//------------------------------//
// 94 - Bleed for Me 
// Story: New Endings, Old Starts 
// by David Silver 
//------------------------------//

"I..." She hadn't walked through any puddles. She bled a lot, but blood did what blood does, drying up. She wasn't sure she'd have any to use... "That hurt, a lot..." She held up her savaged thumb, clumsily bandaged at it was. "But I do want to..."

"Comfort me," repeated Cracked in a light tone, as if beckoning the sun to do its thing and shine.

"There has to be a way..." She looked around in the gloom. It was almost entirely dark, upstairs in... what room were they in? Comforting sure didn't know, but it was dark.

Cracked watched Comforting, seemingly able to penetrate the gloom with her piercing eyes. "Blood is the glue." She pointed at the mirror. "Fix me. I fixed you."

Comforting dug out her phone and flicked on the light, making both of them squint a moment, but she could see! They were in a bedroom. There was no bed, or much of any other furnishings. A cabinet stood, lonely and abandoned. "I'm... I want to!"

Cracked stomped a paw, claws tacking against the wood. "Then do it. Blood is glue." She prodded Comforting with a human finger. "You have it."

But she was already a little low on it... "Let me think..." She ran her fingers over her phone in a nervous fidget. "There... Oh." Her phone, it was on! She flipped it about and tapped at it. "Please pick up!"

"Comfie-cakes," rang a voice through the phone, Diamond Tiara. "What's the haps?"

"You will not believe this." She leaned a bit to the side as Cracked leaned in on her. "I'm inside the creepy house."

"W-what?! Are you alright?" Comforting could hear things being moved around, tossed? "I'm coming! Why did you go in there?!"

"I'm alright!" Mostly? "In fact, I made a friend. She could use your help."

"Um, am I on speaker? Hi, whoever you are. Why are... Nevermind! Coming!" The call ended.

Cracked snorted softly, her fingers flexing. Her nails, already long for a lady, became deadly sharp for a moment as she flexed and worked her fingers, but became human nails not long after. "Who was that? Will they help?"

"That was one of my friends." Comforting tucked the phone so the light hung out of her pocket, keeping the worst of the gloom at bay. "Hopefully, she'll become one of yours. Be nice to her."

Cracked stared at Comforting, empty of emotion a long moment before she forced a smile. "She will get scared," she noted as if this was just obvious. "Then she will run. You would have run... I stopped you."

"You're not so bad." Comforting gently petted at one of Cracked's legs, where it transitioned from human to furry wolf leg, leading down to her dangerous hind claws. "And I'll be here. If I say hello to her first, she won't run. She might get scared, but she won't run." At least she hoped.

"You." She pointed to the stairs down. "Go. I stay." She sank in a squat. "Most." She offered a hand towards Comforting, literally.

Comforting took the hand, grasping it like one would a handshake. That it flexed and wriggled a bit was...offputting, but she drew it close and cradled it. "Alright. We'll start by showing her this isn't so bad." She pointed to the hand she was holding. "Then move on to the main event." She started for the stairs. "You wait here. You can see what I'm doing." How a hand saw things, still beyond her, but it seemed to work. 

Her bounce was more energetic as she descended the stairs, creaking with her motions. She wasn't bleeding to death! She wasn't being torn apart by an angry monster and/or ghost! Things were looking up by all measures Comforting could come up with. The day had taken many terrible turns, but it was on an upwards slope. "Can she get in?" She turned the hand to 'face' herself. "Does the door have a knob on the outside?"

The hand clapped itself 'shut' and nodded. A clear answer there, no words given. "Alright." Comforting went for the front door and waited. She couldn't peek outside very well, the windows as dirty as they were.

Fortunately, it wasn't too long of a wait. She could hear the handle on the outside being jiggled. "I'm in here," she shouted, one hand to her face. "Come on in."

Diamond pushed the door open, but she wasn't alone. Silver Spoon came in with her, the two looking around nervously. "Are you alright?" demanded Diamond, moving directly for Comforting. "Why are you even here?!"

"Seriously!" Silver threw up an arm. "This place is, like, not a good one for random visits. What are you thinking?" She jumped back suddenly. Had she spotted the hand? No, her eyes were on Comforting's hand. "What happened?!" She could see the big bandage, stained red and dark. "What... What happened?!"

Comforting tucked it reflesively, which just got Diamond wrenching it into plain view, lit by the outside light coming through the open door. "That is nasty! Girl, why aren't you bawling? I'd be totally crying right now."

"Like, for real." Silver drew the injured hand closer, hugging it even. "Poor thing... Why are you even in here looking like that?"

Comforting smiled awkwardly. There was no way to get her hand back without fighting the two caring teens. "Um... more importantly, I made a friend."

Diamond crossed her arms at that. "You made a friend? Before or after that?" She pointed at the injured thumb.

"After?" Comforting jumped, the two girls screamed. She gave herself half a credit for not joining the yelp as the door slammed shut. "And that's them. Don't panic."

"Why wouldn't we panic?" shouted Diamond as she wheeled around, as if standing protectively over the smaller Comforting. "W-W...."

