Tag by: @flashfictionfridayofficial
WIP: Death of a Monarch Butterfly
POV: Crystal
Context: this is towards the very end of the book, the last scene before the epilogue
Crystal looked at Rebekah, waiting for a reaction. She had dumped a lot of information, so maybe it was shock -- but the way Rebekah looked at Alice made it seem like she wasn't surprised. She was sad, sure. But it was the kind of sad people got when they knew something bad was going to happen, and they had just hoped it wouldn't.
"Bekah?" Crystal dropped her hands and stepped back. "Did you know this would happen?"
"Crystal..." Rebekah took a breath and started again. "I need you to be brave for me."
"No!" Crystal stepped further away from both of them. Alice, to her credit, didn't try to placate Crystal. She just stood warily by the entrance. "No, Rebekah. Last time you told me to be brave I --" Crystal gripped her head, trying to get her thoughts together. "Last time you disappeared, didn't you? You left me. Both of my parents were gone and you left me!"
Crystal grabbed a metal pot and threw it against a wall. She was angry and her thoughts kept slipping away from her and maybe if she slammed enough things around the pounding in her head would be cancelled out. "And I couldn't remember!" Crystal sat abruptly on a chair and Alice started in the corner.
"Crystal, don't push it--"
"Why couldn't I remember you? Why does everyone seem to know what's going on and I don't?" Crystal was screaming now, trying to hear herself over the blood pounding in her ears. She ran out of words but the pounding didn't stop so she just screamed nothing instead.
Then the smell of sage and coriander surrounded her. Rebekah was close again, whispering in her ear like -- when was it? Flashes of a knife, cameras clicking, undone curly hair pulling her to safety, and those same whispers. The same words. The pounding got quieter, Crystal's breaths slower. She stopped screaming. Alice leaned against the wall again.
"Think of softer things, my love. Think of--"
"Stop!" Crystal pushed hard against Rebekah's chest and watched as she stumbled back, looking wounded. Crystal pushed her hair back off her face. "Is anything you say not an attempt to control me?" She was whispering now. Rebekah sucked in a breath and closed her eyes. Tears fell down her cheeks, cutting through dust and landing forgotten on the floor.
"She was trying to help. When you try to push through the programming by yourself, without the right commands and without having the slightest idea of what you're doing, your mind fights back." Alice stepped forward. "The constant ringing? Your blood pounding so hard you feel like your brain might just explode? It's lethal, Crystal."
Crystal stared determinately at the floor, feeling like a chastised child. "She had no right--"
"I had no right!" Now it was Alice slamming her fist against the wooden table. "I was the one who tried to hurt you. I hated you. All Bluebird ever did was make my programming weaker. She gave you escape routes. She gave you a way to find her. Without her we would both be dead and I didn't come all this way just to have you change your mind about how you feel."
Alice stood and gave Crystal her space. "I can deprogram you. But it's not an overnight process. You need to trust us -- both of us -- if we need to stop so you don't die in the process then we stop."
Rebekah took one step forward. "We're all pawns in different government projects. Alice has the codename Monarch, because her project--"
"--is the worst."
Rebekah paused, then shrugged her shoulders. "I'm a Bluebird. I'm supposed to be trusted with controlling specified targets and get them to do or remember certain things, even if they may not be true."
Crystal looked at both of them. "We're all pawns?"
Alice drummed her fingers against her arm and answered for Rebekah. "If you had taken the deal at the hospital, you would have been a Mantis."
"So Kirtus..."
"Was supposed to die after you had a baby. And that baby--"
"Melody."
Alice nodded and looked away. "Melody was to be taken to the nursery. She would--" Alice cleared her throat as her voice cracked. "She would be raised by scientists to determine what program she would be most beneficial in."
Crystal looked at Alice, who was now talking towards a wall, her face an emotionless mask. "And if I had twins?" Crystal whispered.
Alice ground her teeth and shook her head. Rebekah stepped closer and placed a tentative hand on Crystal's shoulder. "You would have had to choose which twin to keep at home and which to never see again."
Then they were all quiet. Two women Crystal loved in different ways, neither of which she was supposed to know about. All of them beaten by some secret government agency that took and killed people like puppets.
"Tomorrow I want to start... undoing everything. Deprogramming?" Crystal looked at Alice, who nodded at the wall she was still staring at. "And then I want to take down the people who did this to us."
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