Resident Evil: The Hades Memoirs
Monica Strauss - The Moth
Clay stepped backwards, colliding with the frosted surface of the stasis tube behind him. His eyes wide with horror, he lifted his hands in front of his body as though to pacify her, but she could see his gaze shifting as he searched for a way to escape. Though he tried to hide it, she could tell that he was casting around for some way to disarm and perhaps even kill her. He opened his mouth to engage her, trying to buy himself some time by distracting her with talk. Even if she had given him time to answer, the adrenaline that was coursing through her veins and turning her heartbeat into a thrashing cacophony in her ears would have deafened her to his pleas.
Her finger tightened around the trigger and then there was a thunderous bang, followed by a gushing noise as blood ejected from the hole that had appeared in his throat, staining his orange scrubs a deep, dark shade of crimson. Gore frothed from his lips and nostrils as he recoiled in what looked strangely like surprise, before collapsing into a heap on the floor.
Monica froze for a moment, watching as her breath turned to vapour in the chill air as she felt a creeping numbness settle over her, though not as a result of the cold. She had expected guilt, or some other negative emotion, to render her paralysed but was surprised to find that nothing of the sort occurred. Instead, all she could feel was a deep sense of satisfaction at how she had performed. Everything was going according to her plan as she had envisioned it.
It seemed appropriate to congratulate herself considering that trained soldiers from the group who had been despatched by the company to seize Doctor Birkin's research had died in their attempt, and failed where she would succeed. Even now, the corpse of one man continued to decay nearby, where one of the laboratory's aberrations had torn him to pieces.
Lowering the pistol that she had taken from the security room on the day of the disaster, she stepped over the prone form of her colleague and wiped a streak through the scarlet that was covering the surface of the glass tank. Floating within was her prize, a dormant embryo of the G-virus, Birkin's final and most important work. It was an ugly little creature, but would no doubt fetch a pretty penny on the open market; the price would be hers to dictate and then her life would truly begin. She would shed the skin of her past existence, cast off all that she despised about working in that dingy facility with those stuffy old men and whining junior researchers, and start anew in any way she wished.
"No turning back now," she said, smiling as she caught a glimpse of her reflection superimposed over the form of her reward. Today marked the beginning of her transformation; in the darkness of the complex she had felt like a dull little caterpillar, her potential stifled by those around her, but in the light beyond those walls she would bloom into a bright and beautiful butterfly.
-----x-----x-----x-----x-----x-----
Mere minutes had passed since she had first put her plan into action. It had been over a week since she and Alan Clay had originally been trapped together; in that time they had been able to do nothing but listen as the others were eaten alive. They had slept in shifts, eating and drinking sparingly from their meagre supplies. She had never trusted her fellow survivor, even before the disaster. During their time in the room, however, she had occasionally caught him staring at her while he thought she was sleeping with a look that she could only describe as predatory. While she doubted that he would have ever had the intestinal fortitude to attack her, she had kept the handgun concealed within the confines of her top, just in case.
Though she knew that the danger would never completely pass outside of their haven, she also knew that there were boundless opportunities open to anyone smart enough to seize them. Her colleague would have preferred to have them both wait for a rescue that Monica doubted was coming. He would not have understood her ambitions. In the end, she had convinced him to accompany her to the stasis chamber where the samples were kept under the pretext of procuring something to present to their saviours in exchange for their safety. She could not have killed him any sooner; two employees were needed to open the door, after all.
Once she had gained access to the materials within, however, she had quickly discovered that murder was not as difficult as most people would have had her believe. The ease of it made her feel superior.
Unfortunately, since completing the first phase of her scheme, things had begun to grow complicated. As she had never reached a particularly senior position within the company, her ID card possessed a relatively meagre clearance level. In her mind, it was yet another example of her superiors' blinkered approach to her hard work and natural talent keeping her from her goals. The card of her now deceased partner was equally useless to her and thus she had found herself trapped in the laboratory with no conceivable exit.
She had been forced into one of the ventilation ducts, as though she were common vermin, in order to reach the train platform on the lowest level and it was not an experience that she had enjoyed. One of the specimens from the botanical laboratory had apparently been exposed to an excessive dose of the T-virus and now its tendrils were threaded through the majority of the crawlspaces in the complex. Her struggle to reach her destination had only served to further affirm her belief that she was worthy of the reward that awaited upon her escape.
