So this idea came to me randomly during a boring geography class which followed in me fleshing this idea out during the rest of the class. This is the result of this horrifying abomination of an idea. Anyways, enjoy!
Two young humans were out on a stroll in the forest. The brisk spring air still bit harshly at their skins, and the plants around began to unfold, the snow and ice dripping off their unfurling leaves. The hibernating animals were beginning to wake after the winter, their eyes twinkling in their burrows and nests. Those many eyes followed the two strolling humans as they made their way across the forest.
Their hands were linked, fingers filling the holes between fingers, the two golden rings glistening in the low sunrise sun. They walked stride by stride, mesmerised by each other, their hearts beating fast with the many emotions that were flowing through them. Good emotions they were, for this couple were no longer boyfriend and girlfriend, but husband and wife. For quite some time too, this would be the second year after their wedding day, yet it still seemed like yesterday when those bells rang, when the vows were spoken, and when their families had cheered.
Preston Northwest led his beloved through the dank forest, careful to not get her expensive shoes soaked through thanks to the thawing snow. Priscilla was a dainty creature, and stepped lightly across any surface, whether it be carpet, hard polished floor or the uneven terrain of the surrounding forest. Every time she moved, she looked as if she were dancing and many would look on in envy, admiration or jealousy.
Barely any sound circled in the forest at this time, the animals still lazily waking up from their slumber and insects still deeply asleep. The only noises now were the crunching of thawing snow, the breathing of the Northwests and the whisper of the breeze between the pines.
However despite the awe they were travelling through, Priscilla Northwest also had many negative emotions merging with her happy ones. They had returned from a rich party in Europe a mere month ago, and were greeted with some unwelcome news, at least in their eyes.
On a massive billboard, there was plastered an old advert for Bud's Auto, back from summer time that same year. The words were written in a massive blue font with two people on the front, one smiling, and the other squinting and looking on the verge of a tantrum. However the original writing was hard, yet still possible, to read beneath the many graffiti drawn over it.
JUST HAD A BABY SALE
Priscilla's heart broke in two when she saw that advert. Even the Gleefuls managed to have a child. Why could everyone get something that she was biologically impossible to conceive?
The news of Priscilla being barren was kept strictly inside the manor. How would the people react if they realised that the only offspring of the Northwest family had married an infertile woman, unable to produce a child to carry on the Northwest legacy?
It was the very reason the married couple had gone for a walk in the woods in the first place. To clear their minds.
Preston had gone against his family's wishes for him to get divorced with the unwanted girl and stayed with her. At least Preston's genuine love for Priscilla managed to calm the woman down. She didn't take the richest man's love for granted, and greatly loved him back in return, but it didn't prevent her from having doubts about his family.
So deeper they went into the forest, away from all the prying eyes of the other townsfolk. To them, home was not only the ridiculously massive mansion but also the town and forest around it, and they loved it there.
"Preston," Priscilla broke the long silence between them and stared her love in the eye. "Promise me you'll never leave me."
She somehow knew he was thinking about the same thing as her. He also seemed shaken up after hearing the news of Gideon Gleeful's birth.
At first Preston looked appalled that she would even say such a thing, but then his face melted into a calm and reassuring glare.
"My darling," he addressed to her, taking her smooth hands in his own. "Have you forgotten our vows? The promise we made that very day we were linked? We promised each other that we will stay together until death do us part." Seriousness was in his eyes, but also those embers that Priscilla had grown to love over their long relationship. "Believe me, there is no-one else quite like you, not here, or anywhere in the world. I don't care that my family wants me to remarry because of your condition. I will not leave you. You may not be my first love, but you are my last."
His words were like melted chocolate, and Priscilla found herself calming down from her anxiety. She placed his warm hands on her cheeks against the bitter spring air, and their foreheads touched to seal their everlasting love for each other, and inched closer.
But they were interrupted by a sudden noise. The pair were so startled that they broke free from their bond and looked towards where the loud noise had come from.
It was not a noise that one would likely hear in a forest, for it was not a cry of a waking animal.
But instead the cry of a human baby.
It was not just bubbling and bawling like a little baby usually does either, but rather- it was screaming. Shrieking and wailing so the few evergreen birds flapped off their branches to get away from the terrible noise. But for every tone of human that the cry sounded, there was always an undertone of noise that a human baby could never and should never make. Only a while after listening to the outburst the cry became unbearable to listen to. It was close too, like it came from the surrounding, frosty blackberry bushes.
