The Butterfly Girl: A Star is Born

One More Thing

[Sophia]

The next day, Apollo and I came back to the tree house where the twins were waiting for us. Apollo brought them some food and told them they could come to the house any time they wanted something to eat. It's always a bit of a hassle bringing food out here, not to mention the "ant" problem we had a few years back. The twins understood, curious to try a different variety of foods. So far, they liked Apollo's cooking the most.

A while later, Teri appeared. This time, she climbed out of the pond with her legs and came to sit underneath the tree house with us. We greeted each other and talked happily for a while. Until Apollo and I looked at each other and knew that it was time. We had talked about this yesterday evening and agreed that it was time for them to know the truth. There was no point in hiding it any longer. They had a right to know. Their attention turned towards us and the smiles faded from Apollo and I. We both sighed and Apollo spoke first.

"Okay..... so, Sophie and I were talking last night, and... well, there's been something we've been meaning to tell you about and you deserve to know."

"What is it?" Teri asked.

Apollo glanced at me as I pulled my satchel towards me and started rummaging through it. He scratched the back of his head nervously.

"Well... Teri, I know before when you first met me, you said you were afraid of... monsters living up here."

"Yes?"

"And, you two, I know Sophia promised you that you'd both be completely safe up here and you had nothing to worry about..."

"Yeah?"

"But... the truth is..." Apollo trailed off, too nervous to continue. I pulled out an old composition notebook and ragged my bag aside.

"The truth is... there are actually... some monsters up here." I finished. I saw everyone's faces switch to surprise and concern as I flipped through the notebook, finding the page I wanted them to see and laying it out in front of them neatly in the dirt. Teri and the twins looked down at the pages.

They were sketches, or... old and messy sketches of the Shadovians. Most of them were drawn in pencil, but one or two sketches were filled in with black ink. They all looked similar, but in different poses. Some were just the faces, and by faces I mean, black scribbles that vaguely resembled the face of wolves. (Or... more like a poor rendition of one.) But they eyes were all colored with red. The brightest red pen I had.

"Sophie, what are these?" Teri asked.

"Oh, I made them a long time ago. They're not... the best, but I did what I could. It's really hard to get them to look right. But, I mean... technically, either way they look the same."

The sketches were messy, sure, but it really was the best I could do. Some of the pencil and pen strokes were curled to resemble the shadows or smoke. Others were simple stray lines to give the effect that the creature wasn't... tangible. Completely physical. I hoped the illustrations helped get our point across. I saw Teri lean forward to get a better look.

"What Sophie means is..." Apollo continued. "We... she calls them... Shadovians. Wow, you're right, that does sound weird to say out loud."

"I know, right?"

"Anyway, these... these things are real creatures. And they're very, very dangerous."

"Wait... I do know these. I've seen them before..." Teri interrupted.

"You've seen them too?"

"Yes! That day... It was the day we met! We lost track of time and when I was trying to go back to the lake, those... those things came out and attacked us!"

"Yes, that's right! Those are the same creatures."

"You know what they are?" Teri asked.

"Well... no... not really. But, they've been around for a long time. Probably as long as we've lived, but... there's only so much we actually do know."

"So... why are you telling us this now? Why couldn't you tell us before?" the twins asked. Apollo and I exchanged nervous glances before continuing.

"Well, because... at the time, we didn't know how to tell you. And, if we're being honest... we weren't sure if we could... trust you. But after everything that's happened, I realize now that we should've told you everything before. We should've... prepared you for what was actually up here. Besides ourselves..." Apollo explained. I nodded along with him, agreeing with everything he said.

"If anything... I wasn't even sure if you'd even believe us. Even if we tried to warn you. But, well... now you know." I added.

"Okay, well... I can understand that. But... what exactly are these creatures?" Teri asked.

Apollo explained it all to Teri, similiar to how I explained it to the twins, but in better detail.

The Shadovians are dark and dangerous creatures that have been here since who knows when. They've appeared, ambushed and attacked us since we were kids. Even while we were attending school, they never stopped. (Can you imagine how hard it was not only to hide our true selves, but to hide our scratches and bandages so no one would get suspiscious? We could only tell the teachers so many times that it was just an accident from riding our bikes.)

