Title: The Strange & The Unexpected [1/?]
Her first relationship ended in blood and death. Perhaps her next one would fare better, although her status as a 'black widow' might hinder that hope. Sometimes Zoe wondered whether it was worth it to be in love.
Disclaimer: I own nothing. The only thing I do own is my imagination of things that will probably never ever happen. Still, a girl can dream.
"This is my room?" Zoe questions as she stepped inside the presented area. Spalding, the resident butler, simply walked past to place the girl's one piece of luggage down in a corner before moving to open the curtains. Zoe immediately looks away from the exposed windows, the sudden bright light temporarily blinding her.
Blinking rapidly to clear the resulting spots in her vision, the girl almost misses the headmistress's response. "I hope it's to your liking," Cordelia answers as she clasped her hands before leaning her right shoulder against the doorframe.
Zoe spared another glance around her new surroundings. The walls, the furniture, and the floor – basically the entire building – were uniformly a single color. "It's very white," she finally comments as she faced the other woman.
Spalding walks past Zoe once more as he heads out, understanding his presence was no longer needed. A small silence follows before Cordelia recognizes the girl's discomfort – understandable given Zoe's abrupt departure from normality. In response, the headmistress pushes off the doorframe and straightens herself.
"Well, I'll let you unpack and settle in before I begin anymore introductions." Cordelia turns, only to hesitate and turn back. "You'll like it here, Zoe," the woman offers with what she hoped was a comforting smile before finally leaving.
Zoe only lets out a sigh before moving to close the door for some privacy. Leaning her back against it, she surveys the mostly empty room once more from left to right. This was to be her new humble abode – emphasizes on the humble.
Walking towards the bed, Zoe sat down with a slump. With one hand, she felt the sheets' fabric before letting her mind wander once more. She speculated the number of girls that were brought here over the years. Then she pondered about the ones who've spent their days and nights in this very room – her room.
Unintentionally, she begins to envision the blood and the screaming and ––
Zoe quickly cuts off the rest of her musings before she revisited violent, old thoughts.
Lying down, she moved onto her side as she stared at the wall that held the three aged photographs. She thought back to the strange woman who appeared alongside those oddly identical men in suits. They've uprooted her from the only life she's ever known and brought her here.
"You're one of the few special girls still left in the world. Cherish it," Myrtle said. Those were the only words the woman had spoken to her after she was taken from her home.
Remaining silent, Zoe blankly stared back. Unable to comprehend what the eccentric woman beside her meant, she returned her gaze towards the window and continued to watch the trees pass on by.
The rest of the train ride over to New Orleans held no more words, not that it mattered to Zoe.
Mindlessly, the girl looked to the clouds as her nails periodically bit into her palms – a developing habit that reminded Zoe that she was indeed being whisked away; an unwanted adventure that literally began with the blood of her first boyfriend.
Zoe certainly didn't feel special. In fact, she felt kind of numb as if her emotions were being stunted at the moment.
"So what are you in for?"
Startled out of past memories, Zoe immediately sits up. Jerking her head towards the left, she spies the source of the voice – a rather fashionably dressed blonde stood waiting at the now opened doorway. Slightly panicked by the sudden presence of another, Zoe quickly pulled her knees up to her chest while tugging down at the hem of her dress whenever it rode up.
"Chill out," the newcomer begins as she brazenly enters the room without permission, "I didn't scare you that bad." Noticing the single bag in the room, the blonde only raises an eyebrow at that knowledge before clucking her tongue. "I see that you didn't come from much," she mutters before turning to look at Zoe's still huddled form on the bed.
"You don't have to be that freaked," she scoffs before striding over and taking a seat at the far end of the bed. Zoe continues to stare unabashedly; the blonde's appearance was startlingly familiar even though she was fairly certain they've never actually met.
"I won't bite," the blonde continues – momentarily interrupting Zoe's thoughts once more – before smirking rather devilishly, "Unless I feel like it."
