#reneweys birthday saga

[honey-hippie-harper]

Warm

MY. SON. LOOK AT MY SOOOOOOON AFSGHJAFGSHJAFSGHJKA

WELL, MY DAUGHTER AFGSHSFGSHJ

@nodrianbcyes HAPPY BIRTHDAY, SWEET DAUGHTER OF MINE AFGSHJASFGSHJK

Geez. You’re a year older :’)))) <3. I hope that, despite the world it’s still going to shit, you have a nice birthday surrounded by your loved ones :’) <3 <3 <3 Thanks for being such a great friend and for having such a great sense of humor acvsbnayjk yo mean a lot, and I hope you know that :’) I wish you the best of birthdays, and remember to eat lots of cake (AND SEND PICTURES OF THE CAKE AHSFSGHJA).

Here’s a little Ruby thing <3

TW: BLOOD

Warm

Warm.

The sensation of blood could be described as warm.

For Ruby, the bigger the wound was, the warmer the blood, until it was boiling hot. It flowed out of you and made you feel like all your limbs were on fire, leaving a trace characterized by the strange, yet distinguishable smell of steel.

The saddest part of it all, was that it was a part of her.

It had become a part of her.

Lucky were the ones who had been born with it.

The others…others like her, had to watch it happen, and then live with it.

It’s not that she wasn’t proud of being a prodigy, or a Renegade, for that matter. The Renegades, especially Blacklight, whose powers he hadn’t been born with, made special emphasis on how important it was to embrace one’s prodigy persona. Perhaps a couple of counseling sessions for prodigies with acquired powers instead of birth powers before allowing them to become a Renegade would’ve been useful, but the majority of them seemed to be doing just fine.

Being a Renegade gave you a sense of importance, which, Ruby sometimes supposed, was similar to the one the Anarchists must’ve felt when Ace Anarchy appeared and decided he would be the one to change everything.

There was a huge difference between the Renegades and the Anarchists, though, for the Renegades, although not perfect, hadn’t become as corrupted as the Anarchists, and they had also managed to overcome the economic crisis they had left behind.

The Renegades often made you feel secure in your own skin, no matter where your powers had come from, and one of their main objective was creating a society where prodigies and non-prodigies could coexist, without putting the other down to defend their own cause.

Despite their flaws, Ruby considered them to be a great organization, and she was proud of being a Renegade.

And, more than that, she was also glad she had managed to get something so fulfilling, exciting and important out something that had been so horrible and gruesome.

“Sometimes you can find light in the darkest things.” Blacklight used to say.

She knew it was only because he like to involve the concept of dark and light in every single one of his speeches, but that specific phrase had been stuck in her head for the longest time, and it refused to go away.

She had found light in the darkest thing that had ever happened to her.

But that didn’t mean she had forgotten the darkness, and how it came in the shape of knives, with the taste of metal and the boiling sensation of blood covering her entire body like a huge blanket, only to be replaced with the itchiness of something solid growing from the fresh wounds.

The memories were rarely there during the daytime, because she had better things to think about.

However, the nighttime was a different story, because in the night everything was more silent and Ruby was calm. Inert. And overall vulnerable, which she wasn’t the biggest fan of.

There were better days than others, and she rarely ever knew she was having a bad day until she saw scary faces in her dreams, holding sharp things and screaming the most soulless words she had ever had the pleasure to hear at her, a tiny dot staring at them from the floor.

It always started with the men, and it usually ended with the rubies. When she was lucky, it ended with the sensation of swallowing a pill, but a hundred times more unpleasant.

That day, she happened to be lucky.

“Hey…hey…” There was a hand shaking her whole body, taking her by the shoulder. “…Ruby?”

Her body bounced upwards upon the falling feeling people sometimes got in their sleep. There was a strong smell of metal and steel, and it broke through her nostrils, invading her entire system. She was used to the smell, but it still made her very nauseous after waking up from a nightmare.

A nightmare. Yes.

That’s all it had been.

A nightmare.

Trying to steady her breath and focus her vision, she found Nova’s eyes staring back at her.

That night, they were standing guard in the old theatre, for no specific reason other than it was going through some renovations. For some time now, it had been used to present low-budgeted musicals or plays, but, legend had it, after the job was done, it would be turned into a party salon, because, after all, it had been used as a party salon during the Age of Anarchy anyway.

