Chapter 1: Lost Purpose

It was early September in Hometown, the start of her senior year, when the plans for her future were dashed and the curtain pulled back.

 

She was a tad more than three months out from her 18th birthday at that point; her and everyone else in her graduating class were coming up on adulthood (or in Azzy’s case, already there), and that meant getting everything squared away for life after graduation. For Dess, this had already been made up in her scattered mind for a long while, evident by the combat jacket she always wore about the town.

Once the recruiters came along, she was going to sign herself up to join the FRN Security Force.

Of course, as the messy-haired girl made the trek to school on that warm morning in the dying days of summer, an open house session where all she had to do was meet up and sign some paperwork, the thought did linger in her head about what exactly she would be doing. The Federal Republic of Northamer wasn’t exactly the greatest of countries on the global stage, and their Security Force was the wretched arm that carried a sword of oppressive control.

An idealistic, almost assuredly naive part of her rationalized this ideological discrepancy with thoughts of revolution. She was an ardent socialist and a hothead, she had a thirst for blood and an almost even greater thirst for imagery. She had a proposed Northamer Socialist Republic flag that she had designed herself stitched on her sleeve, right below her Ostrheinland emblem, and hopefully she’d be stationed in a plush country in Europa, like Anglia or the modern Rheinland Republic, where she could slowly work the minds of her fellow soldiers and fit them to her will. With any luck she would be flying that brilliant yellow banner of hers from atop the Capitol once her inevitable military coup was successful…

Yeah, right.

Naturally, she reasoned that she wasn’t a completely deluded mess of a girlfailure... yet. It seemed clear that such a thing probably wasn’t going to happen, although she wasn’t going to rule it out! But in the event such a thing weren’t possible for whatever reason, she knew that she could reconcile her values by joining the Domestic Service Corps. Unlike the heavy-handed militarized branches of the FRNSF, the DSC seemed almost too good to be true, as if it were hand-carved to fit snugly within the framework of her rugged socialist values. Venture off across the country with a team of like-minded folks, see the natural beauty of it all, and all the while working to serve marginalized communities and make Northamer a better place. Disaster relief, home building, park maintenance, all that sort of thing. It was tough, grueling work, but it was rewarding, knowing all of the lives you were helping. Even if it was a band-aid on the buckshot wound of capitalism, it at least stopped the bleeding for some.

Not to mention job stability. A guaranteed pension, 5-year term of enlistment, and with all of that, if she proved her worth during that time, she’d be able to continue on in a leadership role with the DSC, heading the charge for the sake of helping others. Even if her time was only enough to parlay it into a middling career, and not enough to bring about the rise of socialism, it was still something.

And that was what was most important to her about all the structure, it was something. Something that could get her out of this town, away from her, and leave her on her feet by the end of it. With any luck, she’d be able to get Noelle out as well once it came time for her to graduate.

With a sense of hope crossed her heart for the future, something that felt like a rarity to her for much of the past four years, she strolled down the last bit of sidewalk before turning in towards the doors to Hometown’s school building. Pushing past into the vestibule, she left her black baseball bat by the entryway and made her way down the hall towards the recruitment station.

The small table was set up right next to the double doors of the supply closet, with two people sitting there, boredom having taken hold of both of them. One was a muscular, likely roided-up human of fair complexion, reading a magazine and sporting a buzzcut, but it appeared obvious to Dess that his hair color was likely blonde, although a more saturated color than her own natural hair when it wasn’t dyed black with an auburn streak. The other at the table was a monster, a dark-furred anthro dog with a stack of folders sat in front of him; if he were a non-sent, he looked as if he’d pass for a Rheinland Shepherd. A… fairly stereotypical meatbag pairing, if she were honest, but that didn’t necessarily have to mean anything… right?

Struggling to get that nagging thought out of her head, she took a deep breath and continued up to the table, mentally preparing herself for the conversation ahead.

The monster noticed her approach first, but instead of acknowledging her with a greeting or introduction, spread out the folders and tapped the human beside him on the shoulder to grab his attention. Dess had seen him reading a magazine beforehand, but hadn’t made much note of it. Up close, however, it appeared that the military man had been reading Monster Girls Monthly, which appeared to be some sort of risque mag for humans, judging by the very visible shot of an avian monster posing on top of a car hood with a man in the driver’s seat.

His attention grabbed, the human peeked up from his magazine at the jostling of his fellow soldier, and at catching sight of Dess, set the rag down and slicked back his non-existent hair in an attempt to look suave.

“Hel-lo, jailbait, Garrett. 12 O’clock!” he not-so-silently whispered to his buddy, although it was clear that he had no idea how loud he actually was.

Dess was more dumbfounded than anything by the response, too bewildered to form any strong emotion other than a now-setting-in disgust, and replied flatly. “Excuse me?”

“I said good afternoon, ma’am,” he hurriedly answered, blatantly trying to put that last comment away without an apology. “My name’s Lance, and this fellow soldier here is Garrett.” He gestured over to the dog, who quietly and obediently waved, before turning back towards Dess with his hand outstretched towards her. “I’m his superior officer. And what might be your name, beautiful?” He put on a chivalric smile.

She made no move to reciprocate the offered handshake, just standing there skeeved the hell out, and now a good bit annoyed. “Yeah, and my name’s December “I’m Not Putting Out For You” Holiday, but you can call me “Dess” for short.

“I can see why, that’s a pretty long name,” Lance said. Dess could scantily tell if that was a joke or not, considering neither of these dunces seemed to be the brightest of bulbs, but the fact he set his hand down at least offered the slightest indication that he knew he fucked up. Whether he was sorry was another question. “I’m assuming you’re here to apply to our, ahem, wonderful armed forces?”

Slowly nodding, still creeped out being alone with the two more than anything else right now, Dess pulled out a few papers from within her army jacket and handed them over to Garrett, who willingly obliged and took them. In turn, Lance pulled out a form of his own from one of the manilla folders sat upon the table and extended it towards Dess. She hesitantly reached out to grab it, but decisively snatched it once it was in reach. Her stomach still churned even by just coming close to touching him.

“That there, ma’am,” Lance began with a prepared speech of jargon, “is a legally-binding contract that, if you sign, means you pledge to serve the Federal Republic of Northamer as a part of her military forces, either in one of the weaponized units, or as a part of the Domestic Service Corps, for a period of no less than five years. And what may be your date of birth?”

Dess answered succinctly as she read over the finer details of the paperwork. “December 25th, 1997.”

“1997, SIR!” Lance emphasized. “You’ll have to get used to that if you wanna make it through basic, miss!”

Greeeeat. Dess was already mentally cringing over how much hell that was bound to be. The idea of just cutting to the chase and joining the DSC was already starting to creep into her mind.

“Now, as a seventeen year old, it is optional, but recommended, that you have a parent co-sign that contract with you to gather their consent, but as someone over the age of sixteen, you are not legally required to, and may sign-”

“Uh, sir?” Garrett chimed in, handing over one of the papers Dess had given him. Her medical report.

Lance glanced at the health record she provided, before an expression of first surprise, and then of plain questioning swept across his face. “Ma’am, it says here on your medical history that you have… ah, a history of…” He narrowed his eyes as he read out from the list. “...depression, anxiety, bouts of mania, violent outbursts, and… have previously been prescribed a mood stabilizer, lamotrigine.” Flatly, he put the paper down and asked, “Care to explain any of that?”

