OCTAVEUS
I'M GONNA tell them. I don't want to keep hiding it any longer; I've hid it from everyone I've ever known. Maybe they won't freak out if I actually tell them. Every other time somebody finds out, it's because they accidentally see my tail. But maybe if I actually told someone instead of waiting for them to see me they won't freak out and we won't have to move schools again. I braced myself all day to reveal myself, trying to find a time where I was alone with Summer or Micah so that it was only someone that I trusted seeing. By eighth period I knew that I'd have to find one of them after school ended in order to get them alone. Summer and I usually chatted for a little bit after ninth period before I started walking back to the headquarters, so I planned on telling her then.
    "Summer," I started talking when we got outside of the school, but she pushed me into the alleyway between the school and the apartment complex beside it before I could finish my sentence.
"What the hell are you?" Summer asked me harshly, her blue eyes wide.
    I sighed, holding my hands up as if to surrender. "If I tell you, you can't tell anyone else."
    "I don't care if someone else finds out, I just want to know what you are! You're obviously not human, no human can clear a three-foot-high bench without a running start, especially if that not-human is supposedly crippled!" I winced. Oops. Didn't mean for you to see that.
    "Summer, please, you have to calm down," I started. Even though I'd been mentally preparing myself to confess all day, I thought, 'I can't believe I'm about to tell her.' "I wish I could have told you sooner, honestly, but I couldn't. You're right, I'm not human--"
    "Then what are you?" Summer interrupted, though her tone was a little calmer (but still not calm).
    I took a deep breath, then said, "I'm a Choronus."
    Summer just stared at me incredulously for a minute before saying, "No. No, that's not even possible. Choronuses are just mythological creatures, made up to entertain in kids' stories."
    I shook my head. "No, they're not. They're real, and I'm one of them."
    Summer backed away from me. "No, they're fake."
    I shook my head again. "They're real. You know in the 1900s, when a farmer shot one?"
    "That was a hoax."
    "No, it wasn't."
    She shook her head at me, backing into the wall on the other side of the alley. "I don't believe you. You're just making things up to try to get into my head."
    I started to advance toward her. "No, I'm not, Summer. When have I ever tried to hurt you?" She didn't answer and as I advanced I slowly reached up.
    "W-What are you doing?" Summer asked uneasily.
    "I'm going to prove to you what I am."
    "You're insane, that's what you are!"
    "No, Summer, I'm not insane. Just let me show you--"
    "No! Go away!"
    "Summer, please," I stopped a couple feet in front of her. Summer's eyes were wide in fear and disbelief, and she was watching my movements like I might try to grab her.
    "Please, just trust me," I decided to give it one last go before she decided to call the cops.
    Summer didn't respond, so I continued. I moved my hair back, and I could see her eyes widen when she saw my ears. I dropped my arms back to my sides. Summer just stared in disbelief at my ears, pressing herself even closer to the wall. My ears are pointed slightly, because of the Choronus ear genetics not in use.
    "No. . ." She whispered. "You're crazy. Those aren't real, Choronuses aren't real."
    "Yes, they are," I was beginning to get tired of saying it. I bared my teeth in annoyance. "Oh, pourquoi ne m'écoutes-tu pas?"
    "I. . . I don't. . ." Summer whispered, pressing herself against the alley wall.
    "Just please listen to me," I spread my arms to her, and her eyes widened in fear. Only then did I realize that I had my claws unsheathed, and I finally understood. She was scared of me. I lowered my arms and sheathed my claws.
   "Summer. . . You know I would never try to hurt you," I said to her softly, trying desperately to calm her down. She shook her head.
"I. . . I don't know you," she whispered.
   My chest felt heavy with hurt. 'My only friend, the only person that didn't cast me out immediately. I thought you were different from everyone else.' I took a couple steps away from her. "Oh. . ." I swallowed hard, hefting my bag onto my shoulder and turning to walk away. I left Summer in the alleyway and tried to ignore the lump of hurt rising in my throat as I limped down the sidewalk to the headquarters.

