(PARASYTE X WORM) CHAPTER SEVEN

Taylor was beginning to regret naming it, and it wasn't because Kali had done anything particularly terrible since then. If anything, the opposite. The name had made it easier to forget that she was talking to a parasite.

It wasn't all the time, and not enough to actually make her comfortable. Every time she looked directly at her hand and saw an eye where no eye should have been, the panic came rushing back. Every time she remembered that there was something living under her skin, sharing her body, she felt sick all over again.

But sometimes she would find herself talking to it, actually talking as though it were a person. And that felt wrong in a way she couldn’t properly explain.

She sat cross-legged on her bed with her back against the wall. The evening light spilled through her bedroom window, painting pale rectangles across the carpet. Normally she’d have been reading, or doing homework, or avoiding homework. Instead she had spent the past hour arguing with Kali.

And that sentence alone should have been enough to make her question her sanity.

Unfortunately, the parasite kept winning points, mostly because it refused to get distracted rather than because it was persuasive. 

“You still haven’t explained why.”

Kali’s lone eye shifted toward her. The movement was subtle, yet unsettlingly natural. 

“Why what?”

Taylor resisted the urge to throw something at it. “Why Amy made you.”

A pause followed, long enough that Taylor immediately became suspicious.

Over the past hour, she’d started noticing patterns. Kali answered most questions instantly, sometimes before she’d even finished asking them. So whenever it hesitated, it usually meant the answer was important. Or uncomfortable.

“Amy was unhappy.”

Taylor stared. For several seconds she genuinely thought she’d misheard.

“That’s your explanation?”

“Yes.”

“That’s not an explanation.”

The eye blinked, and Taylor hated that she’d started assigning emotions to the blinking.

Most times it looked curious, sometimes confused, and other times thoughtful.

She knew intellectually that she was probably projecting. Unfortunately, her brain kept doing it anyway.

“Many actions originate from unhappiness,” Kali said.

Taylor let out a slow breath. “Okay.” She rubbed her forehead. “Fine. Let’s try this differently.”

The parasite waited.

“What was your purpose?”

Silence.

Taylor immediately sat up a little straighter. There it was again, that hesitation. 

“If you want this to work, you have to tell me the truth this time.”

Eventually Kali spoke: “I was intended to improve a relationship.”

That wasn’t what Taylor had expected.

“A relationship.”

“Yes.”

“What kind of relationship?”

“A familial one.”

Taylor blinked. For some reason that answer made even less sense.

“Familial?”

“Yes.”

The eye remained fixed on her, as though it had answered the question completely.

Taylor stared back.

“You’re going to have to give me more than that.”

Another pause. Then: “Amy wished for Carol to love her.”

Suddenly, Taylor felt tired. Tired in a way that sleep wasn’t going to fix. But she managed to push herself higher against the wall, dragging a pillow into her lap without really thinking about it. 

“Amy wished for…” She frowned because the sentence didn’t feel complete. “Amy wished for Carol to love her?”

“Yes.”

“And you were supposed to…” she trailed off, suddenly unsure if she wanted to hear the rest.

Kali didn’t seem to notice, her answer coming immediately. “I was meant to increase emotional attachment.”

For several seconds Taylor simply stared as her thoughts snagged on the sentence, failing to process it entirely.

“Increase emotional attachment,” she repeated. 

“Yes.”

The phrase would have sounded almost harmless in any other situation.

Taylor swallowed. “What does that mean?”

The tissue around the eye tightened slightly. “It means Carol would have loved Amy more.”

The knot in Taylor’s stomach became something cold, and for a moment she wasn’t sure why. Then the meaning finished catching up with her.

“Oh.”

The word came out in a whisper.

Kali continued speaking, unaware, or perhaps simply unconcerned. “Amy believed increased affection would resolve several interpersonal difficulties.”

Taylor continued staring as the horror arrived gradually. Like cold water rising around her ankles, then her knees, and finally her chest.

“You mean…” She swallowed again. “You mean you were supposed to change how Carol felt.”

“Yes.” The answer was matter-of-fact.

Taylor’s skin crawled. “No.” She sat up straighter. “No, that’s not…”

The words refused to come together.

Kali watched her. Or rather, the eye watched her patiently.

“That’s not increasing affection.” She heard her own voice growing louder as she added, “That’s changing someone.”

“Yes.”

The casual agreement hit harder than any argument could have.

Taylor stared, then laughed once. A short, disbelieving sound.

“Oh my God.”

The parasite squinted its eye slightly. Confusion, if she was reading it correctly.

“You appear distressed.”

“Distressed?” Taylor almost laughed again.

“Yeah. Distressed.”

The room suddenly felt too warm. She kicked the blanket away from her legs, then immediately felt cold, and then warm again. Her thoughts refused to settle.

“Amy wanted to change her mother’s feelings.”

“Yes.”

“Without her permission.”

“I do not believe permission was discussed.”

Taylor let out a strangled noise.

There was something uniquely horrifying about the way Kali talked, and it wasn't because it was cruel. Cruelty would have been easier. Cruel people understood why something was wrong and chose to do it anyway.

Kali seemed genuinely unable to grasp why Taylor was reacting this way, as though it were describing the weather or discussing furniture.

The parasite shifted slightly against the back of her hand, coming even closer to her. “I do not understand the issue.”

Taylor stared at it. 

“You don’t understand why secretly changing somebody’s emotions is wrong?”

“People influence each other’s emotions continuously.”

Taylor opened her mouth and closed it. Then, she opened it again.

“That’s different.”

“How?”

Taylor looked away.

She didn’t actually know how to explain it, at least not in a way a creature like Kali would understand.

People influenced each other all the time. Parents. Friends. Teachers. Strangers. A smile could change someone’s day. A cruel comment could ruin it. But that wasn’t—it wasn’t—

Taylor struggled for words.

“Because… people get a choice,” she finished lamely. 

Kali remained silent, encouragingly silent.

Taylor hated that.

“You can walk away from people.” She gestured vaguely. “You can ignore them, disagree with them, and be angry at them.”

The knot in her stomach tightened.

“You can’t just reach into someone’s head and decide how they feel.”

For the first time, Kali didn’t answer immediately.

The parasite flexed slowly against the back of her hand. “I believe Amy felt the situation was more complicated.”

Taylor barked out a laugh. The sound held absolutely no amusement.

“I bet she did.”

Cars were still passing outside, and a television was still playing somewhere in the house, punctuated randomly by commentary from her dad. But Taylor stopped hearing all of it.

She found herself looking at her hand again, really looking at it. At the eye. The living thing attached to her. The parasite that had just casually explained it was originally designed to alter human emotions.

A feeling of unease began crawling up her spine, and her mouth suddenly felt dry.

“Kali.”

The eye turned toward her immediately. “Yes?” 

“You were designed to make someone love somebody.”

“Essentially.”

The cold feeling in her chest deepened. “And now you’re living inside me.”

A pause.

“Yes.”

Taylor became aware of her heartbeat, the weight of her hand resting in her lap, and every new piece of information she’d gotten over the past few hours. She ran through every moment she’d sympathized with it in her mind, every moment she’d tried to understand it, and every moment she’d caught herself thinking of it as another being. 

“Kali.” Her voice sounded strange, smaller and less certain. “Am I being affected?”

For the first time since she’d met it, the parasite seemed genuinely surprised by a question as the eye widened slightly. And suddenly, Taylor wasn’t sure she wanted to hear the answer.