Hello everyone, sorry for the delay but i was trying to do a better job at my grammar as its been horribly mangled in the last two chapters to which i wanted to apologize for. But thank you to those who took the time to point the errors out. That's how we learn.
Anyway, there is a scene where the spell is cast on Meliah. Kind of explaining how she came to be possessed by a demon and for that idea I have to thank Shadico. I barely changed any words but added a few more to keep it flowing, so THANK YOU! .
Chapter 39. Memory vine
Upon arrival, the landscape in Meliah's mind was a disarray of greenery. The fog had remained but not as thick as before. A quick look around and Raven could see a bit clearly what the girl's mind was about. The sky was cloudy, as if a storm was coming. There were distant sounds of birds and the trees, although present almost everywhere, were deformed of various hues of dark greens and browns.
The two girls walked while looking around. Raven trying to make sure no demonic traces were left and Meliah just as curious, admiring her surroundings.
"I thought all this existed because of her" Meliah said quietly.
"Not at all… this is all you" answered Raven without looking back at her and looking at the trees instead.
But at a short distance was a luscious weeping willow tree. Separate from the other mangled ones. But this one in fact was in full bloom. As they approached, they heard quiet murmurs and whispers and under the tree's foliage, there was a vine that wrapped around the trunk and branches with luscious leaves that compelled the girls to touch them.
Meliah gasped upon touching the first leaf. "I had forgotten about this" she whispered to herself and a smile replaced her surprised expression. Raven came forward and touched the leaf as well and for a split second saw how a small frog on her hand jumped to her face while another giggle resonated in the background. She gasped as well at the odd image.
"When Gar and I were little, we used to go to a pond to watch the frogs and he had dared me to touch one and I did and even grabbed one in my hand but I squeezed it and jumped to my face. I fell backwards and Gar wouldn't stop laughing for the rest of the day" she said quietly, reminiscing at the memory. And as soon as she remembered, the leaf turned to a darker shade of green.
Raven then noticed the different hues along the vines and branches and grabbed another one a bit higher than the last. In this one, her vision was a bit blurry but as her eyes focused she noticed someone at the door, she blinked a couple of times but whoever was there was gone, instead, she looked around and realized she was in a hospital room. To her right was a very young Garfield. He had fallen sleep on the chair in front of the bed but woke up the moment she tried to move. He was green now, she noticed. He was worried and teary eyed. "I'm sorry M" he whispered, then the image was gone.
"What happened here?" asked Raven. Meliah softly touched the leaf then just as quickly, let go of it.
"It had been an accident. The first time Gar transformed into an animal, it was a Bear. I was too close"
"You mean he made the scars on your face?" asked Raven wide eyed and realized Garfield had never mentioned anything like that. In fact, he had never spoken about the first time he ever transformed into anything.
"Yes, but like I said, it had been an accident. But he still feels guilty."
Raven nodded then continued studying the memory tree. Another leaf however, showed her running, being pulled by a boy in a clearing, she was compelled to look back and saw a monkey making its way towards them with dilated red eyes and foam around its mouth. Raven felt panic, fear and in the distraction she tripped over a branch and covered her face as the animal was almost upon her but stopped when a shot was fired. The boy pulled her to her feet and run again but suddenly he pushed her out of the way and the animal had grabbed the boy's leg. He was kicking and screaming until another shot was heard, then, everything went dark.
Raven let go of the leaf. The memories so livid as if they were her own, had her panting for no apparent reason. Meliah saw Raven's expression and touched the leaf as well but snatched her hand almost immediately when she recognized the memory. "That's one of my worst memories" she said quietly.
"He told us once he was bitten by a wild animal but, he never went into details"
"I'm not surprised. If is a bad memory for me, its probably a nightmare for him"
Then as quiet as before, Raven continued looking thru the memories. There was something there that had caught her attention but she couldn't put her finger on it. She came across earlier memories when Garfield and Meliah had been kids. The time she came out of the hospital and Garfield had placed a kiss on each one of the scars. The time when Meliah had tried to save Garfield's parents by turning into an octopus. Again as if she had been the one there. The fear, the panic, the frustration and pain were all too real.
Then she realized what had caught her eye earlier. This new memory was when Meliah woke up at the edge of the swollen river. She could feel the pain shooting up her leg from her ankle. Her sore limps and dizziness and then noticed a woman laying on the ground next to her. It was Garfield's mother, unconscious and bruised. A small fire was burning behind her and then he came out. A monk wearing tattered robes with a gentle smile.
Raven let go of the leaf and looked at it with curiosity and narrowed eyes.
"What is it Raven? What did you see?"
"I'm not sure" Raven said then looked at the other memories from before and came across another one. One when again Meliah was in a hospital room but this time, she was alone. Got up as best she could because of the cast on her right ankle and then felt her body change and suddenly, wings were holding her mid air, she could feel the thrill of flying for the first time and as she flew around the room, out of the corner of her eye saw the monk standing by the door for a split second, but the pain on her ankle was to great to ignore anymore and so she transformed back, then the image was gone.
