Broken

[Crissatha Pandora]

Cause we are broken...
What must we do to restore...
Our Innocence...?


The world went to shit.

Hell, it went to worse than shit. But we fought it, hells yes we did. What else were we supposed to do? With the Fragments taken over, the Brokens did their best to…well put the pieces back together. Everything had fallen long ago. Cities were a thing of the past, and skyscrapers were myths in fairy tales. Electricity was long gone…along with technology—not that I was opposed to that. Why had it happened? Well, why did these things ever happen? War. War and new diseases. And new weapons. And new nanomites. They had eaten more than they should, destroying everything metal in their path. Diseases took out most of the population, as did the weapons.

The government tried to fix it. But, wouldn’t you know it, things went horribly wrong. They decided to experiment on the population. Take out certain genes that they decided weren’t necessary. Take out pieces that made people rebel, that made them their own person. Some went beyond wrong.

Some made them super soldiers without a conscious, loyal to the government hounds.

People, called Brokens, figured out what was going on. And they hid. Hid so fast that they basically disappeared off the map. See, theres a town underground. It’s called Utopinot. Get it? Like…almost Utopia. I wasn’t born there like my counterparts. I was born somewhere very different, but we’ll get there.

Anyway, the government used the Fragments, as in almost whole people, to take down the Brokens, they hunted but they only ever got most of the Brokens. See, they couldn’t find the entrance to Utopinot. It was guarded carefully, hidden away. Only those that knew where to look could find it.

The Brokens thought about fighting back, but they didn’t dare. It was better to hide, and keep living with their minds intact. Why? Because Fragments were special. Along with the super speed and strength they got along with the loss of personal thought…they also got something special. It was personal to the Fragment, but some could blow fire. Some could control the weather. Some could compel. And one bastard could “Puppeteer” but I’ll get back to him too.

Anyway, the issue happened when they forgot to remove the piece in one Fragment that made them comply to the government. And this one Fragment took hold of the whole system and killed. Every. Last. Person in the government. And then he took hold of the gov’t itself….and now he runs it, with all the Fragments at his beck and call. He’s called the Puppeteer, no one knows his real name. No one but me. See, before they took his happiness, his sweet and funny side, he was my love. He was the one and only for me.

I was the daughter of the leader of the old government, a stern woman named Marianne. She didn’t approve of my relationship…that’s why she Fragmented my boy. That’s why I ran and became a Broken. I found Utopinot when a small Asian girl with eyes that shone like a blade in the sun and a taller girl with blue streaks in chocolate colored hair found me wandering around in the desert, dying, and took me there to recover. Sadly, my face was slightly well known. But mostly for defying my mother, so they took me in knowing I wasn’t a spy.

And I helped work for them, a special team that worked to take down the Fragments slowly, going against what the Brokens usually stood for.

I had been trying to convince myself that it wasn’t my sweet boy anymore that ruled the body that once did silly things to make me laugh. But it’s hard. Though the blue eyes are harder now, its still hard. Though he doesn’t stand the same anymore, still hard. It was easier when I was in an underground civilization of him, just reading what we got in snippets of papers that blew our way. Easier than seeing for myself what he had become. And I never told a soul about this. Not even the girls who had brought me to that place. Anyway…

The group I worked for, the Rebels, ingeneous name, I know, had decided to go on a new mission. Stealing supplies to help the slowly dying Utopinot. See, we were running out of food…hard to get when we lived underground. And we needed more. So the Rebels were going to sneak into the city and get some of their well stocked store rooms full of food on their horses and carts and drive off before they could get caught. It seemed like a good plan, very well laid out, they had taken the time to fully go over every aspect of this plan and make sure that nothing was missing, that everything went according to plan and no one would be lost. Because I knew the place best, it just seemed logical that I’d go in first and scout it out. I had been born in City after all. I had run around in its streets as a child, as a toddler, as a teen in later years. Those were the fun years, the ones where I purposely caught the attention of any newscaster I could find to embarrass my mother. It was safe to say that I didn’t approve of her tactics.

But the best plot of mine back then had been him. Pick the person my mother was least likely to approve of and go wild with him. I hadn’t intended to fall in love. But I had. So deeply. And now he was my greatest enemy. I wondered if, had I been in the City at the time, if I hadn’t fled before the surgery had finished, would he have had the Fragments kill me to?

Anyway.

The plan didn’t work out the way it should have. Fragments were waiting for me. I have no idea how they knew I’d be coming…but they had. They had been waiting like they had known exactly where I would be. And they had brought me kicking and screaming, quite literally though I was screaming profanities, not actually screaming, all the way to the Puppeteer. No longer my love. Even if my traitorous body swayed towards him every time he came near.

And sadly, he came near.

Now I’m kind of stuck here. Trust me, I’d rather not be…I have no idea what is being planned, I don’t want to. But I’m happy right here. Happier than I was in that first reunion anyway. Besides, my cell has a view. A view of a skeleton city, with the frameworks of old skyscrapers still standing, but a view none the less. I sat in this window seat, as I had the past…well it seemed like a week to me. That was the amount of times I watched the sun rise and set anyway.

My crew probably thought me dead. If they were smart they had abandoned their mission. I hoped they had. I prayed they had. They shouldn’t come. Not if they had known I was coming, what else did they know? I had spent the past seven days pondering these question. Along with wondering how. How had they known? How had they figured out what had been going on? How had they known exactly where to wait?

How could I do better the next time I saw him. Because kissing him back when he kissed me, a natural reaction unfortunately, was not an option. Neither was nearly punching him in the face only to get thrown down to the floor and restrained. Though I had wanted to punch him so badly! He had deserved it. Not my boy. Not the one I loved. The one who currently inhabited his body I mean.

Well, it seemed I would get my chance soon anyway.

The, always locked trust me I’d tried, door to my cell opened. Maybe now I’d figure out what they wanted. I figured it wasn’t Fragmentation. If they had wanted to do that…why hadn’t they done it by now? They usually Fragmented Brokens right away from what I had heard, from what I had seen actually. Because mother dearest used to make me watch. Used to threaten to do it to me if I didn’t settle down and do what she wanted.

She had tried to once, tried to do a little modification, not one as strong as Fragmenting me, but one to make me more compliant. I fingered the spot on the back of my head where hair wouldn’t grow anymore, carefully hidden away, as the door opened. I had gotten out of that one.

I froze when the person entered the room, all thoughts of the past gone. Because it was him. Looking like him. Dammit why was this so hard! I knew it wasn’t him. Wasn’t the boy I wanted. Wasn’t the boy I loved. But it was so hard…nothing had changed. He entered…shutting the door behind him. And softly he spoke. ”Hey,” he said. It was soft. So unlike how the Puppeteer spoke. Like he was trying to set her off by speaking like…who he was. Dammit!

I made a move to launch at him. But my feet wouldn’t move. I couldn’t get up off the window seat I sat on. I couldn’t move at all. Dammit! He had turned me into a damn puppet! I opened my mouth to yell at him, but it was as if my mouth had been wired shut. Which was why I fixed him the best glare I could manage, as icy as they came. Because that was the one thing he couldn’t control.

It was obvious, on first glance, why he was called the Puppeteer. He controlled the Fragments as easily as puppets on a string, controlling their every movement because they didn’t have the ability to think for themselves any more. He did. They had screwed up when Fragmenting him.

But it was also because of his special ability that he was called that. He could control a person’s every movement like they were a puppet, whether or not they were Fragmented. Every movement except their eyes, but few got close enough to learn this. I had personally, just figured it out.

He came closer until he was sitting on the edge of the windowseat, right there. And every fiber of my being yearned to at least bump him off the damn seat. But I couldn’t even turn my head away as he reached out to brush his fingers lightly across my cheek. Couldn’t help the shudder. It was too familiar. Too missed.

It didn’t answer why the hell he had kept me locked up here. Not for sentimental reasons, I wasn’t that stupid. He didn’t have that left in him. There was no remembrance of what they had to this. There was a reason he kept me, like a bird in a cage. And it was to use me. But for what?

”You want to know why, right?” he asked, amusement in his eyes. And I really at the very least wanted to be able to open her mouth to tell him off. But I couldn’t. I hated that he could use who he was to control me, to remember what I’d be thinking. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. I was beyond at a disadvantage here. He sighed and shook his head, annoyed with me of course. I wouldn’t comply like everyone else in this damn city was most likely the reason. And I wouldn’t comply. ”Walk with me. I promise to let you out of it if you can just do that peacefully. Think you could do that much?”

An annoyed sigh left my system, I could manage that much. But I relaxed and stopped fighting the iron grip that he had on my entire system. He knew me well enough…I was curious. Too curious to pass up this offer.

I’d take the bait. Probably regret it later, but I’d take the bait. He stood first, as if to get out of my range—smart boy—and all of the sudden I could move. Too bad I had been fighting so hard that the sudden ability to move had my sprawling out off the window seat with a: ”Holy fuck!” before crashing on the floor. I heaved an annoyed sigh, another one and possibly one of many, as I stood, dusting off my way dirty black jeans as I did. Way torn and dirty black jeans. A week in one set of clothes with no shower really was too much. Way too much.

But really, couldn’t I have managed to preserve my dignity at least a little?

Apparently not. Of course not. I was just a spaz these days. No surprise there. I sighed and ignored the hand he offered to help me stand up. I could stand all on my own, thank you. Even when he had been him I never took his hand. I was too strong, too proud for something like that.

He shook his head with a laugh, a laugh that made me ache for the old days. Dammit, I needed to slap myself if this kept up. It was just plain getting pathetic, and if there was one thing I refused to be, it was pathetic.

I let him lead me through a few of the hallways, too wary of getting turned into a puppet to freak out and hit him and run. I knew I wouldn’t get far, sadly. But I couldn’t take the silence anymore. ”Spill” I said, making sure to lace my voice with the appropriate amount of ice for this.

He stopped then, and turned to me. Getting a lock on my eyes, which he needed to set up the puppetting. But I was too proud to look away, even though I knew the danger. What was so bad that he had to set up the proper parameters to lock me in his spell before he even spoke? And then he did tell me, and I understood. ”You’re going to lead me to Utopinot, Cris”

And that was when I tried to run.

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The tiny girl huffed and resumed her pacing. She had been pacing for…about an hour. Two of the other girls, the one with the blue streaks in her hair and the red head, were making bets. Bets on what? On how long before she wore a hole in the ground big enough that she disappeared.

The tall dark haired girl, on the other hand, was hanging in the background, watching the sky. One more day, they were just giving her one more day before they gave up.

And they all knew the tiny girl would refuse to move until her best friend had come back. It had taken all of their persuasive powers to keep the girl from storming off into the city as it was! She was determined. And they had to constantly distract the silver eyed beauty to keep her right where she was. Luckily the girl was easily distracted, or they would have been in trouble.

Not like the other three weren’t worried.

They were just better at hiding it. Sephora, however, their tall, raven haired leader with the stunning sapphire eyes, had kept them right where they were. And had given their fifth member a week to come back.

After that, the chances were that she had been Fragmented.

Not that any of them wanted to admit that, no not at all. They would rather hope their friend was dead than have her really be turned into one of them. All of them had flirted with that danger before, that was why they were part of this group. They knew the danger so they figured that they knew how best how to fight it off and move on. They wanted to liberate their Broken people. Not hide in the shadows.

”Ki, you’re going to wear yourself out” the girl with the blue streaks said gently to the other girl. It was all she could do. She was amused by her bet with her red headed friend, but at the same time, the tiny girl should conserve her energy.

Especially because things were about to get a lot more eventful.

[Crissatha Pandora]

I glared down at the shackles. Damn, I couldn’t even call them shackles! Shackles at the very least had a chain that connected the two metal parts that wrapped around the wrists. The things that kept my wrists pinned together were more like a figure eight of metal that kept my wrists strictly pinned together. Useless pair of…ugh.

So my escape plan hadn’t gone all that well, obviously. He hadn’t even needed to puppeteer me, just got my own half brother to retrieve me and drag me back. I didn’t even bother to try and appeal to him. First off, we weren’t all that close. I had just discovered we were half siblings a few months ago. Okay, to be fair, he was the one who had discovered it. Boy was too good at fucking mysteries. The most I knew about him was that he was in love with one of my partners, enough in love with her that he had sacrificed himself to save her. Which was how we had ended up in the situation of me thrown over his shoulder. Trust me, we weren’t anything alike, so why should I bother? We got along well enough to have started developing a sibling bond and that was about it.

