"Say, can I borrow that book you were reading yesterday?" Abby asked after coming into their room, but Celia didn't even blink in her direction for a second.

"Returned it already," was all she said in her most monotonous tone.

"Oh, so it was a library book…" she simply replied, looking over her shoulder as she pulled something out of a kitchen cabinet.

It was amazing how something like that could be as amazing in the drill hall as she was, seeing the way Celia was watching Danny Phantom while lying on their couch. The latter just barely fit into their room between two beds, a metric ton of trash and their smelly clothes strewn all over the place.

Celia was still hung up on the question about the book, wondering how her roommate had missed the fact that she never had many books of her own. In fact, she only possessed one consistently over time, because someone gave it to her, so she felt bad about throwing it out. But in a shared dorm room, where would she have the space for any more?

In fact, she was thankful to even be able to have some extra space to put her stuff in. And even there arose the problem that she couldn't access any of it when she was in the middle of the city. Not exactly book shelf material, as one could say.

"Hey," Abby called out simultaneously with a small object flying at Celia's head, "you forgot that earlier."

The fourteen-year-old easily caught the device, recognizing it as her smartphone, which had been through a lot with her. She didn't have the money to replace it right now, as she was currently saving up for a new sword. The one VAULT issued was… well, she wouldn't use it for long if she could avoid it.

"Thanks," was all she said, turning it one with her fingerprint scanned on the screen.

"That thing is so busted, seriously," her roommate complained, "don't you want to get a new one?"

"Broke," Celia lazily answered as she browsed through her video library, stopping at the record of a Wedding, standing out in her otherwise bleak diary like a sore thumb.

"Ah, right, fair enough."

Abby wasn't that surprised, because they all didn't have much, otherwise, they wouldn't live in this dump of a dorm. And still, she felt that a girl as young as the one she was looking at wasn't supposed to worry about such things to that extend.

Most of the people had some family to back them, giving them support; granting the option to leave at any given moment. But what did Celia Smith have, if she wanted to go? What would she be doing?

"Hey, you know, if you ever decided to, well, go, you could totally live with my folks, you know? They're out in the boonies, but I would totally get you there."

Blinking, Celia felt confused. "I don't know why I would do that, Abby." The Harlot family would surely be nice, but what use would they have for someone who could do nothing but brawl?

And why would she even leave in the first place? The thought was completely alien to her, though she didn't like VAULT one bit, it was the only home she had ever known, and would ever know. What use was it to intrude on someone else's?

With an empty laugh, she looked back at her broken screen, realizing she hadn't finished her diary entry for the day. She would always record for a certain amount of time, if she had the chance.

Tapping on the red record button for another video, Celia's brown eyes stared emptily at the screen, wondering what she could say. What did she say yesterday again? How did she feel right now?

She couldn't really tell what she was supposed to be feeling. The day had been very calm, maybe she should mention how her family had been found, but not after every single one of them was dead.

As she stared into her camera, nothing else mattered, and yet she could only stare without saying a word. Only when a sudden noise occurred did she glance in the direction of her roommate once more.

Something moved fast – too fast for her brain on standby mode – and the next moment, a heavy body crashed onto the couch, landing flat on her lap like a stranded whale.

"Good morning, Vietnam!" he yelled as he threw herself down as if he was applying for WWE.

"Shit, get your fucking fat ass off me, you damn jerk!" she yelled back in response, as Lenny made his point by weighing her down.

"Oh, don't cry, I know you can take it," he mocked her as she was unable to get up.

"I'm saying you're fucking heavy, doesn't matter if I can take it or not."

At this point, she was sulking, finally rolling her lazy room parasite off the couch, making him land on the floor with a thud and a wheeze. She had known that Lenny and Abby were best friends, and he spent a lot of time in their room, so they felt they had to include her somehow.

After stepping over the hurting young man without a thought, Abby flopped onto the couch close to Celia – though at least she didn't land on her as well. She stared back at the camera of her phone as a flickering light drew her attention.

The story has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

"Don't know what you were talking about with the Major, but you sure look down since then," Abby cut into their banter, feeling relieved that her roommate finally showed a trace of being alive on earth with them, instead of hanging merely physically around, mimicking a sad slob.

"I always look like this."

"Nah, you're definitely down," she insisted, "so I got you a little something."

The "little something" being a butter cake from the cafeteria's vending machine, with a small candle placed in the middle.

'It looks like a sorry mess, for all it's worth,' was all she thought at the sight of it in the hands of the black haired teenager. "You're trying to burn down the dorms, is that it?" Everybody knew how clumsy she could be sometimes.

"No!" She held the cake in front of Celia's face. "I know your birth date is dodgy at best, but it's been exactly one year since we have started sharing a room and hanging out together. Roomy-anniversary?"

Celia suddenly started fake coughing. "Very funny," she said while shaking her head, "don't burn down my bed, please." She wouldn't spoil their fun, and they would be happier without her there.

So she took her sweat jacket and put on her boots, as she knew that there was something she had to do anyway. Granted, she was going to stall for time, but now she had a reason to leave her comfortable cave.