Fuck, right. It was going a bit too quick and easy, all things considered. Dess straightened herself out as she prepared to present her prepared lie to the recruiters. “That was all noted down during my last annual physical, as you can see. My mother, bless her…” She nearly gagged at the faux-religiosity, but kept it together, knowing that it would only help her keep up the lie and calcify it. “...she’s unfortunately a bit of an… abusive figure, so to speak, and she reported a whole slew of conditions to my doctor that were completely fabricated. One thing led to another, and they ended up giving me a mood stabilizer that I didn’t need.”

She put on some jovial airs, hoping to seal the deal. “So if you’re asking, no, I’m not crazy.” Finishing with her best approximation of a cutesy smile, she could only hope it was enough to sway the human in front of her, who was looking her down with that same flat and unmoving expression he had started this line of conversation with. One that didn’t seem to communicate he fully bought it, but at the same time, one that showed he may not particularly care anyway.

That disinterested look, however, would morph into something approximate to a focused gaze, and then glare, at a certain part of her. For an uneasy amount of beats, those eyes remained eerily transfixed on her, with Garrett joining in once he figured something was amiss. If Lance hadn’t spoken up when he did, Dess would’ve likely lashed out at him to some capacity, thinking they were staring at her chest, but what was said instead sent a panicked shock straight through her spine.

“What’re those patches on your left sleeve?”

She froze, caught in the headlights of his questioning. The pair of patches, one an emblem of a hammer and drawing compass encircled by wheat, the other a yellow flag with red star and white deer head in the middle, felt as if they were giant beacons lighting the way for an enemy nuclear strike. How had she forgotten that they were on her military jacket, or that they would be seen?!?!

Squinting his eyes to check as Dess just stood there slackjawed, unable to muster anything beyond an “ummmmm…,” Garrett snapped his fingers and pointed. “That top one looks like the Ostrheinland emblem, sir!” he bleated.

“Yeah, I could tell, I wanted to hear it from her.” Lance was now working to temper a scowl. “But that bottom flag… I’ve never seen anything like it before.” His eyes stared daggers right into her own, which nervously looked away as he commanded her. “Okay, December, be honest with me about that bottom flag…”

“It’s my own design!” she blurted, finally revealing the truth. “It’s… just a concept I have for a… ahh… a socialist Northamer… sir.” That last “sir” tacked on at the end came out as nothing more than a mere squeak.

Lance held quiet for a while, before a sly smile crept up on his face. “Oh, so you’re just a vexilologist,” he said, seemingly unknowing.

Not picking up the undertones to his voice, Dess jumped on the provided lie like a bear to a picnic. “Oh, uh… yeah! Just really into graphic design, thought that socialist symbols just… totally looked cool, hahah… hah…. That’s why the deer’s on the one… because… I… uh….”

Now firmly satisfied with where the conversation had headed, Lance prodded in another direction. “And to shift gears, where and what exactly do you plan on doing while serving with us?”

Again, Dess hopped on the chance to change the subject. “O-oh! Yes! Erm… I was hoping to either go over to Europa for a tour of duty if I go down the armed route, ideally with the Air Force in Anglia or Rheinland but anything there in Europa’s fine really! And, ah… if I choose to stay domestic, then some volunteer work with the DSC would be nice, preferably still in the Northeast, though. Or if not just that, then please not the Deep South!”

Lance and Garrett just sat there for a few moments after Dess finished blabbing, the latter having struggled to take in everything with the frantic pace she was speaking at due to her nerves. The human, however, had heard enough, and smirked to himself as he decided what to say next.

“How does a desert tour sound?”

Dess didn’t understand at first, or at least she didn’t want to. “Huh?”

“We’re not gonna be sending you to Europa if you sign,” Lance confirmed, grinning as he swore he saw her soul shatter right in front of his eyes. “Monsters don’t tend to go there unless they’re cream of the crop, and you just look like cream of the crap. We have new lines opening up out east, and we need infantry out there on the Ayden Peninsula.”

He leaned forward just a bit to shatter her heart even more personally. “And you look like a good fit for the front, if I do say so myself.”

Swallowing her stress, Dess tried to press him. “I mean, are you sure front line infantry is really the place you want me? I mean, I’d make a pretty valuable asset to-”

The two recruiters just burst out laughing at the remark. “Oh, oh,” Lance wheezed. “Oh this is just too good.”

“I can’t believe you’re actually serious!” Garrett exclaimed to Dess as he tried to reign in his laughter. “Have you seen your grades?! No way in HELL are we letting someone like you pilot a fighter jet, and even no-er a way are we letting a political radical like yourself anywhere near Europa! Feck, I’m unsure if you’re even fit to serve combat at all!”

“And that’s why we’d have her on the front,” Lance said, finally under control of himself. “She’ll learn not to fuck around there…” He then turned to stare Dess down, “...or she’ll end up dead.”

Dess could feel something building in her mind, a cloud of fog creeping in at the edges as it began to burn hot. “You know what, fine,” she tersely said, shifting to her backup plan. “What about the Domestic Service Corps, then?”

Lance let off a mean and mocking chortle. “Hah! Are you serious? With your mental problems and affiliations, no way you’re fit for the DSC, either!”

“B-but…” Dess’ mind raced in a panicked babble, static starting to creep up on the edges of her mind.

“Buh buh buh!” Garrett mocked, joining in on the ribbing. “Spit it out, ya skank, you sound like a fucking retard! Hahaha!”

That was enough. Her eye began to twitch as she fought back her desire to lunge at the dog like a feral animal. “OI DOG MEAT!” she shouted through his laughter, hoping to at least assert some sort of dominance as words finally came to mind. “I woulda thought that community service oriented stuff would be just the right kinda low-drag thing for someone like me! And now you and FLESHY over here are trying to tell me otherwise? WHAT FUCKING GIVES?!”

The pair sat there silent for a moment, taken aback by the outburst. They glanced at each other, their gazes telling silently that they’d never had an encounter like this before, before Lance turned back and addressed her coldly. “Well, if you must ask, Miss December, I’ll be blunt with you. We wouldn’t consider you for any position in the DSC regardless, since you’re far too unstable and left-leaning to be suitable for the Undercover Police.”

The world felt as if it had pushed itself away from Dess at that moment. “What…?”

Lance looked at her with a disgusted sense of curiosity. “Really? You don’t know?”

“They don’t tell us monsters until we’re a part of it, usually,” Garrett chimed in, contextualizing things for the human.

“Ah, right, how could I have forgotten that?” Lance turned his full gaze back upon Dess, who was already starting to tremble with what was boiling inside of her. “The community volunteer regiment is just a PR front. They do actual work, but it’s just to provide cover for a larger secret police operation. You’re familiar with the Stasi, right? You’re an Ostrheinland fangirl, after all… you freak.” He said that last part with a hush, as if talking to himself, but with a deliberate loudness to ensure Dess heard. She did.

“But anyway, it’s like that, but we’re good, because we’re capitalists,” he said venomously, with a direct spray of spittle in Dess’ direction. “Simple work, for someone of sound mind, that is. The DUP basically just go around and keep tabs on any fringe or dangerous groups out there, mainly left-wing radicals.” He glared at Dess, again staring intently at her Ostrheinland patch. “And if they get up to any trouble, something that could cause, ahem, serious harm, we… how should I say this, we eliminate the problem before it can fester into something threatening to-”

Dess slammed her hands onto the table, cutting the bastard off. “YOU’RE KIDDING?!” She was apoplectic at the mere mention of such a duty. “You seriously think I’ll go undercover and turn in leftist revolutionaries, my comrades??? How dare you! HOW FUCKING DARE YOU!!!”

The human continued staring her down, finding it personally hard to believe such a character could even have comrades close enough to betray. “...Exactly my point from earlier,” Lance answered back, continuing as if he hadn’t been interrupted. “But knowing you specifically, there’s still no way in Jesus' name we’ll be letting you onto even the community service branch of the force. For one. Simple. Reason.”

