***NEED WORK

I stared at Thya, stunned like a prey caught in front of its predator. The moment her question was out, my head went for a spin.
“Zavius, who the hell is this she-conscience?”
Shit, I slipped up again---wait a minute, when did I even mention her?
“Uh,” I started, shifting nervously. “How do you know about her?”
Thya frowned, looking at me suspiciously.
“What are you talking about? You just told me in your recap of events of the past week.” she said. “You kept on mentioning this she-conscience person, and a dark void-place and her chillingly calm composure. I’m curious to know who this girl is.”
I can’t even remember speaking of she-conscience…Damn my loose tongue.
Thya was looking at me expectantly, waiting for the answer I had promised her just minutes ago. I couldn’t get out of this one…
I huffed out a forceful breath and ran my left hand through my hair, pulling my hair off of my forehead.
“I…I don’t know.” I said.
Immediately, Thya’s expression hardened.
“Zavius, you promised. I can’t believe you are trying to hold out on me, after all that just now!” Thya cried out angrily.
“No, I’m being honest.” I said, hastily calming her down. “I’ll tell you everything I know, but I don’t know who she is. So just hear me out.”
Thya’s brow scrunched in confusion.
“…Okay.” she said slowly, watching me with careful eyes.
I sighed and walked over to the couch she was sitting on. I dropped down to sit next to her, leaning forward so my elbows resting on my knees. I felt nervous for some reason as I scrambled to find the perfect words to find a good place in my memory to start talking.
Where did this all start, anyway?
“This may sound really insane.” I admitted, almost warning her.
Thya gave me a jaded look, raising an eyebrow.
“Really? What part of any of this seems sane?” she asked, motioning her hands at the trashed room.
I didn’t reply, but instead focused on my thoughts and tried to figure out where to start.
I guess from the first time I ‘met’ her may be a good place to start. Where else would I start?

“For a while I’ve been having this weird dream, at random times of this dark, lightless space…”
The abyss; I told her of the reoccurring dream I’ve been having, how it used to be the same every single time. Thya listened intently as I described to her in as much detail as I possibly could about the quiet, soundless dark, and how it used to be my private sanctuary.
And then came she-conscience…
“The first time I talked to her was in one of these dreams.” I said, recalling the startled shock that rang through me when I realized for once I wasn’t alone in the dream. “She sort of snuck up on me with her calm thoughts; right when I was wondering why I always ended up in the abyss.”
“She answered your thoughts?” Thya asked, guessing.
I sighed.
“If only,” I muttered. “All she did was ask me why I was there.”
I shifted a little in my seat and glanced back at Thya, who was looking at me with her attentive posture and an unmoving gaze.
“Her calm and cool tone and how completely at ease she was pissed me off. I could practically hear the amusement in her thoughts. She was invasive, wise, distant---”
“What did she look like?”
I frowned.
“I don’t know. Supposedly we were talking through our thoughts. All I saw was black.” I told her.
Thya mused thoughtfully, looking a little disappointed.
“Too bad; I can imagine that she is very beautiful.” she said.
I felt my mouth twitch as I turned back to look at her.
“Now you’re making fun of me.” I said.
Thya’s eyes widened as she started to shake her head frantically in denial.
“Oh, no! I wasn’t--- I really didn’t mean it as a tease!” she said hastily. “You know, she can be real…ah, really---”
I gave her a small smile to reassure her that it was okay.
“No, it’s okay; I know how it sounds.” I said. “It all seems juvenile, stupid even. A man of my ripe old age dreaming up an imaginary girl.”
Thya scrunched her brow and chewed on her lower lip, as if trying to find a harmless answer.
“It’s really okay,” I reassured her. “She was just a projection of my subconscious to me too, until…”

The sounds and images of she-conscience being tortured suddenly forced itself to the surface of my mind. Her pained gasping, the sneering of the men, the bones cracking---

“…Zavius?”

My eyes flickered back to Thya, who was watching me with a concerned look. I swallowed the hard lump in my throat and forced a smile.
“Until recently.” I muttered, finishing my sentence. “Very recently.”
I coughed, loosening the tightness in my chest before continuing.
“But she is very real now, and I need to find her.”
Thya reached over and soothingly patted my shoulder.
“Until recently, huh?” she echoed. “It’s intriguing that you say you need to find her when until recently she was virtually nonexistent.”
She dropped her hand from my back and looked at me.
“Why do you call her ‘she-conscience,’ anyway?”