Raven let go of the leaf and looked at Meliah with narrowed eyes.
"Raven? What are you looking for?"
Raven looked back at the vines and tried to follow its pattern up the trunk. She saw another leaf bright yellow. She had to extend her arm until she could touch the edge of the yellow leaf and gasped when she realized she had found what she was looking for.
"Meliah… do you remember the monk that rescued you from the wreckage?"
"Yes… he's the one who went to the village to get help for Gar's mom and me, why?"
"Did you ever see him again? Or before that?"
"hmmm, never saw him before but I think I saw him years later, but I'm not sure. Why?"
"Take a look at this" Raven said and guided her to the memory when Meliah had woken up in the hospital after the accident with Garfield. But this time, Raven was as herself in the memory, just like she had been in Garfield's when he was having the nightmares. She could see the two kids by the bed, with bandages covering Meliah's half of her face and then looked to her left towards the door. Still a blurred image but the robes were noticeable.
"I told you this had been an accident" said Meliah after letting go of the leaf.
"Its not that. Pay attention at what you see in the background, concentrate and try to remember"
This time, Meliah grabbed the leaf by herself, closed her eyes then frown as she went thru the memory again. "That's strange… it doesn't make sense. I wasn't anything by then. This happened about a month before I messed with the vials" she said when she let go.
"I think he was after Garfield" said Raven while pointing at the yellow leaf above their heads. When Meliah met her eyes with her own questioning ones, Raven said "This one is from the day the spell was cast on you. Please, try to concentrate on the details. I need to see it thru and don't worry, its just a memory so whatever you see, whatever you hear… is not real" Meliah nodded and reluctantly, grabbed the leaf's edge at the same time as Raven did.
Raven saw Meliah, running thru the African jungle. She was older, ten or twelve years old, when on a small clearing, she happens to come across a group of three evil looking men. For a split second she stops, but something is wrong, so she morphs into an eagle ready to take off. Then, the men yell in a foreign language, extremely excited and start to run towards her so she flies away.
They manage to track her down and corner her, forcing her to fight. But these are no ordinary men. They seem to have a plan. A purpose. Raven recognizes the monk from before among them, but not only that, the tattoos and clothing they're wearing are from an ancient voodoo clan she has read about before.
As they start closing in on her, one pulls a dagger, the other a spear and try to stab her. They're fast, but not as fast as she is. She turns into a gorilla, then a rhino and after failed attempts on their part to neutralize her, she knocks them out. Leaving them bloody and unconscious on the ground.
The third man. The monk now in different clothing, is enraged and pulls a dagger on her. Even though his chances of winning are slim to none, he advances slowly, all the while cutting his other hand with the dagger, mumbling to himself. Meliah seems confused and watches the man apprehensively while he begins to chant softly then louder, until he sounds more and more unhinged as the demonic words flow from his lips.
Meliah is now frightened and out of instinct of self preservation, pounces on the man who had slowly come to an stop. With bared teeth and claws, she dives at the last man the moment he felt silent and then a malicious grin spreads on his face as he focuses intently on her and stabs her as she falls on him with the same dagger stained with his blood.
She screams the moment the dagger cuts thru her skin but at that moment, her eyes crystallized broken blue and she managed to dig her claws into the man's chest before she hit's the ground. And as everything Raven sees starts to get darker, she sees the man get up and stumble away until everything is pitch black.
…
…
When Meliah woke up in the medical bay, everything was quiet save for the beeping noises of the monitors. She was no longer intubated and only had an iv attached to her left arm. As she looked around, noticed the bed across the room where Raven laid still unconscious. Garfield had fallen sleep holding her hand while Red X was sitting on a chair on the other side, leaning against the bed, arms crossed over his chest with the soft rise and fall of his chest, indicating he was also asleep.
Meliah sighed deeply and leaned her head back against the pillows, trying not to think of anything while focusing on the dim sunrays that came thru the window behind her bed. She smiled to herself at the strange feeling of a quiet mind. Then a soft pressure over her right hand made her snap out of her enjoyment. The thief was standing next to her.
"How are you feeling kitten?" he asked as quietly as possible while he squeezed her hand a bit more. She smiled at that and sighed before she answered him.
"I haven't felt this alone since Garfield left" she said looking over at the other bed. The thief followed her gaze and attempted to move his hand but she stopped him.
"Not in the way you think… there is a kind of peace. A silence in my mind that I had forgotten what it felt like… there is no… whispering questioning my every move. There is no anger to hold back. Just me and my own thoughts." she said almost absentminded. Distracted by the meaning of her own words.
"Do you miss her?"
"I was… used to her. The company kept me sane… or insane, which ever way you look at it. Thanks to her I'm alive now when otherwise I would have given up a long time ago. Somehow in the madness, she gave me hope and a new perspective of me being able to do more"
"So you do miss her"
"In a way I guess but, the prize I had to pay… I wouldn't have been able to live with myself and that's why she was taking over… but the question is.. Will you miss her?"
