Virgo Ascending

1.

You carry Marcy to the hospital.

Well. “Carry” is a strong word. It would be more accurate to say that the three of you are leaning into each other as you stumble forward, slowly making your way to the hospital. Anne and you both have an arm around Marcy’s waist, a desperate attempt to keep her upright through the exhaustion seeping into your bones.

“What a day, huh?” Anne is, arguably, the healthiest one of the group. Her grip is firm over Marcy, and she stumbles less often than you. While your back is on fire and you muscle scream with every step, here she is, tired, but whole.

(She died she died she died you were there you’d tried to keep her together to hold her tight enough that she couldn’t crumble she died before your eyes you were the expendable one of the two you were the one ready to embrace death if need be and yet you had to watch your two best friends fall in front of you.)

Marcy makes a noncommittal noise. She’s starting to slip. You take a moment to readjust your grip. Her suit (the core’s suit) feels weird under your fingers. A bit slimey, like a frog’s skin. When your arm press against her back, you can feel it caving in.

You let go of Anne, back then, on this crumbling tower. Never again. You will hold onto her, onto Marcy, if it’s the last thing you ever do.

“Come on, girls.” You say quietly. “I need a bed and a century-long nap.” 

---

2.

When you were about- eleven, maybe? Twelve?- You watched the Pole Express with Anne and Marcy. You couldn’t quote a single line of the movie even if you tried, but you do remember the gist of Marcy’s speech midway through.

The movie featured groundbreaking 3d animation at the time, you know? Yet it had very little success comparatively. See, the thing is that the models look pretty human, but just off enough that it’s obvious they’re not. And, turns out, people get weirded out way easier by stuff that should look familiar, than by stuff that is obviously very different! So this movie gave the creep to a lot of people, while, say, Disney Robin Hood had no problem since it owed up to the fact that it wasn’t about real humans at all. We call that the uncanny valley! Isn’t it interesting?

Oh, boy, do you feel the uncanny valley.

“When I get discharged,” Anne says, grimacing, “the first thing I’m doing is order a big, fat burger. Hospital food is the worst. ”

Though she complains, she still polishes her plate. Anne is a lot less picky about her food than she used to be, which makes sense. So are you. The big changes are logical consequences to your adventure, and you have no problem accepting them.

She’s holding her fork in her left hand.

It’s a detail. A footnote, really. Anne has grown more assertive than she used to be, has her skin littered with scars, has a bump at the elbow where the bone hasn’t quite healed right, and the one thing you cannot get over is that she holds her fork in her left hand.

(It was with her right hand that she used to write you notes back in elementary school, it was with her right hand that she used to hold with her tennis racket, it was with her right hand that she held the sword she held to your face, and she is holding her fork in her left hand.)

“I’m def passing by your parent’s restaurant when I’m discharged.” Marcy sighs dramatically. “I need some spice to balance all this bland.” Her hands tremble as she eats, her cheeks flush green under effort, and all you can think of is: her voice is wrong.

You remember, a while back, when you were a kid (when you were more of a kid; it’s hard to remember you’re still technically a child, when all armies once bent to your will) you learned that people do not, in fact, perceive sounds the same way you do. Marcy then, seven years old and brimming with curiosity, had asked: “what do we sound like to you?”

Anne’s voice was a deep red. The sun setting in the distance; the leaves when autumn dawns in. Puberty has slightly changed the exact shade, but the fact remains that she sounds still red to you.

Marcy’s voice was yellow. A light shade; lemon curd on top of a pie, the first light ray after the rain. Yellow, with just a hint of green, an apple rolled in a field of wheat.

It’s blue now. An endless sky devoid of any cloud. The wind curls with her giggles. It’s not a bad color, really, but it’s Marcy’s face and Marcy’s words and her voice is wrong, wrong, wrong. Some of my organs rerouted weird, she told you once, amphibian medicine had some weird effect on my lungs and it’s audible, it’s nothing worth noting compared to Everything Else and yet it’s the most jarring thing you’ve ever heard in your life.

“I agree,” you say, grinding your teeth. This is fine. This is nothing. This is fine. “let’s make it a team outing, shall we?”

---

3.

Marcy leaves, eventually, as she was always meant to. It is (horrible, terrible, paranoia-inducing, I saw you die I saw you die in front of my eyes don’t go where I can’t make sure you’re still alive ) quite inconvenient.