Second off, us Brokens had learned the hard way a long time ago that they couldn’t hear you anymore, the Fragments. Their memories were gone…it was something that was removed in the Fragment process. That was why no former Brokens could lead them to Utopinot.

They had tried keeping in the memories once. And it had backfired. Not that it did the Fragment in question any good, he had them but he felt entirely detatched to them, as if they were from a different person. Trust me, I knew this one well enough.

Anyway, he had dragged me down to the bath houses of all things. I mean really? Way to let me keep at least some of my dignity. The girls in charge of the Female Baths had threatened to throw me in, clothes and all if I didn’t stop struggling. Which was how they had managed to strip me down and toss me in the warm water. Dammit.

So now I was sitting on a bench in the corner, all wrapped up in a towel at least. And bound with shackles. That weren’t even good shackles. That was the least they could have done if you asked me. At least offer me some sort of hope of escaping.

Not that I wasn’t planning my escape anyway.

I wouldn’t be me if I wasn’t, really. Sadly, thoughts of escape were made hard by the encasings on my wrist and the fact that the chain that connected my ankles was only long enough to allow me to walk, and take small steps, let alone run. There was no way I could get away. I mean, I had tried to sweet talk my way out of them already, all this protection over little old me? Didn’t they think they were overdoing it? But no one had bought it.

I just wanted my clothes back at this point really.

Until a blond head crossed my vision. I knew that head! Okay, that sounded really weird but you know what I meant! I knew who that was. And for the first time since hearing why I was being kept here like a bird in a fucking cage I felt the knot in my chest loosening. ”Colby!” I hissed urgently. I didn’t really know my best friend’s love all that well, but we were all here for the same thing.

He was taking the biggest risk of all really. Pretending to be Fragmented, infiltrating the system the Puppeteer had set up and getting as much info as he could back to them. I knew it had been a long time since he had seen Ki. In fact, this mission was supposed to have given him an excuse to see her again. Before it went wrong. That was why our group took the missions that got us sent here, to give Ki time with Colby. It made the tiny girl so much happier, and that made her much easier to live in an underground city with, trust me. But I couldn’t have been happier to see him.

He stiffened slightly, the movement so slight I wouldn’t have noticed it if I hadn’t been looking right at him. The boy was good that was why he had been chosen for this task above all others. His eyes flickered to me, and I saw them widen slightly. Yeah, I was shocked I was here too. Join the club. We have cookies. No…chocolate. Hells yes, that was so much better. I adored chocolate. Okay, do you see what being captive was doing to my mental state?

I sighed and managed to stand, wobbling a bit considering I couldn’t use any of my damn limbs, seeing as yeah that’s kinda what happened. I swore, this entire thing was designed to make me seem like an uncoordinated fool. And destroy the society I had helped build up. Yeah, that too.

”What are you doing here, Cris?” he said after checking to make sure no one could hear us. Luckily, with me all chained up and locked in this little bath room, no one thought they needed to keep a very stern eye on me. I wasn’t sure that the question was worth answering, not when I was pretty sure we didn’t have a lot of time to begin with. If I had had the time to answer, chances were a sarcastic bitchy comment would have come out of my mouth like saying I was here to smell the roses cause I’d heard they were divine. Yeah, never said I was nice. Take a look at my backstory and tell me you would be nice after all that had happened to you. I thought so.

”Not important, Colby. Listen, I need you to find the girls. Tell them to go home and leave me. Please!” I said urgently. I needed him to do this; needed him to believe me and get them gone. Otherwise, all that we worked for would just go down the drain. The girls couldn’t be allowed to lead the puppet me all the way to Utopinot. No, that wasn’t allowed to happen.

He looked at me warily and I saw the thought process going on in his head. He so thought I was a Fragment. I could see it in his expression; that he thought I was using him to detect where the rest of the girls were, and they would follow him and Fragment the rest of the group too. ”Why should I? What’s the password?” It seemed like such a childish question. I mean, when we’re little we have our little hide outs and had the passwords, keeping out all that we didn’t like and letting all that had the privilege of knowing the pass code inside. But it had become necessary when we stopped being able to tell the Fragmented from the Broken. There was no physical difference really, the latest Fragments had been equipped with a personality to remove that blank look the older Fragments acquired when they lost pieces of their brain and memory.

”Not on your life” I said scowling, acting as if I wasn’t going to give it up to him. That was, sadly, our password. But it worked. It allowed those undercover to stay as such if it looked like we simply weren’t giving it up…and it had a meaning to us, because we often got asked what the Not stood for in Utopinot, as if it was such a key to some stupid mystery.

He relaxed and looked like he was going to ask more, or maybe offer to get me out of here, not that I would have let him. His assignment was more important, he wouldn’t be allowed to risk it on a grunt like me. There were other Rebels with knowledge of the City and not many that could do what he was doing so well that no one had detected him. But all he could manage was a nod.

Because the Puppeteer was back. Colby left, making it look like he was checking over my binds first before he left. I prayed that he would do what I had asked, otherwise we were doomed. Hell, otherwise we were beyond doomed. I wouldn’t let Utopinot fall because I had been careless enough to let myself be captured. I would have stabbed myself before they could have taken me too, but they knocked me out too quick sadly.

”And here I was so hoping you had given up on me” I said, scowling at the shell that had once been my love. Sadly it only made him smile and come closer. Ass. I was probably just reconfirming what memories that weren’t truly his were telling him about me. I hated that. Maybe I’d try to be nicer from now on to throw him off.

”All squeaky clean, Cris?” he said, helping me to stand even though I wanted to shrug his touch off me. I was sick of feeling confused because his touch felt so…right. Dammit. I didn’t want him touching me anymore.

”They’ll just know something’s up if I come back like I just came from the spa, ass.” Well, there went me pretending to be nice to throw him off. I was never good at playing nice with the other kids in the sandbox anyway. Scowling and pushing had always been more of my thing, really. I had a point though and I knew it. I was all squeaky clean. I had thought the damn bath girls that had pushed me in to the giant bathing pools were going to scrub the red and black right out of my hair with how hard they were going at my damn hair. And I was pretty sure my skin was still red and raw from their attempt to make me all squeaky clean. It was standard procedure before Fragmenting someone to clean them up. I had hoped that they were just going to give up and Fragment me, it was a safer fate than being a puppet if you asked me. It meant I couldn’t lead them to the underground city.

No cigar it seemed. I would have washed myself too, but I had already been cuffed at that point. Sadly. Either way, he had to walk slowly as he led me down the hall, due to the damn chain in between my ankles. I wondered dimly if I could possibly persuade him that I’d behave if he just unshackled me, but he knew me too well. I really wished he was just like all the other Fragments for the millionth time. Then the stupid hope that was buried deep down in me that he could be turned normal again would disappear and leave me alone. I didn’t want to hope. I didn’t want to dream, or wish, or…

I didn’t want to feel. I had cut that off when I had run.

He just shook his head though, smiling at me and it made me ache deep in my heart where I had thought I had locked away that feeling. ”All part of the plan. You escaped Fragmentation, no one will doubt it. Not with you being who you are…of course” he said it in that tone again. I knew he didn’t usually speak in that tone, he was just doing it to throw me off. Like he had faith in me…like…ugh. I didn’t want him around me anymore.

Sadly, he’d soon be constantly in my head.

He spoke again and caught my attention again, as badly as I didn’t want him to be able to do that so easily. ”That or….we’ll simply let your friends rescue you if they storm the castle. Simple.” He said this like he had it all planned out. That was enough to help me stop mistaking him for the boy I loved. That was enough to reaffirm that I didn’t want this boy near me. The boy I loved was spontaneous and crazy…would rather joke and be happy and make everyone laugh than plan out everything. Wouldn’t have been working to have the entire population that was left on this Earth under his thumb just so he could have them there. It just….was never his style. But it was the Puppeteer’s….and that was who I was dealing with now. Not my boy. I had to remember that, as hard as it was.

I didn’t like that he had this all planned out. It made it harder for me to come up with ways to escape. To come up with ways out of this predicament that I had gotten myself into. His plan seemed to be two steps ahead of mine though. He seemed way ahead of me and this meant….it would be hard to get free. Right now, it felt like all my hopes were laying with Colby and his delivering of my message.

”Fine…can I have my clothes back?” I said with a defeated sigh, looking down at my feet as if I had given up, as if I had resigned that this was inevitable and I just wanted it over with. Well, that last part was true at least.

”One last thing.” He stopped then and I did as well, curious, arching a brow at him. One last thing? Hadn’t I had enough curveballs thrown at me? Stop teasing the bird with crackers between the bars, already. I was miserable enough. He tilted my head up with a finger and I jerked back, biting at his hand. I would have fallen over, caught on the chain that tied my ankles together, but the wall caught my fall. My actions only seemed to amuse him, which really just pissed me off more than anything else. ”There’s a switch in your brain now, you do anything I don’t like or manage to get free of the puppetting by some stretch of the imagination, you’ll be Fragmented.”

The news was a shock. Despite all my earlier claims, I didn’t want to be Fragmented. I didn’t want to lose memory of who I was, shut down and just be a drone. I didn’t want to lose my freedom. I wanted to be free, and able to run wild. I wanted to be out. Despite my wide eyes moments before, I tried to play off this information as if it didn’t bother me in the slightest, I didn’t want to fall into that trap. Why would I? “Like you weren’t going to anyway” I mumbled, pushing myself up off the wall. I started to walk away from him then, he could catch up. Not like I was really going anywhere. It was true either way, I had to give up hope of getting out of this with my own brain intact, I had tried every way out and it hadn’t worked.

Trapped like a bird in a cage…

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Ki was still pacing. Well, she was pacing for .52 more seconds before she growled and turned towards the city. Her partners turned towards the girl when she stopped, they knew that look. That look meant trouble for the rest of them because that look meant that the tiny girl was plotting. Or feeling slightly sadistic. One or the other. ”That’s it! I can’t take it anymore, I’m gonna go kill someone” the small destructive girl declared and began to stalk off towards the, currently abandoned seeming, streets of the city, leaving the three others to scramble after her.

”Listen, Ki you can’t! They’ll-“ Red’s attempt to convince Ki to stay put was cut off by Ki running straight into a very nice muscled chest.

Well that was enough to stop any girl in her tracks. Especially Ki who had a weakness for very nice muscled chests. The one she had run into in particular.

”Colby?” Miyuki said incredulously before launching herself right at him. She had missed him so much, could you blame her? It had been months since she had seen him last, since he had last managed to get away without looking suspicious to see her. Then she firmly planted her lips on his in a kiss, fully forgetting her former rage for that moment at the very least. Likely it would flare right back up again soon, but for this moment…she was happy.

That was, until Raea managed to speak up. ”Not to interrupt the rabbit-y moment, here, but what’s going on Colby? How’d you find us?” she was both teasing Ki and Colby on their “rabbit” tendencies to forget the rest of the world and get sucked into each other, and at the same time asking what was going on. It was a very skilled move, and one that really…only Raea could probably manage to do without making it look clunky. She was too sweet for the other girls to get mad at her really for things like that, when they would easily bitch at each other had another girl been the one to say it.

Colby nodded, and didn’t bother to separate himself from Ki. It was a move that made the rest of the group ache for their respective others. Sephora the leader girl was still in denial about her love, but she missed hers who was back home. Red the redhead’s was still back at home as well, safely helping to run the world of chaos down there seeing as he was practically the mayor of their little haven. And Raea’s…well it was safe to say that Raea missed her boy more than words could ever express. Ki saw the ache in all of her friend’s eyes and did her best to lessen the lovey-dovey-ness of she and her boyfriend for their sake. ”I saw Cris. She sent me”

”You what? Sephora demanded, stepping forward. The girl was a very dominant one, and one that always looked out for her crew. She didn’t care who loved this boy, what his role was in their little crew, what he was doing for their town… if he had knowledge for her, she’d do anything in her power to get it out of him what was going on.

”I think they were preparing her for Fragmentation” he said, sadly. It was what it had looked like to him, all the Brokens brought in were scrubbed clean to sterilize them for the operating table, kept bound in shackles so that they couldn’t escape their impending fate…and always had that hopeless look in their eyes as if they had given up. The ice eyed girl had shone him all the signs of being prepared for a coming Fragmentation.

