Copperhead
Over the days before the mutiny, I visited Olivia as often as I could. I brought her school assignments, as well as the occasional snack, staying to chat if time permitted. Nurse Moe would take notice of my frequenting the infirmary, and hug me. I’m not sure if the two events are correlated; he just hugs people a lot.
I don’t know why Olivia and I talked. All she ever asked about was Grady.
But not today, it seemed. I walked into the infirmary with a crepe and flowers for her bedside.
“Hug attack!”
Now, I consider myself one of the courageous few at Pierpoint. But the thought of a hug attack from Nurse Moe was enough to make mountain lions tremble. As well as regular lions. And mountains.
With no time to dodge, I braced myself.
Something soft squished against my face, something...comforting in warmth. I looked up and realized what it was.
“Olivia!” I scrambled backwards, turning red.
The Shark flipped her golden hair over her shoulder, smirking. “What’s up, Nick?”
I shook my head, banishing the heat from my cheeks. “N-nothing...you just caught me off-guard.” My gaze slowly fell from Olivia’s eyes to her chest, which had been pressed against my face a few moments ago. At least this time, she’s fully clothed, I thought while tugging at my collar.
“Hey.” Olivia put her hands on her hips, leaning forward. “You alright in there?”
Crimson blood rushed to my cheeks as I nodded.
“Rather,” I said, clearing my throat, “you’re able to walk now?” A grey medical boot was strapped over her broken leg.
“Yep!” Olivia twirled on her good foot, grinning. “Nurse Moe says I’ll make a full recovery. Just a few more days with this thing, and I’ll be ready to go!”
I smiled before realizing that I wasn’t supposed to be able to.
“But enough about me.” Olivia walked forward awkwardly, grabbing my hand. “There’s something I wanna show you. Come on!” She limped quickly out of the infirmary, dragging me with her.
Not three feet out the door, she tripped over her boot and fell flat on her face. “Uwaah…” she moaned.
I crouched beside her, prodding her shoulder. “Perhaps you could direct me, and I could go myself?”
She uprooted her head from the floor, eyes lighting up. “Or…”
-------------------
“...Ah…”
“Ufufu...getting a little hot, Nick?” Olivia played with a lock of my ebony hair, stroking my head.
“S-sorry...I’ve never done this before.”
“Just relax, and let me show you the way.” Olivia’s body pressed against mine, making my heart race with excitement.
“Ah...I’m gonna…!”
I collapsed into the Academy workshop, crashing onto the floor. “Die,” I finished weakly.
“Meanie.” Olivia stuck her tongue out and leaped off of my back. “Girls are sensitive about their weight, you know.”
“My muscles are just as sensitive because of yours.” I stood up, rubbing the base of my spine. “Was it really necessary to give you a piggyback ride down here?”
“You’re just weak.” Olivia crossed her arms and huffed. “You’re not going to get a girlfriend like that, Nick.”
“Madame Haley, I believe in my own inner beauty, like a gem waiting to be discovered.”
She grinned, averting her gaze cheekily. “You don’t have that, either.”
I whistled, recoiling a bit. “Touche, my friend.” Placing my hands on my hips, I looked around the workshop. It was a bit of a mess, with sawdust and steel scraps strewn over machinery and ashen furnaces. This part of Pierpoint was mostly used for wood and metalworking, for those who enjoyed crafting swords of malice and chairs of villainy. Understandably, it was a bit less popular than most other areas of the school. Today, it was deserted.
I turned back to find Olivia staring at me, smirking. “What?” I asked.
“Just now. You called me your friend, didn’t you?” Olivia leaned forward, rubbing her chin.
I immediately realized my mistake. “It’s just a figure of speech,” I backpedaled, waving my hands and clearing my throat. “A mockery, even. You should be insulted. Can’t you even understand that, you moron?” I suddenly noticed how untended the machinery was, and began to clean it absentmindedly.
Olivia shrugged lightly. “I guess it was too much to hope for. Anyway, wait here.” She patted my shoulder and disappeared into the shop’s project room. I kept my head down and scrubbed the drills.
“Stupid, stupid, stupid,” I murmured to myself. The word had slipped out, without a thought. It was unthinkable that I, Copperhead, could have made such a mistake. But what would that mean if it wasn’t?
A clang of metal and a hushed yelp of pain sounded from the back of the workshop. I raised an eyebrow before shaking my head and returning to my work.
