confession . . . ? - MUMBLE

[redd]

It was a surprise she didn't spontaneously combust or something other terrible when she set foot in the holy building. Thankfully none of that happened, and Redd was left to the church, which, was empty for the time being. She had walked the upper balcony, the main floor, and the area all around the altar. She wasn't there to pray, no, she was there for the sheer purpose of it.

Sitting in the confession box where the priest normally sat was one of her more interesting hobbies. No one ever came into confess when she was there - it was as if they knew - so it left Redd with her own personal getaway so she could collect and gather her thoughts together because wrecking havoc on everything two blocks away, as the way her usual day was spent.

With her legs curled up on the bench and her head resting on top of them, she had locked the door and closed the panel between the two boxes so that if someone entered, she would only be able to hear their voice, and they would not be able to see her.

Perfect. Now she could plot to herself - although, the better part of her knew that plotting with the devil was the exact opposite of what she should have been doing in church, there was something special about being a rebel and doing it there. A fetish of hers - of which she had many. She wasn't even religious, technically. Sure, she believed in a superior being, but not one that forced her to worship it.

She worshiped herself.

[Mumble]

Life wasn't fair. Mumble had reached that conclusion fairly early in his life, so why was it so agonizingly present in his mind right now? Bad things happened to good people, the bad people got things they didn't deserve, and the people you trusted often turned out to be untrustworthy a-holes. And where was a guy supposed to turn when the one thing he'd thought was a constant had been turned upside down and inside out and transformed into a happy, giggling, danger-defying lunatic as soon as he'd realized how much she meant to him?

Was the universe just trying to frak with his head and screw him over? Really? Stupid, stupid, stupid, he thought, yanking open the door to the church. How had he been naive enough, after everything that had gone wrong, to think that things could be fixed just like that? How had he managed to convince himself that he'd be able to handle whatever came along? This wasn't fair, and it wasn't...natural, or...

He didn't even know what he was doing here. All he knew was that...when there was nowhere else left to turn, sometimes you had to go looking in the places you'd been avoiding for so long. He walked into the confessional without having any idea that she was there. As far as he knew, there wasn't even a priest in there...he hoped. He wasn't in the mood to confess his wrongdoings to some other person. People...people just let you down.

He sat in silence for a moment, trying to collect his thoughts, trying to figure out what he could say to the deity he'd never been very good at talking to.

"Guin, I..." He faltered. "Look, I don't know if you're listening...I wouldn't listen to me, if I were you. I did something stupid, and I think I made a deal with...well, whoever's the opposite of you, and I don't know where I'm going anymore, so if you're up there, and you can hear me, just...I could use a hand."

[redd]

Oh, this was absolutely too perfect.

Maybe God did exist, if he had willingly put her most favorite person in the world in the church, right in the box beside her. Redd didn't make a sound, simply waited, listened. Perhaps the devil had sent Mumble to her - whoever had though, now had Redd's prayer and thanks.

When he started speaking, a smirk came to her lips. Naturally she was going to mess with him, and hearing him pray to . . . whatever that was . . . was just too good. She'd give him a hand all right - a hand full of nails digging into his face and back, leaving familiar scratches in both places. Now that she no longer served as Headmistress, she wasn't bound by the school. Police or any other laws couldn't touch her. Diplomatic immunity, or something - she just knew being a Queen protected her. That, and her Black Imagination.

Smirking, Redd quickly formulated something inside her sick and twisted brain.

"Doesn't it just suck to know you're praying to the devil herself right now?" She asked in a conversational tone, twisting her wrist in place. Vines emerged from beneath her skin and snaked toward the wall that seperated them, fitting easily through the cracks. Rather quickly, they grew over the door so Mumble couldn't escape, and began to wrap around his wrists and ankles, binding him in place.

And with that, Redd grabbed the grated piece of wood that usually served as the place where the priest and the confessioner would speak through. She ripped it out, pulling most of the wood of the wall with her. Either way, it left the size of the box now doubled, and Redd moved closer. With a malicious smirk, she trailed a finger along his jawbone and dragged her nail across his neck. When she spoke, it was nearly a purr.

"Forgive me father, for I have sinned."

