Downloaded Monument Valley a few days ago... I liked it... so I just had to make this.
She looked about the tiny cave with sad eyes.
It had served her well, and provided her with much-needed protection for a long time. First it had done so for days, then months. Years went by. Then decades. Centuries.
Ida had hidden out in this cave for longer than she could remember. Waiting. Watching. Being brought news occasionally. Hiding behind rock crags when they came to find her. But then her steady trickle of reports of the world outside of the cave was stemmed, its flow blocked. Still she had hidden in the cavern, until she grew desperate. She waited for two days more. Then, frenzied, frantic, she made up her mind.
She would leave.
She would seek forgiveness.
She would give back what she took.
She would again go to Monument Valley.
But first.
She had to be prepared.
Last time she had been there was a mist of confusion to her, and not just because her people were changed and she was being chased and the Storyteller's face loomed at her, foretelling her doom, from every nook and cranny.
Because of what she did, she was no longer welcome in the Valley. It misted and befuddled her mind. And she needed to remember. Remember, remember, remember.
She took a piece of coal- hard, dark, smeary coal- from the floor and rolled it between her fingers.
Then, making up her mind, she sat down and chalked words on her clean, white dress.
Ida. Give back what's in your hat. Keep going. Keep going.
She wanted to write more, to not be afraid, to tell herself why, but there was no space on the dress, and her writing skills were, quite honestly, appalling.
She straightened her long, pointed hat. She clenched the black piece of coal so hard it was crushed and fractured in her hand; grey sooty smuts all over her palm. She opened her hand and let it drop. And then she walked, slowly, deliberately, out of the cave.
She was out of there.
She was out.
She ran.
Leaves brushed her stockinged ankles. It was dark and damp. She ran.
The ground beneath her feet was steeply sloped, but the adrenaline from her escape pushed her ever forwards, not even stumbling. She could taste it.
She fled so fast she was almost flying.
Before she knew it, she'd reached it. The peak of the mountain.
Her tiny cave couldn't be seen from here. It was too small. Ida didn't notice. She didn't look back.
She paused, if only for a moment, at the pinnacle of the mountain. The one she stood on was the only way to get to her goal. Her goal was Monument Valley, inside the mountain range which still was quite a long way away.
She took a deep breath and dove down the other side of the mountain.
The swirling, muddy black awaited her.
She plummeted down toward it. It and the fog. She could already feel the muddled effects of that fog on her mind. And all around her was inky black so thick you could cut it with a knife, she was still plunging downwards, She needed to remember but she couldn't. Her head swelled with the screams she would and could not utter, The soupy jet-blackness was pulling her in, She couldn't think, She couldn't breathe. Her head, her ears, her mouth, were filled with Screams. She couldn't, she couldn't, She needed to let the screams out. She opened her soundless-for-so-long mouth and out of it came
the loudest silence ever to be.