All killers had a family - or some semblance of one. They had friends, most likely; had dreams and aspirations. They lived a life that they considered to be good, so much so that murder was not necessity in their mind. They were gratified, fulfilled. Perhaps even happy - or is that too strong of a word?
Regardless of their individual contentedness with youth, it remains a fact that a killer is not born a killer. I knew this from experience. I'd lived with one.
Beyond Birthday was strange, but he was decent. Vicious, but not violent (not in the early days at least). He preferred to scowl rather than smile but, then again, name a teenager that doesn't. He wasn't happy - far from it - but he hadn't murdered anyone by that point so that must've meant something, right?
At that time, we'd never have guessed his face would one day be plastered in black and white across the front covers of tabloid papers or that he'd attempt to burn himself alive in a desperate act of protest and a pathetic display of pride.
We being the Wammy children, of course.
For those of you who aren't quite familiar with the name, allow me to elaborate. Wammy's was an orphanage that took the name of its founder, Quillish Wammy. Situated in the quaint little city of Winchester, a quiet urban area known best for its medieval architecture and overpriced accommodations, it was a large Edwardian structure purchased by Wammy not too long after the Second World War.
Though, Wammy's was no ordinary dumping ground for undesirables. Here, the brightest and most vigilant children were reared, their minds ripened for harvesting. Wammy's functioned much more like a school than anything else, with curricular lessons commencing at eight o'clock sharp and ending just before five o'clock in the evening. These lessons consisted of not only your basic English academic syllabus, but also syllabuses detaining criminological, pharmaceutical, and philosophical subject matter, as well as sociolinguistics, psychoanalysis, and how to handle a Glock 17.
Originally, Wammy's demographic was solely British but eventually it became gathering place for abandoned geniuses across the continent, born from the utter depths of human depravity, to help them ascend to the level of global recognition and endless wealth.
Well, actually, only one child had managed to achieve that level of greatness, but the rest of us were trying.
I'd been one of the first to live under its roof. I'd only just turned nine when I was whisked away from the mother who couldn't cope and the neglectful father who blamed his entire life's misfortunes on me. A typical sob story that no one really has any interest in, so I shan't digress.
My name is - or rather was - Cecilia Ann Clarke. The most pretentious name to grace any child born in county Durham.
To me, that name was just a memory. A string of letters on a page. I relinquished that part of myself the moment I stepped through Wammy's gates. Not by choice, mind you. I had to. It was one of Wammy's core rules, a strange safety regulation made to avoid making children into political targets.
Thus, from the moment I crossed the threshold of Wammy's doors, I became known as C. It wasn't the most exceptional identifier - I mean, a letter? - but it was better than being numbered; letters maintained some semblance of humanity. Cecilia was my name, and that fact would remain a truth, but C was distinctive enough and I came to embrace it as my own. It wasn't until much later I was told it stood for Copy. Now that was insulting.
As I said, the whole lettering business was put in place to protect us, but as time went by and more unwanted geniuses flooded Wammy's halls, a system arose. A hierarchy of sorts, with the most brilliant of us all reigning supreme.
L. He was the goal that we aspired to reach; the desired standard. The golden child that sat atop the pyramid with nothing but stars and sky stretched over his head, and the universe at his disposal. Truly, the world was his oyster. Below him, however, it was like the gladiator's pit; a myriad of bloody soldiers. The rest of us scrambled and fought for recognition, desperate to ascend through the rankings in this survival of the fittest. It was a cruel and vicious underworld. We fought - both verbally and physically - and sabotaged each other's education. People who I'd once called my friends became little more than competition.
We took the tedious workload. We took the harsh discipline. We took the condescending comments and the goddamn letters. We took it all in hopes that one day it might be worth it.
I think Beyond was the first to realise it wasn't.
To those of you that aren't already familiar with his story - and I'm sure there are many - I'll take it back to the beginning:
The alphabet commences with A and B so, naturally, I'll start there.
Alternative and Backup. Alpha and Beta. Adam and Beyond.
A and B were the original duo; the first two children that Wammy took in. They hadn't been there much longer than I had, but they were much, much smarter.
Being the first girl adopted into Wammy's care, I immediately became an interesting specimen to the two boys.