[Mumble]

Her voice was like a physical poison that spread through his veins in a single instant, filling him with terror and dread and a kick of adrenaline that left him the most alive he'd felt since he'd lost his ability to sleep. He should have moved as soon as he heard her speak, but something in him locked up, left him paralyzed for that crucial, precious second in which he could have made a move for the door. By the time he reacted, it was too late, she had him tied there.

That seemed to be a pretty swift answer to his prayer...if the answer was 'no, you've committed far too many wrongs to be set right, I'm leaving you here to lie in the bed you've made'.

He flinched violently at the edge of her nail against his skin, and stared up at her, wide-eyed, terrified and electrified all at once. He had no defenses against her. Nothing. She had a hold on him, through sorcery or something else, and he could tell himself all he wanted that he was going to lay down the law and tell her this was over, but the second she touched him, all he knew was the sheer vibration of that terror that proved he was still alive.

What was she doing here? In a church!? She didn't belong in a church! She belonged in...whatever was the opposite of a church! Had she followed him here? That didn't make sense, though...there was no way she could have followed him, then gotten into the confessional after he was already in there. He would have heard her, unless she had some freaky teleportation ability, which he wasn't entirely counting out.

"Redd," he said, steadying his tone. He didn't have to call her Headmistress anymore...that exchange of authority was gone, and strangely, it made him feel a little better and ten times as scared all at once. This way, it was just...him, and her. No titles, no threats of expulsion, none of that. But...she also didn't have to adhere to whatever rules of conduct headmistresses were bound by. "Fancy meeting you here."

[redd]

Fear and terror were two of Redd's favorite things - and when they came from Mumble, well, that just turned them into something a whole lot better. She studied him, wrapped in the vines she had so beautifully created, the smirk never leaving her face, the micheivious spark still visible in her eyes. Her finger trailed along one of the vines and it twisted under her touch.

His flinch had not gone unnoticed. Growing ever closer to him, she laughed quietly and spoke even quieter, her voice nothing more than a mere whisper. "What? Are you still afraid of me Mumble? I thought we'd be long past that." She said quietly in his ear, fingers curling around the vines that bound his wrists. "I'll remove these if you promise not to run."

Hearing him use her first name sent goosebumps flaring up her arms. No one used her first name. Vaguely, she wondered if he would call her by her real name if he knew it, or if it would still be Redd/ Hell, she'd half expected him to call her Headmistress. It wsa pleasing to her, though, that she hadn't lost her effect on him even if she was no longer Headmistress. But that also meant she wasn't bound by school law.

"Mhm, it is fancy meeting me here. I didn't exactly peg you as the religious type of guy." She mused, pulling away now and sitting on her legs, her dress pooling on the ground like a puddle of blood around her. Fitting."Guess I was wrong. I do like to come here myself, stake out the competition if you will." She added, and for a moment her eyes flashed red, then back to their startling blue, as if she truly was the devil him - or her - self.

"Tell me Mumble," She purred again. "What sins have you comitted? After all, this is a confessional. Tell me yours, I'll tell you mine." Again, her eyes flashed the red and her smile increased. This was going to be fun. Far too much fun.

[Mumble]

Not sleeping left you in kind of a haze...like there was a curtain between you and all the things you wanted to think about or focus on. Mumble had been under the influence of that haze for several days now, but when Redd came into the picture, it was as if the curtain was flung open, his mind jolted into alertness by the fight or flight mechanism that kicked in when he felt like his life might be in danger.

Of course he was going to run, though - at the moment he felt like he could run farther than he ever had. She knew that, though, didn't she?

"Yeah, you pegged me wrong," he said, although that wasn't entirely true. He'd been raised with religion, but he hadn't stuck with it, and now he was wondering if maybe that might be part of the problem behind all these issues he was facing in his life.

Like he was really going to sit there and open up to her about all the things bothering him, especially when she was the cause behind 80% of them. Not likely.

"Just you," he said, rather defiantly. "You're the worst thing I've ever done. I guess I'm paying for it now, though, aren't I? What did you do to me? Why can't I sleep? Is this because of the voice thing? Because you can take it back...I don't want it anymore, I just want to be able to think my own thoughts and live my own life."

