Healing the Dark - Dragon Age Inquisition Fanfic

Holli sat up with a sigh, blearily rubbing her eyes. Her mum had been getting on the piss with a bunch of her wank friends well into the early hours of the morning. Never mind that Holli had school this morning...

She'd managed a few hours of sleep at least, long enough to have a string of nonsensical dreams featuring mostly fictional characters from books she had read.

Shunting her exhaustion to the side, she got up, slipped on her uggs and headed to the door, pushing her dressing table out of the way.

With a bunch of drunks and druggies in her house, she had learnt a long time ago it was safer to barricade herself in her room if she wanted to have any sense of safety. 

After a night like that, the first thing she always did was check on her mum. She found the woman in the lounge, crashed out on the floor. There were others around in similar condition, but she didn't much care about them. She checked her mum was still alive before shifting her into the recovery position. The woman had nearly killed herself—a few times actually—in the past because of shit like this, and overdosing, and alcohol poisoning. 

Her mum made shit decisions and could be an abusive bitch on the wrong substance or when she'd gone without for too long, then she could also be really fun and awesome on the right combination. But Holli loved her. Candace was her mum. 

With her mum taken care of, she went back to her room and grabbed her school uniform before shuffling down the hallway to the bathroom to get ready for the day. There was already a lock on this door, so she didn't need to barricade it.

At least today was the start of their school trip; she'd be away from this bullshit for a week. But she did worry about her mother. Who would make sure she didn't choke on her own vomit? Who would call an ambulance if she OD'ed or got alcohol poisoning again? 

Holli got on well enough with the old lady next door and might be able to ask her. But Mrs. Polatsky really didn't like Candace and made no effort to hide it. She got the feeling the only reason she was nice to Holli was because she felt sorry for her. It rubbed Holli the wrong way, but she wasn't going to cause trouble over it. It got her hot meals and baked goods from time to time. And if she lay on the charm enough, it might get her someone to make sure her mum didn't die. 

Holli doubted the old woman would wade through drugs, vomit, booze, and unconscious bodies to check on a woman she despised. But it was worth a try. 

The thought of getting some kind of wellness check had crossed her mind, but that could bring in police and social workers. Holli worked pretty hard to make sure no one knew what home was like. She didn't want it getting out and being spread all around school somehow. Her private business was her private business. Her closest friends suspected all wasn't right at home, but she lied when they asked. 

At least she could take comfort in the fact it had been a long time since her mum had needed her life saved. But did that mean she was getting better at taking care of herself? Or that she was due for something terrible? 

Dammit, that would eat at her the whole week. 

Of course she had her cell phone and could text her mum, unfortunately, the woman wasn't very reliable at texting back. No reply from her would also make Holli worry. 

Once out of the shower, Holli dressed and styled her hair to hide her stupid ears. Though people had stopped making fun of how pointed they were now, it was ingrained in her to keep them hidden. The ends of them were deformed—pointed. She'd tried to hide it with a buttload of piercings, but that wasn't as effective as she'd hoped. Hiding it with her hair and hats was the best way. 

When she was a child being bullied for her stupid ears, she used to imagine she was an elf. Who hadn't seen Lord of the Rings? But her ears weren't quite the same. Not as pretty and delicate. Just deformed. 

With her ears safely hidden, Holli was ready for school. There was no food in the fridge or cupboards, so no point in breakfast. She penned a note to her mum reminding her where she would be for the week and having to bite down on the bitter voice in her head that told her Candace probably wouldn't even notice she was gone. Holli grabbed her school bag and her duffel with her trip stuff and left the house. 

It was a bit nippy outside; her uniform and scarf didn't do much to keep the cold out, and oh, how she hated the cold. Her school jacket wasn't as warm as she'd like either, even with the long-sleeved thermal top underneath. But once at camp, she'd be able to discard the tartan skirt, stockings, and blazer for mufti clothes all week. And she had some warm hoodies in there, her pea coat, and her oh so comfortable fluffy socks and snow boots. 

When she grew up, she was going to move somewhere warm and then never set foot in the cold again.

Getting to the school gate, she smirked inwardly at seeing one of her classmates, Ginny Pike. The bitch had been trying to crawl to top of their class all year now. She had even accused Holli of cheating to maintain her spot. As if she needed to.

Holli had started to expend a bit of effort in maintaining that spot since Pike arrived. But it wasn't hard. Holli knew she was smart; it was one of the only good things about her. She could absorb information at a phenomenal rate and retain it indefinitely. It made school easy since exams were just tests of memory most of the time... 

Holli usually tried not to excel too much though. If she did too well, they'd contact her mum about advanced classes or courses. Too low, and they'd contact her mum about the drop—is everything all right at home? Does she need tutoring sessions? But she didn't want them to stay so low that she tanked any chance at scholarships for uni. It was a bit of a balancing act. She wanted to go to med school. The plan was to start excelling in her final year. It might not be as effective as doing consistently well the whole time, but she would manage.

But this time, Holli couldn't resist crushing Ginny Pike and had been doing super well since Pike had made a dig about her cheating. Her marks had soared to heights Pike could never reach no matter how hard she tried. It was petty and could blow her whole not-too-much-attention thing, but Holli had gone with it anyway. Fuck Ginny Pike.