Truthfully, Apollo and I don't and still don't know what they really are. They're just these creatures that almost look like evil wolves with bright red eyes that blend and hide in the shadows, waiting for us so they can try to kill us. They're especially more dangerous at night. Apollo told the quick tale of when we were kids and we stayed up late, basking in the darkness of the forest, stargazing and just playing around. It was one of the closest times we ever came to getting killed. They were stronger, more determined, and much harder to see in the dark which made them all the more terrifying. I had never seen so many of them come out at once. Since then, Apollo and I would hide away in the tree house every night, refusing to come out until the sun rose. Then when we found the abandoned house and took it as our own, we finally made it a rule to never, ever go out in the forest at night for any reason. While the Shadovians still appear in the daylight, they're much less frequent and easier to see, which also makes it easier to flee from them or fight them off.

The twins made a good point of asking why we didn't just stay indoors forever so we wouldn't get attacked so often. The simple truth was... we didn't like to be cooped up. Hiding our true existence from the eyes of humans is one thing, but to hide and stay in complete solitude was something we just couldn't stand.

While the house gives us shelter and safety with all the amenities we need, and all the comforts and entertainment we need to either stay busy or relax, the tree house and the forest beyond is the real safe place for us. Where we can actually let our wings loose, to stretch and run around, to yell and shout and laugh loudly all with no fear of normal people spotting or hearing us. Here, we were truly free to be ourselves without fear, without shame, without consequence.

Don't get me wrong, I like being lazy and spending days on end watching cartoons and playing endless video games and working on my art as much as anyone, but going outside, being able to let my wings hang open and to see the world with both my eyes uncovered... that's something I couldn't stand to lose. Sure, it also came with the risk of being mauled to death by viscious shadowy creatures every now and then, but it was a risk Apollo and I were willing to accept. We only ever stay near the tree house, we never wandered far off into the forest like we used to. We only went as far as the lake, and the waterfall that stood on the other side. If we wanted to go to the beach, we'd just fly there as walking the entire way wasn't really an option. The Shadovians were more likely to attack us if we went deep enough into the forest, where they could easily hide amongst the trees. To us, it seemed like the area around the lake and the tree house were the only "safe zones". For some reason, they've never come anywhere near those areas so there was never a reason for us to worry about getting attacked whenever we felt like just hanging out and getting some air.

Teri and the twins were a little confused, but they understood. We were both merely victims of circumstance. We were just doing whatever we could to live, to stay hidden, and to enjoy life... however way we could.

Teri and the twins of course had a lot more questions, and most of them couldn't be answered simply because we didn't know. We know it doesn't make any sense, but we had no clues or means to figuring out why things were... the way they were.

Why are Apollo and I the only ones out here living like this? How and why were we born with wings? Why was it just us? How could we be sure there weren't more like us out there? How come the humans have never heard or seen these Shadovians elsewhere? (Apollo even tried researching them a long time ago, but we came up with nothing. No links, nothing related or even anything that could be described similarly to the Shadovians. All we found was just cool art in a similar style to the real Shadovians, but that's it.)

And if humans had never seen or heard of Shadovians before, then why were they just here? Why did they only come after us? It's almost as if they're trying to stay hidden from the human world too. I mean, the tree house lies pretty closely to the neighborhood we live in, but it's also far enough where no one would randomly stumble across it. Not to mention the fence that goes around the whole area. But then how were the Shadovians even smart enough to know how far to stay hidden from the human world? How was any of that even possible? We really don't even know where they come from, they just live in the shadows. They are the shadows. But the mystery around our own existence was also just as vague.

You know, once I thought that maybe Apollo and I were test tube babies. Mutant freaks made by the power of unethical science for some unknown purpose. Like in Maximum Ride. But I quickly realized how much of that doesn't make sense either. It wouldn't explain the Shadovians, or the crystal gem I have that can turn into a sword. It just didn't fit.

Apollo had hopes that maybe we were in some kind of Percy Jackson situation. That we were children of some other world with other beings like us, until something happened that left us all alone to survive and fight back against the last forces of... darkness... or something like that. Maybe our real families are still out there somewhere, looking for us, or waiting for us to come find them so we could all live happily again. And while I don't mean to be a bit of a downer, but I had a sense that it just couldn't be that either. It felt too... simple? Too... easy? I dunno, but his theory was just about as plausible as mine.

All we had were pieces.

Very small pieces that didn't seem to fit no matter which way we thought about it.

And now with Teri and the twins thrown into the mix, we had more pieces, but..... we were no closer to discovering the real picture. In fact, we only had more questions.

Nothing about the Shadovians made sense.

Nothing about us makes sense.

Nothing about Teri's underwater kingdom or the caves where the twins live, which are both in close proximity to where we live, makes any sense. And almost feels too much like a coincidence.

The only real answer we could give was... we don't know.

We just don't know.