3: Silence

Alexandrie thought she was on the verge of panicking as she ran into the temple dedicated to the sky. She found a corner to hide, pulling her knees up and hood forward to make herself as small as possible, breaths short, chest heaving, nostrils flaring.
To anyone who wasn’t Alexandrie Donadieu, Alexandrie Donadieu was panicking.

The Fulxithii’s screech and sudden rocket upward was one thing. A creature a foot and a half taller than she shooting into the sky was an alarming sight even before the creature had been standing right beside her. For a moment, she’d feared Kazsra had led her into a trap. But the sheer distress of the avian told her otherwise and she kicked herself for saying she wanted to do this alone. She couldn’t read minds, she wasn’t good at soothing or calming or anything like that. She couldn’t learn about people the way Spider did, or impress them the way Lucas did - and she couldn’t do it from the ground when Kazsra had taken to the sky -

Merde.

She’d liked the relaxed curiosity the Fulxithii offered, was enjoying asking and answering questions. And now she had frightened her and Kazsra would look at her the way Lucas had: with fear, or suspicion or -

She didn’t even know how to call her or if she even could, so she sat in the temple with the sound of something looking for her and La Chanson nudging her fears. Every thought was jumbled, nothing felt right, or clear.

Nothing made sense.

When Alexandrie left home, there had been a sense of excitement. Hope. Fear, yes, but fear based in insecurity based on her ability to do something Grandmère had not been able to do. Now… Now she suspected she could do whatever La Chanson asked. It knew she could, even if she didn’t know she could, so she must be able to, but she had deep misgivings about whether she should. In all the time she had heard La Chanson, she’d never heard it sound anything like that before. All the times she had scared people, all the times she’d been told people were afraid of her or La Chanson…was this what they were hearing?
Is this what they saw?

There was something wrong, and there was something wrong with her, specifically. Because what she’d heard had been frightening. She knew that. And she’d just gone from temple to shrine to learn the differences between them. If she’d wanted to escape the sound, she should have run to a shrine. But here she was, in a temple - hiding - because to be without La Chanson was…frightening.
It was frightening.

After a year and a half of this constant companion, did she like it? Or was she used to it? She didn’t know, and that was even more frightening.

For whatever reason she had been chosen by an entity to go to a place and carry out a task. Had others refused? Who were they? What were they like? What lives did they live?

Did they fear silence?

Was she doing this out of fear or love? Did it even matter anymore? Had it ever mattered?

And why couldn’t the Ascended Saints hear La Chanson?