Hatchetfield.

We Could Sing a Duet

When Paul told Emma infection would guarantee her happiness, she didn't believe him--well, more precisely, she was too busy screaming and trying to run for her life to give it much thought. Now she knows it is half-true. She spent so much of her life without attachments, too used to the comfort in escaping to reach back when those who loved her tried to reconnect. They'll realize it's not worth the effort eventually, she usually told herself. Now she will never want for connection again. Granted, she'd like a little more say in who exactly she is connected with (she might have punched Ted once or three times, despite how such a jarring note of dissonance in the Hive stung her mind as much as his), but overall, she'd be lying if she said this unlife didn't give her anything it promised at all.

She's not as enthused about the singing as most of the others, but she doesn't hate it. Unlike working at Beanie's, when she was forced to learn cheesy tunes straight out of a bad rom com until she felt exhausted and exploited, the Hive never demands any effort. There's no need. Everyone already knows the song as well as everybody else. When it's her cue, the melody and the choreography become her. Behind the lyrics, there is always meaning, a pulsing, iridescent truth that draws her close, wrapping her snugly in its embrace. By the coda she feels herself glowing, a conduit for its light. Not the worst thing in the world. She's never tried anything more recreational than pot, but she imagines this is what the people who do are constantly grasping for.

Often she thinks about Jane and there's a swell of anger in her melody, spilling into their collective song. Anger at who? At herself for not having tried harder. At how this existence where death is impermanent came too late for her only sister. To its credit, the Hive doesn't judge. It listens, and listens, until it echoes her hurt as its own. She is seen. She is known. She basks in the catharsis, sometimes while driving a knife into someone's guts. She'd feel shitty about taking it out on random strangers if she didn't know they would wake up just fine in a few minutes.

And then there's Paul.

Paul. Emma prides herself on being able to adapt and forge on whenever life decides to throw something new at her, but apparently, this forte of hers does not include relationships. She fell for the awkward, reserved Black Coffee Guy who tipped generously, who listened to her rant about her crappy job like she was kindly giving him her time instead of presumptuously taking up his, who cracked self-deprecating jokes when he opened up, believing himself to be less interesting than he was.

If someone told her a year ago that dates with the first person she seriously wanted a committed relationship with would involve singing, killing, and making plans for world domination, she'd probably ask them what they were on. She doesn't know what she'd do, if they told her she'd enjoy it too.

Life has no sense of timing. Sometimes just as you find out the cute guy who brightens your day at work reciprocates your feelings, he becomes the mouthpiece of an alien pathogen hellbent on assimilating the world. It's just one of those things.

She remembers that day in the hospital. Are you going to tip me? He looked so goddamn happy with himself as he used their inside joke against her, and saw her flinch in terror. Emma thought at the time that Paul Matthews must be long dead and gone, and whatever was puppeteering his body just had a very nasty sense of humor. If only. When the Hive took her in she saw things the way they were.

She remembers lying very still on the hospital floor as her mind reeled with the influx of information, and the first breath she took in her second life was an anguished gasp. Paul was there. Not the empty husk of him, but him. Just... changed. She sat up and had the urge to slap him across the face, but even stronger than that urge was the ache, the regret, the disbelief. Then, somewhere deep down, relief. She hadn't wanted this for either of them, but she also didn't want those few moments by the crashed helicopter to really be the last time they spoke.