A and I had clicked almost instantly. We shared the same wry sense of humour and wit.
B, however, was much harder to connect with on an emotional level. He was always a bit weird. First off, he ate jam straight out of the jar... with his hands. His emotions were all over the place, and sometimes nonexistent. He'd say the strangest things about death, and even stranger things about numbers.
When I grew older, I begun to suspect some sort of mental illness plagued his brilliant brain. To be fair, we'd always thought he had some form of OCD (the boy would not allow his room nor his person to be dirtied even if we paid him; he had to be clean) but I feared something more sinister was bubbling beneath the surface.
As the months crawled by, I grew closer to the pair and spent less time by myself, hiding with a book inside Roger's office. I finally came out of my shell and decided to spend my spare time with whichever boy was doing something more interesting. Said boy was nearly always B. A was a hard worker and was constantly studying - something that my young self considered to be very boring. So I nearly always got stuck with the backup option (no pun intended).
If I thought Beyond was weird when I first met him, I had something coming.
During the times that we played together, I came to see Beyond's darker side. He was careless and twisted, always wanting to do something that would most definitely get us in trouble with Roger, if not killed.
It had started with relatively innocent things such as stealing chemicals from the science lab or climbing the pipes on the side of the house. However, as time passed and the level of familiarity between us grew, our games got more intense.
Beyond had dissected a live rabbit in front of me once. He'd held it down by the throat and carved it open with a scalpel he'd stolen in a lesson. The thing had clawed and screamed for what felt like hours, blood congealing in its white fur.
When I asked him why he'd done that, he said he liked it when they twitched.
I told no one what I'd seen out of fear he'd do the same to me.
Then came the more unmentionable activities.
I was a virgin once, but no stranger to sex. What, with my parents having done it several times with me still present in the room, and my father describing in vivid detail what he'd love to do to his tight-bodied female colleagues. My mother had explained to me that all men wanted one thing and it was important to be good at it. She told me I wasn't an ugly girl (how kind, mum) and this would mean I'd be a catch.
I'd been prepared from a young age. I knew more than I should.
For me, getting off with Beyond was not only a (premature) exploration of sexuality, it was an opportunity to thrive. I wanted to push my own limits, to see how far I could go without being criticised on my mistakes and branded with a strict A-F grade. It was my escape. My chance to express myself freely in a world where everything was orchestrated. There were no limits and no boundaries. Beyond knew this well, and he took advantage of it.
By age fifteen, I was doing things with Beyond that most adults wouldn't be willing to try. I wasn't ashamed, and for the most part, I enjoyed it. It was rough and it was brutal; far from an act of bonding, and even further from an expression of love. Beyond didn't love me and I didn't want him to. There was little to expect from that boy but pain - both in and out of the bedroom. He seemed incapable of offering anything other. Even so, I took his pain and worshipped it, right up to the last drop.
In hindsight, it was abuse. We were both children, yes, but Beyond took advantage of a weakness in me that no man or woman, regardless of age, should ever attempt to manipulate.
And I couldn't escape it, not for years, and even then, Beyond had left his mark. Session after session of therapy did little to elevate the damage that had been done. Years later and I'm still reminded of the boy who didn't love me and told me he knew when I would die.
Believe it or not, I was more worried for him than myself though. I'd held Beyond's interest in the same way a trembling fly did a spider. He loved the way my fear tasted. He loved to feel my agony as I shook, and the frustration in my tears. To this day, I fear it awakened something in him.
Inside that wild, raucous head of his, something finally clicked into place.
A/N
guys, the plot bunnies are holding me hostage again, send help - grace
So, yes, I finally decided to write a fanfic for Another Note after reading it for about the 50th time. It's such an intense, complex story and I love it. And I love Beyond. So much. Too much?
He's underrated in this fandom. Some people genuinely still don't know who he is and it's been *checks watch* fourteen years since Another Note was published. I'm sorry, but that's a sin in my books.
On a more serious note (excuse the pun), I ask that you read the trigger warnings included in the story's description before continuing. If this chapter wasn't proof enough, this story is dark, and it will become much darker very quickly.
[might edit. don't know. will see how I feel about this in the morning]