I shrugged, leaning back and resting my head on the back of the couch.
“Well, her thoughts seemed to have a feminine vibe to it. And she was talking through the subconscious and I thought she was my conscience in the beginning.” I said. “Besides, she wouldn’t give me her name, even when I told her mine and asked for hers.”
Thya tilted her head to the side, a look of confusion coming out.
“Why?” she asked.
I shrugged again.
“I have no idea. All she said was that is she and I were destined to meet, I’ll find out who she is then.” I told her. “She also said she had no name to give me, and something about ‘reasons and consequences.’ I didn’t really get it.”
I glanced sideways at Thya, and stopped. She had a stunned, unreadable expression on her face that alarmed me.
“…What?” she said in a hushed tone.
I frowned, bemused at her sudden change in mood. I sat up and faced her.
“I just didn’t get what she meant---”
“No, what did she exactly say?”
“Uh…something like ‘I have my reasons and consequences.’”
I stared at her, trying to decipher her expression.
“What’s wrong?”
“It’s nothing.” Thya immediately replied. “It’s just that Sir Elder had told me something similar.”
The same, unreadable expression was still there on her face. She wasn’t telling me the whole story.

“Tell me more about her.”

I blinked, caught off guard.
“What?”
“She-conscience. I want to know more about her.” Thya said, sounding somewhat impatient.
I didn’t know what to think of her sudden increased interest in she-conscience, or her being secretive about something I didn’t know about. But I let it go.
“Uh…Like I was saying, I don’t know a whole lot about her.” I said, picking and pulling at the bloody shirt wrapped around my right hand. “I’ve known of her for only two weeks now, and only talked to her twice.”
The second conversation with her flitted through my mind and I let out a frustrated sigh.
“The second time I talked to her was after I was Branded by Taeri.” I said, guilt washing over me. “She was actually the one that told me I was Branded…well, not that I didn’t notice it, just that I didn’t know what Taeri had done to me.”
“How did she know?” Thya asked.
“I don’t know.” I said, shaking my head. “It was as if she could see me. When Taeri Branded me, she practically burned half of my body to a crisp. It was the worst pain I have ever had to deal with.”
I closed my eyes for a moment, remembering the last bit of that dream.
“I think she-conscience healed me.”

I couldn’t look at Thya. Instead, I stared hard at the shirt binding my knuckles, glaring at the dark red that now stained the whole fabric.
“Zavius…what’s wrong?” she asked.
My hands gripped into tight fists, and I saw a few drops of blood fall from the shirt.
“She healed me, actually took time to heal the burn, even after…” I stopped, hating how pathetic it sounded. “I snapped at her. I told her I didn’t need her help…and that she didn’t exist.”
“Zavius…” Thya started to say, but stopped. There was a brief moment of silence before she spoke again.
“She just healed the burn, but didn’t do anything about the Branding?” Thya asked. “That seems out of…I mean, strange, don’t you think?”
“I don’t think she could do anything about it. She told me I wasn’t going to be able to handle this by myself.”
“Huh, smart girl.” Thya muttered.

I looked over to Thya, who was now hunched forward like I was, with her elbows on her knees and her hands clasped together. Concern was showing through in her posture and expression. Then I remembered something from the conversation we had three days ago.
“Deus, Thya.” I said, suddenly feeling like an insensitive idiot. “Sorry, I completely forgot that you had your own problems. Did you find that girl you were looking for?”
Thya glanced my way, giving me a tired, worn out gaze.
“No, it’s as if she disappeared into thin air.” she sighed. “I just have a really bad feeling about it.”
She sighed again, looking down at her hand. A look of total loss filled into her sad expression, and I was reminded of how I was feeling…
“What can I do to help?” I asked.
Thya looked at me again and gave me a small smile.
“Don’t worry about it; you are already doing plenty.”
I frowned.
“But I haven’t done anything.” I said.
“No, but you’re finally talking to me. That right there solves half of my problems.” she replied. She reached over and gripped my arm reassuringly. “Besides, your problems are bigger than mine.”
“But still,” I argued. “You are doing a lot more for me by listening and keeping this all quiet. Can you at least tell me more about this girl?”
But Thya shook her head.
“Hey, it’s still my turn to ask and listen. We had a deal and I still have questions.” she said. “So continue with your story. You had your second dream with her, and suddenly you’re healed, and you can hear her even when you’re awake. What else?”

