Fangirl x Hunter Chapter Two

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"Riley, we don't need any more cheese-"

"Fuck you, we need all the cheese-"

"Aren't you lactose intolerant?"

"That won't stop me from enjoying my goddamn brie."

It had been about three months since they'd entered the Hunter x Hunter world, and about two and a half months since they started living at their apartment. Miraculously, they'd both been able to find jobs; with Mrs. Shirogane's help and a few more tears, Meray had landed a waitressing gig at a café and Riley now worked at a bookshop-bakery… Basically, it was a Half-Price Books or Barnes and Noble.

As for Krollo, they'd found him a 240-gallon tank that was in remarkably good condition at a second-hand shop for not too much. Unsure if he was a burrower or a climber since he didn't even have an actual species, given he was bigger even than the Goliath Bird-Eaters (and spiders don't generally tend to have hot pink eyes), there was a thick layer of sphagnum moss to dig into and some branches for him to climb on, and a few hollow logs as hides.

He seemed to really enjoy cockroaches and crickets, so now both Riley and Meray kept a few jars on them in case they saw any during the day (the local pet shop didn't keep things for pet tarantulas, unfortunately). Riley was especially zealous in taking care of Krollo, and had so far acquired quite a few nasty bruises jumping for the insects, one time even falling into a fountain in pursuit of an especially big cricket.

Currently, however, they were grocery shopping for the week.

"Why are you getting sour cream?"

"It's for beef stroganoff later. I think we have almost everything…" She consults the slip of paper in her hands. "Oh! Can you grab some milk, eggs, and unground beef? I'll go get some onions, egg noodles, and bread, then we can check out. "

"Alright!" With her plastic basket filled with snacks, Meray heads off deeper into the refrigerated section of the store. Riley turns and heads off to the produce section, grabbing the noodles and bread on the way.

However, the makeup section shone like a beacon, calling her name ever so sweetly. "It's no harm if I just look, right?" she reasons, pushing her bangs back from her face. A few hesitant steps towards it and she shakes her head, instead turning to go to the vegetables. Riley carefully inspects the onions and is reminded of her family.

From onions.

Making caramelized onions with her older sister to put on Paninis, eating an entire raw onion on a dare, non-stop Shrek jokes- oh gods the colorful-haired girl missed her family so much. She thought of her dad, trying to find another big client after his last one dropped him, of her step-mom who was working on senior portraits, and two older sisters that lived at home, both working towards moving out. A step-sister was expecting with her fiancé while the other was working on an engineering degree. Were they okay? Were they still searching for her? Riley thought of her girlfriend- ex girlfriend. They'd broken up the day before Riley and Meray went dimension hopping.

She was heart-broken, of course. And angry, so angry so could strangle-

Riley shakes her head and places the onions in a plastic bag, weighing them, and slapping the sticker on the bag. To make herself feel better, she heads back into the makeup section. Eyeliner, mascara, anything she could hide in her sleeves and purse. Material items made her feel a little less empty- she couldn't afford to see a therapist, much less buy her medication.

"I could go for a smoke," she mumbles to herself, waiting for Meray to show up. After another minute or two of waiting, she decides to get in the longest line to give her friend more time to get there.

With no more room in her basket, and two more things to grab, Meray was in a bit of a pickle. She had the unground beef, but how was she supposed to carry the eggs and milk when she needed both hands to carry the basket? With a sigh, she kneels down out of the way to play a game of grownup Tetris. With some deft rearrangements, puzzle solving skills honed by years of playing the Portal games and Skyrim and that strange period of her life where she was part of the rubix cube club at her school, she made room for the eggs (it was the perfect fit), and managed to precariously balance the milk carton on top after her trip to the dairy section.

On her way to the register, the brown haired young woman caught sight of some instant noodle cups, the same as the kind her dad used to buy. On a whim, she picks up two spicy shrimp cups, for old times sake.

Time was up, Riley was next in line. She unloaded her basket of bread and noodles and cheese and everything else. She eyes the wall of cigarettes and liquor behind the counter, and then to the cashier. Everyone always told her she looked like she was in her twenties, time to put that to the test…

"Hey, excuse me? Could you also ring up two packs of menthols, a bottle of vodka and a bottle of root beer schnapps for me please?" Riley smiles prettily, leaning forward on the counter to give the guy a peak down her shirt. She looks at him over her glasses and through her eyelashes, trying to look coy, winning, ten years older than she actually was. The guy blushed slightly and nodded, turning around to grab the items she requested. 'He looks pretty young,' the seventeen year old muses to herself, picking up a lighter and slipping it into her waistband. 'He's probably around my age, maybe a little bit younger.'