Silver was staring at the same thing Diamond was, both trembling in place as the hand scutted slowly towards them with purposeful steps of its fingers, nails tacking on the floor.

"That, is my friend. She's harmless, I promise." Comforting ducked around the numb Diamond. "At least, that's her hand. She can hear us, and see us. Hi!" She waved cheerfully at the hand, and got a wave in return. "See? Nothing to be scared of."

Silver shuddered forcefully. "Why is it being nice to you?"

Diamond clamped a hand down on Comforting's shoulder, preventing her from moving any more forward. "It wasn't nice all the other times, what'd you do?!"

Comforting instead lowered, offering a hand for the other hand to crawl up towards, much to her friends' discomfort. "I helped them. We all need a hand." The pun struck her a moment later. "Sorry. But she's not mean, promise. She was just in a bad place."

"Bad place..." Silver looked around the gloomy area. "Yeah, okay, that, like, checks out... So... is she just a hand? I saw more than that."

"Way more." Diamond took an uneven step back. "You sure this is safe?"

"No." Comforting stood up, hand held up in both her palms. "But she seems nice, and she needs a little more help. Just a little." She inclined her head at the painful cut. "This'll sound super strange, but my cut helped. She has a broken--"

"--glue--" drifted in from upstairs, along with the shuffling click of heavy canine paws.

Silver hopped in closer to the rest. "What was that?! Comforting, why are you so... comfortable right now?"

"She's hurt." Comforting put the hand to rest on her shoulder to perch. "And needs our help. As she said, blood is glue. It's gross and scary, but it worked. I fixed most of her mirror."

Diamond threw up her hands, though they didn't detach. "This is a big thing you're throwing at us." But Comforting wasn't backing down. "Wow... Sheesh... Well... we did ask you to get involved."

Silver gaped at her friend. "You're going along with this?!"

Diamond squeezed Comforting's shoulder. "We've trusted her this far. She didn't invite us over for nothing." That grasp tightened. "Right?"

"Right!" squeaked out Comforting, wriggling away. "This way." She started for the stairs, her phone casting light over the area. "Now, I should warn, Cracked is... Well, she has a wolf's tail and two big wolf paws for feet..."

Silver zipped ahead of Comforting to cut her off. "Hold up there! What?"

Diamond shook her head, following along less urgently. "That explains the howling..."

"Forget the howling!" The thumping click from upstairs didn't calm Silver Spoon. "We're in the same house as some kind of wolf monster and you're worried about that?"

Diamond gestured with both hands at Comforting. "The wizkid says they're alright. If we didn't trust them, why did we ask them to come check this out at all? I say we go say hi. We'll get to rub it in all the others' faces that we did what they were too scared to do." A wicked smile spread over her face. "Imagine Scootaloo's expression."

Silver looked ready to argue that, but she thought of Scootaloo's face when they told her what they'd done... "Yeah... Like, that would be pretty great... Promise me." She looked Comforting eye to eye. "Promise me we're gonna be alright."

Comforting raised a hand for a proper solemn oath, and that was a reminder that her thumb was still in terrible pain, spiking with that motion. She squeaked, curling a bit on herself as she sniffled. It hurt... too dang much. Tears stung at her eyes as her small form pleaded with her without words to go find somewhere safe, curl in a ball, and cry until it all stopped.

No matter  how old her soul was, she was still a little girl, and she was hurt.

Diamond gently placed a hand on Comforting's shoulder. "Look, let's get this over with so we can get you to a hospital or something. This is not where you need to be right now."

"Like, double that!" Silver started up the stairs. "Hello? You needed help?"

Diamond hurried up after her. "They need blood. How are they going to get it without... All the ways I can think of it are pretty awful."

"Blood is glue." There was Broken, at the top of the stairs.

That was the last place either girl wanted her, shrieking in fear and falling backwards, down the stairs. Comforting joined in the startled cry, trying to catch them to little effect but joining their fall, sailing down the steps in a grand plummet.

But they never hit the ground, instead something else was in the way, holding them a few inches off the ground.

Silver rolled off the pile she had landed on. "Everyone alright?"

Diamond was next off. "Oh, wow, sorry Comforting. I flattened you. What caught us?"

Comforting flopped to the side, sniffling. She had been landed on by the two, but she hadn't slammed into the ground. It could have been worse... "Ow..." She could barely see, unwanted tears forcing themself free. "Ow..."

What had caught them came into view with her roll. Broken's hand was there, having saved the day. That hand scuttled up the steps with practice, rushing to rejoin the rest of her.

Diamond offered a hand to the squashed child to help them stand up. "Sorry, um... Cracked was it? You came out of nowhere! Give a girl some warning before you jump scare her like that."

"Really." Silver took Comforting's other hand, helping her up. "We'll try that one more time, and you better not be waiting at the top like that."

With their wits returned to them, they ascended as a cohesive unit to face what was waiting for them. Silver leaned in towards Diamond. "We still have the problem with the whole blood thing."

"Talk first, blood later," whispered Diamond. "If they're nice, it shouldn't be a... big deal, right?"

"Right." A bit of a pity that Silver Spoon sounded very uncertain about the idea. "Just ask the strange wolf monster how it prefers its blood. What could go wrong?"