A/N: Hehrow people.

I apologize in advance if anything in this chapter seems unrealistic. I did a bit of research (a bit, hehe) and everything is apparently accurate. So if you don't like it...well, it's purely your own problem. Lol. :) Either way, love you guys, mwah~!

Oh. By the way. I know I said I post on Fridays, but I am going to be busy packing and leaving the house tomorrow morning, so I figure better safe than sorry. Might not be able to find time to be perfectly punctual. But it's okay, because the chapter is early and that's always good. :D

She's got her eyes open wide
She's got the dirt and spit of the world
Her mouth on the metal
The lips of a scared little girl

I've got an angel in the lobby
He's waiting to put me in line
I won't ask forgiveness
My faith has gone dry

Marilyn Manson – Count to 6 & Die

Chapter Three: Scrabble and Monsters

Her hand disappears into the pocket and I feel hatred and shock and anguish and panic rise up within me all at once. The little interloper! She's ruined everything! I dive at her in a last attempt to save myself. Maybe she hasn't touched it yet…her eyes widen and she's tackled to the ground. She's looking up at me, and I can feel my human form slough off of me to be replaced by the lighter feeling of my God form. She opens her mouth to scream but nothing comes out.

I've lost. I'm stranded here.

She's making these strangled little noises and I realize that my weight was on her middle. I am forbidden to kill her, so I step off of her. I don't know what to feel. I am well acquainted with anger and disgust but now it's directed at myself. How could I have been so painfully dull? To leave my bag beside her?

She's coughing and trying to scoot away from me, gasping hysterically.

"I knew it!" she rasps. "You are a monster! You're just like the other ones! Why are you here?"

All of my anger drains and is replaced with a dejected feeling. I can't believe this is happening…

"What do you mean?" I say, listening carefully to my voice. Yes. I am definitely back in my God form.

"Ever since you came here I've been seeing a monster inside of you! I was worried you were possessed by something evil! But you're not! You are evil!" she shrieks. My ears ring as her annoying voice penetrates them like ice picks. So she did see my God form…

"Why have you stolen my bag, you petty little louse?" I demand. She flinches and backs away from me.

"I was looking for proof," she whimpers. "And I found it. You're a monster."

"I'm not a monster," I growl. "I'm a God of Death. And you're a pathetic little child for involving yourself in my affairs. I should kill you."

She glances at the fallen notebook. Perhaps she didn't hear me. I just said I was going to kill her. Not that I really could. I would. But she doesn't know that. She's crazy.

"What is that?" she whispers.

"Twit. Do you have a death wish? I can smell the stupid coming off you."

She opens it and looks at the front cover.

"How was a lowly dunce able to tell what I was?" I mutter to myself.

"I see monsters," she says in response. "In the corner of my eyes. But when I look at them straight, they're gone. But when I looked at you, I could see the outline of a monster around you." So she sees other monsters as well as me…she's obviously insane. "Does this notebook really kill people?"

I sneer in answer and she looks awed.

"Read the back cover," I say, and lean against the wall of the school, crossing my arms. "If you can even do that much with your little human mind." I can now do nothing but live with my mistake. When she finishes, she looks up at me again.

"So now I'm the only one who can see you? And everyone in there has forgotten you even exist?" She doesn't wait for an answer though, and flips back to the front of the notebook. "I can kill people with this…but who would I kill?" She stares into middle distance for a moment before shrugging. "I'll think about it. But what should I do now, Anat?"

"It's Anathema," I correct with a growl. "And whatever you damn well please. I've got to follow you around for as long as you have that notebook."

"Follow me around…" she muses. "Does that mean we're friends?"

I reel back, horrified at even the thought of being associated with a human like that.

"No. It does not."

"I see," she says, with a faint smile that makes me want to rip her lips off. "Well, I'm glad we're friends now. I haven't had a friend in years."

Stupid human. I loathe this world.

Since I am now invisible to the rest of the mites, I follow Quinn while she attends the rest of her classes. I observe the children from my place on the ceiling, glad that I am no longer a part of this prison. Being in my own skin is the only consolation for failing at my punishment. My maggots squeal and run in and out of my hair with delight, and I'm glad to be able to hide my expressions with my chain mask. Above all, I am pleased to have my wings back. When I unfurled them for the first time, they were so cramped and sore that it almost hurt to move them.

Quinn looks up at me jealously periodically during her lessons, and I'm in such a good mood that I forget I hate her for taking my Death Note. I can't help it – I pull my chain mask down and give her a grin. Take that, silly human. Stuck on the ground while I'm free to do whatever the hell I want.

She gives me a dirty look but shudders a little at my smile. I'm sure I look frightful to her – but she's the one who is descended from monkeys.

Floating meditatively with my back against the ceiling, I seriously consider whether or not this is better than being confined to my human form. I'm still carrying out my punishment, and even though it is actually frozen in place, I'm free in my own form. The only thing I have to cope with is being bound to Quinn, the primate-child. Could this really be a punishment? I can draw and fly. I don't have to gamble with stupid Gods of Death, who can always catch up to me and bother me even if I fly away to be alone.

