The Virgin Sea

[Grim Wolf]

Footsteps in the sand.  Someone coming closer.  Wrong way for Isabel.  Who?  Tyler and Keith?  God I hope it's Tyler and Keith.

It wasn't.  It was...uh...Reagan?  That couldn't be right, Reagan was a president.  But there were Washingtons and Harrisons and...it could be Reagan, right?  But what was the first name?  What was...

She was still sobbing as the thoughts battered back and forth across her weary skull.  God, it shouldn't have ended this fast.  One swift fall.  One swift blow.  And Lily...

Oh, God, but it hurt to be alive.

Reagan dropped to her knees and began to treat her wound.  She asked if Lizzie was okay.

And Lizzie laughed, and immediately sobbed, because laughing made her abs move and moving her abs she felt in her belly wound and another wave of hot exhaustion swept over her, and Reagan pressed her hands against the wound and offered her a bloody ibuprofen model and Lizzie took it gratefully, swallowing down a handful of the pills and sinking back against the sand.

"Okay," she repeated, after she'd quieted and Reagan had started some attempt at a dressing, as though it mattered.  Lizzie suddenly understood why animals crawled off to die by themselves: because they knew it was coming.  They could feel it, just like she could feel it.

Dying.  After all of this, dying.

"Not..." she said.  "So...I was so..."  Tears in her eyes again, shame rather than pain.  So fucking stupid.

"How can people like her..."  Lizzie closed her eyes.  "How can they be...real."

Isabel.  Nancy.  Alex.  And Lily, too.

It was an effort to raise her hand, but she did it.  She grasped at Reagan.  "Thank you," she mumbled.  "Thank you so..."  Tears in her eyes again.  She'd been so in pain and so afraid, dying alone and in agony while a merciless killer and her cowardly cousin looked on and carved her up.  But now...now there was someone else here.  Someone helping her.

There was so much more pain in the world than she'd known.  So much more kindness, too.  And so much more love, if Tyler Yazzie was any indication.  So much...

So much she'd never get to see.

She started crying again, a little softer this time.  She didn't want to die.

[MK Kilmarnock]

"Who were they?" Coleen swallowed the lump in her throat. She was not allowed to cry, for this was Lizzie's time. All she was here for was a strong shoulder and a firm grip. There for a pill or three and a compress on the wound. Somebody to talk to.

She didn't know how to react to being thanked. If only the cold truth of the inevitable weren't so near, it'd be a moment for hearts to swell in shared compassion. She just wanted Lizzie to feel better, to stop feeling pain. A silent voice inside her own head that dared not make itself known mentioned that the only way for Lizzie's agony to check out early was through a bullet, but such a dark song never ran across the conscious meter. The suffering was an inevitable cruelty, then, and so in apology, Coleen took up Lizzie's hand.

She smiled again. "Hey... just chill out. I think I've stopped the bleeding... so. So." Coleen strung lie after lie and hung them like a pearl necklace across Lizzie's breast. "Just shut your eyes and rest for a bit. We can talk more about this after you wake up. 'Kay?"

She squeezed her fingers gently.

[Grim Wolf]

"Who where they? she asked.

Lizzie fought to get her crying under control, but found she couldn't.  She couldn't even take deep breaths: every time she did, she cut herself off in a short gasp as a new, fresh pain tore its way out from her guts.  

"Lily," she grunted.  "And...Isabel, but...but...!"

Crying again, harder, and trying to fight it because it just hurt worse and Reagan's hand was clasping hers and she squeezed as tight as she could and that didn't feel very tight at all.

"How could she," she mumbled.

And Reagan was whispering soothing nothings Lizzie almost didn't understand, and she hurt so much and she felt so weak and the world was fading into the dark

after you wake up

That sounded nice.  Sleep sounded nice.

after you wake up

but there's not...gonna be an...af...ter...

She shook her head.  "N..." she started, a low, climbing wheeze.  "N...not..."

