cascade | kotlc

28. Faye's Story

tw: attempted su/cide

- F. K.

The details are so blurred, and she cannot remember the specifics. But she knows well enough, and that is all she needs to break down into Fitz's bewildered arms. She finally understood why June loved him so much.

There was just such a distinct warmness to him, a pulsing of a warming flame that whispered, I'll be here, no matter where you go. And if you go, I would go with you.

It was at that moment when her heart completely fractured, broke down into shattered pieces of bloodstained glass, as the bullet hit the menagerie center mass and exploded the crystal structure. All around her was the smell of smoke after thunder, and there was a tingling all over her skin.

Fitz blanched, stroking his hand down her back. "What happened?"

Only the faint whistling of thunder spoke for her, and tears slipped from her eyes as the clouds in her body churned and boiled, a broth simmering over the stove as water vapor rose from the pot.

She had told June, in the infirmary, and she had somehow found the courage to tell her, but that was when she remembered everything, the flash of the blade and what encouraged her to stop. Even now she couldn't recall the moment, couldn't project June's face in her mind.

A sizzling went down her throat, an electric current sparking and itching her lungs. She talked.

"I- I have to tell- to tell you something," she managed to stutter out again, and her voice was trembling, bouncing between high tenors and low basses. Smooth jazz was playing at the back of her mind, with a hint of electric guitar, the improv rhythm wailing as she hitched on her breaths.

"Of course," Fitz whispered, embracing her. "What is it?"

"I tried- I tried to- I-"

The words were so frustratingly elusive, always slipping from her mind the moment it was about to break the precipice and release the words.

The silver knife, the shock that had run down her wrist and her palm, the glistening of the blade in the moonlight, the fear that had coursed through her. The pain that she had not yet registered, the pain that she had not yet caused.

She was remembering again, and her mouth opened with a creak.

"I tried to- to- kill myself."

Fitz stopped. His entire body fell still, and somehow his heartbeat froze momentarily, leaving three skipped beats, and his mouth opened.

The infirmary. The covers that were too hot. The face June had made when she had told her, one that had cycled between shock and horror and disgust and panic and anger and frustration, all with the fleetingness of a shining bolt of lightning, until her dainty features settled into sympathy and understanding.

She looked up, her eyes wet, and waited for those same emotions to flash through Fitz's face.

But she didn't find them, didn't find his mouth subtly curving down, his brows creasing, his hands nervously fidgeting. Instead she found him hugging her, hugging her tight, and his golden aura flared and engulfed her in its warmth.

"Oh," he breathed. "I- I'm- it's alright, Faye."

She responded with incoherent sobbing, and her mind seemed to activate. The outlet was plugged in, and there was current shifting through her.

The ogres, the Armorgate, the team working on soporidine, the cold vial with its green liquid. The serum that had taken them years to acquire, thousands of pages and hundreds of experiments, and she had held the vial in her hands.