Chapter Thirteen - Big Sister Talk
Crossover: Fluff by RavensDagger
***
“It’s worse than you can imagine,” Emily said.
“It can’t be that bad,” Abigail replied.
Abigail’s friends had both left soon after Emily arrived at Abigail’s table, which of course had all of Emily’s social anxiety alarms ringing their death knells. It was only seeing the Daphne girl give Abigail a peck on the cheek and promising to see her later that calmed Emily down.
Somehow, that was enough to reassure Emily that she wasn’t the reason the other two girls had run off. They’d obviously had other things to do, and Emily’s presence wasn’t enough to scare them away.
“They’re so cute though,” Abigail continued. She was taking frequent sips from a large mug filled with steaming tea. It was one of those more plain teas, not a fruity mess of berries and such like how Emily’s mom liked hers.
Emily followed Abigail’s gaze towards her sisters. The five of them were recently joined by a sixth girl. She was about the same height as Trinity, with a round face covered in little freckles, and big ruddy cheeks. Her hair was the same as Abigail’s though. She looked rather sad, sad and confused, and Emily was proud to see that her sisters were trying to distract her.
Unfortunately that mostly involved making fart noises with their armpits, and arguing about who was cooler, Emily or Abigail.
“Sure, cute,” Emily said. “That’s your sister?”
“Uh, sorta?” Abigail said. “She’s my... kind of like a little sister, I guess. It’s complicated?”
Emily nodded. She understood complicated.
“That’s Dreamer’s clone, really.”
“Huh? Dreamer?”
Abigail blushed. “My, uh, little sister, sorta. She’s... upstairs, I think? Honestly, I really should go see if she’s alright.” Abigail took another long sip of tea in lieu of seeing if things were alright.
Emily took a sip from her coffee in understanding.
So the brown-haired girl back there was Abigail’s sister’s friend, then? That tracked. She was probably disappointed that the other girl wasn’t around. Or something. Emily wasn’t going to dig too deep into any prepubescent drama, for her own sanity’s sake.
“Your sisters seem mostly well-behaved.”
“Yeah, right,” Emily said.
“Really. They’re a bit loud--” Abigail paused to let Teddy finish screaming about finding joy in comradeship. “But I bet they don’t cause any sort of strange trouble.”
“Strange trouble?” Emily asked.
Abigail nodded, then paused. “You know. Weird things.”
“Yes,” Emily agreed. “My sisters only cause normal problems. Perfectly ordinary ones.”
Abigail nodded. “Yes, mine also is like that.”
They both knew they were lying.
Neither of them cared.
Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.
“So, any advice on how you manage to wrangle so many brats all at once?” Abigail asked.
Emily considered it. “Mostly I think it comes down to setting boundaries and explaining what is or isn’t too much. They’re young, and rather dumb you know.”
Abigail nodded. “They are.”
“So you can’t expect them to know what is or isn’t okay. You need to outline what’s acceptable and what isn’t, and once that’s done, you must absolutely never let them get away with anything past that line.”
“That sounds harsh.”
Emily nodded. “I know. I hate it, and I’m terrible at it.”
“I don’t know if I’m all that good at telling Dreamer what she can’t do. She always seems to want to do what she thinks is best.”
“My sisters are the same. They’re really sweet, but sometimes what they think is the right thing to do is, ah, a terrible idea.”
Abigail nodded. “Thanks. It’s good advice. I mean, I think I already knew all of that, but I guess hearing it helps a lot.”
“Sometimes things are like that,” Emily agreed. “It’s why school repeats the same lessons sometimes.”
“That makes sense,” Abigail said. “Do you go to school?”
“I do,” Emily said. They started to chat about school, the hardships around that, and then a bunch of inconsequential nonsense in between.
***
The clone, who was Dreamer and yet wasn’t, was confused. “I don’t understand.”
The girl with the bear-ears growled, her little hands balling into a fist. “What is our purpose in life, if not to spread villainy, to do right by our big sisters, and to help our comrades in their times of need?” she asked.
The clone considered this. “My purpose is to give people pamphlets.”
“Sure! But that’s just a short-term goal. Something to do now, to spread the word” The bear-girl placed a hand on the clone’s shoulder. “Today we give pamphlets. Tomorrow, we will seize the means of production!”
The clone nodded, it seemed like the right thing to do, even though... even though the thought was wrong.
Her goal, her purpose, was to give people pamphlets. What was existence but a fleeting thing, the passage of time between the handing of folded paper to strangers?
This message, about seizing things, that was like... like if her purpose in life was to take pamphlets instead. It was wrong.
And yet, it felt so very, very tempting.
“Alright girls,” the one the others called the Boss said. “We need to head back home. Put everything away for poor Abigail, and say bye to your new friend for now.”
The bear girl nodded, then pat the clone on the back. “Don’t worry, comrade, you’ll figure it out.”
But as the clone watched the children go, all of them holding onto one of the precious pamphlets she was destined to hand out, she wondered if she really would figure it all out one day.
***