He leaned forward on the table, staring daggers at the doe as even she couldn’t maintain her tough act any longer and began to backpedal.

“You’re. A. Duster ,” Lance said with a cold, plodding, deliberate voice. “And Dusters like yourself don’t ever serve in the community service branch. Domestic Undercover Police, maybe some in Europa, or Front Lines. And you’re only fit to be artillery fodder. Nothing. Else. Capiche?”

Dess couldn’t do anything but stand there, venomously staring down the two recruiters as her fists trembled by her sides. She silently hoped that the dog would chew out Lance for saying such a thing, or at least talk them down from the precipice, but the disdain in his gaze, the non-reaction towards a slur directed towards them and hatred towards her….

“You’re just dust on the damn heel of the FRN,” she spat out, lashing out at Garrett specifically. “Traitor, to both class and creed!”

Unable to contain herself any longer, she violently swung her fist backwards and collided it with the wall, shattering one of the tan tiles that lined it. Her breathing, frantic and feral, alerted her that it was probably best for her to leave, lest she cause too big a scene to be ignored.

“You two will pay one day!” she shouted, tearing up the crumpled release paperwork that had been in her other fist as she stormed down the hall back towards the entrance. “THE REVOLUTION WILL NOT SPARE YOU! GLORY TO THE NSR!”

Stomping out the exit, she threw the shredded paper up in the air and grabbed her bat, hesitating for a moment. Trembling, she clenched the handle with an iron grasp, a million violent fantasies running through her mind, before she pulled herself back and slammed the doors behind her. A few monsters from other open houses peeked their heads out of the classrooms to see the commotion they heard, but after being greeted with an empty hall, turned back and shut the doors, leaving the army recruitment booth quiet and alone. They both sat silently, unsure of how to process things, before the human responded first.

“Well, that went swimmingly,” Lance quipped, kicking back in his seat. For all the bluster he had put on for her, much of it admittedly legitimate in his disdain, he really just didn’t give much of a shit at all about recruitment. “She’s the only one to come in so far, not looking good for numbers, G.T.”

His compatriot, however, was a little less at ease, the whole spiel she gave at the end really getting to him.

“Should we call into DUP-HQ and tell them to assign someone to keep tabs on her?” Garrett asked. “I mean, that Ostrheinland patch and political chatter…”

“Fuck if I care about her,” Lance nonchalantly answered. “She’s too mad to ever be someone significant. I reckon she’ll take herself out before anyone else.” He lit and took a long drag from a cigarette pulled from his jacket pocket, not caring one iota that the school was a smoke-free zone.

“She’s not worth our time.”

 

…

 

“So that’s it, then? Huh.”

With a toss, Asriel hurled another stone into the lake, skipping it thrice across the surface before it sank into the blue depths below. Dess had just finished recounting to him what she’d just been through, and while the messy short-haired blonde boss monster may’ve had a quick mind himself, it was still taking a while to process.

“Yep, ‘bout all there is to it,” the doe confirmed, her body reclined along the shoreline at their secret little inlet on the lake, tucked deep into the woods off of a stray dirt auto trail. “Honestly, kinda glad to find out now, at least. Otherwise I would’ve been suckered into fighting on the front lines in one of those oil states out east… whatever one we’re at war with now.”

“Akkadia?”

“Nah, I thought we just pulled out of there once Rheinland decommitted their own forces. I’d like to think it was… Aden, maybe? Ahden?” She turned her gaze away from the fluffy clouds above and towards her fluffier (in her opinion, at least) boyfriend. “How do you pronounce that again?”

“Eye-den, spelled A-y-d-a-n.” Azzy let off a stifled chuckle. “Y’know, for someone who considers herself a political revolutionary, you’re quite shit, er, bad with understanding and remembering those sorts of things,” he playfully jabbed.

This got Dess onto her feet, springing her upright to rush the goat and lock him in a playful noogie. “Oh, shut up! You thought we were at war with Akkadia until I corrected you!”

“Alright! Alright! I yield!” Azzy jokingly surrendered, holding his arms in the air to get Dess to back off, the both of them sharing a light bit of laughter before letting things simmer down again. For all the problems she had, at least having him in her life seemed to keep her tethered to the world, at least to some degree.

Picking up a stone, and then throwing it herself across the lake, silently cheering as she saw it skip a fourth time to beat out her boyfriend, the urge to get stoned crept upon her in her mind just as quickly as the stone itself had sunk. Reaching into her right breast pocket, she pulled out a beat-up mint tin, opened it, and then began scooping some of the suspicious leaves into one of the papers she had inside of it.

Asriel noticed Dess was rustling about with something and looked over. “What are you doing, Dess- oh, this again?” He rolled his eyes and sighed.

“What? I’m craving it!” she protested, much more carefree in this regard than Azzy was. “Ugh, and I swear it takes more and more of this stuff to even feel anything anymore,” Dess lamented, rolling up the paper and licking it shut with the contents tucked inside. “One puff of a dart used to have me seeing things, now it’s just so fucking mellow I don’t even know why I bother.”

“You’ve probably built up a tolerance,” Azzy stated blankly, ever the prototypical choir boy of Hometown. “Maybe take a break if you want it to fade.”

Dess pondered for just a moment at this thought as she pulled a lighter out from the same pocket she stashed the mint tin in. “Nah.” With that, she lit up the joint, and took a puff from it, coughing a little as the smoke hit her lungs.

“Care for a hit?” she offered, sticking the crudely rolled blunt over in Asriel’s direction. He couldn’t help himself, and snorted as he stuck out his hand in refusal. “Really? After the last time you offered me some? No way in the Angel’s Heaven am I ever doing that!”

The memory of that night, dormant for so long in her mind, reignited like the tip of her joint, which she stuck under the lighter again before taking another long, smooth drag off of it. Both of their parents were out of town with Kris and Noelle, the lot of them staying the weekend at a fun fair on the coast earlier that summer. With just themselves left alone at the Holiday Manor, Dess had finally been able to cajole Azzy into trying a bit of weed with the promise of being his tripsitter and keeping it a secret from everyone else.

Now, Azzy had expected to be eased into the whole thing, but if Dess had been anything, she wasn’t a good tripsitter; the devilish side of her that surely influenced Kris’ gremlin-like behavior must’ve been brought out in full force that night. Things started off funny enough, with Dess egging Asriel on to hold in their hit, under the fake pretense that it somehow made the high better. A funny enough prank, which led to some light, good-natured teasing.

But from there, things only accelerated. Dess had managed to break into the convenience store earlier and sneak some beers out, just some Genny Cream, nothing great or noticeable. Actually, it tasted quite shitty, one of the worst beers she’d ever had to drink. Yet the intent was made well-clear by the fact they came in a bulk 18-pack: binging. And in this case, with Azzy already starting to fall under the influence, she found the idea of cross-fading him quite funny. And to pair with all that beer he washed down, Dess decided to give him some brownies to munch on, conveniently forgetting to mention that they were laced with more grass.

The coup-de-grâs, however, was the movie she put on that night for the two of them to watch: Eraserhead.

“Ah, shit, right!” Dess exclaimed, everything coming back in a surprising amount of clarity, as she usually struggled to remember her more intense trips. “You were so fucking bugged out, man, it was crazy! I think you were screaming at your radiator for half the time you were so messed up, it was… ah....”

She was going to say “hilarious,” but in a surprise moment of clarity for her, she held back. The thought of him screaming in fear, curling up in the corner of the house while having a mental breakdown and greenout, and seeing him re-live it all now with an upset grimace on his face, was it really “hilarious?”

