Elizabeth Ember's Questionnaire

"I feel like talking to the mists is a whole new level of crazy for me, but... I don't know.   There's a reason I'm out here at night.  And I can... feel the mist talking to me.  Is that crazy?  Yeah, probably.  But uh...."

"Well, I feel like the the mists should know where they are, but... I don't know.  I can't really say I know that much more than the mists, I guess.  I don't have a phone, and no one really told me the address where they shipped me off to.  So yeah.  Somewhere in New York, in what we've been calling the Mist House.  It used to be a group house for troubled children, and... I don't know.  I'm not sure I'm ever going to scrub all of the blood out of the floor.  But it's dry, at least, and has an old fashioned furnace for heat even if there's no power and we're having to pee in a bucket.

I don't know where else I'd go.  Plus there's Amber, even if I need to make sure she doesn't get any bright ideas about the furnace.  I can't leave her.  I'm sure Grace is... going to leave us at some point, but.. I dunno."

Heh.  Hahaha.  What money, I'd ask?  I don't have any money.  I'm living in a house shrouded in mist with no electricity or running water and no doors, even.  There's a town nearby that I've been stealing food from, but it's not like I can keep doing that forever.  It's not a big town, the owner is going to realize.

I need to figure something out. Amber's not a ton of help, and... I don't know.  Grace is... Grace.

Do I move up to stealing money? Maybe.

What do I spend it on?  Whatever we need to survive so far.  That's a lot of stuff.

"What is my ambition, dear mists?"  Elizabeth runs a hand gently though the thick mists, making a trail.  "I'm going to kill the shit out of the sissorman.  I'm going to avenge all of the other people it's killed.  And then I'm going to kill all the other things like it, hunt down all of the monsters under the bed and such and take them apart."

She spins a little, her cloak flaring out, its tassels making patterns in the mist.

"How far am I willing to go? As far as I need to.  I managed to get over my fear and stab some kind of monster that cut people up twice and... well, I can't say I killed it, but I stabbed it!  And how close to death?  I... I screamed, and I might have wet myself, but I kept going when that monster beheaded someone beside me.  So I think I'm willing to go pretty far."

There's about ten seconds of laughter.  In the thick mists, anyone listening would just hear the laughter echoing though the opaque fog.

"Well.  Before signing it?  Probably having some kind of a monster show up at the group home I'm at, murder all of the boys and the headmistress, and then get defeated, leaving me in a house that's.. I don't know, cut off from the world or something.  You'd think the police would show up or some shit, but... day after day, no one has shown up.  So after that point my entire life just got turned upside down."

There's a pause.  "But maybe, excluding that?  Probably when I punched that cop.  He fucking groped me!  And he hit me first!  But... yeah. That's what really got me in the system, and... well.  That's how I'm here now."

"Uhh... do you count, mists?  Maybe if I like... say your name with a capital?  Mists?"

There's a pause, as she listens for a response. She doesn't hear one.  She never does. She's probably imagining the questions, to be honest.

"I don't know.  If you don't, I really.. just have two.  I guess I could say the security guard at that store in town?  He's.. kind of in my life in that I dodge him every couple of days when I go to steal food."

There's a sigh.  "But yeah.  If I can just use two... it would be Amber and Grace."

"Amber is the other girl who was at the group home with me.  She's... I don't know.  She's shy, and kind of a pyro, and a bit of a derp.  But I'm really happy she survived all of this. It's like... someone else who can prove all of this isn't some fever dream."

"And then there's Grace.  Who is...I don't even know who she is. She looks like a little girl, but... she's got a ghost with her, and she can shoot fire, and.. I don't even know how to describe it. She's something, certainly."

"I wanna be like her."

There's a snort.

"I've had people tell me they're in love with me.  Typically just before they tried to do things that I should have stabbed them for.  Did, sometimes.  I got a reputation for being violent.  More like I had personal boundaries.  But if there's one thing I've never been allowed to have, it was personal boundaries.  Not at home, not at school, not in this stupid group home.  But... I don't know.  I guess Amber wasn't so bad.  We got to commiserate together.  She's like.. my first real friend.  Even if she's a pyro. But like... that's close enough, right?"

First off, fuck you.

Secondly, fuck you.

I don't know.

Why'd you choose me, anyways?  Why aren't I dead, with the others?  Or just some.. quivering mess in a different group home or something.  But I'm not.  Instead I'm in a house surrounded by the mists, and I'm out wandering in them.  I'm... pretty sure I should have hit the road a while ago, or the trees.  But there's nothing out there.  Just more mists. I feel like I could wander in here forever.

But as soon as I want to go home, if I wander just a little bit further you take me back home.

But I guess I'm just wandering now talking to myself, aren't I?  It's not like you're asking me these questions directly. 

What are my worst fears?  Probably that asshole that killed everyone.  I see him in my dreams.  Cutting up the caretaker.  Well.  What he did to her.  That he's going to come for me.  Sometimes he gets me in the dreams, and I wake in a flop sweat.  One day... one day, I'm going to get him.

