Chapter Text
The night wasn’t pitch black, the moon made it so that even though she couldn’t see in detail, she could see plenty enough to navigate the woods back to the hole that housed the alien terrorist. She was thankful for the black night really, it meant that she wouldn’t have to see the thing die. She imagined that it would be disgusting to watch, but most likely not near as horrible as it’s eating was. The corpse of the kidnapper didn’t deserve the things done to it, but it wasn’t a person anymore.
Maybe she should have felt something after killing the man, but Jessie didn’t. She didn’t think that he deserved anything from her, not even a feeling. He was wrong, and now she was wrong. But she was going to do a last right and then let them take her. Let justice do it’s work on her, and accept the punishment they give her, along with a punishment that she would choose for herself. The people in charge always seemed to go soft on children, but she would not take soft. She could not stomach mercy for the sake of mercy.
Jessie stumbled, the weedkiller sloshing in the jug, spilling a few drops on to the ground. Jessie went on. It was hard, juggling the flashlight. It cut through the darkness, but also made what had formerly been a wide, if undefined view whittle down to just what the light hit. Jessie was getting closer.
Maybe she should say a few words? No, it would only laugh at her again, but if she had given him his meal, then she would give him his last words. He would get a last chance to ask for forgiveness, though she very much doubted that he would ever do such a thing. No, Jessie would be laughed at, but it was a rule, a custom, and if one didn’t live by the rules or culture then how did one live?
God, she hated this skirt. The only on she owned, now stained with blood and allowing her legs to get cut by the thorns and brambles. She wondered if she would burn it, but no, she would need it to prove that she killed the man even though the body would never be able to be produced. She wondered if she would have to tell them about the alien, but no. They might think that she was insane, and she wasn’t Jessie was very much so in touch with reality.
Here it was. The pit. The jail. The prison that she was the guard and executioner of. A judge and jury unneeded when even the inmate boasted that there wasn’t enough time left in the earth’s sun to punish it long enough to pay for it’s crimes. An inmate that begged for death and release in equal measures, and here was Jessie, prepared to give into it’s requests. To take care of what she had claimed as her’s, her responsibility, her prisoner. A monster that could be described to her by many with thousands unfriendly words, in languages across the universe with many extinct, that would cause her to wrinkle her nose at their language if she knew their meaning had gained a new one to add to the list as long as the seconds it’s been alive.
Mine.
Jessie walked to the edge of the pit, preparing to be laughed at by the monster in it for a last time, before shock froze her. It was empty.
The jug slipped from her hands, disgorging it’s contents into the ground, spilling into the pit as the flashlights narrow beam swept back and forth through the pit, searching for bone or mucus green. For yellow eyes with cross pupils in red. Nothing. Not a thing was in the pit but for the ground that had been smoothed form it’s constant movement.
There had been a prison break.
Jessie spun around, as if the monster could possibly be behind her. As if it would really be that easy.
It was.
JESSIE. LITTLE KNUCKLE BONE JESSIE. YOU DID NOT HURRY.
Jessie did not scream. Jessie was not a screamer. Not even in the face of a monster that dripped from the trees and boxed her in with it’s large rib like bones as it slowly crawled up her legs. Jessie struggled.
“You’re out of the pit, how are you out of the pit! I though that you couldn’t leave”
COULD NOT WAS RIGHT. IS NOT NOW. YOU FED ME. GAVE ME SUSTENANCE. GAVE ME WHAT I NEEDED TO BE STRONG.
Jessie stopped struggling. It was everywhere. She felt it on her thighs now, and it had taken the arm not holding the flashlight. Jessie could not get away, she knew that there was no point in the struggle.
“Are you going to kill me then? Eat me?” It could. It probably would, it would eat her and laugh as it did, tormenting her about her screw up until she died in it’s clutches. Until she dissolved and became apart of it. Not how she wanted to go. She regretted that it would live.
NO NO NO. YOU, JESSIE MARROW BONE ARE NOT TO BE KILLED. ARE NOT TO BE EATEN. MURDERED MAYBE. NO. THOUGHT ABOUT IT. YOU WOULD BE A THING TO BE SAVORED. THE KNOWLEDGE THAT YOU ARE IN ME TO BE KEPT IN MIND FOR LONGER THEN THE LIVES OF MOST STARS. BUT NO. YOU KEPT ME CAPTIVE. I WILL REPAY YOU IN KIND.
“WHAT. You’re kidnapping me?! Why?! Where can you even take me? What would you gain? Revenge?” It was in her hair now, crawling over her stomach like an octopus that spread where it touched, everything from the waist down was submerged and teeth and eyes grinned up at her as she bared her teeth down at it.
REVENGE? NO NO NO NO! SUCH PETTY THING. SUCH USELESSNESS. NO, JESSIE DONKEY KICK. YOU CLAIMED ME AS YOURS? I HAVE MADE THE DECREE TO TAKE YOU. I WAS YOURS. NOW YOU ARE MINE.
The mold closed over her mouth before coving her eyes, taking her deeply into it, all the while clenching in such a way to keep air in her lungs through her nose as it took the young girl deeply inside of it. It surrounded her in a tight cage of shifting bone before making it’s way out of the woods and toward the lights to gain enough strength to call for it’s gang. To show them it’s first prisoner, it’s former guard, the only treasure that it’s taken in it’s longevity. Little Jessie. a prize to be sure
All the while Jessie snarled uselessly though the ooze, not daring to open her mouth, unable to stop breathing.