zero.

                                    

                                          
GRIEF — CHAPTER ZERO
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      eli morrow was a fucking trainwreck.
      between being the sole survivor of a subway accident that killed his entire family, and living off of blood and milky way bars, he was out of his head.
      well, technically, he didn't survive the crash. he did die, but the devil let grief tunnel into his head, and not the kind you'd think. it wasn't grief as an emotion, but grief as a biotic organism. eli often referred to it as grief, giving the burrowing parasite a name.
      grief took over at eli's most vulnerable moment; the moment his heart stopped beating.
      maybe he deserved it, maybe it was karma finally coming back to haunt him after he tore his way through his mother's body, making him a killer before he even took his first breath.
      growing up, his father resented him, of course, as he had murdered his mother, mark morrow's love of twenty-one years. the fact that his father was a pastor didn't much help the matter, as he truly believed that eli was sent from the deepest pits of hell to torment him for past mistakes. 
      guilt buried itself in eli's churning stomach, you could smell it on him; the sickening scent of agony and despair.
      scrub, rince, soak, and drown— it is melded into your flawless skin, it will always linger. 
      grief and regret took him over completely, proving his father partially right. he was from hell, but this time, he was the devil.
      midnight left eli's body in the hands of the creature he called grief, tearing apart whatever bled and whomever walked alone at such an ungodly hour. on the shadowed streets of queens, grief played judge, jury, and executioner, choosing his victims and feeding off of their blood. 
      once dusk turned to dawn, though, eli could regain his sanity, but it also left him to revel in the guilt nightfall had left him with. he could wash away the blood of those he'd killed with his tears and soap water. 
      by day, eli let himself exist among the living and the empaths, though he knew that he did not deserve such luxury. he did not deserve the feeling of normality; he was a monster.
      the taste of blood upon his tongue seemed to speak to the foreboding burning a hole in his gut. the worst wasn't over quite yet.
      oh my darling, it will never end.
      silk, lies, mist, and searing showers was all his newfound existence was for years before he got a grip on his life and eli found that he was relatively likeable. within his first day of attending midtown science high, he found a quiet, yet compassionate, girl named gwendolyne stacy.  
      gwen was a small, comely girl, with so much understanding and concern, eli was sure no one was more perfect than she. the one and only thing wrong with gwen, however, was the boy she frequently hung around with. this boy's name was peter parker. peter may have been fairly good looking, but he was the most obnoxious, godawful person eli had ever had the pleasure of meeting. it wasn't jealousy that tainted eli's dislike, as gwen and his relationship was strictly platonic, of course.
      for a while, grief didn't eat him alive, didn't kill everyone and everything that could be killed. for a while, eli felt like the monster was where it belonged, locked up where it could do no harm.
      but nothing can stop unparalleled power.
      despite all of gwen's impossible compassion, even she could not do anything to soothe the grief that had invaded eli's body. 
      after grief slaughtered over twenty humans crawling the streetlamp lit nights of queens, new york in one night, eli knew his existence had to come to an end. in a beyond desperate attempt to bring attention to the monster he had become, he, while conscious, built piles of bodies in the alleys, praying someone would seek him out and kill him.