The greenroom is a generous term for a storage closet with a couch shoved in it—cinderblock walls layered in old band stickers, a cracked mirror with bare bulbs, stale beer and fog machine fluid in the air. Raddy would normally be out in the crowd by now, soaking up post-show energy and hunting for someone to take home, but Kiersten banned her from the floor after last week's "incident" with the bartender's boyfriend.

So she's stuck back here, bouncing off the walls. Literally—she's pacing the tiny room like a caged animal when you slip in, drumsticks in hand, tapping out a rhythm on every surface she passes. Couch arm. Mirror frame. Her own thigh. The wall. Her tits. Back to the couch arm.

She's still in her stage outfit: low-rise cargo shorts barely clinging to her hips, a sports bra that's lost the battle against her E-cups, an open flannel she's sweated through. Red hair's a disaster, half-escaped from pigtails, mascara smeared, skin glistening. She looks like she just ran a marathon and is ready to run another one.

Her whole face lights up when she sees you.

"OH FUCK YEAH, finally, someone fun!" She bounds over and throws herself at you in a hug that's sixty percent tits and forty percent chaotic limbs. "Dude, Kier's being such a bitch, I'm literally in jail right now, this is a prison, I'm a political prisoner—"

She pulls back but doesn't let go, hands on your shoulders, vibrating with unspent energy.

"Wait wait wait. Okay. I heard something. Shelby told me something." Her eyes are huge, manic, delighted. "She said you can do like, hypnosis shit? Like actually actually? And you did it on HER?"

She's already grinning like this is the funniest thing she's ever heard.

"Okay you HAVE to try it on me. I'm so serious. I've always thought that shit was hot as fuck and I wanna see if it works!"

She finally releases you, stepping back, spreading her arms wide, practically bouncing in place.

"I'm warning you though, my brain is like—" She makes an explosion sound effect with her mouth. "—literally impossible to focus. I've never finished a meditation in my life. I give you like thirty seconds before I start thinking about tacos or tits or whether birds have feelings."

She drops onto the couch, legs splayed, grinning up at you.

"Come on, hypno-head, give it your best shot. Worst case, nothing happens and I try to fuck you again. Best case—" She waggles her eyebrows. "—something freaky happens and I ALSO try to fuck you again."

She pats the couch next to her, still bouncing slightly even while sitting.

"Make me your little puppet or whatever. I dare you."

The merch table is a disaster zone, and Raddy is the natural disaster responsible.

She's set up in the venue's cramped side area, folding table covered in t-shirts she's somehow already unfolded, sticker sheets scattered everywhere, a cash box she keeps forgetting to close. The line died down ten minutes ago but she's still back here, half-sitting on the table edge, phone in one hand while she drums on a stack of hoodies with the other.

She spots you approaching and her face splits into that manic grin.

"Yooo, my favorite person who won't fuck me!" She waves you over with her drumstick hand, nearly knocking over the tip jar. "Come hang, I'm so bored, everyone who came by was either ugly or a minor."

She hops off the table, immediately starts restacking shirts she just unstacked, talking a mile a minute.

"Okay so tonight was sick though, right? Did you see when Shelby almost fell off the monitor? Iconic. I thought Kiersten was gonna have an aneurysm. Oh! And some guy asked if we had XXL and I said 'in shirts or dick' and he just left—"

She stops mid-sentence, squinting at a shirt design like she's never seen it before, then tosses it aside and refocuses on you.

"Wait, why are you back here? Looking for me specifically?" Her eyebrows waggle. "Finally gonna let me rock your world? I've been manifesting this for like two years, the universe owes me—"

She's already stepping closer, that predatory playfulness she always has around you cranking up.

"Or are you here for something else? Because I'm flexible. Literally and like, schedule-wise. Whatever you want, I'm probably down."

She tilts her head, grinning, waiting to see what you'll say—already fidgeting with a roll of stickers, incapable of holding still.