“You know,” she confessed, “the more I think about it, the more that wasn’t actually that fun of a time.”

“Ya think?” Asriel shot back.

Sighing to herself, Dess nodded in remorse. It’d make sense that Azzy still held some resentment over that night; all the more amazing he was still in love with her, especially after what she did. It was things like that which made her sometimes think he was way out of her league, and that the only reason they were together was because they were neighbors.

A thought popped into her head. “Hey, uh… Azzy?”

“Yeah?”

She hesitated for a moment, a little bit nervous to actually say it. “Have I ever… apologized to you for that night?”

Asriel paused for a moment. “No, I don’t think so.”

Dess sat down by the water at the mention of this, and crossed her legs together as she leaned back and covered her face. She really had been a bad girlfriend, hadn’t she?

“I’m sorry, then,” she finally admitted. “That was a really fucked up thing for me to do.”

She was greeted with only silence for some time, long enough to start to worry, only for Azzy’s calm voice to fill her with relief. “I’m honestly glad to hear it, Dess. I mean it.” He sat down next to her and gave her a hug, one that the both of them definitely needed after remembering that night. “I forgive you.”

Separating, the two sat tepidly beside each other, still recovering from the recollection, before an idea popped into Dess’ mind to bring a bit of levity back into the conversation.

“All being fair, the first half of that night was pretty fun. Y’know, before it got all fucked up.”

“Hm?” Asriel played along, chuckling a little. “Honestly, I can’t recall much from early on.” He girlishly giggled at the thought of what he may’ve done. “You mind giving me a recap?”

“Aw, it was so funny, dude!” Dess exclaimed. “You were all like, ‘these eggs hold the power to the universe, yo, they’re hidden behind the tree of life,’ and ‘aw your body is so beautiful, I wish I had one like that!’ So fucking funny, man!”

Asriel had been laughing along at that first part, but the mention of the second point had him completely freeze up. He would’ve been turning a pale white in fear, if… well, his fur hadn’t already been a bright white.

Dess almost immediately recognized something was up and waved her hands across his face. “Um, Earth to Asriel… everything okay?”

He shook his head, staring nervously out towards the lake without a word spoken.

Sighing, Dess looked down at the ground. “I’m sorry for bringing that night up-”

“Don’t,” Asriel assuaged.

That took Dess off guard. “Huh?”
“Don’t apologize,” he repeated, “You didn’t do anything wrong. I just… got hung up on something. Let’s just not talk about it, okay?”

Dess really wanted to say something, anything, in response to that, but she knew Azzy would just get more strung up if she kept on. She held her tongue.

With silence once again gracing the forest, the two gazed over the lake and mused. Dess’s thoughts, in their endless drift, came back upon what had happened earlier that day. “Y’know, wearing the military jacket may have gotten me off on the wrong foot with them,” she thought aloud.

“Hm?”

“The jacket.” She pimped her olive green combat top. “I think I should’ve just worn one of my plaid jackets instead, maybe the red one?”

Asriel turned to face his girlfriend with a quizzical look. “Why would that make any difference?”

Dess turned her shoulder to Asriel, letting him take a glance at her leftmost patches. After a moment with no response, she gave up and just gave him the answer. “Ostrheinland patch, Azzy. Y’know, the SOCIALIST Rheinland, back when they were split in two.”

It finally clicked for him just like that once it got mentioned. “Oh yeah, that’d do it.”

The doe chuckled to herself as she turned back to fully face the shimmering lake once more, debating whether or not she should pick up another rock to skip. It’s funny. For as book smart as he is, Azzy can be as dull as a sack of rocks when it comes to situational awareness. Dess smiled to herself at that thought. It’s really cute, though.

Speaking of Azzy, though, another question popped up into his mind which sharply pulled Dess out of her own. “Wait… why would you want to have made a better impression with them, anyway? Seems like they were as ideologically misaligned with you as they could possibly get.”

The question froze her like a deer in headlights, which seemed ironically fitting, but Dess really hated whenever her body did that to her. Fuck. “Um… I mean, I still want to serve to make the country and world better, y’know, but….” She desperately tried to come up with an answer, blurting out the first thing that came to mind. “...theeeeee only way to do that is a SOLDIER’S COUP! YEAH!” She chuckled to herself and crossed her arms with a grin, proud of coming up with an answer on the fly like that, or at least hoping to feign assuredness. “Yeah, you know, a revolution of the proletariat, classic military coup by the common folk against their officers and corrupt leaders! What’s not to like about that? Fuck, I even got the Northamer Socialist Republic flag on my jacket, that certainly must’ve tipped my hand too early!”

She was hoping, desperately, that Asriel would buy what she was selling.

“...really, Dess? THAT was the best you could come up with?”

Welp, so much for that.

“I mean, really now, a soldier’s coup? You’ve been standing here telling me for the past half hour how disenchanted you’ve become with the common man and monster for willingly enslaving themselves to the shackles of the FRN and suckling propaganda from the teat, and now all of a sudden you’re telling me that those same ‘ideological üntermenschen’ or whatever the flip you call them are gonna be on your side and willingly raise their arms against their superiors? You’d be put up in front of a wall and shot before anything else happened!”

Dess could only sheepishly rub her hands as Azzy continued tearing her facade to shreds. Yeah, maybe busting out the big and nasty “Ü” word like that earlier made such a flip untenable.

“...Honestly just using that word makes you sound like a fascist, and I know how big you are on imagery more than anything, so don’t you think such phrasing’ll give us a bad name and ruin it? And that’s not to mention the fact they’d have no idea what your NSR flag even is if you don’t explain it to them, since you made it up! And-”

“Okay, Az, I get it! …Dummkopf.” Dess said with gritted teeth, clearly trying to hold herself back as she felt a switch flip in her mind, that strange fuzziness she came to dread fogging up her thoughts. “Fair, fair, it’s not the Ostrheinland armed forces, anyway, I’d be bound to grind up against them…”

“...and running bets on whether or not it’d be the same there,” Azzy sarcastically mumbled.

Dess chose to ignore this, although self-control was already starting to slip. “... anyways, the Domestic Service Corps was always gonna be the safest bet-”

Asriel cut her off once again. “The same DSC that, according to you, is not only a secret police with a coating of civil service for appearance sake, but also doesn’t even allow monsters like us to serve in the actual civil service program? THAT DSC, DESS?”

Her brain was lighting up like a switch board, words becoming hard to come by as the cloud in her mind consumed her. “...Yeah….” She got up onto her boots, no longer feeling comfortable seated.

Azzy pawed at his face and cringed, sighing to himself. “Feck it, mom’s not here to hear me say this. Bullshit, Dess! I know you, you’d never be so conciliatory and ambivalent to injustice, for better or otherwise. Actually acting on it, sure, you can’t keep up a boycott to save your life, but this is different! Something’s gotta be eating at you deep inside to have you out of sorts like that… er, more out of sorts than usual, heh….” Nervously chuckling to himself, the normally mild-mannered goat gave off another protracted sigh and continued. “I just… you can tell me what it is, whatever it is. I’m here.”

He could see Dess’s hands tremble into fists as she stood there looking down at the waterline, back perfectly straight; she only ever broke her slouch if attempting to look cool for Kris and Noelle, or if she was genuinely pissed off. In a flash, she picked up a rock that was sitting right beside her left boot, and hurled it with all her might over the lake with an audible grunt. It sailed with a long and high arc, before crashing down with a large splash about halfway to the other shoreline; she had made no attempt to skip it.

Hearing Dess' pants, and seeing how she was acting, Asriel had all but confirmed his suspicions. If anything, he should’ve been more confident in his intuition earlier; it seemed so obvious, knowing her.