"That'll be a total of five-hundred sixty-eight jenny and fifty three cents, ma'am."

"Thanks, boo," she responds, pulling five seventy out. "Here you go, keep the change! Have a good day!" Riley grabs her bags and flashes another smile at the cashier, keeping an eye out for her friend.

"Hey, did you already pay?" the brunette greets, seeing the bags in her hands.

"Yeah. I'll wait for you outside. Did you bring your wallet?"

"No…" Meray moans.

Rolling her eyes theatrically, Riley fishes her wallet back out of her purse and hands it off. "Here. I have like, another thousand or so jenny in there, so that should be enough."

"Okay, cool. I'll pay you back when we get home, okay?" Meray hugs her friend and scampers off to get in line. Riley exits the overly air conditioned grocery store and leans against the wall close to the door. Setting the bags on the ground, she pulls out a pack of menthols and lights up. Quietly, she puffed way at the cigarette, looking out at the pedestrians on the street. The trails they left behind them stayed, some bright, some dark, but they always took a while to fade completely.

Some of them had ghosts trailing after them, dead relatives or friends that just refused to let go. Riley had grown used to them again, she had to. Her meds were left back in her home dimension. Her hallucinations, or her sight into the afterlife, whatever it was, seemed stronger here for some reason. She'd talked it over with Meray, and their hypothesis was the presence of Nen that was causing it, though it came with the downside of her anxiety becoming worse. Now, she carried a bottle of lavender essential oil around with her everywhere to help with it as well, just in case.

A swell in the whispers that she normally kept as background noise made her snap back into focus. It felt like a shadow had fallen over the street and the teenager was the only one to notice. Eyes following the invisible shade to its source, Riley saw Phinks again, and Feitan, and there was Omokage. Something clicked in her head, and she exhaled loudly.

"Jesus fucking Christ."

The Kurta Massacre might not have happened yet.

She finished the cigarette, and lit up another. Why was Meray taking so long? Was the line that long? They needed to get out, get back to the apartment, and talk about what the hell they were supposed to do now. It was at least two years before the pilot episode, but it might even be more than that. She'd need to ask around- of course, no one who was still breathing; the dead seemed eager to share what they knew with her, probably because she was one of the few that could see and hear them-

Abruptly, the girl was brought out of her racing, spiraling thoughts and off the brink of an anxiety attack by the gentle whispers she'd been hearing as long as she could remember.

He's looking.

As the whispers said, Phinks was indeed looking her way. Riley pretended not to recognize him or even see him; it'd been decided that getting involved with the Phantom Troupe was the absolute worst fucking idea. No matter how tempting it was, purposely fucking with the timeline was completely off limits.

The goth girl forced herself back into a daydream about… Naruto? Yeah, one of her last daydreams had to do with Naruto, so she started going back down the rabbit hole of creating a new character. Her brow creased in thought, at what point would this new character be injected? Perhaps at the very beginning…Sakura's sister? Sure, why not. Just as Riley began going through her mental list of Japanese names having to do with flowers to find something suitable, she barely registers a body slump against the wall next to her.

"Hey." A deeply masculine voice sounded from next to her.

It took Riley a long moment, but she turned her head to nail the man with a flat stare.

"What the fuck do you want, Ryu?" the teen glares at her unwanted companion, flicking ash off the end of her cigarette. If anything, she expected another awkward conversation with Phinks, not… this. She's just found a good name, too, and now she couldn't think of it. Dammit! The irritating regular at her job looked vaguely perturbed and rather amused at this, and Riley's dark-painted lips turned into a frown. "What?"

"You just looked-"

"I looked what exactly? Lonely? Bored?"

"Like my next girlfriend~. Let's go on a date." The dude had an annoying smirk on his face.

Riley scowled at the brunet man, growing angry. She literally was not in the mood for this, she just wanted to go home and probably cry or something. The whispers were growing louder and louder, something about an eye stealer? Was it about Omokage? She shook her head and took another drag, there was too much going on-.

"So you want to date a goth piece of shit?"

"If that's what you are, honey~."

Their eyes, their eyes-

She tilted her head and thought of her options, mind wandering to the abandoned hospital she frequented. "No."