No, friends and family were concepts beyond me. I had decided that long ago, when I’d listened to that useless label echo from my psychiatrist’s mouth. Psychopath. I’d decided it when I’d tapped that cursor icon and let the bombs drop. Psychopath. I’d decided it when I’d looked upon the scorched earth and smiled. Psychopath. I’d decided it when I showed my handiwork to my mother, raising the warm metal tablet to her horrified face. When she called me a monster, with those disgusted eyes that seemed will my soul to rot. Psycho-
Something crashed over my head, jarring me momentarily. Strong arms wrapped around me from behind, restricting my movement. Panic ricocheted through my body as the strange device was adjusted further onto my skull.
I struggled and lashed out backwards, but my muscles were too weary from carrying Olivia. Olivia. If they were here for me, they’d take her too... assuming they hadn’t already.
But the thoughts were futile, and I finally fell still in my assailant’s arms. Olivia. After all this, such a simple thing would be the end of Copperhead Hewitt. So be it. I closed my eyes and waited for the darkness swallow me whole.
“And...done.”
A hand held up a mirror in front of me, while another lifted my chin up to gaze into it. “Ta-da!”
Olivia grinned as I gazed into the mirror at a strange thing indeed. A bronze helmet adorned my head, with small, sharply contoured horns sticking out of the top. A triangular plate came down just above the eyes, giving the whole helmet a sharp and menacing look, and the cheek plates tapered into points that angled down like fangs.
My eyes widened with realization. The entire helm was a bronze snake head. No, not merely bronze, but a-
“Copperhead!” Olivia hugged me from behind. “Happy birthday!”
“B-birthday?” I tugged the helmet over my eyes. “That’s ridiculous. It’s not my birthday.”
“I know,” Olivia purred. “But I still want to give this to you.” She tilted the helmet up to give me a full view. “So, what do you think?”
I hid my face with my hand. “What do I think? A person with your breast size really should be more careful about how they hug people.”
She quickly pulled out of the embrace, a bit embarrassed. Dispelling the heat from my blood, I walked forward and turned to face her. Pulling the helmet off, I shook out my black hair, which had been sufficiently ruffled during the frenzy. Holding the copper head in one hand, I regarded it discerningly. “Did you make this yourself?”
She saluted, grinning. “Aye, sir!”
“I thought so,” I said, turning the strange helm in the light. “It has all the markings of an amateur.”
Her lower lip began to tremble. I realized with a start that I’d saddened her with my remark.
“O-of course, that’s not to say it’s bad,” I put in hurriedly. I regarded the helmet again, pushing appreciation to the surface. “Rather, it’s quite a fine piece. Very...original.
“And, er...it’s appreciated.” I looked at the floor again. “This is the first birthday present I’ve ever received. So, as one who could feel would say,” I mumbled, glancing up at her, “thank you.”
“Aw, you’re sweet.” Olivia walked forward, towering over me. I realized just how short I was compared to her. “But there’s one more present for me to give to you.” Leaning down, she planted a kiss on my cheek.
I stared at her blankly for a moment. She smiled back, angelic and blissful.
Quickly realizing what had happened, I jammed the helmet over my head, hiding my face. “Wh-wh-wha-wha-what was that for?” I stammered, my cheeks scorching.
Olivia drew back, her expression confident. “I guess that confirms it.”
I looked up at her curiously. “Confirms what?”
Her eyes shone as she returned my gaze. “I’ll definitely be able to get Grady now!”
My blood turned to ice and shattered in my chest. “Ah,” I swallowed dryly.
Olivia twirled around, grinning. “Yes!” she said, pumping her fist, “he’s definitely going to notice me!”
“That’s...wonderful.” The word felt hollow, lurching out of my mouth from a leaden tongue. I searched numbly for something to say. “Indeed, your techniques are at an unprecedented level of seduction. I’ve trained you well,” I added, shading my eyes in what looked like a display of ego.
“Spare me.” Olivia smirked, looking more beautiful by the second. “Ah,” she sighed, “I’ll finally be his lover, after all this time!”
I nodded, not showing her my face. “They say that love would be worthless were it not hard-earned.”
“Isn’t it though?” Olivia laughed, releasing wave upon wave of relief. “Thank you so much, Copperhead!”
Copperhead. I shifted the helmet uncomfortably. That’s right, that was my name. My own personal moniker of terror. “I suppose even psychopaths can be of some use in the way of love,” I joked, my teeth locked in a rigid smile.
“Alright.” Olivia put on a look of adorable confidence. “Starting tomorrow, I’m going after him with all I’ve got!”