(⚠️ EXTREME TRIGGER WARNING AHEAD⚠️)

When I got to our dens I passed Gwen in the doorway. She stopped when she saw me. "Vee, what's wrong?" She asked, seeing the look on my face. I shook my head, not responding in words. I dropped my bag on the floor by my bedroom door and shut the door, sitting on my bed and trying to ignore the thoughts running through my head.
   I'm so sick of this. I'm sick of the constant mental pain, of not being good enough. I'm sick of it. As these thoughts ran through my head, along with others like them, I felt my breathing come in short huffs and my eyes started to sting. I closed my eyes tight and clenched my teeth to try to control my breathing. 'Just leave,' a horribly familiar voice taunted me, the same one that taunted me every night. 'You aren't even worth the energy. Just go away; go away from everyone. Haven't you noticed how no one wants to be around you, how people avoid you? You're just a waste of space, a f—up that nobody wants. So why are you even still here?'
   "Shut up," I said aloud to the voice. But it didn't work; the voice only got louder until I started agreeing with it. 'Just leave. Nobody wants you. Nobody needs you. You're worthless.'
   I felt hot tears run down my face as I took my head out of  my hands and grabbed the pocketknife on my nightstand. I grabbed the white sheet from under my bed and draped it over my lap. It was stained with red splotches. The thoughts got worse, as they worsened the tears came more quickly. I flicked open my pocketknife and ran my thumb along the stained blade. A thin line of blood appeared in the blade's wake on my thumb, but didn't even drip.
I held out my arm over the sheet over my lap, seeing the dozens of scars that covered my lower forearm and wrist. My tears came faster, running freely down my face while the thoughts ran just as freely through my head. I gripped the knife in one hand, then positioned it so the blade was sharp-side-down over the one clear spot on my wrist; a spot that I had been saving until the right time to mark. Until the time. My shoulders started shaking, the tears blurring my vision. I wiped them away with my shoulder then slowly ran the knife across the clear area, creating a thin slice that just broke the skin.
Even that small, shallow cut started bleeding more than the cut that had been made on my thumb. I took a deep breath, the thoughts continuing in a steady current of regret and depressing fact. 'No one wants me.'
   I drove the blade deeper until blood seeped around the knife, then in one quick motion ripped the blade across my wrist. I watched the blood flow out of the new wound, dripping down my arm and onto the sheet across my lap. The pain was intense, just as I'd hoped it would be, but to me it felt pleasing. 'The more intense the pain, the better,' I thought to myself. I lined the knife up on one of the older scars on my wrist closer to my hand and sliced again, watching the blood run red, staining my arm. The pain's intensity increased, and the thoughts were drowned out for a second by it. But they returned, just as they always did. I kept cutting, slicing at my wrist until it was just a mass of open wounds, then doing the same to the other one, slicing until the pain drowned out the thoughts completely for a full minute and the physical pain didn't fade. The sheet over my lap was redder than it had ever been previously, the blood pouring freely down my forearms from the masses of open wounds on each wrist.
I felt my shoulders start shaking again and dropped the knife as the true pain finally overtook me, pulling my legs to my chest and cradling my wrists as I sobbed silently. It was unbearable, the pain so bad that it finally drowned the voices. I closed my eyes and leaned against the wall, cradling my bleeding wrists and shaking. The sheet was still over my legs, now so red that it was black and I could feel the blood seeping through my jeans. I tried to control my breathing, but I couldn't. It just kept coming in shorter and shorter gasps, until finally I just stopped breathing at all for a full half-minute before gasping and sobbing again. My vision was starting to grow black at the edges. I could feel my head pulse the way one's head might after crying for a long period of  time, or after being hit hard. I kept crying and shaking until finally I came to a conclusion, just before I blacked out.
   I'm done.

Sorry for the gore and self harm, I warned you. Heads up the next chapter will also be under the category of 'EXTREME TRIGGER WARNING'. But I'm not gonna tell ya why hehehehe CLIFFHANGERRRRRZ not really but still. Yep I warned you sooooooooooo have fun, after the next chapter the depressing ness goes down a little bit.
Soo ya have fun reading! (Also thanks for reading!)
— Snake Eyes