As though to exacerbate her already foul mood further, the electric train that was used for cargo and, in the event of emergencies, escape was not functioning properly. She stood at the controls in the cab at the very front of the vehicle, growling with barely restrained anger as the lights flickered and dimmed around her. In spite of her best efforts, it did not seem as though she would be making her escape this way.
"Stupid piece of junk," she snapped, slamming her palms on the panel in frustration. With the train out of commission, she faced a long walk down the tunnel and the thought of it made her temper flare. She struck the terminal a second time, though that only succeeded in making her even angrier.
Giving the contraption a further kick for good measure, she snatched up the metal sample case that she was using to carry her prize and hurried out of the train. The pistol was still in her possession and she kept it close, having already needed it to dispatch several of the shambling cadavers that had once been her colleagues. While the low calibre of her weapon was enough to eliminate the occasional zombie, she had taken great pains in avoiding the more troublesome Lickers that were roaming the halls, as well as the creatures that had spawned from the giant plant, where it would be less useful.
Stepping out from the train's interior, she moved quickly to the wall on which the platform's controls were located. She had been impatient to test the transport in order to see if it would function and now that she had determined it would not, she wasted no time in opening the gate that would allow her access by foot to the tunnel. With a blare of sirens and a flash of warning lights, both of the bulkheads that had previously sealed the facility off from the yawning passageways began to rise. Once she was certain that her exit was opening, she turned and strode back towards the other end of the train, shooting it a glare as she passed.
As the cacophony began to die down, Monica thought that she heard the sound of footsteps behind her and turned to make sure. She had not survived as long as she had in the laboratory above by being complacent of her surroundings. What she saw upon investigating, however, made her freeze where she stood.
Beyond the train's last car was a figure that she at first thought was just another of the walking corpses, though a closer examination made her reconsider her assumption. The form did not stagger or hunch over in the same manner as an infected human but rather walked with a mixture of trepidation and purpose with its shoulders pulled into a slouch that only beings capable of self-loathing could perform. It was female, wore its hair in a short, black mop, was clad in a green, hooded sweatshirt and jeans, and carried a rucksack on its back. Though she was certain that the interloper would not be a factor in her escape, there was something about the way in which it carried itself that reeked of familiarity.
She reasoned that, as she was carrying the gun, it could not hurt to better acquaint herself with the intruder.
Aiming the handgun at the floor to the left of the new arrival, she fired a shot that left a black smudge on the tiles when it ricocheted as well as aggravating the tender flesh on the inside of her right hand. Even now she had yet to truly come to grips with the sidearm's aggressive recoil and the bruising around her fingers was making each pull of the trigger a chore in itself. Still, the blast had the desired effect of bringing the individual to a stop so that she could approach it.
"Hey!" she called out as she came closer, "what are you doing down here?"
Visibly shaken by the fact that she had just been shot at, the young woman in question backed away nervously as she approached, evidently afraid to remain where she was standing but too frightened of reprisal to try and run. Advancing with determination, she thrust the weapon forward as though to insist on an answer. The unarmed female studied her face nervously and the brunette almost felt that she noticed a flicker of recognition on her features.
"Monica?" she ventured, the sound of her name causing her to momentarily balk. Glaring at the unknown girl quizzically and searching her own memory for any recollection, she wondered if perhaps it were possible that they were not actually strangers.
It took her several seconds, but eventually an identity for this other person began to form in Monica's mind. Granted the individual she had once known had possessed longer hair and worn spectacles, these were not static characteristics when given a pair of scissors and contact lenses. Her faintly oriental countenance and guarded body language, however, were not things that could be changed so easily. Memories bloomed, and they were not happy ones.
"Yoko," she sneered, almost entirely unsurprised to find her former colleague here of all places, "you've got some nerve coming back here. I assumed after your unfortunate incident you just went and crawled under a rock like the little child that you are."
"I don't understand," the other woman insisted, receiving nothing more than a callous frown.
"Oh please," she snapped, disliking the fact that her acquaintance from the laboratory's staff was playing the innocent as always, "did you pretend to leave so that you could wait for your moment to come back, was that it? You assumed we'd all be dead so you'd have free reign in this place? Well, I've got bad news for you; this is my prize and you can't have it."
She gestured with the metal sample case that she was carrying in her left hand as though to illustrate what she had been talking about and almost immediately Yoko's expression took on a familiar look of curiosity. "That capsule?" she asked, eyeing the object critically. Almost immediately, Monica came to a sudden realisation.
