Roadtrip

by enamis

Where Spirits Don't Follow

Author's Note:

[most of this chapter was written before i disappeared, so i shambled together what i had in a backed up document. please read the next chapter for all the other things that need to be said]
[this chapter can very much be taken as an ending of sorts as it closes on an emotional arc/note. it wasn't where i wanted it to end but it is an ending if nothing else]

The wind was really going today.

Goddamn.

I still felt like mostly garbage considering my arm and the amount of shitwater I managed to both swallow and waddle in. That stuff really soaked into ya’. Oh and the entire lack of oxygen kinda messed with my head and I wasn’t eating as much for a while. I was probably going to rectify that on the way, as, thankfully, none of us were seasick.

Didn’t very much help at the moment, tho.

Neither did the wind. It was kinda creepy actually. Especially how the trees moved. Frigen’ eldritch demons…

Or maybe that was me and the weird thingy in corner of my left eye. Hi thingy, were you here to take my soul? I still kinda need it- oh it left…

…

Meh…

.
At this rate I was going to go only by having a fistfight with the Grim mo-fo Reaper. Granted I'm still a grade-A pussy with sharp hands and gun, but I'm sure if it came down to it -what the absolute fuck am I even on about anymore-?

I was standing in the shadow of the Freedom Monument just by Home Base, which, by the way, was no longer going to be home base since we were all packed up. Well… we left plenty of things there, and some notes too in case some unfortunate soul were to stumble all the way here (why I don’t know since we were and still are the bumfuck-nowhere of the Baltics).

Right, yes, Monument. Or as we Latvians lovingly called her /Milda/ because I don’t really know, it’s just a thing that we do. The wind was really going and it was making me even more nervous than I was thanks to not sleeping, because my body and brain hated me.

At least I wasn’t cold, which was the one thing I had going for me. I was wearing new kid-sized sweatpants with my bag and holster over them. Mutilated wool socks over my fingerless gloves and an extra sock in the fancy mid-length kid boots for my back legs. Head feathers stuffed under my baseball cap on the back of my skull. And of course, my trusty blue jacket which I had ‘Kaja’d’ aka zipper on the back party in the -no-

^{My brain was in the process of melting, I'm not sure if you could tell.}

I did look like a hobo but then again I did that on a regular basis so not much of a change.

“There you are.”

Oh hey twatface, nice of you to pop up and ruin the moment.

No. Be nice. I couldn’t risk my other arm.

“Did Kaja send you again?”

“Yeah. She’s really deadset on making us make up.”

“Well tough shit.”

Silence as the dark minotaur walked up beside me. He too was dressed warmer. Thank you fat people clothes stores, he now had shirts that he didn’t rip to shreds just by existing. And a single jacket. Not that he needed it much, dude was a walking furnace, but you know, modesty sakes. Mostly because the way his pecs’ rippled when he moved made me feel all flavors of weird.

“We’re almost ready to go. Mind telling me why you’re wasting time here or am I not worthy?”

“Keep being snide and you won't get jack, buddy.”

“You started it…”

I only laughed.

It was a hollow laugh.

Wind.

Wind and silence. The two went together pretty well.

.
“Mom once…”

My voice cracked.

The way the overcast sky tinted everything blue… it made the Monument that much more beautiful. Carvings of farmers, soldiers, singers adorned the sides of the massive stone blocks. This was our history. Our home, our legacy, a piece of history that no one managed to take away from us all throughout our brief existence.

It fascinated me. It always had, since I was tiny. There was a majesty about it that was hard to put into words.

“I remember mom once told me Dad was in the Honor Guard.”

Two dark stone squares around the front, one on each side. Once upon a time there were soldiers standing there every single day. Unmoving, unflinching, always vigilant.

.
Empty now.

“He was over a meter eighty, as tall as me, with broad shoulders and… and I quote ‘a gorgeous man’…”

I laughed.

It was a desperate laugh

“I think… I think out of everything I regret most is not asking her about him. Because now… I’ll never know. And I’ll never have the chance to know.”

I ran my hand through the feathers falling over my eyes.

“And that’s the part that hurts the most.”

.

.

.

“I'm being stupid aren’t I?”

Nothing

“Get. I’ll be there in a minute.”

He hesitated. Eventually though, he left, his heavy footsteps fading away.

I faced the Monument.

I straightened my posture best I could with this strange body.

Familial words carved into stone.

