funnygirl | 006 | Action/Voice

[Belle woke up early in the morning feeling a sudden wave of home sickness she hadn't felt in months. But it wasn't Beast's castle that she longed for, but the small cottage she had lived in with her father and their small assortment of animals.

It's this feeling that brings her to the stables. She's only been here a handful of times since arriving to accustom herself with the horses and to take one out for the occasional ride. Things have been so busy she hadn't been able to come by recently.

She spends most of the morning feeding the horses treats and keeping them company. Eventually she gets one saddled and goes for a ride through the forest, though she's careful not to ride out too far from the village. People may catch her during her ride, or they may come upon her while she's at the stables before or after her ride.]

[After she finishes brushing down the horse she took out for a ride, she decides to sit down and pull out her journal. She has a question she would like to ask the village.]

Good afternoon, Luceti. I should also welcome all of the New Feathers who have arrived. My name is Belle. I have a question I would like to ask everyone, out of mere curiosity, nothing more. So no one should feel pressured to answer. But how many of you had animals you cared for back home? Or do you have any here in Luceti? And if neither of these, what kind of animals are your favorite?

As for myself, I grew up caring for my horse, Philippe. I suppose that's why I feel so comfortable around horses. I miss him every day...[She pauses for a moment before continuing, sounding more upbeat.]

Well, I'm curious to hear everyone's answers.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Mm. I apologize... I imagine that's something most people would rather not dwell on.

No, it's alright. It's true I try not to dwell on it. But that does not make my longing for home go away.

Sometimes it's good to talk about it.

That's what my mother would say. You can't achieve a necessary catharsis if you bottle things up inside.

[She sighs.]

Mother is a psychologist.

Psychologist? [She's heard that term somewhere before. Maybe in something she read....]

Oh! Those are the people who study the brain and people's actions, and emotions isn't that right?

Yes. Essentially. Mother took it to something of an unfortunate degree, but that was what she was trained to do, at least.

It sounds like she enjoyed it, at least.

Oh, she did. It was the single most important thing in her life, without question or competition.

Well, what about her family? I'm sure you were just as important to her.

No. Not even marginally.

[But she's not bitter. Oh no. ~~Wait yes she is.~~]

Father found an audio dairy where she actually admitted that she kept her distance from me to ensure that her eventual plans for me would not be altered by any emotional attachments she might have developed for me as her daughter.

Eventual plans?

[She keeps her tone calm and gentle, even though she's clearly disturbed by what Eleanor has said.]

I'm sure she had reasons. She might have been trying to help you, in her own way.

[Eleanor is quiet for a bit, and when she speaks again she almost sounds amused, in a tired sort of way.] You know, I haven't any idea what she was planning for me when I was little. Before everything happened. What she eventually wanted me for must have been different, she couldn't have known what they would...what would happen to me.

[Eleanor sighs.]

My well being wasn't her concern. Sofia Lamb was worried about the world. She didn't have time for petty concerns about one frightened little girl.

[She's insistent.]

She's your mother! All mothers are concerned for their children.

[Eleanor sighs.]

Maybe most mothers are. Mine...was not. I was a tool to advance her agenda, and nothing more. She was prepared to sacrifice me to a procedure that destroyed the last man she used it on. She started doing it, before Father rescued me.

She was going to turn me into something...even worse than what I am.

Even worse than...?

I do not understand.

[Damn. Eleanor shifts, the sound noticeable, and then lets out a breath, trying to sort out how to explain.]

Things were done to me when I was a child. Things that can't be fixed. Not completely.

What sort of things?

[There's a delay before she answers.]

It is unpleasant. Are you certain you wish to know?

[The girl seemed...well, innocent.]

I'm sure speaking of it will be more uncomfortable for you than any discomfort I have listening. But if you do not wish to...you do not have to.

[The strangest part is meeting someone who doesn't know, honestly. Eleanor thins it over.]

When I was little, I and many other girls my age...six, seven, were kidnapped. We were given drugs and surgeries and implanted with a..creature...In my stomach. A slug from the bottom of the ocean. And sent out into the city to steal blood for corpses.

I don't remember much after that, honestly. I...Mother rescued me, and it took her years to fix what they had done to my mind, but...she couldn't fix my body. The other girls weren't even that lucky.

I may have my sanity, but I am still a freak.

[She gasps in horror and then goes silent. It's much more horrible than she thought. More horrible than anything she could have come up with herself. The silence stretches on for a long moment.]

No...I don't believe you're a...freak. None of that is your fault.

[Eleanor sighs.]

Fault has little to do with it. I am what they made me, regardless of who is responsible.

Knowing that I am blameness does not remove the thing living inside my body. Or the changes they made to my DNA.

But it's not something you chose for yourself. So it's not something I feel should be held against you. Nor should it define you.

It doesn't define who I am. Only what.

006 | Action/Voice

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