A pissed off looking Billybilly stares down at us from where she is tied up near the ceiling in a corner of the room, hanging from a web of vines with nothing but her head showing. Pulling and fighting against her restraints, she eventually lets out a tired huff and gives up when she finds that she can’t get free or even so much as move for that matter. All she can do is wiggle around like an angry caterpillar in a spider’s web.

“Screw it! I can’t beat you. I can’t even beat this little pipsqueak of a failure…”

Vivviv curses at her, her vines writhing across her body like a dozen angry snakes, thorns growing along their lengths and dripping with poison. “Screw you, I’m not a failure! I have big Sister Gra. That means I’m a winner!”

I can’t help but blush at that, but I refuse to let Vivviv see it…

Billybilly frowns, dropping her head as she lets out a sad breath. “Yeah… You have someone. You have magic. I can’t even compare to a little traitor that got tossed aside by Father. The enemy wouldn’t even kill me, they just keep me here like I’m some pet. I can’t even escape on my own, and now I am stuck here with you two…” She complains.

I give her a tired look and cross my arms. “Try not to sound too depressed, you get to live. That’s a lot better than the rest of our people that are dying out there. You can hear that noise, right? All of that gunfire? Thousands of our people are being slaughtered out there right now, throwing their lives away just to try and please Father.”

“And I should be out there with them! I should be leading the charge along with our Brothers and Sisters!” She shouts from her webs of vines, bouncing around as she kicks her trapped legs.

I just look at her, exhausted and already done with today, wanting nothing more than to go to bed.

“And what about your child, Gov’es’s baby in your stomach, huh? Would you rather die and take the last part of my stupid brother with you? Because that is what will happen if you go out there, you idiot!” I end up shouting, something inside of me getting emotional when I said brother. The idea of his child dying, hurting me in some strange way…

“I…” She tries, but falters as she looks down at herself.

She eventually stutters out, “I-I would be dying with honor. Just like big Brother Gov’es did!”

Oh, fuck this honor bull shit!

I snap, glad to finally get this off my chest. The fact that it is one of our own making it all the more important for me.

“Father doesn’t care about any of us. Not you, not my Brothers and Sisters, not Vivviv, and not ME! All of us are nothing more than disposable pawns to him, trash that can be thrown aside if it means getting what HE wants! He tried to kill me, just today, when he found out that I was captured. I have seen our own piled up in the streets like so much trash! I have seen the little ones, killed by the thousands, by Father’s own hand, simply because they were in the way of his magic. I’ve seen how they burn, their bodies melting to the monsters they were still attacking. And how many do you think died just to create those of us that came first, me and my four brothers!? How many more died to create the next, and the next after that? And of my Brothers? Gov’es, Safta, Hajka, and that BASTARD Arigaly!? All dead now, I am the only one that is left! Only me! … I mean yes, I killed Arigaly myself, but the rest of my Brothers died at the hands of the Grey Demon, Father’s enemy. Dead because they got dragged into a fight that. Wasn’t. Even. Theirs! And do you want to know the best part? Do you!?” I scream, getting a bit too heated. Vivviv sets a reassuring hand on me as I shake in anger, a cold mist radiating off my body despite my efforts to keep my Aura contained.

Billybilly remains silent as she looks down at me from where she hangs, not uttering a single word.

I continue, vitriol hate filling my voice as I speak.

“Father’s big, bad, enemy. His oh so hated rival that he is destined to face. The drive for his revenge that pushes him forward and drove him to run so many thousands of our people to their deaths? She didn’t even know who he was… She had forgotten about him, hahaha... It wasn’t until I talked with her that she even remembered that he existed! You know what she has been doing, all this time, while we were out there dying? While Father was building his strength and gathering our people? She was living her life, building a home for herself. She was protecting her family and working to better the lives of her people. And when we showed up, they didn’t panic, we surprised them, yes. But they aren’t afraid of us. The Grey Demon, no, Lain, because she isn’t some monster in a story despite how fucking horrifying she can be, her Demons, actual Demons and nothing like us, and even her humans, they see us as weak little things that can be kicked aside with ease. And they are right! I have personally witnessed their power with my own eyes, my own body, and they left me in FEAR! Me! And I have killed monsters with nothing but the wave of my hand! My magic, my precious gift that I was so proud of, is nothing in comparison to them. They don’t even need to use magic to beat down and crush the likes of me! Our people are FUCKED, little Sister, do you understand!? And it is all HIS fault, because he was so utterly blinded by his desire for revenge against a girl that DIDN’T EVEN KNOW HE EXISTED!!! FUCK!!!” I scream as I kick the table, sending it flying into the wall.

I turn and hug Vivviv, tears falling down my eyes as she holds me and gently rubs my back.

“He didn’t care! Father never cared… My Brothers are all dead and so many more of them are out there dying, right now… And where is he when they need him? … He’s off fighting his ‘fated rival,’ his ‘hated enemy,’ while the rest of you charge into a death trap…”

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Vivviv uses her vines to move a chair and helps me sit down as am I sniffing back tears. Vivviv pets my head with one hand as she tries to straighten out my ruined and torn robes with the other. I give her a little nod to show that I appreciate the help.

I’m not even looking at Billybilly when she next speaks. “What do you mean by death trap?”

I slowly look up at her and I find her eyes full of fear.

“Lain, her Demons, the humans, they are fully prepared to wipe us out down to the last. Even if they have to suffer casualties, they are confident that they will win. Hell… you only have to look at how the fight is going here. I can feel it, you know? Ever fresh body that falls in the snow out there. Every fresh drop of blood that freezes to ice… The humans haven’t suffered even a single casualty, and yet they are tearing us apart… Little Sister, this isn’t even their home! Most of their forces are further to the south, ready and waiting for our people to arrive. We won’t win this…”

Billybilly shakes her head desperately. “No… we can win. We’ve killed so many monsters. We’ve conquered so much and eaten everything that has tried to stop us!” She tries.