[TĒVZEMEI UN BRĪVĪBAI]

I lifted my claw to my forehead in a salute.

I stayed like that for a while.

Eventually, left and never looked back.

Goodbye home. I’ll miss you.
.

o.O.o

.

Gray. Gray. Gray gray gray _gray gray gray ^gray gray _gray ^gray

I was getting so sick of it. It was everywhere. The city the sky the water the boat UGH!

We still weren’t moving. I was sick of that too. I’d been begging to leave for forever. It’d gotten so bad I’d stopped sleeping because I was a nervous wreck. It felt like something was constantly on our heels and we needed to MOVE.

AND WE WEREN’T.

ARGHFGHGFHFFGHHHHHHHHHHHN~

I slammed my forehead down onto my hands that had been crossed and resting on the edge of the boat’s back rail. Move. Move you piece of -no- be nice. Be nice to the boat so it doesn’t kill you, yes. I came close once and I wasn’t very interested in fistfighting the Reaper.

Hah hah. References.

To me…

Umm…

.
“Hey.”

“JESUS!” I jumped a solid half meter straight up and fell flat on my ass on the way down. For fu-

“For fuck sakes Kaja I almost pissed myself!!” I yelled, clutching my heart and soul through my clothes. The woman gave me a bemused look and it looked like she was on the verge of apologizing anyway. Yeah, this was on me but still. I was jumpy as hell as of late, there was no way they wouldn’t have noticed.

“Christ all-fucken’-mighty are we ready go or what? I'm literally going to start tearing shit up if we don’t go in the next now.” I stomped both arms down for emphasis, the clank of metal echoing through the empty streets.

“Yes, yes, we going. I heat up engine to go. You can stop doing a freak, now, okay?” Wow if Kaja was getting short with me that meant I was really grating on people’s nerves. Maybe I was overdoing it a bit?

Uhh… actually file that little revelation for ‘never’.

Now where was I? Oh yes. I was in the process of hugging Kaja. How I ended up here I don’t know but it was the least worst thing that could have happened.

Aww she hooked one leg around my back, how sweet. What I didn’t quite understand was why I felt this horrible tightness in my chest and behind my eyes. I didn’t feel like crying. I had no reason to cry, really.

I was perfectly fine.

.
Suddenly Kaja seemed to freeze, her leg still locked around the back of my neck. I couldn’t see her face but I could hear her rapid breaths right in my ear.

The next few seconds were hell.

Because the singular word ‘people’ had never held that much weight as it did that moment.

.

I can't remember if it was a whisper or a shout or telepathy but she took off running. And I took off after her, screaming for Carl the entire way off the boat, down the same walkway that almost killed me. Evidently Kaja’d gotten mastery over her quadrupedness because holy shit could that bat go. I wasn’t that out of shape and I couldn’t keep up for squat. I only followed the purple and red blob retreating in the distance because I sure as shit couldn’t see anyone anywhere.

Thankfully for us the road along the river was a straight one and soon enough I saw a tiny shape that almost got run over by half a ton of mom instinct. I slowed my pace as I did so, trying to not wheeze out my lungs.

Then came barking. And a scraggly white blur with a leash dragging behind her that beeline’d for Kaja. Following that came a slew of miniature earthquakes as Carl tried desperately to catch up the rest of us girls.

By the time I’d made it to Kaja and our mystery human, Carl had caught up to me and was the only sensible one of us to yank a crazily barking and jumping Bella by her leash and away from the action.

That was finally the point where my brain registered the crying. And the fact that the other person was small enough to fit and hide in Kaja’s embrace. And it was small. And four-legged. And small. And black and white. And small.

My spine went a little cold.

.

Kid.

It was a kid.

.
“H-elp help he-elp” the little thing kept repeating between hiccupping sobs. What struck me as odd was the way they pronounced the words. Like they’d never actually used them normally, kind of like me whenever I tried out saying ‘help’ in Russian. Carl and I cautiously circled the two horse-people and I got a better look at the kiddo.

Dude was straight up a zebra.

They were off-white with dark brown-ish stripes and messy, multiple-toned hair. They had ill-fitting jeans and an orange t-shirt awkwardly hanging from their frame. I managed to catch a glimpse of their dark-purple eyes that gave away the fact that this was definitely no normal animal.

The kid kept hiccupping, pushing themselves harder against Kaja while the woman angled her head to look at the rest of us.

“Well. Talk to him.” Kaja hissed at me as Carl was busy restraining Bella who was in process of losing all her shit.

