Part of Them

Part 21

Muttering profanities under my breath, I sat up. Despite the splitting headache, I was determined to get out of this bed and pay the bathroom a visit.

Surely freshening up a bit would ease my unwellness, nothing would feel greater than a cold shower right now.

I grind my teeth, roll out of bed and land on the ground with a loud thud. I couldn't care less if anybody were to hear me at this moment.

Not waiting for any noises from downstairs to see whether Rayi had heard me, I got onto my feet and supported my swaying body on the wall.

I closed my eyes as I let out a sigh, and with a push off the wall, I walked towards the bathroom door, but right in front of the door I realized my mistake. If I was going to take a shower I had to take some clothes with me. I'm not about to trip myself into an uncomfortable situation, just in case somebody stumbles into my room the moment I exit the bathroom only covered in a towel.

Shrugging my shoulders I passed the bathroom door and walked into my favorite room, the walk in closet.

Spotting the fluffy sitting aisle in the middle of the room I changed my plans for the day. Screw the shower, I'll just lay down and stare at the ceiling. Rest sounded much more appealing than any dreadful shower or confrontation with my face in the mirror at the moment.

Letting myself fall face-first onto the soft, beige surface of the aisle, I let out a soft breath. Finally I could relax a bit. I didn't want to think about all my problems anymore. There was just too much to worry about at this point.

As I rolled over a bit to lay on my back I let my gaze wander to the ceiling.

"Huh, now that's a weird shade of white," I thought out loud.

God the fever must really be getting to me.

On second thought, the ceiling was just a normal, clean white.

Groaning, I let my head fall to the side. The curtains of the glass front were drawn half-close and I could see a little bit of the balcony outside.

Suddenly I noticed some weird glowing thing flying idly on the usually white, but now tainted dark in the moonlight concrete platform of my balcony.

I stood back up and, squinting my eyes, approached the glass windows.

It seemed to be some kind of bug upon closer investigation. It was a tiny, yellow-glowing bug with cute little wings and it seemed to be flying in circles on the balcony.

I was completely mesmerized by the small creature behind the glass, but when I stretched my hand out to open the glass door, it stopped glowing altogether.

If I were just a mere human without good night vision it would've seemed as though the bug had suddenly disappeared, but I could still make out the outlines of the now black bug.

With no warning, it started to glow again and this time I managed to identify the glowing part of the insect, it was it's butt.

I had never seen such a thing in my 254 years of life and out of curiosity, I opened the door and stepped outside into the cool night. The wind was blowing softly through my messy hair which I had yet to brush.

Letting my gaze wander over the panorama that was greeting me, I completely forgot about the glowing bug.

Down in the forest, beyond the treetops, rested the glowing pond from a couple days ago. But it wasn't the glowing of the water, or the seemingly pitch black plants around it that surprised me, no, it was the sheer amount of glowing dots next to it. Or at least they appeared to be dots.

Those dots must be other glowing bugs, but why are they here and what are they?

Are they magical creatures? Or perhaps they were normal bugs that had been bewitched?

And why in the world was there a glowing pond in the middle of nowhere anyways?

They wouldn't revolt to newer technology just to have something like that, right?

Suddenly, out of nowhere, my ears started to ring and behind closed eyelids, I spotted a woman with long white hair and gray eyes.

"What are you looking at, little fairy?" the woman asked. I stretched out a slightly chubby arm and pointed at a small, glowing animal that was flying through the night.

The woman turned her head into the direction I was pointing at and laughed.

"Do you mean the fireflies?" She whispered softly. "They come out once a year to mate before their death. Their glow is supposed to attract others of their kind so that they can find each other more easily. They don't live long once they reach adulthood, you know?"

Hearing this, I stopped smiling and let my hand sink back to my side slowly. Suddenly, the firefly sank to the ground and landed in a puddle on the dirty street we were living on.

"Aw, poor thing. It must be lost in this part of the city. Luckily the forest is just around the corner. Let's bring it back to its friends, shall we?" She tried to cheer me up.

It worked and I nodded my head happily.

Barefooted, with mother carrying the little bug in her hand, we headed to the end of the muddy street.

Our dirty rags, brown in color, had many holes in them and everytime a mild breeze passed by, we shivered.

But we didn't care much about our appearance as long as we had each other.

When the ringing in my ears disappeared and my head turned clear again, question after question started to flood my head.

Who the hell was that woman? And was that really me? But I've been living with my brothers for as long as I can remember.

It must've been a weird fever dream or something like that, because I couldn't explain it any other way.

Little did I know that there was way more to it than it seemed.

Shrugging it off as a side effect of the fever, I acted as though nothing happened and fixed my gaze back on the pond.

Things just didn't add up to me. I had to ask them about this when I get the chance to, because this all seems really fishy in my opinion.

Stepping back inside I decided to just get myself some clothes and hop into the shower. And maybe I should also take a painkiller, because the thousand aches I had wouldn't just go away on their own, and they were killing me.

Honestly, it was just a matter of time until they discovered everything. Why even bother?

But there was still a slim chance that fate would finally grant a wish and set me free before that happened.

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Happy New Year!