?”

Carol turned towards him and gave him a mean look, gritting her teeth as she spoke. “Let. Me. Handle. This.” He meekly acquiesced, taking a step back into the dark, paralleled by Carol striding on over to Dess, their gazes locked.

“Do you have ANY idea what the fuck you just did?!” Carol spat, fully abandoning the cold, distant wall she had set up for herself. “Half the fucking town is awake and gossiping right now, and when they find out that MY DAUGHTER not only broke into the hospital but disrupted the dust of Hometown’s most respected citizen before we had the chance to hold a funeral ceremony, do you have any idea as to how bad that’s gonna look for our family?! For ME?!?!”

Meekly looking down, anger building inside of her and ready to burst, Dess tried to put a lid on it for as long as she could. “I don’t care about you.”

“WHAT was that?!”

“I SAID I DON’T CARE ABOUT YOU, MOM!!!” she finally shouted, fully snapping. “DO YOU THINK I GIVE A SHIT ABOUT YOUR POLITICAL CAREER RIGHT NOW?! GERSON’S DEAD!!!” She bared her teeth and got all up in her mother’s face. “He’s fucking DEAD, and I missed my chance to make things right with him. You can rebuild your reputation, THIS IS FOREVER, YOU FUCKING WORTHLESS SACK OF SHIT!!!”

Taken completely by surprise over there being an actual rationale to Dess’ actions, for what felt like the first time in her life, Carol found herself on the back foot, and stammered to come up with something to hurl back at her daughter, no longer giving a flying fuck about what she had covered in therapy. “D-December! Watch your language, young lady!”

“LADY?!?! You think I’m a fucking LADY?!?!?! I’M A DIRTY LITTLE DYKE, YOU FRIGID BITCH! YOU ICY CUNT!!!”

“DON’T YOU EVER DARE CALL ME THAT!!!” Carol bellowed. “Why the fuck do you even care about Gerson, anyways?! It’s not like you even knew him like I did!”

Dess actually cackled maniacally at this comment. “Are you for real?! Are you for fucking real?!?! You really have no fucking idea, do you?!” She waited for a response, only to be greeted with no retort. She pushed on. “Gerson was probably the only adult in my life that I felt safe confiding in, besides maybe dad, and he’s always been a doormat to you, anyway!” She gestured out into the hall, where he was standing idle, only listening into the conversation as Carol had instructed him to do.

“Gerson got me, he understood me! He’d let me vent to him about how miserable my life is, how miserable you are, and he wouldn’t cast judgement! He’d let me be seen and heard, or hell, sometimes he’d even agree with me! You know why I decided to apply myself these past few months and try to go to art school? HIS ADVICE!!! He fostered my dreams, even if they didn’t work out, and what have you ever done? NOTHING!!! You’ve only gone and quashed them. And now he’s dead, and now I have nobody!!!!”

Carol was taken aback by the whole outburst. “I… I didn’t know…”

“Of course you didn’t know!” Dess screamed. “You haven’t been giving me any attention at all for the past six months! It’s like I don’t even exist to you! I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I miss it when you drank!!!”

That was a bridge too far for Carol. “How… HOW DARE YOU!!!” she hollered. “Is my sobriety nothing more than a sideshow for you?! Do my attempts to be a better parent mean nothing to you?!?!”

“Hell of a ‘better’ parent you are!”

“SHUT UP! Maybe things would be better if you were a better daughter! Why can’t you be more like your sister! She’d never stoop to doing something as disruptive and desperate as… this!” She gestured at the dust that was covering Dess, and the chaotic mess left behind her. “Noelle would never do such a thing! She’s actually respectful of my authority, she’s calm and demure, she’s the kind of daughter that’s easy to love!”

Dess was beside herself, an exasperated smile sat upon her face. “Fah! I’ll ignore that you just said you hated me for now…”

“I never said that-!”

“CAN IT, ÜNTERFRAU!” Dess got up so close to her mother’s face that bits of spittle flew out onto her, causing the elder doe to recoil. “You don’t even know your own daughter! You think Noelle is just the perfect little trad-girl?! WRONG!!! She’s more like me than she is like you, she just knows how to hide it, or if I’m one to guess, you just haven’t broken her yet! Hell, she may be a bigger freak than I am! Have you seen the stuff she gets up to? No, of course you haven’t, but I have! I’ve seen her get physical with Kris in the mud, I’ve seen her dress up like a goth with Catti, I’ve seen the smutty werewolf websites she visits on the laptop, hell, I’m the one who deletes them from her search history, so you don’t find them!”

Carol blushed at that last point.

“And don’t get me started on her penchant for the old ultraviolence! Decapitating her cats in Cat Petterz, playing the Evil Route in Dragon Blazers, she’s told me that there are people in this world that she just wants to grab by the neck and choke the life out of! Do you hear that?! She’s more like me than she is you, she’s just young enough to mask it still! Mark my fucking words, if you don’t fucking change, she’s gonna snap just like I did, and don’t expect her to show the same restraint towards hurting you as I have, because YOU DON’T EVEN KNOW YOUR OWN DAUGHTER!”

“HOW DARE YOU EVEN SUGGEST THAT, DECEMBER, HOW DARE YOU!!!” Carol was trembling herself now, leaning in towards Dess with her fists shaking. “Do you know how much I’ve sacrificed to make sure you and Noelle could have a good life?! Do you know how much stress goes into being the mayor of this mess of a town?! Trust me, there’s a whole load of drama you’re not privy to, and that’s because I’ve shielded you from it! I’ve spoiled you your entire damn life, and so the Angel damns me, you turned out to be the snottiest, most entitled and ungrateful little brat I’ve ever had the displeasure of ever having to raise!”

“So that’s it, then?! You’re gonna kick me out now?!”

“Kick you… December! What kind of wretched mother do you think I am?!”

Dess clutched her bat tightly by the handle, a red fog washing over her mind and giving her a purely murderous tunnel vision. The whole world became Carol, and she wanted to smash it. “Oh, I don’t know, maybe you’re the mother that never came to my hockey tournament because she was too busy with work! The mother who told me to shut up and be quiet whenever I played guitar or metal music in the sanctuary of my room! The mother who drank herself into a stupor every night and called me a whore for how I dressed! THE MOTHER WHO TOOK A KATANA OFF THE WALL, PRESSED IT INTO MY SHOULDER, AND FORCED ME TO KNEEL WHEN I BACKTALKED HER!! THE MOTHER WHO DRUNKENLY THREATENED TO SLICE MY BELLY OPEN JUST FOR BEING ME!!!”

For once, the anger wiped off of Carol’s face completely, too stunned to maintain it. Her voice became weak. “Did… did I really…?”

“Oh, you don’t remember?!” She leaned out and called into the hall. “HEY DAD, CAROL DOESN’T REMEMBER NEARLY KILLING ME IN AN INEBRIATED STUPOR!!!” She leaned back in real close, her hot breath blowing right over Carol’s shocked face. “OF COURSE YOU CAN’T REMEMBER! JANUARY FIFTEENTH, 2013! THAT WAS JUST ANOTHER TUESDAY FOR CAROL THE DRUNK, BUT FOR ME, IT WAS THE DAY I LOST MY MOMMY!!!”

Carol’s legs trembled, the elder doe nearly collapsing in a heap as the hazy memory came back to her. Dess didn’t notice the wave of guilt crash her shores, nor did she care; she just saw a target to swing at, her mania at the greatest fever pitch it had ever been at.

“AND NOW DO YOU KNOW WHY I DYE MY HAIR BLACK? DO YOU KNOW WHY I PUT THAT AUBURN STREAK IN IT, AND PAINT MY ANTLERS RED? DO YOU KNOW WHY I DETEST ICY BLONDE HAIR AND THE COLOR BLUE? IT’S ALL BECAUSE I HATE YOU!”

With a sudden, almost suspiciously prepared movement, she swung. The bat connected with Carol’s ribs, a faint crack being heard as the hit registered. The wind knocked out of her, Carol stumbled out of the way and leaned up against the wall, wincing as she held herself, too much in shock to fight back. Unsatisfied, Dess wound up this time, and unleashed a second hit to her mother mere seconds later in the same spot. This time, a loud, echoing crack could be heard emanating from the room, followed by a loud, shrill wail as the pain overcame Carol. Her ribs shattered, she collapsed into a heap on the ground, grimacing as she cried out with a wail of pain so sharp it could shatter glass.

Writhing on the floor, mumbling nonsense that amounted to her faintly begging for mercy, Dess grinned maniacally as she stood over the limp body of her mother, fixating on her head. Winding up one last time, she prepared to go for the kill, to crush that wretched woman’s head like a watermelon and hear her skull crack. With a loud, feverish holler, she swung down at her like a lumberjane…

…Only for Rudy, frantically running over to protect his wife, to dive right in front of the swinging bat. It collided with him square in the back, before the tape and wood glue gave way, and the entire device splintered, the weapon falling to pieces in her hands.

It was as if the entire world stood still for Dess, an eerie lack of noise permeating her skull. She could tell that her father was screaming out in pain, unable to move, her mother torn between cradling her husband, tending her own wounds, or just screaming out in mournful pain. The fog that had clouded her mind was still present, but only in the most abstract sense, rendering the sounds of horror to nothing more than static.

Her focus was locked in on her mother, anyway.

She wanted to focus on her father, desperately so, anything to avoid her, but his face lay on the floor, crying out in shock. It was her mother’s face that drew her in; with no means of injuring or maiming it, all she could do was look. Look at her panting, nervous breathing. Look at the way her mouth curled when it screamed. Look at her disheveled hair, her raised ears, and twitching nose.

