I’m not insane.
“Why did I go to the Bucket? I should have stayed in hiding. Nothing was bothering me where I was…”
What’s that?!
Looking around he finds he’s alone but not quite where he was. The walls, the decour, everything was tilted at the wrong angle. Paper littered the floor filled with wild scribbles.
I thought I heard something.
“I just needed to be out with people again. I didn’t think they would be there. Why in all of this blasted city were they there.”
Those cats… always cats… I hate cats… all they do is ruin me.
My first wife.
That “nephew” of mine.
“Beryl…” he said with a mixture of hatred and odd curiosity. Something was different about her, something he was afraid of…
Though she did open my eyes.
Yes, Cyan isn’t really related to me. He’s just some kid. And kids die in this city all the time. No one ever miss some kid.
Hehehehehehe.
But I can’t do this alone. I need some help.
The Professor said he recognized me… and for some strange reason I think I recognized him too. I can’t remember where though… or can I?
“Was it at a tea party?”
I very much like tea.
“There’s a new tea shop in Mad Alice Lane. I think the hatter has also moved above it too. So is he a mad hatter?”
Hehehe.
“My god…that….that woman put him into a coma.” Wright growled as others sighed quietly on the other side of the door. Despite their outburst and indignation none came crashing through the door to separate the two. Perhaps Sonnerstein had heard the deep regret hidden in Beryl’s harsher words.
The familiar ignored them as she looked down at the comatose child. Cyan was in a hospital gown, his possessions had been removed and placed to the side. He looked small, tinier than she remembered. Once, she would have given her life to protect this or any of the other children. Now? She had partially caused his mind to be lost to the aether. Guilt was biting at the back of her mind fighting with the deep resentment she had for the urchins, especially Cyan himself. As much as she may resent him, and despite what she said when the coldness came over her, she didn’t want him to be hurt. Not like this.
It was something Cyan had said the night before that tilted the tide…You know what it’s like to go to the bedside of your best friend and think that they will never come back?! Read to them daily to make sure they are okay!
The lad had done that for her years ago after Cortman’s massacre. Things were different between them now but…she owed it to him.
She looked into his possessions expecting a book to be among them. The boy loved to read and had three checked out from the library. She went to his bookmark and started to read to him. It was a horror story of a madwoman with red hair from the days of the old empire. She picked up where he had left off, with the doctors certain their science could restore her going ahead with his experiment.
Doctor Sonnerstein and the others heard her reading and allowed her to continue.
She read to him for an hour, and just as she was starting to finish she heard a whisper in her mind, one that no other would have heard, deeper than the child’s usual voice “I’m sorry. I thought I could summon you, try to talk this out. I didn’t realize… I only wanted to help…”
Then there was silence, and her storytelling came to an end.
“He just wanted to help me…” she said to herself quietly as she closed the book, thinking of Captain Heinrichs words as she did. “How far have I fallen?”
There was no answer, even the whispering outside was quiet and waiting for what she said next. The feline closed the book and walked to the door. Before she exited her sorrow melted from her features, and she stood upright smiling coldly. She walked out abruptly and dismissed her friends with, “Good day.”
As she descended down the elevator she could hear Wright sigh and wonder if she had a moment of introspection or not. It did not matter. She would be back to read to him the next day regardless. No one could reach Cyan, but perhaps if they kept trying he would find the way back himself.
Kasa paced in her study, it had been a long day, with Snow going down with a flu in his condition, she had to put her animosity aside towards Wright, an issue that weighed on her that she would have to deal with in due time. She puffed once more at her cigar, her room smelling of Carrot greens, a custom type she had made, not harmful had an odd smell but a taste she enjoyed.
She had made it clear to the urchins not to disturb her unless it was extremely important. She had work to do, her paper on her studies of the rot lay in a pile on her desk. But what was on the rabbits mind the most right now… above all else was what happened to Cyan, why.. How… she at least knew who.
She sighs a bit and shakes her head, moving over to her bookshelf and pushing some books aside. “I am sorry..” She says softly to herself “But it might be time to read this..” She says pulling out an old leather bound journal with the initial’s EK embossed in gold on it. “I know I should not.. But maybe… if I have to I can find an answer… I just hope.. I can do something before it’s too late… before another …” She says, as she moves over to her candle lit desk and opened up the old journal, she was amazed it survived the fire… as she braced herself for what secrets it held, but she knew in it might be a way to do something she may regret.
She exhaled as her eyes moved over the symbols and writings, a mix of German and Lithuanian, and some old runes, she never knew a lot but feared a lot, she knew what cost her father and swore never to go down this road. But she knew it might help her find a way to keep herself safe a contingency plan. She thought to herself. She set the end of her cigar into the ashtray and looked over the notes, some horror on her face.. Intrigue… and fear, learning more than she wanted but buried in these old notes might just be an answer