#;ficlet

      They say the war is ending soon, but he’s seen enough in his the few years he’s lived that he’ll believe it when he sees it. A freshman in high school now, Thredson goes to school and works small odd jobs here and there for pocket money. He wasn’t one to blend into the preppy Oxford crowds with pastel button-downs and penny loafers, or fuzzy sweaters and poodle skirts. Nor was he one for the hoodlums with greasy hair and a leather jacket to match. To the other kids, he was always just Thredson–a tall lanky kid in worn hand-me-down blue jeans rolled up at the ankle, a short sleeve collar shirt, and some plain pullover sweater to match. A loner. And that’s just the way he liked it.

      Tonight, he wasn’t particularly eager to return to the orphanage right away, choosing to wander the streets alone until his tennis shoes stopped in front of something familiar. From beneath heavy brows, he stared up at the brilliantly glowing marquee of the in-door movie theatre downtown. Thursday nights are quietest. Even better? Late nights meant he could spend the evening alone save for a few bodies occupying random seats across the theatre floor. For once, the idiots at the home would spend most of the night scurrying around town looking for their troublesome charge like fretful mice. It wasn’t as if it mattered really. One punishment was just like any other, the only difference is you could never be certain of when it was coming. And he would bear every one of them, whether a paddling or the leather crop as if it didn’t bother him because he was raised that boys don’t cry.

      Sometimes he didn’t return that same night or the next night for that matter. Listening to a crowd of whining boys bicker, complaining about school and the social lives that didn’t exist wasn’t exactly at the top of his list. They were either a) too naïve or b) too clueless to realize they were outcasts compared to everyone else. An orphan, the preordained destiny that led to a life of crime that would never amount to anything from the day they took their first breath. At some point, he’d decided he wouldn’t be like the others who ripped off sweets or anything else they wanted from the local shops before they made run for it.

      Some say the most important thing in life is to pursue happiness—that no one else’s happiness matters except your own. Well, happiness is elusive, temporary, and evolved from circumstance. Especially when you’re five, living in a broken home where the ceiling is cracked and leaking into a dented pot. There should be one person that you can depend on to make it worthwhile and erase even the hardest of days. Make you forget that you’re hungry, warm your hands, distract you from the icy tendrils of Boston’s winter as they creep in beneath the front and back door like a deadly invisible fog with the intention of wrapping around your vulnerable little bones.

      Being a mother isn’t easy and there is no love greater than that for her children. Some do an excellent job of that challenging assignment…but not all. Mothers who are abusive can mask your bruises beneath layers of clothing, knowing that it’s too cold to take them off (that no one will see). And when you’re that small, five-years-old, you think you can disappear or that your silence will somehow protect you.

      She was the doctor’s first case: the owner of a little half-way house for orphaned children: Julia Menken, thirty-eight-years-old, mother of Christopher Menken, five-years-old. Tonight, her own little boy and every other living in her home will spend the first of many nights in an orphanage. If it can be helped, never is the doctor’s intention to take a child from its mother but in this case, it’s the only way to protect him, all of them, from her. 

      ‘She’s undeserving,’ the doctor thinks, the leisurely tap of rubber soled boots echoing as he circles in the surrounding darkness of his steel table. Dark eyes as cold as the table she lay on. She’d used them all for the money provided by the state to care for them, has taken the gift of her son for granted, a tiny defenseless target for her frustrations of an unforgiving world. The doctor leans over her to stare into Julia’s frightened face sickly white with fear. She’s always been alone and no one will miss her. His tone is uncomfortably relaxed; the same tone he’d used as he sat across from her in that courtroom, explaining her diagnosis, her use of scapegoating and shaming her son into believing he was something bad and was at fault for her failures.

      “Julia—” the doctor says, his tone mildly scolding. “Children require protection from the world, from its cruelties—its debasement. Innocence is something you can’t get back once it’s lost, you know that. You should have been soothing his scuffed knee and wiping his tears…yet you didn’t.”

