[Solo set after the events from this RP]
She doesn’t leave the house for three days after it happens and it takes two just to get her out of her room. Her mother presumes she’s sick at first because that’s what her daughter tells her. Chicken soup is made, temperatures taken, motherly hugs given. It gives her some relief but it’s not her body that needs healing, it’s her heart. She’s isn't just Anelie anymore, she’s also Aludra and Aludra is in a crisis. Aludra has seen terrible things and doesn't know how to cope.
Anelie sobs into her pillows and then dries her tears before her mother can see them. She curls on her side in bed, clutching a pillow to her chest and she watches the same image in her mind over and over: a girl hoisted into the air on a spear, grasping hands and blood leaking down the shaft. There’s never any sound, just the buzz of white noise and her desperate, shallow breathing.
I couldn’t do anything.
She has never felt more of a child than at that moment. She felt, and still feels, small and helpless. Anelie hates it; hates the darkness that creeps into her heart and makes her body cold. She thinks she should be stronger. She wishes desperately that she could be stronger.
On the second day she stares out of her window and whispers the words, 'I quit'. As if Aludra is something you can just toss away. Anelie doesn't want to fight anymore, she doesn't care about helping people and doing good things, she doesn't care about being magical or being capable of amazing things. She’s done with all of it. She’s seen death for the first time and at the age of twelve is discovering her own mortality.
It could have been her.
She wonders how the others are doing-
Persephone, Dionysus, Sidouer…
… and if she’ll ever see them again.
She wonders if the Negaverse is out there killing other girls or ruining other teams.
On the third day she sits on the couch in the living room, with her mother hovering near the kitchen door, watching and waiting. ‘Tom and Jerry’ is on and she watches the cat chases after the mouse without even seeing it. She watches the mallet come down a spear stabbing forward and Jerry is squished Biela held high like a trophy before he shakes himself off and scampers away simply tossed aside.
Anelie closes her eyes and moments later feels a cool hand against her head.
"Mama…"
"What’s the matter sweetie? You can tell me."
"... I had a fight with some friends. That’s all. I’m sorry to worry you." Anelie tries to pull herself together with the lie and force smile but instead starts crying.
"Aw, baby." She’s engulfed in her mothers’ warm, embrace. "It’s okay sweetie. These things happen but it will work out. It will get better."
And maybe it will.
I quit. She tells herself again. But her heart isn't quite in it because somewhere out there her friends are still fighting and people are still getting hurt and even though she’s small, maybe there is some good she can do.
So she quits, but just for a little while, just until her heart can partly heal.
But there will always be a scar.