The thief chuckled to himself, distracted while he caressed her hand and run a finger along her forearm, raising goose bumps on her skin.
"You are only as wild as you want to be Mel" he said while he run a finger on her cheek.
Garfield, who had been awake from the moment the thief got up from the chair, had listened to their conversation. Incredible to think that the suave talking, elusive thief, was soft enough to fall for his friend and stick this far in the mission when he hardly knew her. Then he felt a soft squeeze on his hand.
Raven was awake, with that subtle yet playful smile he loved and in the excitement, got up and hugged her without restrain, ignoring the fact that the other two had let go of each other's hands.
"I take it everything went according to plan?" asked Garfield, looking from one girl to the other.
"Not only that but we found out who cast the spell" said Meliah with a smile as she tried to get up.
The thief, on seeing her smile so genuinely at the green Titan, silently walked to the window and glanced at the other couple. And while Garfield chatted with Meliah, he could also see the apprehension in the beautiful purple eyes of the demoness. He was no empath like she was, but could only imagine what she was feeling no matter how good she tried to hide it. Because somehow, that's exactly how he felt.
Garfield had also noticed her evasive eyes. Raven was now reclined on the bed, looking away at the opposite direction where Meliah was and for a split second caught sight of the thief disappearing without anyone else noticing. For a moment there, Raven felt more alone. Her chest and heart constricted thanks to the heartbreak and disappointment she still harbored.
At some point, Meliah mentioned how amused she was at how relaxed she could feel at the moment.
"Gar, is incredible! I haven't felt this much freedom from myself in a long time and I owe it all to Raven… thank you"
Raven nodded once and briefly glanced at the smiling girl and said as cold and detached as she possibly could "Don't mention it"
Garfield however, caught the strain in her voice and winced when he felt her hands slip away from his while she prepared herself to get up and leave. Meliah could only feel the tension in the room and her smile faded. "Well…um, I think I'll get something to eat" then, in almost a whisper she said "I'm sorry" then without waiting for a response, Meliah left the room.
Garfield then turned towards Raven, her back to him, but when he tried to reach her shoulder, she got up, leaving his hand in the air and when he was about to speak, she cut him off and said "I need to meditate" just as cold as before while she walked towards the chair where her cloak had been resting. Garfield in the meantime, rolled over the bed, got on his feet and in two strides, he was behind her, so when she turned, she had no choice but to look at him in the eyes.
"Rae, talk to me… you're still mad, are you? And don't tell me you need to meditate right this second, just… talk to me"
She looked in his eyes for a split second, then looked down while she tried to walk around him. "You should go eat as well. Its been a long night for everyone."
"Raven!" he said a bit more sternly than what he meant to, but he didn't back down. Instead, he grabbed her by the shoulders "Raven… I'm not the empath here. You need to tell me what you're thinking. I don't want to loose you over a misunderstanding"
She narrowed her eyes at him and pushed her way pass him with a scuff. "you want to know what I'm thinking? Then let me tell you first how I feel… I feel exhausted, empty, disappointed and most of all, angry beyond reason. What am I thinking? I'm thinking that is taking lot from me not let Rage take over and let her tear Meliah apart…" she said eyes glowing white and trembling hands she had balled in a fist.
"Raven…" he tried to say but she cut him off once more.
"… And the only reason keeping me from doing just that, is the mere fact that you're here, that thanks to what she did you're alive…" she continued not noticing half the equipment was encased in her dark energy, floating around them.
He dared a move and grabbed her trembling hands in his and tried to ease the tension by rubbing them softly with his thumbs. He had no words he could think of to ease her mind and her heart, so, he said nothing and waited for her to calm down on her own accord. And amidst the chaos of her own emotions, Raven could feel the waves of uneasiness and even guilt coming from him.
She looked down at their hands, she was making no attempt to grab his and slowly tried to slip them away out of his hold. Her eyes were no longer glowing and carefully, guided the floating equipment back to their places.
And after she sighed once more, she said more quietly. "Gar, I don't blame you. Not for a second. But to also realize that I have no right to feel this way is also frustrating"
"What do you mean no right. You're my girlfriend. I understand why you feel that way Rae"
"I am your girlfriend now, but I wasn't back when that happened and, well… I had, sort of imagined… I would be your first." she said more quietly but she knew he had heard judging by the surprised expression on his face. "You know what? Forget it!, what's done, is done. Its pointless of me to remain angry when that wont solve anything. But I really need to meditate before Robin starts questioning me about my findings in her head and somehow, quiet down my own mind and please… I don't want to be disturbed" she said, and with that, she opened a portal and disappeared in the darkness, leaving a confused but smiling Garfield behind.
So, even though and regardless of how this chapter was developed towards the end, I promise the fluffy parts will come back at the end of the next chapter as I still have a bit more drama to develop and get out of the way that will lead to the end of this story. Thank you all for reading and please, feel free to review.