A/N: I know this is short and not that good, but I promise it will get better. please READ and REVIEW so I know to keep updating or if not to.
Prologue
Insanity. Some people are born with it; it's simply in their genes. Others, though, are pushed to it. Laurie Bridges had sworn to her parents as a toddler that she would go crazy if she was forced to share her toys. She claimed she would go mad in her teenage years if her curfew was before midnight. She vehemently declared that she would go absolutely mental if she had to sit through one of her Psychology teacher's droning lectures one more time. Laurie Bridges had no idea what insanity truly was.
She was starting to.
Each day, the walls around her closed tighter and tighter. Each day, the air grew more stale, filling her dry mouth and nose. Each time she awoke, Laurie ran her trembling fingers over her cracked lips. Her red-stained fingertips became moist and she winced. Chapped lips though, were the least of Laurie's worries. The reason they had become so far parched was a far greater dilemma. At the very thought, her stomach churned and her mouth attempted to wet itself with saliva that was no longer there to no avail. She had lost count of the hours, or had it turned to days? Either she was unconscious from exhaustion and starvation or praying and desperately fighting for a way out of the entrapment. Her first time in this terrible darkness, Laurie would say an unspoken prayer as she felt herself slipping away to sleep, begging to die before she could awake. She imagined that dying in her sleep would relieve her from the torture. This time, though, there existed a new part of her that kept going. Somehow, somewhere, a piece of her would not give up. Laurie did not know if she was grateful for it or loathed it. That piece, that spark; was her family. Somewhere, outside of the darkness she was trapped in, the last person on earth she truly loved with all of her being, was experiencing equal, if not greater peril. She refused to allow herself to imagine the possibilities.
When she had first been thrown into her confinement, she lashed out and pounded aggressively at the walls, ceiling, and door. Her screams were guttural, almost animalistic. She had been enraged, but coating all of that uncontrollable fury, was panic. The angry shouts and demands gradually devolved to tear-filled pleadings. She hated beginning the same person who had imprisoned her but was at her most desperate after what she had just experienced. Her body was still weak from the ordeal and the beating, but her emotions and adrenaline took over and fueled her for some time.
By now, her voice was hoarse, nothing more than a mouse's whisper, but still she begged in vain. Feebly, Laurie scratched and beat at the door. The soft contact of her limp fist again the metal barely made an audible noise. Nearly all anger and all energy had escaped her as she lowered her arm and leaned her head back against the wall. The only thing left in her, were tears. They came slowly and painfully, stinging as they dripped against her lips and slid across her scratches that decorated her face. It was not long before they too ceased and she had no more tears left in her to cry.
Just as she was about to permit sleep to overtake her yet again, there was a deep clanging sound that rang out and suddenly light rushed into her small space. It was not bright like when you open a window in the morning, but a dim glow that at least allowed Laurie to see something besides black. For a solitary moment, Laurie allowed herself to hope. Her heart fluttered and her breath came in deeply as she slowly looked up to view her savior. Instead, a tall and familiar figure loomed over her in a commanding stance.
"There," he spoke in a deep and uncommonly calm voice, "have we learned our lesson now?"