Red paled a bit and stepped forward, not willing to believe this. Not willing to believe that one of their team could get lost to this stupid process that had taken so many others that this crew had held dear. ”Where, Colby? Take us there” she said, confidently. Red was usually the fastest out of the crew to think rationally, even if it meant doing things that other’s didn’t like. But that was before she had become part of this crew and accomplished so much with them in helping make their city great again. If their friend was hurt, she wanted to help. All five girls were simply…fiercely loyal to one another.

Colby’s shake of the head wasn’t enough to deter them, not even the message he passed on from their partner. She had been so determined to steer these girls away from the city, he had to at least do her message justice. Even though he knew that it was unlikely they would go like she wanted. ”She said to tell you to go. Consider her dead. It seemed…urgent.” He was frowning, obviously not liking being the one to deliver this message to the other four.

Ki scowled and stepped back to glare at the city. ”Sorry Colby. Not an option.”

[Crissatha Pandora]

Back in the room with the view. Well, at least I had my clothes back, that was all I could say. If I didn’t know better, I would have called him a pervert, leaving me in that damn towel and nothing else for so long. Though…no, I didn’t know better. I had to keep reminding myself that. That I didn’t know better, for all I knew he was all for the naked ladies these days. Ew. Now that was a scary thought…which incited a slightly possessive round of thinking that I needed to get a hold of. He wasn’t him…he wasn’t him…

Either way, I wished I could move. I couldn’t at this moment, even though all forms of shackles and bondage were gone from my body…physically at least. I mean, yeah, my leg was currently slowly swinging off the edge of the window seat. But it wasn’t me doing it. In fact, I had currently shoved all of my will into making it stop. My body may be moving…but it wasn’t me moving it. Dammit! I willed with every ounce of my being to make that small movement stop. It should be so simple, shouldn’t it? Making a leg stop swinging. Simplest of the motor skills. And I couldn’t even control that. I let my eyes drift out the window and away from my body. Maybe if I took my mind off it I could pretend that I was the one controlling myself. Maybe.

I still fought every little movement.

”You’re just going to wear yourself out” came his voice in my head, a bit of a laughing tone that simply pissed me off! And made me fight it harder, with every ounce of my being.

”Get out of my head, asshole” I shot back at him, growling with my mental voice. I knew he wouldn’t though. He had explained this to me earlier, whether I had wanted to hear or not didn’t matter at that point because…he had already had me under his damn spell at that point. As a puppet. He had explained that his ability, as long as he focused on taking just one puppet, let him inside the mind of the person he was controlling fully. Allowing him to get in my fucking head and read my every last thought. It was so that he could have the person act as they usually would. Not that he really needed it with me. He had made sure to throw that one in my face, just to piss me off, I promise you.

For all the world, I looked relaxed. Though…moments later when he had gotten a warning I wasn’t allowed to know about because he wasn’t in the room with me…my body got up without my permission and started pacing the room. Do you know how bizarre it is for your body to be moving even though you don’t want it to? To be a passenger in your own body? For a person like me…it was pretty damn annoying. I was going frantic because I wanted to move it myself. I wanted to control myself. I didn’t like being a passenger in my own body. I didn’t like this at all. He was having my body walk like me, act like me. I had been doing this two days ago myself in this very room, before I had taken to just staring out the window and contemplating what I could throw to make it break, whether or not I could survive a fall like that. Whether or not it mattered if I survived as long as I didn’t get Fragmented.

”You’ll get used to it” came his voice again. It was a tone, just the right tone that usually made me calm down at least slightly. It was just right. But not in this situation, and the words weren’t right. The words just made it worse, just made me more frantic, just made me fight it more. I didn’t want to get used to it. I wanted to control my own body.

The door burst open moments later and my partners burst into the room. I wasn’t sure whether I wanted to laugh with joy, seeing them break into a facility like this for a brat like me or if I wanted to cry. Because they had just walked into the biggest trap that had ever been laid for our little group before. I was pretty sure it was the second. I was pretty sure it was the option where I wanted to scream for them to run as fast as they could in the other direction.

I could still warn them. I could. I could still tell them to turn back because he couldn’t control my mouth. He could wire it shut or let me talk, but he couldn’t control what I said. My body froze when they entered, and without my permission a smile spread across my lips. The surprised, but happy smile I myself would have worn if they had done this for me, with my own will. I hated this. Sephora was the first one in, no surprise there. But Raea was second in. She took in my seemingly fine person and immediately put her hand to her heart. ”What the heck Cris? Worry us for nothing? You’re going to give me a heart attack!” That was Raea. Usually worried and the first to take in a situation. I loved her for it and longed to say something.

”Well…I wouldn’t say nothing, squeaky clean there, Cris?” Sephora said sarcastically, typical Sephora. She was being sarcastic and teasing because she thought I was fine. And that was wrong, so wrong… I turned my eyes to Ki.

My best friend was the wary one, the one who always thought something was up. Please let her be herself. Please let her see this was wrong! Please….I saw her looking at me that way, the way she did when she was taking in a situation and deciding something wasn’t as it seemed. Yes!. Score one for the Twins! Please, let it be score one for the twins. She was wary of the fact that I had been here for seven days and appeared to be perfectly fine, not a mark on me. Please let her keep thinking that… ”What was with the warning, Cris?” she said, cautiously.

And then came his voice in my head again. He didn’t know how I’d warned them, and I wasn’t about to think about it too hard to let him see how I had gotten a warning to him. I was happy that Ki knew well enough not to say it out loud in here. We were the cautious ones, the twins. Even if we were the most reckless, we also knew how to keep ourselves from getting killed with the stunts we pulled, we were careful. Cautious. . I could say whatever I wanted, I could warn them off right now, get them to run. But then he’d just Fragment me and use me to round them all up and Fragment them. I had to keep this charade up a little bit longer, had to get them out of here so that they were safe.

Then I’d risk Fragmentation.

A smirk pulled at my lips and my shoulder shrugged, typical me behavior, typical how I’d act if I was nervous but didn’t want the world to know. It was hard to fake…but he was in my head. And these girls knew me well know to know why I’d be doing it. But it wasn’t me! ”Yeah, cause I was about to be Fragmented, good as dead, ya know? Didn’t want you guys to keep risking it if I thought I was practically dead,” I said. I saw Raea and Red relax at the comment, though Ki wasn’t buying it…and neither was Seph.

They were cautious and I was silently singing their praises for this.

Seph looked around the room, taking in how it didn’t look like your typical jail cell, despite the heavy bars on the doors and the bars on the windows. It had a big, comfy seeming bed…window seat under an impressive window…the rest was pretty sparse, keeping me from having anything to use to escape. But it was still nice as jail cells went. I understood where the wariness was coming from, it had made me wary too. Until I knew what they were up to. ”Jeez, nice room. I can see why you stayed so long” Pure sarcasm.

Dammit how to answer that one? Maybe she’d pretend that she didn’t know…purposely say something that they would suspect…

”I can hear you, Cris

Fuck.

Ugh. ”Hello, ex-governor’s Daughter? They had to keep me in the royal suite…plus it’s not exactly secret who I am now…” as if to emphasize what I was about to say, my hand came up to run through my bangs, pushing the red strands back out of my face. “Had some, oh so fun, little torture sessions. Info.” My arm held out, the other pulled up the black sleeve to show exstensive burning and lacerations. ”Oh, show them my back too where your goons fucking whipped me[/color] I added in my head sarcastically for the Puppeteer in my head.

The cuts weren’t a lie. The info wasn’t a lie. I had been tortured pretty damn extensively. It had hurt like shit…and the memory would have made me shudder if I could. It was extensive…but it had had a purpose, a reason they were doing it. The obvious reason really. For info, mostly info I didn’t have. Runner’s like me weren’t given information for precisely this reason. Can’t spill what you don’t know, right?

Sadly, he took what I said literally even though he knew I didn’t mean it literally and turned, lifting up the back of my shirt with my own hands even though I wanted to tug the shirt back down. Stop that! I don’t want to show that! I would rather keep the fact that someone actually managed to torture me to myself thank you! I’d rather keep who did it to myself too…

I heard gasps from them before I, wordlessly of course because I so wasn’t speaking, dropped my shirt and turned back around. I got the big eyes from Raea, the big, need to hug Cris but afraid she may smack me for it, eyes. Red on the other hand just looked way pissed off. ”Who the fuck did this to you, Cris?” she said, pissed off.

I let the Puppet Man take that one, lifting one shoulder in a shrug. I’d rather not share. I didn’t need Raea to know it was the Fragment of my half brother. The Fragment of her love. She didn’t need to know that. She was broken enough knowing that he was a Fragment, she didn’t need the extra details of what his body was being used to do. They had used him on purpose, knowing that it would hurt me if he was the one to do it. I saw the suspicion lessen in Seph and Ki’s eyes. And mentally cursed the fact that I couldn’t take the sadness from my eyes at this being done to me.

I wanted them to be suspiscious. I wanted them not to trust what was going on here. I wanted them to leave without me. Please.

But they wouldn’t, even if they thought it was a trap, they would think it wasn’t me that was the trap. They would still take me with them and be wary of other things. It was wrong, it was all wrong. But it was annoyingly enough a perfect plan. ”Thank you”[/i] Came the smug voice in my head. I would have scowled if I could and attempted to just block out his voice from my mental ears, I didn’t want to hear him. I didn’t want his voice in my head, it was too intimate. Too close. Too much.

I was brought out of my thoughts by a hug. I could still feel it, which was weird. I could still feel hot, cold, pain, all of it. I just couldn’t react to it. It was weird. And it was driving me up a wall. I would be insane by the end of this experience, not that I wasn’t already. My body stiffened at her hug, like I would have done, had I been in control of it. But I didn’t push her off…or rather my body didn’t, considering it wasn’t me. He knew, cause he was in my head, that if anyone could get a hug out of me, it was Raea. She was my little sister.

Over Raea’s head, I could see Ki smirking, making fun of me for getting sucked into Raea’s mushyness in the form of a hug. Ki and I didn’t do the whole…sappy thing. Anything sappy. I rolled my eyes, something that I myself did, forgetting for a moment that it wasn’t me.

Until he moved my body without my permission again.

This was going to be a long…long….trip.

---------------------------------------

Sephora looked warily at the tent that Cris had crawled into. The other girl had been exhausted, and none of them had blamed her for it, encouraging the other girl to go to bed. It had been a long week for her…if those marks on her body had been any indication. Seph was just happy they had gotten to Cris before she could have been Fragmented…but something was still off.

It was hard to navigate the halls of the complex that was the main building in the City, sure. But it had still seemed too easy. They shouldn’t have been able to find where they were going that easy, to have gotten through with so little fight. And then there was the fact that they had kept Cris for a week when they usually Fragmented them much sooner. It was true that she was the old governor’s daughter…but was that really enough of a reason? Seph wasn’t sure….but she didn’t want to startle the other girls.

Well…she didn’t want too startle Red or Raea. Ki on the other hand, was thinking the same thing, and she knew it.

Which was why, later that night when they were camped out far enough from the City that it was safe to start a fire, and it was just Ki and Sephora sitting around the fire because the other three were tucked away, the pair of them started to talk. ”It was too easy…wasn’t it?” Ki said, poking the fire with a stick repeatedly. Don’t get her wrong, she was happy that her Twin wasn’t Fragmented. And she had been happy to see Colby. But still. Something was wrong about all this.

Sephora nodded. It was. Way too easy. I don’t like this. I don’t like this at all. I keep thinking something is going to jump out at us.” Sephora said, scowling at the fire herself.

And then Sephora shook her head and looked up at Ki. ”I can trust you to be wary?” she said, knowing that in truth she didn’t really need to ask the other girl this question.

But it was better safe than sorry in today’s world.

”You can. Duh” Ki said, smirking a bit up at Sephora. Wary was Ki’s middle name, or sadistic was. Either way. One or the other. The girl could be trusted to keep an eye out in order to keep this group safe. She had been sport of a bunch of Fragments, along with a few other Brokens, when she had been younger. It had taught her to be careful and wary. She knew what she was doing, she knew how to spot when things were off. And she intended to keep an eye out.

”Good” Seph said simply. There was nothing else left to say. Ki and Sephora didn’t talk often, but they understood each other in a way that only strong willed women like themselves really could.

And they didn’t like this.