"No?"

"I don't want to date you. Or touch you. Or talk to you, or look at you. It's creepy how you watch me at work and I really don't appreciate it. Also, could you back up? You're too close."

Large hands closed over Riley's wrists and she could feel her bones clack together. "Ow, what the hell are you doing?"

"Thing is, doll, you don't get to say no." His lips peel back to reveal too-perfect teeth, brown eyes glinting sickly. The girl felt a chill of fear seep into her from the cool brick wall, and why were people just passing by? Didn't they notice, why weren't they helping?

"No, no, no, nonononono-"

Massacre, one survivor-

Riley needed to think, breathe, she was beginning to hyperventilate-

They stole our eyes, HE STOLE OUR EYES-

Everything was so loud, too loud, couldn't anyone else hear the screaming?

"L-let me go, let me go…" she mutters like a mantra. Her terror and anger built up inside her, boiling and wanting to get out. Months of rage and sadness with no outlet burned her insides.

"LET ME GO!" Riley's aura exploded, and her harasser dropped to the ground in a dead faint. She sinks down to the ground and begins stroking her socks, focusing on the grain and feel of them as she gets her breath back under control.

'In, two, three… out, two, three…'

"Riley? Riley, what wrong?" Meray was beside her, a foot away ('Too close, she's too close, everyone is too close-') on her knees. Riley mutely shook her head, feeling drained, and shakily stood up from the concrete.

"N-n-not here…" she stutters, grabbing her grocery bags.

"Okay, okay, let's get you home and a glass of water…" The brunette says soothingly, sticking close to her trembling friend. "I'm going to put my hand on your shoulder, okay?" After receiving a nod of acquiescence, her hand gently lands on her friends' broad shoulder and rubs it gently. They start their walk back to the apartment, Riley keeping her eyes on the ground as she counted cracks in the pavement. So engrossed she was in grounding herself, she accidentally walked into someone. Dark brown eyes glance quickly up at him and into his irritated face and utter a quiet apology.

"Sorry about that, Phi- dude."

Teal eyes glare down at her, and the screaming reaches a crescendo.

HE'S THE ONE WHO STOLE OUR EYES.

Involuntarily, Riley's eyes begin to water as spirits grasping at her clothes, pinching her skin, pulling her hair and demanding to be heard, to be answered. Brown- no, not brown, scarlet, scarlet eyes glared at her from beyond the veil. They demanded action, revenge, they demanded that the mermaid-haired girl do something. But she was frozen, a deer in headlights, watching her own impending death-

'I can't, I can't I need to get home-'

"What are you staring at, girl?" his voice like a whip and strange eyes staring into her own unremarkable ones.

Meray was gently tugging on her elbow, making apologies and excuses that bled into the background noise. The world had stopped and faded away, it was just her and her voices versus this ice-block of a man and his eyes. The longer she stared, the more Riley felt like she was swirling down the drain-

"Riley!" a sharp voice and even sharper pinch to the delicate skin on her hand bring her back to reality. She blinks and manages to plaster a small smile on her face.

"Your eyes." She murmurs, hoping that by keeping her voice quiet she'd be able to mask its trembling- the effect was monotone. "I've never seen a pair with that color before. Makes me want to pluck them from your head and keep them in a jar above my bed."

"Riley, what the actual fuck-"Meray whispers as they continue walking, both oblivious to the eyes watching them retreat.

"They're gone." Riley states frankly, emptily, a little too loudly for public. "The Kurta Clan is dead."

"H-how do you-"

"How else?" Riley still had that blithe smile on her face, her hollow voice echoing within her hollow throat. "They told me."

Meray watched her friend out of the corner of her eye as she cut up an onion for dinner. The brunette was worried, she really had every right to be, Riley was in a lot of pain and some of the things she knew didn't make sense. Like, Meray believed in the afterlife and everything, but to be completely honest having her best friend be able to cross that sacred threshold without trying was disconcerting, and she worried that some of the spirits Riley talked to didn't have her best interests at heart. Admittedly, talking to the dead had been incredibly useful to them, as they were able to start learning Nen, but…

"Hey, are you done with that onion? It's about time to start cooking it."