A slight dip of my chin served as a sign of consent, of my blessing. “Excellent. I have confidence in your attractiveness.”
“Thanks to you, so do I.” Olivia walked forward and patted me on the head affectionately. Giving me one last smile, she began to stagger out of the workshop.
“Are you sure you don’t need me to carry you?” I called.
“Nope! I gotta stand on my own two feet!”
I stayed silent as she left, her uneven footsteps echoing down the hall. My eyes were fixated on the floor, on the earth that seemed to be shifting beneath my feet. “Yes,” I murmured eventually, “you must stand without me.”
A saccharine voice chuckled around me. “Ouch. Now that must have hurt.” The voice seemed to come from nowhere, reverberating from everywhere. I whipped my head around, searching for the intruder. The lights shut off, leaving me in distorted darkness. The furnaces roared to life, crackling blood-red laughter and casting oblong shadows across the room. The machines seemed to loom ever-so-slightly in my direction, drill bits grinning silver.
“You poor, poor snake. What, did you swallow your own tail?” It came from behind me.
I whirled around, lashing out with my fist. Evangeline caught my hand casually, forcing it back. “Careful now.” Her icy blue eyes seemed to glow in the firelight. “We wouldn’t want you poisoning anyone else, now would we?”
She slammed her fist against my helmet, jarring me as the metal plates smashed against my skull. Her image swam, but her sharp-toothed grin was still crystal clear. “That girl...she’s weak, isn’t she?”
I recoiled slightly, growling. In a straight fistfight, I had no chance.
“Terribly, terribly weak,” Evangeline continued lustfully, her fingers curling strongly as though tightening around Olivia’s neck. She stared at me intently. “I wonder how long she’ll last?”
“Haven’t you read the novels, Lakewood?” I coughed, grinning. “Her love will empower her.”
“If you say so, Nicky.” Evangeline suddenly rushed forward, reaching out as if to snap my neck. Instead, she popped the helmet up, spinning it viciously around my head. I stumbled backwards, grabbing at the horns to stop the motion. Evangeline’s laughter echoed in my ears as I clutched at my copper head in the whirling bronze darkness.
Faintly, a new kind of laughter could be heard. Clear and bell-like. Olivia. Grady’s barking, brutal chortling mixed harshly with the voices, the cacophony seeming to form a sinkhole of noise around me. Slowly, the laughter deteriorated, melting into one long moan that rattled inside my bones.
Facing my snake head the right way, I glared out of the visor. The lights were back on, brightening the grey ash from the burned-out furnaces. The drills and saws were lying about, dull and rusty, and Evangeline Lakewood had disappeared into thin air.
“You’re one to talk, Lakewood,” I muttered, pulling the helmet off and walking back to the Shark bunker.
----------------------------
For such a pale man, Brandon Hayes had a surprising amount of blood inside him. It bubbled out through his throat, lacquering the table a dark scarlet. I thought briefly of wiping it away before deciding that Evangeline would approve of such macabre decor.
Since Will had taken Grady, and Evangeline was asserting her dominance, it fell to me to deal with the corpses. Luckily, the death count was low; I suspected that most Sharks had been expecting this outcome. The few loyal fools that charged Evangeline were dealt with by her personally. They made hideous cadavers.
I’d just finished loading them into body bags when William Black strolled back into the Alcove, flanked by two other Sharks. The two Sharks, I realized, who had helped Grady up after Will had defeated him in sparring class. As for Grady himself, it was all too easy to guess what had happened.
“Well, I’ve finished cleaning up your mess,” I said to Evangeline, who was balancing three knives on her fingertips. “May I be excused? I’m a busy man, you understand.”
She raised an eyebrow. “By busy, do you mean schoolwork, or terrorism?”
I winked uncharacteristically. “A little bit of both, Miss Lakewood.”
I walked out of the room and ascended the ladder, taking care not to get shot. It was a shame that Will had taken Grady. And judging by the video feed I received, it was a shame that Grady hadn’t died right with his brother.
I slid the pillar panel open to find Olivia’s face inches from mine.
Of course, she didn’t react much, merely smiling and offering a greeting. I returned it, just as cheerfully.
“Aren’t you a little vulnerable to be up and about so soon?” I asked, looking at the cast still on her leg.
“I just couldn’t wait to see him,” she gushed, looking past me. “Is he down there?”
I scratched the back of my head, unimpeded by the helmet. I’d left the accursed headpiece in my bed. “I’m afraid he left a while ago. I think he was headed for the woods.”