------------------------------------------------------------

I could move my body. Was it weird that I wanted to do jumping jacks, or spin or something? He had moved my body into the tent, waited a bit and then shifted “us” out farther into the plain. And then I could move. I could move. I could move. I felt the need to repeat that twenty more times. And just because I could, I did probably about three roundoffs in a row, just feeling the need to be in complete control of myself. Just saw the need to prove that I could. I bet he couldn’t control my body well enough to do that.

”Want to bet? The voice came from behind me and I whirled around. What the hell was he doing here? And how the hell was he reading my thoughts? Don’t get me wrong, I wasn’t stupid enough to think that he had let me go after one day of good behavior. But he could still get in my head without controlling me? I narrowed my eyes at him, backing away a few steps. I liked my freedom, temporary as I figured it may be. I wanted to run, would too if I didn’t think he’d just drag me right back here. Debated doing it anyway. ”I figured you deserved a reward for good behavior.” he said, smiling. The familiar smile made me ache all over again.

STOP THAT!

You know what? Screw good behavior.

I turned and I ran…intending to run as far and as fast as I could. My bare feet felt amazing with the hot desert ground underneathe it. It was still warm from the day’s sun beating down on it even if the air around it had cooled off so much with the night now. It felt amazing under me, it felt amazing after a day of walking without really controlling anything. I felt him behind me but I didn’t care. I wanted to run, I wanted to be free of all this.

Let me be free dammit!

He could have used his damn ability on me. I’m not sure why he didn’t. I don’t care why he didn’t. It wasn’t because of sentimentality, and that’s all that mattered. All that mattered was that he caught me around the waist and lifted me up off the ground.

I opened my mouth to scream but found I couldn’t. It wasn’t until moments later when the need to scream had passed that I realized I was speaking again. ”Oh fuck you, fuck you, fuck you, let me go!” I was repeating this without realizing I was even saying anything. And I was kicking, trying to get down. I wanted to get down. Tears? Didn’t notice them. Didn’t care. I wouldn’t acknowledge them either way.

I wanted to be free.

Let me be free.

Damn you. Let me be free.

Even the caged bird still sings…

[Crissatha Pandora]

I didn’t speak to him the next day. Yeah it’s sorta hard to ignore a person who’s in your head but I did my best. I refused to answer when he spoke to me. I refused to speak. I refused to move, or react. He needed me to speak, he could control my body but not my tongue. I wouldn’t make it easy for him and speak, no. That just wouldn’t happen from this girl. I could have one form of rebellion to myself at the very least. I refused. I refused. I wanted to be fucking free…I knew we weren’t far away enough from the City that my friends could escape Fragmentation if I screwed up, but it wasn’t like he could blame me…

No instead he just had me play the part of the recovering kidnapped girl. Using my silence to his advantage.

Somewhere around midday, I gave up. The sun was hot, the day was hot, I could feel the heat and do nothing about it. My feet were tired even though I hadn’t been walking at all. I was hungry and thirsty, but it wasn’t me that allowed my body to eat and drink. It was frustrating, and it was upsetting me all the more. Every time something bothered me, he would allow my body to do something to fix it. But he couldn’t fix what bothered me most. He couldn’t give me my freedom.

Plus, I hated him being so nice to me like that…it made it harder to think of him as a bastard. Because he was a bastard. It was his fault I was trapped…unable to move and about to betray the society I had sworn to help rise up again.

”Let me sleep…”[/i] I thought softly. I knew he could do it. I was sick of seeing my body move and I couldn’t do anything about it. I couldn’t control it at all. I was sick of it. I didn’t want to see anymore. It would give him full control over me, tongue eyes and all. But I refused to care. It didn’t really matter anymore, did it?

I was pessimistic but it didn’t matter. At this point, I was just waiting until we were far enough for my friends to be able to escape…before I said something to help them get away. Before I let myself be Fragmented just…to stop this feeling.

I surrendered myself silently to the blackness, and I didn’t know what happened the rest of that day.

I came back to myself that night, when he had given me control again. Like it was supposed to be some sort of peace offering or something. Peace offerings used to work. They didn’t anymore because he wasn’t him He never would be again.

The freedom didn’t excite me like it did the night before. I didn’t care all that much. I didn’t even leave the tent or move. I didn’t see the point, why should I bother? I’d probably get upset and try to run again, which would just make it that much worse later on when I was dragged back. I didn’t think I could take that kind of heart break all over again.

I just wanted to sleep. I was happy in the damn darkness of before, I could be happy there again. Besides, when I was there I could pretend I was back at Utopinot. I could pretend I was happy and playing my guitar with my long haired dude best friend, or plotting evilly with my tiny chick best friend. Or even better, I could pretend I was still happy with my boy…before all this.

I could pretend. I had given up…

”Happy now? I asked silently, before retreating back to sleep when I got no answer from the Puppet Man in my head. Well, if he had no comment, that was all well and good. I was going to sleep….

I was sick of this, I was sick of having to deal with this and it had only been two days! I was a very freedom driven. I was they type of person who wanted to control herself entirely. I hated the idea of not being in control of my own life, that was why I had defied my mother so seriously. That was why I had never bothered to listen to her. That was why I had done everything I could to get away from her and do my own thing. I liked to be in control.

I guess this was why only two days not being able to control my own body had me so broken down. I felt defeated. I just wanted to surrender to dreams…

Life was better in my dreams.

----------------------------------------------------

Laughter.

”Get back here!” I yelled, tearing after him down the crowded streets. People who saw just chuckled and tried to get the heck out of our way. This was before my mother got the brilliant idea to Fragment people. This was a more rebellious sector of our fair city. In fact, I would see many of the people I was currently weaving around later on in Utopinot, they had fled this place and Fragmentation…a short month after this. When my mother would go power hungry.

We often hung out in this part of town because no one would report my movements to my mother. I could escape the stupid guard she kept on me to keep people from taking me hostage. Like they would. Everyone knew I opposed my mother, it would do no one any good to take me hostage, she wouldn’t pay to get me back. She would just let them do what they wanted to me, even if it was kill me, she wouldn’t care. She never cared.

”Psh, yeah right!” he called back over his shoulder as he did his best to stay away from me, running and weaving around people.

We were both laughing though. I missed that. I missed laughing.

I don’t remember now what it was that he had done to incite me chasing after him. It didn’t really matter though, this sort of thing often happened with us. He called me abusive…and I was. But I did it out of love, always out of love. It was why I was so pained now looking back on it. He always made me laugh…and I loved him.

”Blind boy get the fuck back here!” I yelled again, inciting laughter from those we passed. It was a normal sight. No one was all that shocked. A friend of mine purposely got in the way, even if he was pretending he knew nothing of our crazy little chasing game. I grinned at my friend over my boyfriend’s shoulder and tackled him. Okay, so it was more of a glomp that managed to make him very nearly fall over, so not my fault.

I grinned, pulling away from him, smacking his arm.

And then he showed me chocolate, peace offering. I took it with a grin, and tore off a piece for myself, nudging him with my shoulder in a silent show of forgiveness and he shoved me right back. Normal, this was so normal it made my heart ache to look back on it.

Eventually it led to us sitting on a bench, a bit away from the rest of the City, just trying to get away from my mother’s constant influence. He had originally just been my friend. And then he had been my ploy to piss off my mother. I hadn’t expected to fall in love with him, but I had. And now I did my best to keep our relationship away from my mother’s ears. We were overlooking the plains, and I had my head down on his shoulder, his arm around me like always.

”Hey, Cris?” he said after a moment. I didn’t lift my head off his shoulder, I was too content. My eyes were drifting shut…but I wouldn’t fall asleep. I was just comfortable. I made a noise, a soft hmmm asking what without really asking. ”Did you hear about that city? The one that people are going to…to escape this place?”

”A bit…why?” I asked, not really putting much thought into it. It was just a random question, not one of too much important because the idea of really leaving this place, getting away from my mother…wasn’t one that I really had put too much thought into.

”I’ve been thinking about leaving…getting out of here” he had a happy tone to it, but I knew he worried…actually I knew he hated my mother, but same difference.

I agreed. I wanted to get out of here…and be with him. It seemed like a good plan to me. I just kinda nodded, too content to talk too much.

”And maybe if you ask nice enough I’ll let you come with me” He finished. I looked up from his shoulder to find him grinning at me. So I smacked his arm. Repeatedly. But I was laughing.

Damn, I missed laughing.

The memory faded…and shifted…I wanted to stay in the realm of dreams though…I wasn’t ready to leave just yet….maybe if I fought really hard it would let me stay here a little bit longer. Maybe…

------------------------------------------------------------

Red looked up at the stars. Funny, so beautiful yet so out of reach and people put so much faith in them, even in today’s time. It was like…people needed something to believe in, something to count on. They needed something outside of themselves to give them a reason to hope that things would get better.

Red preferred to keep a level head. She preferred to be the one who thought rationally and helped keep everyone together. There was a reason that she was in this group, they would be so lost without her. The thought made her grin a bit and toss back her red locks.

But there was a reason she was outside when the rest of her crew was safely snuggled up in their blankets and sleeping bags inside the tents. She wasn’t keeping watch, no, they had slowly managed to get far enough away from the City that keeping watch wasn’t necessary. She had just needed to think. It had worried her that Cris had been so quiet today. She understood, in part, after seeing and assuming what had happened to the girl when she had been away from them—she still wanted to kick the ass of whoever had done it for the record. But at the same time…it wasn’t like Cris to fall apart like that. Red was very good at reading people.

She was also very good at prying. Which was how she had learned from a certain long haired wonder what the Puppeteer meant to Cris.

She debated sharing this fact with Sephora and Ki, and getting them to chill on the suspiscioun train. Cause Red was pretty sure if she had to see the Fragmented form of her man, she’d be pretty broken down too. But she’d probably talk to Cris about this before she shared this information.

Hey, pessimists for the win…maybe Cris had finally just figured out that the world was falling apart.

Raea came out of the tent she was sharing with Cris, because they had thought it best to keep the girl with the calming presence with the broken girl, and it broke Red from her train of thought. ”Astraea Dike…aren’t you supposed to be asleep?” she said, attempting to smile. She always tried to put up a good front…most of the time anyway.

Raea smiled tiredly and plopped down on the log with Red with a heavy sigh. ”Can’t stop wondering…”

”About…” the redhead asked, arching a brow at her good friend, and roommate back at their crazy city. She rolled her hand as if encouraging the other girl to keep talking. Cause she was.

”It’s…stupid. But I can’t help wondering if she saw…you know…Pride…?” Raea asked, tears in her eyes just thinking about it. It had been months, beyond months. But Raea hadn’t been able to deal with it, how could she? The boy she loved was as good as dead! How did someone deal with that?

Red frowned and put an arm around Raea. Red often somehow managed to take the role of rock of the group because of her ability to keep level headed, sugar coat nothing and tell it like it was. ”It’s not stupid. You could always ask her you know?” she said carefully.

Raea simply shook her head. Cris wasn’t speaking at all, if she did it was short sentences and nothing more. How was Raea supposed to ask about Cris’s half brother and Raea’s love in a situation like that?

Instead she simply joined Red…looking up at the stars, and wishing on every single one. Maybe if she wished hard enough…it would come true.

-----------------------------------------------------------------

I had been enjoying my last dream. Any memories with Marluxia, my male best friend who had helped bring me back from the dead when I had first stumbled into Utopinot, always made me happy. He was the closest thing I had to a real…family. We got along so well. Yeah, sure, I had my crew…but it was a different connection I had with Lux. He taught me how to play the guitar so I could express the pain in my soul without breaking. He was there for me to laugh and be sarcastic with.

He was my rock. I dunno what I’d do without him. I felt back that he’d have to learn how to do without me…

But either way the memory shifted.

To one I didn’t want to see.

My half brother, called Pride because he had forgotten his real name for a while, had come along on this mission. He was good at picking up on the little details, much better than the rest of us. Plus, he was a Rebel too…just from a different Crew. So it hadn’t been much of a big deal. It had allowed the pair of us to get to know one another seeing as we had just figured out we were related. Okay, I just figured out we were related. Mr. Sherlock Holmes had figured it out weeks ago. Whatever, okay? I wasn’t all that interested.

Either way, it also gave him time to spend more time with Raea. The pair of them had first started dating before I had showed up, I didn’t know how long because I had never bothered to ask. My future sister-in-law and brother could do whatever the hell they wanted, wouldn’t see me opposing. Anyway, it gave them time to be all lovey dovey.