What she couldn’t look away from the most, however, were the eyes.

With a sense of finality, the two’s gazes met. Dess looked down upon her with shock, shock for what she had done, and shock for what she was seeing, but from the outside, the murderous rage still lay burning in her manic, twitchy eyes. In Carol’s, however, there was complexity. Behind them, reflective of the truest depths of her soul, there was, of course, fear. But there was also pain. Not physical pain reflecting outwards, but emotional pain, the emotional pain that comes about with a great amount of self-realization and guilt. It was the realization that this was the cumulation of eighteen years of parenting, that this was the monster she had created. The realization that years of neglect, years of punitive punishment, years of yelling and screaming and months of abandonment and the cold shoulder had done nothing to mold her daughter in the way she had hoped; it had only made her more brittle, deprived her of hope.

But Dess didn’t see that. Those emotions were buried too deep in Carol’s soul to see. Outside, there were the primal emotions that come about when exposed to such direct violence. Emotions of terror, panic, and a deep, wincing fear. Her eyes wide, weeping, Dess could only interpret the look in her eyes one way.

Betrayal.

It was a look of pure and utter betrayal beneath the terror, that’s what it had to be. Such a look that came with the crossing of the Rubicon in a relationship. The kind of look that comes about when something truly unforgivable has happened. The bond between mother and daughter was forever shattered, forever severed. And it was all her doing.

She should’ve been happy. She had been waiting for this moment for years, to finally lash out, to live out her wildest, most violent fantasies. A training ground; first her mother, and then the horrid liberal and fascist politicians of Northamer.

Why, then, did she feel guilt? Why, then, did she feel pain, the very pain she inflicted, radiating out from Carol and into her soul? Was it because her dad was hurt, an innocent target in all of this? Was it because her bat was broken, shattered in pieces on the floor?

Or was it because she realized that, in clear mind, not in an accidental state of delusion, but in a deliberate and conscious decision she was planning on killing her mother right then and there, and had only just been stopped by the grace of her father? And that with this final act, this final betrayal, she was sure to lose the love of both her parents, whatever little may have remained, for good?

The fog clearing, and with a rush in the head, sound came forth into her world, and it overwhelmed her. The crying, the yelling, the screaming, coming from both Rudy and Carol, it overpowered everything. She wanted to cry, to get on her knees and beg for forgiveness, to console her stricken parents.

But she knew better. She knew she was beyond forgiveness, or that if she somehow wasn’t, then it was something she didn’t deserve. What happened with Adelaide was horrible enough in isolation, but with this, it was a pattern.

She was an active danger to everyone that she loved.

And the only solution she had was to remove herself.

Stepping back, trembling, staring on with fear petrified on her face, she pivoted and high-tailed it out of the room, rushing past Asgore, who had just come running in at the first sound of trouble; she ran over the shattered glass, ran out the door, ran down the silent streets of hometown, and out of the lamplight and into the woods. As the screams of her parents echoed out into the night, as the sleepy town awoke from its slumber, before anyone could lift a finger and raise the alarm, she had vanished, like a ghost in the wind.

Chapter Text

Come that following morning, there was still no sign of Dess, and the mayor had sent Hometown spiraling into a state of organized panic.

At least, she attempted to. As much as she insisted on having as many people as possible lead search parties for her daughter, not many people actually turned up on that crisp, windy winter’s morning. It seemed that Dess’ reputation preceded her; very few seemed to care that she was missing. The few that did were random nobody do-good volunteers, Adelaide, Carol, and the entirety of Hometown’s police force.

Carol being there at all was a small miracle.

As she finished calling out into a megaphone, directing the search groups where to go, she winced and wheezed as the pain in her ribs flared up again. Asgore noticed this, and gently came over to her side.

“You know, Carol, you should probably be in the hospital with Rudy right now,” he calmly asserted. “I know how much this means to you, but Dess definitely broke your ribs-”

“DON’T SAY IT LIKE THAT,” she hissed, before the pain made her come back to Earth. “I’m… I’m sorry, Gorey. I just… I can’t sit idly by with her missing. No matter what happened to me… it’s… all my fault in the end… and I need to be the one to make things right.”

Asgore knew better than to protest; when Carol had her mind set on something, there was very little that could be done to sway her away from that direction. Especially now, with her hopped up on pain killers.

Her face worn down with age and pain, she grimaced some, before letting Asgore take her hand for support. “Thank you,” she murmured, before continuing. “It’s also… I’ve seen the weather report, Asgore. That winter storm that’s coming looks to be the worst one in a century. If we don’t find her before it hits tonight….”

The goat squeezed her hand before she could finish the wretched thought. “We’ll find her,” he promised. “We’ll find her and bring her home safe.”

The gesture nearly made Carol smile ever so slightly, but the comfort was interrupted by her rib pain. As much as she wanted to push on, her body made doing so a struggle. “Say, I know that the rest of the search parties are going by foot,” she panted, “but can we… go down the back trails in your truck? I don’t think I can walk….”

He nodded. “I’ll get the keys and bring it over.”

…

With rays of the afternoon sun peeking through the branches and parting clouds above, the light danced around Dess’ eyes and lulled her out of her slumber. Rolling around in the pile of leaves she had assembled, her makeshift natural mattress, her eyelids fluttered open, and she gazed out upon the placid lake sat forth in front of her. It was in a little nook, tucked far off of any trail, away from the peering eyes of whatever search parties might be after her; she knew that her mother had sent them out in full force by now.

Gazing out towards oblivion, the magnitude of her mistakes finally set in. She was a violent, wretched monster, one that had gone so far as to nearly kill her mother, father, and girlfriend. They all probably despised her now; the search for her certainly wouldn’t be out of goodwill, but to keep someone as actively dangerous as her from inflicting any more pain. They were going to either put her in jail, or institutionalize her. Either way, they would be throwing away the key. Her life, as she knew it, was over.

So what to do now? The thought of continued violence, fleetingly, entered into her mind. It made sense; her life was over as she knew it, and the world would only continue to descend into an authoritarian hellscape throughout what would be her lifetime, so if that were the case, why not do something with it now that she was expendable? There were so many people she could target: CEOs, stock traders, corrupt politicians, the President and his government in the Diet, the various people that were to assemble in Bay City for a Conservative Party conference within the week. Any one of those people or events, and she could do the world a favor.

But, as quickly as the idea came to mind, it was quashed. There were more holes in that plan than there were in a sieve. She was only one person, and there were, what, thousands of those evil, corrupt, and high-ranking individuals across the country? Would icing one of them really make a positive difference? Or was Addy right, would doing such a thing lead to no meaningful positive change? Knowing how she appeared demographically - a bisexual, socialist monster in a human-dominated world - people like her and people that she cared about would certainly be targeted as part of retributive attacks. Whoever she killed would become a martyr, a hero to the masses, despite their wretchedness.

And that was the sick irony of it all, what tore her apart more than anything. She desperately, cravenly, wanted to see conservatives dead at her own hands, the most wretched parts of humanity purged within a blinding darkness. But despite all of that, she couldn’t bear to follow through; the only people she had ever hurt were those she loved the most. Even her mother, as much as she hated to admit it, deep down she still wanted to love her, no matter how much she hated her.

Besides, what had hurting her even accomplished? All it did was drive her away from her family and put her on the brink of existence, it didn't even make her happy in the moment! All that she could do was make things worse, inflict pain, but never prosperity. What purpose, what point, did her life even still have…?

…One. She had one purpose left. One thing that she desperately needed to do, to give her life value, to make sure that she could never hurt anyone she loved ever again.

With a cruel resolve, she slowly worked herself onto her feet, and turned her back to the lake, starting her trek into the woods. She knew now what she needed to do, but in order to get it done, she would need some supplies.

…

By the time evening fell upon Hometown, she had finally managed to return to her manor through the back woods. It had been a perilous trek; not that there was anything actively dangerous on her journey, but multiple times she had needed to lay down prone in the leaves or up behind trees, hiding from the various search teams that were out for her. The threat kept her hidden away, even off the forest trails, mostly just sticking to her instincts on where to go along unmarked territory of woods. But finally, she was back.

Creaking open the rear door to the kitchen, she slid in and took stock of everything. The lights were all off in here, so she reckoned that both of her parents were likely away, either in hospital or actively searching for her. She took in the peace and quiet, finding a restful solitude in it all, before continuing to the task at hand. She made her way into the still-lit front rooms of the house, up the stairwell, and through into the dark serenity of her own bedroom.

Fishing through her closet and beneath her bed, she stuffed all matter of gear into her bag. A tarp, some military rations she got at surplus, a sleeping bag… and a bundle of strong, thick rope. All things one would reasonably expect to find packed away for a camping trip.

Zipping the bag shut, she sighed to herself, and took in one last good look at her room. For all the painful memories this house brought to her, the relative sanctuary of right here filled her with nostalgia for times gone by. As she looked at the neon stars that were stuck on to her dim, dark walls, she thought about how she would never get to see the big city lights with Noelle, lights that flickered in the distance just like those lights in the night sky. Her guitar, sat against the closet door, whose strings would never be plucked again. The homemade band posters on her wall, relics of a simpler time where she’d craft them together with Noelle, based on bands she liked and those she saw on Midnight Special reruns. Posters she made for The Doors, The Cars, The Clash, Depeche Mode, Nena, and The Smiths, alongside posters she made for her own imaginary bands, bands where she was the lead star, and all of her friends, the few she had, were members alongside her. Noelle one of them.

