The stairs creak, but they have nowhere to run.
The feet are the first thing to appear. Worn boots, combat boots specifically. Then his legs, and his torso, until finally his curly mess of hair is plain to see. Artemis has a five o'clock shadow. He looks older, then again, he is probably older. He smiles when he sees them.
"Ahh," he sighs in relief, "so, I don't have to explain it to you then. Excellent."
Ez doesn't feel the need to vocalize that he is Poppy's twin. It is obvious to them all. With names like Artemis and Apoline, how could they be anything but siblings?
Luis is not shocked either. Artemis is made of the same clay that Poppy is. It's clear to see, how similar some of their features are. It's a wonder he didn't see it earlier. It seems that Poppy has slipped from his memory.
"What's your game plan, Prevost?" Kai says the name like it's a slur. In some ways, it is almost as evil. Nearly as rotten.
Artemis laughs. Briar has heard the sound before, and it sounds no different now. Just as light, just as soft. She leans in closer to Ellie. Briar does not enjoy being duped. She has always been the savviest, the most politically minded. It is clear to see that she is hardly her father's daughter.
"Please, that was my father's name," Artemis laughs. "You can call me Arty."
Felix shuffles himself so that he is in front of Evelyn. He is petrified of dying, afraid of being injured, but more afraid of looking cowardly in the face of danger.
"If you prefer Arty, why not call yourself that instead of Artemis?" Jetta asks. Her hands are slippery from sweat.
Artemis laughed, "I wanted to see if you were all as clever as you thought. Artemis and Apolline, brought to Earth from the Heavens. Obviously, you are not very smart at all."
Ellie wants to know what his game is. Both of his hands are visible, so he is unarmed. Clearly, he is mourning his sister, but he was suspicious enough to invade them. What would make him wonder if there was foul play when they have everyone else but The Divide confused?
Tom clears his throat, "so, your Poppy's sister. And? We barely knew her."
"You may be an actor, but off-stage you are not very convincing," Artemis says.
He continues to stand in front of the eleven of them, who are crowded together against the wall. Evelyn is in the back, hidden, but the rest of them have a clear line of sight to his grin. He takes a step closer, but none of them flinch.
"Come," he instructs, "let's have a seat."
He takes a few steps backwards, and gestures for them to take a spot along the sectional. They file over, one by one.
Evelyn's body has gone so stiff she can't move. Tears leak out of her eyes. She is petrified, more so than when they were shot at in the water, or when the house burnt down, or when they all worked together to make sure Poppy would choke to death on her absinthe.
"What do you think is going on?" Roman asks, the last one to take their seat. Their shoulders are hunched, their head slung. They won't be able to talk about this in therapy either. Will they even make it to therapy? They are tired of clawing for life. They are trapped in the slowest quicksand to ever exist. It is hard to forgive oneself for trying to live.
"You think I'm here to answer your questions?" Artemis, or Arty, or the other Prevost twin, shakes his head. "No. That's not how this is going to work."
"It's us versus you," Ez says. "You're unarmed."
"This is my house," Artemis points out. He reaches into the back of the waistband of his pants and pulls out a pistol.
No one knows how many shots such a small gun can hold. No one wants to be the first to discover at the end of the barrel.
"You're going to kill us?" Ez raises an eyebrow. "Now, that hardly seems possible. We outnumber you, more than ten to one."
"Which of you shot Poppy?" he asks, looking around.
Ellie's eyes glance away from the gun to look at the others. She can see the panic on their faces, in the creases of the foreheads and the wideness of their eyes. Soon enough, someone is going to have a panic attack. Maybe it will be her. Maybe they will all become ill.
Ez thinks that maybe they do not deserve a happy ending. Certainly not an epilogue where they've all grown and are happy. It's not that kind of story. It isn't a story at all. Things happen and they don't make sense. There is no narrative structure, no powerful verse to protect them.
Jetta isn't afraid of him. She's paranoid, of course, she is, and certain that if someone finds out she's trans that she will be killed. Artemis though, is a man who knows so little he cannot be a threat. It seems he doesn't even know about The Divide, "we didn't shoot her. I thought she died of an overdose."
"Yeah, right," Artemis says. "Somebody shot her before she died. I saw her body."
"How did you even find us?" Briar asks.
He flinches, "the family doctor mentioned a name. Your name. It was a matter of finding you."
"So then you must know that Briar was roofied," Kai points out. "You must know that Poppy was too before we even got to Hawkwood."
Artemis laughs, "there's no way she was roofied. Poppy's too clever for that."
"It can happen to anyone," Ellie cuts in, her voice with an edge, despite the gun held at Artemis's side. "Briar isn't stupid, and neither was Poppy. She was excessively clever."