It seemed win-win.

It was a simple mission either way. Get in, get info, and get out. Don’t fuck around. Don’t do stupid shit. Don’t let Ki get caught up in seeing Colby and forget that she had to come home with them in under an hour. That was our time frame. The rest of us were just there to help Pride get in, not to really do anything special. Well, I was there because I had lived in the place we were going to.

The place that had the room with the view. Central. Where prisoners were kept, where the main information hub was, where people were prepped and Fragmented. One of the most important places in the city. It was also heavily guarded, but seeing as I had snuck out so often, I knew secret ways in and out that…well okay, half of them I had helped make when I was really desperate to get out. The sterilized, crisp building was intimidating. The only building left that was above 10 stories in the whole place. It sat in the middle of the city, overlooking all it saw like a tyrant.

And on the eleventh floor…where once I had lived with my family…only one person inhabited that now.

But I wasn’t going near there.

We were going to the sixth floor to get the info. I blame myself for what happened next, I truly do. It was supposed to be simple. It was supposed to be in and out, I shouldn’t have flubbed the guard’s schedule like I had. Then we wouldn’t have gotten caught.

The guard had been aiming at Raea. Pride had taken the hit, gotten shot in the shoulder with a stun gun. Raea’s face when he went down…I don’t think I can ever get that image out of my head. She was horrified. She leapt forward. Sephora held her back. And than did something that I’m not quite sure Raea every forgave our fearless leader for. She knocked her out.

It had been for her own good really. It had been…

But Raea… To see the person you love go down, be taken and dragged away like that… It was hard on me, and I barely knew him! What was it like for Raea? I didn’t want to delve too deeply into that. But I understood her pain. I understood better than most. Would it have been a good thing to finally give up and say my story, spill it to comfort my friend? Give her something or someone to relate to? Probably. I probably should have.

I didn’t though. I just did my best to comfort her anyway.

I didn’t like this dream…

Didn’t want to relive someone getting fragmented cause of me…

--------------------------------------------------------

The sunrise was an odd sight when it rose up over the desert. It was odd…because it was just so much orange, yellow, bright colors on one landscape. It made the dark haired girl that stood watching the sun rise stand out like a sore thumb. The girl debated waking her crew and getting them moving. It would be smarter to move before the sun rose fully and made it too hot to bare…

Seph sighed and shook her head. No…let them sleep.

Seph was too busy worrying anyway. Often, Sephora felt like she wasn’t doing a good enough job with her crew. Like she would let them down, or do something wrong that would cause them to get hurt.

She was trying very hard not to feel guilty for Cris’s capture and subsequent torture. But it was hard.

Mostly she appeased herself in coming up with ways to torture the person who had hurt her most. It helped. Also…she was focusing on other things.

Like why the hell had it been so easy to get her out? It shouldn’t have been so easy…not in the Central building like that. It should have been more of a challenge, more of a fight. Cris’s weird behavior didn’t help.

Well…

She supposed, as the sun rose, that time would illuminate all things.

((Note: I'm sorry if anyone's OOC....tell me and I'll try and fix!))

[Crissatha Pandora]

When life hands you lemons, you make lemonade.

Okay, who the fuck came up with that brilliant saying? Well, whoever it was, they needed to get their head examined. Immediately. By me. Well…actually no, if it was me they’d just end up with a bloody lip. Cause that saying was really pissing me off. I blamed him, I blamed him cause it made me feel better.

”Blaming people always makes you feel better” came an amused but…tentative voice in my head. As if he was testing out the waters in a pool. A pool full of piranhas in scalding hot water. It was an appropriate similie if you asked me, I wasn’t sure if I was feeling nice enough to actually reply. I wasn’t sure if I wanted to actually play nice today. Well…okay, nicer…because I didn’t often play nice. Especially not with boys who controlled my fricken body.

But I figured if I was stuck with the ass…

Urg.

It didn’t help that he knew me. Actually, it epically pissed me off that he knew me this well, because those weren’t his memories, he wasn’t allowed to use them! So…technically they were his memories, technically. But…if he wasn’t…him…then…

Okay, shut up on the mental rant, I yelled at myself. Oh, wait! New tactic, maybe if my thoughts were bizarre enough, he’d get out! Score! I heard chuckling in my head, and bizarrely enough it didn’t piss me off. Okay, so perhaps I had just woken up in a good mood and I had no idea how.

His next comment, I noticed, showed that he was trying to take advantage of this mood…or at least keep me in it. I was happy to be pacified. I needed it…partially because, I am excellent at denial. Like, amazingly excellent. I win the gold medal when it comes to this.

”So…I think it’s safe to say I finally wear the pants in this relationship.”[/i] The comment caught my by surprise, and I snorted a laugh, the noise actually coming out of the mouth that belonged to the body I wasn’t moving. The other crew looked at me weird, and my shoulder lifted in a shrug. I hadn’t been expecting it.

”Oh shut it…lucky I’m in denial”[/i] I replied. We had often joked when…he was him…that I wore the pants in this relationship. It was because I am an abusive child, always had been and always would be. So, effectively, I wore the pants in our relationship and he had always taken it with a smile, even if everyone else would tease him about it. Normally him referencing…that…now…would piss me off. But like I thought…world of denial. I was squarely in it.

Like the fact that if I didn’t focus too hard, I could pretend it was me moving my limbs…

*******************

It was when Ki dropped back to talk to me that I got my real distraction though. I knew she had been looking suspiciously at…everything this past day or two. Which didn’t surprise me. People didn’t go through the stuff Ki’s been through without getting a little cautious. I encouraged her caution, it meant that she may figure out what was going on. Or, at the very least it meant she’d believe me later on. Because, whether he could hear me or not, I didn’t care. I’d announce it to him that I refused to go through with this.

He should know better.

But when she came back to talk to me, she held nothing back. See, Ki and I got along so well because we plotted. And I do mean plotted. You could stick us alone in a room together and we’d plot someone’s doom or a prank that could damage someone for life like we were just discussing the weather. It was just what we did.

I figured that Ki was more suspicious of the situation than she was of me. Which was wrong, but I couldn’t exactly warn her off of this theory. Not yet anyway, I was picking my timing very carefully when it came to this particular plan of mine. I couldn’t spring it too early…or I put four girls I cared for very much in danger. So for now, I had to play along.

”So…we still scaring the shit outta everyone?” Wasn’t that how our conversations always started? From the moment we met, Ki and I had been plotting together. Hell, we had known each other an hour tops, and we had started plotting. Well…once I was conscious and able to walk that is. The beginning, finding me passed out dehydrated on the desert floor doesn’t count.

”Duh” I answered easily, grinning on instinct, or at least I would have if it was me controlling my body. Ass. Life would be easier if I was in control and he was back at his nice little tower away from me. I liked it that way. Lets go back to that dynamic, shall we?

Okay, safe to say that my good mood had slowly begun to diminish as time had gone on and I was made more and more aware of the whole…it wasn’t me moving me aspect of this little trip. I hated not being able to move, being able to be in control. For the heck of it, I threw my entire mental weight into stopping. Into pausing this little walk we had going on. Entirely. No more walking. But nothing happened. Of course nothing happened. Millionth try proved to be unfruitful just like all the others.

But back to plotting. Please, back to plotting. Even if my body didn’t react the way I wanted it to, I could still speak right? I could still plot and take my mind off of the bullshit that currently was my life.

”Think Raea will go for it?” she asked. From Ki’s grin, she already knew the answer just as well as I did.

”Think she has a choice?” I asked, laughing. See. Land of Denial. I swear, I’m the queen of this place. I’m so good I scare myself.

---------------------------------

Control.

Was it bad, that I lived for the sun to set? I lived for the time when he would give this back to me, let me act out my own movements. I had questions though. Way too many questions, and I figured that he fucking owed me some answers considering he was driving my body like a fucking marionette. I was owed some answers at least.

I found him sitting on a log. Why was he always here? Where was his fucking army coming to watch our every move so that way they could swoop in on Utopinot when we got there? Where was the force of Fragments come to interrupt the peaceful townfolk so the Puppeteer could have his army? Or…better yet. If there was no army than why was he there? Why did he follow. DIdn’t he have a city to run? I was pretty sure that he did. That was our problem here. I knew he could see just as well from my eyes, just as well. He didn’t need to follow physically.

Unless there was a space limit on his ability? That would make more sense. If he couldn’t be a certain distance away.

I didn’t want him to have any form of humanity. It made my life easier.

”Why?” I asked, thumping down on the log next to him. Like I said, I had given up on running away. I had since learned that it didn’t work. It just hurt in the end when it fell apart. When it got taken away from me again. Better to just…give up and forget the whole notion of hope. Like really, what was this hope you speak of? I had given up on mine…over a week ago. When I realized they had something bigger planned other than torture and than Fragmentation.

He looked up at me. And I wanted to smack him for just looking at me. Irrational? Yes. Did I give a shit? No.

I know. I don’t make much sense. I’m abusive and I’m mean and I push people away. I don’t think before I speak. Often times I shut myself down and say bitchy things just to make people leave. And yet…I ended up with a solid group of friends. I had a boy I loved. Sure, I didn’t have much of a family, but I found a group that was more than family to me. How had this happened? How did I attract people?

Ugh this had nothing to do with anything.

”Why what?” he asked, looking at me from the corner of his eye. I hated how he knew to be careful not to set me off.

But I appreciated the question. I knew he knew what I meant. He could just reach into my damn mind and figure out the answer all on his own. But he was willing to ask to make this seem more normal. This I appreciated. He wanted to play normal? I could do normal. I could definantly do normal.

Like I said. Queen of Denial. It’s more than just a river in Egypt, people.

”There at least…ten other Rebels each day…that get caught and Fragmented. Why me? Why the fuck do this to me, the girl with issues with control?” Was it bad that part of me wanted the sentimental answer? The one where he secretly remembered everything and just missed me? Ugh. This boy turned me into a sap when he wasn’t even himself! There was something wrong in my head. I didn’t want to believe it.

My life would be easier if it wasn’t that answer, the sentimental one.

”You were the governer’s daughter. I killed the rest of them…I couldn’t go easy and just Fragment you, Cris. It wouldn’t look right. It would look weak.” was the careful answer. Trust me, it took him long enough to answer, I knew he was being careful about how he was feeding me this bullshit. Not that it was bull. In all honesty, he did have a population that he lead. I guess he did have to worry about that, how things looked.

But still.

”Right. So torture for a week is going so damn easy?” I said, turning to look at him with an arched brow. I was kind of pissed at the answer. Mostly because it made sense. I’m not rational. Get used to it.

”For information? Yes it kind of is. Plus…I do still know you, Cris. It’s less effort with you.”

Now that’s the answer I knew was coming! It was easier because of the damn memories. ”You don’t fucking know me, okay?” All the same, I couldn’t believe that. I didn’t want to believe that. I didn’t. No. Not okay, not approved. This was going to be passed on as a bull shit answer. It was the right answer, it was the real one. I knew that much. I just didn’t want to believe it. I didn’t want to remember that…the memories of us was buried under this persona, this persona who was nothing like the boy that I loved.

I didn’t want to believe it.

To his credit, he just sighed and shook his head.

And we sat there for a while.

But I needed to relax. It was nice to relax. To twist my hands about each other and tap them on my thighs in that weird pattern like I always did. He could be in my head, but he couldn’t replicate that. That was mine, something I always did. It was all me, all me moving my own body. And reacting.

Sadly it meant it was also all me that put my head on his shoulder.

For the record, I blame the fact that I was half asleep.


But I still had questions, of course I still had questions. Too many. Like…more personal ones, like what he remembered and all that shit. Part of me wanted to know so badly…But I had more pressing questions that had to do with what was going on. Which had to deal with what I was happening, what he was using me to do. ”What are you going to do to the Brokens.” It wasn’t a question. It was a demand. I wanted to know.

He shook his head though, I could see it out of the corner of my eyes. ”Ask something else, Cris. Please”

Fucking lucky he added the please or I would have seen it as a demand and kept pressing. But I was half asleep, and in all truth I really didn’t want to know. I didn’t want to know what I was about to cause. So fine, I could ask a different question.

”Why use Pride? You know what I’m talking about,” I asked instead, scowling.

”I didn’t. But it’s the same reason as before…you were the governer’s daughter. Had to go hard on you. Besides, I knew you could take it.”

