Safety is an illusion out here-- Fate knows as well as any. The Peak was her home now, an ancestral one at that, but did she belong among them? A part of the girl knows she doesn't. There's a different kind of feral nature to her. The kind of feral that means breaking apart what she's supposed to be, deconstructing her very sense of self. That's what she's in the midst of, now. Creation through destruction, but it's not that poetic. Through finding what was left of her life on the islands, she's finding herself.
Why does that sound like bullshit too?
She'd seen the Shore, once. For a little while. Another chapter, one that she'd rebuked. She'd looked for him, once. Not knowing what else to do. In those days, she'd been different. Now? Was Fate jaded now? No, there's something different. Pride, but in a bad way. A set jaw and a chill in her green gaze, there's something wrong with her. These days, there's always something wrong with her.
Like now, for instance, she's sure she's hallucinating. Fate straightens up, narrows her eyes. Though she looks rough, whatever this beast was looked just as bad. Whoever he was.
As if she wouldn't know him anywhere.
"Fuck you," roadweary, Fate has been through the ringer lately. She changes course, moves toward him instead. Watching as his form becomes more solid against the sunlight reflecting on the ocean, something strange taking shape in her chest. "I'm not seeing things, am I? It's really you?"
It's true, she would have known him anywhere. That didn't stop Fate's aching chest, spinning head.
I’m not like them
but I can pretend
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