Wingram Clinic@Nanaya, @Psyker Landshark
It was imperceivable.
A drunken shiver ran down Ciara's spine, though she couldn’t will herself to be afraid.
Blame the opioids.
She could only ‘stare’ in horror, feeling a peculiar essence wrap around her. A familiar, yet unfathomable essence. A presence she had become dependent upon, whether she realized it or not.
"Through mortal will, you survived the knight, the mage and the dark. Lives ended from your whims, and you gave them no thought.”
Ciara, though finding trouble to think, acted on impulse with her speech, naked truth clinging to each slurred, mumbled word.
“I just… wanted to survive.”An auditory hallucination - she could
hear the snap of bone, feel the sickening give under the pressure of her tentacles. She was too strong - had she really killed them?
…Did it really matter? She would have killed them if it meant she could survive.
“Davil Wund himself was merely a bargaining piece, was he not? You care not for the boy, but for the moralistic satisfaction it brings upon you to save another to rid yourself of the guilt of killing innocents.”
“He's weak… Maybe if I saved him, they would...” Ciara mumbled, before her eyes glazed a little more, and she trailed off.
In actual fact, she continued to speak in her mind, continued to think. However, her thoughts were uncoordinated. Somehow, Davil's blood resurfaced when she thought of a fateful day at the orphanage. The kids had caught her and tried to burn her, calling her a witch.
She had… blacked out. But when she came to, kids were passed out around her, some staring at her in fear, clutching their chests in pain, other fleeing entirely.
Davil was her way of atoning for her sins, again and again. And it worked. In her head, everything was balanced. The good outweighed the bad. No matter how many times she heard the screams of guards repeat in her ears…
Her thoughts unraveled.
“Maybe… my own weakness disgusts me. I can't fight beyond my shadow, stuck in this cage…”A long pause, Ciara's eyes blindly looking from left to right. Before her mumblings were low, yearning.
“I just want to drink it…”She fell silent, listless again. The words rattled around in her mind.
“The light. Embrace the darkness. Follow it wherever it goes, and sate my gnawing Hunger… It's lonely, agonizing… I just want to eat.”“You are exactly the machine I saw, the steel I sharpened, the rock I carved. You have done well. If any would attempt to end this journey for the duration of your recovery, rest assured, Ciara Ventura…
"I̷̮͗͝ ̸͔͍̯͗̆͆̊W̶͉͛͑̚I̴̛̩̐̿̂͆L̷͔̞̾͆̒̈́̇L̵̟̓͒̂͌͠ ̷̢͔̦͎̔Ķ̵̜̲̱̮́I̷̛̗̝͚͗̏̃̉Ļ̵͈̝̱̼̂̀L̷͇̑̉ ̶̢͓̲̻͔̂͋͒͠Ţ̷̥̪̟̺̒̽Ĥ̷̹̞̩̇͋͗Ë̵͖̥̞͇̗M̶̯͋̒̃ ̴̣̘̻̟͆̎̽͊M̵̹̝̓̆͋͐͠Y̴̺̥̿S̷̛͓͔̥͒́͠Ḛ̴̡̘̙̼̄̏L̵̛͜F̸̨͙͎̼́̉̒.̶̡̟͚̽"”
Ciara moaned quietly, limply and numbly shifting in her bed, head lolling from side to side. It was like she had a fever, and she was desperately trying to escape it. Her lips parted, her breath shallow, sweat glistening on her brow.
In a vivid, fever dream-like state, Ciara found herself in her home. Before her Ethos had awakened, she was in the warm, loving embrace of her parents. It was safe, it was freeing-
It was exactly how this presence of darkness felt. Like a parent. Like safety. Like the ultimate form of authority, tightly woven with a sense of love.
Ciara continued to unconsciously twitch, limbs pinned, gasping as the presence's words caused her ears to ring and wail. She cried out in a whisper, her voice raspy and wanting.
“Father…! Mother…!”Like a child crying out for their parents.
As the presence faded, a sense of longing took hold of Ciara, before it was lost to the euphoria, and she settled quietly on her bed, breath returning to a slow rhythm. Euphoria churned her guts as bells rang in her head somewhere in the stratosphere.
So, it took a long, long time before Ciara’s eyes managed to focus on Iraleth, standing at the edge of the curtain. Her gaze immediately softened, appearing to take physical joy in seeing Iraleth.
“The light… is here…”A few more low breaths, before her head lolled to the side again, blinking rapidly as she groaned softly. She was struggling to remain aware, serotonin and dopamine pinging off senselessly in her mind, causing her to feel in and out of body.
“Don't… kill me… I'm sorry about eating you… I was just hungry…”A child's lie, a child's excuse. Even drugged, Ciara struggled to be honest about her desperation to win, to use any means necessary…
The Otter
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flux