“And we left a trail of our blood and bones in our wake!” I say through gritted teeth. Memories of my first few days after my changes filling my mind, of when I used to walk beside Father and my Brothers as the hordes of little ones mindlessly charged ahead of us. How I would walk barefooted through burnt down forests, the charred bones of our people crunching under my toes like sand filling the bowels of hells deepest pits. I remember how their lifeless eyes would stare up toward the sky, never to blink again until the birds would pull them from their skulls in their gruesome feasts. How the most desperate of the little ones would cannibalize the corpses of our own when they could not get their hands on the precious monster meat that we so desperately hunted.

Back then, I had still believed in Father. I thought that he would lead us to greatness. Lead us to a kingdom where we would stand at the top of the world and everyone else would be the food. But that belief faded slowly with every death. It faded when Father didn’t stop Arigaly from pushing me down and ripping off my clothes. And it died when Father didn’t stop me as I killed that bastard, freezing and breaking his limbs off one by one as everyone watched on and cheered. As Father watched me kill my own Brother after torturing him, nodding in approval as I crushed his eyes with my thumbs and smashed his skull with a rock. Smiling at what he just witnessed his own children try to rape and kill each other.

He told me, as I stood before him, naked and covered in the blood of a sibling, “The strong are the ones that command, and the weak obey. The weak die, and the strong feed. I’m proud of you, my daughter.”

My faith had died on that day, and every time I looked at him since, I saw a monster. Nothing more than a power-hungry beast that will burn and sacrifice everything in his quest for vengeance.

He doesn’t love any of us. He never did. The only other person that his eyes have ever seen is Lain. His big bad Grey Demon. And she didn’t even know he existed until a couple of days ago…

“We’re going to lose?” Billybilly asks as she shakes, tears building up in her eyes.

It takes me a moment to respond, having to pull myself out of my mess of emotions and memories, my hands still feeling wet with the memory of Arigaly’s blood. “Yes. If Father was capable of putting aside his desire for revenge, we might have been able to win. But without him, our people are charging to their deaths. Even if he wins his fight against Lain, the rest of us, no, the rest of you. You’ll all be dead. Left as bloody corpses in the snow, frozen meat to be picked at by the birds.”

She goes quiet and doesn’t utter a word for a long while as I sit there and try to get my own emotions back under control. My hands are shaking.

I feel exhausted. I just want to take a nap. At least when I’m asleep, life is easier to deal with…

“Vivviv, let her down, gently.”

“Are you sure?”

“Mhm, it’s fine.” I say with a dismissive wave.

Vivviv moves her hands and directs her vines to lower the girl back down to the floor. She doesn’t even try to stand and just collapses to her knees as she is released. Her hands hold her stomach as her eyes stare off into the void, tears running down her face to drip to the now messy floor of this destroyed room. Blankets, pillows, chairs, clothes and food litters the floor where Vivviv’s vines now covers this place and coats the walls and ceiling. The lantern that fills the room with light had fallen over and is now glowing from its new place where it lays on the floor, strange shadows getting cast across the room as the light finds toppled over furniture.

The silence stretches on until Billybilly finally speaks again, her voice sounding broken and hollow. “Gov’es, he died fighting the Grey Demon. He gave his life even though he knew he would die. He left me with his child so that he could die with honor… but… if what you say is true…” She looks up at me, her tears staining her light green cheeks as they flow from her puffy red eyes.

“If Father never cared about any of us. If even, you and Gov’es were…” She sniffs back her cries. “If he never loved any of us, then what did he die for? What purpose did his death serve, except to take him away from me? I only just got him. I fought so hard to finally get him to accept me into his forces, to take me on as a captain, to get him to notice me… and I only had him for one day… Just one day…”

She pets her stomach, the start of a baby bump filling her hands as she holds the life inside of her like it is something precious. She hiccups, and then breaks down, her face turning ugly as she cries out in anguish toward an uncaring ceiling, tears spilling out with renewed vigor and snot falling from her nose. She collapses forward and wallows in suffering, smacking the hard floor with her fist as she screams. “Give him back! I finally got him to notice me! Give him back, he was mine! He was my mate! Ahhhhhhahhaahhhh~!”

I stay seated and watch as she cries, not knowing what to do in this situation. Not knowing how to care for someone that is suffering. She is close enough to where I could reach out and touch her, and part of me whispers that I should. That I should place a hand on her shoulder and let her know that I am here for her. Because, after all… she is the mother of my brother’s child…

But when I shakingly reach out a hand to touch her, I have to pull it back, my fingers burning when they get too close; as if I had just tried to stick my hand into a blazing fire or a puddle of acid… Vivviv holds me to silently reassure me as I sit and watch my little Sister cry and tear herself apart on the floor, her only love in the world, dead over a useless cause. Sacrificed before the throne of an unloving King…

“I’m sorry, Billybilly. When everything is over, I promise that I will help as many of our people as I can… I will make a safe place for us, where we can actually build a life for ourselves. Where we can become people. We will build a place for our people, a place where you can raise your child in peace. I promise you…”

With Vivviv holding me, her presence like a warm blanket wrapped around my person, I reach out, forcing myself to move as I grit my teeth, and set my hand upon my crying little Sister’s head.

My skin writhes in protest, even with the protection of my gloves, my mind recoils at the touch of another person. But I don’t pull away. I force myself to pet this poor crying girl’s head until I can’t take it any longer and must pull away lest I scream.

I’m breathing heavily as I hold my hand, shaking as if I had just willingly thrown my own flesh into a monster’s gapping maw. But I had done it. I managed to touch another person…