Red viscous poured in front of Calypso’s stolen long coat. Maybe it was the small nugget of vanity she held within her soulless body, it wasn’t the fact that her caved-in neck felt like an embedded knife constantly prodded in her body. It wasn’t the fact that no matter how big the heaving breaths she took, they meant precious little.

It was the fact that she was whimpering, on the ground, holding her broken neck. So small, so little.

Despite everything, she’s still her.

“‘I offered you kindness—and you spat in my face—‘”

After that terrible impression, Calypso felt the right side of her skull crumble.

Not only was she flung to the back of the tower from where she was, the sharp kick that did it all was strong enough to break Calypso’s head. Cassie’s power, combined with the potential Melissa had—with no disregard for going too far—Calypso wondered why her head didn’t explode, versus break open.

Regardless. Calypso was glad that she barely used the right hemisphere of her brain, and her motor skills were still active. She had to pour everything into the rapid healing, it was all that she could do in that moment.

And yet, the neck…

The neck healed… But very. Very badly. Calypso’s fingers were met with a “natural” indent, her skin smoothed over where Melissa’s dug themselves into.

“Like it, huh? And the funniest thing is that there’s magical bullshit…”

Calypso was yanked upward, and hoisted in the air due to Melissa’s strength. Cassie’s stupid smirk taking the credit.

“Easy counter to Consumed: break them in such a way where even with their healing—can’t fix a constitutional problem.”

Calypso tried to meet Melissa’s gaze, now twisted by malice and overconfidence. But she felt a new stabbing sensation almost instantly.

“It’s kinda nostalgic—us being like this,” Melissa purred in an unnerving monotone. “It’s been a while since our first time, Cally~”

Calypso tried to roar at her, before realizing that the stab started to worm inside of the wound itself.

The skeletal monster girl wanted to sigh, so badly. It really is a repeat.

“So no ripping your arms off,” Melissa was forced to insert a new vein into Calypso’s body. “No surviving being baked.” Five more veins entered simultaneously. “And you can’t even transform. You’re fucked, basically. Now do me a solid, and tell me what you’re doing. Where’s your friends? What’re you doing to me?”

Calypso wheezed repeatedly, straining out the words.

“Ca…n’t… Talk… You… Sociopath…”

The immediate, tugging itch flared sharply within Calypso. She couldn’t even scream properly, just a wheeze that into a whimper.

“A) You just did… And B) I’m a self-diagnosed PTSD sufferer~” Melissa was forced to chuckle. “Or a schizoaffective disorder—whatever aligns with my mind goblins—”

Melissa’s head leaned forward, Calypso and the person inside of her were face to face. “Now try again. Tell. Me. Everything.”

Calypso slowly blinked. She felt her skin slowly tightening. She was already struggling to breathe in the first place, now it felt like her very heart was struggling to keep up.

Calypso had to say it.

“…That was a terri… Ble… Will…iam Defoe…” Calypso smirked. “Only know… Becau…se, my not-girlfriend loved that—”

She was thrown seconds later. And by thrown, “blasted with high-pressure blood, straight into her wounds as the skeletal monster girl banged her back against the walls”. Almost like the inner structure of the clockwork, already damaged by the skeletal monster girl, stuttered due to the reverberations.

As Calypso struggled to pathetically move under molten blood that was already hardening into a massive scab, she was forced to watch Cassie prance about in a body that isn’t hers.

And forced to hear the screams of people, legitimately begging wordlessly for their lives, as the background to this stupid dance.

“Ain’t it wonderful…?” Melissa was forced to say, to swoon. “In a few hours from now—this is what Earth’s gonna be like and what it was the entire time: Hell. Straight up Hell. Down there, people are fucking each other—well, not literally, but I wouldn’t be surprised—proving time and again that all those stupid mind games we were hoping to win some prize for, was just a pointless exercise… Kidding ourselves, and for what? How many people—chewed up and spat out like garbage—changing themselves for rules that never made sense to fuckin’-gain with…? Whatever. I said what I said.”

As she got the whiff of her cooking limbs, Calypso struggled to maintain her decorum.

“I fucking know that smile.”

Cassie tried in vain to contort Melissa’s face into a cocksure grin, one that will endure through audacity. But it was clearly struggling to hold itself.

