TFS: Burnt Earth

Molly

We spend weeks watching her, from a safe distance. Phelan forbids us from shapeshifting, so we have to do all our patrols on foot. Fucking torture. If not for how guilty I know he feels for taking Sheyla’s energy, I’d put up more of a fight. Yeah, that’s a lie. Truth is, I don’t have the energy to fight. None of us do. Connor’s doubly low on energy since he was already on the withdrawal wagon prior to the mission.

The only one not experiencing the side effects of low reserves is Phelan, and he’s clearly not comfortable. It irritates me he’s wasting the joy juice with his self-loathing. Too bad he can’t just give over the energy to me. I’d slurp the hell out of those leftovers. I’m not a picky eater. If a meal is provided, I’m eating it. I give zero fucks where or who it came from. Food is food. Whether it’s supplementation (earth to fire) or augmentation (earth to earth) means fuck all to my craving. To be fair, the earth element tastes better. Obviously. It also lasts longer since it loses some of its efficacy when converted for use. What’s that saying? Eat to live, not live to eat. Some horseshit like that. It tracks.

Connor’s the main reason I’m dwelling on mealtimes again. He’s in the throes of a terrible withdrawal. Naturally, Shitface Sheyla can’t leave us alone to deal with that. She has to stick her nuisance nose into everything. When she isn’t doing that, she’s throwing her irrelevant dramas in our direction. Brody brought her here to the cabin as she’s in meltdown mode again. To make matters worse, he stuck me with babysitting her. Swear to fuck, I’m surrounded by imbeciles. I can’t even effectively babysit my brother, and I love him. What the fuck good am I to this ratty chew toy?

I sit on the opposite end of the couch glaring at her. Why hide it? She knows how I feel. We’re both thinking the same thing. Can we end this thing before Brody realizes what’s going on?

This girl’s been complaining about the fire since I met her. If she wants to give it away so bad, I’ll happily accommodate her. Just as I’m thinking through how best to action that, Connor lets out a pained whine from the bedroom, where Brody and Phelan are nursing him. They evicted me after my suggestion to shove a ball gag in his mouth. Said I wasn’t helping. Bullshit. Not hearing him helps.

Why are we all so miserable? Because of this bitch sitting next to me, oblivious to the wreckage she’s causing. She’s the reason for our suffering. I’m sick as fuck of all the sacrifices being made to keep her alive.

“Will they let me help him?” she asks quietly.

I full-on belly laugh. This girl. What a card. “As if you could legitimately help him.”

“I can at least make him comfortable,” she insists.

My sauce shooter is loaded and ready to blast her ass. “No, I don’t want you anywhere near him. He’s not in a controllable state right now. If something happened to you—”

“You could finally go home,” she cuts me off like the cunt she is.

I glare daggers at her. “If you think they’d let me walk away, after allowing you to sacrifice yourself, you’re a lot more stupid than you look.”

Her hair is frizz city. Seems she stuck her firework fingers in a light socket. Her makeup is smeared all to fuck too. She’s been crying, and she’s an ugly ass crier, so it’s legitimately pretty hard for her to be stupider than she looks. She deserves a special prize. Not talking about a helmet either. She doubles down on the bitch factor by making herself at home using our kitchenette to scrub her hot mess of a face.

Connor roars loud enough to rattle the windows. It sounds like he’s in labour. I reckon he’s giving birth to a giant shit right in the bed, along with his humanity. I’m not cleaning that mess up. Fuck that, fuck them, fuck this, and most of all, fuck her.

“You use the earth element,” she mumbles, more to herself than me. “Your specialization is fauna.”

I roll my eyes. “Yeah, you’re a regular rocket scientist.”

“Another fauna-user changed you, right? That doesn’t happen by chance. That’s calculated. All the Scouts display the same specialization. Tally’s power is different. It’s flora. She can grow living things or manipulate organic things.”

She’s annoying me with her theorizing. I fold my arms across my chest to keep from punching her into silence. Tyler’s tethers are the reason the Sentry all has the same power—shapeshifting. It doesn’t work that way with anyone else.

“You all ended up as land-walkers, despite their hopes to recondition some of you into the sky-walker and water-glider roles,” she continues.

I yawn, shoving myself further down on the couch, still not looking at her. Maybe if I pretend to be asleep, she’ll shut the hell up. Unfortunately, it’s hard to feign sleep with Connor wailing like a banshee in the next room.

“Whoever converts you dictates the powers you have and will display. Whoever converts you controls what you become.” She stands from the couch, beginning to pace back and forth in the small living room. “I deal in emotions. What if she isn’t feeling anything? What if where I can stop emotions, she doesn’t have any? Maybe she isn’t suffering like that.”

