The process extended onto Kate, gunk being removed from her eyes, her nose, to Kate's surprise even her ears were tweezed, make-up was put on her eyebrows.
"I'm gonna give you a week, then I'm sending you to the cousins."
Kate's eyes widened in stunned silence.
"Don't worry, they're here."
Kate's eyes threatened to burst out their sockets.
"No, don't over think it. But you'll be moving soon. When that happens, make an excuse. There you go looking dignified."
She kissed Kate's forehead but not before opening Kat'e mouth one last time after revealing a syringe that had NOT come from the hospital! Mother dribbled a little of it into her cloth and put it in her mouth. Kate's whole body jumped and a gargling scream erupted from her she must have sounded like a beached whale as the cut in her mouth bubbled and burned white hot and then was gone along with the cloth and by the time Kate's eye stopped watering, Mother was gone.
It was perhaps only then that she really started crying. Her whole body thrown into the act. No one came in, and no one would, Mother wouldn't let them.
And she'd know, it lasted so long she almost forgot where she was.
That was when she looked up and found a person she'd never seen before.
A mask on, scrubs and a stunning set of platinum white-blonde hair. What had made that hair so amazing? She didn't know, only that it was glued to that girl's scalp.
And it was a girl. She had to be Kate's age, perhaps older, which at that point was Kate's normal. They were in a hospital but despite her hair being tied it was loose enough to threaten to come off, gravity making bridges and arches that went perfectly with thick eyebrows that reminded her of a fist in their thickness. And her green eyes were so green they had to be contact lenses, or the gods were unfair.
She had to be the most stunning woman in the world. Another one! Randomly appearing.
Kate had been staring for so long. She entered the room and stood over Kate and pulled the mask off.
And there it was the catch, the thing that had to even things out. She had the thinnest lips and a huge mouth, its like god had created her mouth by blindly swinging a machete. And just like that Kate was talking to a human again.
"Hey there. How are you feeling?" Ms Stunning asked.
"Like a truck ran me over. You're Elsie right?"
Her wonderful brows quirked with style, she was such a model. Kate was surrounded by models!
"What made you guess that?"
"You look like a super model. Also you both have this eye thing, that's hereditary also your jaw lines, and right there, you got this little nostril thing you do that makes your nose look even pointier somehow." Kate said with a drowsy smile.
The girl in question seemed to think about that, tapping her chin absently and smiled, it looked like an emoji. Thank God she didn't grin because Kate would have expected multiple rows of teeth.
"If you're wondering Gen told me a lot about you. Not about your look. Just stuff."
"Like?"
"Like that you had the same thing happen to you."
=================================================================
✨ Follow, share, and support me as Zenith continues — every bond is tested, every truth revealed. ✨
A model's poise, a medic's scars, a survivor's defiance.
Elsie and Kate circled each other with words like weapons.
Death, meaning, sacrifice—
Kate reached for purpose, Elsie clung to life.
And in that moment, Kate confessed the truth:
she had fought to be Elsie, but she could never want her life.
Next time on Zenith:
What happens when two survivors see themselves in each other—and refuse the reflection?