They weren’t the only patrol there, either, because it was a big building and they were in charge to prevent or stop break-ins. All of them, however, were scattered through the floors. The floors where they would spend the night were supposed be sorted randomly, but Adrian was given the chance to choose. Hence, they were now in the third floor, in a room that had once been used as a dressing room.

The junk food’s remains were all around them, and, with the nightlight they had brought with them, Ruby could see the rest of the team, very comfortable in their sleeping bags.

Oscar was the closest to her, lying on his side, facing the opposite direction Ruby was. His head was resting on his arm, and his cane was next to him, close to his backpack.

Danna was drooling on Adrian. They both were out of their sleeping bags, and he was laying on his stomach, while she was using his back as her pillow.

Nova, naturally, hadn’t brought a sleeping bag with her, because she didn’t need it, and over the few months they had been around her, something Ruby noticed (although she didn’t tell anyone because she didn’t want to be rude) was that, besides being practical, she didn’t own many things, and she always declined the invitations to go out to eat with them. At first, she didn’t pay much attention to it, because she started acting the most distant after she shot the Detonator in self-defense, but then, even after she looked way less shocked, it didn’t seem like her attitude had changed all that much. She still didn’t appear to own many things, and she always wore the same three or four shirts when she wasn’t wearing her uniform.

One could only hope that, with the paycheck they received from the Renegades’ part, her situation would get better eventually, but, as for now, Ruby highly doubted she even owned a sleeping bag. After all, a sleeping bag wasn’t exactly a top priority item for a prodigy whose power happened to be not having the physical necessity to sleep.

Snapping back into reality once again, Ruby realized she was still here.

Deep down, she was disappointed this wasn’t Oscar, and, when she realized that, she felt guilty. Hence, trying to smile, she said, in a hoarse voice:

“Hi.” Then, Ruby gulped. “…I had a bad dream.”

Nova blinked and nodded, as if agreeing with that statement.

Another thing she had noticed about Nova, was that she always seemed to be emotionless. She rarely took the time to consider whether the thing she was planning to say would offend or hurt anyone’s feelings. She just phrased her sentences in her mind, and then they came out from her mouth like word vomit. She was straight up, and sometimes she said mean or self-deprecating things in a tone so flat, dull and nonchalantly it send shivers down Ruby’s spine. She wasn’t exactly a warm person, while Ruby considered herself to be one, and that’s why, at first, it had been kind of weird to have her around.

Not that she were complaining.

Adrian always said, ever since they became a team, that it was important to have balance. You couldn’t have a team full of people who had the personality of a cinnamon roll, just like you couldn’t have a team full of people who had the personality of an icicle (that’s why everybody hated Team Frostbite so much).

He seemed to like Nova very much.

As in, like-like.

There was a huge difference in the way he liked Danna or Oscar or herself, and the way he liked Nova, which reminded her of the way in which she liked Oscar.

Maybe that’s why she found herself to be kind of disappointed when she saw Nova instead of Oscar.

“You’re bleeding.”

The first thing that popped up in her mind was “Yes, I’m always bleeding”, until she realized that Nova was way too clever to make such an obvious statement. She had to mean something else.

Once she looked around, Ruby’s attention reached her bandages, and also her sleeping bag.

She was covered in blood.

Her forever open wounds were itching as the dense, crimson liquid gushed out of them, though the hemorrhage was starting to settle down already.

Ruby had been stabbed four times. Two in her right arm, one in the chest, and one in the stomach. Ever since the incident, the wounds hadn’t stopped bleeding, so they always had to be wrapped up in bandages. Nevertheless, every now and then, a trigger appeared, and that made altered everything.

Her power was embarrassing and complicated sometimes.

Nova, from her part, didn’t seem to be judging her, nor did she seem to be disgusted by the scene right there, in front of her.

Nova wasn’t the problem.

The problem was that Ruby had been made fun of because of it before, especially when they attended camps or when, for some special circumstances, they had to spend entire nights in the Headquarters. Her team always managed to defend her, and she knew how to defend herself, but that didn’t change the fact there were some things she had had to gone through, because of something that hadn’t, nor would it ever be her fault.

It wasn’t her fault she smelled like blood (It was logical. She was always bleeding), just like it wasn’t her fault she sometimes bled more than the usual.

