Chapter 1: The Crimson Canvas **The Fina
The world swam, a dizzying ballet of distorted shapes and fading light. A metallic tang, sharp and unwelcome, coated my tongue, a crimson tide spreading across the pristine white of the… well, the *thing*. Let’s call it a surreal canvas, soon to be irrevocably altered. The irony, you see, was exquisite. And as the darkness encroached, a twisted, almost gleeful humor, a macabre symphony played out in the face of my demise.
“You know,” I gasped, the air thick with a smell I wasn’t brave enough to identify. “One day, you’re going to get shot in the head by your *supposed* husband-to-be, along with his… (and this is where the humor *truly* shines) …his gosh-awful, ugly, strung-wire…*whore*!”
The words, unfortunately, caught in my throat, a painful, raspy wheeze. But, hey, a girl’s gotta get her last jabs in. “And then,” I continued, pushing through the pain, “you’ll think, ‘Oh my gosh, I could have been in bed watching 50 Shades of… *porn*!’”
A weak, pathetic chuckle escaped me, sounding remarkably like a dying seagull. “See what I did there? Eh, eh? Sarcasm before I… die. And no one would have given a single, solitary flying fig what I was doing, anyway.” The unfairness of it all, the cosmic joke, brought a fresh wave of bitterness, almost as potent as the metallic taste.
“But nooooo,” I wheezed, a thin thread of defiance clinging to the edge of oblivion. “I just had *luck* on my side.” The universe, I swear, was laughing at me.
“Anyways,” I mumbled, the world blurring at the edges, my laughter now devolving into a choked sob. “Looks like I’m dying. Goodbye… world (hahahaha haha ha).” A final, desperate attempt at levity, like a clown trying to juggle chainsaws while balancing on a tightrope made of razor wire.
The silence that followed was heavy, thick, and oh-so-deafening.
“…Fuck,” I whispered, the final thought a desperate plea, a prayer to whatever uncaring deity had orchestrated this mess. “At least you could have given me an orgasm right now…”
Another bitter laugh escaped me, a strangled sound. “…oh right. His dick was/is small and wonky, with a bend to it.”
*Sign.*
**A Momentary Pause for Dramatic Effect (and, you know, context)**
A Quick Word from Our (Presumably Dead) Heroine:
Oh, where are my manners? You’re probably wondering who I am, currently dying. My name is Erza Saint Balora. Yes, yes, the name is fancy, sounds a little… *suave*.
Blame my dear old adopted parents, who pulled me from the wonderful, vibrant, and not-at-all-depressing-sounding (let’s be honest, slightly depressin) Oran Heights Orphanage.
They always told people I was their flesh and blood, the golden egg of the family. They loved to tell everyone, and I mean *everyone*, that they’d fully conceived me and that I was the egg in the sack waiting to win the race and come out on top (chuckles). I mean, I *did* come out on top. Top grades, killer career, sports? Yep. The only thing I wasn’t on top of? Finding a man who didn’t turn out to be a walking disaster the only thing I utterly failed at. It was like I had a sign that said ‘I am the worst at choosing people’, if I had it on a t-shirt, I would have wore it to bed.
Anyways, the incident began 6 months ago. And if anyone had told me what was going to happen, I probably would have shot the damn bastard first.
