Zoe Katsaros
AUTOMATIC 14
Jane Bruno
The world ached in ways it could only do when morality decided to crash through the window like a baseball bat swinging its way to a new world record. So often would it break and bend over the course of time, a tidal wave colliding into the twisted fragments of life that seemed to break off into little bits and tangents that could paint the world black and red. Blend, it all would, each little shade shifting so gently into the next, as though there was never a difference between them at all. Discord would wind through the body as one became something new, something different.
Jane was different. Not in the Tumblr way, where being different meant something positive and good, but in the horror movie different way, in which she'd just become the guy carrying an ax to the supermarket.
She walked back into that house she had entered earlier, her mind still blank thinking about it. As much as she wanted to erase having met with those monsters it would not leave her—no, they were very much real. As was she. Blood pumped through her veins in ways it had never before. Every sense was sharpened—sounds were broader, smells were sharper, and everything felt as though there were more of it. With those overload of senses came the fear, the pain, as though everything was intensified. She longed for the world of before, where the worst thing to happen was Monica.
Monica.
It hadn't occurred to her in over a day to check upon her sister. No, instead Jane had gone to a meeting and learned of her vampirism. Afterwards, she'd gone to her job, having convinced herself it was nothing but a nightmare...only nightmares were real, and she wasn't the loyal heroine living a life of sassy come-backs and fighting. No, Jane was the anti-hero, the bad guy who was trying, the person who would inevitably die in the end. Death, the welcoming widow to the poor, the kiss of freedom to the pained, and the laughter to the sick and sick of heart.
For once, death would not welcome her. Instead, it rejected her. With that in mind, her body walked back to the house. To that house. Where the coven lived, where the clan lived, whatever it was called. Eugene walked with her, his hand on her back, coaxing her in ways only he ever seemed able to do. Their feet fell in rhythm as they walked, his shoes louder than hers, his body bigger than hers, and she fitting perfectly into his side. It was comforting, having his presence there, just as it had been in ages past. Anytime she found herself too drunk and throwing up, he'd lead her to the bathroom and tie her hair back before he left. Eugene may have been a sassy, unruly, rude guy, but he was there and that's all that mattered. Friendship like theirs was true.
If only the world she found herself in could be as well.
"Caroline is dying," Gareth said to them as they entered the house. His body hunched over, eyes dead set on the floor, everything falling apart. "She's not going to make it." There was anger in his soul—it was in the way he spoke, each word a shout and yet a whisper, the vibrations causing the world about him to shift and morph. It was all an illusion of pain and hatred. Pain and hatred at what, however, was yet to come to light.
The house was fairly large, furnished, but it was dark. A heavy presence lingered in the air. One would expect cobwebs to hang from obtuse places, spiders to be scurrying across the floor back to them, and the sounds of screaming from ages long gone to grace the ceiling with their fragrances of death. The sounds would be delightful to some and horror to others. Laceration and incineration, everything a good coven seemed to need. But no, that was not the house at all. The house wasn't some horror movie. Things weren't perfectly evil and grotesque.
