In Hollywood: Glorybringer Fanfic.

Chapter Thirty

Kinkajou

"Run!" Moon shrieked, grabbing her wrist. Kinkajou looked back at Clay.

"No!" Kinkajou said. "You may be my friend, and you have bananas, but I don't want to come with you!"

Moon widened her eyes. "If you don't, you'll die!"

Kinkajou felt...anger. WOAH. "NO! And leave the people there? The ones you and your family hurt? Do you have no sympathy?"

Moon seemed afraid. Near them, somebody screamed. There was a flicker in her eyes- confusion? Pain?- but then she shook her head. "I didn't hurt those people," she whispered timidly.

Kinkajou huffed. She was angry. But most of all, she was disappointed. "Then go. I'm not coming with you. I can see through you. You have been hiding in the shadows ever since you were born. You know what I feel? PITY. Because you can be better but you suck!"

She ran back, not daring to look at Moon again. Everything was exploding around her. But she ran. She could hear Moon's fading footsteps.

Anger. Pain. Hate. The feelings she had tried for so long to push back.

Unavoidable, hateful pain.

"Glory!" She yelled. Stop thinking. Stop thinking. They're safe. They're safe. Safe. Safe. Safe.

But they kept coming-

She remembered bananas. She remembered warmth. She remembered opening her eyes in the sun. She remembered a voice, warm and comforting.

"No," she whispered. "Stop remembering. Don't let it control you." She felt tears sting her eyes. "STOP IT."

It didn't stop.

"You'll be safe there, darling."

But she wasn't safe, she realized. But she trusted her. The voice. Was it her family? Her mother? She could not remember. She had avoided it for so long. Hope. It felt foreign.

She could not remember anything.

Just the rainforest fading away as the car sped forward, watching it get smaller and smaller at the back of the truck, with the other kids. The hot sun. The beautiful sun, shining on her back, now her enemy.

Her throat begging for water. The people in the black suits. The crying children.

You have to do something, the voice in her head said.

"Glory!" She shouted. But it seemed like a small voice. "GLORY!"

For a moment, she cried with them. But then she saw the people in the black suits. They were taking the weakest. They were taking them away to a different place.

Stay strong, Kinkajou.

So she cheered up. Forcing her tears down, laughing and laughing and laughing. And people laughed with her.

She was that girl with the happy smiles. Because she needed to be. Even with tears sliding down her face, she was happy. Or she told herself she was, because there was no other choice.

Smoke. It was everywhere. It hurt her lungs. It hurt to breathe. Her breaths were coming out in short gasps.

Am I really safe here? In this place of no warmth, no trees? Where do I even belong?