Being a governor's daughter was far from easy.
Being the daughter of one of the Intergalactic Space Administration's governing council members was anything but easy.
But being in love with her sister was really fucking hard.
It had started slowly enough. Anna had known her sister since the day she'd been born, had clung to her blonde relative from her first ungraceful days as a mewling, puking infant, seeming to find solace only in her touch. Her parents assumed it was natural, that the bond they shared so early in their lives was important and should be nourished.
Growing into a toddler and learning to ride her first hoverbike would have been impossible without a helping hand.
Going to school as a petulant child was made easier by knowing she'd have her sister nearby at all times.
The years between her primary and secondary schools were the worst; she couldn't attend the same school because the hierarchy of the two was fundamentally different. Whatever the reason, grown-ups didn't understand how much she needed her sister.
Of course, going through puberty at that time made everything that much stranger. Hair growing where it'd never done before, bleeding irregularly and feeling the aching cramps that accompanied the wrath of some hell she'd rather be without, her shirts and underclothes suddenly beginning to feel too tight as new life developed within, molting the dorky child she'd been before somewhat ungracefully into a teenager, complete with the finest in dental technology and special medicines to keep her face and body clear of unsightly blemishes. Her freckles, though, seemed only to get worse.
She could only imagine what Elsa was going through, being that in addition to being the brilliant child Anna could never be, she had the ability to wield ice. Manipulating water of any sort seemed to be a talent of hers, something which her parents had attributed to a rare genetic mutation, though anything of colder variety worked well to her favor. It certainly explained how a blonde existed in a family of predominantly brunette relatives.
Nobody understood it, really. Even Elsa seemed hesitant to explain what it was like; she certainly saw no benefit to her powers and found them to be more the cause of trouble than solution. The number of times she'd been in detention for losing control stacked up faster than those for Anna's general misconduct. Her parents seemed to understand, but only on a base level: for Elsa, it was purely accidental; for Anna, it was to garner attention and cause chaos.
If they'd only known about the festering turmoil of emotions raging under her pretty red hair. If they'd only known the kiss she'd given Elsa one day at the age of eight had been her first and would haunt her at night. If only.
But it was at age fifteen Anna suffered her greatest travesty.
The day had started simply enough: her parents, as was routine every three months, boarded their interstellar shuttle to reunite with the ISA once again to discuss politics, economics, and general space talk the likes of which Anna was neglect to understand. Elsa was the one to pick up on it, conditioned to be the next counsellor once her parents had stepped down and retired. So, naturally, she boarded the shuttle as well, all bidding Anna a farewell for their two week hiatus from the home. Anna was sad to see them leave, but left it well enough alone; the tantrums she'd thrown in the past had been neglect to accomplish much beyond aggravating her parents, even if her sister confessed she found it endearing.
So they boarded and departed, and Anna was sent to spend time with her cousin Rapunzel while she waited for her family to return.
Except it would never come to pass.
"Anna."
She looked up, her braids tossing over her shoulders. The holoscreen had a headline marked in white text on red background, a newscaster with ridiculous hair listing the daily grievances.
The headline read "Councilman and Family Murdered," though Anna could only raise an eyebrow.
"What, Punz?"
"Isn't that your dad's ship?"
Anna took another look. The craft on the screen, a sleek vessel with the shape of an arrowhead, spun slowly in a circle as the newscaster rattled off information about when and where the attack had happened.
"It…looks like his ship…"
The serial number matched. Clear as day, the dark blue printing on the starboard side of the hull matched the memorized sequence Anna had known since she was small, and she gasped.
"No…"
The reporter indicated that a hijacking was suspected to be the culprit, that the ship appeared to have exploded in subzero temperature, and Anna stared unblinking at the screen.
Elsa.
She knew, with startling clarity, that Elsa had destroyed the ship. She was the only thing that would have been capable of doing so, and she managed the feat to avoid being captured by an unknown alien hijacker.
Elsa.
Anna had no time to think. She bolted from the house, startled shouts echoing from Rapunzel's distant mouth. She ran, tears slipping down her cheeks, sobs catching in her throat amid her strangled breaths, heart pounding, lungs squeezing, body collapsing in on itself.
She ran into the vegetation behind the house, heading deep into the forest, drawing her plasma pistol from her hip. The weapon was supposed to be for self-defense purposes, and it had never been fired before.
She fell to her knees, limbs and organs aching from the strain. She'd found it. One of several mighty silver-barked trees in the forest known for their inherently unstable nature when exposed to high heat or pressure.
Anna pointed the pistol at the tree. She's gone. Time to rid myself of these feelings.
"Anna, no!"
The tree detonated, a wave of heat energy whiplashing back to scorch Anna and set her clothing alight. Nearby trees were uprooted; the ground trembled from the explosion. She could hear screaming above as she fell backward, splayed on the floor of the forest, a charred mess of vaporized flesh and blackened anatomy.
She watched a shadow descend from above, eyes drifting to black as the end closed down upon her.
This shall be an attempt at revisiting my prior story-telling ability, but as anyone who's written anything will tell anyone who's never written anything, Writing in and of itself is really fucking hard. I am very aware that this chapter is raw and unpolished, and I am also very aware that, as a chapter on its own, it sucks. I really offer nothing to you guys with this short bit, and I'm not bothered by that; with any luck, this work will evolve and gradually say the things I've got jotted down on a notebook paper. I have an idea for the basic plot of the story, but we'll see just how closely I follow that plot.
Anyways, this story is yours, snowflakes. -Canis