At her almost casual tone, I felt my muscles lock, my mind immediately zoning in on the next, third and final dream. The last dream I had…

Slowly, I got up from the couch, forcing myself to go slow, almost as if to hold myself back. I felt unstable, as if I could explode any minute.

“Zavius?” I heard Thya say behind me.

But my mind was now elsewhere, back to where it had been for the past three days.
“The two dreams I had of the she-conscience weren’t the only dream I had of her.” I said lowly. “Honestly, I didn’t expect to ever hear her thoughts ever again after all that I had said.”

Thya was quiet and very still behind me, but I didn’t stop to look back at her. I could feel the crunching of the glass shards as I found myself drifting towards the shattered mirror. My eyes caught those of my broken reflection, my blue irises swirling, slowly churning to green---

What, she’s the one that can feel all of it; you just stuck around for the ride.

Something in my reflection’s eyes flickered sharply, switching to the harsh emerald green in a flash. A flare inside my chest burned acidly, the head shoving through my skin---

I snapped.

The remaining half of the mirror splintered before my eyes as my already battered fist crashed into the broken surface. The crystal shrieking of glass ripped through the air all over again, but the sound was already old in my ears. The new shards hit the floor, clinking loudly with the other mix of destroyed things.
My hand shot out and grabbed the nearest thing---a broken chair--- and I swung it around with all my might, not minding where it went. It whooshed through the air and connected with a corner of the wall, where it was reduced to a woodpile.
Growling, I chucked what was left of the chair in my hand off to the side and kicked aside the new addition to the demolition rubble.
“Vardavit!” I swore.
My hands flew to the back of my head again to grip my hair once again as my eyes scanned rapidly across the ruined living room for more inappropriately intact things---

“Stop, Zavius!”

I heard Thya’s pleading cry screaming at ame and I stopped. I wheeled around and stared back at the couch.
Thya was now out of her seat, standing behind the couch with her arms held out defensively in front of her, guarded and ready to repel anything that came flying towards her.
Once sure that I was done breaking things, she quickly stepped around the couch and approached me.
“Zavius, you’re bleeding even more!” she yelled, grabbing for my wrapped hand.
But I twisted out from her reach.
“Let it!” I snapped, more harshly that I had intended.
I yanked the dripping shirt off of my knuckles and let it drop on the floor.
“This is nothing. What’s a few bloody cuts?” I continued, raging. “I’m still breathing, aren’t I?”
I swore again and started pacing, the glass crunching and grinding under my shoes as I stomped angrily over the clutter.
“What the hell are you talking about?” Thya yelled. She stopped me mid-pace and forced me to look at her.
“Zavius, what is this really about?” she demanded, waving her hand around at the trashed room and stared at me. “What’s wrong?”
I scoffed, rolling my eyes slightly.
“No, I’m fine. I’m totally okay. A little cranky, but good.” I muttered.
Thya gripped me by my upper arms and started evenly into my eyes.
“Listen to me.” she seemed to say carefully. “Talk to me and tell me everything. You said she was real, and that you had to find her. Why do you need to find her?”
I blinked, as I stared incredulously back at her.
Why…

Slowly, I stepped back, pulling away from Thya. Once out of her hands, I turned around and went back to pacing.
Crunch. Crunch. Crunch.
“Get it up on its feet.”
Turn. Crunch. Crunch. Crunch. Crunch.
Remember how you couldn’t move, or how you just watched and listened? And how the bones occasionally cracked like they were brittle twigs?
Turn. Crunch. Crunch. Crunch. Crunch. Crunch…
…I have my reasons and consequences…

I stopped, and drew in a shaky breath.
“No…No.”
I wheeled back to Thya, my whole body feeling shaky.
“She may have her reasons, but this shouldn’t be her consequence.” I said breathlessly.
Thya looked at me, confused.
“What?” she said.
I growled and wheeled back around and away from her, my hands gripping at my hair again.
I could really use something to break right about now.

