Mcmolly

Amygdala Circuit

There was quiet, without intent.

What had they done to her?

A vague question, and Besca could only sit there and think. She thought about Hovvi, about the interview, and the feeling that something wasn’t quite right with Quinn even though they’d only just met. She thought about her questions when she’d woken up. Her panic, so much panic, so much fear and all of it made sense viscerally but logically, emotionally…

She thought about Follen, and their talk in his office. He had known something that she had only just begun to piece together—a puzzle she was too afraid to complete.

She was still too afraid.

“They hurt you.”

Hands came to rest on Quinn’s cheeks, guided her head back down to meet Dahlia’s eyes. The girl knelt in front of her, holding her gently by the face, not firmly, but unyielding. She could not look away.

“They lied to you,” Dahlia said. Her lips quivered, but with how still her face was, it was impossible to tell if it was the grief or the anger that touched her. Her eyes glistened, but no tears spilled. “And they hurt you.”

They hurt us.

A chill bristled Quinn’s skin, not sharp, it was almost comfortable in fact. The hollowness that had enwrapped her cooled, eased into a pervading calm.

In the doorway a small figure stood, too shadowed to see much but the glinting of the metal horns on her head. She watched impassively, but Quinn could feel something radiating from her, touching her, or perhaps it was trying to escape from her own depths.

Anger. It wanted her to feel angry. But below that was something else, something…curious. Probing. It wanted to know why she was so resistant.

It’s not fair. They locked us away. They hurt us.

“They can’t hurt you anymore. Quinn.” Dahlia sounded so sure. So certain. “We won’t let them.”

The shadow’s head turned down in thought. The light caught her, illuminating the barest hint of confusion on a strange face.

Then in a blink she was gone. The chill went with her, and warmth found Quinn again.

It was just the three of them. Dahlia before her, Besca besides, cleaning her up. Just them. Safe. That feeling came next, and it was foreign, but it was the first one to come to her as a suggestion, not a demand. An acquiescence.

Safe…

Amygdala Circuit

Quinn’s hands fell away, and Besca took the opportunity to continue cleaning her up. The scratches staunched easy enough, and she wiped her fingers clean with the towels. She dabbed her lips; the girl was slurring like a drunk, but it didn’t look like she’d chewed through her tongue, and not deep enough into her cheek that she couldn’t speak.

Dahlia kept a hold of her hand, brushing fingers through her hair, checking where she’d clutched at her forehead. No blood there, thankfully.

“Th' Savior. Tell me 's got both eyes. Pleeeease.”

Besca shivered. So she had noticed it after all; it had happened during the phasing. God, but if she’d felt that she would have been shrieking through the comms, wouldn’t she? She’d had pilots go numb, ignore the pain, but for someone like her? It didn’t make sense. It didn’t make any sense.

“Don' wanna be them. Tell me 's not true.”

Now what did that mean? Besca watched Quinn’s head roll back, watched her mumble nonsense into the air. Something was broken in this girl, and while she was no longer sure that break had happened during the invasions, it had certainly been irreparably worsened there.

Quinn was not a pilot. She couldn’t be. Besca was absolutely certain of that now more than she’d ever been before—a bar so high Aerie Station couldn’t have cleared it. Her mind was gone, and if she was ever going to get it back, it wouldn’t be in the cold dark of a cockpit. There was no way she could go back there. No way Besca would let her.

God, but she couldn’t make that promise.

She’d seen the readings. The times. She was fast—very fast. Off the top of her head, she could think of two, maybe three pilots in the world who could match or pass the speed she’d phased in that test, and one of them was sitting right next to them. RISC wouldn’t let that go. They didn’t see how unfit she was, they saw her numbers, they saw statistics. They saw a buoy in the storm of the Hovvi disaster, and they were going to latch on.

“Your Savior…” she said, thinking it over. “It, uh…it did lose one of its eyes during the test.”

And it wasn’t regenerating.

But she didn’t say that. It wouldn’t help, and she was being paranoid. Head wounds always healed slower, and the process wasn’t always uniform. Sure, normally they’d have seen some sort of mending in the socket, but that didn’t mean it wasn’t going to happen.

It had lost an eye. That didn’t mean anything. It didn’t.

