From the beyond 'Chapter 1 continued'

Those were his last words and Mr. Mysterious walked out with that gorgeous hair of his. It looked silky, beautiful, anything that a girl would wish for. If it had been any other time, I might’ve sat back and had daydreams about it; I wasn’t in a perfect situation for that right now. I had bigger things to worry about, and hair definitely was not one of them. Iven followed his suit and left. And this was how I had been left till now. Hold on...did he just say my name?

How the hell did he know my name? I mean, this really wasn’t starting to look good, not in my sense that is. I had the feeling that if I stayed any longer, the night was really going to be a long and... dreadful one for me. If it cold get any worse, and by the looks of it, it really could. And that was how I had been left up until now.

I had given it all to pull and tug against the bindings but it did no good. I searched with all my might but there was absolutely nothing. The light had flickered out at one point, the night lights above and I was left in the darkness. I hate to admit it but I was afraid of the dark, of the few other ridiculous things I feared; my imagination worked too much at this time. And being in such a place, it was on a rampage. This sucked! How on earth did I end up like this? It took a lot of force to get myself to move in the black, everything around looked menacing and ready to jump me. I hate it. But I just couldn’t lie here like this, didn’t matter whether those guys had really saved me or not. Obviously, being in this state, it didn’t really convince me that they were trying to help; more harm done than good.

It took some effort but I somehow sat up and got myself to the edge of the bed. I needed to get down, find my way through the room and cut the ropes with something…anything. I looked down at the floor, the darkness hid it in pitch black and I couldn’t figure out the depth of it. It was too dark and there was absolutely no light outside to light even the faintest corner of the room, after all, by the looks of it, it was 3 in the morning and as my luck would have it, it was a moonless & starless night. I took a deep breath; my feet dangled from the side, not reaching the bottom. There wasn’t much of a chance as I was petite in size, something that really sucked, especially at times like this. Okay, all I needed was to keep my tied hands at the edge of the bed and slowly lower myself; it would’ve been pretty easy if my feet weren’t bound too. The chance of losing balance was really high. I took a deep breath and slowly let myself get lower and lower; the moments passed as I dreaded the fear of falling, going a tenth of an inch. I didn’t have shoes on, that was a good point; only the black netted socks that reached till my thighs, a stylish pick that Éclair had made. My hands slightly shivered, threatening to throw me off balance at the thought; home…

What was going on at home? It was highly doubtful that they knew where I was. I could see Éclair pacing around worried; she always was one who got all jittery and panicked at times like these. And even though I wasn’t the best to be mentioned about responsibility, I knew better than to be away from home and not give her a call to let her know about it. I wasn’t sure exactly how long it had been, but it was definitely past my time to return. I took a deep breath, and then the picture of the six little ones drifted in front of me. I clutched my hands together, balling a bit of the silky sheets within. A throbbing feeling inside my chest thrummed, it ached inside as the vivid images of them flashed through my head.
“Damn it, curse this!” I murmured to myself.

I didn’t want to do anything with... anything that was going on. I had no idea what I was doing here…why I was brought here. All I wanted was to just have everything fade away and vanish, being only an illusion. I wanted so badly to find myself in my room, surrounded by the kids, maybe with Éclair somewhere, talking to us, singing a bedtime song, or even lecturing us on some boring work related matter. My eyes filled with tears but I bit my lip hard, I was not going to cry, I was not going to give in. I was going to get out, no matter what the odds or how bad it seemed.

