#greatdcvide

she can't believe they're back where they started. somehow they'd all convinced lottie that they needed more time before they had decided on who was going to die. she had given them an hour. taissa was pacing back and forth, fleeting thoughts of things she could do to stop this racing through her mind. she could somehow get to a car ( she'd feel bad for leaving the others and her past would still follow her ) or she could run into the woods and survive like she had before ( but that just felt like throwing herself face first into her past ) she had to admit that she was stuck in the middle of nowhere with people who had the ability to kill her - AGAIN.

she doesn't want to think about the potential that lottie was right. taissa was actively ruining her own life and while she felt the guilt, it wasn't like she was doing anything to fix it. if anything, the fact that she had even driven hours to be at this very compound was proof that she had never moved on and she was never going to. her thoughts are interrupted as lottie enters the room and she stops pacing, walking right up to her.

Maybe it's a shard of a mind fragmenting, but she was there. Still as real, as visceral seeming as anything else. She sighs, wide eyes focused on her older counterpart, eyes that could maybe even be described as innocent. But you know better, don't you? She offers a smile too, at herself (was this some kind of fucked up attempt at self reassurance?)

The words dance around the room, why are you still here? As if the answer could really be found anywhere external. As if she doesn't already know. There's something to be said about the past and how it does not like to go quietly, especially when yours is as loud and ravenous as hers.

And so here she stands, a haunting, an echo of girlhood. A remnant of a lifetime ago, something that refuses to die. "You really don't see it yet?" She asks softly. "Even when you don't see me, I'm still here. I never left."