#hadlee

+ more nighttime photos I took

No one in Bogtown knew who she was, and no one opened their doors for her. The Mystics took Hadlee in, teaching her their ways and giving her a family. As grateful as Hadlee was to have a home, the mystery of who she was and where she came from was always in the back of her mind. It didn’t help that every time she slept, she had the same dream of herself and three women being burned alive.

Two years after she was found, the Mystics moved to Darkmoor, and Hadlee with them. She would help with making jewelry to sell as well as do tarot readings and fortune telling, the latter which she had a natural ability to do. Whenever Hadlee made physical contact with someone, she was able to see glimpses of their future.

During one session with a young man named Marc, Hadlee saw in the near future he would be bitten by a werewolf and turned into one. She tried to warn him, but Marc did not believe her, thinking everything about the Mystics was just a bunch of superstitious bull.

A few days later, an older Meg Giry came with her husband, Benjamin Fletcher, to see the wolf-seer and determine if the bite Marc received was from a werewolf. And just like Hadlee predicted, the Maleva confirmed it was and that he had the curse of the werewolf.

Hadlee knew how the rest of the story would go. One of the Mystics would have also been eavesdropping on the meeting and would tell the Hounds, who would hunt Marc down, and take him to Victoria Frankenstein for her to conduct her experiment on. She had seen it play out countless times before, even before they moved to Darkmoor. It was despicable, but there wasn’t ever anything she could do.

Or was there?

Using her seeing capabilities, Hadlee was able to find Marc before the Hounds did with the help of his younger brother, Justin. She gave him a headstart, letting him escape to the woods through the Catacombs minutes before the hunters came.

Hadlee figured that would be the last time she saw him. What went on in the forest was none of her business. She went back to the Mystics, living her life the same way she did before. Only, she couldn’t help but feel as if the Catacombs held secrets that explained who she was.

When Marc came to visit her and said he would do anything in order to repay her for saving his life, she knew what to ask for.

It was the same every day. Every maintenance worker who would get crushed in some pipe within the labyrinthine coolant systems. Every actor who had died a thousand times before, entered once more into the reviving schedule. Every caller who got the rehearsed, meaningless message that would inevitably get them brought in, killed, and worse.

She wondered what it would have been like if she had been the one to answer when Paislie had called the place looking for a job. If she could've told the sixteen year old to never call back, take her siblings and run, get away, anything.

It wouldn't have worked.

Nothing ever did, not here.

Not even when the company had found a way to cheat death and defy the nature of the universe.

Of course the one it had failed every time had to be Paislie.

The younger had stopped forming coherent sentences hours ago. Their breaths were too shallow and fast, their hand cold as Hadlee clutched it to her own chest.

Hadlee didn't want to tell anyone Paislie was dying again. They'd take them, and Hadlee would be refused any information for days on end without even a file of the ex-actor's to look at.

That feeling only got worse with time.

"Hal?"

"Yeah. I'm here, Pey-Pey," Hadlee murmured into their hair.

"Home?"

Hadlee wanted to scream, but she stopped herself with a deep breath. "I promise, Lee, if we make it out, I'm gonna take you home and we'll never look back, I promise you. I'm sorry."

Paislie's head lolled to the side as they made an effort to keep eye contact with Hadlee. "Not your fault."

The black-haired girl paused, picking up rocking Paislie again. She hardly dared to hope, but the other seemed more coherent than she could've possibly hoped for.

"Just hang on for me, yeah? Then you can be upset at me."

Paislie looked down slowly, then back up once more. " 'M I dyin'?"

Hadlee swore she could taste blood. This wasn't fair, this wasn't fair, it wasn't fair. "I'm not letting you. We're not going anywhere except back to work in the morning."

The younger frowned.

"I know, Pey, I know. We can talk later. I'm sorry."

"Stop," Paislie muttered, resting their head on Hadlee's shoulder with a dull thunk. "Nuh uh."

Both of them fell silent after that, and Hadlee moved to relax against the wall.

She couldn't help but wonder where Paislie's siblings were. If she ever got out, she had already sworn a million times over to find them. They'd all be between four and eight by now, if she had to guess.

If she were honest, she was probably most excited to meet Paislie's twin siblings.

She wondered how much they looked like Paislie.

And as she fell asleep, she hummed any tune she could think of and prayed to whatever was out there that this wouldn't be the last time she saw Paislie.

Hadlee hadn't been prepared when Showfall had really and truly been shut down.

She found herself questioning reality as swarms of government officials crowded the place, rapidly shouting orders and discoveries at each other.

All the employees were considered suspects for a long time. Hadlee hadn't realized how lucky she had been to land a desk job instead of- well, anything else. She would let it suffice to say that court-ordered therapy was for the lucky ones.

Paislie, along with tens, maybe hundreds of others, were found in the form of ashes with serial numbers on the boxes. What put a bitter taste in her mouth was the fact that some of them couldn't or even wouldn't be returned, whether that was due to not knowing whose ashes they were or as some form of evidence.

With the truth out, the number Showfall had set up was quickly shut down and given to someone. Hadlee wasn't sure it should've been reassigned due to the publicity, but whatever floated the guy's boat.

What had to have been the worst part was seeing her family again once the police had located them. It was like she'd come home for the first time all over again. Her siblings, her little brother, her parents, none of them knew who she was. All because Showfall had thought wiping memories would keep anyone from looking for her. All because they'd been right.

Returning to college felt like digging up some dead, alien part of herself; something that tore through every inch of her memory and dragged the imagery of thousands of bloody deaths through what had been familiar halls. She'd only realized it wasn't real when she snapped out of it to find herself nearly lying in her own vomit and a crowd of people standing close enough to suffocate her.

She didn't go back after that.

She felt like the world had packed up and moved on without her. The people she'd been starting college with already graduated with two-year, four-year degrees. Her high school senior class had been holding reunions every so often, probably a result of the closeness of everyone in the little county.

Sometimes Hadlee wondered if she was wrong for wanting to go back to the mall. Think about how she could've done things differently, stopped people from hurting people and being hurt.

Stopped Paislie from dying.

The younger probably would have survived if the employees had escaped sooner.

Her therapist always questioned her down that line of thinking every time she said so. Sometimes Hadlee could hear the man's voice repeating the same questions to her, over and over. She hated it. She hated knowing nothing she did could have changed that outcome.

With one last sigh, she dragged a large bag from under her bed, revealing the outfit Paislie always wore while they were fixing things.

Hadlee laid it out over her desk, ignoring the dusty, small spider webs stretching over her textbooks and laptop.

She felt an unnatural silence pour through her veins, shutting her feelings down where nothing would reach them.

Showfall had won.