Zoe's jaw drops slightly; the action obviously amuses the other girl when her smirk gets that much wider. And then Zoe finally makes the connection when she recognizes the particular smile. "Oh my God, you're," she begins only to be interrupted.
"Madison Montgomery," the now recognized girl finishes before flipping back some of her hair with her right hand. "Took you long enough to recognize a movie star," she adds with a slight scoff.
"I," Zoe begins as she tried to understand that she had a celebrity in her room. "I'm sorry?" she offers in an attempt to placate the actress. There's only a momentary pause before Zoe makes the second connection.
"Holy shit, you're a witch," she exclaims once she finally realizes the implications of Madison's presence at the academy.
"Yesterday's news," the actress offhandedly comments before shifting in her seat to fully face Zoe. "How about some fresh gossip?"
"I don't understand," Zoe responds as she furrows her eyebrows slightly in confusion.
Madison only releases a breath in exasperation before rolling her eyes. "I mean," she stresses out before explaining, "What'd you do to find out you were a witch?"
When Zoe doesn't answers as fast as she'd like, Madison continues on with her inquisition. "I bet you killed someone," she concludes with a grin, hoping to provoke the timid girl.
The star's flippant remark startles Zoe into a memory that she'd rather soon forget – Charlie, the convulsions, and oh God!
Another voice interjects, snapping Zoe out of that past instance she first utilized her powers.
"She did. She killed her boyfriend," a girl bluntly states as she and another appeared by the doorway. "I'm Nan, by the way," the same girl further includes when Zoe turned her head towards the newly arrived pair. Nan only smiles as if it was natural to suddenly confess another's darkest secret.
"Queenie," the other – a casual, hefty African American girl – offers as introduction. Although her face showed a slight grimace at what Nan just revealed.
"It was an accident," Zoe abruptly states, desperate to explain herself and not be alienated from the other girls.
Madison claps, obviously amused by the revelation. "Bravo. What'd you do? Slice and dice him?" she curiously asked, greatly piqued by the possibility of Zoe's powers. "Or maybe a little flame broil?"
Zoe doesn't answer. And Queenie blatantly stares at Madison with clear disgust.
No matter, the actress wasn't deterred. "Don't skimp. I want all the gory details," she continues with a small wiggling of her fingers.
Repulsed by the sudden turn of the situation, Queenie voices her discontent. "Damn, how morbid can you get?" she asks with crossed arms.
"Not as morbid as you when you eat," Madison coolly retorts before turning her attention back to Zoe.
Nan quickly interjects before Queenie could physically harm the actress. "Come on, Miss Foxx wants us all downstairs for our daily gathering." Promptly, she begins tugging at one of Queenie's arm, hoping to lead the infuriated girl away and towards the stairway.
Body tensed, Queenie only takes a deep breathe in through her nose before relaxing. "This isn't over," she comments before finally moving with Nan to go downstairs.
"Whatever," Madison lightly scoffs.
Eyeing Zoe, the actress watched as the other girl quickly looked away from her gaze. "Come on. You can tell me," Madison prompts as she scooted closer to Zoe on the bed. "I promise I won't judge," the actress offers.
Instead, Zoe pulls away as she chose to leave and follow the others.
"Boring," Madison taunts at the girl's choice.
"There are only four of us?" Zoe questions once she realizes no other girls were arriving. Shifting slightly in her seat, Zoe glanced at each of the three seated teens she met earlier before returning her gaze towards the headmistress. For such a grand school, there sure weren't a whole lot of students.
"At the moment," Cordelia answers before folding her hands. "In its heyday, the academy was home to as many as sixty girls. Over the years, those numbers dwindled."
"Why?" Zoe curiously asked before realizing she did so.
Cordelia took a moment to look at the girl before answering her inquiry. "We're a dying breed, Zoe," she admitted softly before continuing, "Many of the families who knew they carried the bloodline made a choice not to reproduce."
