I want someone to do a Freudian analysis of me based on this story.

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"Hello little black sheep."

I opened my eyes. I sat up in bed. Ruby slid off of one arm. Weiss curled to the side on the other.

'Salem…'

"Tut-tut is that how you address me? My forlorn son?"

'How should you like to be addressed and why should I care?'

"Because we are one. You are not at the bottom of yourself. I am. You… you are the one in the middle."

I looked from right to left at the sleeping women beside me.

'Maybe so.'

"I have won."

'Then why talk to me at all? You must have no choice so your victory cannot be so complete as you would have me believe.'

"Or do I merely allow you to believe that?"

'If I have to question whether the voice I am hearing is an angel it cannot be the voice of an angel. If you're a goddess there should be no debate. And I should be a demigod. If I have to question if I am a demigod, I am not a demigod. If anyone can question whether I am the son of a goddess then there is no question. You are a mirage. You are a facsimile of a god."

"Then what am I?"

"The question is malformed. The question is what is something rather than nothing? And I have never seen nothing in my life."

"Cloud?"

"Do I defy categorization?"

"You aren't a person. You are a thing. Get out of my head."

"What's going on?"

"I don't know, he's just talking. Cloud? Can you hear us?"

"You think, child, therefore I am. This is our head."

"You aren't a god. If I can even say that you must not be a god. Leave me to rest you miserable half creature."

"I can force you…"

"To do what?"

"Cloud let go!"

I had my fingers wrapped around Ruby's neck.

"You are mine."

I couldn't let go and Ruby wasn't fighting back against me. She was turning red. She was just staring at me with wide eyes.

"I'm not your puppet!"

"Then release her."

I couldn't. I couldn't force my fingers to unclench where they dug into the soft skin of Ruby's collar. I was surely leaving behind dark bruises under my fingers. Her skin was so smooth. I was able to feel it even if I couldn't do anything but stare into Ruby's eyes.

Weiss jumped on my back where I had Ruby pinned underneath me in our enormous bed. She tried to pull me off but I was like a statue. She couldn't pry Ruby free and Ruby wasn't kicking her legs or helping. She was limp. Her mouth moved but in the dark I couldn't make out the words she was trying to form.

"Get out of my head!"

"Make. Me," she mocked.

I couldn't. I mustered myself totally but I couldn't repel her from my mind. I was the one in the middle of something greater. I was a shadow on the cave wall, too. Being shown the light is by its very nature a blinding process and you may not like what you share the cave with.

I couldn't throw myself off of Ruby and she turned so deep a purple that she became ugly.

"Cloud!"

"I am Cloud…" I trailed.

"You are me."

"I am me…"

I let go of Ruby with shaking fingers and she inhaled a deep breath in an enormous gasp.

"I am Cloud. You're not Cloud."

"I am you…"

"You are Salem. I am Cloud."

"I thought I defied categorizations."

"All things defy categorization."

"I am all things…"

"You're not God. You are a part of all things. All things are in you. But you're not God. You're not all of it. I can question you. I can debate you. I can resist you. You're not God. The voice of God would be unquestionable. For me to be even able to think that you can't be God the Light or God the Darkness. Though you are of the Darkness you are not the Darkness. Just as I am both. Both are in all things. You cannot exist in an absence of space but without an absence of space you could not exist. I see you, Mother. You are not a God. You cannot unmake me or remake me. There is a Light within me you cannot extinguish and there is a Darkness you cannot see through. I defy categorization as well. I am part person and part you. Riddle me this and I'll kill myself tonight. What am I? A goddess would know."

"You are a person."

"What is a person?" I wondered. "I don't know what that is."

"You know one when you see one."

"You're not God," I deduced. "God would know. You don't. God would be able to categorize that which defies explanation and explain even that which cannot be categorized. You must be able to do this. A real goddess would know."

"That does not unmake me."

"But it does make me."

"Cloud?" Ruby choked hoarsely below me.

"You didn't fight back," I whispered. "Why didn't you fight back?"

"I trusted you…"

"Why?" I sobbed. "Why would you do that to me?"

"Cloud?"

