Chapter Text
Raya’s POV
I don’t know when I realised I was dreaming.
Maybe it was when the clouds started singing. Or when the grass beneath my hooves turned to silk — not in some surreal, dreamy way, but like my brain just gave up trying to remember what real grass felt like.
Nothing here feels quite right.
Not the air, not the light, not even my own body.
I’m walking, I think. Through a field of mirrors. Each one cracked. Bent. Some of them are fogged so badly I can’t see myself at all. Others — well, I wish I couldn’t see what they’re showing me.
There’s one where I’m laughing. Surrounded by the girls. Holding a mic, standing in front of a crowd.
I look happy in that one. It almost makes me mad.
Because I was happy once.
I just don’t remember when exactly that stopped.
I sit down. Or maybe the world sits for me — I can’t really tell anymore. My legs fold underneath me like they’re made of paper and my breath hitches. I can’t feel wind on my skin, but I can feel something inside pressing against my ribs, like it wants out.
Like it’s been wanting out for so long.
I don’t know when the sadness started. That’s the truth of it.
I wish I could say it was when Jackie died. Or Reyna. I wish I could point to one moment, one crack in the timeline, and scream — There. That. That’s when it broke.
But it didn’t start there.
It was before.
Somewhere quiet. Somewhere no one noticed. Maybe not even me.
Maybe it was that time everyone else was laughing and I smiled too but didn’t feel it. Or when I tried on the prettiest dress in the world and still felt like I wasn’t enough.
Maybe it was when I walked into a room and felt like everyone would rather I walk back out.
Little things.
Always the little things.
Piling on until I was underneath them and couldn't remember what breathing without pressure felt like.
Jackie and Reyna dying didn’t cause the hole. They just… tore off the lid I’d been keeping over it.
When they died, something inside me screamed — not with noise, but with silence. A quiet so big it swallowed everything else.
And I got so good at pretending I was fine.
At laughing a little too loud.
At acting like every outfit I wore could shield me from grief.
At brushing off every “you okay?” with a joke and a flick of my mane.
I mean, I’m Raya. I don’t fall apart.
Except I did.
I stood on that windowsill, almost as though it wasn’t really me acting but someone inside me who saw the deepest parts of me and wanted to help me get rid of it.
And I wanted to do it. Not just because the drug made me, but because I wanted to.
I just wanted to feel something different. I wanted to feel free.
And in that second, it felt like falling was the only way to do that.
Just for a second. Just to see what it would be like to stop fighting gravity.
And maybe part of me thought I’d wake up after. That someone would catch me. Or maybe I thought I wouldn’t have to wake up at all.
I didn’t want to die.
But I didn’t want to keep hurting either.
In this dream space, the mirrors keep whispering. One of them shows Jackie. Another shows Reyna. They’re together, laughing at something I can’t hear. I reach out to them, but my hoof only meets glass.
I try not to cry. I do.
But the tears come anyway. Not because I want to, but because I can’t remember the last time I didn’t feel like crying, even when I was smiling.
Even when I was surrounded by people who loved me.
That’s the part that makes no sense. I know I’m loved.
I just… don’t always feel it.
And I don’t know why.
I want to wake up.
I want to go back to the girls. To hug Flora and hear Penny yell in her weird chaotic way. To see Talia’s worried face and make her roll her eyes at my outfit choices.
I want Summer to insult me gently and pretend it was a compliment.
I want my friends.
I want me.
Wherever she went.
The mirrors start to fade. The silk grass turns back to stone. I feel a shift somewhere in my chest — a tug, maybe. Like someone’s calling me home.
But I’m not ready yet. Not until I say this.
If I come back… if I open my eyes…
Please don’t let me pretend again.
Please don’t let me lock it all back up and smile through the cracks.
Please don’t let me be fine.
Help me be real.
Help me come home.
Reyna’s POV
My back is pressed so hard into these iron bars, I can barely feel where I end and they begin.
Maybe I’ve become part of this cage. Maybe I’ll never be anything else.
I don’t remember what warm feels like. Or what time is. Or if I’ve always been in this dark, damp prison, aching in places I forgot I had.
Every part of me stings. Scrapes, cuts, bruises — some deep enough that I think they’ll scar if I ever get out of here.
If.
But pain doesn’t scare me anymore.
No. The thing that terrifies me — that’s been eating me alive every second since I woke up here — is lying limp on the cold stone just a few feet away. So still. So quiet.
Jackie.
She hasn’t moved in… hours? Days? Years?
She’s just been there, lying in the blood-stained silence of her own cage, and I can’t reach her. I’ve tried. God, I’ve tried. My arms are scratched raw from reaching through these bars, stretching so hard to get to her. To feel her.
But she’s always just… out of reach.
And I’ve been sitting here, whispering to her, telling her stories, begging her to wake up. Telling her I’m sorry. That I love her. That I can’t do this without her.
That I won’t.
And still… nothing.
Until now.
The softest sound breaks the quiet — a low, broken groan.
I freeze. My breath catches like a gasp that never gets out. My heart slams into my ribs so hard it hurts.
“Jackie?”
I whisper it like a prayer. A curse. A scream caught in trembling hands.
She shifts. Just barely. Her head turns a little. Her mouth parts.
I scramble forward, hands grabbing at the bars so fast I slice my knuckles again. I don’t care. I’m practically pressed against the metal, staring with wide, hopeful eyes.
“Jackie. Baby. It’s me. It’s okay—you’re okay. I’m here, I’m right here, oh my god—thank god—thank god.”
My voice cracks into a thousand jagged pieces. I can’t stop. I don’t want to stop. I just need her to say something. Anything.
She groans again, eyelids fluttering.
Then, finally, finally, she speaks:
“That’s… real sweet of you, sugar.”
I wait for her smile. For the little smirk that always comes after she calls me that. For her to say something dumb and flirtatious just to make me laugh.
But it doesn’t come.
She squints at me. Blinks. Her eyes are searching mine like I’m a math problem she doesn’t understand.
“But, uh…” Her voice is a strained whisper. “Who… are you?”
Silence.
Cold. Deafening.
My world doesn’t just fall apart — it implodes.
I forget how to breathe.
“W-What?” I croak. My voice is barely there.
She blinks again. No recognition. No light in her eyes. Just… confusion. Distant, broken confusion.
She doesn’t know me.
She doesn’t remember.
All this time — all these days — I’ve clung to the idea that she’d wake up and she’d see me and everything would be okay again. She’d say something ridiculous like “you look like shit,” and I’d laugh and say “you look worse,” and we’d be us.
But this?
This is worse than her being gone.
Because she’s right there.
And she doesn’t know me.
“I—” My hands are shaking now. My fingers slip down the bars. “I’m…”
I can’t say it.
I can’t even find the words. I want to scream. To sob. To shatter.
But all I manage to whisper — barely more than a breath — is:
“I’m yours.”
And she blinks like she doesn’t even understand what that means.
And it kills me.
A fresh sob claws its way up my throat and I press my forehead against the bars, as close as I can get. I don’t care how much it hurts. I want to break these goddamn bars with my fists. I want to shatter the world that put us here.
“Please…” I whisper. “Please remember me.”
But she just stares.
And the silence between us is heavier than any chain.
I want to tell her everything. About the firelight on her skin. About the time we danced barefoot in the barn until the sun rose. About how her hands holding mine made the world quiet. About how her voice saying my name was the only sound that ever made me feel real.
But I don’t.
Because right now, she doesn’t even know my name.
And all I can do is sit here, in the dark, and bleed for a love that I might never get back.