There's a moment of silence; the other girls appeared familiar and almost bored with the topic whereas Zoe was still new to it all. She tried not to shift awkwardly in her seat. Even in a room of other witches, Zoe still felt like the odd one out.
Briefly she glanced at Madison, who sat opposite of her on a couch with Queenie. The actress held a porcelain cup in one hand and, by circling an index finger above, mindlessly stirred the tea within. Zoe's eyes widen as she realized the girl was a telekinetic. Like Jean Grey¹, she thought. Luckily, Zoe managed to hide her surprise before the others could notice and refocused on their little group session.
"So what's a Supreme?" she asked, remembering the headmistress's previous mention of a past Supreme from generations ago.
Cordelia suddenly straightened, the question seeming to have caused the woman some discomfort. "An average witch is born with a few natural gifts," she begins before a pause, "But in each generation there is one woman who embodies countless gifts – some say all of them. She is the Supreme."
"Are you the Supreme?" Zoe questioned without thought.
Madison and Queenie immediately muffled their laughter but made no attempts to hide it; Zoe frowned at their actions. Were they laughing at her? Shifting her gaze towards the girl in the chair besides her, Zoe watched as Nan only smiled before nibbling at the cookie in her hand then sipping at the tea in the other.
"No, I'm like you. Just a witch," Cordelia answers, recapturing Zoe's attention. "And a teacher. I'm here to help you identify your gifts and teach you how to control them."
"She means to suppress them," Queenie adds from her spot.
"Not suppression," Cordelia adamantly corrects before reiterating her earlier chosen word, "Control."
"She thinks it's still the 1600s," Madison interjects as she not-so-gently places the porcelain cup down with a sharp clink. Zoe watched as some of the untouched tea spilt over the edge and fell onto the cup's saucer.
"No," the headmistress immediately answers. "Back then our kind understood the dangers. Today so many families know nothing of their ancestry. Too many girls aren't lucky enough to have found us or weren't identified in time for us to have found them. Like that poor Cajun girl just outside Lafayette's a few months back."
"Cajun girl?" Zoe questions, almost fearful of the answer she'd receive.
"Misty Day," Cordelia strongly answers. "She wasn't much older than any of you. And she had a gift, the power of resurgence." The headmistress sat back and rested her hands on the chair's armrest. She looked at all the girls to ensure she held each and every one of their attention.
"Misty could reach into that place between life and death and draw a soul back from the precipice – back to this side, back to life." Cordelia paused to let the information settle in her students' minds before continuing. "To some this appeared to be the God touch power of resurrection. To others, necromancy."
Again, it was Zoe who questioned the headmistress. "What happened to her?"
Cordelia didn't hesitate in her reply. "The same thing that's happened to women like us throughout the centuries."
"You mean they," Zoe begins only to falter in her response. She felt a chill break out across her spine as Cordelia's solemn silence expressed exactly what had happened to the 'poor Cajun girl'.
"We are under siege, ladies. Our lives, our very existence is always at risk. Know this or face extinction," the headmistress ends seriously before getting up and leaving the room.
The girls remained seated, lost in their own thoughts after the revelation of a young witch's unfortunate demise from not so long ago.
Atop her bed once more, Zoe hugged her knees to her chest as she leaned against the headboard. The sparse room she was situated in only reminded her of the life she left behind – everything she lost because of her great grandmother's "genetic affliction" as her mother had delicately (cautiously) described it.
After the discussion, or daily gathering as Miss Foxx calls it, the other girls had hurried towards parts unknown to do whatever teenaged witches did, whereas she promptly returned to her assigned room. Zoe lets out a light scoff at her actions; already she was acting like a social outcast in a school for girls like her.
Her nails bite into her palms once again, a developing habit since everything began. An emotion surges within her when she surmises that none of the other girls were quite like her – someone who utterly (horribly) destroys at the first intimate touch.
The whirlwind of emotions that initially eluded her after Charlie's death finally erupts. Fear, anxiety, remorse, anger – each one begins taking effect until Zoe feels the suffocation. She resists clawing at her chest from the fierce pounding of her heart as each breath comes out harsher and quicker.