Other than that?  I really hate being touched.  I hate.. a lot of things, really, but nothing as much as that.

Well... I don't really have a lot of possessions, really.  I don't know.

I guess it's you, kinda.  Does that sound weird?  But I have an amulet with you in them, and I can hear your voices in it.  And it lets me carry you with me, even when I'm away from the house.  It lets me call to you, and you come.  You always come. 

Or maybe it's the sissors.  They're so cold to touch, and I know they're coated in the same stuff as the sissorman's blades, and.. they can cut anything.  They've saved my life a few times.

Outside of that?  I dunno.  My mistcoak?  I like that a lot.  It makes me feel special when I'm traveling though the mists, and I think it helps hide me. 

Yeah.  I don't have a lot of possessions, so.. probably something I got from these jobs.  Or maybe the mistcloak.

Definitely not the creepy book made of human flesh. 

The biggest problem in my life?  Well.. probably that I'm fourteen and live in a house surrounded by mist with no power or running water.  Or heat.  And despite how much effort we put into scrubbing the floors in the master bedroom it's still stained with blood.  There was so much blood.

The rest of the problems in my life are kinda under control, I guess.  I finally have a regular income, and a good amount of actual cash from someone's life I saved.  I still really don't like being touched, but... I don't know.  It's not exactly like there's a therapist coming to see us anymore.  It's like everyone forgot we existed.  Which... is probably for the best, really.  It's not like most of the people who knew I existed before were great.

Other than that... Amber keeps using my toothbrush.  I swear to god, if she does it again, I'm going to strangle her in her sleep.

I do my best Amish impression.

Because, you know, no power or water or heat. Or technology.

I get up from under the mountain of blankets we use to survive the cold. When there was snow outside we tried sleeping together to conserve heat.  Grace... was weird. Grace isn't warm.  I don't know what to make of that.

But yeah.  We have some jugs of water, that's something for drinking.  We have some like.. dry cereal.  And I guess a few other things, we have an ice box now.

There's not a huge amount else to do. I guess I start to try to fix the house up?  We're finally starting to get it in standard work.

This is all assuming I'm at the mist house - I've been working for Captain Pete some on and off, and he's treating me well.  When I'm on the ship I have heat and electricity and water and I take a really hot shower and it's amazing.

Uhh... it really, really depends on what place special I'm going. 

Is it special to me, or is it special to someone else?  Because most of the special things I've done have been the latter.  Where I am at best a setpiece. I'm expected to dress up, and smile, and most importantly be quiet. ...You wanna know what the best thing in that case is?

To make as big of a scene as possible. Eventually they get the point and quit forcing me to go to things.

If it was special  to me?  ... Fuck. I don't know.  I haven't really done that much.  I guess I'd probably.. uh, probably have to work out where I'm going to find a shower, and where I'm going to steal a nice dress and stuff...  Because it's not really like I have one.

Although I guess... I have some money now?  Maybe I don't have to steal it?

Weird to think about.

Do people do things for their birthday?

I... don't really know.  I've never had money to do anything special.  I guess... I do sorta have magic now, don't I?

That, and magic.  And some.. actual friends.  Those all help, right? That and not being with parents who suck or locked in a group home for troubled kids. That's... yeah.

I don't know. Maybe just... spend it with Amber and Grace? That sounds nice, actually. Maybe get a cake.

Maybe actually buy a cake.  My first instinct was 'steal a cake' but... I have money now.

More money than I've ever seen.

...That's not really a fair question.  Is it?

I don't know.  I have a lot of regrets.  Some are.. irrational.  Like regretting not being able to save everyone at the group home.  I.. I was just a girl at that point.  And the monster that was killing everyone.. he could have killed me as easily as everyone else.  But I still lunged at him with those scissors.  And I killed him.  For a little bit, at least.  But I couldn't keep him dead, and most of them were dead before I knew what was going on.

But I still regret not saving people.

Other than that.. I dunno.  Do I regret hitting that cop?  Maybe?  It... changed my life, being in the foster homes and then the group home.  In a way.  But at the same time, it kinda made it better. Sorta.

Do I regret not stabbing my father? Maybe.

"What a weird question from what's giving me my abilities."

There's a short pause, and consideration.

"Or does that imply that you aren't giving me these abilities?  I... guess you've never really told me you are."  There's another pause, a longer one.  "Well, I guess I can't really say you've really told me much.  I might just be hallucinating all of this.  Wouldn't that be something."

There's a moment of laughter.

"If I'm actually in some straight jacket in a psych ward or something, drugged up and imagining all of this.  If I survived some completely normal serial killer at the group home or something and just broke me and the last six months I've been imagining a fantastical life and all that.  I... mean, I guess that would explain a lot of things, wouldn't it?  What do you think about that?"

There's only silence in reply.

"I want a fucking cigarette."