The thoughts of my family crashed down on me, and before I realized what was going on or catch myself, my hands slipped. I had leaned too close to the corner and the sheets slid slightly bringing me down, slipping. I felt my feet hit the ground and pushed backward toward the bed so as not to fall face flat, that was supposed to be a good decision, a positive one, but it ended up completely wrong, if that wasn’t one of the biggest mistakes I had made that night, strangle me. Everything around was a flurry; I hit the side of the bed but didn’t manage to sit down because of the instability of my feet and the slipperiness of the silk. I fell, not forward towards the floor or backwards towards the bed; instead I was aimed sideways, straight for the ebony night-light table and banged head-first into it. The pain was excruciating; I yelped as loud as I could and let out an instinctive scream, there wasn’t much sound from it. I slipped off of the table and fell onto the floor. The room spun around my head and everything around seemed to pound in rhythm with my vision and head. My eyes went from clear to blurry as tears streamed down, every drop that I had tried to hold back trickled down my face. The pain rippled through my body, it seemed to blossom even more with every passing second; my head felt like it had literally split in two. The moments that passed…it was impossible to put to word exactly what it felt like. I coughed, my vocal cord seemed to have gone dry and felt as if I wasn’t able to breath. And then, I felt the warm trickle as it seeped down from my forehead. The single streak dripped down across my face onto the floor. My gag started to get heavier as it became wet…I was bleeding and from the feeling of it, a lot of blood. It was a matter of minutes before I would lose consciousness. Was I really going to die here? That was the first question that flashed through my head. The life around me started to go off like lights as the inner thrumming continued to get dimmer and lower. I was going out, faster and faster… the silence was getting more and more vivid as I suddenly heard my heartbeat. The beat, the haziness, the pain, the blood, the feeling of trickle, everything... the feeling of heaviness starting to push me down, so this was what bitterness felt like? The feeling of emptiness and loss as it suffocated me.
“Amaryllis! Amary!”

My name echoed as I started to see everything go white. I let go, this was it.
“Amary!!”

I heard her call again…except this time, it was accompanied with other voices. As my eyelids closed the small face, blue eyes, two pony-tailed blonde Primrose popped up. There were tears in her eyes. I could see her expression twisted to the look of terror, eyes wide with shock. Her eyes seemed to plead; I could see them continuing to scream out ‘no.’ It was just like last time, she had run into the street to get a rolling ball. A car had come but I had managed to somehow grab her and push her off of the head on collision, I had slipped and twisted my ankle, and as I lay there, I still remember the tears-stricken face as she stared down at me, horrified. It was the same.

I clutched my hands into fists and forced to open my eyes. I didn’t want to give up right now… I didn’t want to lose everything here, not here. I wouldn’t let myself fall, not now, not when I was in this unfamiliar place without anyone around me. No Eclair or Primrose, or any of the other kids. I wasn’t going to die her, I wasn’t going to let myself, and there was no way I was going to accept this.

I bit at my gag and tasted blood. The tears were cascading down and I made no efforts to stop it. I needed to try to get myself together, to stop the darkness from engulfing me. The dark shadows were pulling me, tugging harder to fall into nothingness. I wasn’t going to give in, not yet.

The thought was terrifying, I was going to die here alone. Not a single soul around me. It was a horrifying thought which made me shake in fear and remorse. No one would know, not a single family member, friend or anyone. They’d never know what happened except for the fact that I died if word got out. I was going to vanish from life...

A sound snapped me to reality, it was like holding onto a rope with the last strands snapping as you watched them, helplessly. The sound of thump against the floor echoed beyond the headache that was threatening to split my head in two. I forced my eyes to keep itself open as something seemed to flash in the darkness, a light and then it flickered out coming from a few feet away... the doorway. I coughed against the gag and looked up, the blood was seeping into my mouth and the metallic taste was gagging. The shadows of the room was starting to get hazy and fade; the drapery, TV, wall and a peculiar vertical line shadow that had not been there. I was not going to go out like this...
    A distant voice echoed, it was really far away. I shut my eyes. The sudden noise which vibrated against the floor, footsteps? And then I felt as I was lifted from the floor.I was getting shaky, my conscious getting hazy, I wasn’t sure what was going on, except that I wasn’t alone, not anymore. The voice was very, very distant. I could feel myself leaned against the hands of someone, I couldn’t hold on any longer, I tried my best to move and opened my eyes, my vision faltered. There were two deep green circles, you could see the intense color even in the darkness, they stared down from above as I lay facing the ceiling. And then, as if a blurry shade fell, the color seemed to shake and I felt the hand on my arm squeeze painfully tight. The color seemed to flicker and it changed to blood-red. My body seemed to give one final jerk of adrenaline as those familiar eyes pulled my memory back, that night; they were the same eyes. I had seen them before, they were so familiar. Beside the run down storage house outlining the woods, a bit farther from the crowds of people. I had went and seen them, perfectly clear.  And immediately, I seemed to be pulled back, as if I was suctioned and everything around me went utterly dark, I felt myself descending into black. I fell, the soft smiling face of Éclair floated right in front of me, it was accompanied with the laughing face of three girls and three boys, and Primrose was one of the little tykes, joyous and sparkling. I watched as I descended looking into the laughing faces as they sparkled; I fell, into the darkness as it pulled me deeper and deeper until everything around me seemed to recede… even my self… my feelings and body suddenly seemed to get disconnected, severing myself from reality and I found myself in void black. Everything…gone.



