[Title] Fading Away
[Rating] G
[Fandom] BBC's Look and Read: Through the Dragon's Eye
[Notes/Summary] Morris knows he's helpless against Charn's powers.
It was very cold in the house now. So cold that Morris didn't think he could even knit any more. Not that he would have anyway. He didn't want to make any noise. He didn't want to attract Charn's attention in any way.
Click. Click. Charn's fingernails - no, talons, really, that was a better word - idly tapped the table. Morris tried not to look at them. He was trying not to look at a lot of things right now. Charn. Jenny's pale, terrified face. The purple puddle which had once been Doris, she hadn't yelled or anything, maybe you didn't know it was happening once it had happened. Because your brain and eyes and mind and everything that would notice, all that melted away, didn't it? Didn't it? Except what if it didn't all go at the same time? What if the bits behind your eyes lasted long enough to feel the rest of you collapsing into liquid?
Why had he thought that? Why was he wasting time being scared when he should be trying to do something?
Well, he couldn't do anything right now. Charn was looking straight at him. Morris tried not to look back, but he couldn't stop himself, couldn't stop glancing at the bleached bones of Charn's beaked face and scrawny ribcage. How could someone end up like that? No wonder he hated them all.
There were too many bad things in the world, really, when you actually sat down and thought about it. Probably being able to read only made it worse, only told you more bad things, but at the same time he wished he could. Then he would be useful. He'd have something Charn wanted. As it was, both of them knew that all he could do was knit really long scarves and look after caterpillars.
Well. Not that there were any caterpillars left to look after now. He wasn't going to look at those puddles because Charn would see him looking and besides, he'd only start thinking stuff again, like how it wasn't fair, how Frug and the others were just pets, they hadn't been dangerous, how Charn had just melted them because he'd wanted to see Morris's reaction -
- he'd stared down at the edge of his jumper and picked at a loose seam and tried not to cry but Charn had laughed anyway -
- actually. Actually, Charn was probably going to melt Morris for exactly the same reason. He wasn't dangerous and he couldn't do anything so Charn would melt him just to make Jenny sad or to scare the others into coming back or something like that. There was nothing he could do about it.
He hunched down further in the chair, trying not to shiver too much. It felt like he was fading away already.