"Yeah, yeah…" Meray says, dumping the chopped bits into the frying pan from which the smell of melted butter oozed through the apartment. She then leaned back against a counter and watched the goth girl move about the kitchen with robotic grace. She could tell that the other was just going through the motions, probably dissociating from the afternoons events. Yes, they were able to learn Nen, but Riley had been taking anti-depressants for a reason and to just stop cold turkey like that probably wasn't good. She knew her friend wasn't getting enough sleep, she saw the bags that hung like mourning curtains beneath her eyes when she wasn't wearing makeup. Often on her days off, Riley would sleep for near twenty-four hours, wake up to eat, then fall asleep again for another four or five before going back to work. It was either that or disappear off to that hospital to practice on her unwilling patients, where she'd stay night and day and barely make it back to shower then go to work with damp hair and wickedly flicked eyeliner. Actually, it was mainly the latter scenario.

Meray sighs quietly and goes about preparing the sandwiches to be grilled, putting on condiments and then layering up the cheeses and meats. On a separate frying pan, she begins to heat the food. When the multitude of cheeses had thoroughly melted, the caramelized onions were added and they sat down in front of the TV to eat.

"Hey, the Magic School Bus is on!" Riley says in excitement, throwing her legs over Merays' lap, cramming a bite of Panini into her mouth with one hand while using the other to turn the TV on with the remote. They sit in relative silence as they learn about bees and pollination.

"Are you going back to the hospital tonight?" Meray asks quietly, setting her plate down on the floor. Pale blue eyes look into dark brown, heavily circled in black kohl and mascara.

"Yeah," Riley responds, picking up the plates and taking them to the kitchen to wash. "I'm getting really close, I've almost perfected my techniques; honestly, I can't wait to be done with it." She sets them on the drying rack and starts scrubbing the other things used to make dinner, hands damn near immune to the steaming water. "I think tonight will be my last- knock on wood." A soapy hand reaches out to knock on the old wooden cabinet doors.

"God, I hope so." Meray answers, hopping up to sit on the counter. "The longer this goes on, the more likely you are to get caught."

"Oh yeah, I forgot I was breaking the law," Riley lets out a guffaw, draining the sink and rinsing it out as well. "At least it's all people the world is better off without." Child molesters, rapists, abusers, none of them were safe from the teen. What about murderers and thieves, you may ask? Well, she wasn't a hypocrite. "Would you like to come with me tonight?"

"Nah," Meray swings her legs a bit. "I have opening shift tomorrow and its getting dark already."

"You right."

Riley goes around and tugs on her shoes and a jean jacket. She makes sure she has what she needs in her prepacked bag, and checks on Krollo to see if his skin had finished hardening after his latest molt about a week before hand.

"Hello my little darling!" Riley coos as the rather large arachnid scuttles up to her arm. "How's mommy's precious boy? Do you wanna come with mommy to the hospital?" He climbs up her arm and settles on her shoulder, two forelegs messing with the long side bangs that framed his owners face. She continues baby-talking Krollo as though he were a puppy or cat, and not a potentially lethal tarantula-spider thing, all the way down the fire escape to the alley behind the apartment complex as she started her trek to the condemned hospital.

Weak light streamed through broken windows, barely diminishing the plentiful shadows that filled the hospital to the brim. Old wire bedframes, broken chairs, torn up carpets- the whole thing looked like a place only a stupid white person would step in, especially after midnight. The crumbling, dilapidated walls cast strange silhouettes for spirits to hide behind and you could feel their eyes on you. Judging.

Shadows fled in terror when a flashlight cut through the gloom like a sword. Riley looked around cautiously, even though the whispers promised no one else was near. Slowly, the technicolor-haired girl made her way down the corridor.

"Why am I giving into stereotype and being a stupid white person? Why?" she mutters to herself. The feeling of being watched burdened her shoulders while unseen hands plucked and pulled at her clothing, asking for attention. Easily, she ignored them as she wove her way between broken furniture. Finally, the teen came up on a missing stairwell, halting her progress deeper into the bowels of the hospital. Riley pulled out her rope, which she's woven herself with spider silk and aura, and climbed down into the oceanic black below.

Technically, Riley didn't need a flashlight to navigate the inky hospital basement halls, though there were next to no windows to allow in natural light and it was darker than pitch. Quiet voices whispered in her mind as to which ways to go, but she just liked taking in the sights, eerie as they were. The girl pauses momentarily to light up a smoke to help quell her nerves before continuing on. She was getting so close with her experiments.

