#anna jay

Anna stares down at the water. It’s up to her knees now, the sloshing slowly getting worse. Thunder rolls around her softly.

“Hey! Anna!” Max calls from his platform high above her. “Up here! Are you okay?”

Anna looks up slowly at him. She looks downright miserable. There’s bags under her eyes, and she looks as though she’s been crying. “What did you do?”

“Nothing,” Max says, clearing his throat. “Nothing. I didn’t-“ he sighs, trying to think of how to explain this. “I don’t know,” he admits.

Thunder cracks from within the walls, making Max jump.

Anna stays perfectly still as she watches him sadly.

“We gotta get you out of here,” Max says. “You can’t stay here.”

“You ruined my home,” Anna says, sniffling. “I don’t want to go with you.”

“You don’t have a choice, Anna. It’s either us, or death.”

Anna steps back.

Max can see a drop off behind her. A wave pool, swirling in the middle into god knows where.

“Anna,” he says cautiously, “you need to come with us.”

“Why should I? So you can ruin other people’s homes?”

“Because you can help us fix it,” Max says. “And everyone else’s.”

Anna looks around at her crumbling home. The ceiling is crying, the water fountains are cracking. The storm only grows louder, more violent.

The water pushes her back, closer towards the whirlpool.

“Anna!”

Anna gasps as she stumbles back, falling backwards.

Max snaps out of the dimension, back in just in time to catch her, and back out.

Anna flops out of Max’s arms, hitting the ground with a thud. She shakes, hugging herself. Silent tears get smeared over her cheeks.

“What the fuck did you do to her?” Darby asks, getting in Max’s face the second after he lays eyes on Anna. “You were just supposed to ask for help, not traumatize her!”

“Her world was falling apart, shithead,” Max hisses. “What else was I supposed to do? Let her drown?”

“You can’t just snatch people up, Max, that messes with them.”

“Oh, yeah, like you’d know, you freak of nature.”

Orange crouches down next to Anna as Max and Darby argue. He puts a hand on her shoulder. “You’re gonna be okay,” he says quietly.