By the end of the day, the elation of being back in my own body has dampened. I still had to sit through eight hours of school today.

"Do you need any of this crap?" Quinn asks, digging through the duffel bag she had stolen earlier that day. I am hovering around her as she walks home from school.

"You own the Death Note now," I say. "But give me my portfolio back. I guess there is no way to get your germs off of it."

"Oh yeah!" She snaps her fingers like I didn't just insult her again. "I meant to look at that. Mind?" She opens it, flipping back to the God of Death sketch. "It's you."

"No it is not," I say. "It is just a God of Death." Idiot.

"Oh, please," she scoffs. "It's totally you. Look. It's got those weird chains around its mouth, and those shoulderpad things."

I twist my head various directions to try and see what the ridiculous child means.

"I don't see it," I say. "You're crazy."

"Its head is shaped like the head of a hammer."

I squint at it.

She giggles like a maniac.

"You draw pictures of yourself."

"I do not."

"Do so."

"Do not make me kill you."

I've changed my mind. Any place is better than trapped beside this runt, in this noxious world. I'd rather watch Deridovely's disgusting mouth complain for all eternity. I'd give up my wings again to get away from her.

"Well, you can't," she snickers. "Because I've got this." She waves the Death Note in my face. I resist the urge to grab it and hit her with it. Instead I just soar away and phase through the roof of the house she pointed out as hers.

"I'm so tired," she complains, flopping on her bed. I hover a few feet above the ground, pulling my legs up so I'm sitting in midair with them crossed. I'm reluctant to touch anything in this residence. It reeks of human. The bedroom of a fifteen year old female human is horrifying. It's nearly as foul as the Gods' of Death realm. While that realm has bone and rock formations littered throughout the expanse, Quinn's room has clothing and books and broken pencils and fragments of potato chips scattered all over the floor. I wonder if there is something growing or mutating underneath the bed – that seems to be the centerpiece of the mess.

Quinn is silent for a few minutes, lying on her stomach with my portfolio in front of her. She's browsing through it, occasionally stopping and peering more closely at a picture.

"Do you see everything in such a dark light?" she asks. She points at a picture of an ugly God of Death. "Who's that?"

"It's you."

She snorts and laughs. But she doesn't stop laughing like a normal person would. She snorts some more, laughs even louder, and rolls over on her back. And keeps laughing like a freak. I wasn't serious about the drawing being her, but I did mean to imply that she was just as ugly as it. And apparently she thinks it was a joke. I'd love to kill her…but I wait it out.

Eventually she lapses into periodic spouts of giggling, but she manages to speak.

"Wanna play Scrabble?" she hiccups. I move past my unwillingness to look at the crazy homunculus and stare at her. "Well, do you?"

"What is Scrabble?"

She gasps, rolling off her back onto all fours. She looks at me in very theatrical shock that I already hate.

"Only the best game in the world."

"Which world?"

She ignores me and slides off her bed and lies on her stomach to dig underneath it. She pulls out a rectangular box and throws it at me. She must be kidding. I phase out and allow the box to slam into the wall behind me. Her jaw drops and I look back at the ruins, somewhat bemused.

"Jerk. I don't like you," she growls.

"Well, I hate you. If you don't know that by now, than you're stupider than I thought you were."

She walks over and starts setting up the pieces. I watch her, feeling sick. What is this torture she has in store for me?

"Okay," she says when she finishes. "This is how you play. First, we have to decide who goes first by drawing a letter." She shoves her hand into a bag and pulls out a wooden tile. Then she looks at me. I grumble, but I'm intrigued. I float over and pick a tile. She looks at it. "Okay, you got B and that's closer to A than F, so you go first. Take this." I take the little wooden thing. "Now draw seven tiles." I do. "And set them up on your rack."

"I beg your pardon?"

"Just do it."

I do it. Reluctantly.

"If this turns out to be stupid, then I'm going to kill you."

"You can't," she counters.

We dissolve into a game of Scrabble. Admittedly, it's not as bad as I thought it'd be. But I still have to look miserable so she doesn't see. And I'm better than her. She leans forward and stares at the board, as if realizing something for the first time.

"Why are all of the words you make things like: Ugly, revolting, nauseating, and horrid?"

I look closely and notice that she is correct.

"Well, those are the only words that come to mind when I'm sitting across from you."

This time when her eyes widen it's not because she's interpreting what I said incorrectly. Or bending it her own way. She's offended, at the very least. She leans forward, drawing a fist back. I don't bother phasing through her punch, instead letting it slam into my eye. Maggots fly out of my hair, hitting the floor and disintegrating. Some of them land on her fist and face and she shrieks, clawing at them, but they've already vanished.

"What is that?" she cries.

"That," I say, "is normal. It's something you're going to have to deal with unless you give up the Death Note. So, how about it? Give it back." She holds her fist and rubs it feverishly, undoubtedly trying to get the feeling off of the skin. I feel the same way about her. All the time.

"I could give it back?" she inquires once she's finished wigging out.

"Yes. But you'd lose all memory of it and me."

"I see. No thanks. I want to keep it."

My eye twitches. Fine.