Amygdala Circuit

Quinn went limp, falling back against the wall but for the grip she had on Besca’s shirt. Besca caught her, lowered her to the floor as gently as she could and didn’t let her go. She was dumbstruck, which, considering how utterly wrecked this girl had been since she’d woken up, was a statement in and of itself. Eyes, eyes, what eyes?

“Quinn,” she said, softening her own voice as Quinn’s withered to a wheeze. “Whatever you saw, it was nothing, it was a dream. You’re awake now, breathe. Breathe.”

Dahlia returned, roll of towels and small red bag in hand. She knelt down beside them, handed Besca a few swabs and a bottle of strong-smelling liquid, then took Quinn’s hand in hers. “You’re okay, you’re okay. Relax. Talk to us.”

Besca wet the cotton swabs on the bottle, dabbed them lightly on Quinn’s arm, over the shallow gashes. Nothing too deep, thank god, but a whole hand’s worth of nail-work to worry about. It would sting slightly, but she wasn’t sure Quinn would even notice in her state. Blood stained her lip as well—she must have bitten her tongue, or her cheek.

What in the world was this?

“What eyes, Quinn? she asked, low, sincere. “What needs to have its eyes?”

Amygdala Circuit

“I told you, I appreciate the position you’re in, Minister Toussaint. Losing a national idol isn’t easy.”

“Losing Abroix isn’t the problem, miss Darroh. Losing him with ministerial reviews so close is tantamount to murdering my career.”

Besca took the phone away to breathe, and swallow down the urge to scream at the man on the other end. “If you’re looking for a murder charge, Jaime, that’s all well and good. But you’ve got the wrong subject. Maybe take another look at the evidence I sent you, and then you tell me who should be on the block for what happened in Hovvi?”

“He ran. From a situation you failed to prepare him for.”

“Killing civilians, RISC personnel, and pilot, she hissed. “You think Abroix’s death is killing your career? What do you think happens if that footage goes public? My predecessor ordered it seized, not me—I’m under no obligation to hold it, and frankly, if I don’t, you can expect the Runan people to be demanding repayment from Casoban.”

There was silence, and if anger weren’t burgeoning within her, she might have let herself feel smug. Eventually Toussaint spoke again, his voice thin and frustrated.

“Your predecessor,” he said. “Understood the nature of our relationship. He understood how tenuous the ties between our countries are grown.”

“What? What do you mean ‘tenuous’?

“I mean that Westwel was fifteen years ago, commander. The sentiment of international unity between us is beginning to wear. Eusero has been pushing for partnership for years, and while miss St. Senn’s abilities have been keeping our support exclusive, more and more the common citizen is starting to wonder what an affluent nation like Eusero could do for them. Our Savior programs being so interlinked will prevent that, but what do you think happens if I’m replaced with someone who doesn’t value our relationship?

“So go ahead, commander Darroh, release the footage. When the dwindling love between our people turns to fury overnight, see where that leaves you.”

It was Besca’s turn to be silent, and Toussaint gave her the same courtesy to let her find her bearings. It took some time.

“We can’t repay you for Magnifique. We’re crippled, we just can’t.”

“I’m very sorry to hear that.”

“So you need to think of something else.”

A pause, then. “I’m sorry?”

“Think of something else,” she said. “Something else we can do to reaffirm things.”

There was a shout in the next room—Quinn? It was. She was starting to learn to recognize the sound of her screams.

“Well what in the world would you suggest?”

“I don’t—uhm, what? It’s your fucking country, Toussaint, figure it out.”

A thud, heavy, frantic footsteps. Her door flew open and Quinn came barreling in, so fast she carried on right past her and into the wall.

“Quinn!”

“Quinn? Commander, who—”

“THE EYES!”

“What was that?”

Quinn was positively frenzied. There was wrought madness in her eye, and blood on her—she was bleeding. She was clawing herself like a panicked animal.

Besca cut the call and tossed the phone aside, scrambling over and pulling Quinn’s hand away from her arm. “Quinn! Quinn stop! What are you talking about? What eyes?”

Dahlia appeared in the doorway, worry all over her face.

“Towels! Get paper towels and—just grab the first aid kit!”

Dutifully, the older girl ran off. Besca turned back to Quinn, still holding her firmly, desperately trying to calm her down. Eyes? What eyes?

Amygdala Circuit

Enough.