A floodgate had opened and she was left drowning in the tide. There was nothing but her own thoughts and emotions for company and it added to her misery.
The voices start and Zoe quickly shuts her eyes and covers her ears as the echoes begin. She takes some shaky, deep breaths – referencing back to a relaxation article she read once in boredom – and hopes to whatever gods or goddesses listening that she doesn't get permanently labeled as the freak of the group if discovered.
The method seems to work for however little until the images of Charlie convulsing beneath her fills her mind's eye. Not long after, Zoe remembers the blood. The blood that just doesn't seem to stop no matter what Zoe tried to do to help. The revulsion piles up and she feels herself begin to gag. With haste, Zoe tumbles off her bed as she raced towards the en suite² bathroom. It wasn't long before the girl was reintroduced to what little she had eaten.
After a few more retches, Zoe quickly cleans herself up and exits the bathroom. She manages a few steps before jerking back slightly in her walk, obviously startled. Madison sat, legs crossed, a couple feet away on top a desk; boredom was clearly shown on her face. Zoe couldn't help but stare, a little gob smacked.
"Took you long enough," the actress comments as she casually inspects her perfectly manicured nails.
Zoe, suddenly self-consciousness of what Madison might have heard, hugs her midsection as she takes a few steps back – a complete loss of words and actions until she notices a particular oddity. "The door was locked," Zoe blurts out after glancing towards the now opened doorway and back.
"Hmm," Madison hums as she tilted her head, "Doesn't work on me." The star doesn't seem particularly interested in what Zoe had to say, currently more invested with her own appearance. She spends a few more seconds inspecting her nails until satisfaction. Madison then refocuses her attention at Zoe, positively smirking in the other girl's direction. "Not with my powers," she boasts with a quick wink before waving a hand at the door; it promptly shuts with a resounding click.
Zoe's face tightens slightly at the thought of her privacy's existence relying heavily upon a certain actress's current whimsies.
Without much regards to the other girl's silence, Madison hops off the desk and does a walk around of the bedroom. She glosses over most items as Zoe, the new girl, had barely begun to decorate the room with her own personal effects. The star surprisingly keeps any disparaging remarks to herself during her inspection. Although she did stop and turn to take a good long look at Zoe, effectively making the girl feel naked in the process.
"Besides," Madison casually starts as she returned to her original task, "I once researched a role for a cat burglar. It wouldn't have been hard to pick the lock."
Zoe lets out a huff in annoyance as Madison returned to nitpicking through her stuff – what little of it that was stuffed in a bag and thrown onboard the train after her abrupt departure.
"What do you want?" Zoe finally asks in exasperation, especially with how her day's been going so far.
"You really shouldn't stay cooped up all alone in your room," Madison comments, completely ignoring Zoe's inquiry. Or maybe she just didn't care enough to answer. "It's not normal," she finishes before letting herself fall upon Zoe's bed.
"We're witches. We are so far from normal," Zoe retorts. Already she could feel the stress of the day begin to build up again. Madison opens her mouth to speak, but Zoe beats her to the punch.
"Why are you here, Madison?" Zoe stresses once more. The sudden straightened back and clenched fists showed she was serious.
"Feisty," Madison comments at Zoe's bubbling anger. The actress appeared more amused than deterred by Zoe's behavior. "Nice to see that the new girl's actually got some backbone."
By Zoe's deadpanned expression, Madison finally decides to relent with an answer. Of course, she rolls her eyes and lets out a small breath in annoyance before doing so.
"Given the slim pickings, it looks like you've won the jackpot." Jumping up from the bed, Madison places her hands on her hips as she flashed her usual movie star smile towards Zoe. "Congratulations, you're my new best friend."
Zoe wasn't sure how she felt. Perhaps stunned and slightly insulted. Still, maybe having a friend – she says this term loosely regarding Madison – in this place wouldn't make it so bad.