Upon entering her little laboratory, bastardized as it was, Riley lit the candles scattered throughout the crammed room. She carefully laid out her tools on a rolling table, including a scalpel, sewing needle, spider silk thread, scissors, knitting needles, and hand-made yarn (also made of spider silk). Also in her doctors' kit was a headlamp that was brighter than her flashlight, a surgical mask, apron, and rubber gloves that she promptly put on. After double checking the restraints, she gently pats her… patient… awake.

"Hey, wake up. We gotta get to work." His eyes fly open and he struggled against the leather straps, muffled crying escaping from behind his gag. Riley sighs and puts out her cigarette.

"How long have we been doing this? A week? You should know the rules by now- no struggling or else you get no food."

The guy stopped struggling and even quieted down.

"That's better." Riley wheels over her old rusty supply cart, eyeing the mostly nude male on the metal table. "So, exciting things have been going on in my life. I actually managed to sleep last night, which is great! I'm the most rested I've felt in months, which isn't saying anything because I've stayed up for two weeks with, like, three hours of sleep total." She takes off his gag, leaving deep red marks on his cheeks and tosses it onto her cart as she giggles to herself. She swirls her scalpel and needle in some alcohol and dries them off on a clean towel.

"So, normal stuff for tonight. Stitches, skin grafting. If that all goes well, we're even doing limb reattachments!" She threads her needle and doubles the thread over before knotting off the end. "I've made a lot of progress with you, my dude, I knew I'd get it… eventually." Riley's mind briefly went back to her other experiments, feeling no remorse for the ones who died under her knife. Without further ado, she cut deeply into his thigh and listened to his screaming. Not even bothering to mop up the blood, Riley neatly stitches up his wound while channeling her aura through the thread.

He starts giggling, and is full on guffawing by the time the girl was done with her stitches. She watches in interest and victory as the silken threads sink into his skin and the wound closes and heals before her eyes. "Nen ability: In Stitches, a complete and total success."

She begins adjusting the operation table so it's more vertical and puts a straw in her water bottle and holds it up to his lips. "Go on, drink. You're probs dehydrated."

Hesitantly, he takes a few sips before downing almost all of it, and Riley snatches it away from him. "Watch it, asshole."

"Why are you doing this to me?" he whispers, haltingly. Sweat poured from his brows as he watched her in fear, cleaning her scalpel and dumping out the used alcohol from the beaker. Riley pauses and looks at him over her glasses.

"Because you like to diddle little kids; no one will miss you." She readjusts the table to its previous horizontal positon. "Heck, I'm doing the world a favor by getting rid of you. Besides, my other test subjects died."

"A-am I going to die?"

"Oh yeah, definitely. There's shock, infection, blood loss- and when I'm done with you, assuming you live, I'm killing you anyway." The girl watched terror and helplessness spread across the pedophiles face as a thrill went up her spine. She had complete control over this man, whether he lived or died, and it was absolutely intoxicating. Suddenly, a thought struck her and she wondered why she's never thought of it before. Riley begins adjusting the table again, this time with her prisoners' feet toward the sky.

"If I make all the blood rush to your head, you're less likely to die from blood loss for this next bit. The idea comes from a medieval torture method where the dude is hung upside down by his feet and is thereafter sawed in half. They don't die immediately because all the bloods in their head and not anywhere else."

Once again, she swirls her scalpel in alcohol and starts muttering to herself, as she was prone to do when doing something complex. "Ok first, take off a chunk of skin…" A centimeter deep and about as big as her palm, it slaps wetly onto the floor, leaving a gory hole in the mans' thigh. She ignores the struggled screaming and begins to connect her aura with his as she starts her first row on her knitting needles. "Now focus on the aura surrounding the wound and entwine it with yours and the yarn…"

Her needles flash dimly in her hands, clicking rapidly together. Riley's aura lit her face in a gentle silver-blue glow, emphasizing dark eyes and making her look like Doctor Death.

In a way, she was.

The graft was finished, and there was only the slightest hint of an ovular scar. She smiles in satisfaction and picks up a bone saw. She'd found it in this room, rusted and dull, but under her tender care, light once again bounced dangerously off its edges. "Leg? Calf? Foot?" Riley asks to the open air, tapping along the leg with each word. She tilts her head. "Well, its' just a refresher really, so I don't need to chop off a lot… A toe will do." Swiftly, she removes his left big toe, performing In Stitches flawlessly.

