This one was partly inspired by Melanie Martinez's "Pity Party" and Halsey's "Control" (just listen to those and imagine Cassie singing them to herself in a trembly, demonic voice while wandering the halls of her Murder Mansion). This might sound morbid, but I actually had a lot of fun with it (*sheepish smile*)


Pity Party

July 31 - Free Day

(say hello to the Pity Party AU: if the YouTubers had been too wary of 'The Host' and their invitation and the New Order hadn't just happened to go through the Twin Moons world portal, what might have become of Cassie Rose and Winslow?)


Every day and week and month that Cassie Rose has spent feverishly planning out the way tonight will go. Every bit of logic and creativity that she's poured into it. So, so many sleepless nights. Useless.

No. No, worse than useless. Wasted. All because of something she simply hadn't counted on. Something that she'd been so desperate not to let happen that she'd taken steps to make sure it didn't. And yet never once has it crossed her mind to make another plan, a back-up of sorts, in the event that it did.

Until now.

And it should've, it should've, she should've.

They – the 'YouTubers' – might be gullible and sickeningly sentimental and good for nothing except as a means to an end. But the fact remains that they're also experienced adventures. All of them. They know, understand, this hellhole of world twice as well as Cassie or Winslow ever will.

Had she really thought that releasing some zombies, of all things, would send them running straight into her mansion – and, in turn, straight to their deaths?

They'd been so close, her and Winslow. So close. It had practically been dangling in front of their noses. But never, ever close enough. Her portal home is sitting underground, just waiting to be lit and passed through, but without that precious key to light it with? It may as well be worlds away. Just like home.

Maybe...maybe it's some kind of cruel joke.

Is it?

Of course that's what it is. Cassie knows damn well, she probably knows better than anybody, what a sadistic sense of humour the world has. Why should anything good ever happen to her? Why should she be allowed to be happy? Ever?

For several long minutes, the bitterness and the hatred that Cassie's been running on for so long causes formless new plots and schemes to surge into the twists and turns of her mind, hastily constructed lies and fronts and manipulations snaking themselves around every thought like poison ivy around some sort of trellis, heart hammering, fingers twitching, blood sending thrills through her veins...and then it's all gone. Gone like the shallow euphoria one might feel after a few too many at the wine bar, only for the rippling veil that's been draped over cold reality to be lifted once again. Leaving a trembling girl in its wake, wandering from mockingly empty room to mockingly empty room (past the remains of the portraits which, thanks to her axe, now lie on the ground in so many shreds that it's impossible to tell which scraps belong to which painting, as though by doing that she can subject the people in them to some tiny part of what was happening inside her because of them) on shaking legs. Still waiting...waiting. Although for what, she's not sure anymore.

Stupid. Pathetic.

Remember that next time you think you have any glimmer of hope. Next time you think you'll ever be anything but a worthless brat and her bag of fleas.

No. She's not remembering that voice. She's not.

You stupid, stupid, stupid little girl.

"Stop."

The word falls out before she can pull it back. It doesn't matter anyway. Her croak (whimper) is quickly swallowed by the recycled whispers whose echoes follow her from room to room. By the faces that lurk in every corner, right down to the fractured walls of her mind's maze. Her mental cell. The kind that keeps the weak and the desperate ensnared in its web.

If only she could remember where she left the key.

Correction: Cassie knows damn well where she left the key. In other people's clutches.

A dead smile pulls at the corners of her lips. Really, that's the best of it. Doesn't she know better than to ever depend on anyone else for anything by now? Hasn't she learnt anything at all? What was it Soren had told her once, back when things had been simpler (well...before everything hurt in this way, at least)?

"You have a great deal of potential, Cassie. Don't let yourself throw it away. When you find your happiness, seize it; never leave the key to it in anyone else's pocket."

Soren. For a fleeting moment, she wishes he was here, just so she could go back to being a kid again, even if only for a few minutes. Hear his promises that it'll all be okay, empty as they always were. Let someone else look out for her for the first time in...in longer than she cares to remember. She wishes it so badly that she almost loses all sight of where she really is, who she really is, for a second - which is almost merciful, in its own sick sort of way.

Well. That ship has well and truly sailed, hasn't it? She's never going to see him again. So why bother lamenting his absence?

(Again.)

And the fact is, she's had no idea who she really is for months now. Years, in fact. So why should she go through all of this, turning it over and over and over in her mind?

(Again.)

Lost. She's lost. And nobody's there to help her to find her way. To catch her when she stumbles. To never let her fall this far in the first place.

(A-frickin'-gain.)

Maybe Cassie's knees buckle; maybe she throws herself down. Either way, she finds herself huddling into a ball under the dining table, subconsciously counting the innocuous little buttons on the underneath. This is what she did as a child. Find a place to hide. Wait, wait, wait for the world to make sense again. Beside her, Winslow lets out a long, low, vehement hiss, declining his little head upon her feet. He's done the same thing so many times over the years: curling up against her side or around her feet as she slept. Guarding her from the shadows and monsters lying in wait for her there.

Her little kitty. Always there with her when the dark comes slinking in. Even here and now.

Even there and then, back in the 'Old Builders' world. So long ago.

Did either of them ever leave that place? Oh, in a physical sense, of course they did (otherwise they wouldn't be trapped, confined, helpless yet again), but did they ever really, truly leave it behind them?

A mixture of snort, sob and burst of maniacal laughter explodes from Cassie's mouth as she throws her pounding head back against the table leg. She doesn't care about the throb it sends across her skull. She doesn't care about the lit candle that topples from the tabletop. She doesn't care about the wooden floor beneath her burning with the savagery of straw as the greedy little flame refuses to stay confined to one measly candle wick.

It's still her party, after all. She supposes she can cry if she wants to.

A toxic shroud of smoke rises around the two; flames spread their vivid skirts and dance around the room for them both. It's quite beautiful, really. And Cassie sits amongst the fragments of her most desperate hopes, hands coated with blisters and blood, with the dust of her sanity, and smiles.

The pitiful peal of a broken laugh is lost beneath the whispers of the blaze spilling out around her and of the frayed thread holding a heart together finally snapping.


Yay for ambiguous endings. Cassie Rose is one of those characters I really like writing about - and no, I don't really think she'd give up this easily (though who's to say that she has given up? (*DUN DUN DUUUUUN*)), but once this idea popped into my head, I just sort of ran with it.

My thanks to Toni for letting me borrow the concept of Cassie and Soren having a father-daughter relationship once upon a (probably somewhat happier) time. And, of course, many thanks to you guys for reading. Be wonderful to each other :)

(*awkwardly tips hat*)

~ Rainy