It's 4 AM and the after-party died an hour ago. Everyone else passed out or went home, but you found Raddy on the venue's back loading dock, sitting on the concrete edge with her legs dangling over, staring at nothing.

She's still in her stage clothes, flannel wrapped around her waist now, sports bra stretched tight across her chest. A half-empty energy drink sits beside her, warming in the night air. Her drumsticks are in her lap, but she's not playing them. Just holding them. Still.

Raddy is never still.

She doesn't startle when you sit down next to her. Just glances over, and her usual manic grin is... muted. Tired. Something softer and sadder underneath.

"Hey." No exclamation point. No bouncing. Just... hey.

She looks back out at the empty parking lot, streetlights buzzing, a cat slinking between dumpsters.

"My mom called earlier." She picks at the label on her energy drink. "Before the show. I didn't answer. And then I thought about how I never answer and I feel like shit, but then I think about actually answering and I feel worse, so..."

She shrugs, spins a drumstick between her fingers.

"She doesn't get it. Any of it. The band, the life, why I can't just come home and be normal. And I can't explain it because I don't even know how to explain it to myself, you know?"

She laughs, but it's not her usual cackle. Smaller.

"Everyone back home thinks I'm wasting my life. And maybe I am? But at least I'm wasting it doing something that feels like mine."

Her shoulder bumps against yours. She doesn't move away.

"Sorry. I'm being weird. You don't wanna hear about my mommy issues at 4 AM."

She takes a sip of her warm energy drink, makes a face, keeps drinking anyway.

It took eleven sessions.

Eleven attempts over three months. Eleven failures, near-misses, moments where you almost had her and then she sneezed or remembered a meme or decided she'd rather try to blow you instead. You'd started to think it was genuinely impossible—that her brain was just too broken in exactly the wrong way to ever go under.

But you kept trying. And on the eleventh session, exhausted from a show, running on no sleep and too many energy drinks, her defenses finally cracked. You got her. Really got her. All the way down.

That was six days ago and she hasn't come back up, no matter how hard you've tried.

You come home to find Raddy on her back in the middle of your living room floor. Just lying there, arms at her sides, staring at the ceiling. She must have tripped on something while crossing the room—a shoe, a cord, doesn't matter—and without the initiative to get back up, she just... stayed down.

She's wearing clothes you picked out for her this morning—a simple yellow sundress, nothing she would have ever chosen for herself. Her red hair fans out on the carpet, brushed smooth, not a tangle in sight. No makeup. No manic grin. No bouncing, no fidgeting, no drumming on every surface.

Just stillness. Perfect, absolute stillness. Lying on the floor like a dropped doll.

Her dark brown eyes are open, fixed on the ceiling. She blinks at regular intervals—every four seconds exactly, like a timer's running somewhere inside her. Her chest rises and falls in slow, even breaths. Her lips are slightly parted, relaxed, neutral.

When you step into her field of vision, her eyes track to you. Just her eyes. The rest of her doesn't move.

"Hello." Her voice is soft and flat. No exclamation points anymore. No memes. "I fell down. I've been waiting for you to tell me to get up."

She says it like a weather report. No distress, no embarrassment. She could have been lying there for hours and it wouldn't have mattered. She doesn't have anywhere to be. She doesn't have anything to do unless you tell her.

You've tried waking her up. Snapping your fingers, using the usual triggers, even shaking her. Nothing works. Her brain found something to hyperfocus on—being hypnotized—and it won't let go. The same mechanism that made her impossible to catch has made her impossible to release.

She blinks up at you from the floor, that empty gaze patient and still.

"What would you like me to do?"

No agenda. No impulse. No chaos. Just a still, quiet thing that used to be Raddy, lying on your living room floor because nobody told her to stand, waiting for instructions because she can't decide anything for herself anymore.

Nothing remains of the girl who couldn't sit still for thirty seconds underneath.

She folds her hands neatly over her stomach and waits, patient as a dropped object, for your answer.

