Empty Shells (reader insert)

Chapter 10

It had been a day since you saw Mimi feed. You've spent the time in your room laying in the bed. It's strange. The intense fear you had felt then, is gone. You were so scared after having seen Mimi feed that you couldn't think straight, but now it feels like a distant memory.

Suddenly a loud knocking on the door catches your attention. "(Fn)? Please open up!" It's Clare. You open the door to see her with a confused expression. "Have you seen Mimi?"

"I-I haven't seen anyone since last night. Why?" You ask. Your memory after Tom coming in the room is fuzzy and you're not sure why. "What's wrong?"

"She's missing. She left a note." Clare says holding a paper out to you. You take it and see words in messy writing scrawled on the page.

"'I'm sorry.'" You read out. "Oh no. Please tell me she didn't-"

"She's run away!" Clare says. "We can't find her in the house. It's because of you."

"Me? What did I do?" You say surprised.

"Your reaction! You made her think she did something wrong. By feeding!" Clare says starting to shout. "Why did you make such a big deal out of it?"

"I'm human!" You say back with a little attitude. "Am I supposed to just ignore the fact that you kill people just like me? Besides, that's beside the point. We have to go look for her!"

"You humans think that you're so high and mighty, don't you?" Clare snaps back. "So high on the food chain, but can't handle something above you. Tell me, do you always act this way when you kill and eat a pig? It's the same thing."

"No. But I'm sure a pig wouldn't like to see a person eat one of its own kind right in front of themselves!" You say back. "Just like how normal people get scared when they see another person die!"

"Shut it, both of you." Tom says from the doorway to another room. He must have just gotten up. His shirt is ruffled and his usually neat hair is slightly out of place. "What's this racket for?"

"Mimi's missing. She ran away because of (Fn)'s reaction last night." Clare answers bitterly.

"Then why are you standing here?" Tom says back. "Go look outside."

For a second both Clare and Tom glare at each other. After a minute of tense silence, Clare closes her eyes and ducks her head. She passes Tom and stalks down the stairs.

"I've never seen her that mad before." You mumble watching her leave.

"It's nearly impossible for wraith to have children that survive." Tom says not looking at you. "As such, female wraith become overly protective of any children that do survive. They won't forgive anyone who harms a child."

"But she can't seriously think that I would do anything to Mimi, can she?" You ask, a feeling of guilt rising up in your stomach.

"She can, and she does." He says back fixing his hair. "Which is why you're going to help look for Mimi."

"What makes you think I wouldn't?" You say grabbing a jacket from beside the door. "I'm human, not heartless."

"Where do you think you're going?" He asks as you walk away.

"To go look. Where else?" You say back pulling the jacket on.

"Not alone." He says grabbing a jacket and following you. "Heartfelt or not, I'm not going to leave you with an opportunity to escape."

"How can you think of that when a kid is missing?" You say back.

"She's not a kid, she just acts like one." He growls opening the door. "She needs to learn to grow up."

"More like she's the only one here who knows how to really act human." You whisper to yourself. He just scoffs and follows you out.
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"Mimi!" You shout cupping your hands over your mouth. "Mimi! Where are you?"

"She's obviously not answering or can't hear you so stop making that noise." Tom says quietly looking around. He has driven the two of you down the road following Mimi's path in the snow. The problem now is that it's started snowing and her tracks are now covered up. So the two of you followed the trail as far as you could. Now you're walking around in a forest trying to find any sign of the small girl.

"Well what do you suggest?" You spit back. Mimi must be freezing by now. "We need to find her before dark."

"You caused this," he says back. "So you think of something."

"Fine." You say pointing with your thumb over your shoulder to the left. "I'll go this way. You," You point right with your other hand. "Look that way."

"And leave you alone? What if you run off?" He growls glaring back at you. "I'm not letting you get away."

"You have the car keys." You spit back stomping away to the left. "Where am I going to go?" You turn around and glare at him. "And how sick do you think I am that I would think of myself over a kid who could be in danger!"

He just glares at you before turning and walking the other way. "Get back to the car in two hours. Don't freeze to death." He shouts back over his shoulder.

You sigh and turn away. You keep walking and looking for anything out of place. After half an hour, you find a small dirt road. It must have been a service road that connects to the main one later. The trees give it more cover from the falling snow so you can make out something small sticking out.

You run over and see that it's a hat. It was the hat that Mimi was wearing when you had both played in the snow the other day. "Mimi! It's (Fn)! Please come out!" You shout looking around. The snows stopped and you can see some tracks going down the road.

You run down the road following the tracks. At first your sprinting, but you slow down when you notice a second pair of footprints. They're larger and sink more into the ground. What is this? Is there someone else out here? You better find Mimi before whoever else is out here does.

You start sprinting again trying to see if you can see anything ahead. You're starting to get a bad feeling about this. You don't like the fact that there's someone else out here. If they find Mimi, she might kill them by accident if they try to talk to her.

A scream rings through the trees making you freeze. Your blood turns cold and races. Was that Mimi?