Her sister weighed heavily on her mind; how could it not, especially with what she was about to do? Perhaps it was the fact she was so lost in thought about her which distracted from the pitter-patter sounds of hooves moving down the hall outside her room, and the gentle creaking of her door.

“Dess?” a small voice rang out.

She froze; she had thought the house was empty. How naive of her, how foolish of her; why would Noelle be allowed outside to help in the search, anyhow. She was far too young for that.

“Heyyyy, Ellie,” Dess nervously greeted, turning around to face her younger sister in the doorway. She could tell from the apprehensive look on her face that this conversation, this final talk, would be a tough one. “Whatcha up to?”

“Dad’s in the hospital, and mom’s looking for you….” She was on the verge of tears as she clutched a stuffed deer doll in her hands. “What happened, Dess? Is everything gonna be okay?”

“Oh, Ellie,” she cooed, gently making her way over with the bag slung over her shoulder, before kneeling down to talk at her sister’s level, placing a hand gently on her shoulder. “There’s just… a lot going on right now. Mommy’s probably really mad at me right now.”

“But mom sounded worried, Dess! She sounded scared!” Dess’ heart ached as Noelle told her the truth; it sounded like a lie in her ears. “Please stay, sis! Mom’s worried you’re gonna be lost out there in the woods, and… and I don’t want to lose you, either!”

Too wrought with emotion, Noelle began to openly weep. Dess was quick to move, cupping her cheeks and wiping the tears from her eyes. “Oh, Noelle, please don’t cry,” she begged, her own voice weakened by her struggle.

Noelle continued to plead as she cried. “Dess, I don’t wanna lose you! Please stay! Mom won’t be mad, just let me tell her you’re okay, and we can go back to being sisters again! Please, I beg you!”

Dess felt her soul crack apart within her as her sister pleaded. “Ellie,” she sighed. “I fear…” she trailed off, choking on her own words, desperately searching for the right words to say, to appear strong for her sister one last time. “Look, I need you to be brave for me. You’re a big girl, right? Big girls don’t cry, they’re brave… and big girls keep secrets.”

Noelle nodded through her tears, easily swayed by her sister’s strong words. “Okay….”

“Good. Now… just know… I’ll always be with you in your heart, and you’ll always be in mine.” Dess turned to hide her grimace, before pressing on. “I need you to keep this conversation a secret. If mom ever asks, when she gets back, a month from now, a year, whenever, you tell her I was never here.”

Noelle looked down and away, still unwilling to commit.

“Look, I’m just gonna run off for a few days. This stuff in this bag?” She patted it, before unzipping it and showing the contents off for a brief moment. “Camping supplies. I… need to process a lot, and I would prefer to be alone as I do it.”

She figures to sweeten the pot with a sticky lie if it meant Noelle would get off her back. “If it makes it up to you, when I get back, and… everything gets sorted, I’d love to go visit the big city with you.”

The young girl’s face lit up. “You really mean that?”

“Yeah,” Dess choked, fighting off her own tears, knowing the truth was they’d never get to visit together. “And if you’re still nervous, just look out the window, look out at the sky. I’ll be safe out there. I just… need to spend some more time alone for now, go somewhere. If it’s snowing and I don’t come back… then you can worry. But it won’t. I promise.”

She flashed a goofy buck-toothed smile for her sister, one last moment for Noelle to bask in the warmth of it. Just like old times.

“We cool?” she asked.

Weakly, still nervous in her weary heart, Noelle nodded in turn. “Okay, I trust you. I’ll keep quiet.”

Taking in the moment, letting it settle into her heart, Dess leaned in and gave her sister a gentle kiss on the forehead, before wrapping her in her arms and bringing her into a tight embrace. Knowing what was ahead for her, she didn’t want to let go, but knew she had to.

“I love you, Ellie.” She silently wept, feeling the tears stream down her face. “Remember this moment, always. I’ll always love you.”

Noelle reciprocated, wrapping her arms around her big sis and grabbing a tight hold of her olive jacket, fighting off her own tears.

“I love you too, Dess.”

Sighing through her gritted teeth, Dess wiped the tears out of her own face and stood up, slinging her bag over her shoulders once more. Then, with a wave, she made her silent goodbye with Noelle, before striding past her, down the stairs, back into the kitchen, and out of the house for good. She couldn’t bear to look back.

…

Night had fallen by the time Dess had returned to the back trails of the woods, trails she was familiar with more than anyone. She figured she could take things easy now that darkness had come about; with the sun gone, and the winter winds now whipping, she was sure that the search parties would be using flashlights by now to search for her, if they were even still out at all by this point. Either way, it’d be easy to spot them and duck out of the way before they spotted her, and from the look of things, she was in the clear.

As she crested a hill on her path back towards the shelter, however, she was blindsighted by a pair of bright lights that were cresting over from the opposite side, and rapidly approaching. As the roar of an engine picked up in intensity and grew ever closer, Dess froze up; it was her natural instincts kicking in, at the worst possible time. The ground beneath her feet shook, and her eyes went wide, as a familiar blue pickup finally crossed into view…

…And in a flash, she dove out of the way, rushing for the treeline, and laying up right behind the trunk of a mighty oak.

It had been just in time, both for her not getting run over, and hopefully, not being spotted. The former point she silently lamented; that would’ve made things so much easier. That latter point, however, soon was translated into fear, as just as the thought came to pass, the sound of brakes squealing shook her to her core, as the engine switched to an idle mumble, and then pure and utter silence.

They had spotted her.

The doors opening, she heard two voices call out her name. The first called her “Dess,” and it was the deep, baritone holler of Asgore’s voice. The second, “December,” and it was the voice of her mothers, but it sounded weak and nerve-wracked, not the usual authoritative call that usually came about with her name.

Terrified to so much as make a sound by moving, she kept deadly still against the tree as her name echoed out a few times more, hoping to wait the pair out. Eventually, the calls turned into a conversation, and she listened on with her heart in her throat.

“...Are you sure that was her?” Asgore asked. “I thought it was a feral at first-”

“I KNOW it was her!” Carol shouted, her voice wavering as she audibly was holding back tears, which played with Dess’ heart, guilt filling it. “It just… it had to be. She must’ve dove out of the way, and is probably listening right now…. DECEMBER! Please come out!”

Seeing how sure of things Carol was, Asgore sighed, acquiescing, and figured how to make the most of things. “I suppose, if she is out there,” he whispered, but still loud enough for Dess to hear she was so close, “then perhaps we could try having a dialogue with her, to have her come out?”

Dess hardened her heart in preparation, knowing that it was about to be played with.

Carol nodded, waving Asgore off as if to ask him to go first. “Make sure she knows she isn’t in trouble.” Sighing in preparation, he cleared his throat and spoke. “Decmeber,” he called out, “if you’re out there, I just wanted to say, you’re not in any trouble. If anything, we’re worried about you.”

Dess couldn’t believe that. How could she not be in trouble?

“We know that you’re struggling with a lot right now, and what happened last night was… well, we don’t have to talk about it. The point is, everyone in town is worried about you. Kris is scared, Noelle is scared… they both wish they could help search for you, and it breaks my heart to have to tell them ‘no,’ that they’re too young.”

It broke Dess’ heart, too, thinking about her sister again. The thought of her having to grow up without a sister….

She was nearly ready to give herself up, but Asgore kept talking.

“And Asriel… that poor boy, he’s been out searching for you all day! If you won’t come out for us, or for them, won’t you come out for him?”

That snapped her out of it. How dare he, she thought. He didn’t even know he had a daughter. How could she trust him to be truthful or righteous about anything. Besides all of that, how could she ever trust a cop? For all she knew, she’d be arrested the moment she revealed herself and put in a psychiatric hold. That decided it; she kept quiet, letting only the wind answer the goat in blue.

Turning back to Carol, Asgore whispered into her ear again, barely loud enough for Dess to hear. “It doesn’t sound like she’s there, Carrie,” he relayed. “I would’ve thought she’d come out if she were really here to hear all of that.” He paused, before sighing over Carol’s tired, worried glare. “Is there anything… you might want to say?”

She eased her way forward, leaning on the truck for support as she wheezed, her ribs still burning with pain; the painkillers were only just keeping her upright. Standing as tall as she could, wincing, she spoke out into the woods and into her daughter’s soul.

“December… I mean, Dess…” she started. “I just want to say first of all, that I’m sorry. I’m sorry for all of the horrible things that I’ve done, I’m sorry that I haven’t been the type of parent you needed, and I’m sorry for hurting you. I fully understand why you hurt me back, why you ran off… it’s all my fault….”

Dess exhaled nervously as her mother played with her heart; she swore she could feel it pounding out of her chest.

“I… I feel that I owe you some explanation, some sort of rationale for why I… did what I did.” Choking up on your words, she pressed on. “You never met your Aunt Clarice, Dess. She… wasn’t really ever a fixture in my adult life, she ran away from home when I was about Noelle’s age, and… we barely ever talked after that point. But I loved her, Dess. I looked up to her more than anyone else in the world, even if she was always a punk rebel. You… heh, you would’ve loved her….”

Would’ve…. The specific word filled Dess with pity, fearing in her heart what was probably going to come next.

“It… it was five years ago to the day when I got the news… that she took her own life.” Carol openly started to weep like a baby. “I never got the chance to say goodbye to her, to tell her how much I truly loved her. I didn’t even get a chance to cradle her in my arms! That’s why I turned to drink, Dess, and it was a horribly selfish thing for me to do, to deprive you of the mother you needed, to deprive you of the childhood you deserved when I took that katana off of the wall….”