Ugh, was that some form of pride I could hear in his voice? Or was I just thinking things again? It was like I was so determined to torture myself.

I was about to answer but he shifted so I was leaning heavier against him, the move had me more in a relaxed positon…and I felt my eyes drifting…slowly…shut…

And all me that passed out on his shoulder, annoyingly comforted by the fact that his arm was around me, my head on his shoulder…it was all so familiar. In the old days…there wasn’t a time that I didn’t sit next to him and put my head right onto his shoulder.

[Crissatha Pandora]

Tomorrow we would be close. At the rate we were going, by the time tomorrow hit we’d be close enough to Utopinot that they could slip inside without getting Fragmented. We were far enough from the city that the only one who would be lost was me. I had made peace with this plan a long time ago. I was ready to take anything that got thrown at me. At least I wouldn’t have to do this anymore, play at being myself while a distant being controlled my body from afar. It would be…well I didn’t know.

None of us knew enough about the Fragmentation process, not even me. We knew they lost their memories, entirely. Not even a piece of that was allowed to remain. We knew they were obedient to whoever was in control. We knew they tampered down the pieces that made people want to rebel. We knew that they delved into the body and the muscles to make them stronger, make them react faster, make them move faster.

We didn’t know if they laughed. We didn’t know if they had a personality, or could fall in love, or play. We didn’t know if they hurt, or if they cried. We didn’t know what they felt. How they thought. No. That was one thing we didn’t know.

Were the Fragmented still human? We didn’t know.

I supposed I’d know soon enough, but how should I react to this? I wouldn’t be me anymore, I wouldn’t remember. Right? So…how do you prepare for this? Usually the Brokens couldn’t prepare, I suppose that made me special.

”Don’t dwell on it” came the Puppeteer’s voice in my head. Right. Because it was so easy not to dwell on my impending doom. What did I have to distract myself? Play my guitar? Oh right that required my fingers. Run? Oh right that required my feet. Sing? Well that I could do but I didn’t want to. Do my gymnastics? Flip and twist and exhaust myself physically? That took my whole body. That was out.

”Smart idea, ass” I bit out with a roll of my eyes. I was lucky no one could see my face, it looked kinda strange for me to randomly roll my eyes while my body hiked up a particularily difficult hill. Sandy and slippery, it drove me insane everytime I had to climb this thing, and it was giving my body trouble, which was obviously distracting my lovely controller from paying attention to all of my thoughts. Worked for me.

I wished my thoughts had more bite to them. It was hard to hate someone when you had to deal with them day in and day out in your head. Trust me, I still hated him. How could I not? I couldn’t move my body, he had taken my freedom, he was using me to destroy everyone I had come to love again. So yes, I did hate him.

I was just being nicer. For reasons I couldn’t put my finger on at all. It was beginning to piss me off that I couldn’t figure out why I was being nice. Not, nice per se really…just not biting and bitchy like I always was. It was starting to drive me up a wall that I wouldn’t just shut him out and tell him to fuck out.

”Maybe because you did that for three days straight and it got you no where? came his answer. Dammit.

”Stop making sense I grumbled mentally back at him. I was paying more attention to the conversation that was going on in my head rather than the one that was going on around me with everyone else. Which was probably why it took Raea three tries, or so she told me, to get my attention. Before Ki shoved me lightly to get my attention. I could feel it even if I couldn’t react to it.

Instead it was him that made my head look up from my feet. I had liked that view, thank you. It meant no one noticed when I reacted to the convo in my head. ”Wha? I asked, oh so elegantly.

Ki simply snickered a bit and rolled her eyes at me before my Twin answered me. ”Mornin’ to you too, sunshine.” I nudged the fricken Puppet Man until he shoved her right back with my hand. Thank you, listen to the fucking girl who knows how to react like herself. Idiot. He’s the one that wanted no one to know. Neither did I, for one more day at the very least.

”Fuck you, Ki” I laughed good naturedly, actually feeling it for the first time in days. Was it weird that my conversation with the ass in my head that was controlling me put me in a bizarre good mood? I had no idea why. And I was starting to get pissed at myself. ”What is it?

Raea spoke up then, coming up to walk next to me. ”For the third time…are you okay? You seem…off” She asked, concerned. That was Raea for you, the one that was always looking out for the rest of us. The kind one. The happy one. Hell, the one that kept us all sane. We would have been doomed without her many times over and we all knew it.

I smiled a bit, well okay I didn’t. But my body did. Good enough for right now, I didn’t want to lose the weird good mood that I was in at this moment. It would go soon enough if I knew myself. And my need for freedom. ”I’m…I’ll be okay” I offered tentatively. She didn’t seem happy with this answer, but what else could I say? I didn’t want to worry her and say that I was pissed, I was upset, I was worried. I was about to lose my mind.

Literally.

Ugh, stop going there.

”No you’re not” came a very blunt voice from behind. Well, that was Red. She never really let anyone kid themselves, which was good. Because kidding oneself was a stupid thing to do.

”Denial Red. I am very happily in the land of denial.” Well that was true enough. I was. I was there, solidly. And they all seemed to accept it. Which made me wonder how often I was in denial and they knew it and decided to leave me alone to stay there. Probably more often than I really knew. I was so grateful they never pulled me out of it. I liked it there.

-----------------------------------------------------

”We’re almost home!” Raea said with a smile. She was so happy. She felt so peaceful and calm and safe when they were safely in Utopinot. Sure, it was underground, which was slightly creepy, but it was home. It was the one place she knew no one could ever get her. For some reason, whenever they went above ground, she always felt slightly panicked, like at any point she could get scooped up and Fragmented. She shuddered at the thought. Even thinking about it scared her a bit. Well, it was normal! Who wouldn’t be scared at the thought of losing it all? Well, Raea knew one person who acted like she didn’t ever get scared. Raea cast a glance at the girl who acted like a sister to her, Miyuki Tsubasa. Her head was against a rock, and she was looking up, seemingly lost in thought.

Raea hadn’t originally wanted to be a Rebel. Than she had met Ki who always seemed to flared up and passionate about helping them get back in power, in making things right and kicking the Fragments’ asses. And then she had met Pride…oh Pride she missed him. These two always seemed so passionate, it was hard for Raea not to get sucked right into it.

Her first mission had solidified her way of thinking like this. Her first mission had been a simple scouting one. In fact, it had just been her and Ki who had gone out on it. Just to scout and look out for Fragments coming their way so that way they could lock up shop so to speak.

They had been bored, and Raea had allowed Ki to convince her to go out further into the desert. Raea had been born in Utopinot, her parents had been one of the first inhabitants of this place. Before being a Rebel she had never seen a Fragment or the City. She had never crossed the desert their city hid under. But Ki was convincing when she wanted to be.

They were both so happy they had done this.

Because they hadn’t found Fragments, no. They had found a girl. Passed out face first in the sand, her clothes tattered, her ribs showing from lack of food….They had brought her in right away, gotten her healed up.

And now Raea had two sisters who looked out for her all the time, even if Raea insisted that she could do just as well on her own, thank you. She was no damsel in distress.

”Yep, almost there” Ki replied without looking away from the sky. Ki was too busy wishing they were back at the City. She missed Colby that badly already. The pair of them were so close, such a happy couple that it was hard for them to be apart for too long. But they bore this load because their city needed them to, Utopinot needed the information that Colby got for them every day, it helped them stay one step ahead of the Fragments.

”You’ll see him again soon, Ki” Raea said, smiling sweetly at her sister. Even though Raea hurt all the time seeing the other girls with their boys, she still didn’t let them know this. Even though they knew and tried to be careful not to let her see it too much, they were careful around Raea.

”And we’ll find a way to get the Fragments back, Raea. Promise.” Ki said this and the look on her face was one of determination. Ki wasn’t just saying this, she never just said things. She meant it. She meant every word of it. And honestly, people were working on how to get the Fragments back. It was hard without the limited technology the City still had, but they were making strides towards it. Making strides towards making it right again.

They were going to make it right again.

Raea simply nodded and sighed after her nod. She’d really rather not discuss it. As hard as it was, most of the time she managed to distract herself from thinking about it, from thinking about him. But she didn’t let herself forget, no she would never allow herself to forget him.

She would never move on either, not as long as he was alive. Even if certain sweet shop boys gave her free things all the time, and smiled at her, and asked her to go to dinner with him. She wouldn’t. She couldn’t give up on Pride. He wasn’t dead, he was just out of her life. For now. It wasn’t permanent. She refused to think it was permanent.

Just temporary.

”So what do you and Cris have planned?” Raea asked with a sigh. They always had something planned, something mischievious and crazy that would get them in trouble. And they always dragged Raea into it because sometimes she could get them out of said trouble, she was just that sweet that she could make people think twice about punishing her little crew of crazies.

Ki’s smile when she thought about what they had planned though, now that scared Raea a little. What the heck were they up to?! Blowing up something?

Raea hoped not. They had done that last week and Raea’s hands still burned with blisters from the punishment from that one. Digging new rooms really was more torture than punishment if you asked Raea.

”You’ll see…like you said, we’re almost home”

-----------------------------

The sun had just rose when we took down the camp. Sephora figured we should get an early start, that way we could get home in time for dinner and that way we wouldn’t be walking in the heat again. Besides, we only had half of a day’s worth of water, and that was a dangerous thing in this desert. See, we knew all the hidden oasis things and all the hidden taps where we could pick up more water. But there weren’t any more in between here and Utopinot.

It worked fine for me, it meant that we were sooner to finishing this game of cat and mouse. I was anxious and I was nervous. If I could move my own body it would be twitching. I needed to time this right, I needed to do this. I was panicky and I was freaking out.

In a few hours I wouldn’t know who I was, I wouldn’t be me anymore. I would be a Fragment and no longer a Broken.

But I would do this and more. To protect my friends. I was a protector, I protected them because I loved them. They were the first people I had ever had in my life that I could consider a family. And the people at Utopinot…they had welcomed me back in with open arms. People who had known me back at the City had embraced me, quite literally. I had felt at home for the first time, I could smile while walking down the streets and wave to people as I passed. I was part of something.

I would protect them all.

Even if it meant my death.

They weren’t allowed to lose because of me. I would protect them with my very life because I believed what they stood for down there.

”Don’t do this Cris”[/i] he cautioned, I simply ignored it like he had said nothing.

I would do this. He couldn’t stop me.

Seph dropped back to talk to me and I looked up at her in surprise. Well, my eyes did at least, my head never moved until it was too late. He had been doing that lately, being a second off. I wondered what was distracting him so badly. Just excited cause he thought he was finally going to get what he wanted? I didn’t care. My head looked up a moment after my eyes did and I looked at our fearless leader. In truth, no crews had actual leaders, but Seph was unanimously voted the leader of ours because she simply took charge of us crazies and kept us in line. She had the clearest vision of what we had to do, no nonsense, no distractions. And she looked out for all of us in her own distant, sarcastic way.

She also always stood up front and didn’t talk to us much. I knew this was because she liked to think.

”What’s up, Seph?” I asked, curious despite myself.

”I’m sorry you got taken, Cris” she started, and before I could answer she held up her hand to stop me from answering before I could bother to do so. She still had more to say obviously. ”But I wanted you to know I’d personally help you kick their ass for it” she said, turning to smirk at me.

My mouth lifted in an answering smirk. ”Thanks Seph. I’ll take you up on that” I said nearly laughing. Having the fencing legend herself as back up would be almost good as having Ki help.

I wish I would still have my mind long enough to actually do it.

I looked up than and saw the first landmark that we were so close to Utopinot. A half hour if we ran.

No.

No…

It was too close.

I hadn’t been paying enough attention and I had missed the signs. No. We were nearly here. I needed to keep them from here. I opened my mouth to speak, I attempted to warn them, but my mouth was wired shut. No! No! Don’t do this, I won’t let you! My eyes started tearing up and I shut them tight. I wanted to lift my hands to tear at my mouth and pry it open so I could make noise but they wouldn’t move! No!

Don’t let me do this!

A little distressed noise made it’s way from my throat, unchecked by the closed jaw because it didn’t require my mouth moving for that noise to escape. The other girls stopped and looked at me worried.

I’m sure I looked strange. Jaw clenched tight, tears rolling down my cheeks from clenched shut eyes, but my body showing none of this distress. They were confused. What? What did they think was going on? I didn’t know, I could only sense they had stopped, I knew my body had stopped.