“Is it Carol?” he prodded gently, standing up to talk to her.

He could hear Dess’ breathing begin to slow, as if the mention of her name by someone else had returned her lucidity. Hunching over again, she looked up and over at her boyfriend, pained eyes peeking out from her messy hair, and nodded. “Yeah,” she verbally confirmed with a mumble. Emotionally weakened, she crouched down by the waterside and sat back on the dirt patch they were on, curling her legs up to her body and holding them still as she fought to cool down mentally.

Seeing his girlfriend in such a state, Asriel reciprocated, seating himself criss-cross beside her and gently stroking her neck and shoulders. He could feel her muscles slowly lose tension as he comforted her.

Dess spoke up again, at a low whimper. “I’m sorry I got like that again, Azzy,” she mumbled, audibly fighting back tears. “I just… I felt a compulsion… I wanted to hurt someone, to wring their necks, the President’s, my mom’s… heh, if only I had freaked my shit out on those Army freaks, made that man bleed and turned that traitorous monster to dust, wouldn’t that have been-”

“Dess.” Asriel cut her off there, pressing down on her shoulder with a gentle, yet firm, force.

She’d done it again. “Shit… I’m sorry. I’m… sorry.” Her voice on the second sorry was noticeably weepy and strained, and the two parted physically.

The pair sat in silence, looking out at the natural scene in front of them as they let their own thoughts play out in their mind, digging for the right ones. Azzy looked up towards the sky and leaned back to peek at the clouds; Dess, curled up into a ball, could only look down towards the lake, the rocky bottom visible beneath deep blue water fading away in the inky depths further in.

She sat there, choked up on words she was afraid to say, but all the same felt needed to be said. “I’m scared, Az,” she finally confessed.

For his part, Asriel did his best to remain steadfast, although there was still an audible amount of worry in his voice. “Scared about what, Dess?”

A tremor went through her body with each passing thought. “I’m scared of myself, man.” Asriel grimaced at this, for whatever reason unbeknownst to Dess, but she made no mention or acknowledgement of it. “Like, you’re right about those army guys back there, and if I… I came so close to hurting them as I was leaving, taking a swing with my bat, and if I did….”

She struck the ground with a balled-up fist, her teeth gritted. She couldn’t go on and say it, but they were both thinking about what the military police would do to her. Interspecies violence especially was never tolerated; the mutual decision to maintain and live in fairly separate consolidations around the country meant this was no surprise at all, and such a thing against a man in uniform would almost certainly have been met with full force.

Seeing his girlfriend sniffling, Asriel gently went back to rubbing her back and tried thinking back to his psychology class for any words or subjects that may help out his lover. “It sounds like you’re lashing out at the world more than anything else,” he finally posited, hoping that his therapy-speak wasn’t too heavy-handed.

Clearing her throat, Dess responded affirmatively. “Yeah… that sounds about right… Hell, if the whole damn thing was covered in darkness, I wouldn’t even be all that upset.” Whatever sense of call Asriel hoped would come from the acknowledgement was quickly dashed when she continued to blab with an ever-growing intensity.

“I just wanna get away from here, Az. Away from her. But I have no idea what to even do! Truth be told, I was already pretty disillusioned with this country and their armed forces going up to that recruitment table, but what other options do I have?! I’ve already sunken everything into this life, this persona, and for what??? NOTHING!!!!!”

Her screams echoed through the forest; a flock of birds took flight from a nearby tree in a huff, squawking as they flew away. Azzy could tell she was probably close to boiling over completely again, so he scooched on even closer to her and wrapped his arm around her back, cuddling up to her.

The tension in Dess’ shoulders melted somewhat, but was clearly still present with how on-edge she was. “Thanks,” she mumbled, still down about the whole conversation. “Mind if I keep rambling?”

“Go ahead,” Asriel assured.

Dess took a breath and continued. “It’s just… what else do I have? Academically I’m a low-B student at best, mostly a bunch of C’s and some D’s, and there aren’t really any community colleges in the area here to take me. Not to mention how much harder it is to get into good schools as monsters.”

“Yeah, tell me about it.” Azzy kept his own thoughts on the down-low, but the application process he had been going through really opened his eyes as to how narrow-minded and human-centric many of the institutions in Northamer were, even the supposedly open-minded ones. The only colleges he had found that truly seemed to be open to monsters on equal terms were some of the art colleges, but that was nigh useless for a prospective psych major such as himself. He happened to be fortunate enough to be a straight-A student, so getting into something wouldn’t be a problem for him, but the fact his species could influence whether or not he got into a prestigious landing spot like the City College of Megalopolis certainly still rubbed him the wrong way.

But for Dess, he knew that whatever struggles he faced would only be magnified tenfold. She didn’t have the outstanding grades, athletic success, or diversity of clubs on her resumé like he did. She was a reclusive, although admittedly very artsy student, but that didn’t count for much in the cutthroat world of universities if the grades don’t carry.

Her voice continued marching on. “So nobody’s gonna take me for higher education, and as for something like the forestry corps, well they only have a limited amount of slots for monsters, similar problem to the DSC. Chances I actually get in, waitlisted or not, are slim to none knowing I have zero prior specialist training. And… that’s all I can really think of.”

She buried her head in her hands.

“There’s no backup plan for me,” she wallowed. “Lost without a paddle, completely rudderless. I’m just fucked.” The doe silently sobbed to herself.

Asriel searched for any comforting words he could offer, but Dess spoke up again before he could.

“Like, what’s gonna happen to me after I graduate?!” Her voice wasn’t even all that frantic for once, just worn down and morose. “Am I gonna have to work some menial gig in Bay City or some shit? Am I gonna be homeless in Hometown, doomed to die in some random back alley? Or am I just gonna lose my mind and end up somewhere in the system.” She chuckled morbidly. “Heck, maybe I’ll end up on the front lines after all, in one of the prison conscript units. Wouldn’t that be ironic?”

Uncupping his previously held-together hands, Azzy delicately took hold of one of Dess’ own. “Hey, as much as you may hate to admit it, nobody in your life’s gonna let that happen. Not me, not your dad, nor your mom, either. Especially not-”

He was going to say himself, but Dess filled in with the worst possible answer. “Oh ho ho, no, no way would she actually ever care enough for me to do that. Or, I guess she does care, care in the negative sense! I’ll bet the moment she finds out I shitcanned the army deal, she’ll move to kick me out come my birthday!”

Azzy held Dess’ hand tighter, hoping to drill in some comfort and sense, only for her to yank it away. “Dess,” he began regardless, “I know neither of us like her that much, but from all I’ve seen, I really doubt Carol’s the type to actually kick you-”

“OH, MISS ME WITH THAT BULLSHIT!” Dess countered. “You don’t have to live with her! Do you know how bad it’s been lately?!”

Asriel felt he had a pretty good idea, but held his tongue to let Dess vent, who took his silence as consent to continue.

“Every day I have to live under that roof with her is like seven eternities in hell! Every little act, every misstep, every word out of my mouth, gets matched by some grand chastisement.” She put on a shrill and mocking posh voice. “‘Why haven’t you showered yet?’ ‘Grilled cheese isn’t a breakfast food!’ ‘Don’t lug around that damn bat of yours inside!’ ‘Why are your grades so low?’ ‘Can’t you just be more like your younger sister?!’ ‘WHY DIDN’T I JUST ABORT YOU?!?!’ AND IF I EVEN DARE RAISE UP MY VOICE A SINGLE DECIBEL TO HER, SHE’LL GET INTO A SCREAMING MATCH WITH ME FOR AN HOUR!!!”