Her monologue ceased, as the emotions became too hot to handle; Carol fell to her knees in a puddle of her own tears, and Asgore had to rush over and keep her from putting too much strain on her shattered ribs.

Dess, for her part, could only sit idly by in shock, tears streaming down her face, fighting back from audibly sobbing and giving up her position.

Carol only continued to wail from the ground. “She just… you’re so much like Clarice, Dess, I always saw it in you. And it scares me! The last thing I want is to lose you, too! I tried to steer you down a different path, so you wouldn’t end up like her, to keep you safe in a protected little bubble, but now I realize all I’ve done is push you further to the edge! So please! Come home! We’ll get you whatever help you need, whatever help you want! I’ll let you be yourself! Just please! Come out and give your mommy a hug!”

Breaking down, Carol howled in pain, both emotional and physical, as the toll on her ribs and soul became too much to handle. She collapsed into Asgore’s burly arms and sobbed, screaming out Dess’ name as she did so, just begging for her to come out.

Like a siren’s song, the call was almost irresistible to Dess. Every part of her soul was kicking, screaming, begging for her to cry out, to run into her mother’s arms with tears in her eyes and beg for forgiveness, for all of this to be over, to actually get the help she needed.

But her mind, ill as it was, was too convincing, too strong to counter.

She didn’t mean it. They’re crocodile tears. You’ve seen the woman she is, you already know her well enough to suss it out. She’s just gonna put you in a fucking mental ward and leave you to rot, leave you alive.

One last twist of her mind’s knife put her soul in its place, beating back the power of a mother’s love for good. She flashed back to that night way back when, when the katana was pressed down upon her shoulder, and forced a smile.

She deserves this, anyway. And YOU. YOU deserve this.

Despite everything, she stayed quiet, as her final chance slipped through her fingers against the bark of the tree.

As Carol’s wails turned to sobs, and then to mere sniffles, Asgore helped her to her feet, and gently gave her a squeeze, mindful of her ribs as he hugged her. “I think it was just a feral, Carol,” he seemingly confirmed. “I think we need to go back to town and regroup, get you some more pain meds before we make one last push for tonight. Hopefully the snowfall tracks south of us, and she’s alright, wherever she is.”

Wiping her tears away, not quite believing him, but agreeing with him nonetheless, Carol solemnly nodded. “Okay, Gorey,” she mumbled, too tired to persist. “Let’s go.”

Quietly, the two shuffled back into the truck, and the engine fired back up with a roar. With the sound of dirt kicking up, the pickup truck made its way down the dirt road and off into the distance, the lights eventually fading out of sight.

Finally letting out an exhale, Dess moved away from the tree and back onto the dirt trail. That was close, too close. But that one thought still remained, propelling her down her path towards the shelter.

You deserve this.

…

Kris couldn’t stand it.

They had been told that they were too young to help with the search, and despite their protesting, Toriel had made them stay home, setting them in front of the television in the hopes that it would distract them.

But nothing could get their mind off of Dess. Adelaide had told them in vague details of what had happened through teary eyes hours prior, and with their own last conversation in vivid memory, the worst possible fears filled their mind. They needed to try and find Dess.

Yet it all felt useless. Teams of people, their sister and father included, had been searching the entire town and surrounding woodland over for her, and had found nothing. Many were already suspecting that she had simply bought a bus ticket and ran off somewhere to the south, and that this whole process was just a farce.

Kris knew better, though. They knew that Dess feared being alone more than anything, so if they had run off, it couldn’t have been far. They tried to think of something, anything, that could be a potential lead.

And that’s when the shelter popped into their mind.

Sure, they had sprung a gas leak in it, but Dess had said that place was one of the few places she felt safe. Maybe she had run off somewhere nearby, and had just been missed by the search parties somehow. And most importantly, it was something easy, something that even they as a middle schooler could help with.

Throwing caution to the wind, Kris donned their horns, slipped on their shoes, and slipped out the door. Toriel surely wouldn’t notice if they were gone for a little bit….

…

Adelaide’s heart was in her throat.

Thoughts of the night before refused to leave her mind as she slowly trudged back into Hometown proper from one of the lakeside trails. She knew that Dess was gonna do something drastic, she just knew it. And she knew that she was well within her right to let her leave; in fact, her parents had said just as much when she told them about the intimate violence she had faced. Despite all of that, though, she still felt guilty. She wanted Dess to get help, and her mind grew fraught in rumination, playing back the events of that night in full. If she had been more demanding of Dess for her to stay, if she had just kept her trap shut and not told her of wanting to take a break, if she had called the police and had them handle things….

A call from her cell yanked her out of this state. Probably for the best, she reckoned; this self-pity wasn’t healthy for her. It’s not your fault, she reminded herself. It’s not your fault.

The Caller ID showed it was from home.

She immediately picked up, frantic with a newfound worry as she spotted a pair of red horns laying on the side of the road. She had a feeling she’d be having to make another call to Asgore as soon as she got off.

“Azzy!” Tori cried. “Kris has gone missing!”

…

It was the perfect tree.

Nice and tall, thick branches that jutted out, far off into the woods by the shelter, it was just about the best place she figured to set up shop. The scene from the top was picturesque, too. An absolutely serene, eerily still view of the dormant forest that surrounded her; bare trees covered the landscape in a wooded blanket.

She’d be one with them soon enough.

She held the rope tight in her hands; the rest of her supplies were left on the ground below in her bag, having no further use for them. They were just distractions, anyway, things to have on hand so if she were ever found, people wouldn’t question her. The implications of only carrying around a rope, after what she did… well, they were certainly accurate.

One end was already tied firmly around the tree, looped around the branch, affixed with a Gordian knot to ensure it would not come undone and ruin her plan. And with the other, she had created for herself a simple loop, one that she had already wrapped around her like a necklace.

Fitting, she joked to herself. December Holiday’s about to become a Christmas ornament.

She laughed morbidly at the stray thought, hoping that it would soothe the nerves, for what she was about to do had them all flared up. It seemed like such a simple, easy plan the entire way over and up, but now that she was atop the tree, looking down into the dark void of the forest floor below, as the wind whipped through her hair… she questioned if she could even follow through, if she even should follow through.

She thought about just abandoning the plan. What if something went wrong? What if the rope didn’t snap her neck, and she died slowly of strangulation? Wasn’t it better to just let the elements take her, to die in the cold of the winter storm and let the wind blow her dust away with the snowdrifts? She had always heard that hypothermia was a peaceful way to go….

No. She clenched her fists and trembled on the branch. No, she couldn’t back out now. Every time she had gotten to this point, whether trying to slit her wrists open or drown herself in the lake, she had always chickened out of it right before it could turn fatal. If she left now and attempted the hypothermia plan, all she’d accomplish would be freezing her ass off for half an hour, before retreating back home to cry in her mother’s arms and wind up locked away in an insane asylum. This had to be her curtain call.

Filled with just enough resolve, she stared down at the forest floor below, mentally preparing for a quick snap and for the void to swallow her. She tried to think of something poignant, something poetic to say, to close her life with.

A single song lyric came to mind.

Teetering over the edge, she let her toes curl, as she belted out one last sorrowful dirge, her voice warbled through the tears.

“My spirits are low in the depths of despair,

My lifeblood… spills over…!”

Then, with a loud, feral scream to amp herself, she echoed out into the woods, and pushed off.

There was nothing more than air beneath her feet now.

…

The sound of screaming immediately perked up Kris’ ears. They had just arrived at the doors to the shelter, and recognized the sound of her voice coming from the woods instantly. “DESS?!” they screamed out, only to get no response.

They knew that it was stupid for them to venture out into the woods after dark without a light, especially without a light, but if Dess was in trouble, they needed to find her, and fast. Throwing caution to the wind, they sprinted forth into the forest, just as Adelaide spotted them from a distance. “Wait, Kris! Wait up!” Before she could get anywhere close, their sibling had disappeared off into the woods.

Rushing to and fro between the oaks and pines, deep into the woods, some odd gurgling sounds alerted them that they had neared. Hearing the struggle coming from behind a tree, and seeing a bag laying open beside it Kris pressed forth with all of their resolve, and turned the corner….

…

It had all gone wrong.

It had all gone so wickedly, horribly wrong.

Swaying from the end of the rope, Dess was still very much alive; the fall that she had hoped would snap her neck cleanly had been far too short, leaving her dangling in the air, twitching and writhing in the wind as the tight noose constricted around her neck like a vice grip. With all her might, she tried to reach and grab the rope above her neck and lift herself, but her weakened, flailing muscles couldn’t take hold. Eventually, she was left helpless, desperately clawing away at her neck, hoping somehow she could slip her fingers in between the noose and herself and let herself fall through, but it was no use; her knot was too good, the rope was too tight.

One last desperate idea clung to her decaying mind. Reaching for her breast, she desperately fought to unbutton her leftmost pocket, hoping to grab her hunting knife and slice herself down.Touching herself, however, she realized far too late, to her horror, what she had already known. Adelaide had her knife, not her. It all sunk in for her at once; she was doomed to hang.

It was as if her body had lost control of all of its natural processes. Gasping for air, she could feel her bladder release, an icicle forming as the cold winter air blew through her piss-soaked pants. Her once deliberate clawing at her neck, a vain attempt to pull open the noose and let her head slip out, ceased, as her hands uncontrollably spasmed and flapped in the air, trembling.

The worst sensation, besides the pain of the tightened noose around her neck and difficulty breathing, however, was a loud, indescribable roaring in her ears, the constriction limiting the flow of blood into her head and sending her mind into a hellish world of pain.