“It’s a ‘I’m so fucking smart’ one—a ‘I know shit that’s gonna ruin someone’s entire fucking day’ one… Thing fucking is—I know I can’t kill you right away: because your little shits won’t tell me then, or did the thing you wanted them to do already. So. I’m. Stuck. I am not gonna fucking let you ruin this day for me. Soooo…”

Melissa’s opened fingers whipped out, loaded with engorged veins creating potent steam. “Gonna beat it outta ya’. So just tell me, and we can get all of this over with.”

Things were rendered completely silent. Melissa’s face dropped and forced to pout, her legs were forced to walk forward.

Only to stop once she heard a sound coming from Calypso. A scrapping, dull, and twisted sound as her body barely moved from the spot she was trapped in.

It was the sound of her laughter. Her amused laughter.

Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings.

“No… ‘I, Cassie’… Huuah…?”

Even if Calypso died right here, it was worth it to watch the truest expression Cassie forced Melissa’s face to make. A flash of uncertainty, confusion.

Fear.

In an instant, Melissa was forced to fling her arms about, as the veins spurted what seems to be volumes of blood as her pathetic pilot roared:

“WHAT THE FUCK DO YOU KNOW?!”

These bloody streams were much different from the previous splatters. What were once straight vectors of death became intercrossing patterns that were impossible to dodge head-on, and just as wild in sheer speed.

And Calypso was down a limb or two. Encased in burning smolder.

But thankfully, she’d been focusing everything into her healing the entire dialogue.

Giving her the chance to rip out of her restraints, despite her limbs still singed—still smoking, she dodged out away from the weaponized wave of blood, rolling to the left.

In a huff, Cassie directed Melissa to reel back, arms in the air to mirror a puppet on strings… Violently flinging her arms downward, creating various arcs of blood that solidified into more varied patterns of intersecting lines.

Calypso’s wheezes were becoming more and more pronounced. Struggling to breathe in an already baking room, regained her limbs but still damaged regardless. Starting to feel like she was losing energy.

But there was no way but forward.

The skeletal monster girl leaned forward and darted towards the first waves of blood. And using her everything, proceeded to jump through the claustrophobic space that was afforded to her. Immediately felt the clothes on her back catch fire, but couldn’t deal with it because it was time for the next wave to jump through, repeating the same process. The angles and spacing getting smaller, and the unfairness of the situation expressed differently with each shape.

By the end of it all, Calypso was steaming all over her body, her clothes in complete tatters as she immediately rolled on the floor in vain. Coughing up a storm before she simply became too weak to.

Laying on her side, clutching at her caved-in throat. In a reality where she nearly lost her entire body, this was the most painful injury she’s gotten.

There was no getting around it.

Using her claws, Calypso crudely cleaved out her grievous neck indent. Immediate burst of her blood, and maybe the release of air that came from doing something like this. And unlike that one hockey player she read about, she couldn’t just pinch her now severed—nay, removed—jugular and arteries.

All she could do… Was hope that her panic brain can focus and simply lay there. Twitching slack.

“I did warn you.”

Calypso debated about using the last of her strength to defiantly glare at Cassie, to die looking at her. But she didn’t have a say in anything anymore.

She was grabbed as if she were a doll, Melissa’s fingers once again dug directly into the neck hole. But this time, the veins searched about, wriggling within Calypso’s dying flesh.

And steadily connected themselves to each ripped-apart vein Calypso owned. Their induvial fangs not just clamping down, but hooking themselves within that flesh. Stopping the already dire blood loss, but completely at the vampire’s mercy now.

With fading eyes, Calypso looked down to an unimpressed expression brimming from Melissa’s face. And in Calypso’s delirium, actually saw Cassie’s face emanating from such.

“Let’s be real,” Cassie began. “We both know that I’m becoming more of an individual again—I saw it on your face. You were smug because of that… Or, you were smug in part of that.”

She made her bloodsucking veins tug on Calypso’s, causing the limp girl to make sounds that she could never shake. “You guys knew that by making me all emotionally compromised causes the Terrortide to end, in some way. Got some dirt on me somehow… Or. You think you know me and think you could deconstruct me. Prove me wrong, and all this shit ends and I probably die a horrible death.”

Cassie stared straight into Calypso’s eyes. “And if that’s the case… You, more than anyone, get what I’m saying. Right?”

Calypso couldn’t exactly hide her forlorn expression. Her face shag under the weight of such terribleness that she relived in that one moment, due to that one, simple question.