Not like this.  She didn't want to die like this, falling asleep besides the beach.  And why not, Lizzie?  What's it matter now?

She could hear the ocean, the surf sweeping back and forth.  Somewhere out there was the world she'd never get to see.

Her grip tigthtened still harder on Reagan's hand.  Her eyes fluttered open, and she found to her horror that she could barely see Reagan's face.  Everything was dark.

"Help..."  She said.  "Help me...up.  I wanna..."  Trailed off, fought for breath, fought against pain and weakness.  "If I'm gonna...I wanna...out there."  She jerked her head towards the sound of the sea, wincing at the echoes of dim and distant pain it stirred across her stomach and shoulder.

[MK Kilmarnock]

"I... okay."

Coleen left her gun where it was for the moment. There was nobody around to take it but Lizzie. All the rifle knew how to do was to kill, and there was nobody to kill, not anymore. She held tight to Lizzie's hand, scooping the other hand down to try and support the back of her shoulder. Lizzie was not necessarily heavy but she was weakened, hardly able to sit up, let alone stand, and Coleen never thought much of her own strength.

She thought of the two names Lizzie croaked out. She said one with more... more pain than the other one. Lily... did she know a Lily? Was it Lili Wiliams, or Lily Caldwell? Caldwell was one of the Luz family, making her... like her step-sister or her cousin or something. Coleen was an outsider looking in and never once attempted to understand that family tree when she had a large enough family of her own to help take care of. Both of the girls were Juniors as well, so she didn't know much about them aside from Williams' musical talent and Caldwell's relation.

Didn't really matter now. She'd get her answer to that question when the next announcements played, telling of Lizzie's murder. Probably right around the time it spoke of Arthur's.

"I think we got you... can you stand?" Coleen asked, her arms still supporting much of Lizzie's weight. "Here, I won't let go until..."

[Grim Wolf]

It was hard to stand, harder than she'd ever imagined it could be.  Everything hurt, everything ached, everything felt weak and wrong, like she was dehydrated and sunburnt after a long hike in the baking Arizona sun except it was her very bones that felt sunburnt and she had no convenient comparison for the aching hole in the pit of her stomach, carved into her by a woman who'd claimed it was fun.

Standing was hard.  Walking was harder.  But Reagan propped her up, kept her from tumbling to the sand.  Lily leaned heavily on the other woman. "I won't let go until..."

Until, right.  Until.  Big things beyond that until.  Until.  After.  Unless there was no after.  Unless it was 'until oblivion.'

She didn't want to stop thinking.  She didn't want to stop living.  Even now, with these coals burning in her belly, she didn't...

The ocean washed against her feet, a shock of bright cold against her darkening thoughts.  She welcomed the sudden clarity, even as she stumbled, but Colleen kept her upright.  They waded deeper, and it cost her everything to keep moving.  She couldn't think.  She couldn't...

Deeper, and they hesitated for a moment, both afraid of what the sea might do to her wound.  But the ocean took that choice from them: an unexpected wave caught them, and salt stang at her wound, and she gave a low, guttural moan as the pain rose through her, reached into every part of her, but with that wave suddenly she felt lighter, and it was a little easier now.  She sank into the water, and waved off Reagan's attempts to help her with her good arm.

"It's okay," she gasped.  "It's okay."

She was awake.  She was dying.  But she felt so much more alive now.  So much clearer.

"Tyler Yazzie," Lizzie said.  "And Keith...uh..."  Shit, she couldn't remember his last name.  Christ, how had she gotten here?  Talking to a known killer, because she had to know.  Torn apart.  Dying.  Nothing learned.  Nothing gained.  Except now she knew there were true monsters in the world.  The kind that had to be killed.

Thoughts drifting away.  Focus.  Reagan's face was a lot clearer now.  She tried and failed to smile, as the water rubbed her wounds.

"If you see'em," she said.  "Tell'em...tell'em I'm sorry.  Tell'em...I wanted to see'em before..."