Nova’s presence made her feel unprotected, and Ruby shrunk, trying to hide herself beneath her sleeping bag, but in the end that only made her feel more ashamed, because the sleeping bag was bloody as well.

She had bled through all of her bandages, through her clothes, and the blood had then reached the fabric of the sleeping bag.

Ruby looked like a crime scene, and for once she noticed there was something different in Nova’s eyes.

They were not as cold.

A little sympathetic, even.

“Do you have any extra bandages with you?”

It then occurred to Ruby that, perhaps, Nova hadn’t come here to laugh, or make comments that came off as lowkey out of place. She had heard all sorts of comments in regards to the issue. She had been asked if she was having an extra heavy period, or if bleeding like this was the equivalent of peeing herself in the middle of the night. Nova wasn’t saying any of those things.

She pretty much was just…there.

Gulping, Ruby lifted her hand up a little, pointing at her backpack, which was next to Adrian’s.

Trying to make as little sound as possible, Nova crawled and reached for it, hanging it from her shoulders, before getting on her feet and offering a hand to Ruby, in order to help her do the same.

Before doing anything, Ruby wrapped herself in her extra blanket, and she didn’t even had to ask where they were going, because she already knew.

The restroom didn’t have showers, but at least it looked relatively clean.

Once they were inside, Nova held the backpack towards her, and Ruby opened it, only to be greeted by her extra change of clothes, which she would have to wear, and her kit.

Normally, she would’ve removed the bandages and clean them herself, but they were too sticky, and she didn’t even know where to start.

When she noticed that, for some reason, Nova proceeded to try to help. Paying little attention to the fact her fingers were a little red by the end, she removed the bandage from her arm, and then helped her clean it with a wet cloth, no signs of disgust to the sight of the open, swollen, bleeding wound. She passed the cloth through it a couple of times, and then wrapped some new bandages around it.

After that, she gave her some privacy to finish the job, and once she was out of the restroom, Ruby cleaned the wounds in her chest and stomach, wrapping new bandages around it.

She put on her extra change of clothes, and came out of the restroom.

-.-

When they came back to the dressing room, Ruby realized her sleeping bag still looked like a crime scene, and if there was one thing she didn’t have, that something was an extra sleeping bag.

She didn’t want to sleep on her own blood, either, so she just grimaced, and then went to sit next to Nova, who was by the window.

She asked no questions, because she never did, especially when she felt that something was none of her business.

Nova was staring at the moon, and her scarred eyebrow was arched. That, Ruby did try to ask why, but maybe, just like the way her wounds worked were none of Nova’s business, the way she was staring at the moon was none of Ruby’s business.

But they were right there, sitting next to the other, while the rest of the team slept behind them, and while the city slept beneath them.

Then, Ruby wondered why was it that she didn’t sleep.

But it occurred to her that, once again, it was none of her business.

Maybe one day, but not today.

They were not that deep.

“Where do you think prodigies come from?” Asked Nova, out of nowhere, avoiding eye contact. “The moon or the stars?”

If she wanted to be brutally honest, she hadn’t seen that coming.

Nova was more of a science person, rather than someone who believed in myths like those.

Good thing Ruby wasn’t exactly a science person herself, and she had been through her myth and legend-obsessed phase.

“Well, most people believe we come from the stars.”

“That’s true.” Nova nodded. “I believe we come from the stars, too.”

For some reason, Ruby didn’t know how to respond to that, so she just stared.

The moon was still there, along with the stars, which looked like freckles.

One time, Oscar had compared her freckles to them.

“It’s a nice concept.” Ruby shrugged. “Stars are beautiful.”

“They are. Until they explode.” Nova scoffed, ruffling her own hair, carelessly. “They are my favorite part of the night.”

“…And you spend too much time awake.”

“…Exactly.”

Then, they didn’t say anything else, but once they were quiet enough, Ruby sighed, and just like she used to do with Danna sometimes, she slowly got into a laying position, resting her head on Nova’s lap.

For a second, she felt Nova’s apparently touch starved body become tense, hard as a rock, but then she took a deep breath and tried to relax her muscles.

She didn’t pull away.

On the contrary, Nova slowly lowered her hand, and placed it on Ruby’s arm, rhythmically tapping on her skin. It wasn’t an aggressive gesture. It was rather stealthy, to the point she could barely feel it.

