#caevent

[You're almost desensitized to it, to the memories that keep making a point to plague you.  You're almost desensitized to it, but that doesn't mean they stop.  That doesn't mean you know how to snap yourself out of it. You can't even willingly separate yourself from the memories.  You always end up wrapped up, as if you were in each moment all over again.

Particularly the nice memories.  Games with friends, silly human holidays, baking with Joshua, stupid Sunday shit with anyone... It's easy toget sucked in, to allow yourself that shadow of comfort...]

[The memory your fearless leader wanders into starts off as one of these--a memory of you cuddling with your former Moirail, Sean.  He was a human, but you grew close quickly and you rusted him to support and balance you.

He was your first Moirail and, while you felt like you failed him more often than not, as you lay there and cuddle into his larger form, it's easy to forget that.  It's easy to feel cared for and loved despite that.  It's only a memory, but you find yourself giggling and relaxing into the mirage of warmth.]

[Until the scene changes.

Until you are on your knees on a carpeted floor surrounded by a dizzying amount of cherry blood and a deafening ringing in your ears.

Until you stand up, wobbly, and try to focus your attention on the intruder instead of the bloody, familiar heap on the ground muttering something about why didn't his attempted suicide work? ]

[It's hard to turn away from the ghost of your injured moirail.  It's hard to fight the sickening churning in your gut and ignore the vivid detail of the scene--gun in his hand, note on the desk, blood on the wall--but you do.  You face Karkat with barely a look of shock.]

H3Y K4RK4T

[ She had been hiding for a while, hadn't she? Hadn't been seen, nor heard of, for quite a while. Even Deadpool wouldn't have found her, with any luck. She hadn't been paying too much attention to the world of Hive City.

But that had all changed, with this. Somehow, impossibly, she had gotten sick. Maybe this virus was stronger than she had realised, or maybe she just didn't have an immunity to it. Of course, it was getting harder and harder to think rationally, her act of civilization unravelling. Her immune system was resilient, and her regeneration took care of the weakness.

Unfortunately, the main effect of this virus was rage. Something the young mutant had an abundance of, and it didn't take much for her to lash out, even at the best of times. The parts of the brain affected by the virus were also the ones that triggered whenever she smelled the Scent, causing her to lose almost all rationality. To hurt, to main, to kill. It didn't matter who they were, what they meant to her. Everyone was simply flesh and blood. ]

[ Snarling, she stalked through the streets of the city, claws extended. Anyone she saw was a target, just as they always had been. She only paused to lash out at anyone, anything that was in her way,  uncaring of any minor injuries she obtained. They would heal, anyway. ]