Deliberate thought became difficult, as all she could focus on was the indescribable pain and the convulsions of her body, dancing about on the rope like she was mad. Seemingly alone, and having given up on rescue, there was only two saving graces to it all: that nobody was here to see her die in such an undignified and dishonorable manner, and that the pain would soon be over, that her suffering had a defined end where she would be graced by death. Death, which had once been a horrifying prospect to her, the fear of the unknown and infinite beyond terrifying to her atheistic self, now seemed like guaranteed heaven compared to the hellish torment that would be her last moments alive.

Her gaze drifted out into the forest, taking in the endless expanse of barren, wretched trees. What a fitting place to have her dust scatter into the breeze, to be rendered indistinguishable to the coming snowfall. Perhaps she would, in time, become a tree herself, in some other life.

And that’s when she saw them.

In the corner of her eye, as she hanged there convulsing, was the distinctive messy hair and striped sweater of someone she knew, someone that she loved like a sibling, someone that she saw a lot of herself in, perhaps the last person she’d want to have witness her like this, besides maybe Noelle.

With eyes as wide as pie tins, Kris’ terrified, petrified gaze met with hers for the last time.

She tried to utter their name, but the constriction of the rope around her neck made speech difficult. If she were to say anything, it would be an arduous effort, and guaranteed to be the last words she ever spoke. Despite the pain, despite the difficulty in gasping for air, she weakly aired out one last meek utterance.

“Kris… don’t look… at me…. I’m… I’m sorry you found me….” she faintly rasped, barely able to choke out the words audibly before she felt herself fall limp. The convulsions slowed, her arms fell to her side, her body could fight for her no longer. The last of her blood stopped flowing to her head, the constriction final. As fog enveloped her mind, and mere thought became a herculean effort, regret coursed through her weak, ever-fragmenting soul…

…Thoughts of Noelle, staring out into the snowdrifts, crying as she waited for her big sister to come home, only to never return…

…Thoughts of her father, his weak heart just shattering at the loss of his eldest daughter…

…Thoughts of Gerson, to whom she had promised never to do such a wretched thing…

…Thoughts of Kris, weeping, traumatized, reduced to a nigh infantile state having witnessed her final moments…

…Thoughts of Adelaide, applying makeup by herself in the mirror, the sloppily-applied mascara running down her face, crying to herself without her by her side… 

…Thoughts of her body, turning to dust, scattering in the wind, leaving nothing behind but her clothes and a noose…

…And with those thoughts, for the most faint of moments there was sorrow, a fleeting regret, for even her, for Carol, for mommy; a flickering fire that burned with the need to tell her that she was sorry, that they could both try to be better together. But with that last dying thought, the wick had run out, and the flame was snuffed. The sorrow and pain ceased. She stopped regretting. She stopped caring. She stopped thinking. For now, there was nothing left of her to do such things. All that remained was a body, dangling in the wind. And with Kris as its only witness, snow began to flutter down onto the fallen below.

Chapter Text

Their screams could be heard from nearly a mile away.

Having finally made it to the bunker, the wails of a familiar voice echoed out from the woods and over to Adelaide. But they weren’t the type of screams that she was familiar with, no. They were indescribable, a cry of pain so significant that fears of the worst crept into her mind.

Addy wasted no time waiting for Carol and Asgore to come in the truck as she had called for; she needed to find Kris, and now. She darted off into the woods, following the sound of their voice bouncing off the trees as snow began to fall at an alarming rate and the wind picked up. The Great Winter Storm had finally arrived.

The breeze whipping through her blonde hair and blowing snowfall into her face, the cries of her sibling grew louder and louder as she neared, eventually spotting them in the view of her flashlight, on their knees beside a large, sturdy oak.

“Kris!” she called out, rushing over to their side. “Are you okay?!” They couldn’t speak, only sob profusely.

She began to scold them. “Kris! What the fuck do you think you’re doing?! There’s a massive snowstorm about to hit us, and you’re out trying to get lost with Dess?! Why are you even out here?!?!?!”

Nonverbally, their sibling pointed up to the branches of the tree. Addy looked up, and in a flash, her heart stopped. She no longer cared about why Kris was out on their own.

Because they saw their girlfriend’s body hanging dead from the sky above.

Her whole body trembled at the sight of it, unable to look away as they shielded Kris’ eyes instinctively at the sight of it. “No… NO… NOOOO!!! DESS!!!!” Tears streaming down her face, she started to hyperventilate, and without thinking, lifted Kris up to their feet. She needed to get help immediately, and even through the blindness of grief, knew that she couldn’t leave her sibling behind to witness the horror.

“C’mon, Kris!” she begged, having to literally drag the kid along with her through the woods they were in such a catatonic state, unable to do anything but break down and cry. “We have to go!”

In short order, they made it back to the clearing by the shelter, just as Carol and Asgore were getting out of the truck. Asgore, seeing the state of both of his children, rushed over immediately, swooping them up into a hug.

“Oh, thank Angel you’re okay!” he cried out, voice barely audible in the whipping wind. “I came over as soon as I could once I heard Kris got out!” He noticed how inconsolable Kris was, and sensed something was gravely wrong, even more so by the fact Adelaide looked to be on the verge of tears herself. “Asriel, what’s going on? What happened to Kris?!”

Truth be told, Adelaide had no idea how she wasn’t a complete and utter mess right now herself; likely it was just trying to keep a strong face for Kris, and just sheer shock out of the whole thing. Whatever the case, they couldn’t answer straight, only murmuring “bring them home.”

Asgore gave her a questioning look.”Azzy, I have to help run the search with Carol before it gets any worse, shouldn’t you-”

“BRING THEM HOME!” she shrieked, knocking her father off-guard. “I’ll take Carol with me back in there, you go! NOW!!!”
Holding silent for a moment, but not looking to get into an argument with his presumed son, Asgore meekly nodded and swaddled Kris, bringing them into the truck with them and turning the engine on to return home. Adelaide, in short order, swooped in and took Carol by the hand, rushing into the woods with her.

“Asriel!” she shouted, audibly in pain. “Be careful! You know my ribs are still hurting! Why are we rushing into the-”

“DESS KILLED HERSELF!!!” she shouted angrily, not giving Carol even a moment to stop and process. “I NEED TO CUT HER DOWN BEFORE SHE DUSTS!”

Carol let go and paused in her tracks, just as they had reached the tree where Dess had hung herself, her limp, lifeless body in full view to the both of them. The doe’s hands shot up to her face, and tears began to stream from her eyes.

Adelaide snapped her fingers in her face, jamming the flashlight into her hand. “You can cry later!” she snapped, in a manner unbecoming of her. “I NEED you to hold the light for me so I can see what I’m doing!”

Carol couldn’t even nod in acknowledgement.

Taking a hold of her hand and looking her straight in the face, her own eyes teary-eyed, Addy spoke with a shaking voice. “We can mourn when she’s down. I need you to be strong one more time, for her sake, for our sake… please!”

The older woman, slowly, nodded back at last, holding the light firmly in her hands. Turning to face the tree, she shone it up at her daughter’s body, but averted her eyes, unable to bear to look at it herself.

With her way up now clearly visible, Addy began to scurry up the tree, and finally reached a point where she could rest on one of the branches nearby to where Dess was hanging from. Reaching into her own jacket pocket, she pulled out a hunting knife, Dess’ hunting knife that she had taken the night before. A sick part of her mind wondered if she’d still be alive if she had never taken the blade from her, but she pushed that down with all of the other emotions flaring up in her heart, soul, and mind. Sawing through the rope, it snapped, and Dess’ body careened down towards the ground and landed in the snow that was already starting to build up around the landscape.

She slid down the tree and immediately made a beeline for her girlfriend, joining Carol by her side as they both cradled Dess’s head and body. With her safely in their arms, all at once, the emotions burst through like a broken dam. Each of them clutched her tightly, searching desperately for a heartbeat, only to find none. Their cries broke through the wind of the forest, howling above even the loudest of noises.

“OH, DECEMBER, MY BABY!!!” Carol wailed. “WAKE UP, WAKE UP FOR MOMMY!!!!” Frantically quaking on her knees, she shook her daughter, hoping desperately that her eyes would flutter open, only for her head to lazily fall back limp like a ragdoll’s. She nearly rended her suit at the sight of it, and her tears only intensified. “What have I done!” she bemoaned. “What kind of wretched mother was I???”

Adelaide, too, was wracked with grief. “Dess, honey!” she weakly murmured, leaning in close. “I’m sorry for not being stronger for you! I’m sorry for not keeping you safe! I’m sorry….”

Desperately, she pressed her lips up to the cervine’s, and kissed her, the last kiss she knew she would ever have with her girlfriend. Her tears dripped upon her fur, and froze in place, as the snow began to slowly build up atop of them in the raging storm.

Pulling back, she brushed Dess’ hair out of her face and made her appear proper-looking as she cradled her head, and in a moment of weakness, unclamped her heart-shaped necklace and took it in her hand. It just didn’t feel right for her to be wearing such a thing as she passed.

She offered it to Carol, but in her tears, she shook her head. “Keep it,” she muttered. “Keep it, and wear it. Have her heart up next to yours….”

Solemnly nodding, Addy clamped the jewelry around her own neck, and wiped her tears. Feeling herself hit a brief emotional lull, before a major cry could come over her again, she took stock of the situation, and realized that the brunt of the storm was coming down upon them. Besides the grief, she felt a chill right down to her bones. She turned to Carol, and clutched Dess in her grasp.

“It’s too windy out!” she hollered over the gale. “If we leave her here, we’ll never be able to recover her dust, and we’ll surely freeze to death waiting!”

