A/N:

Yes, this is a real update, and I'm going to give you more details about future posting in the bottom AN so, please, read that!

Title: Origins: Living in my Future

Author: MarieCarro

Beta: Alice's White Rabbit

Pre-reader: BitterHarpy

Genre: Supernatural/Mystery

Rating: NC-17

Summary: Mary Alice Brandon had always been different. She seemed to know things that had yet to happen, and the people in town avoided her at all costs. But the cries of "Witch" or whispers of "Changeling" wasn't her biggest concern. Someone much closer to her than the townsfolk couldn't accept her differences, and it put her in life-threatening danger.

Disclaimer: All publicly recognizable characters, settings, etc. are the property of their respective owners. The original characters and plot are the property of the author. The author is in no way associated with the owners, creators, or producers of any media franchise. No copyright infringement is intended.


CHAPTER 8

FRIDAY, JULY 16th – TUESDAY, OCTOBER 12th 1920

The sun was warm and pleasant on my skin, and I closed my eyes, directing my face up to the light to enjoy it. When the light breeze caused the short strands of my hair to tickle my forehead, I let out a giggle.

I was happy. At least, I think what I felt was happiness.

"You're in a good mood today, Miss Brandon," a woman in a nurse's uniform said, her expression soft in what looked like an involuntary smile. I didn't know if I liked her or not because my nightly visitor said I couldn't store short-term memories anymore, and I pretty much forgot a name and a person as soon as they were out of my sight.

I only remembered I had a visitor every night because he patiently reminded me without judgment. His name was on the tip of my tongue, but I couldn't get it out unless he was in front of me.

"I don't like Miss Brandon," I said and watched the butterfly behind the woman's shoulder flutter away. "I'm just Alice." I was satisfied as long as I could remember my own name.

"Okay, then … Alice," she said, and I smiled at her.

"Yes?"

"Why are you in such a good mood?"

"Why shouldn't I be?" I inhaled deeply, the scent of grass and flowers heavy in the air. "I love the sun. It feels so good on my skin." I didn't even have to close my eyes before a quick vision told me clouds would gather shortly and it would rain. "Aww," I moaned in disappointment. "I don't like rain. Rain makes me sad."

The woman looked up at the clear blue sky in confusion. "There's not a cloud in sight." She smiled patiently and tried to lead me toward a group of people gathered farther away. "I can assure you it won't rain. Now come, we're having therapy out here today."

I pulled my arm away and started running. "No, I want to dance!" I exclaimed and started spinning with my arms spread out from my body just to hinder the woman from grabbing me again. But when I got too dizzy, I fell to the ground on my back. The world went round and round above me, and it looked so funny I had to laugh.

"Miss Brandon, it's therapy time."

"Alice," I said stubbornly.

"Until you start behaving, you'll remain Miss Brandon."

Disgruntled, I sat up and pouted at the woman. "But we can't have therapy out here. It's gonna rain."

She clenched her jaw in annoyance. "It's a beautiful day. It will not rain."

I huffed when she forced me up on my feet and made me sit with the group, but just as I said, it didn't take long before dark clouds were above us and the sky opened up to a violent downpour, and everyone scrambled to get inside quickly.

The woman looked at me sideways with heavy suspicion, but she didn't say anything as she led a few people away, probably to help them dry off.

Where the rest of the day went, I couldn't say. It felt as if it was in the blink of an eye, and then I was standing in my room, looking out through the barred windows at the glowing moon.

My visitor was about to open the door, and as soon as he did, I jumped up and wound my arms around his neck. Him I knew I liked, and he never made me do stuff I didn't want to do, like that woman in the uniform.

"Good evening, Alice," he said with a grin. "Do you remember my name tonight?"

I shook my head, but I smiled because I didn't need to know his name. He was my visitor. My friend. That was all I needed to know.

But he sighed and cupped my cheek with his hand, which was strangely cold. Had he always been that cold? I couldn't remember. "My only comfort is that I can see the trust in your eyes, even though you have no business trusting a creature like me."

"Why shouldn't I trust you? You're my friend!"

"There are reasons, sweet Alice. Reasons I've told you before, but you never remember them, and I'm afraid to repeat them because if you do remember them, you might stop trusting me, and I don't think I could live with that."

I laughed at him. "You're not making any sense."

"No, I'm not," he agreed.

"Come look," I said and grabbed his hand to lead him to the window. "Look at the moon. Isn't it beautiful?"

"Yes, it is," he agreed again.

"Do you really think there's a man living in the moon?" I asked, a fleeting memory of someone once telling me about such a thing. "Do you think he's lonely up there? I know I would be because then you couldn't visit me."

"No matter where you'd be in the universe, I'd find a way to visit you," he said softly. He said something else, but I couldn't pick out any words.

"What was that?"

"Nothing," he reassured. "Just talking to myself."

"A lot of people are doing that around here," I said. "Why is that?"