Her response was immediate, and expected. “Well, let’s go find him, then!”
I nodded, and we set off on our journey to find a man who was probably already dead.
-----------------------------------
Olivia trekked cheerfully through the woods, catching her boot on more than a few roots and stumps along the way. Each time she stumbled, she’d lean on me for support. She burned me at the touch.
The forest was littered with clawed, skeletal branches, but every now and then, a berry bush or some grass would pop up between the tree trunks. Even in a cluttered place like this, life could thrive.
I stepped away from Olivia for a moment, bending over to pick up a flower from the earth. Gently, I brushed my fingertips against its soft blue petals, marveling at its beauty. I plucked one neatly away, tossing the silky scrap to the earth. “Loves me…”
“Whatcha got there, Cop?” Olivia began to peek over my shoulder.
I quickly stashed the flower in my pocket. “Nothing,” I said, falling into step with her once again.
She giggled. “So, what do you think I should say to him? ‘Hello, Grady!’ Or maybe he’d like ‘Hey, Boss’! Or should I go for elegance, like ‘Greetings, my love’? What do you think, Copperhead?”
I responded dryly, “Maybe you should say, ‘Hey Grady, let’s XXX so we can XXX and you can XXX my XXX!’” I continued demonstrating this obscene suggestion with hand motions until Olivia turned beet-red and shut my mouth.
“Let’s...wait a little before doing things like that.” A shy blush tinged her cheeks. It seemed she still had a sense of shame.
“So be it.” I shrugged. I checked the footage on my tablet again. The emerald woods had a trick to them, the shaded earth navigable with practice. We were nearing the spot where Will had- oh, yes, that looked like a familiar sight.
A boy lay face-down in the sepia dirt beside a tree. The cameras I planted had been quite accurate; both images showed a well-built boy with thick brown hair, now unmoving.
Olivia’s scream reverberated through the forest, setting the leaves aflutter. I stooped calmly and poked the corpse in front of me. Twenty bullet holes pockmarked his clothes, most of them in the legs. The Ghost had tormented his prey before striking the killing blow.
He hadn’t been here for long. His blood was still a rich red, residue oozing from the holes in his body. I examined them coldly. “They entered from the back,” I realized. “He died trying to run away.”
“No! No! No!” Olivia screamed, yelling her throat raw. I looked up at her as she trembled, her slender fingers rifling through her golden hair.
She collapsed into the soil, burying her face in her hands. Grief poured out of her body, dimming the light of the forest. The leaves fell around her in a flurry, the high-boughed oaks weeping emerald.
I knelt there beside Grady’s body for a moment. Funny, how it used to be a living, breathing person. Now, he was extinguished like a candle, a waxen shell of a spirit set free. I brushed my fingers over his hand; death had already snatched the heat from his body.
“Grady,” Olivia sobbed, “why did they do this?” She spasmed violently, silver tears flying from her cheeks. She stared ahead as her eyes began to glaze over. “Grady…”
“Olivia,” I said, walking over. “Olivia, can you hear me?” She didn’t respond, kneeling lifelessly in front of me.
“Olivia,” I repeated, a bit more forcefully. Despite what most believed, it was possible to die of a broken heart, given extreme stress. A tic of annoyance registered in my mind that Grady would be the one to trigger it.
“Olivia. Olivia, you have to get up.” I snapped my fingers in her face, to no avail. This was bad. If she didn’t stand up now, she might never stand up again.
My fingers began to sweat. She needed a stimulus, something that would invoke a reaction. She needed to be reminded to live. I dove into my pockets, fishing for something, anything to ensure her survival.
“Look!” I cried, pulling the azure blossom from my jacket. “Olivia, you need to wake up. Yes, there’s sadness in death. But there’s beauty in life.” I held the flower in front of her eyes, a hopeful beacon of white and blue.
For a moment, nothing happened. Nothing moved, not she, nor I, nor time itself. Then, she blinked, eyes focusing. “What’s...that?” she asked.
Death’s cloak seemed to fall over me as well, more so than the corpse that lay at the base of the tree. My bones froze as I realized what I had pulled from my pocket along with the blossom. There, entangled in the blue petals of the flower, was a white slip of paper in Grady’s handwriting.
Olivia’s hand darted out and plucked the scrap from the flower. Loves me not. I stumbled back as she tore it open, unfolding it. I could see her eyes moving frantically about the page, her fingers clenching it tighter and tighter as the extent of my deceit was made known.
