𝙩𝙝𝙚 𝙬𝙖𝙧𝙢𝙚𝙨𝙩 𝙨𝙪𝙢𝙢𝙚𝙧

③

Vera strolled through the fruit aisle in the grocery store, carefully selecting apples for the cinnamon apple dessert she planned to make with her mother that evening. Over the past few weeks, Jalraven had been restless, so Vera initiated a nightly dessert ritual to distract her from worries.

Jalraven thought herself to be selfish whenever she'd do something as simple as fall asleep, because it meant that she wasn't advocating for mutants, but she didn't want to abandon spending time with her daughter, so she agreed to the dessert idea. The idea had been a help in calming her down on those particularly stressful nights.

With enough apples rounded into her plastic bag, Vera headed for the checkout line. The cashier, engrossed in the television that was placed on the wall, didn't notice her approach.

"Excuse me ma'am"

No response.

Vera eyed the screen and dropped her bag of apples as she read the news headline.

"Jalraven August : Well-Known Activist Found Dead"

Vera's eyes began to fog up with tears as she looked at the photo of her mother on the screen.

Only pixels.

The picture they'd used of Jalraven was one where she looked absolutely distraught, her terror of the fallen world captured in the look of her eyes during one of her protests.

Before the cashier could turn around, Vera pulled up the hood of her yellow raincoat and fled the store.

Outside, she navigated bustling streets, observing the paleness in everyone's faces. News about her mother played on a huge screen in the city square, but Vera kept walking, slipping through murmuring crowds.

The air was heavy and Vera's heart felt as if it were about to beat out of her chest.

On her way home, Vera could sense an impending danger.

Jalraven, in her activism, never disclosed anything about Vera or their address, but Vera knew Alastor likely had that information anyways.

Vera had nowhere else to go though, her mother had been all she had left, so she decided to continue on the path to her home.

~

Approaching her home, every step weighed heavily. The front door, strangely unlocked, set Vera on edge.

Vera had her key ready, but she tucked it away into the pocket of her raincoat, not letting go of it, ready to use it as some sort of defense if need be.

She trembled as she turned the knob of her front door and pushed it open. The inside of her home only lit by the setting sun outside.

She stepped in, shutting the door behind her.

The house, usually cozy and filled with life even though it had only been the two of them, echoed with silence.

As Vera made her way down a hallway of her home, she noticed that there was broken glass on the floor.

The glass had come from a fallen picture frame, it lay there broken, with a photo of Vera and her mother when they'd traveled to one of the beaches on the west side of Fjall beside it

Panic and sadness overwhelmed her to the point where she could barely focus.

Her lack of focus led her to miss the sound of footsteps behind her.

Only when she felt a blindfold over her eyes and a hand cover her mouth did she realize that she was not alone anymore....