Before the end.  Before...

"And that these people, they don't..."  She didn't know what word she was looking for.  "People like Isabel," Lizzie said.  "They're monsters that need to be..."

Another wave knocked her backwards, and now she was floating, and that felt so much better, even her wound hurt less. Reagan moved to help her, and Lizzie shook her head.

"S'okay," she said.  "It's...really.  It's..."  She managed to smile this time.  "This is how I...I want to be here, until..."

Until.

"Thank you," she said, and found she was crying again, tears mingling with the ocean that was taking her blood out into the tide.

Sometime later--she didn't know how much time had past, as she floated and half-heartedly tried to move farther out towards the sea--Reagan was gone, and Lizzie was alone.  More alone than she'd ever been in her life.  No family nearby.  No friends.  A wound in her belly, from the woman who'd killed Tina.  Another in her shoulder, from Lily.  How had she...how...

There was so much out there!  People she hadn't kissed, people she hadn't met, family she'd never really talked to, friends she'd never make!  Lakes she'd never swim in, forests she'd never walk through, fields of golden grass she'd never daze and doze in.  Whole Doctors whose faces she'd never know!  And maybe there was something big around the bend, maybe there was heaven or hell or reincarnation, but fuck that noise.  She wanted to be here.  She wanted to be alive.

She was crying.  Had she ever stopped?  Here, in this infinite ocean, blood and tears tethering her to that infinity, that big big universe so close and so far away, but that was stupid, that was meaningless, because it was just so much fluid and soon she would be dead.

There hadn't been any answers.  There hadn't been anything.  She'd never found Nancy.  She'd never said goodbye to Lettie.  She'd never said goodbye to Tyler or Keith.  she'd never...

She wanted her chance.  She deserved her chance.  Her story wasn't over.  She'd wanted to go everywhere.  She'd wanted to...she still wanted to...

Floating in the sea, crying, and her wound didn't hurt anymore, and it was strangely hard to see.  And Tyler Yazzie was grieving somewhere behind her, and Keith would be looking forlornly out and thinking of the things he'd wanted to achieve, and Lily would wander with that murderous monster until she was killed in turn and Lizzie was gonna die here, all alone.  

She'd wanted so badly to feel like she was a part of something.  She'd wanted so badly to find the answer.  She'd wanted so badly to find that laughing lunacy that had propelled her for the first day, when she'd felt exhilarated by what was in front of her, exhilarated by the tightrope swing.

But the tightrope had snapped, and she was falling, and...and...

She'd lied to Reagan.  It wasn't okay.  This wasn't how she wanted to die, because...

I don't want to go.

G024 LIZZIE LUZ: ELIMINATED

[MK Kilmarnock]

She watched, wordlessly, until Lizzie had almost completely disappeared into the waves.

Though it crossed her mind, no attempt was made to stop her. How could she? Lizzie wished to die on her own terms, taking what little freedom was afforded to her. Coleen hoped that, whatever happened behind that dark veil called death, Lizzie had found what she was looking for away from here. The only solace, she figured, was that Lizzie wasn't in pain anymore.

Oh, how she hoped that was true, but pain didn't just come from bleeding wounds. There was a deeper, lasting trauma in her words as she spoke. The speech of the dying in theatre did no justice to the genuine article; it was often peaceful and resigned, serene for an audience, tending to add to the tragedy of the scene. Even many of the greatest actors alive would be put to shame by Lizzie's agony.

Coleen had turned away from the beach and picked up her things. Lizzie was out there in the ocean, dying alone as she intended. A ghostly girl walked along the very same shore on her first day with the wind to her back. Maybe she could understand how Lizzie thought, maybe she could feel the way she felt before she took matters into her own hands.

But this is where they parted ways.

Coleen brushed the tears away from her eyes with her sleeve that became increasingly dirty and stained over all the days that she wore it and pressed on.

((Coleen Reagan continued in With Blood and Rage of Crimson Red...))