"Wait, are you after this too?" she queried angrily, taking a defensive step backwards and thrusting the pistol into her rival's face to make her cower for a second time. Though she said nothing, the dark-haired female did not make any attempt at denying the accusation either and so the researcher allowed herself a feeling of satisfaction at having unearthed her true motives. "You are, aren't you?" she continued, doggedly chastising the former golden child of the facility for her deception, "you haven't changed a bit, Yoko; always pretending to be a good little girl while you're scheming to get your own way."
"Stop it!" the younger woman cried, seeming to surprise even herself with how forcefully the words left her mouth before adding in a quiet voice, "I really don't know what you're talking about."
Monica glared coldly at the hurt look in her opponent's eyes and the tremble that was beginning to manifest on her lips, feeling nothing but a deep sense of annoyance that she would think it so easy to manipulate her. "Don't play the innocent with me," she commanded, jabbing with her firearm and watching with satisfaction as the girl in question flinched away, "you can't fool me; you could never fool me."
By now it actually seemed as though the junior of the two women was going to cry. The brunette's grim mood was unlikely to lighten at the sight of a grown adult becoming emotional. Fortunately, a thought came to her and suddenly her outlook seemed that much more positive.
"How about doing a friend a favour, for old times' sake?" she queried, making it almost seem like an offer but for the fact that she continued to aim her handgun directly at the other woman, "you still have your ID card, right? Give it to me."
The dark-haired girl peered at her curiously, before frowning to herself and reaching into the back pocket of her trousers. With trepidation, she withdrew the plastic card, replete with her vital statistics and, more importantly, security clearance. She looked at it as though she had never seen it before, paying particular attention to the picture of her own face that was attached to it, and then held it out nervously, evidently hoping that she could use it to purchase her safety. Monica smiled as she set down her sample case and snatched it, looking at the photograph that depicted the true appearance of her former colleague, no longer caring why the interloper seemed so unfamiliar with what she was seeing.
"Yoko, you little lifesaver," she grinned, tucking the card into the pocket of her scrubs before stepping back and snatching up the metal container.
She did not turn away as she strode the length of the platform, keeping her aim fixed upon her rival's torso as she did so. Though she did not seem to be contemplating fighting her way out of the standoff, the female researcher did not trust anyone lightly; she was particularly wary of taking her former colleague at face value knowing her deceptive tendencies. Once she had reached the elevator that would take her to the freight transport many levels above, she put her prize on the floor for a second time and swiped the card through the reader beside the doors.
"Have a nice life," she said by way of a parting sentiment, before smiling less than pleasantly, "what's left of it." With that, she stepped into the compartment, her hard-earned reward firmly in hand, and watched as it hummed closed behind her.
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From a young age, Monica had always looked up to her father. As a pre-eminent authority in the field of microbiology, he had taught her to have high aspirations in life and of the sacrifices that needed to be made in order to meet those lofty goals. She had followed willingly in his footsteps, intent on making something of herself, and boasted a resume that anyone would have been proud of as a result. As the valedictorian of her University year, her grades had been of an outstanding quality and her work ethic was entirely unparalleled. It was that prodigious performance that had earned her the attention of the Umbrella Corporation, who offered her an internship at their complex in Raccoon City.
At that time in her life, her father had been dead, a victim of leukaemia, for just over three years. Though her mother had implored her to return home constantly since his demise, she had never wished to depart from her studies. He would certainly not have wanted her to surrender so easily. She shed no tears for him, focusing only on elevating herself to as high a position as she could, just as he had told her to. As a result, she was no longer in contact with what remained of her family; it was not such a great loss to her mind.
Interoffice politics were her forte; there was no one more capable of playing those games than her. She was the most sociable and hard-working of all the junior researchers during her internship, and she dedicated much of her free time to ensuring that every one of her colleagues and superiors realised that. When the day came for her to be promoted to a position of comparable authority within the corporation's ranks, however, it did not bring her the satisfaction that she felt it should have for one very important reason.
Promoted alongside her from the group of young and brilliant minds was a girl who sapped the joy of ambition from Monica's life. Yoko Suzuki was several years her junior and had flawlessly replicated her resume; in spite of her clumsy nature and socially awkward demeanour, she seemed to have made an impression on the senior staff members that the brunette could only have dreamed of. For every extra hour of her time she had wasted, desperate to make her mark on her peers, the Asian girl matched her every step of the way. It did not take long for her focus to switch quickly from personal gratification to rabid competitiveness.