Some minutes after that…seconds, she dared to say, Ruby fell into a deep, deep sleep, from which she didn’t wake up until the next day.

Fortunately, this time, it was a dreamless sleep.

#renegades trilogy #marissa meyer #dawnie writes #reneweys birthday saga #ruby tucker #red assassin #nova artino #nightmare #nova mclain #insomnia #TW: BLOOD

[honey-hippie-harper]

Little Sister (Re-upload)

So, remember how I got a divorce from @dawniebb x’d? Well, in that post I mentioned how I deleted all my fics and I wouldn’t be re-uploading any of them except from like three :’) that’s what I’m going to do now :’)

Little Sister is about Nova and Maggie :’). And it was @everyone-has-a-nightmare‘s birthday gift! <3

And...here it is :3

My tag list (tell me if you want to be in or out): @healing-winston-pratt @obsidianfr3sk @alecjamesartino @everyone-has-a-nightmare @razzmooncake

Little Sister

She was named Evelyn.

Now I guess she’s not.

It was amputated from her.

Besides, she doesn’t like it.

I didn’t like it either, and I told them I wanted to call her Evie not because she was tiny, but because I didn’t like Evelyn.

She wasn’t even that tiny. In fact, she was chubby.

One day I tried to come closer and she kicked me. For being a baby, her limbs for sure were pretty strong. My arm was bruised for days, and I remember thinking that, if there hadn’t been an amniotic sac between Evie and her, she would’ve bruised her insides.

Evie was merciless, just like I was, but in a different way.

Merciless, and with very strong lungs.

She had the lungs of an opera singer; and those lungs, I dare to say, had a life of their own, because they refused to shut down when she needed to stop crying the most.

But no.

Her lungs felt entitled to have freedom of speech, like problematic people like me do.

However, I don’t think they were problematic per se. They were…

Functional.

And delusional, for the being entitled to have freedom of speech thing. And stubborn, for refusing to stop giving her air so she could keep wailing and screeching like a tormented demon.

The day I became afraid of fireworks, said fireworks took Evelyn away, because my arms, like her lungs, had a life of their own.

But my arms, unlike her lungs, weren’t stubborn or felt they were entitled to have freedom of speech.

My arms turned out to have nothing but a very severe case of Alzheimer disease.

They still do, to this day. But for the following years, everything they thought about was Evelyn, and they liked to rub everything into my face; how they were an important part of me but, at the end of the day, my brain was the one that controlled them. Hence, it was my fault.

Because everything is my fucking fault, always.

Maybe Margaret believes that, too.

And, maybe, Margaret likes the Dread Warden so much because she thinks the fireworks wouldn’t have gotten her if she hadn’t been visible.

The thing is…

I’m older than her, so I have to pretend I know better so she can believe me.

Still, she doesn’t, when I tell her they would’ve gotten her anyway.

Partly because Margaret doesn’t believe anything, ever.

Margaret is a bunch of broken pieces, floating around a cold, bottomless pit.

That means that, no matter what everyone does; no matter how hard one tries, it’s never enough for her.

I try to pretend I know better, but Margaret doesn’t believe me.

She never believes me, and I’m starting to question whether if it’s worth it or not.

Sometimes I don’t know.

Margaret looks a lot more like her than I do. I think.

Maybe I’m just nitpicking and that’s a lie, because Margaret looks a lot like me. Hence, that would mean that I, too, look a lot like her.

But I’m sure Margaret says her with a capital H, unlike me.

That might as well be just me nitpicking again.

And maybe there’s nothing wrong with that because it really is never enough for Margaret, and her void just keeps getting bigger and bigger and I don’t know how to stop it.

Sometimes I don’t like her.

She’s noisy.

She’s bratty.

She speaks too much but, at the same time, she doesn’t speak enough.

And she’s too far, in every sense possible.

I’m right here and she’s miles, miles away.

I told Adrian to stop grabbing her like that, because she doesn’t like it, and one must respect what other people don’t like in order to stopping them from exploding.

But maybe Margaret exploded some years ago, and now she’s just bleeding through life, leaving a trace of torn flesh by her feet.

Or stardust.

Everyone knows prodigies are made of stars, except Winston, who says they come from the moon, and since he’s older than me, he pretends that he knows better so I can believe him.