The note that Grady had entrusted to me. The note for Olivia. The note that I had selfishly hidden from them both. Olivia’s eyes devoured the words, her head shaking in disbelief.
“No...you mean...he...Grady.” Olivia slumped, her head hanging as the paper tumbled from her grasp. As it fell, the words upon the infernal page registered in my mind once more, and those horrid, noncommittal, completely pathetic four words bubbled to the surface. I care for you. Grady’s true feelings.
“You!” Olivia surged upwards, hands clenching around my throat. Her face twisted into a mask of fury as she tackled me into the dirt. The heavenly blue tumbled from my grasp as my back hit the earth. “I...I thought you cared about me! And then you did this?!?” she shrieked, jerking my head up before slamming it against the ground again.
I clutched at her fingers, desperately trying to pry them from my neck. I choked, “Olivia-”
“We could’ve been happy! I could have been in his arms right now! But you kept this from me! You kept me with you!” Olivia drew her fist back, and smashed it against my nose. Screaming, she pummeled my body, vicious blows connecting in a furious torment. Blood welled to my lips, choking me further as every part of me was dented and bruised by her hatred.
Eventually, Olivia raised both arms and pounded my chest, sobbing. “Is that all love is to you? Is it just a game?”
The laughter from before seemed to echo softly through my ears, the details blurring out as my mind was serenaded by gentle chaos. And then everything became so terribly, terribly loud.
She loomed over me, angelic hair hanging down, tousled and dirtied by madness. “You never even cared about me, you…you…” She gave me one final, disgusted look, narrowed eyes driving her fury into my heart. “Psychopath,” she spat.
The noise swelled to a fever pitch, and Olivia’s words mixed in with the chorus of dissonant cackling. Psychopath, they chanted. Psychopath. Psychopath.
Gradually, more voices began to swirl around me, hammering against my skull. My doctor’s. My mother’s. Psychopath. Evangeline’s. Brandon’s. Psychopath. Peter’s. William’s. Psychopath.
The sinister whispers picked up the pace as I lay there, trapped beneath Olivia’s body. The tempo spiraled into a wordless tumult of noise. Faintly, I could hear a kind of music, sliding in from the background. A lone violin, resonating through the chaos. The quick cuts of bow across string sliced across my mind as I writhed in the dirt.
Psychopath. The noise was deafening now, clouding my mind. Psychopath. Psychopath. The violin’s music could still be heard, the tones rippling through me. Psychopath. Psychopath. And soon, this too fell into disarray, a flurry of random notes playing havoc upon the air. Psychopath. Psychopath. Psychopath. Psychopath.
AHAHAHAHAHA!!!
Damning silence fell over me, and the voices dropped away, leaving a dull buzzing in my skull. “Huh,” I said, not looking Olivia in the eye. “So, I never even cared. Who knew?”
Grey, hazy memories seemed to fall away like cobwebs. The day we’d met, three years ago in battle class. The day she confessed her feelings (about Grady) to me, sitting around a small table at lunch. The day she made my name mean something. These dusty photographs were set ablaze by one, simple, apparent truth.
I was a psychopath. How could I ever have cared?
Lying in the dirt, I grinned bloodily up at the girl I once thought I loved. “It’s your own fault for trusting me.”
The knife sank into Olivia’s stomach up to the hilt. I pushed the cold steel into her body, relishing the warm red trickles that wetted my hand. Olivia gasped, struggling to keep her balance as my grin widened beneath her.
“Please. I’m the one can’t understand love?” I said, twisting the knife in her chest. My smile hardened into a grimace. “You don’t know what it’s like, not being expected to care. In fact, maybe this is why I chose not to care about people at all.”
I gritted my teeth, plunging deeper. “Because they think they can just treat me however they want. Am I human? Am I less than human? Or am I more?”
I laughed, wrenching the dagger out and stabbing upwards, making wound after horrid wound in Olivia’s body. “I don’t know. All I know right now is that I’m sick and tired of your crap.” I slashed the blade down her slender figure, defiling something once beautiful.
Olivia made a sorry attempt to explain herself, delicious blood dribbling from her lips. “Copperhead-”
I stabbed the knife in again. This time, I didn’t speak. The blade burst through Olivia’s neck, cutting off her words once and for all. The world seemed to hold its breath at that moment: Two killers lay on top of each other, one bruised and beaten, the other bloody and lovesick.
I yanked the knife out, allowing blood to spurt from Olivia’s throat. She swayed for a moment, tearing up from the pain, then, slowly, she began to fall.