"Holli!"

Holli looked up to see her friend Yvette on the stairs. She joined her, leaning against the railing. 

"Hey," she greeted. 

Yvette grinned. "Ginny's been giving you dagger eyes since you walked through the gate."

"Number two can dagger eyes all she wants; it ain't gonna help her." 

Yvette laughed. 

"Let's go inside, fucking freezing out here..."

"Gonna be worse where we're going."

"But my own clothes are warmer than my uniform." 

"It'll probably just balance out then," Yvette grinned.

Holli cast her a half-hearted glare for trying to dash her hopes. 

"So stupid. They should have just let us come in mufti," Yvette grumbled.

Holli grunted her agreement as they passed through the doors, their shoes squeaking on the corridor floor. She could hear footsteps behind her, and a body suddenly pushed in between the two girls, arms slung over their shoulders.

"'Sup, bruvs?"

"'Sup, Curtis?"

"We all ready for our trip, ma wee darlings?" He asked, sarcasm oozing off of him. 

Their friend had not been keen on it. He wasn't the outdoorsy type. Or the manual labour type. Or the exert-any-kind-of-effort-whatsoever type...

He thought it was unfair they had to wait until they were on their last year of school before they could go on an overseas school trip. He wanted to go to America.

Honestly, given the shitshow that place was becoming, Holli wouldn't want to go there. 

Besides, school left that kind of trip for the last year because there weren't many of them left by then. Easier to keep track of them when they number single digits. A couple more years though...

"Where's your bag?" Holli asked, noticing he wasn't carrying an extra for all his trip gear.

"On the bus, saving my seat."

"They let you do that?" Yvette asked, annoyed.

"Lou was there, and you know how he loves me." 

"Probably just gave you what you want so you'd leave," Yvette snarked.

Curtis shoved her lightly. "Fuck off, everybody loves me." 

Holli reckoned he was more of an acquired taste, but whatever...

-

Before going out to the bus, they had to go to class so the teacher could take roll and make sure they all had everything they would need for the week. She also wanted to go over the rules, itinerary, and cabin groups. Obviously girls and boys couldn't share the same cabin, so Curtis had to bunk with some of the boys in their class. He wasn't that happy about it since he didn't really get on all that well with them. Most of them afraid of catching the gay. Idiots.

Once that was all done, they were released to go out to the bus. Holli slung her duffel over her shoulder and followed her classmates, veering off at the bathroom to take a quick piss before getting on the bus. It would take hours to get there, and she didn't know if they were going to be allowed to stop along the way. 

Before the door could even close, she heard the sound of screaming and yelling out in the halls; seconds later, it was followed by a popping sound. Lots of pops. She could hear feet running in the hallway. 

It took her a few moments to realise what was happening. Those were gunshots!

She backed away from the door, her eyes darting around for somewhere to hide or a way out. The only places were the stalls. The window was small, high up and didn't open wide enough. She could smash it, but it was still too high. Even if she tried to stand on her duffel. 

The door slammed open and her heart jumped into her throat, she turned to face the new arrival, breathing a sigh of relief to see it was one of her classmates, unarmed. The relief died quickly when she registered the blood all over her. 

"Katie!" Holli gasped, going to help her. 

Katie made it all of two steps before she collapsed, Holli dropping to her knees with her as she tried to help her. Katie was crying, and Holli didn't know what to do. Her breath was coming out in ragged gasps as panic started to set in. Pressure! She had to put pressure on the wound. She'd learnt this in first aid, for fuck's sake. Get it together!

There hadn't been a school shooting since Dunblane if she was remembering correctly, and with the stress of the situation, she wasn't sure she trusted her memory right now. 

Holli thought she found the source of the bleeding, pressing her hands to it, her duffel getting in the way a bit. But she was too scared to take her hands off, fearing Katie would bleed out if Holli attempted to shrug off her duffel and back pack. 

The door opened again, and Holli looked up, her eyes widening at the kid who walked in. He was dressed in a black puffer and jeans, a gun in his hand. She recognised him. He had been a couple of years above her, on his last year of school when he had been expelled. Why he'd been expelled was unknown to her, but rumours had run rampant. That he was a rapist, that he'd been selling drugs on school grounds, that he had been performing satanic rituals in the prop storage room under the stage... Obviously, some were more ridiculous than others. 

Before she could do anything, he fired. It didn't hurt the first second or two; she felt the impact, but not pain as she dropped back. She awkwardly fell over her bag, which probably made the pain that started a second later feel a whole hell of a lot worse.

She looked up at him—Ray? Roy?—as she tried to put pressure on her own gunshot wounds. He looked so... empty; resigned maybe. 

Everything up until now had felt like it had happened in the blink of an eye, but as he advanced on her, it was like slow motion, sound muffled. All she could hear were his footsteps on the lino and her heartbeat in her ears.

And for some reason, everything was starting to turn green—a strange green light forming above him. He raised the gun again, seemingly oblivious to the light. It was getting brighter and brighter, so bright she had to close her eyes. Her hands fisted into her shirt, soaked with blood—some of it hers, some of it Katies. 

She squeezed her eyes shut, and then she heard the bang.