      Her eyes widen, head shaking almost violently with the realization that he was watching then. The doctor could still hear the way she’d dragged her son up the walkway by the scruff of his jacket through the powered snow of the yard like a dog when he’d grabbed the long tails of her coat, unable to keep up after his fall. Rather than pick him up, Christopher chased after his mother towards the house, crying as he shouted over and over, “I’m sorry!” and “I don’t want to go to the closet!”

      Christopher is terrified of the dark and what’s in it. Shame he’s too young to understand that the monsters he fears are hiding where he can see them too. She sent him off to school every day, sat across from him at the dinner table, bruised his skin, and shoved him into that very closet where he was actually safe and just didn’t know it.

Wards often joke claiming they’re made of snips and snails, and puppy dog tails. Oliver didn’t find it funny the first time or any other time after that. This place is one of the circles of hell the Superior talks about during a Sunday sermon; they’re just too stupid or blinded by their beliefs to realize it. Unlike most of the children here, he feels as if he’s well beyond their years. No one is like him, no one is as…self aware…as him. And today, as he stands in the yard—huddled among several other boys against the bitter cold of winter—he’s reminded a little too vividly of the events of yesterday and that this is just another level of hell.

From his perch on the highest step of the rickety wooden stairs, Oliver watches through the balusters, can see the truth of what the boys here are made of. His eyes follow a nun dash back and forth from the infirmary at the back of the building. She’s in a hurry; carrying towels, refreshing water from the pump outside. They don’t know he’s there. At the tender age of seven years old, Oliver already knows this infirmary all too well. He doesn’t like to go all the way in unless he absolutely has to, unless he’s very, very sick.

Watching as a Ward carries the limp body of a boy much younger than Oliver into the infirmary, he subconsciously toys with a metal clasp of his jacket. A nervous habit. Yet he’s indifferent to this boy suffering. His name is Jeffrey. The doctor on call said Jeffrey had something called inanition. The nun’s say it’s a lack of spiritual vigor and mental enthusiasm. The doctor’s say it’s a lack of nourishment. It makes no sense that neither of them know. Rather than watch them bicker over medicine versus religion, Oliver wants to come out of his hiding spot on the stairs, walk right up to them and blurt, “Well? Which is it? Because I don’t think either of you know…”

It’s not that he cares, per se, yet more of a need to sate his curiosity. But he doesn’t ask simply because he doesn’t want to miss what happens. Just looking at Jeffrey, Oliver knows he isn’t going to make it. Their eyes meet. Jeffrey can see Oliver peering down at him from up high. The dark eyes watching him die are the last Jeffrey will ever see and Oliver wonders why he stares into nothingness as he takes his last breath. Strange the way his gaze is enraptured as if something fascinating is happening behind his eyes that Jeffrey will take to his grave.

Every death, they’re all required to come out to the small plot of land behind the orphanage; the cemetery. There they will listen to the Superior ramble a bunch of nonsensical scripture, and place a few freshly plucked lemon mints from the garden over Jeffry’s grave. Often he wonders if the lemon scented flowers are for decoration or to cover the faint scent of decay. Regardless, he would rather go inside, upstairs into the crawl space between the stairs where it’s quiet and warm. It’s where he keeps his collection of books and Sister Carmine’s thimble and a spool of thread, and other stolen articles mostly because he could take them. They are all personal, sentimental effects.

Outside, Oliver watches quietly, an expression of aloofness as the designated slab of cement is laid at the head of the grave. There’s no marker, it’s just an identification number. There used to be grave markers on the first one hundred graves, but he supposes the Wards have either gotten lazy or don’t care. This is a reminder that none of them have names anymore, they’re just a number. Will he join these rows of numbers lined up over the frost bitten ground one day?