He took a deep breath and appeared to contemplate my question for a moment, and I liked that. It meant he took it seriously. "I've been told you're given the best answers that way," he said and smiled.

I nodded. "That's true. That way, no one's lying to you or talking behind your back." My eyes wandered away from the window toward the floor as inexplicable frustration built up inside me. "I hate liars. And people who whisper behind my back. It's not nice."

With the gentlest movements, he pulled me into his embrace. "Don't worry about them, Alice. Those ghosts don't exist anymore."

"They do in my head," I insisted even though said ghosts were nothing but wisps of fog with the smallest hint of a memory almost completely forgotten.

{=LMF=}

I was aware my surroundings weren't what I was seeing in front of me. They rarely were anymore.

Every waking moment as well as those spent asleep, I was locked in an ever-changing world where the smallest alteration could give a different outcome. Foggy images could become clear or they could fade away into obscure darkness.

My communication with those around me was sub-par, if it even existed at all anymore. Sometimes, I heard people saying things to me, but I wasn't certain if I answered them.

"She's become less and less verbal over the last few months," a female said from somewhere in the room I must have been in. "Maybe the electromotive force was too high."

"She doesn't speak about her delusions anymore. I see that as a success, but there will be casualties in the early experiments of a treatment like this."

"Are you saying this will be the state in which she lives the rest of her life? We can't allow this information to leak out about our facility."

"Better contact Mr. Brandon and tell him the girl took her own life. And the documentation of her treatments should be destroyed."

"I agree."

I wasn't a complete vegetable yet. I could hear them just fine even though I didn't make an effort to reply, and I knew the basic things. I knew I was a girl in early adulthood, but I no longer knew my name. I knew I was at a facility to treat insanity, but I wasn't insane. I guessed I was from a town farther away because when I did speak, I didn't sound like those around me. My accent was just slightly different.

And I had slowly started to understand there were parts of our world very few people knew about. Parts made out of nightmares and horror stories. I'd seen it more frequently lately, and I could no longer explain the visions away as my wild imagination.

The red eyes, the blood, the killing. I could have claimed all of that was from reading too many books about monsters, but during the few lucid moments I had—mostly at night when my only friend sat with me and talked—I'd slowly started to understand who was the trigger of those visions. There were so many details I'd overlooked before.

In the moonlight, his skin appeared to be almost glowing, his eyes were definitely a bright red at times, he moved too fast and too graceful, and when he touched me, it was akin to holding the hands of a statue.

"You're not human, are you?"

"No."

"What are you?"

"I thought you'd already know by now."

Flashes of blood-soaked teeth, of animalistic sounds, and stones crushed to dust with bare hands.

"I don't know what to call it. Is there a name for it?"

"Some would say monster."

I shook my head lethargically. "No," I moaned. "Not you."

It was colder outside, but I still enjoyed walking around in the grass. The slightly moist ground was icy, but I didn't want to lose the feeling of it under my bare feet.

"Miss Brandon, put your shoes on or you'll catch your death," a gruff woman said and forced me off the grass before she aggressively covered my feet.

"No," I complained. "I want to feel the grass."

"It's October and not warm enough for that. Stop fussing this instant." She grabbed my upper arm and shoved me in front of her, but my foot caught on a lump in the ground, and I landed on my knees.

"Ow!" I exclaimed and rolled over to see scrapes oozing red blood. They didn't hurt too badly, but they burned, and my knees were very sore.

"Just perfect," the woman grumbled and pulled me back up on my feet. "Come with me and I'll clean you up."

I groaned as the images in my head flashed faster and faster.

Someone was coming, and he was coming for me. He wanted to kill me, and he would succeed.

"Alice! Alice!"

"I'll die tonight ..."

"No," he growled. "I won't let them near you."

"You can't stop them," I whimpered and clenched my eyes shut, trying to push the horrific visions out of my mind. Images of myself with open, unseeing eyes; my murderer crouched above me with my blood dripping from his chin.

"Then I'll run with you." A strong, determined grip grabbed my upper arms, and I felt myself being lifted.

"You're not fast enough," I whispered in despair. I had already accepted my life would end. I hadn't lived an extraordinary life anyway. No one would miss me once I was gone. At least, I didn't think so.

Cold air blew in my face, but even though my eyes were opened, I could only see what was yet to happen and not what was before me. I couldn't see my protector's face, only his death.

"You'll die if you fight them," I said. "Let them have me. I'm not worth it."

"Let me be the judge of that."

Nausea was building in the back of my throat as my visions continued to change even more rapidly. I didn't understand why they changed as fast as they did, but I had never truly understood them, either, or how they worked.

"I could change you," my friend suddenly said. "Your blood won't call to him then."

Faster and faster, and then a sudden stop. Everything just stopped. Everything just disappeared. No future. No death. Nothing.

"I see nothing."

