open starter , location council building.
minnie wasn’t entirely sure how being head councilor of elias had unraveled into… this. she’d known the job would be difficult, yes, but she hadn’t expected the weight of it to feel like a vice tightening around the city and her piece by piece. she should’ve seen it coming. the signs had been there, buried under optimism and the hope that people would rise to the occasion instead of tearing each other apart.
now, with citizens missing and fear running like a fever through elias, everything felt more fractured than it had since the war. she’d always known who not to trust in the underland, but she’d also believed. naively, perhaps. that the rest of the city could stand united when it mattered. that people could care about elias because it was their home, not because they wanted to treat it like their personal playground.
the past few days had proven her painfully wrong.
she sat on the council steps with her lunch, letting the cold air bite at her skin because it was the only thing that made her feel grounded. she’d insisted to the guards there was no need to hover, no need to cage her in even more than her office already did. but they lingered anyway... too close, too alert. another reminder that the head councilor was less a leader these days and more a symbol people wanted to break or protect.
she exhaled, soft and weary, before glancing at the person sitting nearest to her.
“care to join me?” she asked, offering a small, tired smile. “i can answer whatever questions you have… or we can just talk.” her voice gentled, warm despite the storm behind her eyes. “your choice, dear.”