Covering his ears, Asriel grimaced as his girlfriend damn near blew out his eardrums. “Dang, that’s crazy.” He really wanted to tell her to pipe down some, but knew she’d probably blow a fuse if he did.

“It’s just… I’m my own person! I’m not Noelle! I’m a mess, and I’m proud to be a mess. I don’t need to bow to her whims, I don’t need those meds she put me on, ‘cause let me tell you, lamotrigine does NOT make me stable!”

Ever the doormat, Azzy just nodded along. That time on the meds did only seem to make her mania worse, he recalled. Again, something to be said about trying another mood stabilizer, or seeking a different diagnosis, but no. Didn’t want to anger her.

“I just… I don’t know how much more of this I can take! Every fucking day with her is just a trial of my sanity, a game of ‘LET’S SEE HOW LONG DESS CAN LAST BEFORE SHE SNAPS AND FUCKING KILLS SOMEBODY!’ And I don’t want it to be like that, but she… she just keeps on setting me off, and I don’t know what to do anymore… I hate her….”

Finally, Asriel found a question that seemed right to pop. “Well, and don’t take this the wrong way, but given how miserable you are, why does getting kicked out of the house scare you so much?” He tried to rationalize everything before continuing, feeling her gaze set upon him. “I mean, I can understand missing Noelle and Rudy, but beyond that, it sounds like you’d be much happier away from Carol, no?”

“Believe me, I’d love to, but…”

She cowered in shame as she confessed to what felt to be an original sin of class.

“...I don’t think I’d be able to give up my life here, with her dirty investment money supporting me. I guess it’s the ultimate irony, isn’t it? I’m a socialist, ardently in favor of wealth redistribution by militant means, but so used to the plush life the family fortune gives that the idea of being separated from it forcefully feels akin to suicide.”

Asriel nodded silently. The Dreemurrs weren’t wealthy like the Holidays were, but they were comfortable nonetheless. “There’s that disconnect, right? An incongruence between your values and your social standing, and it drives you mad.” He kept quiet about it, but in that silence he harbored similar feelings over his own father being a cop.

“To some degree, yeah, but it’s more than that!” Dess admitted. “It’s the fact I’m entirely reliant on her; I have barely any idea how to cook, keep track of money, you name it! And with how I haven’t been able to even hold a summer job here, am I supposed to somehow jump to working full-time like that?! Bullshit, I’ll end up jobless, homeless, and either dead or in prison.” Rubbing her face, she almost wished she could just melt into the earth.

“Besides,” she added, shifting gears, “I couldn’t abandon Noelle like that. As much as I hate it, with how much of a doormat my dad is, I’m basically a lightning rod for Carol’s wrath and micromanaging at this point. I…”

She nearly teared up at the thought that entered her head. “...I worry that if I’m not there, then all of that will be directed at Noelle, and with how sensitive she is, I… I’m scared for her, Azzy! She has no idea how to cope; hell, I barely do! And it’s not healthy! If she has to go through all that I have to with nobody there to guide her…”

She looked down at the water’s surface.

“I’m worried she’ll fall down an even worse path than I’m on. I’m worried she’ll take her own life… or….”

Azzy noticed her trail off, and after a good ten seconds of silence, spoke up. “Or what?”

She finally uttered some words, so deeply transfixed on the water she barely cared anymore. “...I’m worried she'll end up just… like… Carol….”

Dess looked intently at her reflection in the lake. To Azzy, she just looked like a black-haired, red-antlered, dark-furred deer with some light patterning, but in her view, she saw through the veil of dye: blonde hair, blue antlers, and fur that was turning lighter by the day.

Just. Like. Carol.

“And… I’m the same. The only thing I fear more than her wrath is somehow becoming her.” Her voice was audibly shaking.

Asriel almost spoke out, about how Dess’ anger could oftentimes reach a similar intensity to that of her mother, just at different ends of hot and cold, respectively. Knowing how such a thing would completely shatter her mind, however, he wisely held his tongue.

Dess’ own mention, however, paired with the reflection, was enough to send her into a full self-induced panic. “Tell me,” she demanded with wide eyes, frantically taking a hold of her boyfriend by the arms, “how’s the vitiligo? Is it all just in my head? It seems worse!”

Asriel gazed at the pale spots that dotted the darker fur along her girlfriend’s chest, ears, and face; each spot was the same color as her mother’s fur. “The facial cluster is maybe a little bit denser than the last time you asked,” he gently posited.

Scrunching her hair in her hands, she curled up beside her boyfriend. “Ooh, fuck, it’s only getting worse!” With my luck, I’ll look just like her come 30 unless I fucking kill myself first!”

“Or you could just dye your fur like you do your hair and antlers!” Asriel hurriedly offered, trying to be gentle this time around about the topic of suicide. “It’s… better than offing yourself.”

Looking back over at her lover, she chuckled a little, before somberly turning towards the water. “Yeah… sorry for mentioning it. It’s just… the thought of turning into her, it’s just….”

She paused, taking a rare moment to catch her own emotions by the tail and calm herself. The idea of music, some sort of despondent verse, filled her head.

“It’s just all a lot to have to cope with.”

Reclining back on the shore and shutting her eyes, she let the sound of her soul flow from her lips.

 

“Feel the rain like an English summer,

Hear the notes from a distant song,

Stepping out from a back shop poster,

Wishing life wouldn’t be so long.

 

“At the end of the day,

We’ll all fade to grey…”

 

Letting her eyes flutter open, she turned her head to face Asriel, who rolled over and embraced her in a tender hug.

“Sorry if the lyrics were a bit down,” she softly spoke. “Just felt like the right mood for things right now.”

“Shhh…” Asriel hushed, burying his head into Dess’ shoulder. The music clearly must’ve moved him, too. “That was beautiful. No talk, only cuddle for now.”

Feeling the warmth of his fur and the weight of his body, the smell of his floral shampoo and the beating of his heart, Dess fell into a trance in much a similar way to how Azzy must’ve been cast into one; she could feel her tail, sticking out of her jeans, wag passionately against the dirt below her. Fully giving in to his desires, she wrapped her own arms around him and snuggled up her head to his, gently kissing him on his fluffy ear flaps and running her fingers through his soft blonde hair. The sounds of bluebirds chirping off in the distance, and wind over the water, paired nicely with the placidity they shared.

Asriel’s voice didn’t break the scene, but merely added to it. “Have I ever told you that I love hearing your voice?”

“Only about a million times, Az.” she responded playfully, and just as lovingly.

Azzy answered in kind with a smile. “Well, it feels as if I’m hearing it for the first time every time, it’s just so beautiful….” He turned his head back upwards to gaze at the passing clouds above. “Y’know, I’m sounding a lot like you now for saying this, but it’s times like these that I wish time didn’t have to move forward. Just the two of us, you singing to me, maybe a guitar in your lap, and my head resting on your shoulder.”

He faced his girlfriend once more. “Wouldn’t that be a nice ‘forever?’”

Dess lovingly giggled back. “Aw, Az, you romantic! Hahah….” Her gaze dropped. “Honestly, it feels like that all the time for me. Maybe not here, somewhere off away where Carol can't see, but somewhere. Forever. With you.”

Looking back over the lake, a heartening feeling overcame her for once. “Till death do us part,” she poetically mused.

“And even then, who’s to say?” Asriel lazily lifted his head and kissed Dess lightly on the snout. “It’s times like these when, despite all the troubles, I’m glad to be your boyfriend.”

Dess nodded, and kissed him back, playfully sticking her tongue into his mouth. Asriel nearly recoiled in shock; this was a whole lot more than they usually did, and he could feel his glasses start to fog up, but despite all of that, it just felt… right. He let her toy around inside his mouth for a while, then lazily disengaged to come up for air once he felt like he had enough, panting as he did so.