[redd]

She rolled her eyes. His defiance was nothing but an annoyance. Hadn't she trained him to know better, anyway? She had half the mind to have her vines grow thorns and stab him until the pool of blood was so large that it started leaking out of the confessional box and likely scared anyone in the church. Then again, that would bring investigation and he could possibly die from it - no, she hoenstly didn't want to deal with it.

She arched an eyebrow however, confused. Redd had done nothing.

"I haven't done anything, you little twit." She snapped, irritated now. "You probably can't sleep because you're up half the night having sex with that little princess of yours. Or maybe it's nightmares - tell me, do you have nightmares about me?" She asked ever so sweetly, hardly cared about Mumble's problems.

"Oh, you're living your own life. I gave you what you wanted, Mumble. A singing voice. What you do with it and the rest of your life is your concern, not mine." She crept closer again, pulling the vines away. They stayed across the only exit of the box though. Even if he wanted to run, he couldn't escape. Not easily.

"You don't want to mess with me, Mumble." She stated quietly, bringing a finger under his chin to lift his head up. "I have nothing to do with your inability to sleep. Do not blame me for your problems."

[Mumble]

What was she getting at? What did she have to gain by denying things she'd done? He didn't care, really...didn't feel like getting into an argument with her over what she had or hadn't done. She'd screwed with his life, and whether she wanted to admit to it or not, nothing had been right since she'd come into his world.

That wasn't to say that he hadn't enjoyed it along the way, which was what made it so difficult at this point. How could he tell her, convincingly, that he didn't want anything to do with her when there had been several occasions on which he'd said and done things that indicated quite the opposite?

"I'm not either," he denied. That was just offensive, that she would say something like that about Andy. Especially with her in the condition she was in right now...even if Mumble hadn't been exhausted to the point of collapse himself, there was no way he'd do anything like that with Andy when she was clearly unstable.

"If you're not concerned about my life and what I do with it, why are you in here tying me to the walls?" he demanded, exerting every bit of will power he had to not lean away from the touch of her hand on his chin.

[redd]

Her lips twisted.

"I think we should make the agreement not to lie to each other." She mused. "At least for now. After all, this is a church. Lying is a sin." Redd continued, the grin still there. Mumble was such an easy target and his lacking confidence made it so easy to mess with his head, which Redd had turned into quite a game for herself.

"You are mistaking concern for facisnating. You intrique me, Mumble. Is it fate that keeps bringing you to me no matter where I go, or do you purposefully do it?" She inquired, her lips nearly against his now as she spoke, eyes staring at him as if they were looking straight into his soul.

If only.

[Mumble]

Oh, that was rich. She wanted him to be honest with her. Wanted him to make an agreement to not lie to the crazy woman who had somehow managed to con him out of his morals and sanity all at once.

"That sounds like a fantastic plan," he said, agreeably. "Why don't I just tell you everything I've ever wanted, and then you can make all my wishes come true and we can float off into the sunset on a cloud pulled by magic unicorns?" All right, so maybe that was taking things a bit far.

"I came here to pray," he said, biting his lower lip as soon as he finished the last word of that sentence. "Maybe you should try it sometime. I didn't come here to find you, if that's what you're insinuating. If I wanted that, I would have gone to your office...but wait, you don't have an office anymore, do you? What's the story with that?"

[redd]

Arms folded across her chest, Redd leaned back to study him. Was he high? Redd did nothing involving wishes - except her own -, sunsets, clouds, or magical unicorns, for Christ's sake. "What the hell are you on?" She poked a finger in his chest. "Sharing is caring, you know. I've done plenty of drugs in my time and it sure as hell sounds like you're on them, so share or I'll take them away forcefully."

She snorted, trailing a finger along one of the vines that held the door in, carefully skirting around the thorns that had grown on them. She smiled to herself, glancing back at Mumble. "I pray all the time, just to someone a bit more . . . opposite of the big man upstairs that you choose to pray to." She replied, then her tone grew dark and bitter.

"What happened for that blonde bubblehead to take over Tintagel is for my knowledge only and for reasons I'm sure your tiny microscopic brain could handle." As she spoke, her hand came up to wrap around his throat and to press him back against the wall. "You're not to ask about it or speak about it again, understand, birdie?"

