Update

Valerie still isn't responding to anything. She takes care of herself well enough but... it's like autopilot. There's just no reaction. She hasn't said anything to me still. Hasn't even looked me in the eye. She just sits around with this... dazed look. No, it's not even dazed...

It's lost.

She's just not there. Not mentally here. I've been pleading to anything that is willing to give me two seconds that He is not in her head. It... it can't be that, right? It's just shock. Completely just... fuck...

Morningstar... Hesperus... what the FUCK were you doing at her house, you little son of a bitch...

I wish I knew what the hell happened. Not knowing is driving me insane and the only one capable of giving me an answer isn't capable at all. Nothing I do gets through whatever hole Valerie's sunk herself into. It doesn't even feel as though there's another person sitting there with me - like she's walled off from the world in a way that... that even blocks off the feel of life. I've been talking to her. Sitting with her. Fuck, I even spent a few hours just HOLDING her. Hoping that having an arm around her shoulders would bring some degree of comfort that she'd come back... but I think it just made her withdraw further.

I think I understand why. She... shouldn't be around me like this. Valerie has always believed that we are spiritually influenced by the people we surround ourselves with. That we're... influenced by the company we keep...

I'm... the last kind of company she needs right now. She needs someone full of life. Someone light, like she is. Someone... who hasn't taken a life... or two. Someone who... doesn't walk to Him in her dreams.

All of that is true. Those quotes Christian put up? They're mine. Whether you believe it or not, I've only ever wanted to protect Valerie. I've only ever TRIED to protect her. Now I fear I'm doing the exact opposite by just being in the same room as her.


My mind. My thoughts. Myself. ...I don't want any of it hurting her more than it already does. All I get in my head when I'm close to her is the image of black veins pulling to the surface over my skin... and then over her skin... where I had my arm around her. I see it. In front of my eyes. Paranoia? Mild hallucination? I don't care anymore. It's there. Real enough for me.


But Christian also lied. I didn't kill that officer. I will admit... that didn't flinch when he died though. I stared right into dead eyes and I didn't even fucking flinch...

Split... did tell the truth though. They did force me to take an innocent life. Someone not even in knowledge of Him. They made me kill him. Doubletake had... his hand around mine on a knife. The others held me from thrashing. Held me from getting away. Please believe me when I say I fought back. Please, I tried to fight back but... my body just didn't have the strength to it. After a week with Doubletake... I just... I didn't have the strength to fight them off. I couldn't. I tried, but I COULDN'T. That's when the persona of Doubletake fell away and Verin replaced it. He had... me "draw" with the knife. Everywhere. The bound body was... just a waterfall of blood to the floor. The screaming tore into my head. It felt like it lasted forever. I refused to watch... but that didn't stop me from feeling it. I can still feel it. Flips my stomach every time I...

The... man eventually died of blood loss.

I can... still feel the blood on my face. The Operator Symbol. Just another thing... another thing...

Christian. Split. Doubletake. Verin. CryptX. Eclipse. Ben. Raphael. Parasite. Valor.

Those are just a few of them... and they are all just one Proxy. He goes by a variety of names. Each one with its own personality and history that he'd ramble on about. In his spare time, he'd create a new persona for himself. His "main" is Doubletake.
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Doubletake - or DT - is an infiltrator. He becomes whatever he needs to in order to get what he wants. For whatever purpose he has. This made for... absolute Hell. I couldn't predict him. I couldn't try to twist his mind around back on him. I couldn't get a feel for how he moved. What ticks he had. It all changed. Constantly. Every single fucking persona was completely different from the last and he would rotate them in and out to his pleasing.

One face with a million different masks. By the end, I had given up on trying to mind-wrestle him. I gave up fighting. I let him try to poison my mind with his words as Parasite. I let him whisper words of "friendship" and "protection" as Christian. I let him hit me as Verin. I just began to wait. Wait for an opportunity to get away. Any opportunity.

I... finally got one in the bush.

I swear, the second I got out of the car, I felt this cold chill sink into me. I couldn't help but think that, in the dead of night... trees... in general... really do look... really...

...

Sorry, I... I can't do this right now. I ccan't concentrate... my head is just... I can't... i can't... cant...







goddammit why cani stil l feel you FROM THIS DISTANCE?!??!