"Then I suppose I'm obligated to tell you about it. Listen, because I refuse to tell you more than once." She sits up, showing that she is listening. I resist the urge to roll my eyes.

"You write someone's name while thinking of their face, they die. You can write specific details of their death. You can't kill anyone with it whose name isn't written. So no murdering people and then having the murderer commit suicide," I rattle off.

"What if I don't know their name or face?" she asks.

"Then tough luck. But there is a way to find out their name if you know their face, or have a picture."

"How?"

"You can trade for the eyes of a Death God. It enables you to see the name and lifespan of anyone as long as you can see their face."

She gasps. "Cool! What do I have to do to get them! Does it hurt?"

"No, it doesn't hurt. Regrettably. But you can trade half of your remaining life for them."

"Half?" she shrieks.

"Yes, half," I sneer. "I personally advise that you do so."

"You just want me dead," she smirks.

"What gave you that impression?" Humans are so stupid.

She glares at me, but a moment later she's looking back at the board again, the incident forgotten.

"Quinn?" The voice comes from outside the door. Quinn jumps to her feet.

"Yes?" she says, grabbing the portfolio and stashing it under her bed.

"We have to go. Your appointment is at five."

"Appointment?" I ask. "What appointment?"

"Yeah, okay," she calls. "Give me three seconds."

"One," I drone.

"Shut up."

"Two."

"I said shut up."

"Three."

She grabs the Death Note and a jacket and walks out the door.

"A shrink?" I say in disbelief, even though I'm not really shocked at all. Insane people have shrinks. It is a fact of the Human World.

Quinn filled me in on the car ride. She is a severely schizophrenic. So much that it interferes with her daily life. So, I was right.

"Yeah," Quinn says, stretching her arms above her head. She walks into the office, not bothering to shake the hand of the man who was supposed to be analyzing her sanity. She settles down on a sofa and pulls her feet up, tucking the notebook under her leg. The man, Dr. Harvey, settles himself in a seat as well. My eyes flick up to his lifespan automatically.

Well, t hat's interesting.

"Be careful," I warn her, less because I'm obligated to, and more because I don't want the doctor to see me. "If he touches the Death Note, he can see me."

"Got it," she says, with no regard for the doctor sitting right across from her.

"He can also hear you talking to me."

"I know. What do you think I am, stupid?"

Yes.

Dr. Harvey gives her a gentle look, leaning forward.

"Are you alright Ms. Collins? Are you ready to begin?" She nods and he begins talking about a whole bunch of things that are a nice way of saying, 'I think you're nuts.' I know, because I've been thinking the rude version for the past three months.

"So about these hallucinations you've been having…" he muses, tapping a pen against his chin.

"They're not hallucinations," she interrupts. "They're monsters. " And then, to me, she says, "Can you believe this guy?" The shrink looks in my direction then back at Quinn.

"Well…seeing things is normal for people with your condition," he continues. "Your schizophrenia is mostly characterized by hallucinations. Now, have any of your symptoms changed? Are you hearing voices?"

"No."

"Any symptoms of depression?"

"No."

"Headache, nausea?"

"Why, yes. It's sitting here talking to me."

"Hey, me too!" I say with pseudo-enthusiasm. She cracks up. I didn't mean to make her laugh. I was being serious. The shrink is looking from her to where I am with his watery old-man eyes.

"Now, look," he says with the air of someone who knows they're losing their grip on their authority.

"Now, look," she mimics him. I scratch my head.

"Ms. Collins," he starts again, quietly. "There's no one there. Okay?"

Quinn rolls her eyes and grabs a pen from the coffee table in front of her. I watch, interested in what the little monkey-child is going to do. She pulls the Death Note out from under her leg.

"What's that?" the shrink asks, looking thrilled. "Have you been keeping a journal, like I suggested?"

"The monsters are there, Dr. Harvey. They're there, even if you can't see them. I'm sorry you don't believe me."

She uncaps the pen and scrawls something. I start to chuckle, but then realize I'll sound too much like Ryuk if I do. Quinn leans back against the couch, yawning.

"Come on," she says to me. "I don't really want to watch this very much."

"I do," I protest halfheartedly, but follow her out of the door. Behind me, I hear the rasping and gagging of the doctor as he dies.

Quinn skips into the lobby, which is empty except for her mother.

"Done!" she sings.

"That was fast," her mother says, somewhat skeptically. "Did he want to say anything to me?"

"Nope," she says. "He's a bit preoccupied at the moment."

"Oh?" her mother says. "What'd you talk about?"

"Nothing much. I just killed him, that's all," she says earnestly. Her mother stops in her tracks.

"What'd you say?" she says.

"Oh. I killed him. He told me the monsters aren't real…but he wouldn't believe me. So a God of Death gave me the power to punish people I don't like. You can go check if you'd like." And with that, she tucks the Death Note into her jacket and sits down in a chair. Her mother looks horrified, and runs down the hallway, toward the office we just vacated.

I can hear her screams from here.

A/N: See what I mean with the inaccuracy? I was skeptical about the nature of hallucinations in people with schizophrenia, but I found out that some people really do see things like Quinn claims to see. So yeah. If I haven't lost you at this point, then hooray. Feel free to review. :)