Preston's hands darted to his ears to shut out the horrible noise, but strangely his wife was drawn to it like metal to a magnet. She brushed her pale brown hair out of her ears and listened to determine where exactly the noise was coming from. Her sense of hearing lead her to the one blackberry bush that despite the harsh winter the world had just bore, it was in full bloom, with fruits as big as tangerines. The crying was coming from its branches.
Priscilla strangely no longer cared about the designer warm clothes she wore, and knelt on the ground to get level with the bush. Carefully, her fingers wrapped around the thorny vines and opened them to peak inside.
She had expected the thing she saw, but it still came as a massive shock to her. In the bush, tangled in the thorns lay a human baby, wrapped in cloth the colour of the sun. Tears stained its cheeks as it wailed and made that horrible noise, begging for someone to find it.
And someone finally did.
At the sight, Priscilla's heart melted into a mushy pile of goo, and a frail gasp escaped her massive lips.
"Preston dear, there's a baby in the bush," she told him quietly.
Her dear kelt beside her and looked into the bush. His face moulded into shocked surprise and horror.
"It's been abandoned," he breathed, watching the baby struggle in the bush. "Who had done this?"
The woman commanded him to hold the vines out of the way as she reached into the bush, the thorns raking at her clothes and at her hair. The baby paused in its crying to give Priscilla a confused look, before it returned to its bawling.
"Shh, little one," she spoke softly, her delicate hands beginning to untangle the plant's vines from the small child, slowly and carefully as to not harm the frail baby with the sharp thorns of the blackberry bush. "It's okay, I'll get you out of here."
The little baby stopped its screaming and instead decided to coo and babble in its cute baby voice, stretching up its tiny hands at hers, giggling at her. Priscilla smiled warmly at it, but her smile faded once she looked into the baby's eyes.
They weren't human. At all. There was no white in its eyes, all the colour of shiny amber stones, so clear and detailed that Priscilla could see every muscle in the iris, as well as her own reflection in them. Even the pupil was nowhere near human. Human eyes had circular pupils with a ring of colour around them. However this child's pupils resembled that of a cat's, vertical slits that despite their inhumanity, seemed to smile back at Priscilla.
The little child noticed her scared expression, and somehow understood. A small child should not be able to understand such expressions. It closed its strange eyes and reopened them a moment later. Gone were the amber cat eyes, replaced with normal human eyes, with round pupils and irises the exact colour of a morning sky.
Priscilla froze as she recognised her own eyes, she had gazed into them enough times through the mirror when she was applying makeup. Though her hesitation only lasted a few moments, and she lovingly took the tiny human baby into her welcoming arms and backed out of the bush. It giggled louder, the tiny hands poking at her face tenderly.
"Good heavens," Preston exclaimed once Priscilla emerged from the bush, holding the baby close to her chest. She showed him the child as if she had just gave it life in the hospital. It giggled and poked Preston in the bottom lip so he flinched.
"Who had left it here?" he asked rhetorically, but his voice only made the little child laugh in a high-pitched baby laugh. "Has it just been abandoned?"
"I think so..." Priscilla mumbled, cradling the child closer in her arms. Her face suddenly lit up with an idea. "Preston, maybe this is the answer to our prayers for us having a child?"
Everyone had finally gone home. The servants were away and busy cleaning up the mess left by the commoners, while the last sleeping guests were woken up and rushed home. Once again the Northwest Manor had gone back to normal after the party, which had turned out more eventful than anyone could ever imagine.
On the third floor, a small human girl sat at the window, head propped up on a curled fist as she watched the rain fall and dribble down the glass with fake interest. In reality, the pretty blonde was not paying attention to the water dripping down the window, but instead she was really lost in thought. Memories of yesterday's party played themselves in her mind's eye like a mini movie, and a small smile was raised on her face. She was a hero! She saved everyone from that lumberjack ghost! Pride wasn't the only emotion which was buzzing around inside her, but relief and happiness. She had made two great friends during this party, and it was with the two she had never thought she would ever befriend.
First it was Dipper Pines, who had helped her overcome her personal issues and helped her save the day. Then came his a-dork-able twin sister, Mabel Pines, who treated Pacifica as if she had always been her best friend. The Pines had welcomed her with open arms, and offered her something that she could never buy with money.
Friendship.
It sounded sappy, but that little moment from the long night was something Pacifica swore to remember for the rest of her entire life.
"Pacifica."
The girl snapped out of her daydream and stood to attention before her mother. Blue eyes met blue eyes, and Pacifica's throat suddenly became dry. Would her mother yell at her for disobeying her father's wishes?
"Yes mother?" she acknowledged her mother and bowed her head. She must be assertive, yes, but Pacifica still had the utmost respect for her parents, and she still loved them with all her heart. They loved her, they raised her. She was their daughter... was she not?
