Hey! Thanks to everyone who read/reviewed/favorite my story. It was brought to my attention that Tziporah seemed like an empty character, so hopefully this chapter will 'fill her up'.
Disclaimer: I don't own X-men, only Tziporah Setz-Lensherr.
Without further ado, I present chapter two:
:D:D:D:D:D:D::D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D::D::D:D:D:D:D:D::D:D:D:D::D::D:D:D:D:
Chapter Two: Scream, shout, and sing.
Sometimes Tziporah just wanted to scream. She wanted to be heard, she wanted to be seen. Twenty-two years after her voice was taken away, Tziporah just wanted to shout out her hatred for the man who became her constant nightmare for five long years.
But she couldn't. So she didn't.
There would be no point; it would only show to remind her that she would be eternally silent. And it would be eternal. She seemed to have stopped aging by the time she was twenty. Even though all of the scars she had gained throughout her life remained as a tribute to her suffering, she could not die. Again and again in that torture chamber at the camp she had died. But she always came back, healed to the point where she could live.
The scars that loitered on her body gave proof to that.
A puckered circle, directly above her heart; a silver band of tissue encircling her neck, the list went on and on.
She wanted to dance and sing, to talk and to whisper, to scream and shout…but any opportunity of that happening was taken away by one man.
And so she buried herself deep within her mind, opening up only to her big brother, Erik. But even he, who had survived the camp with her, did not understand what she had been through fully. He, who had been in Auschwitz only a year before its liberation, did not completely know what had been done to her in the years leading up to his stay with Dr. Schmidt.
Tziporah hid behind a façade of benevolent smiles, while inside her feelings roiled and bubbled beneath the surface. She knew she was capable of great terror, but she also knew that she could create an Eden, if given a chance.
During the experiments that had been performed on her, she had retreated deep within her mind, and created a place of beauty and peace. The sky shone bright with a million stars forming never before seen constellations, and a luminous moon. Fireflies flew throughout her dream world, shedding light to what she had created. A breeze ran through the air, bringing with it the smells of a garden, filled to the brim with all types of flowers imaginable. A waterfall would come crashing down into a river, and trees would line the river bed, providing shelter for her terrified psyche to sleep under. An ocean surrounded her land, and giant waves would crash down on the shores; protecting it from outsiders, because deep in the middle of her land was a flower that represented who she was. It was large and white with tips of all imaginable colors. During the experiments, it was always wilting and dying, but afterwards, when she had been saved, it had grown healthy and luminous, a bright light in the midst of the eternal night.
So many years ago, when a terrified boy had appeared in the cell with her, she had made a flower grow. She had taken the flower from her mind, and entrusted it to someone who would become her beloved brother.
Erik was the only reason besides vengeance against Schmidt, or Shaw, or whatever the hell that evil man now called himself that kept her from retreating into her Eden permanently. Because in her Eden, she could talk, she could sing, she could scream, she could shout, and she could be free.
Without Erik, she would have become a shell.
So she didn't care if it seemed childish that she wanted to hold his hand, because he was all that she had, and she would never let him go.
When people looked at her they saw a young woman with hair like fire, and eyes like leaves. They saw her scars, and tsked, shaking their heads and saying that she could have been beautiful. When Erik looked at looked at her, he saw only Tziporah, not the image she presented. He saw a girl who embodied the earth, with vines running wild through her hair, and a world of pain carved into her skin.
And she was the embodiment of the earth to him. She was beautiful, wild, free, and untamable. She was scarred from the actions of man, and she was resilient to what was done to her. She was dangerous and loving, she was kind and forgiving, as well as harsh and deaf to the pleas of those she killed. She was herself, and proud of what she was. She did not ask forgiveness for her actions, because she did not need forgiveness.
Tziporah needed vengeance against the man who had made her this way.
Because before she became all of those things, she had been Zorah, an innocent little girl from Berlin who had loved her Papa with all of her heart, and had been a stranger to prejudice, pain, and suffering. And Tziporah missed that little girl. She missed what little Zorah could have become, had she not been callously murdered by the actions of the soldier who killed her Papa, and a man named Schmidt.
So even when she wanted to scream at the top of her lungs, she didn't; she held it in, hidden behind an empty, smiling façade because it was better than the alternative of breaking down and crying because of what was taken from her.
407365
That accursed number represented so much to her: pain, suffering, and a promise of retribution.
It was why she would happily tear apart any who stood in the way of what she desired most. She would feel no remorse for her actions, because that was who she had been made into. She was what she was, and she would ask no forgiveness for that fact, but that did not mean that she didn't wish that she could have been something better than what she had been forced to become.
And now, staring into the blue eyes of this man, Charles Xavier, she could only laugh (silently) at how naïve he was. Already Erik was projecting his distrust of the man before them through the stiffening of his body, and a tightening grip on her hand. She allowed a vine travel down her arm and wrap itself around their hands, if only to reassure him that she was there, and could handle herself, should the need come.
Because she was the embodiment of earth in most ways, and ever changing was one character which she embodied perfectly. She would always be ready at a moment notice to kill and destroy, to break free of any bonds that held them. Tziporah could tell from years of practice reading him, but Erik was scared and elated at the same time to have finally found someone who was like them: a mutant. He didn't want to trust the man before them, but Tziporah could almost feel the honest intentions that were betrayed by those blue, blue eyes.
Yet again, Tziporah wanted to scream. She wanted to take her life off of mute, and ask so many questions that needed answering, and that maybe, just maybe, this man before her could answer.
Any questions you need answered, I shall try my best. Inside of her mind, a voice, Xavier's perhaps, echoed.
Soaking wet and freezing, all Tziporah could do was laugh silently as this earnest man before her spoke.
Because finally (finally!), her voice could be heard; and she didn't trust anyone besides Erik with her thoughts. She had gotten her wish, and she almost wished she hadn't. Because for the first time in a long time, she was scared; she was scared that someone would find her world, and pollute it with their presence, thus destroying the one thing that had kept her sanity intact throughout all those years of pain and humiliation.
For the first time in twenty two years, Tziporah was scared. She didn't know what to do. Should she be ecstatic that she could be heard, or terrified that this telepath before her could destroy her Eden? She didn't know what to feel, so she settled with the second best option.
She laughed hysterically at her own predicament.
Be careful what you wish for, indeed.
:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D
Tell me what you think, and I hope that this chapter added more dimension to Zippy.
Read Review Read Review…..please.
Jude
P.S. I made Zippy immortal for a purpose.