But I don’t.

Because I watch Margaret bleed stardust every single day and stardust it’s called STARdust for a reason. Stardust doesn’t come from the fucking moon.

Either way, that’s just prodigies.

And as a prodigy, Margaret likes to steal my things.

For example, I carry the only piece left of him in my wrist, and sometimes it disappears.

I always make a big deal out of it, because I never had the right to whine about things and, now that I do, I like it when Leroy comes and asks me what’s wrong.

I always make a big deal when I wake up to my wrist being empty. Naked.

And he asks: What is it?

And I answer, and he knows I know what happened, but he pretends he doesn’t because he believes he is yet to be forgiven.

Margaret steals my fucking things.

The other day I was in a bad mood, so after my conversation with Leroy, I chased her around the house and pretended I’m not a fast runner, just like I pretended she doesn’t have tiny legs.

I could see my bracelet shining in her hand, and in that moment I hated her.

Stars.

How much I hated her.

I hated her for being so empty. So cold. So soulless.

I hated her for pulling away every time I touch her because pulling away is all she’s ever known.

I hated her for talking back because talking back is all she’s ever known.

I hated her for being her.

I hated her when she bit my hand like a dog.

And I hated her voice when she started screaming.

WHY CAN YOU HAVE IT?!

WHY CAN YOU HAVE IT BUT I CAN’T?!

WHY DID THEY ONLY LOVE YOU?

I hated every single one of those phrases, and I hated not being able to talk back because I didn’t have an answer.

So I sat by the kitchen counter, and I massaged my scalp because my brain was pounding.

Margaret stood there, just staring at me in silence, for eternity, until she decided she hated me too and told me to stop, as if I could control when my brain was pounding and when it wasn’t.

I didn’t pay attention to her, so she gave up like the child she is and came to me.

I thought she was going to attack me again.

But she didn’t.

She just laid on my lap, and rested her head on my chest, looking for my heartbeat, while I wrapped my arms around her, because she knew she had hurt me, and I knew I had hurt her too.

Her hair has some curls, like mine, but her hairstyle doesn’t look like it was made with paper scissors, unlike mine.

If she had done her hair with paper scissors, she would’ve ended up looking like me, and when I saw her I would’ve just thought that’s mine.

Well.

Not really.

I’m not that petty.

Well.

Maybe to other people.

Not to Margaret.

I’m starting to think she’s scared of me because, to be honest, I’m scared of me too.

Deep down, I’m also deeply scared of her.

I’m not telling her that.

She doesn’t need to know.

I don’t want her to know.

#renegades trilogy #marissa meyer #my fanfics #dawnie writes #reneweys birthday saga #nova artino #nova mclain #nightmare #margaret white #margaret artino #canon divergence

[honey-hippie-harper]

Before Gatlon Falls (Re-upload)

This was @alecjamesartino ‘s birthday gift! <3 and it’s basically the night before Ace destroyed Gatlon city x’DDDDDD Because that thing was awful but I’m really interested in how it happened :) and to this day I still like to think she is, too, and that she liked this gift and wasn’t pretending :3

Also, writing about the young Anarchist is pretty fun.

Tag list (tell me if you want to be in or out): @healing-winston-pratt @obsidianfr3sk @nodrianbcyes @alecjamesartino @everyone-has-a-nightmare @razzmooncake

Before Gatlon Falls

Honey Harper’s couch had always been uncomfortable, ever since Leroy had moved in with her when he dropped out from college, but it’s not like he had any other place to go.

It’s not like he could complain, either.

Some nights were worse than others.

This one was particularly bad, given that the AC had broken down again, the fans made a lot of noise and filled the apartment with hot, suffocating air. Nevertheless, that wasn’t the only thing that was preventing him from sleeping.

There was so much noise.

So much noise.

The...fucking fans.

And also Alec.

Alec was making too much noise, even though he wasn’t making any. He had been making too much noise since the mayor’s wife had fallen lifeless on top of her dead husband and he said nothing; Alec, quiet as he was, had been making too much noise since then.

He was making too much noise now.

All the furniture in the room, except his couch, of course, had been moved towards a corner, and David and Alec Artino laid by his side, on the floor, lost in a sea of blankets and pillows.