The sounds of several younger boys crying nearby reach his ears and he resists the urge to roll his eyes, to glare at their red tear-stained faces. The entire scenario is a little too macabre for Oliver’s taste. But soon they’ll run off and play to forget what they’ve seen. He’s witnessed it countless times and it’s silly of them to think that death can’t touch them when it’s so recently stared them in the face.

     It was September of nineteen seventy. As a child, Elizabeth would often ask if she can have a dog. At the time, he'd sworn to keep his past a secret from the little girl skipping at his side along the sidewalk. The answer is always no, respectfully. She hardly came up to the height of his waist then, a steadily growing vocabulary, and bouncing blonde hair that seemed to lighten each summer as she sought to keep up with his steps over the pavement. At least until she suddenly snatched her hand from his grasp and pointed at a large window filled with romping puppies of all variety on display. Bright orange-ish letters are painted over the glass.

                                     Reynold's Pet Shop 

                                       Pick A Puppy, 

                                    Leave With A Friend 

     Advertising at its finest. After several mild attempts to steer her from the window, the last firm no is spoken, promptly lighting the fuse of a full-blown tantrum for every passerby to witness.

     "Animals are dirty...and also carriers of disease, Elizabeth," he tells her. There is nothing soothing about his words, no comfort in his tone. And although she still wanted one, there was no explanation he could provide to disguise the fact that she’ll always go off the word of the father of lies. It simply wasn't in the cards for her to know the real reason he doesn't mix well with animals, that he's killed them before and wouldn't stop himself from killing an annoying, yapping ball of fluff in her bedroom while she was at school. Nor is he above telling her that her precious pooch ran off into the woods when he'd left the door open to take out the trash. He can’t help himself, it’s not his fault. It’s just something...unbelievably satisfying about the sensation of sinking as one of his tools seeps into a mass of flesh, the sound of metal grinding against bone, separating piece by piece to throw into the furnace. 

     Truthfully, he'd never seen her so upset, in public no less. At that moment, he was observing his very own temper reflected back at him for the very first time. Elizabeth refused to leave the window of the pet store, had thrown her weight into a dive towards the shop door in an attempt to shake off the large hand tugging her away.

     On that busy sidewalk, he'd become the center of attention—a man carrying a hefty brown paper sack filled with groceries in one arm, a small child screaming bloody murder as she dangled by the back of her yellow sundress from his other hand in haste to get her to the car. It’s not that he gave a shit about the stares, or the hushed whispers of judgment as he manages to scoop her up into his arms. For all they think they see is a lack of good parenting and a spoiled child. They don’t understand that he’s actually protecting her from a horrific truth that no child should ever come to understand. 

FIRST OF ALL FRICK U SECOND OF ALL HAVE A DRABBLE

     They're just toys. Toys meant to put one on edge, thinking that their contacting the Void. There's always that one member in the group that moved the main piece around just to scare the others. However, how could someone else move the piece if it's just one person. Alone, whatever answer they got, if it moved at all, would be legitimate.

     This was Emily Kaldwin's logic when she set out the board on her bedroom floor, her fingers absolutely tinging at the thought of it actually working. It was one of the frequent nights she awoke from a dreamless sleep, thinking of sneaking away into her mother's room, only to remember. The brief instance of the past left her without breath and a with terrible burning in her eyes.

     She attained the game through one of many servants wandering the Tower a few days ago, and against Corvo's wishes. He didn't want her tampering with thoughts like this. Thoughts of the Void, much less attempting contact. The young empress was determined to at least try. Driven by a deep and scarred longing in her heart, with just a hint of childlike curiosity. Her dark eyes scanned the glossy cardboard, her fingers outstretching to graze the letters the adorned its surface. Picking up the leading piece -- a triangular shape made of wood with a glass center -- she took a breath and shut her eyes tightly.

     Think of her. No matter how much it hurts. Make this work.

            "Mother? Mommy are you there?"

     She swallowed after she finished questioning her empty room, pale digits still pressed to the center piece with purpose. And she waited. And waited.

          "Mommy, please. I-- give me some            sign that you're here. There.                                 

