((Instead of having Clo write another barely-legible journal, I've decided to go the way of a third-person story. Because with one eye, little understanding of grammar and all those knocks to the head... yeah, she ain't no Shakespeare.))

Morning breaks upon the once-abandoned crumbling brick, her shoddy castle, a sanctuary of vermin within the bog. Light filters through grimy windowpane to the interior. Shadows of trees surround, creep within, block out some of the sun with their shapes. Upon a pullout bed rests one blue, lethargic, resentful, clutching bottle and whatever else may bring relief - syringe, tourniquet, plastic bag. No substance too strong. No feeling too weak. The Spider weaves her own web of destruction, not a single care if her undoing is to befall in those moments. Dispassionate eye opens to the world outside herself, soaking in the dim light of day, blurred objects in vision devoid of depth perception soon remembered as what they are. A table, a laptop, a cage. Ideal setup, of course. Neighbors and stolen daughter forbidden from entering, this is her sanctuary, company found here only in the rats and spiders in corners. She has no qualms with the vermin. After all, she is one of them.

Slinking slowly from her slumber, Clover - the Spider - rises, azure locks strewn haphazard, untamed as owner. Where green hued eye once rested sits a void of dead muscles, damaged in self mutilation. But all can be covered. Replaced with falsities. It's all she knows how to do: cover pain with whatever may be lying around, easily obtainable. Whatever may shield weakness. In such a quick manner she grabs at gray-hued glass, false eye easily popped into place, though it makes no movements, muscles behind the device in utter devastation. Similarly useless teeth grind together, noise sickening, those sharpened ivories becoming thinner and weaker over time from wear.

Morning has come.

And as such, Clover awaits the day. Lottie doesn't seem to have awoken yet, as no screams to be let out have been made, nor have her neighbors come upstairs to see the child. Within corners insects await, though they know their homes are safe, as the menace with a wild bushel of blue hair does not ever seem to try and get rid of them. In fact, she keeps larger ones in tanks surrounding, pets though rarely taken care of. Instead, she simply watches. Interested, almost understanding, though the woman's capacity for empathy leaves little to be desired.

Chaotic thoughts drift back to the night before. Pain sticks to expression, lopsided as it may be from damage.

'Just me and you.'

The Spider scowls. Clenches damaged fists. Squints eye. The one she had once dubbed Crimson is now constant in mind's eye, prodding at all senses of security she may have harbored. Her vision appears constant now. That drunken night in the grass, self-destructive morning upon the roof, lonely days in the closet with a forgotten carriage, and painful night once more, ending with Bob's pickup truck. It keeps returning to mind, unable to be shut out. Trust is clung to no longer. Upon first meeting of the two started a chain reaction; Aurora. CeCe. Zlata. Deadly actions spiraled, no end in view. Her upcoming payment is thought over, analyzed, scrutinized. But all in all, one thing is certain to the Spider: trust no longer, unless such is earned.

There are two who have earned that trust, but only one now to fall back upon. The first had met death upon her arrival, taken from the world by the Spider herself. No forgiveness is offered to herself, even still. But dwelling upon it had cost her eye, a carving on her thigh. Ercadia. Ercadia. Ercadia. No name more stinging to the woman, no guilt more powerful. It remains constant, a reminder carved quite literally into her flesh, a name she has damned herself to view forever.

The second to earn that trust, over time, has been the one named Voltiel. The Spider views her strangely, at this point; a mother, almost, though her own mother had little to do with her upbringing, resentment shared between the two. No, this is different. There is trust Clover holds. Still uneasy, but trustful in the end. One has to be towards the one who had saved her numerous times. Thinking back, she has tried to save the other as well, an attempt to reciprocate that trust: the hospital, that piranha enclosure on the street, this throbbing bullet wound.

The wound patched by the trusted pains, a dull ache, fever high. She dares not to look, though she knows it's not a good sign. A deep wound to the muscle in her shoulder, it's destructive, left arm aching with traveling discomfort. But she knows well that she isn't going to go to the hospital, as she probably should. No. Too many memories in such a dreary place. Responding to touch with bite and scratch, she is not an ideal patient; one too many times she has been locked within, drugged to the point where muscles no longer responded, last time filled with regret of the name carved on her leg. She has seen the woman's corpse only yards away, the smell of rot thick within chambers. No. She's not going back. Not if she has any say in the matter.

A rat skitters past, frightful of the irate woman, retreating to its hole within crumbling brick. The Spider does not stir; she's silent, watchful, though her vision is shoddy at its very best. She feels comforted only by the rats, the ants, the beetles, the spiders, the vermin.

After all, she's one of them.