"Sit down with me," her mother sat down at the window and glanced outside. Her tone wasn't challenging, but calm. Pacifica hardly hesitated as she sat down obediently next to the tall light brunette. Though it was forced, her stress affecting her body movements. Priscilla Northwest noticed, and put a slender arm around her daughter's shoulder. "Calm down Pacifica, why are you so tense?"
A sigh escaped Pacifica's lips. "Aren't you going to yell at me for letting the townsfolk in?"
To her surprise, Priscilla shook her head, causing her long hair to follow her movements like wisps of magic. There was no anger in her eyes or shown on her face, but instead a reassuring smile.
At this, Pacifica rested her head on Priscilla's shoulder, though the gesture came stiffly.
"Your father has changed since I first met him," her mother told her. "He's became more obsessed with carrying on the Northwest reputation, but that doesn't mean he doesn't love me or that he doesn't love you." Her arms embraced her daughter closer, and Pacifica could now feel her slow heartbeat against her body. "I think you did the right thing yesterday. I wish I could've done the same thing as you did. You're the bravest girl I know Pacifica, and I was just waiting for you to grow assertive. I just wanted you to know that I'm so proud of you."
So the girl melted into the hug and curled her arms around her mother, drinking in her warmth and wishing that this rare moment, where her mother's open love was easy to grasp, would last forever.
But like all good things, this one came to an end too soon.
An unpleasant feeling began to arise in Pacifica's stomach and a few other organs, the awful feeling as if thousands of little needles were being stabbed into them from all directions. Tears flooded her eyes and blurred her vision, before a pulse of energetic agony shot through them and made Pacifica close them swiftly. She choked at the sudden feeling, and a loud noise of complete and utter pain arose from her mouth.
Her shudder made her mother brake apart the hug and look her daughter in the face, her cold hands against Pacifica's now scalding hot cheeks. "Pacifica dear, it's happening again isn't it?"
Her daughter nodded her head quickly, clenching her teeth against the pain. She guessed it was lucky that for the umpteenth time in the row, her condition had activated after the party, not during. That would've been an absolute disaster.
So Priscilla dragged Pacifica to her feet, roughly because at that moment the young girl had become stiff with the burning pain that had now spread to her entire body like some sort of infection. Her blood was on fire, her bones were electrified, her organs poisoned. So Pacifica let herself be blindly led down the familiar ways. Downstairs, through the snaking corridors that Pacifica had learned off by heart. It was engraved into her mind like an ancient river into rock. It was her home, for as long as she had remembered. Now she knew that her mother was taking her to the one place where it would be safe from prying eyes.
"Almost there darling," Priscilla would say, reassuring Pacifica that they would almost be out of sight. But of course Pacifica knew that. Her eyes might have been tightly closed, but somehow she could see perfectly clear. Though the perspective was not from her own head, but from an ominous tapestry that hung on the wall. She could see herself and her mother rushing down the corridors, and she could feel the stitched eye move its cotton pupil to follow the mother and her daughter's movements.
The tapestry was always there, or at least since Pacifica had became a link into the Northwest chain. Her parents haven't bought it, and didn't recall it hanging there at the time of her father's ancestors. It just sort of appeared there, and when taken down it would reappear on the walls. Pacifica was also sure that there were many, or either the one would change wherever it was hanging. Once she had even found it hanging on the wall opposite her bed in her room. To say it was frightening would be an understatement. It was probably one of the butlers thinking it was a funny prank.
"Here we go dear," Priscilla announced, pushing the door open with one hand and leading her inside.
It was this room... Its familiar coldness pushed away the heat that radiated from Pacifica, and calmed down the pain that had started to infect her pale skin. Pacifica gasped in relief, willingly inhaling the freezing air. Her mother, however, began to shiver and snuggled into her expensive clothing. Her teeth began to chatter, and she rubbed her arms to get some warmth into them.
"Here we go," she stammered through her chattering teeth, and the sound of a door closing could be heard. "You can let yourself go here."
About time. Any longer and Pacifica would think she would've burst. She took a few steps forwards, and then fell to her knees on the hard, smooth floor, and pressed her cheek against the smooth surface. A flash of bright light emerged from her, and in an instant all the agony melted away as if had never been there at all.
She was finally able to open her eyes again, without any pain. The room came into view before her, and she smiled upon its sight.
The entire room were made of black quartz, a stone which was known to negate magic and negative energy. It was built under the Northwest Mansion, of recent time too. When her parents inherited the mansion, her parents have had an arrangement with someone from the past to built a 'panic-room' that was magic-proof against anything and everything. The room was built before Pacifica looked upon the world with her own eyes, but her mother told her that the man knew his stuff, and that they've let him build a house in the woods in return.
