Through the looking glass [D2, LE]

[Samantha Hayne]

She did not have many of those happy memories; just a few, perhaps, that washed over her. Enough so that she might forget, for just a few moments what she had to do. Playing in the woods, back when Minuit wasn't what it is today. The smell of a good roux being prepared when she came back home from her adventures. Bedtime stories.

But then she remembered what had happened to her. How it had all been interrupted. And what the *thing* Mother had replaced her with had *done* to her family in her absence. And those warm fuzzy feelings were once more replaced by the chill of revenge. She turned back to the mirror; the connection forged by the glamour presumably still open; allowing her to see into the Fetch's room. Where, at this hour, if last evening had been part of the routine, she should be sitting in her chair. Or perhaps this evening she'd retired to the bed already.

Either way, Samantha was determined to see her. And even speak. She willed the mirror to transmit her voice; and spoke.

"Wake up, Medea."

[Dapper Dog]

Medea stirred in her sleep or perhaps nap and said, "Huh... hmm..." She seemed so small in the bed, the fetch, the woman that should not be... but was.

Next to her sat a glass of water and a shiny red apple.

[Samantha Hayne]

The apple gave her a moment's pause, but she decided to ignore it.

"Wake up," she said again, "Lest you never wake again."

[Dapper Dog]

She stirred slowly and said, "Oh... it's just you... or me... can't you leave an old woman be or is this my end?"

[Samantha Hayne]

"You are not a woman," she said, just a disembodied voice coming through the mirror for now. Perhaps she'd show her face, her real face, when the time was right. But not now. Not yet.

"You are a thing. And you will answer for your crimes."

[Dapper Dog]

"I am an old woman, and I am more woman than you can be and if you wish to make me suffer know that old age and this damn bed have beaten you to the punch. Now..." she said breathing in deeply gathering her strength.

"Feel better about yourself... whatever you are?"

[Samantha Hayne]

"You are *none* of de things you say," she said, a coldness to her voice.

"You're not even *real*. You are a *thing*, not even made of flesh, and blood, and bone. A fake. A thing that took my place. Tell me, thing, why did you do it? Why did you twist the family so? We were never like dis. We did not murder guests. We did not bow 'fore greed. We cared for Minuit. And it cared for us. Now what have we become? What have you *done* to us?"

[Dapper Dog]

She coughed and then replied, "I lived... I twisted nothing that didn't already exist. A family is more than person, you blame me but you should blame everyone involved..."

She finished with, "I will not apologize for living a life given to me."

[Samantha Hayne]

"Unrepentant couyon! You do not even know what you have done. Defan Pauvre would roll in his grave! Do not think dat because you are old and near death, dat I can not make you suffer for your arrogance and lack of remorse. Do not tink that death itself would save you from it. De spirits are ever within my reach, Medea. Dey have been ever since dat night oh so many years ago. Do you remember, de night in the cemetary? Midnight? When you were but a young girl."

[Dapper Dog]

She scoffed and said, "Do your worst."