"Miss Foxx isn't joining us?" Zoe questions once Spalding left the room after Madison's taunts. Glancing around at those present, she noted none of the other girls seemed surprised.
"She doesn't eat with us," Queenie answers as she picked up a soup spoon. "She has her own dinner time."
"She would after having seen how you eat," Madison remarks before pushing away the plate that held the rimmed soup bowl. She had reserved her appetite for a salad, which unfortunately Spalding seems to refuse to provide her with for dinner. It wasn't exactly difficult to serve some fresh iceberg lettuce with a side of blue cheese; sometimes Madison wondered why good help was so hard to find these day. Resisting the urge to sigh, the blonde actress sat back in her seat as she figured on what to do. Maybe she wouldn't eat again tonight – a movie star has to maintain her figure after all.
Cautiously, Nan watched the two (usually bickering) girls from her seat. The situation could easily escalate, especially when witches and powers were mixed into the equation. Even Zoe remained quiet as she nervously eyed her own dinner plate. Besides telekinesis, Madison seemed to have a strong ability in provoking others.
Meanwhile, Queenie only tightens her hold on the spoon as she deliberately ignored Madison along with the obvious jab at her weight. Still, Queenie eyed the fork by her side a couple of times before finally refocusing on the group's newest member. "So, Zoe, what's your power?" she asks rather calmly.
"Yeah," Madison interrupts as she turns to Zoe as well. "What exactly did you do to your little boy toy?" she asks with a smirk. It seems her curiosity of Zoe – or, more specifically, Zoe's powers and its manifestation – has yet to be sated.
Zoe froze in her movements; her hand still outstretched from when she reached out for the water Spalding had poured for her earlier. Zoe's mind couldn't help but travel back to her last moments with Charlie and how her life changed from that point on.
"It was an accident, Zoe," Nan calmly states from her seat, interrupting whatever moment Zoe had fell into.
"Nan shut up before you get your ass in trouble," Queenie swiftly advises. Obviously, the African American girl didn't like Nan's ability one bit – or, perhaps, she was more than a little disturbed by it.
Madison, meanwhile, only picked up her own glass goblet and took a sip of her drink as she awaited an answer.
"So why are you here?" Zoe asks instead, turning the initial inquiry around on the actress.
Madison not-so-gently places her cup down. "My agent staged an intervention," she does a small wave with her right hand, "Ever since my drunken disorderly I get blamed for all kinds of shit that I didn't do."
"But you did it. You killed the man," Nan adds.
"I get it, bitch! You're clairvoyant," Madison shouts in a mixture of annoyance and anger. For someone who didn't care about boundaries, she sure had an issue with her own secrets being spilt.
A small silence descends over the table before Madison lets out a deep breath and turns to Zoe. "You wanna know what happened?"
Zoe only stared back, in which Madison took as an affirmative answer.
Facing forward in her seat, the actress eyed the other two girls across the dining table before recounting her tale.
"I was acting my very best, as usual, when the director decided to make a fuss about me not hitting my mark." Madison pauses momentarily to fiddle with her cloth napkin before continuing. "I told him that I was using the space like any good actress would do. Artistic creativity and all that."
Queenie rolls her eyes at that statement, firmly set that Madison was already in the wrong.
"Then he starts in on some bullshit about the light not being able to hit me without the mark," the actress scoffs before adding, "The guy obviously didn't know how to do his job." Dropping the unfolded cloth napkin from her hands, Madison reaches for her drink once more. "The light hit him just fine," she teases before taking a sip.
"All he said was 'hit your mark'," Queenie immediately states, face slightly scrunched up in contempt at the star's homicidal response.
Madison only lets out a small laugh, obviously amused by the other girl; as if Queenie could ever possibly understand her (once) glamorous life.
The African American saw how her words weren't getting through and decided to make her other opinion known. "Why won't you just do the world a favor and just take an acting class, you D-list, Botox bimbo," Queenie manages to get out just before Madison waves a hand in her direction.
