"We all believe that you're a kind person Lucas." Agnes says "We want to believe in you so much but we can't. Tell us more about what's up with yourself, your mind I mean."
"I already explained and well, I feel like throwing up when I point my gun at people." Lucas says as he clenches his fists. "Just thinking about it is to much for me. I know what I told Ashly, but I can still kill animal. I may have over exaggerated a bit to much, but I still hesitate a bit." he says as he covers his mouth.
"Lucas that's trauma, that's a very serious problem right there. I can tell you now that we will help you if you want us to." Agnes says.
"Yeah Lucas, we can help you if you need to talk about it." Silas says "We are good listeners, and we want you to feel that we care. The last thing someone who is going through deep things wants, is having no one to talk to. Trust me when I tell you, talking about your problems can calm you down more than you think." Silas pays Lucas back with a smile.
"Listen to me when I say that I don't mind not being able to shot people anymore. I think it's great in a sense, but the problem is that if Ashly gets in danger and I have to use my gun I…" Lucas takes a pause he closes mouth and the opens it but doesn't speak until. "I…I don't know what to do about that, it's not a common scenario but still. Ashly isn't one to cause trouble but when trouble goes to her, she lets it in with open arms. I just don't want to image the day where she is attacked and I freeze, I don't shot at the person, and Ashly dies like that." Lucas closes his eyes and takes a deep breath. "I don't want her to die such a preventable death, specially with the person she trusts."
"I can see why you're struggling so much." Silas says, "It's a good thing you're feeling that way." Silas then drops his smile when Lucas looks at him with confusion. "I-I mean that you deeply care for someone like that. I didn't mean to come off as apathetic." he says as he backs away and stays silent for the moment.
"It happened not to long ago." Lucas says as he runs his hand through his hair. "She got shot by some bad people, it could of been prevented if I killed that man. I had chances, so many that I could count them with more than one hand." Lucas then raises six of his fingers. "When we escaped she was holding onto me, and I could feel her grip loosening. When I stopped to make her bleeding stop I got close to her and…oh gosh." Lucas begins to tear up a bit. "I saw her face, her hands, her stomach, her…life. It was as if I was staring at death itself, she was loosing consciousness as I was helping her. I was facing her eye to eye, no it was as if only I was the one staring. Her eyes seemed to be dead, I thought she died but she was breathing." He looks up at them. "S-Sorry I got to out of hand just now."
"Lucas I don't know if this is a bad timing, but it's honestly great that you saw that." Agnes says trying to not say anything that will be to insensitive. "You value life itself, it means you're willing to avoid taking it away. Don't let that make you feel useless, you can always help in different ways."
"We are going to be chased by a lot of bad people. Bad enough that they will kill us without hesitation." Lucas says, "I must atleast be able to pull the trigger even if I don't want to. I should be able to cry ,and feel awful after pulling it as I will know I'm still alive when I do it." Lucas then thinks of something and stands up, and walks to Eder.
Lucas sits next to Eder. "I want to know right now, do you all want Ashly gone?" Lucas says with hesitation, he looks around him. Everyone is avoiding his question, and his eyes when he stares at them. "Just be honest with me. I can understand why, but just tell me now."
"Lucas Listen to me." Eder said while he rubs his eyes. "Yes I myself don't want her to be here, but I'm giving her a chance. If it was anyone else, she would of been long gone, not even a second after what she did." Eder puts his hand on Lucas back. "Tell Ashly to get here, you were given a rule that you must know where she is, and have an eye on her. Some of my people think you are letting her do whatever she wants. They think you're lying when you told me that she was still sleeping, you don't lie about something like that, right?"
"Of course not sir, why would I lie about this. I'll go get her right now, I'll be back in half an hour because she isn't really found of following orders." Lucas says as he stood up, he begins to walk away from the community circle. "Ashly is just tired, she doesn't know how to relax." Lucas says with a forced smile at them as he disappears into the forest.
————
Ashly has been shoveling for a while, she is tired and exhausted. "Fuck, never knew burying was this hard." she says under her breath. Ashly is near a ditch, and is trying to bury Mindy's body. Ashly is taking a huge risk as she believes this is an area the people don't usually go to. Ashly can see a few dead animals that she thinks was the doing of Mindy, they seem to have been dead for a few days.
"You had to cause me trouble didn't you." Ashly says as she continues to shovel. "I didn't have to do this, but that would be to easy. It's as if the world is telling me to fuck off, I can't have it go right for once." Ashly is half way done with Mindy. The ditch was a lifesaver to Ashly as she skipped digging entirely. Ashly's hands are a bit sore from all this constant work she is doing. "Got me working real good."
Mindy's body is almost completely covered in dirt. One of her hands is barely showing, but Ashly is to o tired. "I hope this would give me more than enough time. I just need to do this until Lucas agrees with leaving this place, but how would I do it." she wonders to herself but she isn't given enough time because she hears footsteps behind her.
"So this is where you been this entire time Ashly." Ashly turns around, and sees that it's Lucas who has found her. His face is of confusion, and worry as he looks down. "Is that a body, what happened here?" He asked her.
Absolutely nothing can go Ashly's way, it's all just trouble. She is feed up with having terrible luck. Ashly looks down, and then back at Lucas. "Lucas I think this is Mindy's body, help me out." Ashly says with a false urgency, she is hoping that he will buy it. "Help me get her body out, we don't have time to waste."