Alec was sound asleep, his arm wrapped around his brother’s body, illuminated by the warm lamp light, because David wasn’t used to sleeping in the dark (or, more likely, he didn’t like it), even though he was like 11.

Somewhere in this apartment, hidden in a box at the bottom of the closet, there was a helmet, waiting for the sun to come out, only to be worn by Alec, who was either very delusional or very…

Serious about this.

Leroy wasn’t sure, but what he was sure about, ironically, was that he didn’t want to know.

One could only stare after so much blood had been shed. On one hand, prodigies had spoken up, and it had been thanks to them, who were led by Alec…

On the other hand, the point of no return was a drastic measure and, also, an uneven path that could either turn out to be very effective or very tragic and chaotic.

Besides, Leroy didn’t know what he should believe anymore because, being an esceptic, it wasn’t that easy for him to believe everything Alec said, especially when that everything involved a helmet being the answer to all of their problems.

But if it was…

If it was...maybe they were screwed.

Just maybe.

Alec knew that, because he had been the one to suggest it, aware of his actions and its potential consequences.

That’s why Leroy wondered how he could be sleeping so calmly. Actually, when he explicitly asked himself that, he could hear Alec’s voice in his mind:

“Because I know we’re not wrong.”

Which, maybe they weren’t.

Just maybe, again.

With the sound of the fans getting on his nerves, Leroy rubbed his hands over his face, which was sticky thanks to the sweat, and it made him feel gross to the point he actually considered taking a shower at this moment, in the middle of the night, until he realized that would be useless, because he would take a shower, and then he would come back to the couch, where he would sweat again, and it would be like a circle of failure.

Leroy stayed there, his eyes wide open, staring at the ceiling and thinking about how much he hated the fans, the AC and the summer, until he heard a mildly loud thud, coming from Honey’s room.

She was usually loud during bad days, throwing things around accidentally or bumping against things as if she had planned to bump into them. Over time, Leroy had stopped getting up to go check on her, because she wasn’t a baby that needed to be fed every two hours; she was an adult, meaning she wasn’t his responsibility (even though he was staying in her apartment).

That time, however, he felt the need to do it.

Leroy groaned quietly, and then he started heading towards her room which, obviously, was as hot as the rest of the apartment, and the door was ajar.

There was nothing worrying or weird happening in there, but Honey was crouched down on the floor, cursing between her teeth as she tried to pick up her makeup stuff from the floor, putting it inside her cosmetic bag; Leroy thought about helping her…

Before his attention was drawn towards the dress.

The mannequin was standing across the room, next to the twin bed; it was a long dress, with black and yellow stripes, and a sort of cape that looked like the wings of a bee. The pins and needles around the waist and the borders allowed him to know it wasn’t finished yet.

On the floor, Honey tried to take a small set of eyeshadows, but her hands were so shaky that it slipped from her and, when it fell onto the floor again, the one in the champagne shade shattered, so Honey took a deep, laboured breath and rubbed her forehead until she left a reddish, mildly swollen trace in her skin.

It wasn’t that severe, but it snapped Leroy back into reality, as he knelt down next to her and took her by the wrists before she could do any more harm to herself.

“Go wash your face and drink some water. I’ll manage.”

Honey took her time, just staring at the floor, until she decided what to answer and said:

“I’m okay.”

 Even if she wasn’t.

Teary-eyed, Honey looked at the dress she was making, to which Leroy followed her gaze, and they both just...observed in silence, and it seemed like it had a life of its own.

At least, until Honey scoffed and, taking her hands away from Leroy’s grip, she finished putting her makeup inside the bag.

“Is it too much?”

If it were another person, it would’ve been too much, but it was Honey.

Nothing was ever too much for her, and Leroy had grown to accept that. He would only wear a shirt and a lab coat, but of course she would sew a wholeass dress just for this ocassion. Even if she was as unsure and scared as everyone else, and even if she was the one who had cried herself to sleep for the last few days because, although not scared of death, she was terrified of uncertainty, or having to hide the rest of her life.

“Because that’s not living.” She would say. “That’s like...being a ghost, hidden behind a curtain.”

“It’s too much.” Leroy confirmed, trying to shake the intrusive thoughts out. “But it’s not like you care about that, do you?”

“I wanted it to be pretty.” Honey responded, although Leroy could feel some sort of emptiness in her tone. “I’m going by Queen Bee, you know? And it had to look...I don’t know. Special. Like...a queen.”

