blood moon, marc spector

one.

SOMETIMES, IF SHE WAS DEEP ENOUGH INTO SLEEP, LILITH would feel that she was still there. still laying on the crimson-stained sand, clutching her lower abdomen, and biting her lip to avoid crying out in pain.

her mind often plagued her with the fact that she should've died. she frequently wondered if things would've been better if she had. all she had ever known was the feeling of death; a creature that seemed to lurk over her shoulder at every turn she took. and it was supposed to take her that day.

lilith james' birth was the reason for her mother's death, something that her father couldn't seem to let her forget. a part of her had always wanted to believe that it was almost admirable, the way that he loved her mother so deeply. but, as she grew older, she began to understand that he didn't truly love anyone.

she was intelligent, sure. she got good grades in her classes, understood her materials, read every (interesting) book that she could find in the library's free pile. she was smart enough that she really should've gone to college, and really should've worked in a museum, or something.

at eighteen, she had bid farewell to any hope of college when she'd enlisted. lilith truthfully never could tell anyone why, exactly, she'd decided to join the marines. she reasoned that she might as well do something with her life, something that would get her paid without having to pay to be involved. she knew that she couldn't pay for college with the minimum wage she'd made from the local diner, and no way her father would loan her a dime. it seemed like the best option, at the time.

lilith didn't really know what she was getting into. she liked going to the gym, she liked being a part of the wrestling team at her high school, and she assumed that she would like being in the service. but marching, saluting, and reciting commands from a never ending list... wasn't quite her thing.

it wasn't that she had an issue with authority, like most people assumed. she didn't mind the structure of the marines, and she didn't mind when the drill sergeant would yell in her face. the problem, she thought, was that she couldn't stop waiting to actually do something.

she didn't want to kill anybody, she didn't think. she didn't have any sort of inner rage that urged her to become a masochist, or a lust for blood. but she was good in her training, and she wanted to be able to actually do something, for once in her life.

her time finally came when she was stationed overseas, doing ground operations and defending a military base. it was during this time that lilith first killed someone.

she had expected to feel horrified of herself, to start crying, to drop the gun in horror. but she was more horrified by the fact that she didn't feel any of that. she was doing her job, she was doing what she'd been trained to do. as she grew older, she'd grow to regret it. she'd grow to be horrified of herself.

when lilith's four years of service had ended, she immediately got out. her superiors were shocked that she, such a good soldier, was leaving the marines. but lilith wanted nothing more than to get out. she wanted to have a normal job, something where she could just file papers or fold t-shirts. but, of course, that didn't happen.

lilith was offered a position to be a mercenary through a private military contractor. though she had been entirely against the initial proposal, the money that she was being tempted with was too much for her to ignore. she hadn't gotten her college degree, and couldn't afford to try for one. it was her best option.

she didn't mind the job itself. it paid well, it protected her, and it was something she was good at. no matter how much she wished she wasn't.

she'd started to make a name for herself. she looked unassuming, if only a little cold, and yet she was a certified killer. contractors wanted her to work under an unassuming guise, then to pull the trigger when no one had even thought to look.