She did not know what quality it was that her superiors saw in her rival, but it was not something that she herself could recognise or reproduce.
A full year after their ascendancy to the position of permanent research staff at the subterranean facility near the city limits, the older female found her talents squandered on experiments with new chemical compounds on animal subjects. Meanwhile, her colleague had finally been elevated to the status of senior experimenter. That very day, Yoko had been given the distinction of assisting Doctor Birkin's latest endeavour in G-virus research. Monica, on the other hand, was running errands for her supervisor, carrying the monthly reports from their department to administration for the perusal of the Chief Administrator, Birkin's wife Annette.
Holding the sizeable stack of paperwork to her chest as she walked from the elevator, she gave a loud grunt when someone collided with her and knocked the pile from her hands. Though her initial reaction was to scream and strike out at the other person in her frustration, she fought the urge as she always did and quickly asserted the pleasant demeanour that was her trademark at the laboratory. When she realised who she had bumped into, however, she realised that she need not have bothered.
"Yoko?" she asked, before glowering angrily as she stooped to retrieve the fallen papers, "aren't you going to apologise?"
Her mood proceeded to grow worse when the other woman did not respond, choosing only to stare blankly ahead as though she had not heard her speak. She noted that the dark-haired girl was wearing her civilian clothes rather than her scrubs and Monica realised that she was leaving early, evidently full of pride after her success with the human G experiment.
"Did you come here to gloat then?" she asked angrily, stacking the folders in the crook of her left arm as she sorted them into chronological order, "because I don't care even if you are the golden child now, I'm not interested in what you have to say."
She continued to be infuriatingly silent for a moment longer and then walked past the kneeling brunette as though she were not even there. Outraged at the disrespect she was being paid, she dropped her files for the second time and chased her retreating rival, grabbing her by the arm in order to prevent her from going more than a few steps.
"Don't you dare ignore me!" she snapped, spinning her around so that she could face her antagonist directly.
When she became aware of the expression on the younger female's features, however, her previous anger evaporated. Yoko's face was hauntingly devoid of emotion or cognition, like an off-switch had been flipped inside her head to make her stop working. Monica did not quite understand how she was managing to function. After a few seconds, she turned away from her and walked towards the elevator, as though their momentary confrontation had never happened.
Watching her leave, the brunette frowned as she was unsure quite what to think, before she returned to gathering the documents that had fallen to the floor.
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Monica had been told later that day of Yoko's first foray into human experimentation and how it had gone far from smoothly. Though she had seemed capable at first, by the time the first subject had expired, she had descended into virtual hysterics. At the conclusion of the trial, she had become unnervingly silent, seemingly operating solely on instinct as she changed back into her ordinary attire and left the facility. One of the other assistants had said that she wore the blank expression from the laboratory all the way to the exit.
The brunette had considered the news of her opponent's failure to be a blessing; she would either be terminated for her poor performance or buried so deeply in the ranks of the subordinate researchers that she would likely never be heard from again. In the mind of the older female, that meant that the way was clear for her to begin her ascent. Unfortunately, the day after the dark-haired girl's disgrace, she had found herself locked in a room with Alan Clay, listening to the sounds of her life crumbling around her.
She was angry at the senior staff for having promoted someone so obviously inferior to herself and stifling her until it was finally too late to make use of her skills. In her mind, claiming Doctor Birkin's research for herself was akin to restitution for her mistreatment. She could not help but smile to herself when she thought of the steel briefcase in her possession as her severance pay.
She exited the elevator and walked swiftly towards the freight train that was sitting atop its platform, ready to be raised to the upper level. Fortunately, she could not see any evidence that her undead former colleagues had reached that area yet and so did not need to pause even for a moment before making a direct beeline towards her escape route. The turntable rose to a supposedly abandoned marshalling yard located in the sprawling warehouse district on the outskirts of Raccoon City. She would use one of the trains still kept in the yard to reach an area safely beyond the metropolis' limits and then find somewhere to settle while she finalised the sale of the last remaining G-embryo.