“Wha-”

“I can't Latvian, you talk.”

“I, uh, I-I-I-I-I-” I sputtered, taking a step backwards. When Carl suddenly shoved Bella into my arms I almost dropped the poor mutt in surprise. The minotaur kneeled down next to Kaja, trying to make himself as small and non-threatening as possible, with mixed results.

“Hey, hey little guy, don’t cry…” Carl spoke in his softest possible voice, which wasn’t far from his usual deep rumbling.

His name was Adam Pļava <Field>.

We eventually managed to figure out that this kid was in the country with his mom, visiting grandparents. They’d been walking somewhere until one second it was a normal day the next he was a zebra stumbling back and forth along and empty bridge begging for help. Thank fuck the kid was british, because it very much helped with language barriers. That and I very much pretend to not notice just how quickly Kaja seemed to latch onto the lil dude.

I’d completely forgotten Carl had a little brother but it very much helped us with the kid. After a whole lotta bullshit the three of us found ourselves in the captain’s quarters, aka my room.

“So what do we do?” I asked.

“Well it’s not like we can leave him.” Carl gave me a half-horrified look.

“Yeah no shit you fucktrumpet, I never said we should!” I snapped back. “But for what it’s worth we are basically kidnapping the thing.”

“That’s what I'm saying! If he suddenly appeared logic says his mom might too and what are we supposed to do in that situation? Leave a note saying ‘hey we kidnapped you kid on a trip ‘round the world, hope you don’t mind’?” Carl waved his arm.

“So we take him with us! It’s not like we have options!”

“Yeah except the big glaring one.” I swear he looked so unintentionally smug as he spoke. “Stay.”

“FUCK NO!” I shouted, flaring my wings. “We are not doing this shit again!” My wings puffed up even more. “We’ve already fought enough about this, and I didn’t almost drown just for us to stop in our fucking tracks when we’re a few buttons away from finally gtfo-ing!”

“You almost drowned because you're a fucking retard not because of whatever stupid reason you made up this time!”

A sharp clatter of hooves on metal made us freeze.

“SHUT UP ALREADY!”

Kaja was staring us down, fury dripping off her very being. Whatever protest either of us might’ve put up was squashed just by a single glance.

“I am put my leg down! I am tired of you two yelling about this! Decision was made already before! We take Adam, we leave, NO question! And no think about argue because I take leader-ing now and I say stop fighting, stop yelling, listen to me and we go! UNDERSTAND!?”

We both stared at Kaja in abject horror. I barely managed a weak nod and I didn’t even dare glance at Carl what with Kaja burning holes though both of us with those golden eyes of hers. She gave a few more angry snorts before quickly cooling down.

“Carl, go take rope off -uhh- stone beach, Diana go rope Bella so she away from Adam, I go talk to him and explain to him, oke?”

“W-what about his mom then?” Carl sputtered. Kaja looked at him and then stared ahead blankly in thought. “Dia,” she turned to me and I involuntarily shrank back, “can you make note and we leave at bridge?”

“Won't it just get messed up by the weather?”

“We need try.”

I nodded.

“Good.” The old woman smiled, just a little bit. “Last thing. You two make happy now.”

“Eh?”

“I think she wants us to make up.” I gave Carl the side eye as I guessed at her meaning.

“Why?”

“I mean, we have been at each other’s throats for a while.” I annoyedly grumbled.

He didn’t say anything, only fidgeting with his hands as he suddenly very much did not want to look at me. Huh. Now it was my time to give an angry snort that sounded much more menacing what with my anatomy. Carl was on the verge of saying something but I to cut him off.

“No.” I glared right back at Kaja. “I am not five years old anymore, I don’t need adults telling me to make up with anyone. I go by my own judgment and if I have to make up with anyone I'm doing it on my terms.”

The way she exhaled it seemed she almost visibly deflated. “Oke. Oke… just… lets go do thing now, oke?”

“Tch. Fine.” My feathers were still fluffed up in agitation. We lingered in silence for a few more moments before I simply walked out of the room followed by Kaja, and Carl slinking behind us.

We went about all our tasks. I scribbled a note and gave my forgotten skateboard a spin as I took the plastic-wrapped paper all the way to where Adam said he had come from. I taped it somewhere noticeable and headed back. By the time I got there Carl had taken care of Bella and untied all but one rope mooring us to the coast. I gave the area a onceover before boarding the rumbling freighter followed by the suddenly very quiet minotaur.