[Mumble]

She was making fun of him, and he hardly cared. Being made fun of was a heck of a lot better than being scratched and attacked by creepy roses. Obviously he hadn't meant that bit about the unicorns, but it was just like her to turn his sarcasm into some kind of serious plea for her to grant his wishes.

Yeah, no. He'd made that mistake one too many times already.

"Is that supposed to make me feel better?" He demanded. "That you're some kind of crazy devil-worshipper, is that supposed to help?" Stupid question - obviously she had no interest in making him feel better. That wasn't really the sort of thing she focused on, after all.

It was a little low to be poking at his intelligence, though. He figured she was just sore that she'd lost her job somehow, and instead of dealing with it like a mature adult, she was going to make fun of his brainpower.

Also, she was going to choke him. He nodded mutely. Obviously the being-replaced thing was a sensitive issue with her.

[redd]

Redd laughed quietly. "I'm not crazy, Mumble. And I don't worship the devil completely. I'm quite open to other evil entities." She said, then added in a more seductive and suggestive voice: "Although, if you wanted to feel better, I can do that too."

When he nodded, she released her hold on him and drew back, the look of irritation and pure hatred on her face. The damned pretty little blonde that had stolen her job was currently on her hit list - although, her former students did seem to like her better as a Headmistress. And Redd loved the fact she didn't have the misbehaving ones coming into her office all hours of the day.

No, it gave her plenty more time to mess with this kid. So Bubbles could keep the job for now.

[Mumble]

Yeah, that was comforting for sure. She didn't worship the devil all the time, just sometimes, when she wasn't sacrificing infants to Hades or whatever other evil thing she was serving.

She was out of her mind. He had never been so sure of it, and for the first time, he felt a twinge of sympathy for her, because he was starting to understand. Not sleeping, wondering what awful thing would happen next, not knowing how to deal with anything in your life...it was taking its toll on him and he was suddenly starting to realize exactly what crazy might feel like from a first person perspective.

So he did what he'd been doing since his first encounter with her...he gambled.

"How did it happen?" he asked. "You weren't always like this. I know you weren't. You used to be...happy, or something, and somebody must have loved you, and you must have loved somebody, and then something happened, and now you're...what was it?"

[redd]

She blinked once, twice, usnure of how to continue. Something inside Redd's brain snapped and she spoke without really knowing half of what she was saying.

"You want to know Mumble? Fine, I'll tell you. Then you'll know how sick and twisted I really am." She scowled and leaned back, pushing herself back against the far wall and folding her arms across her chest in irritation.

"Did I ever tell you I murdered my parents and sister, Mumble? Oh, they loved me. I was supposed to inherit the throne. I was their pride and joy. But you know when you just hit that point to where you couldn't take anymore? I hit that point. I was never the perfect child my sister could be. I snapped. I suppose the drugs helped that along too. I murdered my parents after they named my sister queen - and like the little goodie good she was, she banished me. Only I came back. Killed her too, and her husband, and chased my niece into this world with intentions of killing her. I followed, fought for my survival, and arrived here."

Redd paused, face blank.

"I was never happy. Not until I started torturing others. Made me happy to see them in so much pain - the kind of physical pain that matched the emotional pain I had suffered for years. I never loved anyone. There was never anyone to love. No one dared get close enough after they found out what I did. There was Hades, once - I'm sure you remember him - but that was something fleeting. No one ever loved me, Mumble, and I sure as hell don't love anyone. My mind is too frakked up to let me experience emotions like that."

She looked away from him to stare at the wall, glaring so hard at it that it was a wonder it didn't spontaneously burst into flames. When she spoke again it was in a genuinuely soft and quiet voice, a tone she'd never used before and quite frankly felt odd ion her tongue and in her mouth.

"The mind is a very fragile thing, Mumble. When pushed to it's limits, it snaps. More often than not you can't repair it. It puts you in a state that isn't a good one to be in. Your mind blocks other emotions - like love - and allows you to feel only pain, sorrow, and hate. There's only so much a mind, a person, can handle before they go insane." Her lips twisted at the corner. "I guess I should consider myself lucky I haven't been put into a padded cell with magic zapping bracelets around my wrists. Maybe they hope I'll kill myself or be killed by something first."