Chapter 12
#12 of Tales of Woe
Well, this was a fun chapter to delay. Kinda hard to write, but I swear, after this, the story sorta hopefully gets better. That or only a few people really care any more and everyone else just wants me to write another relate-able, non-magical, teenager, gay love story like Inferno High.
As always, any feedback or criticism is very much welcome! I know I'm not the best of writers, so tell me about it. Because, well, honestly that's what the comment section's for.
Chapter 12 of Tales of Woe
Jeramiah Beta, September 28th, 3:31 PM
We were at a loss for words. We'd brought home our new borns less than twenty minutes ago, and chaos had ensued. First, Lorelai had started crying when it was too cold, and the heat freaked Carter, but Eric didn't care. So we left it cold and bundled up Lorelai on the other side of Eric. Which solved that problem, but when we were bundling up Lorelai, we felt the glowing parts of her hands and feet... they burned like touching a hot iron plate.
It terrified us, and I had my head on straight enough to call the doctor. We were calmed to hear that glowing markings always had varying levels of temperature different from that of the rest of their body. We were calmed, and found Carter's blue glow to be as cold as touching dry ice.
We figured there wasn't much we could do to about the temperatures, just work and live our ways around them. We could still live normal lives, they'd just need to be careful, especially if this heat difference carried on through their entire lives.
We'd managed to get them all asleep, but only a minute after we did, a strange fox came through our front door. It took a second to realize he was Alex, but all his markings had changed, and were strobing dull colors at blinding speeds. His irises did the same, as did weird marks around his body, like tiny little dots.
Diana spoke up, "... Alex?"
He scratched the back of his head, and he appeared guiltier than I'd ever seen him, and it scared me more than I'd ever been. "Alex, what happened?"
"I... I don't have an explanation." I saw the tears forming in his eyes as his voice began to quiver, "I'm so sorry, I... I just..."
"Alex, it's okay. Come look at your baby brothers and sister." He came over, the guilt in his eyes subsiding into total despair, and I lifted the blanket off of Lorelai, and his eyes widened when he saw them.
"I... Woah."
Diana came over and set her hand on his shoulder, "I'd tell you to feel the glow but it's scorching hot."
"Yeah, I have touched Seth before."
I piped up, "Well Alex, I've brushed by him myself, and this is different. If it keeps up she'll boil away every pool she sets foot in." I saw him move his hand close enough to her to feel the heat radiating off of it, and I noticed his face go blank with sheer astonishment as it all sunk in.
"I'm... I'm a brother... I... W-what are their names?"
"Well, we realized you're a big enough part of our lives that... We didn't just give them biblical names like we initially planned. Instead... This is Lorelai. The others are Carter and Eric."
"I... I don't know what to say... And you're not even mad about this?" He pointed to the still strobing marks on his face with a look of terror.
"No, I'm pissed and confused, but... I can live with it. Maybe it's just something god planned. Or, well, you'd say it's dormant genes or something."
"I don't know what to call it until Monday."
"What's Monday?"
"Uhh... The day a lot of things start to make sense, but, also the day a lot of bad things are gonna-"
"Is this just another apocalypse thing like twenty twelve?"
"... Sure. Only there's a lot of... evidence suggesting it'll happen."
"Like what?"
"... Trust me on this one. I... I don't want to scare you guys, I can't... I can't be here..." He started to turn around and leave, but I grabbed his shoulder and had him sit on the couch, as I sat down next to him.
"Alex... What's going on? You didn't do it with Seth, did you?"
"Well, to his dismay, no. It's nothing like that at all..."
"Then what is it?"
"You guys'll hate me."
"For being honest?"
"For being sinful..."
"Well what'd you do? Kill someone? Steal?"
"No, nothing like that at all, I just-"
"Alex, spit it out, what happened?"
"... I have no way to explain this..."
"Fine, if you won't tell us what happened-"
"Dad, I want to, but I just can't. There's no way to say it, it just..."
"Look, you can say it, say it however you need to, but do."
"I... I can't. Words can't even begin to explain this. I'm just.... I'm just so sorry you have to see it..." He bowed his head, and I realized he was as upset by it as me. I leaned forward and hugged him, and then felt him begin to cry on my shoulder. A couple seconds later he pulled away and looked at me. "Dad... I'm so sorry..."
"It's okay. You saw how your new brothers and sisters turned out. Maybe there's a correlation."
"At least you can look at them and not think how much better they used to look."
"At least you used to look normal." He smiled at the thought, and I leaned in to hug him again...