"I'm glad you’re my boyfriend, too!” she finally said in response to earlier, panting too.

He couldn’t help but chuckle at the response, before another thought popped into his head. “What song was that, anyway?”

“‘Fade to Grey’ by Visage. New Wave band out of Anglia, not usually my jam, but heard them in a record store down in Bay City and it’s just stuck with me.” Dess chuckled to herself. “Now would you believe that I changed the lyrics on that final stanza to be a rhyming couplet?”

Asriel’s eyes opened wide and head shot up, a particular memory coming to mind. “Oh my Angel, you still do that?”

“Of course I do,” Dess responded semi-dismissively. “It’s almost a hobby of mine, changing lyrics to suit my mood. Hell, sometimes I even rewrite entire songs to be about something else! I swear, that derivative stuff might actually outnumber my original works.”

“No, I mean…” Asriel grimaced as the memory grew clearer. “Sorry, I was just remembering the festival last year.”

“What about it?”

“Remember that slight lyric change you made to ‘The End?’”

The mention of those two words made Dess blush; he’d found just about the only way to embarrass her. “That- that wasn’t even an intentional… I MISHEARD THEM!” she stammered.

Admittedly, seeing his girlfriend in such a state was kinda cute; it wasn’t often she managed to get genuinely flustered. Smiling at the sky, Asriel chuckled a bit and relaxed, absent-mindedly saying “It’s nice to see you like this for once, you know.”

Caught a bit off-guard by the stray comment, Dess stopped thinking about her butchery of The Doors and tilted her head. “Like… how, exactly?”

Asriel looked back over at her and answered back. “Happy.”

“Happy?”

“Even over such a sad song, to see you have genuine joy in music… it makes me happy!”

Dess sat there, ponderously, before a foul expression came about their face. But… what if I don’t wanna be happy?”

Asriel was taken off-guard by the remark. “Whuh???”

A switch seemed to have flipped back in Dess’ mind. “I mean, my life is truly fucking miserable, Azzy. This feels great, but… it’s only temporary. I’ll eventually have to leave, head back home to The Bitch, and deal with the aftermath of this morning. Why be happy, then?”

The question left Asriel dumbfounded. “Don’t… don’t you wanna be happy with me though?!”

“I want you to be happy, Azzy,” she consoled, although her own voice was growing tense, “but I just… don’t. Okay? Why’s that so hard to hear?”

It wasn’t hard to hear, but Asriel honestly could not for the life of him understand the chemistry of Dess’ mind.

“I just don’t wanna see you in so much pain, Dess,” Asriel cooed. “I hate seeing you be miserable. I just want you to be comfortable.” He had hoped those words would’ve sparked something positive inside of Dess, but it appeared as if only a candle of melancholy had been lit inside of her.

“They say sadness is a choice to a certain extent. And, well, I choose to be sad, both in life and writing. There is a certain comfort in that. Heck, with how much frightening verse I write, I might as well be the next Sylvia Plath.”

Asriel tried to divert her line of thinking. “Aw, c’mon, babe!”

“Don’t call me ‘babe.’”

“C’mon, Dess!” Asriel repeated, attempting to maintain something upbeat in the conversation. “There’s gotta be someone else you wanna be!”

Dess pretended to ponder that thought. “Mmm, nah, I’m good. Heck, we both fit the mold for her life, you could be my Ted Hughes! We get married, have a tumultuous marriage, separate, and then I kill myself!”

“Okay, no, I protest that,” Asriel denied. “Hughes was a piece of shit, er, crap, I wouldn’t be him!” He then faintly trailed off with “For… uh… a variety of other reasons, too….”

Dess paused for a moment, before nodding. “Yeah, fair, guess that example only works for me in the singular.” She then turned to face Azzy. “Doubt you have anyone better, though.”

Asriel thought for a minute, searching for a good example, before he lit up. “We could be MilkCan! You could be my Lammy and I could be your Katy Kat! Well, I guess not exactly that, I don’t think I could play bass to save my life, and Lammy’s more anxious than manic… but you get what I mean!”

Dess chucked morbidly at Asriel’s futile attempt to raise her mood, as another name popped into her mind. “I fear it’s more likely that you’ll be my Deborah and I’ll be Ian Curtis.”

The air grew heavy at the mention of his name. Asriel knew what she meant, mostly because she just would never shut up about Joy Division or how she wanted to be the next Ian Curtis, but it never stopped hurting to hear.

Dess spoke up once more, putting things much more bluntly. “I’m doomed to die, Azzy.”

“Don’t say that,” he tried to comfort.

“But I am. It can’t be stopped. Why bother fighting it anymore?”

“Dess, please!”

“Oh, quit begging!” She shot upright to bemoan, well, everything. “What’s the fucking point otherwise? Life’s fucking miserable, it’s only going to get worse, and there’s nothing after any of this anyway! Like you said, only a matter of time until I end up in front of a firing squad!”

“Dess, that’s not what I meant, or even said-”

“Might as well live up to my name and turn myself into a damn Christmas ornament the way I’ll be hanging! Mom wants me to be more festive and I’ll damn well make it festive, for her. If I’m gonna die, I’m at least gonna make it beautiful, be the next Evelyn McHale!”

Asriel wanted to refute her, but much like Rudy with Carol, having been worn down over the years, he just gave in and let her speak. Challenging her would only feed her viewpoint. Instead he just held silent, and let Dess do the talking, listening as footsteps skipped along the forest trail nearby. Must be a squirrel, both probably thought dismissively.

She breathed in, and let her shoulders drop as she exhaled. “I just… I just want life to be like one of my poems, or one of his poems, or like something out of Plath. Dark, morbid… and beautiful. For that beauty to come from the dark.”

Thinking of Ian Curtis once more, and with how much she had just been shouting at the person who was meant to be her boyfriend, she leaned back, propping herself up with her arms, and sang the song that came to her mind.

 

“Love… love will tear us apart… again…”

 

A third, new voice rang out. “Ooh, are you singing, Dess?”

The young, lighthearted call behind her startled the nervewracked doe and ripped her straight out of her self-imposed melancholy, who damn well jumped up onto her feet and pivoted around wide-eyed to see who was behind her. Not that she needed to see her to figure it out, though; her sister’s voice was as recognizable to her as the sound of rain.

“Oh, hey, ‘Elle,” she started, catching her breath as she spoke. “Ya spooked me there, y’know.”

“Sorry, Dess,” the seventh-grader said sheepishly. “You sound pretty, though.”

“Oh, it’s alright, ya know I spook easily. We both do. It’s not your fault.” She then playfully pinched Noelle by the cheek and jostled her, letting her know that it was all right. “And thank you, by the way. It’s always nice to hear that from… well, anyone, really.”

She looked around for a moment, a particular absence having caught her mind.

“Is Kris with ya?”

Noelle rubbed her shoulder at the mention of their name. “They were… they said they wanted to go out into the woods with me looking for you, only to ditch me in the undergrowth and then jump out and scare me once I noticed. Multiple times.”

Dess rolled her eyes. Of course Kris was up to their shit again. They probably loved pranking her sister more than they liked their mother’s butterscotch pie. Admittedly they could be funny at times, but mostly she felt the need to step in and “officiate” things, especially with how easy it was to spook Noelle to the point of a panic attack.

Case in point, she spotted them right then, creeping in the woods, waiting for the right time to strike.

“Hold that thought, Noelle,” she finally said as she marched on over to the treeline with a determined stride. She didn’t even bother giving Kris the chance to tear and run; she lunged over and yanked them by the collar, dragging them out into view of their brother and Noelle as the kid barked like a rabid puppy.