I wanted to tear my fucking mouth open. Move! No move!

Do something!

I wanted to scream and screech. Let me free! Let me move! Fuck you!

”I’m sorry Cris”[/i] he said softly and I screamed mentally, no sense being made anymore. I needed to speak! I needed to warn them.

I couldn’t even play the puppet right now, he couldn’t risk letting me speak right now to placate them and reassure them that I was fine. It was too much of a risk. So their questions asking if I was alright went unanswered, I couldn’t answer.

If I could have I would have told them to run.

I wanted to! I struggled to. I couldn’t even move my own damn body.

I screamed at the top of my mental lungs.

And I felt his grip loosen. I used this moment to unlock my jaw. And speak. Finally! ”It’s a trap! Run! Get the hell out of here and shut the gate!” I yelled at the top of my lungs before he got back in control and wired my jaw shut again to keep me from speaking.

But it was too late.

I had warned them.

But then fire raced through my brain. And I screamed through my shut jaw. Ow! Fuck! He had released me from the puppetting, I guessed that he figured I was a lost cause. And I collapsed. I was grabbing my head and screaming now. Fuck it hurt, it hurt, it hurt!

What the hell was this. It hurt. Make it stop!

I felt the darkness in the corners of my eyes.

Felt my body shut down as it prepped to restart.

Felt pieces of myself, my memory slip out of my grasp.

I needed that…

The pain was distant now, I couldn’t feel it anymore. I couldn’t feel the girl’s hands on my shoulders and my back anymore either though.

I was losing it.

But I…didn’t care anymore?

What…

What was bothering me again?

The world

Slowly

Went

Dark…

[Crissatha Pandora]

Seph was pacing her room, well not her room. She was pacing the meeting room for the Rebels. This was not okay. This was far from okay, this was the worst possible thing that could have happened. Seph still had no idea what had happened!

She didn’t like that more than anything else.

Seph only knew a few facts. One was that Cris had been standing there, looking so strange before she had managed to speak and tell them to run. They hadn’t, because moments later Cris had dropped to the ground in pain, and they refused to leave her.

And then she had Fragmented. How had that happened? They could remotely Fragment people now? Seph had never seen the process before, but it was the only way she could describe the way the light and recognition went out of Cris’s eyes. The only way she could rationalize how she lashed out at them without knowing who they were.

The weirdest part? She had passed out moments later, and the Puppeteer of all people had taken her away, before they had been able to get at him. They had been unable to even move closer until he was too far away.

Seph had made the executive decision then to get them back to Utopinot to discuss this. But now she knew that they needed to do something about this. She needed to get her people out of there, even if it had meant knocking out Ki to keep her from pursuing her best friend and dragging her ass back there.

Ki had wanted to kill Cris. The pair of them had apparently made a pact, that if either of them got Fragmented the other would kill her. Seph couldn’t risk it. She couldn’t risk another of her crew so soon…

If Cris was Fragmented there was nothing they could do, she was lost to them now. Which tore at Sephora’s heart. How had she not noticed? They had all seen that something was off with Cris, all figured there was something more up. But they hadn’t thought anything of actually checking out Cris. She had been kidnapped and tortured for a week, it was enough to make anyone act weird, right?

They had figured this and they had been wrong.

And now Sephora had lost another member of her group to this. Just like she had lost her best friend to it so many years ago…so very long ago…

The thing that Seph didn’t get was why.

Why did he come and take her out? Why didn’t he capture the rest of them instead of just making them freeze? Why not pursue them all the way to Utopinot.

What was he after?

---------------------------------------------------

It was dark.

Still so dark…

I didn’t want to open my eyes. I didn’t want to see. I was too busy focusing on the clamoring in my head. What was this? What was with all of these voices? Why wouldn’t they leave me alone? What was with this? There were memories in my head. Tentatively I dove into them a bit, seeing the person I knew was myself, but I felt no attatchment too. I didn’t see the need to delve farther into that because that wasn’t me. Well…not me as I saw myself.

Not anymore.

But there was more. What was this? A boy with brownish hair and deep blue eyes with a girl with blue streaks in her hair? A laughing, dancing blonde girl? A kind, sweet Asian girl smiling at her triplet sister and brother? Why did I feel them too. I knew these weren’t mine…but they were there…

”The memories…of every Fragment in this City” a voice informed me. I opened my eyes and saw him standing by the window. Many Fragments felt automatically drawn to listen to him, because he was in charge around here. It was an obedience thing that had had been programmed in. I felt no such tug.

I wondered why but didn’t ask. I could piece it together on my own. I held up my hand, I didn’t need to talk just yet. I’d prefer to puzzle this out a bit. I knew it wasn’t the way…that the person who had used this body before reacted. I knew the people that used to know the girl that used to walk with these feet, smile with this mouth would be surprised by the way I was acting.

But what was wrong with piecing together things before I spoke? That was just irrational.

I saw him smile faintly and chuckle a bit with eyes that saw more than they did before and ears that heard way better than they had ever done before. Ah, so he was still in my head…and I was in his? Well this was weird.

I could piece this together that way…

I saw what he had been thinking when the Fragments had told him it was…my former self that had been brought in. He opened himself to me, holding nothing back and letting me pick through his brain. I saw him thinking fast, and deciding to do this to me, but make me think that it was to get at my city.

Now that just didn’t make sense to me.

Why would I have to go through all that just to get at the point he could take me to right at that point in time?

”Would you honestly be calmly sitting with me in the same room had you not spent so much time with me before so closely?” he asked, shifting to sit on the edge of the bed that I was laying down on, still too busy trying to piece together my thoughts and ignore the racing constant memories in my head.

He was right though. So I nodded. ”Why do this to me? Why not simply Fragment?” I asked. There was no passion behind the words, no aching need to know or the world would fall apart. No demanding, just simple curiosity

”You needed to see the world the way I did. You needed to still remember who you were…but not be so attatched to it that you wouldn’t think clearly” he said carefully. Weighing each word. I understood. I didn’t know why he thought that, but I assumed I would learn eventually and didn’t see the need to press really. I would know eventually.

I waited for him to continue.

”I wanted you to see what your mother did to me” he whispered harshly. ”To remember it all and not care” he said this bitterly. And I understood. I did. I didn’t feel it, not yet, this need to care about the memories that were still in my brain, but I saw that he did. He wanted to care. Had been trying to care for the past couple of years…and had thought he had his chance when this piece of his past literally had dropped in on his lap.

It hadn’t worked though. He still didn’t care.

But it was easier for him too…with me like this. With someone who understood what he was going through and was going through it too. That was why he had done it.

But there was another reason.

”Tell me” I said. Ha, that was a piece of the old me. Funny.

He didn’t but he let me see, let me go inside and see. It was too complicated to explain outside in words. You simply had to understand it.

There was chip in each Fragment’s brain. That was what kept them the way they were. Destroy or short circuit the chip and you set the Fragment free. You destroyed the obedience portion that was lodged in the brain. You couldn’t give them back their memories, no, that was lost to them for good. But it gave them the capability to learn it back. It gave them the capability to feel and learn again.

He wanted to destroy the chips, but the only way to do that was to blow up the room.

The only way to do that involved killing the person trapped inside.

-------------------------------------

A few days later, Colby came running.

He was out of breath, but he had made the trip in only 2 and a half days, so it was a price he was willing to pay. Ki had been standing guard when he had showed up, out of breath and feeling like he was going to collapse.

But he had to get the news out. He had to tell them.

There had been an explosion in the City the other day. It had taken him nearly a day to track it down and a few more hours to figure out what it meant.

He had to share with them now, he had to tell them what had happened. They needed to know.

---------------------------------------------

The world may have fallen apart, but they still managed to have some very useful things laying around here or there. One of these useful things was explosives. The best part was that it was mostly kept right here in the Center, in this very building that we were currently in. So we left the room that had once been mine when I had been held captive here. It seemed so long ago, but that was mainly because I didn’t feel any emotion attatched to that knowledge.

Fun to go through a building and not be stopped at all. I pieced through the many memories that now flooded my skull, trying to sort them and pack them away so to speak so that way they wouldn’t interfere with anything that I was to do right now.

He sent home most of the people that routinely inhabited and worked in this place, not wanting to destroy any of them. According to his memories this was an impossibility, seeing as the room itself was self-contained and it would take a lot to destroy the outside world once we were in there. Chances were that it wouldn’t even topple the building.

He had wanted to do this for a long time.

It had just been too hard for him to do it alone. So I had agreed to do it with him. I had agreed to help him set them all free.

Which was why, now, there was C-4 taped down to a complicated looking machine and the heavy industrial door was locked down behind us.

It was due to explode any moment.

I turned to him and tugged him down to me, pressing an intimate kiss to his lips. Somethings were hard to replace even with brain surgery and replacements and deletions. Somethings were hardwired into the heart instead.

I did us one last act of mercy with the extra ability that Fragmenting me had gifted me as the explosives went off.

And we set everyone free.

-----------------------------------------------------------------

A week later.

Raea sat on a rock just outside of Utopinot. With the information Colby had given them, they had slowly left Utopinot to inhabit the City as well. And it had turned out to be true, the Fragments were all…different. They were normal again, even if they didn’t remember anything. It was nice, they were getting another start, they were getting the chance to try again.

Raea was too scared to try going to the City. She was afraid that he wouldn’t remember her. She knew he wouldn’t, but she was scared to see.

She wasn’t ready just yet. So she was sitting here and thinking, trying to work up the courage to go there and confront him and restart their relationship, give it another go.

She was just scared he wouldn’t want to. That he had been too changed and wouldn’t want to be with her again. She had heard rumors that that had happened before to other people. That those they loved were different and didn’t want to be with them anymore. It scared her.

She couldn’t do this.

She’d just sit here and wait.

Ki could tease her all she wanted, Raea would sit here and debate…she’d piece it together eventually.

Until she saw a light brown haired head coming towards her. Even before she saw those deep blue eyes she knew who it was. Her heart skipped a beat and her eyes went wide as she watched him come closer. Tears threatened. He was so close…was this… She slid off the rock and managed a few steps forward…

”Pride…?” she asked softly…she wasn’t willing to believe it just yet. She wasn’t willing to believe this was her boy, right here, in front of her. Oh…there was emotions in his eyes. He was confused, and a little bit scared, and a little bit turned around…but there were emotions. There hadn’t been those in so long she had nearly forgotten how to read what he was feeling in his eyes, they had known each other that well, that they could do that to each other.

”So they tell me” he said, his mouth twisting up in that smile, that little smile that put so much hope into her. And she couldn’t help but smile in return. Oh it was him…it was him…but…

”Do you…remember me…?” she asked, hesitating, so worried that the answer would be no. She knew the answer would be no. It always was. The former Fragments never remembered. They had to be taught all over again who they were, if they wanted to be. They never forced anyone to relearn who they were if they didn’t want to.

”No…” he said softly, and Raea felt a tear drop to her cheek. Of course he didn’t. She knew he wouldn’t. She hadn’t realized how close he had gotten until his thumb lightly brushed off the tear that had fallen with his thumb. She looked up at him then, summer blue eyes scared and vulnerable. It simply made him want to protect her from everything. And he would. ”But I want to learn…if you’ll teach me Raea Love”

Raea didn’t question how he had known to call her that. How he had known her nickname. It didn’t matter, it wasn’t important. His words were what were important. Raea launched herself at him, wrapping her arms around him tight, and then she truly did cry, but she was happy…oh so happy…

They all had a new start.

[Crissatha Pandora]

Epilogue

I was attempting to write new battle plans around the cuteness that was Raea attempting to reteach Pride everything. It was cute to watch because she was the happiest I had seen her in months. But it was also very distracting. I had somehow managed to get voted onto the council that ran our new city. Mostly because I had ran the crew that everyone was crediting with gaining back the city I supposed. I sighed, pushing back the long black hair that was always getting in the way of my sapphire eyes as I tried to work.

I wanted to figure out the best method to identify every former Fragment. We needed to get all our citizens back in working order and figure out how to get this city running like a real place again. It was no easy task, but as my girls like to tease me…if anyone could do it, it would be me.

I was just happy to have Raine back. With her back, my smile was back too. It was she, she was the one who was always so important to me. My best friend. And she still danced, I swore that it was in her very soul, not her brain or her gene pool.

It had been amusing to reteach her everything. Some things I couldn’t help with, she had always been secretive, so some things were simply lost to her.