"Don't talk about her like you knew her!" his voice suddenly rises to a shout. "You didn't know her. You didn't know she had a brother."
Roman is suddenly glad they spent so much time memorizing words. Their memory is stronger than most. They remember the night they went over things they like, "we know she liked expensive wine and hated the winter and horses."
"She loved boating and tennis," Kai says.
"She was purposefully mysterious," Felix points out.
"But she spoke French," Luis says. "Well too."
"Shut up!" Artemis roars.
He sits on the ground, holding the pistol up to his head, with his other hand pulling at his hair. He smacks his gun against his head and hits it harder the next time. Blood begins to trickle down his forehead, onto his face and down his chin. Each drop falls from there onto his pants, which are cheaply-made, mass-produced jeans.
"We knew Poppy," Jetta reassures him, despite the fact that she is certain none of them really knew Poppy. Probably Artemis didn't even know her.
"Was she really drugged?" he asks. "Did someone... how could... I can't see Poppy like that. She was always stronger than I thought."
"Anyone can be a victim," Briar says, and she believes it too.
"Did she..." Artemis trails off. "Did she kill herself?"
Tom knows better than to speak. He may be the best actor, but Artemis knows that. He thinks about the time he spent with Poppy. She didn't kill herself. They poured alcohol down her throat. They watched the light go out.
"We were at a party," Evelyn begins. Her voice is shaking so hard. It's meek and light, even for her. "Poppy, she didn't know when to stop drinking. She wasn't mixing her absinthe properly."
"You didn't call anyone," Artemis points out. "You didn't try CPR."
"We thought she was sleeping," Vieira tries to fix the lie.
"She was on the floor, covered in her own piss and vomit," Artemis says.
That doesn't surprise Ellie. Dead bodies often empty their bladders. Maybe Ellie's parents were right. She should've been a doctor, and she would've been a good one. If she hadn't gone to Hawkwook, she wouldn't be here, staring at a man with a pistol.
Luis wants to help calm Artemis. He cannot begin to imagine his pain. Luis feels like the other initiates are his family. If one was lost, he would be devastated. It would destroy him. Cut him apart, like a child making a paper snowflake who makes too many holes. He doesn't look like art anymore. He looks like a mess.
"No," Artemis says. "You're lying. You're absolutely lying."
"And what if we are?" Felix snaps. "What are you going to do about it?"
Artemis's spine straightens and his eyes go wide.
"You can't kill us all," Ez says. "That gun can't hold more than six bullets. I've read enough books to know that."
"We beat up the guy who roofied Poppy and Briar," Jetta cocks her head to the side. "If we are killers, what makes you think we won't kill you?"
"I have a gun," he emphasizes again. "You don't have a car. You can't escape anywhere that you want."
Ellie doesn't want to aggravate him, so she slows her speech and softens her tone, "why do you think we killed her anyway? As far as it seems, the only connection between any of us is that Poppy brought Briar to her doctor."
"The school couldn't identify any of Poppy's friends," he says. "You are the only connection."
They could give up The Divide to save the skin off their backs, but how well would that work in the long run? Surely, if they were to tell an outsider, they would all be expelled. Perhaps that is better than death, but in most ways, it is worse. They would lose their hopes, their prestige, but most importantly, they would lose each other.
"I'm sure Poppy had plenty of friends," Luis tries to reassure him, although he doubts it. Poppy was full of herself. She belonged at Hawkwood, certainly, but that is because she was a menace. She agreed to do all of this to them, after all.
"Go back to campus and find the kid who has a bunch of broken ribs, a fucked up nose, black eyes," Felix says. "He's the reason Poppy's dead."
"He's the guy who roofied her?" Artemis asks.
"He admitted as much," Kai tells him.
Kai is used to smooth-talking his way out of situations, but he's beginning to realize his tongue is not silver. Artemis doesn't seem very clever. He's falling for all of their old tricks. Part of him wishes they could just dispose of Artemis, but that action cursed them once. Besides, they surely wouldn't be able to get away with it a second time.
"Call him," Artemis says. "There is a landline upstairs."
"We don't know how to get a hold of him," Roman says, their voice quiet. "We don't even know his name."
"He's a second-year though," Jetta says. That much she is sure. If he belonged to Poppy's group of initiates, that is.
Artemis gets up and grabs Evelyn off the couch. He holds the gun up to her head, "well, you'd better get a cab back to campus and find him before morning, or else she gets it."
~~~~~
To think, so little left. So much pain to feel. I'm excited to share it with you! Hopefully, you'll all enjoy it. I also feel so sick :( Oh well.