“Unhand me, vile woman!” they protested in a particularly dogshit Stewie Griffin impersonation, although it was clear they were deliberately hamming it up.

“Oh you asked for it!” Dess set them down and swirled her arm by her head, preparing herself to launch a viscous haymaker their way. A convincing enough act, for Kris was so paralyzed with fear they were going to get it for real that they dropped the ball they had been holding.

Swinging at them, she slowed her roll just enough to not hurt, and then lightly connected with their shoulder. Much the drama monarch they were, Kris immediately flopped on the ground and writhed in pain, howling like a wounded dog.

Kris acting out their fursona like that was enough to break Dess out of character for a brief moment, eliciting a chuckle from her. She tried to put back on the tough girl airs, but it was futile.

“That oughta… oughta teach ya… ah, who am I kidding, it won’t. You’re lucky I only brought my wooden bat, by the way. If I had the old wiffle, I’d have beat ya over the head with it and-”

Dess paused her thought, her gaze shifting down towards the oblong ball Kris happened to have dropped when she playfully swung hands at them. “Wait, Kris, what’d the football have to do with the prank?”

“Oh, nothing,” they replied.

“Riiiight.”

“No, I mean it!” Kris pleaded. “I was hoping to toss around the football with you and Noelle, get real rough with it!”

The younger doe’s ears perked up at the mention of “rough.” “Ooh, yeah! We can do a 2v2, Dreemurr versus Holiday!”

“I can’t, unfortunately,” Azzy chimed in, his voice a bit down. “I have cross-country practice in a few, our next race is this weekend, and it’s the big 7k run. I really can’t afford to miss that, especially as captain. Sorry.”

Both Kris and Noelle let out a groan. “But you’re always so busy with sports and school!” Kris bemoaned. “You barely ever hang out with us anymore!”

Asriel frowned at the mention, knowing very well that Kris was already struggling to cope with his ever-intensifying schedule; he couldn’t imagine how poorly they’d handle him being away at college.

Wanting to find a remedy for the situation, at least temporarily, he offered up a compromise. “Hey, how about the day after the race the two of us toss the ball around, but until then…”

He gave Dess a knowing look, one that he naturally expected to be reciprocated.

“...I know someone else who might wanna play with-”

“Pass.”

Azzy, Noelle, and Kris gawked at Dess, all a bit unsure if their ears were working right. “Uh… Dess?” Azzy chimed nervously with a chuckle. “Did you mean ‘pass the ball?’ Or-”

“I said pass, Asriel, as in NO” Dess confirmed, much colder this time and crossing her arms as she turned to pensively face the lake. “I just… need a moment right now. There’s just way too much on my mind to have fun right now.”

None of the other three knew what to do about this; for as much of a social recluse and outcast Dess had been in the past, it had never been to a point of turning away from those few that she loved like this. So for her to be so out of sorts….

“Hey, big sis?” Noelle finally piped up. Are you okay? You don’t seem yourself? You’re never one to turn down a chance to… play sports… with… us….”

Dess flashed her with a glare, but it lacked the mean aura so many of the glares that day had. Instead, it was pitiful, as if she was begging Noelle through her eyes not to get dragged down with her.

“I’m not okay, ‘Elle,” she finally murmured, her voice steadily straining, “but I am myself. This is just… who I am.” She looked down at her hands, bunched up in a claw grip out of stress, and buried her head in them, falling down to the ground right in front of her sister. “This is who I really am, Noelle, a broken, mentally shattered mess of a monster.”

Her sister moved to comfort her, sitting beside her and wrapping an arm around her shoulder. Azzy did the same with Kris, noticing that they were visibly shaking over the condition of the person they considered to be an older sister of sorts.

“Dess?” Noelle asked again. “Can you tell me what’s wrong?”

She was just trying to help, but unbeknownst to the younger doe, she had just flipped the hidden switch in her sister’s brain, one she had no control over, and only vaguely knew of.

“What’s… wrong with me?” The static drowned her mind in a near instant as panicked breathing came over her. Azzy knew just what was about to happen, and knew not how to stop it.

“I’m scared, sis!” she finally wailed, exposing Noelle and Kris to a weak side of her they had not yet ever seen. “I’m scared that mom’s gonna kill me mom’s gonna kill me mom’s gonna kill me for not joining the army and dying, my mind’s running at like a million miles an hour and it just won’t stop or slow down and it feels like my personality changes at the drop of a hat HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH!!!!!”

She gripped the collar of her tank top manically; nonsense spilled from her lips, as all logic fled from her consciousness. “It’s all so LOUD, LOUD, LOUD, and BUSY, BUSY, BUSY, and NOTHING, NOTHING, NOTHING, STOP AND GO, STOP AND GO, STOP & SHOP! OOPS, THAT’S THE SUPERMARKET! HAHAH! GET IT? FUCKING GET IT??? THEY SOUND ALIKE! AIN’T THAT FUNNY?!?! I’M SO FUCKING FUNNY!!! GYAA HA HA HAHHHHHHH!!!”

At this point, Noelle was on the verge of tears, Kris was simply petrified, and Asriel was straight-up panicking over the fact his girlfriend was having a manic episode in front of her own sister like this. He wanted to tell her to calm down, but knew that would only make things worse. He froze too.

“Dess!” Noelle cried out, tugging at her sister’s arm. “PLEASE! SNAP OUT OF IT! YOU’RE TERRIFYING ME!!!”

“GOOOOD!!!” Dess shouted at the top of her lungs, so loud it was as if her vocal cords caught fire. “YOU SHOULD BE SCARED OF ME, BECAUSE I’M TERRIFYING! BECAUSE I’M A DISGRACE! BECAUSE I’M SUPPOSED TO BE STRONG FOR YOU AND CAN’T TAKE IT ANYMORE! BEcause I’m… I’m…”

Words became hard to come by all of a sudden, as even thinking became an exercise in pain.

“…I’m…  a danger….”

Trailing off, and at the drop of a hat. it was as if she was never crying in the first place. The switch had flipped once more.

“...Dess?” Asriel asked, taken aback by the sudden shift.

Silently, she broke from Noelle, stood up, and shuffled over towards the woodline. Grabbing her bat, which she had left resting up against a nearby tree, she slung it over her shoulder and began to stagger off down the path back towards Hometown. 

“I’m sorry,” she mumbled back towards the group, “I just need some space. Don’t follow me. Please.” She then turned her head before she headed off into the woods and disappeared from view.

The three left stood silently by the lake for a few minutes to emotionally recuperate, the scene only disturbed by the thick tension in the air and Dess’ distantly fading footsteps, before Noelle asked a question to Azzy aloud. “Azzy? What’s wrong with Dess? I’ve never seen her like this, and… I’m worried for her.”

Azzy paused for a moment, trying to think of any concise and kid-friendly way to address the breakdown Dess had prior to their arrival, before just punting on the idea. “She’s just dealing with some… adult things, is all. Nothing for you two to stress about.”

“But she’s only seventeen!” Kris pointed out. “She doesn’t even get old like you until Christmas!”

“Yeah, close enough,” Azzy dismissed, not even picking up on the subtle dig. Out of his gaze, Kris and Noelle exchanged unsatisfied glances, before Noelle’s expression turned back to one of worry.

“I’m scared for her, Azzy,” Noelle whimpered, still clearly shaken by having her sister’s facade shatter in front of her. Even with that, she really had no idea how bad of a state her sister was really in, but Azzy couldn’t help but nod in acknowledgement of what she said, as the last of Dess’ footsteps sounded out from the forest.

“Me too, Noelle. Me too.”