I exhaled roughly before forcing in a slow breath.
“I couldn’t move. I couldn’t yell out. She was suffering and I couldn’t do a damn thing about it.”
I breathed out in bursts, trying to relieve the suffocating burn in my chest.
“She was in pain…Deus, and they just kept coming---”
“Who’s ‘they’?” Thya demanded, her tone hard.
I threw my hands up, frustrated.
“They! The men. Black coats, I don’t know!” I spat. “Three of them, one after another; they wouldn’t stop. One kept on demanding answers from her, and another kept on laughing. The third was just as bad.”
I paced, shaking harder.
“The leader left the room earlier, leaving the three men to---Vardavit!”
I swore, my voice ripping through the air in doubled layers. I started to look around again, trying to find something I could get my hands on. Thy grabbed me by the arm and dragged me backwards. I let her push me down to the couch. I continued to talk.
“They…they just didn’t stop. They kept on hitting. Beating her even though nothing made her talk. Even after they figured she was mute, they didn’t stop.”
I couldn’t stop my eyes from flickering restlessly across my surroundings, almost nervous. I caught sight of Thya standing in front of me with her arms wrapped tightly around her torso. Her eyes were wide, looking stunned and horrified.
I pushed myself forward in the couch so I was hunched over with my elbows on my knees.
“The worst part was, I heard everything. Right down to her bones cracking---”
My jaws locked, and my teeth felt on edge.
“And I couldn’t…I couldn’t move. There was nothing I could do to stop them. I wanted to go in and kill them all. But not before I broke every bone in their bodies. String them up and beat them to the inch of their lives. And I’ll return what they gave her by ten-folds.”

I suddenly felt Thya drop down to a kneel in front of me.

“Where were they?” she demanded. “Where where they keeping her?”
I shook my head helplessly, not answering. Thya put her hands on either side of my head, and forced my eyes up to meet hers.
“Describe the room.” she ordered, no longer comforting me.
“I don’t know. It was dark, cold looking. Uh…cement floors, no windows…chains; there may have been chains.” I said. “The door slid open once, but I didn’t see anything outside.”
Thya’s hands dropped from my face and she bolted to a stand.
“I have to go.” she said abruptly.
I watched as she wheeled around and started for the door.
“Wait, are we done talking?” I asked.
She stopped and wheeled back around.
“We’re done for now.” she said. “Get yourself cleaned up and rest, Zavius. You need it. I’ll send someone over to clean up later.”
“But what about she-conscience?” I demanded, getting up. “If you’re going to her, I’m going too.”
“No, you are not.” she said strongly. “Just stay here and out of trouble.”
“But I want to help!” I argued.

Thya stopped once again at the door and glanced over her shoulder.
“You’ve helped plenty, Zavius.” she said. “I mean it.”
With that she was gone in a flash.

I stared blankly at the door, my mind reeling. I briefly contemplated running right out the door and following Thya, but immediately decided against it. Thya was long gone. Without her, there was no way I knew where to go.
With a heavy sigh of defeat, I turned back to my Living room and grimaced at the mess.

Wait a minute…How does she know where she-conscience is being held? I frowned and stared back at the door.
Suddenly, a lot of things didn’t make sense. But then again…that was nothing new to me.

Growling irritably, I dropped down back on the couch and let myself sprawl across the cushion.
Nothing made sense anymore; it was all a jumbled mess.
When and how did I get this way?

My knuckles pulsed angrily, the pain drilling to the bone. Just by the feeling of it I knew I wasn’t healing. Just great…

My eyelids felt heavy, and my mind was starting to dull. Why was I suddenly so drowsy...

I just laid there and let myself drift, suddenly all too tired to fight or deal with all this anymore…

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

I have never welcomed the pitch black as I did, the moment I felt the dense, heavy silence against my skin.
I gasped, almost horrified at how effortless it had been to get to the abyss, when I couldn’t get here no matter how hard I tried for the last three days.

She-conscience! I yelled. She-conscience!

The silence roared on endlessly, continuing undisturbed.
Just tell me; are you alright? I thought, forcing the thought to ring loud through the space. Please…tell me that you are alive.

No one replied. The calm, cool and wise tone that I long for seemed to be some lost memory of the past.