And then came another. And another. Each one less alive than the last. Each one more spectral, more decayed. It was like calling out to a corpse she herself helped bury—or burn?
"MOMMMMMY!!!" "Mom..." "Mommy..."
The last one came out drowned in saliva and dried blood between her teeth. She no longer even knew if she was crying or vomiting—her face pressed against her own acidic juice of pain.
Her hair got soiled. Her soul got soiled. And she didn't care anymore. There was no dignity. No will to get up. Only that rotten cold from the floor.
A cold that didn't come from outside. But from within. As if death had opened her belly from the inside and laid there, breathing slowly, waiting for the right moment.
She tried to reach for the part of her shirt that held the soot from the remains of her parents and brother, just to smell it, a desperate act of feeling that she would die with them, but her arms no longer moved. Her body was no longer hers.
The shadow? It was gone. But the hiss... The hiss still whispered.
As if reality were demagnetizing—like that static from the final dialogue with Chara, in Undertale. As if her existence were being rewound by a cruel, invisible hand, greeting her and introducing itself:
"I am death."
And then... A sound. An absurd noise. The hiss intensifying. The price arriving.
A laugh. Low. Weak. Insane.
Ketlen laughed. Not from happiness. Not from madness. But because the void laughed first, all that remained. And she, purely by reflex, imitated it. By itself, this was the definition of insanity:
"Davi... I-I... I-I wanna... play with you... okay?"
The image exploded in her mind: Davi's little face, his big eyes and full cheeks, trying to convince her with that look that always worked. For a second—just one second—she almost believed everything was okay.
But it was a cruel second. The kind of second that makes it hurt more.
The innocent thought was replaced by a new one: David dying in agony, phone in hand, calling the last heroine he believed could save him, while she was sleeping, locked in the frigid room. A room he would soon enter with his parents as well.
"I..."
She didn't finish the sentence.
Because there were no more words.
No more Ketlen.
Just a body that no longer dreamed of anything.
She passed out. Passed out as if the world had finally closed its eyes on her too.
And the hiss remained.
Like an epitaph without letters.
Like an echo of what we were.
Like a whisper of what still haunts us:
What is left when no one comes to save you?
-----------------☆☆☆☆-----------------
"Oh, Ketlen..." Nunes began, his voice soft and sweet. "I didn't... I didn't know that! My condolences..."
"OKAY... Got it..." She interrupted him, rolling her eyes impatiently. "Whatever. I don't even know why I told you that shit!"
... Nunes chuckled softly, biting his lower lip, a smile she didn't see.
"I... I'm going into the room next door that has the exit suits. You have to use them not to die out there."
"Okay, go on." She still looked away, pouting, trying to ignore him.
He let out a soft laugh. Had Ketlen forgotten he was her adversary? He could easily reach out and snatch the gun from her... and then end her life. But no. It was more convenient to keep things this way. She had her charm. And her story. And her purpose.
She followed him and watched him get dressed.
"I thought they wouldn't have one that would fit you." She commented, more relaxed, but still serious, evaluating him.
Nunes, as he dressed. "Heh... hehe..."
"Hm..." "That laugh..." The thought floated in Ketlen's mind, a strange echo.
But then she smiled with her lips, lowering her head to disguise it. "Just like Daddy."
"They didn't, actually." He returned to the subject. "They made it at the last minute, I guess they regretted calling me for the mission." She laughed, a dry sound, without genuine humor.
"They must have regretted it, alright." She smiled with her lips, an almost imperceptible smile.
Looking at him was bizarre. She would need to climb a small ladder to reach his face, such was the height difference.
"Oh... Guilherme could've been like this too..." The image of Nunes mingled with that of her dead boyfriend in the room, a fleeting, uncomfortable thought.
"Are you sad?" Nunes's question caught her off guard.
She widened her eyes, brushing a lock of hair from her forehead, a nervous gesture.
"Oh, no, I just want to get out of this place..."
Nunes, finishing dressing the suit, confident:
"Relax, it'll be fine, almost nothing must have broken!"
...
"Come here."
Ketlen followed him warily, gripping her gun tightly, her eyes glued to his back. Nunes glanced quickly at her.
"Why are you scared of me?" He frowned, a tone of challenge and curiosity in his voice.
Ketlen rolled her eyes:
"I'm not scared of you, you idiot."
Nunes, chuckling lightly. "Oh, I know..."
"Why are you so insufferable?" Her question was rhetorical, loaded with irritation.
"Since you let me go, you haven't put that gun down for anything. You can relax, plus you messed up my leg, remember?"
"I remember, you deserved it," she replied, serious, without hesitation.
"Sure..." He made an exaggerated grimace, being ironic, the pain still present. "I'm like a duck in clogs now, thanks to the five-foot princess."
She smiled with her lips, letting out that silent nose-laugh—Nunes understood she liked it.