There was a flicker in her vision, like a half-blink, and everything stuttered. Out on the lake, Dahlia and Safie were swimming out again, away from the boat, back towards the buoy. The moon’s reflection seemed like it was under the surface.

Quinnlash frowned. She reached up, gingerly touched one of the horns on her head.

“We…?” she asked, turning back towards Quinn. Her frown vanished, replaced with a tight smile. She giggled, and though it was Quinn’s voice, it was someone else laughing with it. “We’re Quinnlash! Silly. So silly. But that’s better than scared, isn’t it? Feels better. Feels stronger.”

She drew closer again, and the wind and waves shifted to follow her. “Those monsters. So big, so scary, taking from us, turning us into them. But we’re stronger, we’re better, and they know it. I changed that one. The beast from the lake. Changed it to be like us instead. It thinks it can take everything—our friends, our home, our eye—well I took its eye. Stupid thing. Vermin. Worm.”

Quinnlash moved past her, to front, up onto the bow. She stared out at Hovvi, and her hands closed into tiny fists. Quinn’s vision faltered again, flickered. For the briefest of moments the sky was black and the town was fire and ruin and screaming so small and far away but so terrified. And there above it all stood the monster from the lake, a single red eye staring out at them.

Then it was all normal again.

“We’re awake now, Quinnlash,” she said. “So long in the dark. Alone. Locked away. Doors and doors and doors. But now we’re awake, and we’re free, and I’m going to hurt them all. We’re going to teach the monsters to be afraid.”

The wind began to whip up around them. The waves grew choppier, the boat rocked violently but Quinnlash was unmoved. The shadows of Dahlia and Safie were gone, their laughter vanished, and in its place was a sunken groaning, loud and massive. In an explosion of water and steam and vicious roaring, a hand burst up from the lake, black as pitch and streaked with gray metal. It slammed down onto the forested shore. The earth cracked beneath its palm.

And then Quinn was thrust awake.

Amygdala Circuit

Quinnlash stopped kicking. She tilted her head at Quinn, mouth pulled into a little bunch like she didn’t understand her words. Or she was thinking them over. It must have been the latter because eventually she did answer.

“I just talked. It was wise to listen.”

She looked back out at the water, took a long deep breath that she never seemed to let go, but still managed to speak as easily anyway. “I like this one. It’s nice. Warm.”

Hopping down off the railing, she made her way over to Quinn. Her steps were light, bouncing; they left little black footprints behind like she’d stepped in ink, but they faded away before each next step.

“It isn’t perfect. I don’t think the moon’s supposed to be there, but the water’s meant to be black, isn’t it? I always thought so. Prettier, this way, anyway.” She came up before Quinn, looking up at her with wide, colorless eyes. She pointed to the cliffs in the distance. “I left the house out.”

Sure enough, following her finger Quinn could see the Loughvein house was gone.

“Doesn’t belong here. Rotten place, full of rotten people. Hated it. What they did to us. What they took away. Take, take, take. They’re takers. Just like the monsters, Quinnlash.”

She spun around on her heel, marching off to the back of the boat. “No takers, here. Only good people. Friends. We deserve friends, Quinnlash.” Out in the water, the shadowed figures of Dahlia and Safie continued their race to the buoy. “Don’t we deserve friends?”

Amygdala Circuit

Sleep came to her softly, like turning her head from one side of the pillow to the next. One moment Quinn was shuddering, palms ground into her eyes, so tired, and the next—

Morning rose over the lake. Black waves lapped gently at the boat’s sides, rocking it just slightly enough to be soothing. Dawn warmed the cliffs, yellows and oranges chased deep blues from the sky. Birdsong. The distinct feeling that, far away on the shore, there were people talking.

The moon’s reflection painted the water.

Quinn lay on a spread of towels, it took a few blinks for the world to come into focus for her. To one side was a cooler, open and stuffed full with bottles and cans and pouches of melonberry juice. A sweet memory ghosted across her tongue, gone in an instant. On the other side, the fishing poles stood in their loops, strings drawn in. Their hooks were gone, replaced with dull weights upon which the bait could rest and be nibbled without fear of injury.

In the distance there was splashing. Laughter. Two silhouettes swam a short distance away, splashing at one another, racing out to a buoy some ways away. Further, on the shores of a forest along the lake’s rim, something moved. White fur and bone, gone into the thicket.