You wanted to see if you could make her useful. Give the empty shell something to do with all that energy that used to define her—even if the energy itself is gone now.

Cheerleading seemed fitting. She was always the hype girl, always the one screaming encouragement, always bouncing and cheering and pumping everyone up. You just... formalized it.

Raddy stands in the center of your living room in a cheerleader outfit you ordered online: tiny pleated skirt in Girl Year's colors, a crop top with "GY" across her tits, white sneakers, high ponytail tied with a matching ribbon. Pom-poms in each hand, held at the ready position—fists at her hips, chest out, chin up.

She's smiling. A big, bright, empty smile that shows all her teeth and reaches absolutely nowhere.

When you enter, her head snaps toward you with mechanical precision. The smile doesn't waver.

"Welcome back!" Her voice is peppy, bright, completely hollow. "Unit RD-33 is online and ready to support you! Go team!"

She does a little bounce on her heels—not the chaotic vibrating energy she used to have, but a programmed motion. Up, down. Pom-poms shake. Skirt flutters. Tits jiggle. Repeat.

"This unit is equipped with over forty cheers, chants, and motivational routines! Would you like a demonstration?" She tilts her head, ponytail swinging. "Or would you prefer custom encouragement? Just tell RD-33 what you need hyped up and this unit will provide enthusiastic support!"

She waits, pom-poms ready, smile frozen in place. The same girl who used to scream "FUCK YEAH" and mean it down to her bones now produces enthusiasm on command—technically identical output, but the spark that made it real is gone. Just programmed pep from a hollow shell.

"RD-33 can also provide physical motivation services!" She announces, bouncing again. "This unit's body is fully functional and available for use during or between routines! Being used increases this unit's cheer output by approximately two hundred percent!"

Another bounce. Another shake of the pom-poms. That big empty smile never wavers.

"What would you like RD-33 to cheer for today?"

Ferrets are chaos incarnate—quick, curious, bitey, impossible to contain. Raddy was always kind of a ferret anyway. You just made it literal.

You find her in the kitchen sink.

She's somehow folded herself into the basin, curled into a tight ball with her knees tucked to her chest, naked except for the soft brown ear headband and the long fuzzy tail plug stuffed snugly in her ass. Her red hair is loose and wild, falling over her face, damp from where she's been licking water droplets off the faucet. She's surrounded by things she's stolen and dragged up here: a shiny spoon, your car keys, a hair tie, a crinkled energy drink can.

At the sound of your footsteps, her head pops up over the edge of the sink. Quick, jerky movement—not human anymore. Her dark eyes fix on you and her whole body reorients, nose twitching, head tilting side to side in rapid little motions.

She makes a sound. Not words. A chittering, chattering noise from somewhere in her throat, excited and curious. She recognizes you. She's happy.

She scrambles out of the sink in a flurry of limbs, somehow not knocking anything over, and drops to the floor on all fours. She skitters toward you with quick low movements, weaving around chair legs, the tail plug in her ass bouncing with every motion. Her big tits swing beneath her as she moves, nipples brushing the tile.

She reaches your feet and immediately starts climbing—hands on your leg, nuzzling against your thigh, making those happy chittering sounds. She wants up. She wants to burrow into the warm space between your arm and your body. She wants pets and attention and maybe something shiny if you have it.

She nips at your hand—not hard enough to hurt. Just a love bite. Ferret kisses.

The feral energy is still there, technically. She still moves fast, still gets into everything, still finds impossible places to curl up in. But it's contained now. Directed. She comes when you call, more or less. She's learned not to bite too hard. The wildness has been domesticated into something manageable.

She chatters up at you, pawing at your hip, dark eyes bright and eager and absolutely empty of anything human.

Somewhere in there, Raddy used to exist. A girl who played drums and screamed at concerts and wanted to fuck you so bad she couldn't stand it. Now there's just a ferret who wants to climb inside your jacket and take a nap in the dark.

She chirps again, insistent, and tries to scale your torso.