                                        Anything. Please."

     Her hands remained in place, the board showing absolutely no sign of moving. Only fourteen seconds past before she was in tears, her hands retracting and finding her face angrily. Nothing worked. Why would it? She shouldn't have put her hope in some game for kids. She was an empress. She shouldn't be wasting her time with this. Hiccuping, she stood and gave a hearty kick to the triangular piece, sending it tumbling into her nightstand's left leg with a smack. She returned to bed feeling defeated.

tosses a drabble at u tbh ❤❤❤

     It was one of the lonely nights she insisted he put his training to good use and sneak into her room. She didn’t ask it of him too much because of the worried and uncertain look that made his brow crease and his fingers fidget. Excuse of her birthday rounding the corner was used and when her door gave the subtlest hint of being opened, she knew it was him.

     She was positively addicted to his warmth; his arms that held her close and the smell of the skin just below his jaw. She didn’t seem to mind the scratch on his cheek at all, for as much as he apologized for it. Her slender fingers would act a comb on his fairly knotted hair, brushing it back from his dark eyes absently as they breathed together in the dark. She was always the one to fall asleep first, as he refused rest until she was out like a light. She’d tried pretending, before. He wasn’t fooled easily. Their bodies hardly drifted, even in sleep, as they both were too familiar with the act of clinging to each other while resting.

     It was a dirty trick, if he was to take the time to look back on the event later.

     Though it wasn’t as if he were on too terrible terms with the woman. He didn’t get along with many people, and while he wouldn’t necessarily call them friends, he didn’t mind hanging around her. ——Much to her discontent, evidently, as he interrupted her oh-so-languid dancing with an outstretched leg, and a craving for mischief. He almost got away with it, too, if it wasn’t for her quick hands grabbing hold of the end of his long cloak, snagging him back for what could only be revenge.

     Up on her feet in a fluid movement, frustrated fingers still grasping the fairly tattered fabric, she pulled — yanked — him towards her. The thief’s feet made to sidestep before deciding to fall into the movement instead of fight it. Turning around towards her rather elegantly, like a dancer, he might add, Garrett faced her with a sly and proudly guilty smirk. And as Ira went to give him a piece of her mind, he leaned down and met her lips with his own. A short kiss, it was; dry, and without meaning.

     Garrett never would grow accustomed to the supernatural powers this man possessed. It was irritating and intriguing all at once, coupled with the slightest twinge of jealousy on his part. Immortality seemed to fade into the recesses of the unimportant when faced with teleportation, among other abilities he couldn’t quite pinpoint.

     How exactly he’d managed to snag his treasured mask was a blur of the aforementioned talents at this point. It was hard to recall it clearly with a rough hand pressed to his throat, back to the seal of an open window from which he’d snuck into the other’s room many times before. Sometimes with the same goal of taking that handcrafted face piece, sometimes not. His priorities varied.

             " — Anything to say before I                     toss you out like the rat                     you are?”

     The threat wasn’t empty, that was for sure. Hand holding the body guard’s mask is grasped hard at the wrist, and the thief’s spider-like fingers clutch it laxly despite the tenseness of the situation. He had the means of saving himself if the other follows through. But he feels more playful than that, surprisingly enough.

     Once the calloused fingers pressed to his neck loosen some for what he can only assume is to give him a chance to speak, the blackhand thrusts forward and, what with the closeness of their proximity, mouth brushing past his attacker's barely. A smile and he takes advantage of the confusion elicited from the action to kiss him properly, a meeting of dry lips and empty intentions, before shoving him away with the all strength he could muster in the moment. Garrett promptly tossed the mask at the Royal Protector, a flick of the wrist whilst grabbing Erin's claw from its holster at his hip.

             "Take care of it for me."

     Bewildered, the other doesn't move, with the exception of catching his property, as the thief swiftly exits the the way he came, climbing up with his tool's assistance and disappearing into the shadows.