Carol, wiping her own tears away, meekly nodded, but with a grim look on her face. “But we’re too far away from Hometown! She won’t last long enough Fallen Down to bring her back, I can feel it in my soul!”

Addy knew she was right, but refused to leave her girlfriend to dust alone and scatter away in the winter winds. One last desperate idea crossed her mind.

Scooping up Dess in her arms, she adjusted her stance into a bridal carry, and set forth back out of the woods. Sick irony to it all, Dess had once made her promise to do exactly this if they ever got married. There was something symbolically sickening to her stomach for it to happen now of all times.

Seeing Adelaide trudge off, Carol eased herself up to her hooves and called out to her. “Dreemurr! What are you doing?! We won’t make it back to town in time!”

“I’m not going to town!” she hollered back. “We’re going to the shelter! At least she can pass on with dignity there, and we can ride out the storm until this all passes!”
Carol huffed at this, mostly out of exhaustion as she felt dangerously close to having hypothermia set in. With her ribs burning with pain, she felt she had no other choice, and silently rushed forward to join her neighbor up ahead.

Slogging through the mounting snowdrifts of the forest floor, they finally made it to the familiar red doors of the shelter. Stepping forward, Carol input the passcode to the electronic lock, and with a click, it popped open, only for black smoke to come billowing out of the bunker.

“What the-?” Carol started, but before she could take stock of the situation, Addy came plowing up behind her, too preoccupied with her girlfriend’s body to notice what was happening. Stumbling, the pair lost their balance, and careened into the pure dark of the void ahead.

…

“...Ugh… what… what the hell just happened?”

Rubbing her head, Adelaide felt woozy as she came to her feet, unsure as to exactly what had happened. She had been trudging through the snow with her girlfriend’s body when she ran into Carol, tripped, and then blacked out. It was such a strange thing to have happened. Did the cold get to her? Did she just pass out from sheer exhaustion and grief?

As her eyes adjusted to the dark, the sudden realization of where she was, or rather, where she wasn’t, struck panic into her heart. This wasn’t the shelter. This was somewhere else entirely, somewhere without form, without light, yet oddly, she could still see herself.

Yet her body had somehow changed. Her fur was more of a cream color than the near pure white she was accustomed to, and oddest of all, her clothes had changed. Gone was her masc garb; she was in a regal, flowy gown of purple, but a dark midnight purple, almost black. And right on her chest, her now somehow bountiful chest, was a large Delta Rune dyed into her gown, encased in a heart-shaped crest.

Was she… dead?!?!

The sound of Carol sobbing from behind her shook her of whatever thoughts of purgatory she may have, and she turned to catch a glimpse of her. She was knelt down in front of Dess’ body, which was clad in a punk-goth outfit distinct from anything she had ever seen her in before. Carol, for her part, was also clad in black, a mourning dress, with a black veil covering her face.

Addy gently approached her from behind, unsure of what she could even say. “Carol… is that….”

“It’s me,” she flatly said through her tears. “And it’s her. This feels too real to be a dream. I… have no idea what’s going on.”

A third voice, slow and deliberate, answered to them. “You may not… but I do….”

The pair, petrified, slowly turned around to see what was greeting them. But it was only a man, with an egg-shaped head, and an admittedly off-putting smile, but a polite enough voice.

Carol led the dialogue. “Who… are you?”

The man’s smile only grew more twisted. “Who am I…? Even I do not know… I have forgotten myself… a long, long time ago, shattered across space and time.” He stepped forward, raising his boney hands as he spoke. They had holes in the palms. “But who I am… is of no concern… the question you should really be asking….”

He pointed a skeletal finger over to Dess’ body.

“What will become of her?”

Grimacing, Carol shook her head. “She’s Fallen Down. We came in to get out of the snowstorm, and…” She froze, as a realization came upon her. “Wait… why am I explaining this to you? This is supposed to be a survival shelter, where the hell are we?

The man chuckled at the question. “Ah… so you are not aware of Dark Worlds… foolish of me to assume you did.” He slowly began to amble his way over to the group, his vacant gaze fixed upon Dess. “She created this world not so long ago. Plunged a blade into the ground with pure determination coursing through her soul, and a fountain of pure darkness was created. Marvelous, isn’t it?”

Addy and Carol shared a glance, before nodding; they silently agreed it was best to just go along with whatever the man was saying, and to not question it. Clearly something supernatural was afoot, but in the absence of knowledge, meek compliance seemed to be the safest bet for their interests.

“So… this is basically an alternate dimension, is what I’m figuring?” Addy asked.

“In a way… if that’s the easiest way for you to understand.” The Mystery Man finally made his way to the pair, and delicately rubbed the holes in his hands as he looked down at the Fallen body. “I suppose I could detail it further… but I sense that you are in quite a hurry… with her.”

A jolt passed through Carol at the mention. “There’s… not much more to do with her,” she wept, pulling the veil close to her face to wipe her tears. “She’s on the verge of passing on, and in this state… it’s already far too late to reverse. Her soul is-”

“About to shatter,” the man interjected. “Yes, I am very well aware. I can see it.”

Carol looked on with a dumb expression on her face. “See it?”

He prepared his hands, rotating them around each other in an elliptical orbit, and with that summoning, Dess’ soul presented itself. It was a weak, trembling white upside-down heart tethered to her body with gooey tendrils, its glow faint and falling ever dimmer. Pieces of it were already starting to chip off. Both Addy and Carol looked on in an odd, dejected horror; they had never, ever seen the actual manifestation of a soul before, not live, that is. “H-how did you…?”

“I have abilities that many may consider to be… unnatural… in your world. There, I am nothing. But here… I hold a great deal of power.”

The pair looked longingly at Dess’ soul, the last vestige of her still persisting, wishing desperately to tell it to fight on, and that they loved her, but knowing such a thing was far too late.

“I can tell that she is not long for this world… if she is left as she is. Once her soul shatters, she shall crumble to dust, left to float alone through the sands of time. However…”

The man retracted the soul and his smile curved ever upward, the pair swearing they could see a faint white glow in the black depths of his eyes.

“...I may be of some assistance.”

Carol’s face lit up, hope crossing her heart, even as Adelaide gave the man a curious, doubtful look. “You… you mean it? You can help?!”

“Indeed I can,” the man said with a wicked smile. “I can keep your December alive, I can keep her soul from shattering. It may not be how you expect… but it will sure be… interesting.”

Fully bought in, ready to bargain, Carol stepped forward to shake the man’s hand in agreement, only for Adelaide to swoop in and pull her aside to get her concerns off her chest.

“I don’t know about this, Aunt Carol,” Addy whispered into her ear. “We don’t know this man, and he’s giving me the creeps! Plus, we didn’t tell her Dess’ name, how does he know?!”

“Ah, be not afraid, my child,” the man interjected, cutting in before Carol could speak in protest of Addy’s concerns. “I am all-knowing, a being from beyond this world. You wish to see your girlfriend alive again, no? To have her by your side, for her to buy you dresses and to call you a ‘good girl’ again… that is what you wish for, correct, Adelaide?”

Carol, taken aback by what she heard, slowly turned to look at her. It was only then that she also noticed her now-prominent bosom, and gears started to turn. “Wait… are you-”

“We’ll talk about it later!” Adelaide stammered in a fluster. “We’ll… we'll talk… later. Just please, sir,” she pivoted towards the Mystery man. “Do what you have to do, I won’t interfere.”

The man pressed his palms together. “Excellent… most excellent,” he remarked. “All is almost in place, then. I just need… payment….”

Sighing, Carol reached into her pocket, planning on pulling out a fistful of dollars, only for the man’s hand to grasp her by the wrist and stop her. “I have no use for money,” he said. “I need something more… substantial… for my purposes. Something that will be used to create life!”

He turned towards Adelaide, beckoning with the other. “Those red horns of yours,” he instructed. “Grant me those, and I shall save your lover.”

Pulling the red horns out of a pocket in her robes, Adelaide clutched them tightly to her chest and trembled. They weren’t her horns to give away; she knew how much Kris loved them, how much they needed them. Yet all the same, she knew in her heart that she needed Dess more, and to give her life in exchange for keeping something as materialistic as a headband would be worthy of damnation.

Turning her head away, she extended her hand out, horns in her clutch. The man wasted no time in snatching them, before they seemingly fizzled out of view.

“Perfect,” he said. “Those will come in handy… at a later time. But now…” He lifted Dess’ body and began to carry it over towards a small sapling off into the distance. “...Now, we can begin.”

It sounded as if winds began to swirl in the empty void as the man and Dess approached the altar of her resurrection, reaching a fever pitch as she was set down right beside the sapling. Addy held her dress down, and Carol clutched her veil, as the pair looked on. Doubt still lingered on Addy’s face, questioning still if she could trust this man.

Turning back, the man raised his hands up to the inky sky, channeling some sort of greater power as he asked the pair, “Do you accept the risk of this procedure?”

Carol nodded along, with Addy by her side.

“Are you prepared to deal with the consequences of your actions?”

Carol replied with a terse “yes,” panicking as she swore she saw Dess’ back arch up in rigor mortis, the last stage of dying before a monster turns to dust.

The man continued with his questions. “Do you acknowledge the possibility of pain and seizure?”

“Yes!” Carol replied once more, her voice growing harsh as the delay only grew more inexplicable.

“If she is not how you expect her to be, will you-”

Carol finally lost her temper. “CAN IT WITH THE QUESTIONS! DO WHATEVER IT TAKES TO KEEP MY DAUGHTER ALIVE!!!”

The man paused, looking Carol dead in the eyes. “...Anything?”