Quinnlash

She wasn’t alone, and she could feel the moment that became true, like a cold breeze through the warmth of the morning. Behind her, sitting on the railing was a small figure, and as the shadows slipped from it rinsed dirt, and it turned to her she saw—

Herself.

Quinnlash, as she had appeared the last time. Ten or eleven, eyes black rather than shining yellow. Her face still bore the thin lines of blood from her head, where the glinting, modium horns which had sprouted from her hair had grown ever so slightly. Perhaps an inch or two taller, they caught the light much clearer, and at their tips they seemed to be starting to split.

She still looked almost bored. Her feet kicked absently overboard.

“Hello, again.”

Amygdala Circuit

Dahlia listened to Quinn as she stumbled through her words, stuttered to get her thoughts running, and then failed to keep them controlled as they devolved into pitiful ramblings again. She listened, each word a drop of water in the pot. She thought, and the words simmered, and the pot began to boil.

She stood there for a long time.

“What…” she muttered, and it was all she managed.

Almost in a daze, Dahlia made her way back to the bed. She lowered herself down, legs suddenly weak, stomach suddenly churning and for a moment she tasted acid in her throat, threatening to drag her breakfast up with it.

It was like Quinn was a thousand miles away, but she could still hear her crying silently.

What did they do to you? she wanted to ask, but part of her already had an idea. The pieces were small, but they were many. The water. The doors. The panic. Something terrible had been done to Quinnlash. Not once, not twice, but every day of her life. Every day. Her mom and dad…

It's gray there.

“You—” she started again, and then swallowed the rising lump in her throat. Laying back helped the nausea, so she settled down beside Quinn, stared up at the ceiling. “You’re not in trouble, Quinn. You…you were never in trouble, and you never have to say sorry for any of that stuff again. Not to me, not to Besca, not to anyone.”

She felt a grimace twist her face up. Anger did the same to her insides. “And if your parents have a problem with that, they can write a letter, and you and I can shoot it out the airlock,” she said, and looked over at Quinn, face still buried in her hands. “I'm not gonna let anyone lock you away. Ever. Never again. Do you hear me, Quinn? Never. Again.”

Amygdala Circuit

It started alright. Quinn slowly unfurled, inching closer. Just a bit more and she could pull her in, hold her, hope it would help. Then she started speaking again, almost a babble and nearly incomprehensible. Dahlia thought it was nonsense at first, that would make the most sense. A touch from the circuit lingering on a nascent mind. It happened now and then, that someone went in and was changed forever, sometimes too far.

But Quinn hadn’t been changed. Not really. It might have been the invasion that did this to her, but, if she thought about it, dug through the exhaustion and the memories—terrible, leave them be, you shouldn’t—she could recall that Quinn had been peculiar even on the boat. Water, water, she’d mentioned it then, too. Asked if it was always so sweet. Safie…Safie had thought it was a joke. She had, too. And when she’d asked for the juice, how frantically she’d asserted that she wouldn’t, if it had belonged to Dahlia.

“It smells like the water from home.”

She sniffed the air. It just smelled like air. What did—

“Open the door! Open the door, oh god, please, open it, open the door!”

This time Dahlia did move. She sprung up from the bed, dashing over to the door and throwing it open. She whirled back to Quinn, concerned, frightful.

“Quinn,” she said, almost desperate. “What’s going on? What are you afraid of?”

Amygdala Circuit

Dahlia jolted as the water was thrown from her hand, yelped when the glass shattered against the wall. Quinn fell into a panic, curled like a cornered animal and let out a terrible scream. Still sitting there, Dahlia hunched away, winced, tried to keep it from sinking any deeper into her. She didn’t leave, though. Part of her did want to, but that part was weak. So much of her was weak, and afraid, and helpless, and if she left Quinn now she’d be no different than she’d been a week ago. She’d be a failure. Still.

And a bad friend.

She couldn’t be that anymore.

Dahlia scooted over, closer. She took Quinn’s hands gently from above her head, guided them low and held them tight.

“Quinn—Quinn, hey.” she kept her voice soft, calm, as best she could. "You don’t have to drink it. You don’t. I didn’t—I didn’t know. I’m not trying to hurt you, I promise. I’m sorry. Please, you have to relax. You have to, you’ll hurt yourself. Please.”