//------------------------------//
// Sonata 
// Story: Aftermath 
// by Rose Quill 
//------------------------------//

I was terrified. 

Adagio was crying, Aria was looking lost, and all I could feel was numbing fear. And under that, a sinking feeling that sat where I was used to my hunger being. I felt like I could collapse at any moment.

I wasn’t the smart one. I wasn’t the strong one. I was the cheery one. But I couldn’t even muster the energy to try and get my sisters to bond together so we could figure out our next step. I kept looking back and forth from Adagio, who had her head tilted back against the wall as tears dripped down her face, to Aria, who had started pounding a fist against the pavement, anger and pain in her face. I could tell she was fighting back tears, and those alone were enough to panic me.

Aria never cried. Adagio never cried. That wasn’t their reactions. Adagio would convince prey of something they feared so deeply that they would believe it was happening. Aria would just beat them or make them fear of the same. Breaking down was not either of their methods.

I ran my hand through my hair, feeling the roostertail pulling free of the tie I had it up in. In moments, everything was breaking down. I felt my knees give out, and I collapsed to the sidewalk. I felt dizzy, all of a sudden, and the world swam in my vision.

I heard Adagio say my name, and I looked up. She was slowly walking towards me, concern in her face as she drew near. “Are you alright?” she asked, her voice dull, as though my ears were stuffed with cotton.

I think that more than anything else frightened me. We were Sirens, and concern was not a huge part of our makeup. While we were a group, it was always understood that if any of us fell behind, we would get cut loose. It was how we were raised, after all.

But Adagio was coming towards me, worried for my well-being. I felt her hand take mine and I squeezed weakly. The place where my hunger once rested began to feel more and more like an abcess, a weeping wound that would fester before it got any better.

I let Adagio pull me to my feet, supporting me somewhat as we slowly made our way back the way we had come. We crept back to the stage, now empty and the seating devoid of anyone. Up onto the stage we went, and sitting there in the debris of blown trash were the rubicund fragments of our pendents, our Songs.

I picked up a large piece of my pendent, seeing a faint glimmer flicker through the gem before it died again. I didn’t find all that many pieces before Adagio looked around.

“We need to move,” she whispered. “Get back to shelter and prepare whatever we have in the event something else goes wrong.”

And that was when I truly knew how bad things were for us.

Adagio was planning to run away. 

And this was a first in the centuries we had been alive.