When she reached the control panel that she was intending to utilise in her egress, however, she found that the key to operate it was missing. Cursing her luck, she quickly considered all of the locations where the item might be located. Though it could potentially have been as close as the train's compartment itself or as far as the control room on the lower level, it was most likely being kept in the security office nearby. It was fairly typical that she would come so far and find herself faced with yet more trials to endure, as though her life had not been difficult enough already.
Muttering to herself as she went, she turned to walk towards the room in question. Unfortunately, before she had gone more than two steps, there was a crash as something landed atop the train and a huge shadow fell over her. Freezing in position and swallowing hard, she studied the dark outline around her, realising that it was the size of a large man, albeit somewhat misshapen. Mind racing, she spun on the spot and aimed her weapon up at the looming spectre, but hesitated on the trigger when she saw what was confronting her.
The figure leapt down from its perch, landing with a heavy thud on the metal flooring that startled her and caused her to reel backwards, but did not provoke her into finally shooting at it. Her eyes took in its full form, the tattered and stained clothing that still clad its body consisting of a pair of battered blue jeans, green shirt and orange necktie beneath a frayed and bloodied lab coat. Its right arm had grown to twice its original size, the muscle tissue having burst through the skin and swollen to create a gory, sinuous protrusion from its once-human body. Fat, circular wounds that had healed into deep purple knots dotted the exposed areas of its skin, while the side of its face nearest the malformed limb was a leathery mask of burn scarring. The most horrifying aspect of its appearance, however, was that she recognised it.
"Doctor Birkin?" she asked incredulously, as she backed away several more steps. The bulbous sac on her superior's shoulder was instantly recognisable as an effect of direct infection with the G-virus; she had seen similar examples among the samples retained in the chamber where she had killed Clay. It would not have surprised her if he had been insane enough to use his own unstable compound on himself.
"Those clothes ... that face ... I know you," the creature that had once been William Birkin hissed, its words laboured, punctuated by sucking breaths as it struggled to draw air into its lungs. It studied her face in detail as though it were looking at her through a dense mist, before its gaze settled on the badge pinned to her top, "...Monica."
There was a hoarse, rasping quality to its speech, offset by a peculiar distortion that almost sounded like a second voice lurking behind that of the man, which made her skin crawl. To make matters worse, the abomination seemed almost to be in control of its faculties. Though it was doubtlessly slipping further and further from humanity, for now there still remained some vestige of the man whom she had begun to begrudge as her superior at the facility. That thought, combined with the knowledge of what she was currently carrying in her briefcase, chilled her to the marrow.
"What ... is that?" it asked her, its working left eye surveying the object that she had suddenly become immensely self-conscious of. She could feel an icy stab of terror seizing her heart as panic grew there.
"It's nothing you need to concern yourself with, sir," she stammered, trying vainly to defuse the situation in spite of the sense of hopelessness that was slowly beginning to build within her, "I just thought it would be wise to relocate some of the research, since the lab is so chaotic at the moment."
"How considerate ... how loyal of you ... Monica..." it responded, its tone distinctly unimpressed. For perhaps the first time in her life, Monica's measured words and forced sincerity were not provoking the reaction that she had hoped for. "I will not ... allow anyone ... to take it from me. I would ... give up my humanity ... my life ... to stop them. It is mine ... my life's work ... my life. It is the future ... I will ascend ... I will evolve," it continued, beginning to stagger towards her as best it could in its half-warped state. As she looked on in horror, its voice took on an almost mournful quality that, "it is a terrible thing ... that I have done. My daughter ... my wife ... I must protect them..."
She began to back away, disturbed by what she was witnessing and helpless to escape the monstrosity. Casting around in a search for something to use against it, just as Alan Clay had done when confronted with his own dismal fate, she began to feel the situation spiralling out of her control. Internally, she screamed at herself to shake away her own helplessness; almost immediately, her arm snapped upwards to aim the pistol she was carrying towards its grotesque mask. With her last ounce of determination, she creased her features into a frown, calling forth all of the bravery that she could muster in the face of the monster that was stalking her.
She had pressed on through hell and high water to retrieve the embryo, her rightful compensation, and she would be damned if she were going to let anyone take it away from her. In truth, this moment was almost too good to be true. It was her opportunity to exact some needed retribution against one of the men responsible for stifling her and making this act of theft necessary. Killing William Birkin was, to her, completely justified.
