I DON'T WANT TO SEE IT AT MY WINDOWSILL | return

[QUIET]

[align=center][div style="text-align:justify;width:55%;font-family:verdana;"]She could feel it long before any cloud began to go dark, before the first rumble of thunder rolled like the earthquake that had shaken her to life. Every cell, every nerve ending in her form had begun to buzz, a low vibration that detected even the most shallow shifts in pressure and temperature as the breeze picked up, the sky darkened. Rain. A great joy even in this space, where water continuously permeated the forest floor to create a thick, swampy muck. The taste of it, fresh water on her skin, was a joy that she could not ascribe to words - not that she could speak, anyway, for the disease in her throat constricted wildly at any attempt. It did not help that her ailment had been awakened by the low pressure and humidity; she didn't stand a chance in attempting to appear more civil than she had.

(Which was to say, most thought her feral. Her agonized attempts to join civilization gave her very little grace.)

The library, a monument in the center of town, was a vast structure whose gutters had long since ceased to function. Where the piping bent and broke in places, the heavy rain cascaded down in waterfalls and pooled in the dirty asphalt. It was, in her terms, perfect - the weather, the opportunity to refresh herself, the silence of the quiet day. The parasites in her throat, her chest, buzz low in a purr. The algae-laden creature gives little thought to her surroundings, to the child passing to enter the library, as she situates herself beneath a broken gutter and grins. The flora adorning her pelt unfurls and she gives a happy shake, ignorant to the plight of Ivan until a cry rings through the open double-doors.

She can feel his racing pawsteps, low and pounding like the rain as they made a path through the bookcases within. She does not blink an eye - the going-ons of her surrounding peers meant little, when she had only allowed her presence to be known for a week and a day. It's only when the half-open doors are shoved aside and Ivan comes tumbling out, hurling a glass bottle at the stonework, that she allows herself a silent glimpse of the contained chaos before her. The swarm in her lungs buzzes at the soft tink of broken glass on stonework.

The creature stills, allows the flow of rain to cascade down on her head for a moment longer. Ivan curls in on himself, and she can hear a soft sob escape his throat. Poor thing. Shame, there was little she could do but watch and wonder what had gone on behind those doors. She plods out into the open rain. Tilting her head, she opens her maw to reveal a row of teeth, and attempts, in vain, to comfort him. "Ch-ch-ch-ch..." The sound is a low chatter, the beginning of "Child." The parasites allow her nothing more. But, with glass pricking both their paws, she lowers her head and allows him a meaningful silence.