hadriel | audio;

[Henry's voice may be recognisable from the Guard's announcement a few days ago. Yet on this occasion, unlike then, he speaks quickly and sharply with a forceful urgency. There's no time for him to lock this to the Guard.]

Pay heed! Hope's temple may soon come under assault by a monster far more terrible than its kin. Through savage harm it plans to lure out Hope. If you be within, do not leave the temple's protection unless you are prepared for death.

[The reason for his warning quickly makes itself known, faster than Henry would have liked. This voice, too, might be recognised by some.]

I will do far worse than kill.

[Every attempt at emotion is still off kilter, still too dampened by clarity and ice to sound right. It sounds like Kate but all the same it is not, not even a little. It lilts in all the right ways but it sounds like it hasn't ever felt emotion before this.

Which makes sense, because it was only brought into the world a few short hours ago.]

Preparing for death isn't very useful when I don't want you dead, Not yet. Not until your skin is peeling from the burns and every bone in your body is snapped in two. Or more. It doesn't matter that much.

[That is where he switches off his phone, so that it cannot prove a distraction in the fight ahead. Consider yourselves warned about the Torturedemon, Hadriel. There will be no replies from Henry, but feel free to talk among yourselves.]

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[ It takes a while for anything to come through from this version of Kate's voice, because she's still trying to sort all of the facts out. She knows, somehow, what that thing is. She doesn't know what it looks like, but she can feel it in her bones, has a gut-clenching awareness of its existence and movement.

That it has her voice is fucking terrifying and she can't even find the energy to hide her fear when she answers. ]

That's-- That is definitely not me.

[She sounds sincere, but Emily remembers that dream too vividly, the--

No. Stop it. That's not helping any.

Breathe.]

It sure as fuck sounds like you!

[And now, Emily makes the transition from afraid into angry, her voice hard when she speaks next.]

Why does it sound like you, Kate?

[ So many reasons. All of them ones she cannot bring herself to say. Saying why is saying 'shit, we fucked up' and she knows they have, knows because there is no fucking evidence of the Door being anywhere in sight and this fucking post even exists in the first place. But even so, admitting how badly this went wrong just will not come out right now,

not while there is some very, very small part of her that still kind of thinks there may be some way to salvage this. If only this monster - if only her monster can somehow manage the thing she knows it's aiming for... maybe. ]

Guess I have a fucking monster now, don't I? [ Her voice is a growl, an unstable mix of emotions that she shouldn't be directing at Emily, not really. Not if she thinks about it - the only person who should be having that mix directed at them is her. She could have gotten through this all with a lot less bother if only she hadn't jumped on the first half-chance of getting out of here without thinking and without resting for the entire mess of it all. She may have never had a monster, or if she did, maybe it would have been a whole lot less fucking nauseating than hearing her own voice promising torture across the network.

But she's so fucking tired of being underground. So fucking tired of being reminded of her late teens and early twenties at every turn because this fucking place has to look like some upgraded version of the tunnels she spent years fighting in. She's so tired of trying to live some semblance of the life she wants down in a place that seems designed to bring her back to those days.

She just wants to get above ground. Right now she doesn't even care if it's LA, Manchester, or the fucking moon. ]

[Is. Is that all you have to say for yourself.]

NO SHIT, GENIUS.

How are you gonna stop it?

[Your monster, your responsibility.]

[ Are you kidding her, Em? The messages from Kate are taking half an hour at least to come through each time because she's just too tired, as if the fact that she's not even trying to keep her voice its usual level of unfazed isn't enough of an indication. ]

I don't fucking- [ She physically can't manage to move more than a few feet without her limbs shaking too badly to move any further. Trying to stop that thing would be impossible. She doesn't even know where she'd begin if she hadn't burned herself out on working on everything possible this week.

Her voice lowers to a hiss, one that's all exhaustion and reluctant admission; ] I am too fucking exhausted to move. What do you think I could do?

[Any respect Emily had for Kate falls away just then, whether for the moment or for longer, she doesn't know. But nobody talks to Emily like that, nobody gives her that kind of attitude, not when for once, she's not the one who did something wrong here.

And Kate clearly did something wrong.]

Are you fucking kidding me? This is your monster. Do not talk to me like I should be the one fixing your shit for you. How the fuck did this even happen? What the fuck is going on here? First Sharon pulls some fucking magic trick out of her ass and makes this shithole even scarier than it is on a bad day, and now what, you decided it wasn't bad enough?

[Her pause now is brief, but full of indignation, almost palpable through the audio feed.]

Stay the fuck away from me and my friends, Kate. Leave us alone.

[Before Kate can get a word in, Emily shuts off the feed. She hasn't given Kate reason to be angry at them (except maybe now), but somehow she gets the feeling she and her friends won't be seeing Kate or her monster anytime soon. And if they do? Well, Chris said something about a flamethrower.]

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