The beast's good eye widened slightly as the weapon targeted its torso, before a sinister gurgle rose in its throat that could only be described as a chuckle. "You cannot ... hurt my ... beautiful creation ... with that ... child..." it told her.
It convulsed and she screamed as the protrusion on its shoulder split apart with a wet tearing noise, the sinew cleaving in two before her to reveal a slick, bloodshot eye. A film of gore oozed from the glassy orb and along the limb upon which it sat, as it rolled in its malformed socket. It focused on her. Hastily taking aim, she squeezed the trigger and flinched as the weapon fired, the bullet completely missing its intended target. Before she could adjust her focus and attempt to shoot again, however, it was bearing down on her rapidly. Its sheer size was enough to cause her cognition to flee away from her, the gun sliding from her paralysed fingers as she turned to sprint in the direction of the elevator, desperate to escape.
Before she had run more than a few metres, she felt a solid impact on her back when the creature pushed her forward. Her legs slipped out from under her and her face slammed into the concrete floor, the impact causing her to bite through her tongue. Blood filled her mouth and dribbled over her chin as her jaw began to swell with bruising. Dazed to the point where she could not comprehend her situation, she was barely able to realise that it had wrapped its mutated claw around her leg and was dragging her in the very direction that she had been fleeing to. She also failed to notice that it had retrieved the sample case that she had dropped and was currently clutching it in its remaining human hand.
"It ... speaks to me..." it muttered, seemingly by way of conversation as it continued to drag her insensate form across the ground, "it may ... simply be ... an auditory ... hallucination ... that afflicts me ... as my ... conscious mind ... decays, but I ... hear its voice ... nonetheless. It has told me ... that you wish ... to steal it ... and use it ... for your own ... profiteering ends ... but I ... cannot allow that. I have not ... forsaken my life ... so that others may come ... and steal ... what is mine. And so it tells me ... to make ... a host of you. It longs ... for life ... and you ... squander ... your own ... so needlessly. It should ... be put ... to better use."
Once it had reached the doors to the metal box at the end of the short stretch of hallway, it watched as they opened before throwing her unceremoniously inside. It set the metal container beside her and then brought its palm back to strike the button for the elevator's emergency stop as the entrance slid shut behind it. The lights dimmed to a deep red luminescence as it stooped to examine the case, her dizzied stupor forcing her to watch as it pried open the lid. She could see the wriggling form of the embryo she had attempted to steal thrashing in its glass prison, but as the former Head Researcher's fingers brushed the surface it seemed to grow calm and still.
The abomination balled its hand into a fist and punched clean through the transparent shield, ignoring any pain it might have felt when it shredded the flesh on its fingers, before taking its spawn into its palm where it sat, docile and waiting. With the smaller creature retrieved from its enclosure, it wrapped its disfigured paw around her throbbing lower mandible and hefted her so that her back was to the wall of the steel prison.
"Please, Doctor Birkin," Monica sobbed, trying weakly to pry the clawed fingers from her face in a desperate, and ultimately futile, attempt to free herself, "please, no."
"We are ... fortunate ... Monica," the monstrosity informed her, forcing her head back so that her mouth was perfectly in line with her oesophagus, "though we ... may die ... we shall both ... bring forth ... an evolution. The future ... resides ... within us."
Her eyes flooded with tears as she pressed them tightly shut, forcing her jaw to lock so that her teeth would not part, only for the beast to shake her like she were a rag doll. The pain of the movement to her damaged features made her cry out and then her airways were suddenly full of the slime-coated parasite that had been liberated from her briefcase. She could not help but vomit, though there was little more than bile in her stomach after seven days of starvation in the laboratory, but the acidic fluid was forced back by the invading entity. Her body began to convulse as her eyes rolled up in their sockets, saliva whipped into froth issuing from between her violated lips.
The creature passed through her throat and her first breath was ecstasy, but the crushing realisation of its new home within her crippled her spirit immediately. She did not feel its parent release her from its grasp, but she was aware when her form went tragically limp and sprawled upon the floor. Beads of salted water began to flow gently across her face as she wept quietly, curling into a foetal position in her absolute despair. Her former superior had vanished, leaving her to die alone and afraid.
Though she had dared to hope that she would bloom into a bright and beautiful butterfly, she had instead become the cocoon that would nurture and produce something abhorrent and frightening. The thing that hatched from her at her death would be every bit the moth she had feared she would become in life. She closed her eyes and died, surrendering control of her body to its invader.
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