"I shouldn't be within fifty feet of you…" I croaked. "Why would you do that…? You have to kill me…"

"We're not going to kill you…" Weiss murmured.

"You gotta." I choked. "How can I be trusted around your babies? Honestly?"

"You didn't do it…" Ruby protested. "You stopped." She was like morphine in my veins. She was the one in real pain. What was I? A pussy? I clutched my chest and head from the agony.

"This time," I countered. I was still straddling her. "Why did you do that?!"

"I trusted you."

"No!" I half shouted and half begged.

"We both trust you," Weiss managed. She got between us and helped Ruby to a sitting position. She examined Ruby's throat. There were already deep discolorations around her neck.

"I'm so sorry…" I trailed. "I can't do this…"

"Cloud?" Ruby's voice was so hoarse and strained.

"It's not your fault, Cloud," Weiss said like a rush of klonopin.

"Then who's fault is it? You can't blame my Mother. She's just doing what she does. She's a monster but I'm a part of it. I could have killed you. Either of you. And you want me around infants? Be reasonable. Don't ask me to do this. I can't."

"We're asking," Weiss spoke softly. "We know you can."

"Don't. Please don't ask me to do this. It's too much."

"I believe in you," Ruby begged. "Don't go."

I couldn't. I knew I should. I should go. I should fly to my Mother right now. I just couldn't leave. I couldn't. I begged them to break my heart. Couldn't they get that?

I slumped onto the brown carpeted floor. "Let me go… you gotta let me go. Release me," I felt like a genie in a lamp. I needed their permission.

"No," Weiss ordered with a hint of music whimsy. "You'll stay with us. You're ours. Rest, now. I'll take care of Ruby."

I leaned against the wall and let my head roll back. I sighed deeply.

"Black sheep."

"Shut up…" I croaked back. "Get out of my head."

"Don't talk to her," Weiss demanded.

"It's not that easy…"

"No more talking to her."

I was trapped. On one side I was caged by my Mother and the things I should do. On the other by Weiss and Ruby and the things I couldn't do. I was stuck. I felt caught in an unending loop. There was no escape from the prison I fashioned around myself. I was a recursive program without end or begin but I was stuck and turned on.

"I'm…I'm headed out. For a drive. To clear my head. I'll come back to you when I'm done."

"No more than an hour away from us," Weiss restricted. She was clever. Where Ruby might have let me go Weiss saw through me and my promise. She saw how open ended it was. She cut that short.

Even here, in this, a prison.

I felt my shackles grow tighter. I liked them. They fit snuggly and they were mine. But at the same time I loathed them fiercely. I felt like I was being pulled in two different directions. My eyes rolled in my head as I got to my feet and I leaned against the wall with one hand. I could feel the pull towards my… towards Salem. A distant ever present call deep in my head. But just as strong was my desire to obey Weiss and Ruby. I dressed my tunic and baggy pants without the armor but grabbed my sword and shield. I stumbled along to my bike in the garage rubbing the whole of my skull with one hand. I felt like at any second I would start tearing and who knows what would happen then… I needed… I needed something to dull the pain. There were medications I was prescribed to take as needed whenever I felt like I was close to an episode. If this didn't count I wasn't sure what would.

I took the klonopin. I double dosed on it even though that was a touch dangerous and the stuff was more addictive than heroin with worse withdrawal effects. If I got used to a higher dose and came back down it could put me through psychotic withdrawal symptoms pretty easily. I did it anyways… but my angst remained.

Ruby had just laid there. She just laid there and took it.

She would never be able to strike me down if I started slipping.

She would die.

I would kill her…

I could not, then, afford to slip. But I needed something to dull my agony. There was a pounding in my head and behind my eyes and a certain motion sickness that upset my stomach and gave me an aching vertigo at the top of my skull. What could I do? Marijuana was off limits. It was forbidden. So was hurting myself but I wanted to very badly.

What could I do? I tested the limits of my shackles.

I needed some strong medication. Could I get the real stuff?

Ketamine, or vicodin, or morphine, some strong sedative which wasn't forbidden. Weiss would get upset with me later but she hadn't forbidden those things yet. My psychiatrist would be disappointed but I was a little more concerned with surviving the night than with pleasing everybody.

