Nightmares

[thefourthone]

It’s a bad night. The feelings creep up slowly, no matter how much she tries to ignore them and act normal. A weight on her chest so heavy she can’t breathe. That prickle at the back of her neck like she’s being watched no matter how often she checks the doors are locked and curtains tight shut. It doesn’t help. It feels like he’s here, always just out of sight, ready to take her all over again. Worst of all, she doesn’t even know who he is. Daddy or 'Uncle' Jim or Black Mask, all of them haunting her.

Eventually Steph goes to bed. Probably a bad idea but she’s just so tired of being awake right now. Then nightmares, up-close and real with all the protective haze of fading memory stripped away. Chained up and at his mercy, and he’s laughing as he cuts her up. The smell of her own blood turns her stomach and finally vomits when he puts the iron on her skin and the smell of burned flesh fills her nose. Then he’s touching her like Uncle Jim touched her, and it didn’t really happen but she can feel it and it’s so real.

The sound of her own shrieking yanks her into wakefulness, and Steph practically falls out of bed in her hurry to get up and out. She can’t be alone right now, she can’t can’t can’t stay in this empty place alone with the terrible things in her head. She’s a trembling mess as she yanks her black leggings on and doesn’t bother changing her nightshirt before clambering out her window and hurrying up to the roof.

There’s only one place to go, only one person she knows beyond a doubt to be safe. Soon Steph is crouched on the narrow ledge outside Cass’ apartment. It’s so late, but she taps on the glass anyway and tries not to shiver in the wind.

Comments

[thefourthone]

With a little smile, Steph keeps hold of Cass' fingers and follows after her into the kitchen still in her nightshirt and leggings. There's something to be said about 24-hour Chinese delivery places. Then she really brightens, despite herself. "Waffles? Is there syrup?"

[onewhoisall]

Cass led Steph into the kitchen before letting go of her hand as she fetched the toaster waffles from the freezer. Popping them in, she turned to face Steph and gave her a very cold, serious look at the question. Reaching up to one of the cupboards, she climbed up onto it easily to reach the top shelf and grunted as she pulled the sticky webbing that stuck the syrup to the top of the cupboard.

"I teased Kaine once too many times," Cass explained, pulling the webbing off before climbing down onto the counter and sitting on it. "It is very difficult to get out of, don't let him web you. Or any of the others... hn, I think there is three more now. I think."

[thefourthone]

"It's so weird. I thought it would be...goopier. Steph laughs a little as she reaches to touch the webbing and play with it between her fingers. She's seen it before but never actually touched it. "I met Spider-Woman. She seems really nice. Are they all...related or something? Aliens from a spider planet or something?"

[onewhoisall]

"That's... hn, not for me to say. It's Kaine's secret, something like that. Related. Not the alien planet." Cass replied. She knew Kaine could be touchy about being a clone, about feeling as if he was the defective one but she thought it made him beautiful, stronger, more impressive that he wasn't like the others. And well, she preferred him to Peter a hell of a lot more. She hadn't ever been impressed by what she had seen of the other Spider-Men (and women.) "Hn, really? She wasn't nice to me. She was trying to break in somewhere when I met her."

[thefourthone]

"Maybe she was looking for clues." The Spider-Woman Steph had met seemed firmly on the side of good. Anyone who listened to her ramble about her problems that much had to be.

Steph reaches for the bottle of syrup and drips a bit onto her finger to eat. "Breaking and entering in the name of justice is allowed."

[onewhoisall]

"Hnnnn," Cass murmured doubtfully, her voice trailing off as she snapped and tapped Steph's fingers as she ate pure syrup. Raising an eyebrow at her, she gave her a look that indicated she should wait. Pulling the waffles out the toaster, she gave one to Steph and kept one for herself before she stuck another two in. "Breaking and entering when you haven't tried asking first is not."

[thefourthone]

"Do you know if she asked or not?" Steph asks, though most of her focus is on drizzling the syrup on the waffle and let it pool in the little pockets. Mmmmmm. The anticipation is almost as good as eating them. "I mean, she seems on the up-and-up to me."