Chapter Text
Sophia (1)
January
Merchants. It's gotta be.
That's what went through Sophia Hess's head when she looked at Hebert, sitting several desks away and not even pretending to pay attention to her schoolwork. The girl was a trainwreck-in-progress, every day a little more disheveled, a little less together. She was coming off of the tracks in slow motion. Sophia watched Hebert lick her lips for the hundredth time that day, watched eyes with too-small pupils dart towards the clock mounted on the wall. Sophia had watched Hebert a lot, this past week. She had to, now.
There was something weird going on with Hebert, one that couldn't be explained by whatever drugs she'd turned to.
That prank last week had been the tipping point. They'd gone through a lot of work to remind her of what a wimp she was. And... yeah, maybe locking her in with all that rotting shit was a bit much. Maybe spraying that sports bottle full of blood through the locker's slats was more than necessary. But, shit, it was just a prank. If Hebert had any spine at all she'd have gotten out of it, or taken the clue-by-four and left school altogether. But she hadn't done anything, so really, it was her own fault.
Leaving her there overnight hadn't been part of the plan. That was an accident. Sophia had meant to tell a janitor sometime after third period, but there'd been a call on her PRT phone and she'd had to leave. She'd texted Emma, but either it hadn't gone through, or...
Well. Either way she'd gotten a call around midnight.
Soph! I thought you were gonna tell someone!
What? Emma, what the hell? What's going on?
Taylor's dad just called. She never came home.
Oh.
You DID get her out, right?
I told YOU to do it! Oh, shit.
A prank was one thing. Someone dying of dehydration or infection was entirely too much. Especially if she still had Sophia's fingerprints on her. Sophia slipped out of the house and into Winslow as fast as her shadow state could carry her. She reached Hebert's locker inside of an hour, swallowed the rise of gorge from the stench, and tapped on the metal door.
"Hey, Hebert. Comfy? Did you decide to take a nap?" No response. She must have fallen unconscious; that was convenient, Sophia could drag her out of there and dump her somewhere. There was some newly-taken E88 territory fairly nearby, she'd probably be fine there. And if she wasn't, well, that wouldn't be Sophia's fault. Sophia reached forward, phased her hand into the lock, and undid the latch. And that's when things went very wrong.
Because the locker was empty.
Not completely empty, there were the tampons and the pads and the soaked tissues and everything else. And there was a clear compression in the shape of the mass of soiled garbage pressed to the back of the locker, where Hebert's rake-thin body had been. But Hebert was gone. That was weird, and Sophia had a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach, wondering if Hebert had beaten the odds and Triggered. What a pathetic way to get powers that would be. Just another item on the Shit that Hebert Doesn't Deserve pile.
With nothing else to be done for it, Sophia went home.
The next day, the janitor pulled a screaming and flailing Taylor Hebert out of her locker before first period. Sophia felt the little hairs on the back of her neck prickle. It didn't make sense.
Hebert didn't make sense. Not anymore. She had the fidgety energy and cracked lips of someone needing a fix, but if anything she actually looked healthier now. She was more than jumpy, she was strung tighter than piano wire, and Sophia watched the ways Hebert's fingers would twitch towards her belt, at her sides. Sophia knew that twitch. She had one much like it, on rough days when she wished desperately that she could have her crossbows with her at all times. She'd start to reach for the holsters and stop almost immediately, because they weren't there. Sophia told Emma to back off, just for a week or two, to let any attention on Hebert die down. And to let Sophia watch her, because there was something weird with Hebert now, and it might be weird-dangerous.
Of course, Emma wasn't one to be still for long.
"Ugh. God, Hebert, you reek. Do you even know what a shower is?" The focus of Emma's barb went still, not quite pressing herself against the wall. A few of the girls in Emma's orbit drifted nearer, giggling.
"Maybe it's puke. I bet that's why she's so skinny. Stickers her fingers down her throat and horfs."
"She probably sticks other things down her throat. Or lets someone do it to her. How else is she gonna get her next fix?"
"Not with money. She's been wearing the same clothes all year. I bet they've been just marinating in her stink, I doubt she ever washes them."
The circle of girls continued, with Emma holding court, and Sophia standing back, just this once. The hairs on her neck were standing up again. Because Hebert did smell. A sweet, coppery smell, not quite hiding a more musky odor, like she'd been rolling around with dogs. And under that... Sophia took a sharp breath as something in her brain pulsed, twisting like the start of a migraine. It was the faint scent of the color of moonlight, so completely impossible to think of because it didn't exist. Sophia took a half-step back, involuntary.
Hebert licked her dry lips again. "Beasts," she whispered, with the odd cadence of someone repeating what they've heard. "Beasts all over the shop."