manipulate // enoch o'connor

10 // beginning

 CLARA KNEW EMMA WAS NOT AN EASY TARGET. She needed a source, someone who would give her all information she need. She knew the eldest ones are her best shot, but basing from the heated argument in the kitchen not long ago, she had second thoughts. The argument was heard by the younger ones and with Emma and Olive's influence, they had them avoid her. 

She sat lonesome in the living room. Listening to the grandfather clock tick, she rest her eyes and leaned her body to the soft support of the couch. She hated Barron, but she had no choice. She wanted to live. "Clara...?" 

She immediately stood, "I don't have--" She saw Jacob Portman, looking at her, "--anything to do. Jacob, right?" She asked him, he nodded. "I'm good with you calling me Jake. Only my grandfather calls me Jacob."

"Seems like everyone was calling you that. Why are you talking to me?" No one had really talked to her after what happened. Except Enoch.

"Need help?" Enoch asked, finally when Emma and Olive left. Clara was watching him talk to her replica. She faded in front of his sight. Enoch stared from where she fell. Clara walked closed to him and placed a hand onto his shoulder. He immediately turned around.

"I'm fine, Enoch. Thanks." She said, and smiled. 

"How long have you been fooling us?" He asked. 

"Well, since I asked you how you were. I got a feeling they were coming for me so I manipulated them into seeing me, but another version. I was gonna push Emma away but I figured it wasn't worth it." Clara explained to him. Enoch nodded, as her explanation processed through him. 

"Clara, your nose."  She wiped her nose and saw blood. "It's been almost awhile.. I've worked myself too much."

"Am I not allowed to?" Jacob asked confusedly. 

"Didn't Emma say something?"  She answered. Jacob looked at him, confused, "Said what?"

"I think she talked to some peculiars to ignore me. Claire won't speak to me, and Bronwyn just walked past me, so I'm guessing she talked to them to ignore me. A punishment for me." This was it. The beginning of her win, and the beginning of their fall. Jacob was her perfect source. Just what she needed. 

"Punishment?" Jacob asked again, this time, worried, "Is that how bad it was?"

"No, not really. They entered my room last night when I stayed at Enoch's. Nothing happened, I didn't have the energy to go all the way up to my room and slept on his desk instead. I didn't want to share his bed, he was sick." Then, for a moment, she was quiet.

"Clara...? What's wrong?" Clara looked at him with tears forming in her eyes, "Jake.. I feel like I'm going to get abused here too." Her voice was shaky. Expect for being able to bend the reality, she also learned to manipulate them emotionally. Reading people to her is like reading cliche pocketbooks. They're so predictable. So vulnerable. 

Jacob immediately place a comforting hand on her shoulder, "No, they are not that kind of people, Clara. I-- I-- My grandfather knew them. He said they were kind to him." 

"What if they are?" Clara wiped her tears but it continues to flow down her cheek. "T-this is what happened to me from my old loop. I-I had to endure this. All my life." 

"One thing you need to know before going, Prescott." Barron told her, pulling her head up to look at him. She was tied to a chair, and she couldn't do anything. She was surrounded by hollowgasts following his command. She could be dead anytime now.

"The Portman peculiar knows I'm coming. The new Portman. I've already killed the older one. Now, you must remember to put use of your peculiarity all the time, and follow the plan you've been training for." 

"And If I don't?" Clara said weakly. Barron turned around to look at her and he struck her face with his hand, the slap echoed through the room loudly. "You die. They all die. You're their hero, Prescott, but you need to betray them, I want every last peculiar in there manipulated by you, even their precious ymbryne." 

To Clara's eyes, it was just her imagination. Getting beaten up by her old friends who aren't even alive anymore. For Jacob, she made sure she looked in pain in the flashbacks she was showing him. What she showed him was quick flashbacks of Barron kicking her, punching her, slapping her-- everything painful she could think of. She, of course, remembered what Barron said. If she gets caught, she's nothing but another corpse. To her, it was Barron, but to Jacob, it was her old friends doing horrible things to her. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I have to do this. I have to avenge all of you. She thought, hoping it would reach her friends who are in a better place now.

She ended it, and Jacob immediately gave her a hug. She was suprised but she figured it was his way of trying to comfort her. "I'm sorry you had to go through all of that, Clara. That's horrifying." Tell me about it.

She broke the hug, "C-could you do something for me?" 

✧ ✧ ✧

  ENOCH WAS ANGRY AT EMMA. She exposed him in front of Clara. He knew that she was a different case, but something still makes him look at her and think, "She's untrustworthy." But he couldn't pinpoint just yet. While on his free time, he saw Emma heading outside. With his wrath, he decided to go after her. 

Enoch grabbed Emma's arm, "What-- Enoch?" Emma told him, trying to flee from his grasps, "Let me go, Enoch." She gritted her teeth, "Let me go now." She repeated.

"Listen, Emma, I don't know what you're on about, but don't expose me in front of Prescott like that." He said in a hushed, angry tone. "I don't trust her, it's true, but I'm doing this for a reason. I want to know where her loyalty lies, Emma." 

Emma calmed down, so did Enoch. He released his grip on her arm, "Tell me what you think." Emma said, and she pulled Enoch going to the living room, "But not in anywhere she may be." 

Before she could open up the living room door, which had little gap in it, both she and Enoch heard voices from the inside. Curious, Enoch looked through the gap to see Jacob Portman and Clara Prescott, staring to an empty space while Clara said something the both of them couldn't hear.

"She's showing him something." Enoch whispered to Emma, "A memory, a flashback. A place. Something God knows what. She's manipulating him. I've seen it." He added. They watched as Jacob suddenly hugged her, making Emma flinch beside him. He pulled her away from the living room. 

"I believe you, Enoch. I'm sorry. Talk to Olive, please. She really loves you, Enoch. Don't you feel the same? I know deep down, you do." Emma tried to convinced her. Enoch scoffed. He himself knew he was incapable of understanding love, and even feeling it. All his feelings were either anger, irritation or nothing at all. He's forgotten to feel what it's like to be full of emotion.

"Deep down, pft. What bullshit." Enoch mocked, "I will talk to her again, but in no way I would say something romantic. Romance is nothing but a waste of time for me. "

"At least do." Emma said, "Let's separate for now. They may get out of the room anytime now. I'll get Portman to tell me what he learned from her. You have her do the same."

author's note

two updates yay! i had these prewritten. i'll try to update more
since i owe you all that much! thanks for 1k reads, that's amazing <33