Sheyla’s completely hung up on her mom. When she was born, her mom nearly died. In a way, she did die. All the living parts died anyway. Her mom is a vegetable, so Sheyla’s constantly trying to wake her the fuck up. It isn’t happening. She might as well just go ahead and pull the life support plug. They’re only prolonging the inevitable. Honestly, that familial love she feels is her one redeeming quality.

“Before you come to some startling revelation which is wrong, I have to stop you right there,” I interrupt her.

She furrows her brow and stops pacing.

“The element is transferred, yes,” I explain, “but the specialization isn’t relative.”

“You’re all fauna,” she argues.

“We were chosen,” I remind her, “because we’d be fauna, but it’s more than even that.”

“How so?”

“We have to be fauna and we have to be able to shapeshift.”

“Is that genetic then? Like you and Connor both have the same thing because of your genes?”

“The Sentry leader can direct the earth energy to a degree if the right conditions are met.”

“Well, who chose you then?” she presses my sore spot. “How could they know?” I was chosen. First, by my adoptive parents. Second, by Connor. Just not by the fuckwit Scholars.

“I know Brody explained to you about the Tribunal.” I sit upright on the couch. “We share that stuff in briefings, whether we want to or not.” Our conversations are never private. Sheelin sees to that. I wipe at my tired eyes. “The Writers write us.”

“Meanwhile, the Readers supposedly can tell about powers, and the Writers write the history, but that’s where I’m getting confused. A historian would only know things from the past. How would that help with knowing who’d specialize in fauna or be able to shapeshift?”

“The Writers write everything,” I clarify. “They cover the beginning to the end.”

“So, the Tribunal knows everything about everyone?” She’s full of doubt. “Even the future?”

“Did Brody mention the Writers are blind?”

“How do they know what they’re writing? Brail?” she drills me. I want to punch her curious face.

“What they put in the scrolls is blank until it either happens or something’s read by the Readers.”

“Then recorded and relayed by the Archives.” Slow fuck has finally caught on. Fire my ass. My buddy KrazyPants would starve to death slurping this one.

We continue this path until I’m damn near ready to ask Shane to burn my ears off like the Readers. She. Is. Relentless. Her questions? Neverending. Not the fun story kind. You know the one, where the horse drowns in the swamp of sadness. We go over more shit to do with her mom. I direct her to the Archives, which she’ll meet when she transitions. I explain how we’ll brand her ass and why. You know, because it’s a beacon to a food source for us. Cue rainbow light parade. I let slip we’ve lost track of some over time. My bad. In my defence, this bitch is a vacuum for information.

After a while, she starts her Save Connor campaign again. “I can help him.”

“I don’t know what makes you so special, Sheyla,” I hiss, “but if it’s all the same to you, I don’t feel like testing your capacity on my brother. He’s all I have left.”

“He’s asking for her,” Brody claims from the doorway. “Begging for her, actually.”

“No way.” I set my jaw, determined. “Phelan will back me up.”

Phelan appears from behind Brody. “Do you trust me, Molly?”

Fuck, that throws me off. Should be a hard no, right? Except it’s Connor. I do trust him with Connor. I stare at the ground, avoiding eye contact. “Yes.”

“We need to let her try,” Brody presses. “It’s different this time.”

I sigh. “It’s been worse every time.” He’s standing in line with Phelan for the berserk bus. He thinks I don’t know. Like fuck I don’t know. Connor’s everything to me. Of course I know.

“There are three of us,” Phelan notes. “We can stop it if we have to.”

“I always have my shut-off switch,” Sheyla declares. Her shut-off switch is defective as fuck, same as she is.

“This is a bad idea.”

“There’s a reason we were tasked with protecting her,” Phelan adds. “This could be it.”

“Your head thinks too big,” I spit at him. “She’s the only one in transition right now. That’s why we’re here.”

“They didn’t give you more details?” she probes.

“No, Tally was right,” I snipe. “We’re their little lap-dogs, and loyal pets don’t question their directives.”

Phelan’s voice comes in a deadly baritone command. “Enough.”

I wince and lower my head further.

In general, I’m growing increasingly frustrated over our lackluster orders. It isn’t I don’t want missions. I love missions. I love killing. That’s why I requested a permanent transfer to the kill squad. Problem is, I’m starting to question their decisions. Their politics aren’t something I’ve ever given a fuck about. In the last decade though? I’ve been watching more closely. Clusterfucks are entertaining…until they impact me.

“Please, Molly,” she begs.

Fuck. I’m not listening to this bitch beg. I can’t handle that in conjunction with Connor’s cries. “Alright.” I concede. “You were right, Brody, by the way. The girl is like a walking vacuum. It’s impossible to keep things from her.”

I sit on the couch, pull my knees up to my chest, and rock back and forth. Who needs a vacation? This girl.