The room was also equipped with only the finest of equipments, a fancy silver mirror, furniture from only the most expensive of wood, a storage of extra food and a supply of medieval weapons incase something went wrong. It also had a supply of entertainment, for both Pacifica and her parents.
"Are you better?" came her mother's voice, except now it came twice as clearer, and Pacifica's eyes set upon her. As usual Priscilla looked unsure at the sight, but reassured herself once she saw that the girl on the floor was okay.
"Yes, I'm okay," Pacifica replied, sitting up and rubbing her forehead with the palm of her hand. "I guess the rest of my day will be spent down here..."
"Will you manage by yourself?" Priscilla asked, looking up at the door through which they had come. The girl nodded her head and watched her mother leave her be. As the door closed once again, Pacifica stood to her feet and turned to the mirror to look at the creature inside, who stared back at her.
Gone was the bright blonde hair, and gone were the sky-blue eyes. Gone were the designer clothes the colour of plums and gone was the girl the townsfolk thought they knew.
The creature in the mirror was barely human, only just. Sure, it had two legs, two arms, hands, forward pointing eyes, ears and the same shape of body as Pacifica Northwest. The creature had the same face too, but it was there were its similarities ended with the rich girl.
Looking back at her, were not sky-blue eyes, but instead full orange eyes with no white and vertical elongated pupils, like that of some feline. Her usual, short human fangs were replaced with slightly longer, crooked animal fangs, and her whole pale skin had gone to the shade of mocha and the beloved blonde hair had changed to strands of flowing amber. The creature had also changed the wardrobe. Where purple designer clothes were supposed to be, the creature wore an orange tailored tailcoat, completed with black sleeves, gloves, buttons and trousers, and even a bow-tie. Atop its head, sat a tall black top-hat, and it held a long crooked cane in its hands. This creature was horrifying, a monster of the forest, just where her parents had found her entangled in a blackberry bush.
Pacifica stared at the creature in the mirror, and it stared back at her, emotionless. For a moment she narrowed her eyes, and the creature narrowed its eyes too. It copied her every move, shadowing who Pacifica wanted to be. And she hated it.
"You aren't me," she decided and turned away from the creature in the mirror. She indignantly took off her top hat and tossed it to the other side of the room, along with her cane. She didn't want those things, but they seemed tied to her somehow. She had actually tried to get rid of that hat and cane, multiple times, but they had repaired themselves magically and returned to her like an unwanted boomerang.
So today Pacifica would spend regenerating, and honestly it seemed for the best. Keeping a normal human appearance was exhausting, especially when keeping it up for a long time. Pacifica knew how to keep her strange ability behind a facade, after doing it for so many years she was bound to be some good at it, but it didn't mean she still wasn't burnt out after she had kept going for an increasingly long amount of time.
She had never tried to experiment with her peculiarity, since she was human, or at least she wanted to be. Humans didn't have those kinds of power, and shouldn't be able to shift appearances at the flash of light.
Pacifica yawned loudly, her long fangs on show and her sharp inhuman tongue curling as if she were a wild beast ready to hibernate. She had stayed up all night with the party, laughing and dancing and having a good time, and she wasn't just tired thanks to her unwanted condition.
Without further thought, Pacifica lay herself on the soft couch and got herself comfortable against the fabric. She could no longer feel the cold of the panic-room on her skin, if she could even call it such. Her heavy eyelids finally closed and dragged Pacifica into the calling arms of sleep.
"Where the devil is Pacifica?" Preston growled at his wife. Priscilla looked back at him, startled. Is he still mad at our daughter? she asked herself. The woman looked left and right, to see if the servants and butlers were eavesdropping.
When she had clarification that nobody was near, she leaned towards her husband and in a low voice said: "She's having one of those days dear, she's in the panic-room."
The anger faded instantly from Preston's face, and the man straightened up. "I should've known that her abnormality had something to do with her going against the Northwest legacy," he whispered back to her. Priscilla shuddered, but nodded her head.
"She's doing the best she can Preston," she defended her daughter fiercely. "You know how that our daughter struggles to fit in with us humans, and being under such pressure is bound to inflict some behavioural issues."
Her love sighed and hid his head in his hand. "I was told once what Pacifica was," he told her. "But I can't remember, even if it meant saving our reputation. Someone told me what she was... but I don't recall..." He rubbed his temple while trying his hardest to remember.
Priscilla sighed and rolled her eyes. "Does it really matter what she is?" she asked. "She looks like us, she lives like us, she lives among us. She can reason, she can think. She's our daughter, and that's all that matters."