Then she stood up, and Leroy watched her as she walked around the mannequin, shaking some inexistent dust off of the fabric.

“Unlike my prom dress, which was pink.” She said, wrinkling her nose. “...Not that pink it’s an ugly color. I just don’t think…”

She swallowed, and then she, suddenly, started working in the dress again, not as if she had forgotten Leroy was still there, but as if she didn’t mind his presence at all.

“...I mean, it’s my color but I don’t like it...and to be prom queen...you have to fit in. And I’ve always been like… an outstanding actress, not to brag. Can you imagine? I even convinced myself I loved that ugly dress. Crazy.”

Sadly, for what Leroy could tell, she was yet to convince herself she loved this.

All of this.

This whole situation.

“Harper.” Leroy said, getting on his feet too, and putting his hands inside his pockets. “Are we…?”

“Whatever that you’re going to ask, don’t.” She cut him off, deliberately, as a hasty breath escaped her mouth.

Maybe, in her mind, the phrase hadn't sounded that harsh, but when Leroy received it, it did. It sounded, in fact, as harsh as it could, and she seemed to have noticed that, because she avoided eye contact, and Leroy focused on light breaking through her curls.

"We're gonna die." She whispered.

Her voice was breaking, but she didn't cry.

"But I'm tired of being a freak, Leroy. I don't wanna be a freak anymore." Honey said, and Leroy could tell she meant every part of it.

Even the dying part.

"... And he's all that I've got."

This time, he flinched, but not because he hadn't expected it, but because, somehow, he knew it was coming and, yet, something itched when she said it.

Something almost hurt when she said it.

But when Leroy tried to open his mouth, trying to phrase what he wanted to say without sounding like he actually cared or was way too offended, a voice came through the doorway, hoarse and sleepy.

"That looks nice." Said Alec.

And since he had arrived late, he referred to the dress.

The compliment, however, went unnoticed, as Honey just pressed her lips together and continued sewing.

Alec, arching an eyebrow, turned back at Leroy.

"Do I happen to be… Missing something or…?"

So he was asleep.

It was the night before the big strike and Alec was sleeping. Right there. Next to his little brother.

That was so Alec.

And Alec was just so… Him.

It was insane, and almost terrifying to watch and experience.

"It's just that…"

"I don't feel good." Honey said, rubbing her forehead again, this time twice as hard. "Can we… Can we pray?"

To put it lightly, Leroy didn't consider himself a believer, but Alec did. Sometimes, he dared to say, a pretty devoted one, even if he did question some biblical passages and talked about how the translations of the Bible could never be fully trusted.

Still, when he heard that, his lips became arched into a smile; a kind, understanding smile.

"Of course we can pray, Miss Harper." He said, before turning at Leroy to ask:

"Would you like to join us?"

And in that moment Leroy knew that wasn't how he wanted to spend his sleepless night, but, somehow, he was unable to think of any other way, and so he agreed, even though he didn't know how to pray.

-.-

Of course, Alec didn’t want to annoy David, so they ended up going out, to the balcony, where they lit a candle, because Alec wanted to.

Being outside, Leroy felt he was finally able to breathe, because the summer weather felt less hot, to the point it was actually bearable; Leroy wouldn’t have minded sleeping here, if the balcony had been more spacious.

But they weren’t here to sleep. They were here to…

Pray.

A gust of wind struck them, so Honey cupped her hands around the candle’s flame, caringly; her hands were still shaking and, obviously, Ace noticed that, as he smiled in a very understanding way, and he looked up towards the sky, and the stars reflected in his green eyes.

Alec’s smile weakened for the first time in a long time, as he took a deep, deep breath and let the air out in a sigh, putting his hands together, as if he meant to rub them together...but he didn’t.

Instead, he looked down, towards the candle, and then towards them.

“I can see why you’re hesitating.”

“Alec.” Honey said, in a soothing voice. “We’re not hesitating. We’re just…”

He chuckled a little, perhaps with the intention of interrupting her.

“I’m not saying hesitating it’s necessarily bad; hesitating, in fact, is something I consider...human, almost powerful.” He explained.

Because of course he saw it that way.  

“If I had a coin for every time I’ve seen hesitation in my own eyes, I’d probably be...far, far away from here.”