Immediately, the rimmed soup bowl before Queenie flips towards her and splashes its contents all over the hefty girl's front shirt. The propelled item then drops onto the floor, shattering spectacularly after having fallen from the targeted girl's lap.
The retaliation was immediate. Grabbing a fork at the left of her dining plate, Queenie promptly stabs the back of her right hand with the utensil.
Madison automatically screams as she grabs at her own corresponding hand. "Stop it, you bitch!" she shouts as blood began to seep out of four noticeable holes.
"Stop what? I don't feel nothing," Queenie retorts as she drove the fork deeper into her hand.
Madison only further screams at the transferred pain as Zoe watched in shock and tried not to have another freak out episode like earlier in the day.
"I'm a human voodoo doll," Queenie taunts as she began wiggling the fork for good measure. "You like this, hmm?"
Zoe looks away to the side as her hands clenches into fists in her lap. Hearing Madison grimacing in pain only made the girl more aware of Queenie's actions. And seeing the blood only made –– stop it!
Stop, stop, stop. Zoe refused to let herself lapse back to that particular memory. She straightaway recites the one word over and over in her mind until she actually hears the word screamed out loud.
"Stop!" Nan finally shouts before jumping out her seat. "Don't," she continues while grabbing hold of Queenie's hand. "Stop, you're gonna get in trouble," Nan pleads as she tries to free the fork from the stubborn girl's grip. "Queenie stop!" she attempts once more before finally pulling the fork free and tossing it across the dining table, far out of the human voodoo doll's reach.
Undeterred, Queenie automatically reaches for the next utensil, which – unfortunately for Madison – happens to be a rather large knife. Pounding it once on the table, she points it in Madison's direction before holding it up to her own throat. The girl eyes the blonde actress threatening before speaking, "I'll do it."
"Come on," Nan soothingly speaks.
"I'll do it," Queenie repeats.
"Come on, let's take a walk," Nan suggests, attempting to placate the enraged girl.
"A walk?" Queenie scoffs before throwing down the knife as if burnt. "Fine," she suddenly agrees, unable to stand Madison's presence any longer. Pushing back her chair, Queenie stands up and follows Nan around the dining table. "I'm not hungry anyway."
"Like anyone believes that," Madison mutters as she held her injured hand.
Luckily, Queenie didn't hear the disparaging remark as Nan and her walked past the other two girls and headed for the door.
Shaking off the pain, Madison turns to look at Zoe once the two were left alone. "Well," she begins as if that crazy, horrifying scene didn't just occur. "That was disturbing," she admits before staring at Zoe a bit longer than the girl would have liked.
"So how do you like it here at Miss Robichaux's Academy for Exceptional Young Ladies?" Madison asks with a small, practiced smile.
Zoe doesn't answer, the shock having not wore off yet from the recent twist of events.
Madison suddenly hums when she hears the vibrations coming from her cellphone. Picking it up, she checks for any new messages and notifications. It doesn't take the actress long to decide how exactly to spend the rest of her night. Still holding the phone with both hands, she tilts it down close towards her body as she turns her head to look at Zoe. "Do you have any clothes that don't come from the Gap?" she wonders out loud.
Zoe's eyebrows furrow at that line of questioning. She hesitates for a moment before deciding to humor the girl beside her. "Not really," she begins before turning to look at Madison, "Why?"
Madison only lets out a sigh as she looked Zoe up and down. "You can borrow something of mine," she concludes before returning her attention towards the cellphone. "Frat party tonight. I just got the tweet," she explains.
All the while, several lines of blood continued to drip from her injured right hand.
-End Chapter One-
A/N: This is a basic rewrite of the Coven episodes. I've only seen a couple so far but they were enough to capture my interest. Also, if I've made any mistakes, then please notify me so I can correct them.
¹ Jean Grey is a character from the X-Men comics.
² En suite bathrooms are those connected directly to (and only accessible by) the adjoining bedroom; a private bathroom as opposed to a communal one.