before the frenzy

The sun is hiding behind a cloud when Lost bursts out of the stairwell into the open air. The rooftop is a wide plaza, peppered with an eclectic assortment of beach equipment and the usual detritus of disused spaces: buzzing heat exchange units, vents slurping down fresh air, and a handful of pigeons. It feels like it is about to rain, but she hopes that it will not; she needs a fast burn to put an end to things.

Her pocket buzzes, and she twitches; she left her phone behind. She’d thought that Ghost was getting suspicious, maybe starting to suspect what she was planning. He’d never been particularly observant before, but she couldn’t risk it. She checks anyway. Her pocket is exactly as empty as she knew it would be.

She remembers the last handful of messages. Almost-normal logistics; she’d been giving things away. Letting her favorites get a head start on the coming frenzy.

GhostOfAChance: hey bb are you keeping the blue dress

LostGirlsUnited: the Comyns-Carr??

GhostOfAChance: yeah that one. its pretty

LostGirlsUnited: I was going to donate it to a museum …

LostGirlsUnited: but you can have it.

GhostOfAChance: yay tytyty!

LostGirlsUnited: take good care of it! :)

GhostOfAChance: I always do!

GhostOfAChance: btw are u sure? this is a lot of stuff

Accumulation was always in her nature, even before her life started to stretch, and over the years she’d acquired more than her fair share of treasures. Some were small and simple, meaning nothing to anyone but her, but others …

Well.

It was sure to be a frenzy. It always is when a vampire dies.

It takes a considerable effort of will for her to leave the doorway behind—not just an unsafe distance from it, but far enough that she knows that her legs will crumble beneath her before she can get back. Less will than it would have taken if the sun had greeted her when she emerged, but still enough to be hard. She thought that her final moments would be a release; that the weight would lift from her shoulders and she would drift forward unthinkingly to her doom. If only.

Some long-ago architect had thought that the roof might become a third place for the people who once worked in the building, and so the cracked tiles that their pen prescribed click beneath Lost’s delicate shoes. High heels and a hammered metal plate for a sole; durable. She’d learned quickly to treasure anything that wouldn’t wear out, and discomfort had never mattered so much. Hard to walk in, true, but practice had long since brushed away all difficulty. And soon they wouldn’t matter at all.

Step, click. Step, click. Forward and forward, wanting to break and run and wait. The mind goes strange places at times like this, focuses on strange things; not the vast and hungry emptiness bulging in her chest or the lives she is about to change but the noise of her steps, loud enough to swallow up her entire world. Step, click. Step—

There is something she’s heard said, though she can’t recall where. A few words in passing, a line in some half-remembered movie? Permanent solutions to temporary problems. A lovely sentiment, though of course her own problems are rather more permanent than humans usually admit, and only growing with each passing year.

UnderOverAround: Hey! I saw this and thought of you.

UnderOverAround: [photograph of a dog eating shit]

LostGirlsUnited: haha fuck you :)

UnderOverAround: lol I know you love me

LostGirlsUnited: do I though? do I?

UnderOverAround: Yeah, of course.

UnderOverAround: See you tonight! Looking forward to the ball dropping 💋

LostGirlsUnited: … hey where are you?

UnderOverAround: so uh

LostGirlsUnited: Grace? Are you okay?

LostGirlsUnited: … I miss you.

LostGirlsUnited: I wish I could have said something.

LostGirlsUnited: The funeral was nice. You would have liked it. Tasteful.

LostGirlsUnited: I’ll always love you, Grace.

—click.

The wind is rising, dancing with old ash and freshly fallen leaves. In the city’s canyons it would be too much, crowded for space and forced to flow along increasingly restrictive paths, but up here it’s rather nice. The air is fresh, with just a hint of spilled gasoline; the clouds are starting to move, forcing out a faint sprinkle as they do. Just enough to perfume the air and make the tiles shine. The moment could almost be beautiful.

Her skin is warm and prickly when she reaches the roof’s edge. Not hurting yet, but promising that pain will come. She glances up at the shifting clouds, and the sun probing their heavy contours. When was the last time she saw the sun, even indirectly? It has been so long. Her hands are shaking as she reaches for a cigarette; it takes her three tries to light it, but that’s okay. She’s pretty sure she’ll have enough time.

The smoke from her first drag has barely touched her lungs when her skin sublimates. The pain is abrupt and all-encompassing, and then it is gone. She is good at healing, but this? With the sun’s touch still on her, sinking deeper and deeper into her? No. There are limits to everything, and this is hers. All she can see is the light from her hot, hungry flame.

She’s moving, she’s pretty sure. Scrabbling. Something jars her arm and bashes against her thigh, her freshly-cooked meat caving inwards into the untouched spaces within, which burn too. They are worse than unbearable, worse than the nothingness of her skin—the sun is in her and her fat is bubbling and her bones are cracking and splitting as her marrow makes a brave escape for a better future outside her constricting flesh and up isn’t up and down isn’t down and she’s falling, the flames blown away from just long enough to see her reflection in the old skyscraper’s dirty windows, a comet trailing her own death behind her, down into the shadowed streets, down out of the cleansing sunlight.

The part of her that isn’t screaming prays that she’ll be dead before she escapes.