I made my way to Junior's. I parked my bike in a spot too small for a car and set up the kick stand. I grimaced. I might get away with this just tonight so I had to make it count.

I walked up to the bar.

"I need something strong…" I trailed off. He reached for hard liquor to start mixing. "Not alcohol. Something from the back…"

"Did you have a brand in mind?" The barkeep asked. He didn't hesitate much.

"Vicodin. Ketamine. Morphine. Something to really take the edge off. You feel me? I need to be put in a deep sleep. Do you understand? I have plenty of money. I'll pay double."

He gave me a slow nod behind red sunglasses. He walked to the back rooms. I leaned against the bar and rubbed my temples with both hands.

He came back with two bottles.

"They say not to mix these with alcohol but you should mix them with alcohol," he informed me. He handed me a bottle labeled Vicodin and the other indicated it was Ketamine.

"Three shots of something hard, then," I requested. I paid him for the drugs and alcohol upfront from my deep pockets.

I took one of both pills and chased it with vodka.

They worked fast. I felt my muscles relax in a way I couldn't really help and I felt so tired I almost fell over. I stumbled to a seat and leaned back against it. The world blurred into a swirl of lights since I couldn't get my eyes to focus. I couldn't make the tiny muscles work like they were supposed to and I blinked hard and often. The pain in my head faded into a distant twinge. The muscles on my neck relaxed and my head lulled.

I felt like I was just a cloud. I was drifting through the atmosphere on every subtle breeze. I was pulled apart and blown back together like little strands of floating ice in the wind. I felt cold in my feet and my hands. I just leaned back and tried to lay still and feel nothing.

I almost killed Ruby.

She almost just let me.

They still trusted me after that.

What the fuck?

I hated to make this about me, I wasn't the one who almost died and just took it. But how could Ruby and Weiss do that to me? They fucked me up. They should have bashed me in the back of the head. They should have stabbed me and cut me and torn me apart. Instead they just laid there. Weiss tried to pull me off but she hadn't meant business.

They couldn't do it. They couldn't hack it. They wouldn't stop me if I started slipping. That was… it was unforgivable. I couldn't trust them to take me down if I had to go. And while they were pregnant they would realistically be helpless and dependent on me. What the fresh fuck? Why? Why would they put me in this position? And they told me to stay. They forced me to exist. That hurt. My existence was agony. This thing that was happening to me where I was awake and experiencing things was awful. And my sleep was no better. I melted into my seat and let the lights blur without even trying to focus anymore. I felt my antipsychotics working their hardest but they were relatively weak drugs. They couldn't hold up under the painkillers and horse tranquilizers I just took. I felt them give way.

Ruby and Weiss… they had me pinned to a wall like a butterfly dipped in preservatives and under glass. I felt myself and these places where they limited me into doing what they wanted. I felt like a passenger. I felt like I had no real control and I didn't really want it. I hated them for doing this to me. But I couldn't ask for more.

A cycling trap that had me running in place and going nowhere. And they wanted me around children? Young children? They asked that of me? How could I tell them 'no.' They had my soul and they had no intention of letting go. The right thing to do would be to leave. It would be to deny them their babies and not be their husband. That's the right thing to do. The selfless thing to do. But I was a selfish monster. I wanted… I didn't want freedom… but what did I want? I wanted to obey. But… what was the difference between obeying my Mother and obeying Weiss and Ruby at this point. Neither allowed me freedom of choice and they both wanted me to commit atrocities. Having kids was so dangerous… our children might fall apart in our hands. My Mother might set her hooks in them from an early age. They might be a part of it with me. How could I do that to a person? This thing that was happening to me where I was conscious was wrong. It was wrong of my parents to do this to me. And here I was planning to rip someone out of non-existence and put them in a flesh prison. I would force them to have a body and all the hardships that came with it.

I sighed and fumbled with the bottles. I took one more of each blindly. I felt the alcohol buzz against my skull and the whole combination was just so unearthly pleasant. I shut my eyes.

I had no choice. I was a slave.

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-WG