“Sure, save the day—save the people that’s left. Fuck, get revenge on me for fucking you over so badly. Kill me—because that ‘being the bigger man, better person’ shit was a scheme to let weak, sneaky fucks get away to cause more sick things to happen—so yeah, getting pleasure in ending me. Sure. But you can’t say what you’re forcing the world back to is better. Shit’s only going to get worse for us, seriously. I’m a jokey bitch, a literal fucking loser, and even I know this. Even if you save these people, and somehow they walk away from all of this… It’s still a piece of them, chipped away. You can’t fix that. So why are you trying to, when that isn’t your business? Your responsibility? Like you fucking owe them…?”

Cassie lowered Calypso, so they could be level. Wearing a soft, muted expression.

“Because I know that you hate this place just as much as me.”

It was laborious. But Calypso proceeded to nod.

Causing Cassie to immediately snap into fury, tightened her grip in Calypso’s gaping neck.

“THEN WHY?!”

Calypso could only limply twitch, after that moment. It took Cassie having 10 slow, heaving breaths for Calypso to struggle to lift her hand.

Arching a finger weakly, begging Cassie to come closer.

Cassie quickly looked around her, behind her, to the sides. Taking pregnant pauses with each action. And proceeded to move Calypso closer to her.

Calypso weakly, softly… Simply caressed Cassie’s cheek. Being sure to use her palm and lead the claws away from the face. Cassie’s eyes darted about, confused. On edge.

She was too wrapped up in herself, to not notice that Calypso’s worn neck was starting to heal back to a semi-conquerable state.

“You… Remind me so much of my… Love…” Calypso struggled out the words. And it wasn’t because of her neck being poorly formed.

“The 'not-girlfriend'…?” Cassie tried to fashion it into a joke… But her tone was oddly sympathetic. Her uncertainty as to why this is happening, or maybe how she was so sympathetic to begin with, made the tone heavy.

“I was scared of you… And I didn’t know exactly why… Why I took such issue with you… Until I realized. And I couldn’t face that… Face the idea of you being the version of her… Without me there.”

“…What the hell are you getting at--?” Cassie tried to reel herself back. Trying to avoid a kiss, or something along those lines.

But when she reared her head back… She noticed that Calypso’s hand was gloved. Wearing a fingerless, leather glove with a gemstone that was brimming with iridescent light.

Calypso simply tossed her away.

Cassie fumbled, and Melissa’s body had to follow suit. Looking at her writhing veins to find pieces of Calypso’s own at the end. The sight caused the vampire to roar out through the stolen throat she had, looking up at Calypso accusingly.

“THE HELL ARE YOU GETTING--?!”

Cassie’s expression on Melissa’s face dropped. Now witnessing that Calypso from before wasn’t the one here now.

The girl was glowing with that same, eerie glow that her Illuminator showed second ago, covered in a ghastly aura as she rubbed at her neck… And it steadily reformed back to normal.

“There we are…” Calypso’s tone was even, as she looked back at Cassie. Directly towards that small, pathetic essence that hid behind an innocent woman’s body. “You didn’t let me finish.”

“H-how—”

“Let me finish and you’ll get an idea.”

Calypso formed a very cutting smirk, raising her gloved hand… And retracting the claws back. Now completely human once again, tightened her fist.

“So your claims are correct, you and I do hold some sort of kindred bond… But not at all the way you guessed. And unfortunately for you… I know how to beat back every single claim you’ve made today: because I’ve dealt with it for many, many years… So what if there’s darkness in every man’s heart? That we’re all heading into oblivion…?”

The light around her began to somehow thicken. Both a fog and a beacon at the same time, as Cassie tried in vain to direct Melissa’s body, pulling out the poor girl’s own gemstone, and instantly transformed.

But Calypso continued on.

“I’m going to be the monster that consume all of that. The monster that ‘so-called’ monsters, will always fear. I will stalk the darkness of the hearts of men, and I will slay—and mutilate—and chase whatever’s left to the ends of the Earth and until its end: BECAUSE OF MY UNDYING HATRED FOR SUCH DARKNESS THAT RUINED MY LIFE AND THE LIVES OF OTHERS! AND THAT—INCLUDES—YOU! HYPOCRITE!”

With seconds away from Melissa making contact, all Calypso could do was viciously smile, her eyes alight with not only passion—but amber.

There was only one thing to say, and a fact she had to actualize.

Despite everything… Calypso Grimes wasn’t just ‘still her’. She can become so much more.

And already has.

“I—Am—Awake! AND—I—AM—UNLEASHED!”