She never did take the time to consider exactly what it is she wanted from the Program. Where she'd end up in five, ten, twenty years time. She'd had hypotheses, yes. Nights spent wide awake, burning off fumes from another midnight training session. Thinking. Scrutinizing. A dead-weight writhing in bed like a toad thrown into hot oil to cook;
She hadn't asked a single question when she'd signed onto the Project. Not one. Questions were doubts, and she hadn't any. Neither about her own capabilities or whatever it was her father sought to procure.
She'd do anything for him.
In so few years she'd climbed her way to the top and never did this peak feel precarious. She could raise one leg and balance confidently at this highest point, no amount of wind or rain strong enough to buffer her over the edge. She was the perfect product of her father's experimenting; a super soldier. A daughter to be paraded through battlefield and secret base alike. A daughter to be proud of.
Look at me; the mantra of every mission. Look at me.
Is that what she wanted? To be looked at?
Yes. Obviously.
And what good would looking do? Would it make the family whole again? Would it bring father and daughter together at long last?
I don't know. I don't know.
No.
Selfish.
Connecticut is dead. That's the culmination. The beginning of the end. False hope turned deadly obedience. A father doling her out to clean up the mess.
Carolina cuts through the third counterfeit with a high, graceful sweep of her leg. The demon staggers back. Staggers in the way a dancer pretends to lose their footing, looking no less elegant, simply playing a role. He peels away into the shadows and she starts her pursuit again, unable to tear her eyes away from Connecticut for how omnipotent stage-hands force her jaw forward. She can't breathe. What breath does force its way out is ragged and automatic.
The fourth 'hologram' rolls out. She destroys it. The music flourishes; she's the hero in this tale.
no subject
She never did take the time to consider exactly what it is she wanted from the Program. Where she'd end up in five, ten, twenty years time. She'd had hypotheses, yes. Nights spent wide awake, burning off fumes from another midnight training session. Thinking. Scrutinizing. A dead-weight writhing in bed like a toad thrown into hot oil to cook;
She hadn't asked a single question when she'd signed onto the Project. Not one. Questions were doubts, and she hadn't any. Neither about her own capabilities or whatever it was her father sought to procure.
She'd do anything for him.
In so few years she'd climbed her way to the top and never did this peak feel precarious. She could raise one leg and balance confidently at this highest point, no amount of wind or rain strong enough to buffer her over the edge. She was the perfect product of her father's experimenting; a super soldier. A daughter to be paraded through battlefield and secret base alike. A daughter to be proud of.
Look at me; the mantra of every mission. Look at me.
Is that what she wanted? To be looked at?
Yes. Obviously.
And what good would looking do? Would it make the family whole again? Would it bring father and daughter together at long last?
I don't know. I don't know.
No.
Selfish.
Connecticut is dead. That's the culmination. The beginning of the end. False hope turned deadly obedience. A father doling her out to clean up the mess.
Carolina cuts through the third counterfeit with a high, graceful sweep of her leg. The demon staggers back. Staggers in the way a dancer pretends to lose their footing, looking no less elegant, simply playing a role. He peels away into the shadows and she starts her pursuit again, unable to tear her eyes away from Connecticut for how omnipotent stage-hands force her jaw forward. She can't breathe. What breath does force its way out is ragged and automatic.
The fourth 'hologram' rolls out. She destroys it. The music flourishes; she's the hero in this tale.
One step closer to the end.