"Does that mean you'll live?"

"I don't know." I tightened my hand around something that felt like fabric. "I don't die." Finally, I could see my protector's face and his dark red eyes were focused on something far in the distance as our surroundings blurred past us.

Then, he looked down at me. "Please, Alice, tell me it means you'll live."

His expression was desperate, and I didn't understand why he wanted me to lie to him, but I did anyway because he asked me to.

"Yes, I'll live."

He nodded. "That's good enough for me," he said, and without slowing down, he leaned closer to my face. "I never wanted this for you, but you mean too much to me. I can't let you die." And then, he clamped his jaws into my shoulder.

I couldn't properly compare the pain to anything I'd ever felt before. It was a slicing, burning pain, and when I screamed, he placed a hand over my mouth, but not so much to silence me. He held my head away from where he was beginning to drink.

My mind blanked and the pain numbed away as I slowly drifted off, but then, with a horrendous sound, he tore himself away from me.

"I'm sorry," he whispered and directed his eyes forward again. They were filled with remorse and sorrow, but his stained mouth was set in a grim, determined line. "Please, try not to scream too much. I can't stop running right now."

It was impossible to even give him a reply. The scalding pain spreading from my shoulder overshadowed every one of my senses. It was flaming hot as if someone had lit me on fire.

"It hurts."

"Shh." His finger covered my lips. "Please, be quiet."

"Make it stop."

Cool fingers traced my cheeks gently. "It will stop soon. I promise."

I had to believe him. There was no other choice because I didn't want to think he'd lie to me. He never had before. But as the incapacitating pain spread faster through my body, everything started burning. Never had I experienced such agony, and when I thought it couldn't get worse, it did.

"Please, kill me," I begged, and suddenly, I was put on the ground and a bunched up wad of fabric was pushed into my mouth. It made it impossible for me to get a single sound out.

Hard lips pressed against my forehead. "I'm sorry. I'm so, so sorry. I just need you to be quiet."

"Mmph."

The trees around us were a blur again, but the sky wasn't as dark anymore, yet we never stopped moving, and I knew I was squirming in his arms, but his grip on me never weakened.

Suddenly, after what could have been hours, minutes, or possibly nothing more than just a few seconds, I could hear an enraged growl behind us before the arms under me disappeared, and I was literally flying through the air.

I landed on the damp ground with a hard thud and rolled into a tree by the smell of it. A sharp pain cutting into my forehead had me believe I must have hit something else, but it still couldn't compare to the inferno inside me.

Terrible sounds rang through the air. Sounds I never wanted to hear again. Snapping, keening, breaking sounds. More growling and crushing like stones being ground together.

My fingers dug into the ground as I tried to get away, but I could scarcely move.

"Was she worth it, you fool?" someone said, the gentle but viscous tones echoing between the trees. "Ripping your limbs apart will be like music to me. You'll regret your decision each second you have left of your life."

A high-pitched laughter pealed out, reminding me of a child, before something dragged me backward. "What do you want to do with her, James?"

I kept my eyes closed out of fear for what I'd see if I opened them, but I heard and felt the presence of someone sniffing close to my face.

"Let her be," he said with disgust. "The change is too far progressed. And it's no fun in killing someone who can't run."

With brutal force, I was tossed back to the ground, and I could feel how my mind shattered from the intense pressure put on it. I couldn't hear anything, and when I opened my eyes, I couldn't see. My limbs slackened as every part of my body shut down.

Everything was shrouded in darkness, and I didn't know how to find my way out of it. It was too encompassing, and not a single sliver of light could be detected.

All of my senses were gone.

I was but a shell.

I was nothing.

Nothing had no name. Nothing had no memories. No past. No future. Just suffocating darkness.

But then, as surprised as Nothing was, the darkness gave way to something else. Something unexpected.

A man with a tormented expression. A beautiful man with blond hair and terrifying red eyes under strong eyebrows. He looked angry, and his lean, muscular body was coiled to attack, but then his stance changed.

He straightened out, and his expression softened into an awed smile. He held out his hand, and a small, familiar, and delicate, but strangely pale, hand accepted the offer.

As soon as their hands touched, everything pieced itself together, and I was no longer nothing. I opened my eyes to a foreign and sharply detailed world with only one word on my tongue.

"Jasper."


A/N:

This story was nominated for WIP of the Year in the Golden Onion Awards, and it reignited a fire in my heart!

I have missed this story so much. I've missed writing in general, but I need to be honest with you and tell you that I am not fully back into the swing of things yet. I am still going through a lot, not just the aftermath of everything that has happened around Covid-19 for my family, but also with preparations for school, my day job, and a bunch of other personal stuff.

This is the last chapter that I have finished as of now, so I can't resume a weekly update schedule right now, but I want to get back into it very soon.

Thank you to whoever nominated me. It means everything to me and I appreciate it so much!

Until next time,

Stay Awesome!