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Lollipop opened her eyes.
She felt the soft cotton of her grayish white gown cling to her rose red skin. Sweating bricks as usual, the impact of her light-fast travel making her feel sore everywhere. Her naked ankles sensed a warm, comfortable surface, reminding her of human heat. She loved human heat.
Velvet. Burgundy-toned velvet, covering almost every surface of that Oasis.
Lollipop sat up, legs still in an awkward position that made it seem like she had fallen from the tenth floor of a skyscraper. Her delicate hands, temporarily free from the skinless prison she only had to be trapped in once every six days, covered in tiny scars and callouses from centuries-old deadly acts, never seemed to heal. She dragged the wounded index finger of her left hand across the newly discovered surface, her prominent spine feeling an electrifying yet already familiar shiver. Lollipop sighed in surprise, immediately taking her finger off of it only to rub her whole arm against it. Then the other arm, then the boney shoulders, then the tortured back, then the long, blood red hair, spilled in irregular patterns against the velvet as she then laid her head on the surface.Her iridescent yet dead blue eyes were then caught by a dim, yellowish light exhaling from a few meters away. Lollipop let out another sigh, this one deeper than the previous one, trying to ignore the obvious ache that struck her muscles as she got up. A guttural groan escaped her raspy throat, bruised feet solemnly dragging her body across the new space she had to call home for the following days. Her chapped lips exhibited her usual smile, though much more than a force of habit this time.
She got her.She got her.She is somewhere else now.It’s okay.It’s okay.
The trippy arcade she had been forced to stay in with only a bucket of Trauma to keep her alive for five days was nowhere to be seen. She didn’t find the previous devastatingly cold, paper-filled office either, with only a spoonful available of the liquid she had to ingest in order to live, much to her utter satisfaction. Those had been the worst days of her life, the worst days of her three thousand years of existence, and she managed to get rid of them entirely.
The brutal change of scenery struck Lollipop completely, her head a dizzy mess of visual pleasure. Broken modern furniture decorated it, a handful of half-empty syringes filled with some glittery liquid drenching the velvet floor in its content, broken glass cracking under Lollipop’s calculated yet sloppy steps yet not slicing the palms of her feet. Handfuls of multicolored sequins soaked the velvet floor here and there, mixed with snow white dust Lollipop was already familiar with, and broken chunks of sliver glittered eye shadow. A black chariot on the left filled with oversized coats and tracksuit parts had been knocked to the floor, the clothes stained with substance and shimmer. A beautiful black piano graced her view on the right, twenty-seven of its white keys gone. They were nowhere to be seen around the rest of the Oasis either. Paintings of tigers, rabbits, and snakes could be seen on the equally velvet walls, perfectly nailed on them. She averted her tired gaze to the left, a little farther away, finding the source of dim light that was now softly incandescent, bleeding consistently out of a broken diamond chandelier, colorless glassy shards adorning the edges of something that made Lollipop gasp in surprise, then disbelief, then pure ecstasy. She fell to her knees, the smile on her lips now a sign of relief, a desperately formed contortion of muscles upon a feeling. A real smile.A pool the size of an entire mansion living room, filled with what could be described as bloody water by the common eye, delimitated the space before her, the chandelier’s debilitated yet perfect light letting Lollipop see it was as deep as she could go standing up. It was made for her.Lollipop crawled to the central space that separated the velvet from the liquid subsistence, consisting of a smooth obsidian plaque with human inscriptions on it.
SKYE GISELLE RILEY1995-2022
She began with a little chuckle, then a giggle, then an irresistible stream of breathy laughs. Not wicked laughs. Not perverted laughs.
Laughs of joy.
Lollipop slowly stopped laughing, dragging a finger over the beautiful tombstone’s engraved letters, leaving a welcoming burning feeling in her fingerprints, almost as if she were caressing the soft, tortured face of her new host. Her face got closer and closer to the plaque, back arching as she lowered herself to touch the tombstone with her lips. She closed her eyes for brief seconds, letting that same burning feeling caress her lips as she smiled in relief. Lollipop then crawled closer to the edge of the pool, knees on the plaque, carved words marking her kneecaps as a way to bind her to that moment. She held her hands together, reaching for the sacred liquid and collecting just a bit for her to taste. The entity nuzzled her nose against the cocoon created by her hands, audibly slurping its content. She slowly threw her head back, cautiously swallowing the warm food she had been craving ever since she latched onto the cop from Jersey.