As she waved a cab down, directing them to the address on the document she had received earlier, her head was starting to spin. What would she do? What would she say? Or would she say anything at all, when nobody was listening?

'What am I supposed to do, Pan?'

'Only you will be able to answer that,' he gave an answer as helpful as ever, 'but whatever you decide, I am sure it will be befitting of your soul.'

'Great, I'm already feeling smarter.' She rolled her eyes at nothing, got out of the car as it had reached a hillside at the outer edge of the city.

While on the ground, she went onto her knees. A magic circle appeared, just for a moment, she felt the tugging of the connection, before letting her cellphone fall onto the ground, where it slipped right through and vanished. With that done, she walked up the path to the gravesite, overseeing the high rises of the city beyond the cliff from the highest point.

Her shoulder-length reddish-brown hair, held together in a messy ponytail, danced and tickled her nape slightly, swaying in the breeze as she stood motionless, emotionless.

"Wow," she muttered under her breath, creating a misty cloud in the cool morning air, and the music was far too loud, drowning out any other sounds that might have been heard.

They had finally found her parents. 'Were they even looking?' she thought in amazement, as it had taken them six years. 'For an organization like VAULT, you'd think they could do better.'

A sound of disgust ripped from her throat at the thought of the mental gymnastics they had to go through to justify this fact when the truth was so obvious.

Buds in her ears provided her with someone singing about a person who had never wanted to give them wings; had never wanted to set them free. Words so out of context in their meaning within the song she listened to, yet so fitting, in the end, to her quandary.

"And what if I did?" Her head slightly tilted when asking out loud. "What if I 'lay down and play dead and stay dead,' would they leave me the fuck alone then?"

The thought process annoyed her, but she felt that it would probably not happen anytime soon. It made her shake her head and pull her mind in another direction.

Sighing, she looked at the grave in front of her with more intent this time. It was decorated with a family picture, enframed within the memorial tombstone on top of it.

As far as she was informed, that stone had been paid for by her late grandparents. Grandparents she didn't get to meet to ask any questions.

Questions like: "What were my parents like?," "How did we live?," or "What kind of person was I?"

After all was said and done though, it was a nice little memento, she had to admit as much. Unconsciously, her hand moved to the small space above her collarbone. A token to add to her own ledger one day.

Her fingertips fiddled with the delicately shaped silver around her neck, making out the word "Celia". It was the same word written in the center of the tombstone in front of her.

"'Celia Smith' is no more, I guess," the young girl said as if it were a random thought. "How does it feel to be someone? I really can't say."

Celia asked the void around her, but she knew that the one she was talking to would receive her words either way. They had known each other for six years now, but to her, it was a lifetime's worth of memories.

No matter how much she looked at it and went over it in her mind, it didn't feel earned. It didn't feel familiar. She had once thought that maybe once she found where she belonged, all the things she was missing would be returned to her. Except that wasn't true.

Reality hit her like a freight train when she had to understand that it wasn't going to be that easy. Would she ever feel at home? Or that she was her own true self? Perhaps it just wasn't an attainable state as long as she was a chess piece with the VAULT logo basically inked onto her forehead?

'Will you not accept your name?' His words reached her over the music in her ears, turned up to maximum volume.

She blinked at the question directed at her after the long silence. 'Why do you ask if you already know the answer?'

It was a phrase she had always used when he asked a question she didn't really want to answer, even if the answer was obvious. But that didn't make it a false statement.

She licked her dry lips and blinked at the names of her supposed parents, then swallowed and forced a smile. "Nice to meet you," the fourteen-, no, thirteen-year-old said, "I'm Celia Whit-"

Her voice broke in the middle of her introduction to the family she had longed for, depriving her of the single chance to acknowledge who she really was for the first time in her life.

Pain shot through her body as she sank to the ground, numbing her mind and making her forget what she had even wanted to say.

Breathing became harder as she clutched her jacket tightly in front of her chest. She had felt a pulling sensation, similar to someone tugging at her hair, but it affected her entire body.

Suddenly, her heart seemed to follow a rhythm she had never heard before. The song she had on repeat, still blaring from the headphone that had fallen out of one of her ears and was lying in the cold mud next to her, felt so ironic.

"But if I lay down and I play dead and I stay dead – Then will you get bored of killing me?"

It would have made her laugh if that had been at all possible. But apart from her hands, clenched rigidly in the fabric of her clothes, she could do nothing but stare straight ahead with a twisted smile on her lips, as her heart barely managed one arduous pump after another.

The intervals in between were growing longer and longer until she felt the world around her darken considerably. She could barely feel the strain anymore either.

She had imagined how it would happen and feel if she died one day, but this wasn't it. A gurgling sound came out of her mouth and the taste of blood spread on her tongue. There was no way her heart could fail her, yet it felt as if it was ripped out, like a lie.

'No way,' she thought, realization kicking in, 'is this it?' After all she had done and all she had managed to survive, this was to be her end?

"Sucks…," she slurred, barely audible and with her eyes wide open, as her consciousness finally faded.