"Okay, wiggle your toes for me." She watches them fidget and she claps her hands. "As Meray would say, sweg. Alright, you're all done." She adjusts the table one last time to its horizontal position, a pang of accomplishment muddled with some other emotion. Sadness? Riley shakes her head, sadness doesn't make sense, so she decides not to dwell on it. Methodically, she packs her things away and throws her gloves and mask into a corner of the room to join their brethren in a heap. Just as the brown-eyed teen began looking for her pet, who seemed to have scuttled off somewhere during her practice, two hands pushed her into the rusty cart.

Of course she hadn't noticed his struggling begin anew. Of course the restraints decided to come loose. Of course she hadn't heard his footsteps, unsteady, come up behind her. And, of course, the scalpel decided to land blade down in her fucking arm.

"Shitty son of a bitch cocksucker-"Riley yanks it out of her arm and thumps after the escapee, still swearing up a storm. He had grabbed her flashlight, which only made following him easier (he kept bumping into everything, despite having light), and was currently making his way towards the rope.

'What the fuck, how the hell is he able to climb that fucking thing, Jesus Christ-'

Hand over hand, Riley pulled herself up after the pedophile as fast as she could and sprinted after him again. She was growling, blood pumping, eyes narrowed, gaining on him- she tripped. Of fucking course. Mermaid hair fanning out over her face, palms skinned, she pushed herself back up and let out a wordless shriek, blood chilling and thirsty, scarier than any of the thoughts running through her head could ever be if spoken aloud.

The dead were screaming, children wanting help, wanting revenge, unsatisfied that she had dare let their tormentor escape, her previous victims cheering for the man running. They, too, wanted justice for their deaths. However, the children were louder, they guided her down twisting hallways and over rotting walls, and when she saw him, she pounced.

Long nails filed into points scored down his back, turning flesh to ribbons. She rammed his head into the ground once, twice, thrice before stepping off of him. An old metal pipe was exposed and she tore it from the wall, blood slickening it in her shaking hands. She gave in to the red, and the children yelled their approval.

Meray was torn from her word search by the timer going off. With a sigh, she stands up from the living room couch and pours the simmering water into a teapot. She sits back down with her milky tea, staring unseeingly at the page in front of her before shifting her gaze out the window. The moon was making her ascent in the sky, light bleaching the color from everything below, and it was honestly very beautiful.

However, she couldn't appreciate the view at the moment.

Something bad was going to happen tonight, tickling her gut with worry. Pale eyes look towards the edge of town, in the direction her friend often disappeared to.

Quietly, Meray sent up a prayer that Riley would return alright.

Riley came to awhile later, chest heaving. She was standing over a bloody pulp of a body- the man wasn't even recognizable anymore- but it took her a second to process all that had happened. Heavy iron slipped from her hands as she studied the corpse in front of her.

"… Did I seriously dissociate during all of that?" the teen crouched down, revealing the garters holding up her fishnet stockings. (Was it practical? No, but it made her feel pretty.) A long, plump-ish finger reached out and poked the body. Hysterical giggles ripped from her throat as she continued prodding the body in front of her. She felt strangely… empty, yet full? Riley decided not to explore these feelings as she stands up, kicking her legs up high behind her to pop her pelvic bones.

"Time to dispose of you, I guess…" She grabs a limb that looked like it probably wouldn't tear off with the strain of being dragged and begins to walk off the way she came.

"Geronimo-o-o-o-o-o," she cackles, fucking hurling the corpse down the hole before following after it (of course, however, she was using her rope). She cackles again at the sound of wet meat and bones hitting the ground, once again grabbing it by the… whatever and dragging it off into the darkness. She reaches a room, takes a deep breath and holds it before opening the door. The buzzing of flies and squeaking of rats hits her ears, the stench of decay practically visible even now.

With some effort, she hurls the body into the room and slams the door shut once again, muffling the sounds and scents that assaulted the senses. With even steps, Riley finds her way back to the old operation room and finds that majority of the candles have burnt out. She considers taking all the candles with her but shrugs the thought away- they were mostly dead anyways. She set the fallen cart upright and stuffs all her supplies into her backpack. Looking around the room, the girl fails to catch sight of Krollo.

"Darling?" she calls out quietly, checking shadows and piles of garbage for her wayward pet. "Where's my darling dove? My sweet little killer?" But there was no familiar skitter from the darkness. "Krollo?" Panic was rising in her chest like a wave. "Krollo?!"

Krollo was gone.

XxXx

Chapter Word Count: 5, 471

Story Word Count: 8,086