“ANYTHING!!!!!”

His smile turned wicked, as his eyes lit up with the brightest of white pupils.

“...Then let us… begin.”

Snapping his fingers, the reverberation echoed out throughout the entire void, and the wind whipped through Addy’s hair, both her and Carol having to avert their gazes as the blinding flashes of lights lit up the entire space. A hideous procedure had just begun, and Addy felt her stomach sink as she bore witness to the oncoming transformation.

Black, tendril-like roots shot out of the ground and curled their way around Dess’ feet, as her entire body lifted upright into a standing position with her arms stretching out towards the sky. Wind whipping through her hair, her eyes shot open, but where there had once been a brilliant emerald color was now just a blank white glow.

Both Addy and Carol were unnerved by this change, but as the sapling disappeared into the ground behind Dess, her mother swiftly noted something deathly strange occurred, and was immediately filled with a blinding panic in her heart. “What… what’s happening to her?!”
Her legs and hooves, beneath her clothes, were hardening unbeknownst to the pair that whole time, and had only now burst from their confines to reveal a trunky, bark-covered surface. Dess’ whole body began to thicken and expand upward, her arms lengthening up to the sky and starting to darken themselves. As if she were breathing once more, the poor girl began to pant as the black, inky tendrils snaked their way around her thighs, before slipping up inside of her. Her chest heaved once more, but stiffened up once more, not from rigor mortis, but from the awful sensation of turning into bark and the shadowy wood of a tree.

Carol turned towards the Mystery Man and barked over at him, “WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING TO HER?! MAKE IT STOP!!!”

The man’s smile curved ever upward until it was truly demonic, before wagging a finger. “What has been started cannot be stopped,” he chided playfully. “Besides, you said anything to keep her alive.”

Her gaze turned once more to her daughter as she swore she heard her scream. Horrified gaze transfixed, herself and Addy both frozen in fear, they saw as Dess’ head, the last vestige of her body still of flesh and fur, creaked to the side and stared right at them. Her mouth opened, and hollered out a shriek that barely sounded like “MOM!” but was more akin to something indescribably unnatural and guttural, before a glow emanated from her throat and a bright, throbbing, blinking eye contorted her snout and mouth unnaturally wide into a hollow, the rest of her face hardening into the creaking bark of a tree.

Her arms split, her fingers grew, and her limbs and antlers, the last vestiges of who she was, contorted unnaturally as magenta leaves sprouted from the tips of what were once her. The great tree, nearly formed fully, groaned and creaked, as if something was gestating within it, coming to life.

Suddenly, the black tendrils burst from what was once the chest of a woman, but was now merely the bark of a tree’s trunk, and a white, dripping soul was yanked outward, still tethered to the body, but each white tether slowly snapping as the tendrils pulled it out…

…and over to the man, who beside him lay a machine that looked like the skull of a deer.

Suddenly, a blast of white from the machine lit up the entire space, turning dark into an approximation of light, as the soul was blasted with the machine. Blood and essence was sucked out from the soul and into a canister hooked up to the side, which became filled with an odd, red substance that glowed. The tendrils of the soul began to snap one by one in vicious order, as the entire mark of its being shook, bestial screams eminating from the tree as the torture happened.

Carol had seen enough. She ran over to Adelaide, swiped the knife from one of her pockets, and high-tailed it over to the man, who stood patiently as the machine finished the extraction process. Crackling sounds started to emerge from the tree, as the man took hold of the precious, weakened soul in his hands. If he wanted to, he could crush it, and turned expectedly towards Carol.

“LEAVE. MY DAUGHTER. ALONE!!!!” she shrieked, before swinging the knife down at the man’s skull…

…and being stopped in her tracks as a black, midnight claw snatched her arm in fluid motion and snapped it to a halt.

The hand had a hole in it.

Fear struck in her heart, Carol trembled as she looked up, only to find the most foul, twisted, wretched creature she had ever laid her eyes on. Having burst forth from the tree, it was almost skeletal in appearance, it’s spine visible around the waist, it’s legs terminating in knife-like points, and it’s hands mere claws. It had the appearance of having shoulder armor on as well, but most distinctive of all was the head. It was sharp, angular, pointed at the front like a knight’s helmet, with a glowing white visor in the center.

And a pair of distinctive, sharp antlers jutting out of the top.

Dropping the knife, Carol fell limp, collapsing to her knees as the Knight pulled out a sword, as black as it’s body was; it simultaneously had the appearance of a bat and a katana. Taking the blade, it set it down atop of Carol’s shoulder, before pushing down, forcing the deer to submit. She bent over and kissed the ground, shocked and in awe of the Knight’s power.

It was just like what she had once done to Dess.

“Excellent,” the man said, still holding the soul in the palm of his hand. “Most excellent, my Roaring Knight.”

Adelaide, finally snapped out of her trance by the man’s voice, rushed over to the group and eyed Dess’ soul, still quivering in apparent fear within the man’s grasp. “Carol!” she cried out, before turning her attention to the soul once more. “H-hey! What the fuck are you doing with that!”

“Oh, this?” The man smirked. “Pereservation, of course. She needs time to heal, after all. It’s been a long day for her.” With that, the soul was snatched by a tendril and yanked violently towards the tree from which it came, into the hole from which the Knight had emerged. Before Addy could so much as even move a muscle, it was swallowed up into the inky darkness of the inside of the tree, and the tendrils repaired itself, before the tree just looked like any other tree.

“I know this may be a lot for you both to understand, and my sincerest apologies for not explaining more further… I could sense you two were in a rush, and her own preservation was tantamount to both of our interests.” He clapped. “Up, my Knight,” he commanded. “Let your mother, er, Carol… let her rise.”

Retracting the bat-sword, the Knight floated backwards, giving the woman enough space to rise to her feet, trembling still out of shock and awe as she gathered herself.

Her lips quivering, Carol took her hand and cupped it around where she assumed the Knight's cheek was. “Dess?” she meekly called. “Are you still in there?”

The shadow creature only hung there in the air, unmoving.

“Ah….” The Mystery Man clapped. “It appears that our experiment is progressing…” His smile curled. “...in a most interesting manner.”

Carol looked over at the man, her former anger now replaced with a pleading voice. “Please tell me she’s still in there,” she begged.

The man nodded. “Your daughter is in there, yes…” he posited, “...but is she there? Even I do not know, but without her soul… my prognosis as a doctor… is not good.”

Adelaide stepped forward, taking hold of the man’s black robes. “Then what the fuck did you do with her soul?!” she spat. “Put it back in her, then!”

“I’m afraid I cannot just ‘put it back,’” the man chided. “Your daughter… your girlfriend… she was on death’s door when the experiment began. Her soul… her weak, fragile soul… would not survive being imbued with darkness, especially after my DT extraction… the purpose of which will come forth in due time once we have our vessel. It would have shattered… so it had to be removed. And without her soul… who is to say how much of a ‘person’ she is? I presume there is no capacity for emotion… no capacity for independent thought… she is now just merely a puppet on a string, an ‘it.’ But… don’t fret about her soul. The tree will keep it safe… allow it to heal… allow it to become whole again….”

He then shrugged. “Or… maybe not. Who’s to say… only YOU… depending on your actions… for in this world, many people’s actions do not matter… but for YOU, Carol… yours may very well matter dearly in determining the fate of your daughter.”

Putting his hands up to Carol’s face, the holes up to her eyes, she peered into a world of stained glass, a world of words spilling forth in front of her. Images and accompanying descriptions flashed forth before her eyes, rapidly, to the point where she started to spasm. The man pulled back, satisfied.

She had only looked for merely a few seconds, but what she saw was incalculable. “What… what was that?!”

“How much do you remember?”

Carol paused, before everything dawned on her, with perfect recollection. “Everything.”

The man’s smile only grew. “Perfect. Then you have borne witness to… the Prophecy.”

Her eyes widened. “You mean…”

“Like the Legend of your religion, only with the veneer pulled back and all of the details laid out bare,” he said. “The Prophecy dictates the future, dictates your purpose, and… the fate of your daughter….”

The doe paused at that specific remark. “But… there was nothing about her in there? Nothing about her fate, that is.”

“Ah, yes. For her fate is still up in the air. The Prophecy is not set in stone; it is very much fluid. If enacted lazily, if followed improperly, if not done to exact specification… there is a chance that the prophecy line may become severed, that the world may fall beyond the brink and shrouded in darkness, or… in the event that it presses on despite that, that your daughter may fall again, either lost in the darkness I imbued in her, or lost entirely.”

Leaning in close, he put his hands up to Carol’s ear, and spoke through them.

“So be very, very careful, and do exactly as I say.”

Trembling, she mumbled an affirmative “yes,” before stepping back to stand with Adelaide.

The man continued. “Now, then. With that little reminder out of the way… nobody can know what happened to December today. If too many people find out about the Prophecy, or Dark Worlds… then the line will become severed.”

He advanced towards Carol, who clutched Adelaide’s arm for support, her ribs acting up again. “Tell me, Carol,” he demanded. “Would anybody else know?”

She choked up on her words“With the storm outside… I have to imagine the search has been called off by now for safety reasons. The two of us are the only ones who have seen the body….”

“And Kris,” Adelaide chimed in. “They were the one that found her.”

At this mention, the man froze, but the smile remained well-planted on his face. “Good… make sure it stays that way, with nobody else knowing. Her fate must be kept a secret until the time is right. And as for the human child… I saw them before, from afar… they may be of some use to me.” He directed the next instruction towards Carol specifically. “If it ever appears that this ‘Kris’ person may blab… bring them over to me. I may have a use for them, and a means to keep them from talking. They will certainly not be a problem once they are joined with the Determination I’ve harvested from December’s soul.” He then murmured to himself, “the anomaly will very well soon have a host.”