Preview of next Chapter:

    The music was deafening. I squinted my eyes, and turned my head from the stage, my hands covering my ears with as much pressure as my head would allow me to compress and as much force as I could exert with my hands, half covered with the sleek velvet coverall. Even though it was just sundown... it felt like it was way past dark. There wasn’t a light in the sky, not a single star or moon, completely dark and black; but the place seemed no where close to dim, it was illuminated with the sharp stage lights which flickered, moved and danced with the rhythm of the mass.
    A push from my right almost sent me falling face flat straight forward, but was saved right before by a girl beside me as she locked her arm into mine. I turned and verbalized a thank you, but it was impossible over the screaming of the crowd and the bouncing. She nodded and then continued to bounce up and down with the rhythm of the guitar and drums, in perfect sync with the rest of the crowd.
    I looked around, eyes darting from one person to the next, there were a flurry of people, but there was no sign of any of the guys. No Kaylin, Cain, Lyle, Miki, Allen, or Clarissa; I was lost for sure in the sea of people, and there was no hope of finding any of them in here. The rock-band infront did their job as they strummed there instruments, from their electrical pianos to guitars to whatever else that lined the stage. It vibrated through air from light thrumming to heavy metal and then coming down to light as it would end or go out with an explosion. It hadn’t been too long, and I was already getting a headache from the sound. The Scream-O concert, with the largest rock bands was not my thing...and it never will be. I gave another effort to thank the girl who had rescued me from getting trampled over, she was going up and down, our hands unlocked as she waved her hands in the air. It was futile, neither could she hear me, maybe didn’t even notice that I was directing words to her. I sighed, no point, I needed to get out of here, a thank you to her knowing she was deaf to it and I turned around; everything around was too much, and the feeling of nausea with the smell, sound, and without a doubt claustrophobia was piling up higher. I squeezed past through the small openings, it wasn’t too difficult with me being especially petite, but it was just a matter of time before I would be pulled into the movement of the crowd. There was no way I’d be able to fight against the ripple of the people. After reaching a few feet … away from the front line, I was blocked. There was no space, the bodies were suffocating me, brushing against me, pushing me, rugging at me. My size was an advantage, but a huge obstacle and shortcoming too. And if the timing couldn’t have been any better, the music just stopped and the crowd erupted into cheering which to my relief died down. If the next band had given me a fraction of timing, I would’ve maybe made a bit of advance, but the next song started immediately. The ecstasy of the crowd erupted and I was pushed and pulled again, with such force, I wasn’t able to keep my balance. I hit the person next to me, I received angry stares and a hard word or two, but it was completely inaudible with the crowd, neither their irritated words or my apology. I turned, everything looked the same, the screaming, the faces, the bodies, I tried to cover my face with the surrounding suddenly getting really violent, the shoving was too much. I caught myself from a fall and had someones elbow hit my right in the cheek. I stumbled and put my hand over my face, the tears trickled down fresh and the entire area suddenly getting blurry. I got jumped with the sudden scream from behind and my dreaded fear came to pass. I was pushed and knocked off of my feet, the opening was enough for me to not only bump against the people around but fall down. The sudden change from being able to barely see around to completely submerged with the feet of them closing in. I gasped, I couldn’t take it any longer, someones feet hit my ankle and the harder I tried to stand up the more force pushed me down and this time, the hit that I took to my face drew out blood. I could feel the trickle as the sharp object brushed against my shoulder cutting deep. I coughed out, the stench of the people, sweat and whatsoever. I was getting dizzy, oh please, not now. Don’t let my phobia kick in right now; if so, it’d be a disaster. I couldn’t lose stability and get on the verge of fainting here, the possibility of getting trampled over was too high. And no one around seemed to notice. The few hands that had reached down to me were pushed up as the crowd moved forward with the sudden booming of the boombox. Damn it... the surrounding was getting hazier and I was losing touch. I can’t...