She opened her eyes wide.
Warmness invaded her chest, her stomach, her core, like reversed poison, intoxicating her body in teeth-rotting comfort, pulsating in her veins.
Lollipop looked at her own hands.
The tiny scars wrapped around her slender fingers were gradually vanishing, creating brand new tissue, stronger and more flexible than ever.
She formed a cocoon with her hands again, taking more liquid from the pool, slurping it faster than before. More warmth. Her whole hands seemed to be getting rid of the callouses that had haunted her fragile skin for near millennia. A silent, single tear, a watery black swirling inside it as if it were a miniature fortune ball, fell on her open hands, a subtle, comforting smile painting her now healed lips.Lollipop lunged forward, an animalistic will bursting her chest open. She gripped the edge of the pool with trembling hands, then grabbed her long blood red hair with both. Her head lowered itself once again, runny nose burying itself underneath the water, mouth slothfully opening itself wider and wider. She gulped three times, then kneeling as her iridescent eyes, now less dull, rolled back in growing ecstasy. A grunt escaped her rough throat, hands once again gripping the bedazzled edge of the pool, now trembling in a kind of anticipation Lollipop had never felt yet lingered in like a cat getting used to its new bed.Her shaking body was on all fours, head now fully sunk in the fresh Trauma that filled the pool. Her hair swirled around her face, drawing free hand patterns on the surface and beneath it, almost as if Lollipop’s skull had been split open and her blood was decorating the precious substance around her. Multiple, frenetic gulps could be heard, her neck letting them be nearly visible.She violently threw her head back, hair drenching the air in Trauma drops. As she got on her knees again, her vocal cords formed a high-pitched yelp, a stream of dark tears running down Lollipop’s face. Gasping for air, she smiled again. A real smile.
But it was time to start her engines.
Lollipop turned around, facing the wall on the side opposite to the pool. It was an entire screen, not yet turned on. Not a screen screen, like those humans were attached to in the era Lollipop was witnessing now. It was a membrane. In front of it, right on the velvety floor, two marks in the same exact shape as her hands awaited her touch. Lollipop walked confidently to them, a cunning blur in her kaleidoscopic eyes. She once again got on her boney knees, heels supporting her bottom, her now perfect hands placing themselves on the marks, long, dark nails carved in the fluffiness of the burgundy velvet.
The membrane lit up.
It was as if Lollipop were wearing Skye without being Skye, witnessing her surroundings in first person. Her eyes were glued to the wide display, showing what the pop star’s eyes could see. Lollipop could sense Skye’s breaths in horrifying detail, fast and deep and unsure, drumming inside her own lungs in a precise reverb. The entity couldn’t bring herself to close her eyes, for Skye’s were wide open, fixated on the dark walls of the young woman’s cozy yet cold bedroom, similar to her own Oasis. Her lips were softly pressed against one another, warm and wet due to the copious amounts of water Skye had drunk before lying down on her king size bed.Lollipop’s fixation broke a little, her lips curving into a smile. That smile. Lollipop took her hands off of the marks, then placing her left one of its respective one with a hard slam, the impact making her palm ache lovingly. A sound of blood splashing on a wooden floor soared on Skye’s left. Skye’s gasp echoed in her pointy ears, feeling her skin’s warmth shift upon Skye lifting her back from the bed. Her eyes slowly averted to the place the sound had supposedly come from, Lollipop’s smile intensifying as she let out a small chuckle.Lewis Fregoli, with the same robe and underwear he had worn on the day he died, face mangled from the last time the weight hit his face.Skye quickly turned on the lights, Lollipop immediately taking her left hand off of the mark. She felt Skye’s head falling on the pillow beneath it, lips now parted, eyebrows exhibiting visible confusion. Satisfied with the little experimental scare, the entity got up, walking to the pool again, glitter and fake cocaine remains decorating her feet. She lied down next to the tombstone, finger tracing the perfectly carved letters that made her host’s name. Letting Skye fall asleep for a couple of hours, Lollipop let herself sleep as well. She hadn’t slept in over two thousand years.