The Bird and the Garden 2: Restart!

Chapter 6: Class

Ruby felt hopeless. Salem was working relentlessly to take control of Ruby whenever it could. But that was what worried Ruby: if she was always depressed and frustrated, then why was she allowed control? Salem read her thoughts.

{"Oh, don't be a silly girl. I'm playing with you. Allowing you to experience your final moments with those you care for. I can take your body as mine whenever I please. I enjoy watching you squirm, Ruby. Listening to you whimper, watching you suffer through things like Vao falling from this very room... I wonder whom I should target next...? I'm enjoying this game so very much."}

Slam!

Ruby's forehead felt warm as a thin line of blood trickled down her face. She reared her head back, slamming it back into the nightstand with full force.

Slam! Slam! Slam!

Ruby couldn't even feel it anymore. Her sanity was slipping, cracking like glass. Salem laughed quietly.

{"Do you think something will happen? You cannot harm me, Ruby..."}

"Get out of my head... Get out of my head... Get out of my head. Get out of my head. Get out of my head get out of my head get out of my head," Ruby repeated deliriously.

Slam!

Ruby fell over the nightstand weakly. Her head was scraped and bleeding, and a noticeable dent had been left in the wood. And when she turned to the bed, she saw it sitting there, smiling at her.

The thousands, innumerable eyes staring at her. Salem had taken a different appearance; she was formless, a mass of writhing tentacles, mouths, and eyes. But Salem hadn't left her mind. If there was anyone else in the room, they would only see Ruby.

{"Look at yourself, slowly going insane..."} Salem whispered. {"You cannot escape, Ruby Rose... You're mine, now..."}

Ruby picked up Blake's book, throwing it at the hallucination with everything she had. But the hardcover flew through Salem, striking the wall behind her and ruining the spine. The pages flew around the room, scattering across the floor. She drew her scythe, charging the hallucination. She slashed at the rope holding her bed in the air, dropping the heavy piece of furniture down and breaking Weiss's bed. Salem avoided it, slithering to the center of the room instead. It seemed amused.

{"I think you're my favorite toy... Just after Vao, that is... He used to be so much fun..."}

Ruby threw her weapon, the hefty metal soaring through the air and clanking noisily on the ground behind the creature. Ruby was breathing hard. What did it take to kill, or at the very least scratch it?

The darkness welled up inside Ruby. That bitter, sour, yet so very sweet taste filling her tongue. But Salem didn't move; it wasn't taking control. Salem pointed one of her many appendages towards the mirror that hung on the wall. The one Weiss used to do her hair in the morning.

{"Take a look at yourself, Ruby..."}

She could only obey. Standing to her feet, she shakily stumbled to the glass, looking at her own reflection.

It was a ghastly sight. Her skin was nearly white. Almost no color, no rosy cheeks that she once had. Her silver eyes were nearly black, and the black eldritch substance trickled from her forehead. It wasn't blood.

{"You're becoming like me. A host fitting for myself. You are corrupted, Ruby. Even if you were to somehow expel me from your vessel, I can enter again. You should be grateful; you will not die while I am present. I will not allow it."}

Life was a curse. A cage, Ruby realized. A cage where she was locked, surrounded by the abyss. She felt herself losing hope.

She couldn't escape. She couldn't leave. Even if she did get out of her cage, the abyss waited for her. Waited to swallow her whole, to take her to the point of no return.