Witch Doctors Inc: SEASON ONE (Completed!)

Part 5.25

PRESENT TIME
LILY

It's surprisingly easy to reach for the darkness inside me. I thought it would be buried deep, deep down, but it isn't. It's there on the surface, little tentacles of it, rippling in the breeze of my thoughts. Every little lie Onyx has ever told me buds from them, little blooms bursting with anger.

There's the annoyance I feel at Ruby's prying too, and the resentment I feel towards Big Boss for always dumping the crummy assignments on me.

Deeper down, frustration broods in my memories. I worked hard to get a place at Witch Doctors Inc. I put everything I had into it, yet I couldn't find success because my hidden witch powers were going haywire. It hurt to see everyone shoot ahead of me, knowing I'd worked just as hard as them. There was sadness there, frustration, and jealousy. I couldn't understand what was happening no matter how hard I tried, and that scared me. I hated being scared, and I hated the world for not making sense as it should. It was in the past, but those memories have lodged themselves in my mind, and the resentment is still there to draw from.

That isn't the only anger I find. I'm angry at being given a destiny that is so dark. I want to be in charge of my own fate. Why am I stuck fighting against it, while other people get to go along with the flow?

I don't like the feeling of not being in control. I don't like that the First Witch has some kind of say in how things turn out for me. I don't like the mistakes I've made, and I don't like having to second guess myself.

I feel the dark power building up inside me, but it's not enough. It doesn't feel quite whole yet.

I dig deeper, and find the father who never had time for me, and the stepmother who treated me as if I were a leftover nuisance.

Even deeper I go, deep into the memories of my former lives. That's where I find what I'm looking for.

The First Witch's anger.

The First Witch's hatred.

The people who betrayed her were the ones she loved the most. She hated them so much. She wanted to cause them as much pain as they caused her.

Arti, her adopted father, should have tried to understand. He should have given her a chance to explain, at least. Yes, he was scared. She was something he didn't understand. But if you love someone, you try, don't you? You don't do nothing as they suffer, and you don't look away as they die.

Out of all the people the First Witch hated, it was Arti she hated the most. Her beloved Arti. Her treacherous, cruel Arti.

Arti was love, and Arti was pain, and Arti was betrayal. Arti was humanity. The First Witch hated humanity.

When she came back as the Dark Witch, she had her chance to punish humanity. The part of me that is her still wants that. It wants to finish what it started. Its eternal task.

It hands her darkness to me like a gift, and I accept it. I am not afraid of it, and I am not guilty about embracing it. I bring it to the surface.

Black vines wrap around my arms. Butterflies bloom at their ends, like little black sighs. The vines wrap around my torso, my legs, my neck, my head. They feel deliciously dark against my soul.

And yes, they are in my soul. I didn't mean for them to enter, but they are irresistible, and they swirl there like vindicated sin.

I rise into the air, a canvas of night-stained vines and butterflies.

I register only vaguely the shouts below me.

"Is that...Lily?!"

"Lily's a...?!"

Ruby's stunned face is stamped against the earth.

I turn to the moon Amitabh is hiding in. The vines, the darkness, crawl off my skin and slither through the air. They wrap around the moon, their butterflies pasting themselves against its light.

And they begin to devour it.

The butterflies feast until there is no more.