Whirlblast | The Death Cure- Newt

The Sweet Lives of Witches And Semi-Immunes

CHAPTER THIRTEEN
[TRIGGER WARNING: Slight mention of PTSD and suicide]

ADELAIDE

B

ouncing in my over-excited nerves, I had already explored the old, broken down Church twice. It is hard to imagine how this abandoned place once used to be a spiritual place for hundreds of thousands of people.
I find the place really beautiful. It’s walls and pillars are designed with intricate details. Most of its coloured stained glasses had survived this chaos of the crazed world too.

There are hundreds of scattered waxes all around the place, their wax settling wherever the surface they stand on.

“Seems like the one in the really old movie of Avengers. Age of Ultron one.” She’d said, to which a few Right Arm and Aislinn wholeheartedly agreed, leaving the rest of us amnesiac kids confused with the reference.

Bea also told me that there used to be Sunday Masses. The Catholic Church teaches that you have an obligation to go to Mass every Sunday.

“Though I am a Catholic, I didn’t usually go to the Sunday Masses.” Bea says while she lights up the used candles on the marble table.

“Why?” I sat down on the dusty old bench.

“The neighbourhood knew that I was a Semi Immune, which was very bad. We are an abomination, freak of nature.”
I look at the little girl, whose hands are shaking but she continues glaring at the little flame while she keeps lighting the candles.

“W-Why?”

“It was like you either are immune or not, but we are in the middle. They were always angry on semi Immunes. They said that we cheated death. We live with the virus. As if....as if we were the witches of Salem, you know, like we are not supposed to exist.
“When one of us dies, it’s a celebration in the society.”

My heart falls down to my feet. I knew that Semi-Immunes were hated, but I didn’t know that they hated us to this extent.

“Did they...hurt us?”

“No, but their negative comments and inhumane behaviour often drove many to kill themselves.”

I part my lips in shock, my own hands clutching the edge of my jacket in a tight fist.

“We were only allowed to go out during Sunday Masses, otherwise hidden in homes.” Bea looks up at me. Her eyes are glistening with unshed tears. That shatters my heart into thousands of pieces. I can’t help but shudder at the broken look on her face.

“Have I,” I let out a shaky breath. “have I done a  mistake in placing that dagger in your hand that day?”

Bea’s eyes widens.“Wh-Why would you think that?”

“I've been thinking this for quite a time now. Look at you, you used to be so innocent, like a flower but now you are always with guns and daggers and fighting for your life and all. Kids don’t deserve this. You-you shouldn’t be doing this.”

“Didn’t you do the same? Fight for your life, use different kinds of weapons. What is the difference between us? Except for the fact that I still have my memories.”

“Its different. I had to because I was already the Cube by your age, but you aren’t. I pushed you to fight. I handed you the weapon. I pushed you into this violence. Our cases are not same.”

“Exactly.” She nods, her tone now sounding bitter. “We are not same. Your mother had sent you to WICKED to save you from herself and she knew that Aislinn would be there for you.” She lets out a breathy, scoff. “And my parents gave me away for money. They sold me to the WICKED because they didn’t want any kind of relationship with an abomination.’

I shake my head. “No, baby, I didn’t mean that-”

This is the first time I’ve heard the girl speak about her past, like her past before WICKED. Usually she shuts herself whenever I tried to talk to her about it and I know that everything that she’s telling me even now is actually filtered. She is yet to tell me what exactly she saw and she had to endure that made her so traumatized.
I know that she’s traumatized; she wakes up screaming her lungs out, she often has sleep paralysis. I had to know what caused Bea her PTSD from even before WICKED.

I know Bea should be my first priority, but somehow Minho and Newt are becoming the most important issues of my life at the moment. And I hate myself for keeping Bea in the backseat.

“I’m a failure as a guardian.” I whisper to her.

Bea shakes her head. A few strands of strawberry blond hair falls in front of her face, which she pushes away. “When you rescued me, I was weak and helpless like a damsel in distress, always hiding behind you or the others and always whimpering.
“And when you places the dagger in my hand, you taught me to fight for myself, to be defensive, you taught me how to put myself out in the world and never be ashamed of what I am.”

She smiles proudly at me, her amber eyes shining in the candlelight. I tilt my head, smiling tiredly at her.

“Thank you, Ally. For saving me.”

I place my hands on her cheeks and place a soft kiss on her forehead. “I love you, baby.”

“I love you too, Ally.”