He watched his two opponents carefully. He’d need every piece of information he could glean. As he got closer, his instincts started screaming, his hackles raising. The woman with the pot… No. Not the woman. The pot on her head was the source of the danger he was sensing.

Then the woman alighted on the other’s arm as though she weighed nothing. The two bore arms against one another, locked into stalemate. At least, until the danger poured out of the pot and the other woman began to melt, body and clothing both sloughing off.

Kazerol blinked as her wounds congealed into scales not unlike his own. What manner of oddity are you? I would have guessed you were human, but clearly that was mistaken… The strange woman howled out her fury, before getting to her feet, flames engulfing her blade.

He couldn’t know if it was the strange woman’s eyes flicking to look at him, or if the pot woman’s own instincts had warned her, but as he readied the Blade to sever the pot and the danger it contained, the pot woman noticed him and danced just out of reach. The strange woman chuckled and a brief look over at her showed that she too was focused on the pot.

Both their animal instincts had come to regard whatever lay within that object as significant danger and they stepped forward together. The pot woman twitched as if possessed, before she raised her hand, pointing her blade at them and dared them to attack.

So they did. Kazerol and the strange woman rushed forward at the same time. However, after he took only one step, he clutched a hand to his face. No! Not again! You gave up control! I won’t… let you… take it…

You absolutely hate working at a clothing store.

You’ve always hated talking to people; that’s why you applied here, specifically for the early cleaning shift. You could get in, get your job done, and get out before the store actually opens.
No questions asked; no people around. You glance forlornly across the dark store as your shift starts, hating how naive you’d been then.

You hadn’t considered the mannequins.

You hate mannequins with all of your heart; always have, always will. Their smooth faces, the way their limbs kind of just… pull off. Some of them aren’t even full mannequins, they just end at the waist.
And you have to be the one to move them. Your nose curls as you approach the one closest to you, currently covered in a skimpy dress. You’re tempted to kick it over. But you won’t.
You just pull off its dress and switch it with this week’s “new releases,” some shirt and skirt combo with weird holes in the shoulders. This is what you always do. This is your life now. You hate it.

The next closest mannequin is over in the section with men’s suits. You might as well get the mannequins done first, so you can move on with the rest of your shift in peace.
But as you turn around the corner, you feel your heart drop, and whatever peace you may have gotten during your shift flees your mind.

The suit mannequin in front of you has been… altered. That’s the way you should think about it, you decide, as you feel yourself recoiling.
It’s naked, for starters, its perfect white skin shining under the few dim lights you’ve lit. Its torso has been placed on the ground, and its limbs… you didn’t even think there were connectors on its waist for limbs to go.
Someone must have cut out holes or something to shove extra limbs inside. They’re all turned in the wrong directions, stretched out like some strange, humanoid octopus.
And across its normally flat face, someone has painted too many eyes, crimson and black standing out like spikes against the white.

You hate it with all of your heart.

It sits there, staring at you, as if the whole thing was staged. Someone must be playing a cruel joke on you; you remember mentioning your hatred of mannequins to Jerry in the break room, once.
He must’ve spread it around. Or maybe some late-night patron, one of those vulgar teens that always loiters around, decided it would be a fun thing to graffiti.
That must be it. You take a slow, deep breath through your curled nostrils as you realize what has to come next.

You’re the cleaner, after all. So now you have to clean it.

You curse your life, those vile kids, and Jerry from the break room as you take slow, measured steps towards the mannequin. You hate this, you hate this, you hate this.
But it’s your job, and you need to get paid. Your daughter will want dinner after her concert tonight. This is fine, this is fine. You turn your face away as you reach out slowly, grabbing at one of the extra limbs to pull it out--

And it grabs you back.

You scream. You try to pull away but its vice-like grip keeps you still. Terror spreads through your mouth, your limbs, your mind like an infection. Help, someone! It’s alive! Y
ou feel your heart beating out of your chest as you scream and struggle and another hand grips you, then another. You scream and scream and scream.

But no help ever comes. You’re the only person here, after all.

It was the silence that tugged her back to consciousness.

No screams. No reports of pistol shots, no clanging metal. No raucous howls of laughter or the thud of heavy boots on stone. No desperate cries, no broken wails. No screams.

Just silence, broken only by the soft lapping of the waves.

The girl rasped, breath rattling in her lungs. Blood trickled down her throat while smoke hung thick and dark in the air. For the first time in her life, she couldn’t make out the tang of salt.

Where was the sea?

She lifted her head from the cobblestones. Blood dripped down her cheek; her vision blurred in and out of focus. Lifeless bodies lay all around her, their glassy stares fixed and empty. She couldn’t look, couldn’t bring herself to pick out familiar forms, and instead fastened her wavering gaze on her own hand. She reached out ahead of her, dug her nails into the crack between the cobbles, and pulled. Then again. And again.

Where was the sea?

Blood trailed in her wake, one arm dragged limp at her side. Sticky pavement gave way to coarse sand. Raw fingers dug deep into the shoreline as she pulled herself towards the water. Past the first piling that marked the start of the now-sunken pier. Past the burned out husks of hulls that lined the fallen dock. Past the high-tide line, body squelching as it slid forwards.

Salt stung at her palm as she plunged it into the ocean, the bite of familiar pain a welcome jolt through her body - and the numb haze surrounding her shattered. Frozen nerves ignited in lances of agony, burned through her muscles and locked up her limbs - and she howled, savage rage bursting from her throat.

How dare they take away her home, her parents, her future?

How dare they try to take her away from the sea?

The sun clawed its way over the horizon, staining smog clouds scarlet and illuminating the blood trickling down her fingertips to stain the swirling eddies below. Her voice gave out, the last shriek turning into a hacking cough, and the girl thumped her head down upon the sand, turning to watch the ripples of her life bleeding away into the ocean.

A crimson droplet fell from her outstretched hand, only to be caught by the foam and pulled away by the tide. Then another. Then another. Then -

The droplet hung suspended above the frozen surf. Spray stilled mid air. Silence, true silence, pressed in upon her.

Warmth pervaded her flesh, her soul.

"Yer quite the sight now, ain't ye, girly?"