“Why don’t we go far away then?” Honey snapped, shifting her position. “We could...I don’t know...maybe...Alec. Your brother. He’s so young. He’s...Alec…”

“I know.” Alec nodded, solemnly. “And since he’s so young, he’s exactly the reason why we should stay. Think about the children.”

For a moment, his expression darkened, and he could see him, as Ace Anarchy emerged from the shadows, and it held Alec by the shoulder.

And his soul became bold and bigger, while at the same extremely small, like a single grain of sand.

And Alec spoke, with his lips pursing and quivering once.

“Think about the children. “ He repeated. “Think about those who are like us; those who turned out to be like us; those who were mistreated; those who suffered; those who desperately tried to be heard but couldn’t because they were deprived of life; think about the ones we lost on the way, and those who trust and believe in us…”

Leroy felt the need to speak, as Honey was starting to scratch her thigh, like she always did every time she was too nervous.

“There was a child inside of the mayor’s wife...what if that child was a prodigy?”

“But what about the damage they’ve done to us? “ Alec spoke, frowning. “Those were bad people. They killed the ones they didn’t like. They mistreated us and banned us from places just because they could...what about that damage? What about the damage they did to babies who were already born, but killed at hospitals because they were prodigies? As if that were their fault? As if that made them monsters?”

Speechless, Leroy looked down.

“...What about us?”

What about us?

That was an excellent question.

“What about us.” Leroy repeated, as a statement instead of a question.

“What about me?” Alec pointed at himself. “...what about the...celebration held by the ones who wronged me, when they thought me dead? What about all those broken bones when they decided to surround me at school just because it was thought that prodigies couldn’t feel?”

He turned at Honey.

“What about you? What about the people who turned their backs at you just because they knew? How they mistreated you? … What about your family who said it was your fault and made you believe such….beautiful powers were something hideous until you decided the right thing to do was hiding them? "

“Oh, Alec.”

“But what about the sound of your voice? ...How you stand there and speak up? Don’t you like how your voice sounds, Honey Harper?”

“I do. I really do, but…”

“And what about you, Leroy?”

What about you.

“Wasn’t it ironic? How they hurt you because you were just a normal human being and then hurt you again because now you were a prodigy? What about that?...Why should we be okay with that?” Alec’s voice trembled.

“...Why should we allow it? Why should we let the same thing happen to David, who is young? Or the ones who will come after David? Or the ones who didn’t even get to be David’s age? Or the ones who died suffering, trying, hurting or hiding? … What about them? What about the ones who didn’t do anything? Why should we be like them?”

As silence filled the balcony, the candle kept burning, and Alec took a deep breath, again.

“I refuse to be like them. I’ll never be like them...and, since we’re working together, and we know that we’re worth it...then, there’s still hope for this world. And there’s still hope for us, although not for the ones who acted and became evil through time. “

Upon saying that, he held their hands towards them, slowly.

Honey was the one to put her hand on top of his’, and Leroy the second.

Then, Alec squeezed them, closing his eyes, as he said something and Honey answered it, because Leroy had no idea what that meant.

“Dear Lord…” Alec looked up at the sky. “You, who made the stars, and then made those stars turn into us...and you, who chose us to be the ones to fix the wrongs your people have managed to create….please send us a sign if we’re doing something wrong, before Gatlon falls.”

Squeezing his hand tighter, hiccuping and lowering her head, Honey started mouthing a prayer, but Leroy couldn’t help but look up at the stars too.

Send us a sign if we’re doing something wrong, before Gatlon falls.

Maybe the omnipresent entity told something to Alec, because he was the one who knew how to talk to it.

However, it didn’t say anything to Leroy.

He just knew that, for the first time, this felt real, and this was happening and, maybe, if Alec was speaking the truth, this could be the last night they spent alive.

And then…

Leroy didn’t know what came next. After death.

God didn’t send any sign either, as they prayed together.

The candle light, however, did die.

But Leroy wasn’t superstitious.

That had been just the weather.

The summer breeze.

The night.

The night before the strike.

Send us a sign if we're doing something wrong.

And God didn't talk back.

#renegades trilogy #marissa meyer #my fanfics #dawnie writes #reneweys birthday saga #alec artino #ace anarchy #honey harper #queen bee #leroy flinn #cyanide