———3 days prior to the encounter———-
[Day 1]
Ashly has left the house a while ago, she made sure to clean up the blood. Ashly has hidden Mindy's body, and she is feeling empty. "Alright, no one will visit her at all. I just have to find Lucas and run away, simple enough." She is walking casually without any care, she knows if she starts acting differently they will begin to suspect her. Ashly decides to return back to the cabin that she is currently preoccupying. Ashly opens the door and spots Lucas who was knocking on her bedroom door.
Lucas turns around and sees Ashly. "Oh Ashly it's you, it seems you're wide away. Come with me this is perfect timing, we have to go to the community circle." Lucas seems relief and walks to her, he offers her his hand, but she refuses. "Ashly we don't have time to waste, these people want to see you."
"Fine, it's not like I had anything important to do anyways." Ashly begins to follow Lucas, she can tell he seemed worried for a bit. She guesses that it was about her and what the Quill Makers said. "Hurry up Lucas, you're walking a bit too slow to be in a hurry." She says as Lucas begins to speed up.
They arrive at the community circle, and Ashly is behind Lucas. She makes sure to look directly into their eyes to see if she was right. As she is earshot from them. "Listen, I would like to tell all of y'all that I am sorry for what I did. I overreacted and I was being a jerk, but I would like it if that girl stays away from me." Ashly says with a face of regret.
"Well I don't buy that apology at all." Agnes says, "But I do appreciate that you at least tried."
"Listen your friend told us you needed help becoming less…less aggressive." Ashly stares into Lucas's back. "We decided to wait until your approval since he did ask without your permission. Tell us now, are you willing to let us try to help you?" Eder said.
"Fine, I'll let you all try to help me with words." Ashly said as she sits down crossing her arms. "So, how does this work exactly? I'm not much of a social person. Most people I knew didn't give a danm about me."
"Well we are going to do this in session, we will try to do this without pressure. If we are going too fast or overstepping boundaries just tell us alright." Silas says, "We have helped out a few people before, but we just need context."
"Alright let me start with the fact that I can't remember anything. I mean as I don't have any memory of anything that has happened past a week. I need to write it all down in a paper to remember." Ashly said and she watches as the Quill Makers begin to think. "Another thing is that although I can't remember too much, my body sure does. Some of these injuries I just had, I remember them perfectly. I do remember that my life is terrible. I lived by myself since an early age, and I struggled. I can't tell you how many people I killed because of the fact that I was brought into a terrible place I called home. I worked for awful people who wouldn't care if I died, well a few did but not enough to make my life better."
Lucas nods agreeing with all of what Ashly said. "Well if you can't remember much then it will be a problem for us, but we won't back down. Ashly tell us more about this absurd forgetting. Could it possibly be a way your mind is coping with your situation?" Eder asked.
"Well it could be but how would I know, I haven't felt many emotions in forever. The only emotions I know are those that I saw around me or that kept me alive." Ashly said, "I don't even remember if I ever cried as a child."
"Well that's definitely some form of mental issue. To be emotionless is usually a big sign of abuse or in your case bad environment." Silas said, "This could be the whole reason to your forgetfulness, you said you don't remember anything past a week right? Then that means you have developed it when you were a child to block of what most definitely would of broken you."
"Well certainly I don't feel alright, might as well be broken already." Ashly said with a face full of boredom. "If I have some issue that I developed as a child, doesn't that mean it will be impossible to fix?"
"Not entirely, this may be the first time we have to help someone with such problems." Eder said scratching his chin. "Listening if this is coping then we can think of many alternatives for you to replace it. That's only true if forgetting is coping, tell me has there been a situation when you didn't forget at all."
Ashly begins to think a bit, when was the last memory of hers. Ashly then remembers something "Well I do remember that one time I was holding my gun for the first time ever." Ashly then looks at the Quill Makers. "Well it was the first weapon I was given, it was by the man who raised me. That's what everyone told me. Bruno was his name, and if I check it had his name carved into it. Of course it's been damaged, and well I have it now, I guess that's the earliest memory I know of. Probably because nothing really happened, it may as well been the last day I had a normal life as I was then forced to kill a man. Gael never stopped telling me that when I was young, I believe that's the only reason why I remember this."
"Well I can say that my guess on coping has increased." Eder said as he pulled out a carving of a crying woman. "This is going to take weeks to help you Ashly, I'm sorry but you will have to be patient, and very determined if you want to become normal."
"Sure why not, this will definitely help me out a lot." she said as she stretches. "Do any of you know where this girl is at? I don't want to run into her again."
"Yeah you also do have some short temper as well, how could I forget now." Agnes said, "That's will be another priority, but for another day. We have to focus on this for now, alright?" Ashly sighs but tries to not say anything that will cause trouble.
As they continued to talk Ashly has become disinterested, she knew this but didn't try to do anything about it. A few hours have passed and Lucas and Ashly are at Lucas's cabin. "Lucas that was…different than what I expected, but can I ask you something?" she waits for him and he nods. "Do you trust me like I mean truly trust me? I mean as I need you to believe in me as there are some things I do that requires your trust."
"Well yeah I do trust you Ashly, how many times would I have to tell you this?" He says as he grabs a few vegetables. "I have full faith in you Ashly, and I hope you do become a better person. I know you can and as long as you try I'll always trust you more than anything." Ashly has mostly ignored what he said except the last few lines which made her smile a bit.