At least, you have your voice chats.

“-and that's when the mage pulled out a glock!" Through your headphones, Marcy's voice is grained in while. She's been recounting her most recent Creatures & Cavern session to you for the past fifteen minutes. You are (monstrously jealous) really glad to hear that she made herself some friends in her new school, you (miss her miss her her absence like an amputation) were worried for her. (You want her to be happy you would do anything for her to be happy.) "It was a really fun session overall. It was neat."

"That's cool." You say, because it is. "Do you think you could get Anne and me to play sometime? It sounds like a lot of fun."

"Of course! I'd love to! I'm sure my dm wouldn't mind hosting you both. Or maybe I could dm a campaign just for the two of you?" You hear the familiar clapping of her flapping hands. "Ah, this is so exciting! We could do some irl larping, get out there and play around... How's your back?"

"Better." You mindlessly raise a hand to rub your shoulder. You wouldn't go as far as to say it's painless, but... it's improving. Even on your worst days, it's still manageable, which is all you're asking for honestly. "I won't be doing a full fight choreography, but I can certainly trek around holding a shield. What about yours?"

"Oh, mine won't cause any problem. It feels weird, but it doesn't hurt." That checks out. She's been consistently saying this for the past few years. What kind of weird is not something she has ever elaborated, but you like to think she'd tell you if it was anything hurtful. "I wish it had scarred, like yours."

The confession is so quiet you almost miss it.

"It hasn't?" You've never seen her injury post-Amphibia. The occasion never came up, and none of you were comfortable talking about it at the time.

"No. It's odd, isn't it? I can feel it even if I'm not looking at it, I can trace the exact pattern of the injury with my fingers, but it hasn't scarred. Nothing but smooth skin, unmarred, new. As if this was always what I was supposed to look like."

That's... kind of fucked. Your scars are rarely the result of happy moments, but you cherish them nonetheless. They're important reminders- of who you are, who you became, what you lived through. You would not be the same person if not for Anne's mark on your cheek anytime you looked in a mirror.

"But on the bright side, it doesn't hurt!" She says, audibly beaming, and the conversation goes on on its own.

---

+1

"BEACH! DAY! BEACH! DAY!"

The sun is boring its ways into your skin, the heat heavy and oppressive, and you could not care less because you are at the beach! With Anne and Marcy! Who got to show up for summer break! The gang is back together, and nothing could temper your joy about it!

"Let's GOOOOOOOOO!" Screams Anne, kicking her sandals off. You're all three wearing your swimsuit under your regular clothes, so you can simply ditch your shirt and pants and you'll be perfectly sea-ready. So you do just that, as does Anne, as does Marcy, and-

What the fuck what the fuck what the FUCK

"Guys?" Marcy raises an eyebrow at you, her shirt still midway through her arms. "I know I'm pretty, but come on, I sent you pictures-"

"Marcy." Anne speaks up, voice flat and serious. "There is a hole inside your chest."

There is. It's a thin thing, extending from collarbone to navel, like a very flat oval or a (blade. A sword. You know exactly which sword.) It isn't all that wide, but it's see-through; you can see the strap of her swimsuit tied at her back, and behind that the entire sand beach, and behind that the clear blue of the sky, and a thousand other things you should not be able to see because bodies do not typically have holes in them.

"Yes, Anne. It's been there for five years now." Marcy says, jokes, her words ending in a little laugh. You see her chest flutter with her chuckle. The sides of the hole are walled with skin, you notice. It's not a gaping wound giving you a full view of her insides; it's a hole as if her body was molded around it, unmarred and untouched and without a single-

scar.

(Oh.)

"Wait. Seriously?" Ah, Marcy figured it out as well. "You guys didn't know?"

"No??" You glance at Anne, who glances back, confirming that yep, you were both on the same boat here. "You've carried that around since Amphibia?"

Marcy nods. She seems very calm about the whole thing. "Yeah. It's not that bad, honestly. I even got used to feeling the wind blowing through it. You guys wanna stick your hand through it?"

"What? No! That's... no!" Anne makes a very complicated sequence of facial expressions, which ends with her hiding her face in her hands. "No!"

Her funerals! "I do, actually! I wonder if I can feel your heart through it?"

"You can, actually." Marcy reaches out to grab your hand, pulling it closer. "It's on the left side. Come, feel it."

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