The Great Core's Paradox

I hissed, letting [Verdure Parasite] strip away the flow of time from the most-recently grown bits of plant-flesh, sending them rushing towards the next waiting seeds. The ground burst forcefully, pushed aside by the suddenly-there limbs of wood and plant-flesh that ripped free from the once-dormant seeds like mana-water from a spring. Soon after, I twisted the streams of time again, shifting them in another direction. Vines in blues and golds and greens dripped down the newly-grown plant-flesh in the moments that followed, thorn-covered and deceptively still.

I gave them a quick thought-hiss, and they started to sway; a few thorns flicked outwards, released from the greater whole, and buried themselves into the bark of a nearby tree. Seeing the depth of the wounds, I hissed with pleasure, imagining those same thorns digging into an invading bad-thing. It was a pleasant thought.

The Coreless murmured around me, conversing in a series of not-hisses that I didn’t bother to attempt understanding.

There was something else that had caught my attention.

Something urgent.

Anna froze, spine going rigid and eyes going wide. Her butt stayed in its place, nested in its little bundle of tiny moss. Even if she desperately wanted to run.

The monster - not Monster, but real monster - was all sharp teeth and wiggly limbs. Except that the teeth, instead of living inside of mouths where they belonged, poked out across the entire expanse of its many limbs like jagged thorns, twisting and gnashing as the thing pulled itself along the ground.

It sounded like that wouldn’t make for very fast movement, but - horrifyingly - it did. Sort of. Or, at least, faster than a weird combination of teeth and tentacles should have been able to move. Like something out of some of Anna’s worst dreams. Like something that had made her paren…

Anna shook off the thought, hand clenching desperately at the [Little Guardian’s Totem] around her neck. Dried, sticky juices from the earlier feast of fruits rubbed off of its wooden surface, clinging to her hand.

She hoped some bravery would rub off too, fighting the trembling of her legs. And, in a way, it did. Clenching her fists tight, moss caught between her fingers in a less-than-gentle hug, Anna breathed in deep. Remembered the times when the monsters had come for her in her dreams; the times when she had defeated them.

Anna hissed, the sound closer to the Little Guardian’s own than it had ever been. Her heart swelled in pride and relief, sure that the monster would be fooled enough to run.

It didn’t. The monster didn’t care. It just kept coming.

That wasn’t supposed to happen.

Her heart leapt into her throat; with one hand still clutching her [Little Guardian’s Totem], Anna started to scramble backwards, hissing in fear all the while in the hope that the monster would go away - but her legs were still too weak and shaky to really stand. Instead, she pedaled backwards on her bum, her single free hand becoming quickly covered in itchy scratches and scrapes. A trail of red drops formed in her wake.

The monster slowed to lick them up one by one, jagged teeth scraping against the stone. Furiously. Kinda like when Anna licked at a piece of candy, but - she liked to think - a lot less cute.

Probably with similar amounts of biting, though - and all Anna could think was that the next thing it would be biting was her. She panicked further, scrambling backwards even more quickly, fast enough that she slipped and fell. A jagged shard of stone cut across her side, and Anna cried out.

The [Little Guardian’s Totem] didn’t heal her fast enough this time; this time, the girl felt more than a little itch. Still, it wasn’t long before the pain was wiped out, stolen away just as surely as if by a mother’s kiss.

Anna tried not to cry at the thought. She tried not to think about the things she missed. It was easier that way.

She failed; between the horror of meeting a monster out of her nightmares, her failure at hissing it into submission, and the all-too-familiar - but thought forgotten - helplessness…

Anna wanted her mother. More than anything else in the world. And that was the one thing that she would never have again.

Even the Little Guardian couldn’t fix that.

Suddenly, she stopped scrambling backwards, letting her butt fall to the ground again. It landed softer than before, caught by the tufts of blue-gold moss that formed a thin layer over the stone. They wrapped around her legs in a gentle hug, but it wasn’t enough to bring Anna the comfort she needed.

No, she needed a better outlet for that.

“Go away, you…” Anna hissed, the words hoarse in her anger. Tears streamed down her face, dropping down into the waiting strands of moss below, where the fluids quickly disappeared. “You, you…” she stuttered, “you bully!”

The monster was undeterred by the scathing insult, pulling itself further forward by its disgusting teeth-tendrils. Anna shuddered, breathed in deep, and kept going. Not because she thought the words would save her - not anymore - but because they needed to be said.

Because Anna had needed to say them for a while now.

“I hate you!” she shrieked, tearing at a clump of moss and throwing it at the monster. It got surprisingly close, but didn’t quite make it. Anna had always had terrible aim, anyways. Still, she did it again, tearing off another clump and launching it through the air. “I hate you, I hate you, I hate you!”

With every word, she threw another clump of moss; there was always another piece ready to be thrown, a neverending supply to match her neverending anger. And even if they never quite reached far enough, the useless assault seemed to confuse the monster enough for more words to fling themselves from her throat.

Ones that Anna knew didn’t quite make sense, but also knew needed to be said, all the same.

“Give them back! Give them back to me!” she sobbed, tossing another clump of moss. The next one seemed to almost leap into her hand, as if it had understood that it would be chosen next. She threw that one, too, the moss landing closer to its target this time, which had somehow gotten itself tangled in the growing pile of mosses that Anna had flung its direction.

“You took Mommy!” Anna screamed, ignoring the fact that the monster - while a monster - was not the one responsible. It didn’t matter. If it had been there, it would have done it. That was all that mattered. Another clump of moss found its way into her hand; she definitely hadn’t even moved it that time. Anna didn’t notice.

“You took Daddy!” she cried, another two clumps of moss joining the words. They landed on the tangled monster, the moss’ tiny strands of gold and blue awkwardly twisting two teeth-tendrils together. Another clump of moss found its way into her hand, but Anna let that one go.

The monster was already stuck, tied together by a surprisingly large pile of moss. An amount that really shouldn’t have been possible; there shouldn’t have been that much moss left to throw. She was too far outside the forest for that. Still, Anna ignored that, reaching out to find something else. Something that, unlike the moss, had definitely been there when she first passed through.

“You don’t get to be here!” she shouted, arm pulling itself back. This time, she threw a rock - and if it just bounced off one of the monster’s tooth-covered tendrils, then Anna hardly cared. She picked up another one. It joined the first, pinging off a tooth. And then another. And another.

And all the while, she screamed and sobbed and shouted. Told the monster to go away, demanded that it bring back her family, called it every vile name she could think of - all the way from bully to buttface. And if that wasn’t that many, then that wasn’t for lack of trying. Anna just didn’t know that many.

Name-calling was for meanies.

And then, just as she was reaching the end of her admittedly short list, the monster tore itself free. Surged forward, ripping past the blue-gold moss that pulled at its tendril-like limbs. Anna trembled, almost falling again in sheer shock - but then gathered herself.

Anna hissed in defiance one final time, the sound more snakelike - more authentic - than it had ever been. Though that wasn’t because of her.

It was because she wasn’t the only one that had hissed that time.