That was when another person interrupted me. ”Ugh!” I growled, throwing up my hands. I gave up! ”What is it?!” I asked impatiently. And of course it was a fucking male who had to come in and interrupt me. Of course it was. No good meddling…

I sighed and pushed back to stand up out of my chair, utterly frustrated.

I gave up. I’d plan later when everyone else in this damn city was asleep and unable to bother me!

He told me what was wrong though, and I forgot my frustration. There had been movement in the central tower. Someone had been in there. That place was off limits. For one real reason, and one real reason only.

When we had first explored the city, of course we had gone looking for Cris. She was our teammate, with all the Fragments free again, we figured we could find her first and get her back so that way we could have the whole team back together.

Well we found her.

In a scorched and broken to bits room she stood there, with the Puppeteer, in his arms. They were locked forever in an embrace. Why do I say forever? Well…they were made of ice. Entirely of ice, see through. It wasn’t like they had been frozen, it was more like there were very detailed ice scuptures of them standing in front of us.

I had been tempted to smash the one of him, safe to say.

Unfortunately, it would have been impossible to smash him without smashing her. There was no way we could come up with to set her free. No one had an ability left over from being a Fragment that could bring her back to life, trust me we looked.

Instead we had decided to set the temperature in the Central building to below zero and allow them to stay there for as long as possible. We knew it was impossible to stay there forever, eventually they would melt, but we wanted to keep them for as long as possible. None of us had been willing to move her or let her melt.

We had made Central off limits to keep someone from disturbing her. If anyone had I was going to kick their asses.

So I had stalked down there, shivering when the change in temperature made me. I had stalked up to the room they were being kept in…and panicked when nothing was there.

Where was she?

Noise was coming from above me. But the only thing above me was the roof! Who the hell was up there? If they had the ice sculpture that was my friend up there I was going to kill them!

I ran up there, safe to say.

And froze when I saw…what I saw.

A girl with black and red hair stood on the roof, and pushed back a boy with brown hair away from her. He stumbled a bit and flailed, trying to keep his balance without falling over, only to fail and fall over.

And they were laughing.

[Crissatha Pandora]

Cris's Epilogue, cause my mind keeps convincing me to write more...

Some people said that ignorance was bliss.

I was trying to decide if I believed them.

On one hand, there was no pain of the past…and trust me, I’ve been told there was pain in the past. On the other, I really sucked at being patient and letting everyone else explain my life to me. Half the time I wanted to tell them to fuck off and let me figure it out myself, even though I knew I wouldn’t.

See, my memories may be gone, but my personality hasn’t changed a bit. Well, at least according to…oh good Goddess her name….right, Raea. I’ve never been good with names to start with, that one I figured out. How? Well…Central used to be my home. And like any other fourteen year old girl, I kept a journal.

It’s how I know about my mother. It’s why I’m glad I can’t even remember her face let alone half of the things described in those pages.

Considering this mess is all my mother’s fault, it’s a wonder that no one blames me. But then again…I snuck down to the basement and saw all the old news reels, I know now I used to defy her every chance I got and I’m very proud of myself.

It was weird to see the me of before as separate from me now, but it’s easier to move forward if it’s like that. I’m told that when I was first…unfrozen, I knew more and I told Seph, the girl with the long black hair, what I knew before it faded from my brain. I don’t even have a dim recollection of that now. I feel like a blank slate.

Well, not entirely blank.

There’s one thing that I do remember, almost in crystal clear detail. It’s him. I don’t remember how we met, I don’t remember what happened after that. I just remember him and I know that I love him. That’s about it, but it’s enough for me. I know he was…different for a while, and that’s why people avoid him now. But it doesn’t matter to me what they think or what they say. I only know a thing or two, and those things I do know I’m going to hold on to as tightly as I can.

I like to think a lot these days, off on my own.

Often I find myself sitting up on the roof of the central tower, my legs hanging off the edge even though there are no rails for me to catch hold of if I slip and there are no hand holds on the smooth floor I sit on. I just like the danger. And I wonder if I used to like that before too.

I kicked my legs against the side of the building, staring off into the distance, lost in thought and not paying much attention, which is probably how I missed someone sitting down next to me.

His long black hair swayed back in the wind, same as mine did, and sapphire blue eyes shone with a bit of amusement as he looked at me with an arched brow. ”What’s with you and roofs these days?” he asked, chuckling a bit. And instinctively I knew he was asking what I was thinking without really thinking. We never talked about the deep stuff, just laughed and joked and shrugged it all off. He had told me this a few days ago and it had resonated truly within me.

That was the thing about us former Fragments, I was beginning to notice. We knew when something was right. It just…felt right, struck true and then it stuck, like we had always known it. It was a funky little thing, but it seemed to be helping a lot of us adjust.

”Well you know me, best view of the sunset. What about you, come to practice your Rapunzel bit?” There was another thing about what he had told me about who I used to be. It came as naturally to me as breathing to sit here and tease him and have him tease me back. It just felt so…right.

Almost as right as watching the tiny one, Ki I thought, drop paint on people from the roof. Almost as right as Raea telling them to behave and try to touch it down. Almost as right as sitting with Justin and putting my head down on his shoulder.

It just clicked.

He laughed, the sound booming and echoing across the city, we were at the highest point in the whole place after all. ”Yeah, something like that” he replied, laughter still in his voice and it made me smile to hear it. His laughter was a noise that I liked. ”Also, I figured you deserved this” he said, sliding a guitar case carefully over towards me, keeping it away from the edge.

He had come here a few days ago. He said it was when word of what had happened to me had reached him. I also was keeping him away from Justin, seeing as he had punched the other boy when they had first come in contact. Apparently Marluxia knew the whole story because I had told him over the time that I had known him. He had been filling me in bit by bit, stopping when I got too distressed.

I understood where his anger came from, I just didn’t want him to do anything about it. Was that wrong? I didn’t think so. I liked them both, so I could play buffer for now. Hopefully eventually the anger would subside. Something in me, a piece that was buried and slowly coming more and more to light as the days passed, said this wasn’t going to happen and I shouldn’t hold my breath.

”What…is it? I asked carefully, my hands moving over the case that seemed so familiar, and yet so unfamiliar at the same time. It was mine. I was certain of it. I just didn’t know….what to make of it. I couldn’t tell you what type or color or make the guitar inside was.

”Crimson,” he answered as I pulled the black and red acoustic from his hiding place. It slid into my lap like it had been made to go there and I took a deep breath, my eyes drifting close.

”Yes” I breathed in reply. It was just…right. Yes. This was my guitar. My Crimson. My baby. My escape and my release.

I ran my fingers over the strings, and tugged my fingers into the thick bracelet cuff that enveloped my right wrist, just knowing what was there. It always was. I always tucked it there. My mind didn’t know that, but it was so routine for my hands they did it of their own accord. Like tying my shoes. Which was how I knew my pick, guitar pick that is, was tucked away in the underside of my bracelet in a pocket specifically made to hold it.

Experimentally I strummed Crimson and could have groaned at how awesome the pure sound felt to my ears. And he laughed. So I shoved him. And he just shook his head.

”Okay you, lets remind you how to play” he said gently, shifting closer so that way he could get a good grip on what I was playing. And he showed me.

I knew soon enough my music would fill this damn city.

[ℛeesa ℒuna]

((Rather than take up another thread with this, I'm simply gonna put it here in continuation. This is NOT Broken, this is it's sequel, Shattered. Because it won't get out of my head that the story's not done yet. Thank you, enjoy))

SHATTERED

We had thought we had fixed the problem.

It had seemed like it anyway, I mean, how were we supposed to know that the microchips hadn’t been destroyed, just short circuited for a time? Great, thanks for letting me know I killed myself for nothing. It had been a year, most of us had finally managed to get our memories back. Well, there were exceptions here or there because it was always hard to tell whether a person had it all back or not. Not everyone had someone who knew everything about them to fill in the pieces, like me. There are times I had alone with other people who were Fragmented too that I will never get back. But I’m not bitter, it just means I get to make new memories, right? I have been telling myself anyway.

It started off gradually.

It was just a “tip of the tongue” syndrome for a while. Given, most of us aren’t entirely sure of what we know just yet, even though it has been a year, so we’re a little shaky as is. So no one thought it was too suspicious. Hell, even I didn’t think it was suspicious because it had happened to me a time or two over the year I was re-learning things.

It was when people lost their entire memories that we knew something was wrong. We called it the “Fragment Disease” and the former Fragments were constantly paranoid that it would hit them, myself included. To lose everything we had finally gotten back? It was a scary thought. Raea in particular kept a very close eye on Pride. None of our Group seems that bad just yet, it’s hitting the people who were fragmented longer worse. Which brings us to Ki’s spaz out. She finally finds her sister only to realize she may lose her, I’d be spazzed too. May’d been Fragmented a long time after all, nearly two years. Trust me, I kept a close eye on Justin too. I wasn’t all that worried for myself…I had only been Fragmented a few hours before we shut down the process after all.

That wasn’t the worst part though, oh no. That was a walk in the park compared to what started to happen next. But we didn’t know it would happen, so we kept on moving all those who got Fragment Disease to the Central tower and keeping them there so the scientists we had left could keep an eye on them and try to figure this out. They had created the Fragment process after all, we figured if we gave them time they would piece it back together. All a matter of time and all that. We were just scared because, this time, the Fragments weren’t picking things back up.

Can you tell I’m avoiding getting to the worst part? I am. It scares the hell out of me. I know I just said it’s unlikely that I’d ever catch this damn thing, but still. I’m still afraid this will happen to me. I worked too long to find my own personality and then lose it and then gain it back to want to lose it again!

Let me explain. As much as I don’t want to…

Someone figured out how to fix Fragment’s Disease before we did. Only, it wasn’t one of ours, not someone from our fair City or from the people who stayed at Utopinot. It’s someone else, we don’t know who. All we do know is that he or she is not using their powers for good.

He’s been rewiring them different, programming different memories in and making people entirely different. He’s been taking them, changing them, and using them. I’m scared I’ll be next.

We only know because someone managed to get back, and they weren’t themselves at all. We don’t even know how they came back! We’re grateful for it though. But no matter how much we increase the security around Central, people keep disappearing, our people. And we don’t know who will be next….

------------------------

The whispering stopped when Seph entered the room. The stern girl had been even more withdrawn since Raine had gotten the Disease. Seth was still okay, which was good for her sanity, but Raine was pretty far gone. She barely even remembered her best friend and they all knew it had been taking a toll on their fearless leader. It was too much for one girl, barely 21, to be on the Council that ran the town, manage the top Rebel crew, and worry about her best friend’s mental state. She had been snapping quicker, getting more easily angry, and pulling out her sword quicker, which, knowing Seph, was quick to begin with. It had all of the crew on edge.

Lightning skirted away from the door to sit closer to Cris and Ki. She was one of the newest additions to the crew, seeing as she had been a City born who had never made it to Utopinot when all the chaos had gone down. They had taken her in when she had proved her worth to the crew. And she was so not facing Sephora’s wrath. ”So…who’s gonna tell her?” Lightning asked the Twins warily.

In the corner, Raea was cuddled up on Pride’s lap who held her close, protectively. He had no intentions of letting go of his girl, especially now when there was a chance he could forget everything again. Raea looked up from her conversation with her love to realize Seph had entered their common room and paled a bit. ”Don’t look at me!” she said. She loved Seph, she didn’t want to be on the end of her sword was all.

Seph frowned and looked at each and every one of her team mates. What the heck were her nutjobs up to now? She didn’t like how none of them would catch her gaze, so she brought her hand up to her face, pinching the bridge of her nose in frustration. She needed to get more then three hours of sleep if this was what she had to deal with every day. ”Someone tell me whatever it is that you’re trying to keep from me.” she stated, frustrated beyond all belief. She had just come from another Council meeting where nothing had gotten done or decided and all those self conscious, pompous old asses had been doing was yelling and trying to cover up their own asses.

Enter Sephora’s frustration.

No one answered, each holding up their hands to fend off the need to. In the end, it was Red who sighed and stood, figuring it was up to her to share their little batch of news. While Sephora had been in her meeting, a messenger had come and shared a bit of news with them they knew Seph wouldn’t take well.

”Seph, it’s Raine” Red said simply, not flinching from Seph’s newly steeled gaze. She planted her feet and wouldn’t step back. ”She’s been taken.”