She descended above me like a crimson angel. Rivers of red ran from everywhere, tainting her visage in all its shades. I nodded. There was nothing left of Olivia Haley. As of this moment, she was dead.
Olivia laid herself down on my chest, tears and blood staining my body. She pressed her lips against my cheek, leaving a mark of her own blood. “Sorry,” she croaked.
Overwhelming shame gripped me, lacing my blood with agony. Drops of emotion poured out, seeping uselessly into the earth. Shining droplets from her cheeks dripped onto mine, until I could no longer tell whose tears I was crying. I cried in floods of silver and red, even when I didn’t know why I was weeping. I wrapped my arms around Olivia, my friend, crushing her against me.
Eventually, Olivia’s body grew heavy, and her body relaxed for the last time. I lay beneath her until my heart grew numb with pain.
Gently, I pushed her off of me, letting her slide to the ground. Rising to my feet, I swayed as I surveyed the carnage. Blood was splattered over the earth for the trees to lap up hungrily with their roots. Grabbing the hand of the female corpse, I dragged her over to the male.
Propping them up against the tree, I laid their arms around each other in a demented puppet show. They flopped over one another lazily, their skin and clothes ripped and torn to crimson bits. I grinned, pocketing the knife again.
The smile was fake, like every other emotion I thought I once had. I crouched at the base of the trunk, staring at the girl’s face. I’d left it unmarked, since I’d remembered it being quite beautiful. As for the boy, the bullet hole through his cheek was a ghastly sight. But I could not feel hatred for it.
I sat down in front of them, my cadaverous audience. A gentle chuckle worked its way up from my chest. Then another. And another.
It was a low, easy laugh, resonating through the quiet forest. The sickening sound forced its way up from the depths of my soul, my voice thick with emotion, however happy or sad. It was an amiable tone, striking dissonant chords in all the wrong kinds of love.
I gazed at the corpses of Olivia and Grady, the three of us seated in our circle of companionship. “How tragic,” I mused. “This looks to be as close to human as I’ll get.” Then I leaned forward and wrapped them in a hug. They obliged, their spirits finally free of this accursed world, together at last.
“So long, my friends,” I whispered.
--------------------
I lumbered back into school, swaying through the hallways. I never imagined I could make so many girls faint with one look. Well, perhaps this method played to my strengths.
Dark red blood was spattered all over my clothes, most prominently my chest and head. My fingers tapped rhythmically at my leg as I walked, shaking a little as the thick, viscous liquid began to dry.
My head was tilted constantly down, only glancing up to see where I was going. I’d usually meet someone’s stare when I did this. Then they’d notice the crimson rivulets that ran from my eyes down my cheeks. Their subsequent expressions might once have amused me.
I made my way back to the Shark bunker, shooting Nurse Moe a sinister glare as I passed his office. He immediately fainted into the arms of one unfortunate student who was crushed beneath his bulk.
I wrenched the bunker door open, looking inside at the rows of iron beds. Some of the other Sharks were already back, so I assumed that Evangeline had finished her gloating.
Speaking of our glorious leader, she waltzed out of the bathroom at the end of the hall, tossing her cotton-candy-colored hair over her shoulder. She froze when she saw me.
“Copperhead?” Even she looked a little shocked at my gory visage.
I nodded vaguely. “...Yes.”
Grabbing my duffel bag from the bunk, I made to walk past her. No doubt, she noticed the lip mark on my cheek. Her eyes widened, but nothing more.
“I’m taking Brandon’s room,” I muttered to her, brushing by.
She cocked her head before shrugging. “Whatever.” I suppose she was a lot more used to seeing people like me.
People like me. Who was I kidding? There was nobody alive who could comprehend a murderous bastard such as I, and they obviously wouldn’t like me.
I opened the metal door wide, half-expecting a bikini-clad girl to come jumping out at me. Nobody was there. The bunker was kept neat and tidy, with a small bookcase in the corner.
I tossed my bag onto one of the mattresses apathetically. An odd hollowness seemed to embody the room, punctuated with dust that shone silver in the window's light.
Stalking out into the bunker, I fetched my helmet from my old bed. Tucking it under my arm, I walked back into my new room.
Sitting on the edge of a bed, I held the bronze helm out in front of me. It really was amateurish; but it showed potential. It was an excellent start, made with a painstaking amount of care. I was unable to purvey such feelings to its creator.
But I could improve it, this copper head. I could make it anew, and make it worth something more. Perhaps in the process, I could make myself anew as well.
I smiled softly as the sounds of laughter and violins overcame me once again.
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