It was time for us to set off.

Finally.

And good fucking riddance.

.
The three four of us crammed in the bridge. Carl hung back in the doorway and Kaja let Adam poke some buttons as we got the huge lump of rusty machinery to get going.

And going, it got.

I took the kid and hung around the front of the ship as we slowly made our way towards open waters. I wasn’t sure if it was a diversion tactic on Kaja’s part or what but he seemed pretty happy just looking around and enjoying the wind even with the entire Apocalypse thing notwithstanding.

We took shifts of two making sure we were sailing in the direction we were supposed to. The day dragged on into dusk and we downgraded to just one of us making sure nothing went too wrong. I fed Bella twice and spent an hour trying to teach the kid Sudoku, which was more me just trying to get him to learn how to hold a pencil in his mouth. In hindsight I probably should have left that to Kaja since I had opposable thumbs.

Hey, at least we had an even split now.

Kaja set up a room for him next to hers while I decorated mine. And by decorated I mean I made a proper nest for me to sleep in. Pretty sure it had something to do with the bird part of me, but then again I’d like nesting in things even as a human so whatever.

I also made a small sitting area for myself at the back of the ship where there was a small dip. I got some pillows, a blanket, a tarp to throw over it if it rained and a big ol’ umbrella for the sun tomorrow.

I released Bella from being confined in a tiny room below deck and brought her out to what I was going to call my patio from now on. The two of us spent the rest of the evening there chilling, doodling, drinking and watching the last faint vestiges of our home fade beyond the curvature of the earth.

The sun set to our side and the world grew darker and for the first time in my memory I was surrounded by water and nothing but, from all sides. A strange ball formed in my chest and the longer I gazed upon the horizon the more it grew and grew until it spread out to my arms and spine and throat before suddenly vanishing. As if I’d suddenly made peace with the vastness of the world around me.

The alcohol probably helped.

.
Slowly stars began to light up around us. Bella began dozing off so I ushered her inside before returning to my lovely drink of rum and coke. No ice, no lemon, still good.

We had agreed to keep our lights as dim and nonexistent as we could, which helped with enjoying the night sky especially as my eyes adjusted more and more to the dark all around. I knew it was Kaja’s turn to man the helm, as for the two guys, I took a wild guess at them being asleep.

Of course I was proven wrong almost immediately, so screw me right?

He was trying to be so sneaky it was almost comedic, the way the metal groaned under his weight as he slowly made his way over to me. I just laid there, nearly catatonic. I was almost done with a two liter bottle of coke and a good sixth of a big ol’ rum bottle, which in hindsight was probably a bit too much for my tiny body. I sighed.

“Oh for fuck sakes, what do you want?”

He froze. After a few long seconds he shuffled over to where I was, settling down by a part of protruding metal next to my lovely chill-spot. I lazily glanced at him while he continued to fidget in silence for a good while.

“I…” It sounded like he was fighting his own words when he finally decided to speak. “I-I-…”

.
“I'm sorry.”

Eh?

“Pfff, for what?” I tried very hard to not sound condescending and I think I might’ve succeeded.

“A… bunch. I've had some time to think and… I shouldn’t… some of the stuff I said, w-when you drowned I mean, I shouldn’t”

“Just shut up, you’re killing both of us here.” I took a swig to wash away the cringe. “Seriously though, why the hell are you apologizing?”

“Look I was just fucking worried okay?!” He snapped. That got my attention. I sat up, which was mistake because evening went a bit spinny, but anyway.

“I-I was… I, I'm scared. I'm scared of what's going to happen and what happened and I don’t want anyone to get hurt like you almost did, okay?!” He was nervously running his hands through his curly hair, looking anywhere except my direction.

“I don’t know what's going on or what to do or anything! I'm mad at you because you're so stupidly reckless and I don’t want you to die because there's only the thr-four of us and I-I'm scared of being alone again okay?”

He hid his face in his hands.

“It was terrifying before I found Kaja, okay? I lied, I lied about the stuff I did before her, I just sat at home and cried because I didn’t know what was going on, or what to do or where my mom went and then you showed up and I was scared about telling you other people because of this-” He vaguely gestured to the open waters, as far as the eye could see.