Carol gulped at this, apprehensive to the idea of getting them involved, but solemnly nodded. “Okay, then.” Addy raised a hand to protest, but the deer slapped a hand over her snout. “You’ve already sacrificed a part of them today, Dreemurr. Anything goes for December. Don’t forget it.”

Satisfied, the man chuckled, and then pointed behind the pair. “Well, then. If that is satisfactory for you all, I believe our time is done. The storm should be over once you step outside, I can feel it, so feel free to leave at-ease.”

Turning around, Carol and Addy saw a shimmering band of light; they knew instinctively that it was the exit.

“...Are we ready?” Carol asked. Truth be told, though, it was left unspoken that they both knew they weren’t, that they didn’t want to accept that whatever happened to Dess had really happened.

They both needed to say goodbye.

Turning around and stepping forward, Adelaide stood in front of the Knight, who remained floating in front of her. Reaching out a hand, she took hold of the Knight’s black, sharp claw, and gently pulled down. The Knight acquiesced, and lowered to Addy’s level, head height matching.

In an act of desperation and passion, Adelaide pulled herself in towards the Knight, puckered her lips, and pressed it right up to the Knight’s visor slit. She didn’t know if it was even a mouth, or if it was even safe to do so, but she didn’t care. As she stuck her tongue in, feeling nothing resembling a mouth as she did so, a faint part of her hoped for the worst. For the Knight to gore her with the bat-katana, or for the darkness to infest her, to become one with what was left of Dess.

Instead, for the briefest of moments, there was a sensation. Her tongue in as deep as it would go, before she could pull out, Adelaide swore that she felt a phantom tendril dance with her within the visor slit, in the exact same way Dess used to tongue tango.

But then, again, there was nothing.

Pulling back, Addy sighed, before gently kissing the Knight on the forehead, tears streaming down her face as she did so. Taking hold of her hands, and feeling the Knight drift upward once more, she clenched them hard, and spoke a loving reminder right up to it.

“Irgendwie, irgendwo, irgendwann… somehow, somewhere, sometime… I promise we’ll be together again, Dess. I’ll always love you, and I’ll always be here for you. No matter what happens, or who you are… just remember that. I love you.”

Wrapping her arms around in embrace, Adelaide wiped her tears, nodded solemnly, and turned around to make her way towards the light of the exit. Slowly, her body shrank off into the distance, before disappearing altogether.

With Adelaide gone, Carol let her guard drop, and rushed over to the Knight, as fast as her broken ribs would allow her, and hugged it tightly, refusing to let go. Tears streamed down her face, as the old woman wailed profusely.

“Oh, Angel… Dess… I’m sorry for ever letting this happen to you! I wish that I did a better job of loving you! I wish that I… could’ve been a better mother for you!”

Leaning in as close as she could, squeezing as hard as her body would allow, Carol opened her heart, sniffled, and gave Dess one last warm memory to hopefully hold on to. Her raspy, tired voice sang from her soul…

“You are my sunshine, my only sunshine,

You make me happy, when skies are gray.

You’ll never know, dear, how much I love you,

So please don’t take my sunshine away….”

Barely able to make it through the last line, Carol collapsed to her knees and broke down sobbing, inconsolable, babbling “I love you, Dess” and “I’m so sorry,” over and over.

The Mystery Man, seeing her in such a state, stepped in between the Knight and Carol, taking his hands and lifting the woman up to her feet. “Don’t cry,” he said, flat. “You’re daughter’s not truly dead yet. Remember the Prophecy, remember what must be done, and she shall be saved.”

Her heaves slowly subsiding, she felt the man wipe the tears from her face, and nodded solemnly. Without another word, she kissed her hand, placed it where she assumed the Knight’s heart would be, and turned, slowly ambling her way towards the exit.

The Knight began to drift in her direction, as if to follow, but was halted when the man placed a hand in front of it.

“I’m afraid that your form is much too weak to be sustained in the Light World as of yet,” he said. “You have only just come back to life, and would whither and rot away if exposed to the outside. But fret not.” He placed a hand on it’s shoulder, a weak symbol of comfort. “Soon, you shall grow strong, and once the Grand Fountain is opened, your true purpose will become clear. You will hold the power to enact your deepest, darkest fantasies. You will hold the power to cover the world in darkness.” Turning away, he shuffled over to the tree, and slid behind it. “I will leave you be for now, my first experiment. My new puppet. My Roaring Knight. My… DELTARUNE.” With that, he fell silent.

The Knight didn’t care.

It only watched intently, longingly, as Carol slid into the slit of light in the distance, and disappeared from view.

And with that, the world descended into total darkness once more.

…

The light, after so long in the dark, was blinding.

Carol winced as her eyes adjusted to the brightness of daylight; true to the man’s word, the snowstorm had ended, and a bright, sunny day had come to grace Hometown, reflecting blindingly off the meter-tall blanket of snow that covered the landscape.

Rubbing her face, tired, she let out a yawn, before spying Adelaide right beside her. The two stared at each other for an awkward amount of time, unsure of what to even say after such a taxing night.

Eventually, someone had to speak up.

“So,” Carol began. “I take your name is no longer ‘Asriel,’ hm?”

Addy seethed, before nodding. “It’s… Adelaide, now. Dess was… is… the only other person who knows… and maybe Kris, too, I’m still unsure about them….”

Sighing, the doe placed a hand on her neighbor’s shoulder. “Look, Addy… is it okay if I call you Addy?”

“More than fine.”

“Look… you’re secret’s safe with me. If you ever need to confide in someone to deal with navigating the complexities of womanhood, or just a shoulder to lean on, I’ll always be here for you. Just… I’ll keep your secret, but you have to keep this, too.”

Looking down at the snowy ground, pain still in her mind, Addy nodded.

Carol continued on, sternly. “Not a word of this to anybody. Not Tori, not Gorey, and not even Kris.” She paused, taking a deep, preparatory breath, before she added, “I also think it would be in your best interest to… stay at uni for the time being.”

She received a head-tilt at this proposition. “What do you mean? My plans on going to CCML haven’t changed.”

“Correct, but…” She grimaced, knowing how poorly Addy was likely to take this next bit. “I think it’s best if you stayed there even outside of school. I don’t want to see you back in Hometown until December… Dess… is ‘cured’ of her condition.”

As expected, Adelaide shot back at her. “But I made a promise to Dess back in there that I’d-”

“That you’d always be there for her, I’m aware. But Addy, that’s not Dess. That’s just… a shadow of her. Without her soul… that’s nothing more than her body just limply hanging about.”

Addy continued to protest. “But when I kissed her, I felt-”

“What you felt was probably in her head.” Carol sighed, and rubbed her temple. “Look, it hurts me to be like this, too, but… the Prophecy dictates it.”

Adelaide held silent at the mention.

“Addy, you’re not in the prophecy. At all. You’re just a wild card, and I can’t afford to have any wild cards in the fray.” She teared up as she spoke, her voice growing strained. “I’ll do anything! I’ll even cover your housing expenses, but please! Just listen to me! I don’t wanna lose my December, Addy! Please, just… do as I say!”

Seeing the older woman she considered to be an aunt so weak and vulnerable in front of her, Adelaide, despite her soul’s will, cast aside her doubts and acquiesced. “Okay, Aunt Carol,” she promised. “I’ll stay back in Megalopolis once I get there. In fact… I’ll start my college prep early.”

Wiping a tear from her face, Carol offered a weak smile in return, and hugged her. “Thank you,” she cried. “Thank you.”

…

Darkness.

That was the entire world now. Darkness.

Resting alone in the void, up against it’s tree, the Roaring Knight was silent. There was nothing to fight, nothing to smash, nothing to do but wrestle with the thoughts floating through it’s head. Thoughts of guilt, thoughts of shame, thoughts of pain, loss, abandonment, and existential misery.

Had it been days? Months? Years? It did not know; time was almost nonexistent in this plane of existence. There was no day, no sleep, barely a sense of wake, just a tortuous, neverending night. An eternity that drove it mad. It begged for death, to free itself from the torment, but could not die.

The other people had yet to return. Not the deer woman, nor the young blonde goat. They had left the Knight abandoned in it’s void, in it’s purgatory. No, this was hell. The tree, the suicide, all of it, this had to be the seventh circle of hell, personally set aside for it. It longed for the warmth of the sun, the cold of actual night, but for within this void, there was no sensation other than mental torment.

Not even the strange man occupied the space; he had mentioned having to take care of other duties, and that was that, he just vanished, leaving the Knight to it’s own devices. It so wished the man had stayed, so it could kill him, or better yet, torture him, but he must’ve been too wise for that.

Besides, he was still it’s only hope, somehow.

His words echoed through it’s head, about the Prophecy, insistently on how it couldn’t feel pain, how it couldn’t feel emotion. How it was nothing more than a puppet on a string.

And then, in the darkest recesses of it’s mind, the darkest recesses of where it’s soul should’ve been, it thought of the song that woman sang to her just before she left. And that made something within it’s chest swell.

The loneliness, the loss of being, the insistence that it was nothing. It all finally got to it. From it’s visor, a weird goop welled up within the slit, slid down the side of it’s face, and dripped down to the ground, showering the tree’s roots with the odd black gunk. Overwhelmed, it put it’s hands to it’s face, and heaved, as more liquid poured out and dampened the world around it.

Defiantly, she cried.