𝐌𝐀𝐍𝐈𝐀, 𝐩𝐞𝐫𝐜𝐲 𝐣𝐚𝐜𝐤𝐬𝐨𝐧

20 - can we please cut the cryptic bullshit?

˖*࿐ •*⁀➷

THE EARTH SURROUNDED MABEL, drawing her into its desperate grasp. She could feel it tugging at her, trying to engulf her completely. The ground was alive, and it was speaking to her.

Mabel. The voice lilted and swooped like a summer's breeze, curling through Mabel's mind like ivy, infesting every corner of her brain. That cold, evil thing in her chest wriggled again, woken by this presence. Mabel, my dear. My chosen. Let me in.

The earth shoved and pried at Mabel, pushing into her mouth and nose, suffocating her. She was going to die here. Her fingers tightened around something, and she realized with a start that Percy was there too. Fuck. She couldn't let him die.

Years ago, we came to an agreement. I have come to collect. The woman sounded like she was smiling. I will live again, walk the earth I inhabit. The earth felt less like it was suffocating her, now, and more like it was trying to consume her. Roots tugged at her ankles, muck eating at her skin, moss winding its way down her throat as if it wanted to become her from the inside-out.

I've shown you what you were. The images from Mabel's dreams flashed behind her eyes, all those awful memories that didn't belong to her. That image of the golden-haired boy with the bleeding chest, sobbing in darkness. I own you, Mabel. I feed on the fear that lives behind your eyes.

Mabel was desperate now, trying to expel the earth from inside her. She tried to force herself to cough, to gag, to get rid of the muck trying to replace her blood. She wanted it out. But it just pushed back, pressing in on her like it wanted to crush her.

Stop fighting me, this will hurt a lot less if you struggle.

Mabel did not stop. She writhed and squirmed as best as she could amidst the earth, never loosening her grip on Percy's hand. Her head was starting to grow fuzzy, the lack of oxygen to her brain making her movements grow more and more sluggish, and Mabel thought, faintly, that this was it. She was going to die.

Then, something shifted above her and she was being yanked upward by the arm holding onto Percy. The earth fought to keep its hold on her, roots sinking into her ankles and the joints of her knees, breaking skin and prying, but she managed to kick free with the last of her strength.

No! The voice hissed, sounding more like a petulant child than a pissed primordial goddess. We will meet again, Mabel Larua. Trust in that.

When Mabel's head broke the surface, she still couldn't breathe. There was mud in her throat, in her nose, blocking off everything, and she couldn't fucking breathe. As soon as she was sure that Percy was sprawled on the grass beside her, she wrenched her hand from his grip. She needed to get the earth out.

Her first instinct was to shove two fingers down her throat. In an instant, she was gagging and heaving, choking out mud and moss tinged with red. She heaved and hacked and coughed, tears springing to her eyes as she braced her weight on her hands, but that cold thing in her chest still wriggled and when someone laid a gentle hand on her back, she hit their hand away with a sharpness she hoped communicated a big don't fucking touch me right now.

Mabel could faintly hear frantic voices around her over the sound of her own gagging, but there was one last clod of mud in her throat and she needed it out. She slammed her fist into her chest once, twice, coughing hard, and the chunk of earth was choked out of her mouth and landed on the grass. Finally, she sucked in a full breath, the sound wheezing and desperate, and her arms buckled beneath her.