“I don’t want you to h-hate me… I don’t want to keep y-yelling at you I just want the world and everything to go back to normal because that way at least I… I knew… I had… I-I-I-”

“I'm sorry okay, I-I-I don’t want you to hate me, p-please, please don’t hate me…”

He’d curled into a tiny grey and red ball and I could do nothing but stare. An exasperated breath escaped me as I limply fell back into the blankets, the sky spinning in circles.

.
“I don’t hate you, you moron.”

.
“W-what?” I caught him looking at me though his fingers.

I laughed.

It was a bitter laugh.

.
“You don’t get it, do you?”

“Look at you. Being so nice and sweet tryin’ to apologize n’ shit even if I've knowingly been acting like a raging cunt and giving no fucks about it.

It’s actually kind of funny in a really retarded way. You know all the stuff you said about me being entitled and all that? I've never actually had anyone say that to my face. It was frigen’ bizarre I gotta give it to ya. I was actually floored that it was you out of everyone I've known that had the balls to say it out loud…

Hey… Do you… do you remember the day we met? All that stuff I said about pretending?”

Silence.

“Nothing’s changed, ya know. I made my choice when the realization of having lost everything started setting in. And it’s that decision to stay true to whatever void deep down there is, is what's keeping me in one piece.

I'm cold. Cold and selfish. I've always been. Because it makes everything so much easier when you only have to look out for yourself.”

.
“N-not even your mom? You talk about her a lot…” He was so quiet.

“BWHAHAHAH, fuck me, if only you knew… I mean, it’s… it’s not like I ever did it on purpose, at least at first, or to hurt anyone but…

She… she was… my driving force, ya know? When you summed everything up she was… everything. Because I was her everything. I was her world because I was the only thing she still had left. And I always hurt her the most because she was the closest. Because deep down I knew she’d always put up with me no matter what I did.

We always fought, because, let’s face it, I was and still am a piece of shit. Sure she pushed too hard for me to excel in a school that didn’t matter and sure she was overly strict, as much she could while working herself to death so I had everything I could ever want.

I still remember when she told me she was okay with the fact that I didn’t love her… That… hurt… Because I did. Do. I just… didn’t know how to give back. I don’t think I ever did. I don’t think I CAN.

All I've known is how the world takes. That’s all it does. It took Dad. It took my innocence. It took… you wouldn’t believe it, but I used to as bright as the sun, once upon a time. And the word decided that that was too good for everyone involved, so it decided to ruin that. And it ripped and tore and stabbed and betrayed and muddied and destroyed until all that light in that tiny little girl that wanted the best for the world and the people in it was long gone. It took my future. It took who I was. And then it took my future one last time. The only difference is that this time there is nothing to bounce back to. But that’s okay. It doesn’t hurt anymore because there's nothing left to hurt. The shell where my light was isn’t even scratched. Why do you think I've taken everything in strides? There's nothing there anymore, inside or out, do you understand?

And all that nothing? That’s where I came from. Nothing but tar and nothing but nothing.

And it’s fascinating, almost, to see all these sparks in the void of the world, fighting against the inevitable, desperately holding to their light. It’s kinda’ sad actually, how hard some people try. I guess in some fucked up way I admire them, because there is this tiny part of me that still thinks I could have been one of them.

But I'm not. I never was. Never been.

And that child of light I told you about was never really me.

I don’t know what me is beyond what I told you back when. A bitter, selfish, swearing, insecure brat that gave up trying to do better because there’s nothing left to lose but her life full of hollow pleasures and even that is slipping between my fingertips.

But hey, you can try to be Mom. You can try to care if you want. I might care back but it’ll be a passing thing with no noticeable result, and face it, it’ll probably be easier to just be miserable alone.

Because one day… one day you’ll get sick of me. One day I’ll push too hard and something will break. And I’ll walk away. Because I never belonged anywhere in the first place and you’ll just keep being good people, and you’ll feel bad about me when the dust settles and that’s okay. That’s what separates us. Because I’ll be long gone and you’ll be nothing but a passing memory. Nice, sure, but hollow just like the rest of them.

And I’ll keep moving forward.

Alone.

Like I've always been and always will be.

And that’s okay.”

.

I took another sip.

Sweet.

After a while he just kind of shook his head and left.

I stayed here.

For a long time.

The void above was nice and black.

And the stars looked ever brighter.

.

Mom always did say I’d die alone.

.

o.O.o

Comments

[Backlash91]

I....ow....

I love this story....but ow diana.....i wanna find where you belong...

[Celefin]

Damn that was dark. Ow.