#kutah

“the way i see it,” local man says as the ghost that is now his sibling is half sunk into the floor, “is that if i am going to be possessed, then whoever tries to possess me is stuck with me now. i was an only child and i think i’m too young to have a kid, so free sibling it is.”

They had come here for some comfort, for the ghost of an embrace, for something to soothe them and give them hope for the future.

They came here for silence, to find an escape, and yet it was them who had broken that quiet, them who had dragged their thoughts from the deep confines of space back to this wretched planet.

It was them, them, them... and it was their fault, fault, fault.

Their head snapped up at the sounds of commotion—not loud enough to be near but not quiet enough to be of no concern. If they strained their ears, they could almost make out the words.

They bit their lip and then, in a moment, that hard line was back, and that face was blank. They stumbled back to the place where they had to stay, the dreams they had once held no longer able to comfort them.

(Thank you for the ask! I *kind* of changed the prompt to misremembering something that happened. I hope you enjoy it!)

Unlike the others, he never liked to think about what his life could have been. He had memories of a life before, and though the memories were faded by time and few in number, they were still his and far more substantial than any fantasy could be. But just because he had memories didn’t always mean he was content with them, even if he wished he could be.

He didn’t like imagining a life he would never have, but that never stopped him from imagining a life where those memories just... continued on.

He usually shut the thoughts down soon after they started. It was too painful to think of a life that could have been, especially when it had been so close.

“I was really busy this year,” they interrupted. “I don’t think I can take more.”

“You had it very easy this year,” their mother frowned.

They clamped their mouth shut and politely excused themselves. As much as they may have loved their mother, she never seemed to understand that the results and grades they brought out were the result of work. She never seemed to understand that even though she hadn’t seen them struggling, that didn’t mean that they weren’t. She never seemed to understand that not everything came easily to them, and that in order to master something, it took time and energy, two things they were in short supply of.

(Answering this in story format because you know, whatever)

They were told nothing about the package they were meant to retrieve. Only the fact that a yellow post it note would identify it and that it contained a safety hazard. They did not ask for more information; it was a well paying job and those who asked questions often ended up… missing. 

The package was located in a grocery store, which was uncommon, to say the least. Still, they walked in, as professionally as they could muster, and asked about the box. The employees, almost with desperation, pointed them over. They lifted the box, grunting at the unexpected weight. They simply bit their lip and made it outside, putting the box in the trunk and heading back to the station.

They would have been deaf if they hadn’t heard the employees sighing in relief as they left. 

Whatever. They were being paid well for this. 

That mindset grew harder and harder to maintain as noises came from the box. True, it was coming from the trunk, but nothing else could warrant the cracking noise, so it had to be from the box. 

They told themselves it didn’t matter. They were almost to the station at any rate. 

The cracking grew louder, and soon enough, it was followed by a mewling and by scratching. 

It’s fine, it’s fine, they chanted in their head as they parked the car. Nothing will be broken, everything will be normal, they told themselves.

They hurried outside, opening the trunk and saw the box was shredded to pieces. And there, sitting in the middle of the scraps, sat a baby dragon, shrieking to be fed. 

It was hard, being a Frog Caretaker. Not only was there inane backlash for the seemingly useless job, but the frogs themselves were rather fickle. The Handbook on How to Not Die, Retain At Least A Little Bit of Your Sanity, and how NOT to Capitalize things (Cause I’m an eXpErT you know?), AlsohowtodoyourjobIsuppose said it best:

“Sometimes, frogs want to fly, and we should let them. Of course, this comes with the presumption that frogs are under our control and that they express desire to consciously fly. Both of which are incorrect. Frogs are and have never been under the control of man, and their want to fly is not so much of a want but a necessity. Much like how when we do our business, it is usually not because we actively want to do it, but because our bladder is yelling at us to hurry the heckity-feckety-fuck up. 

“Of course, we involve ourselves anyways as we are humans, and humans believe that they must be involved in everything as they are the ‘superior’ being. Not to mention the fact that frogs, with their spontaneous levitation and sonic leaps, greatly disturb life, those little grenouilles.