"In the end, as you fade into the night,

Who will tell the story of your life?

And who will remember your last goodbye?…"

1.

Black feet trampled white sand. The sun above, bright as it was over this barren desert, provided no warmth to her. As futile as it might have been, she had no choice but to run. The horned soldier charged after her, always remaining close on her tail with his weapon in its hands, but just far behind enough for her to remain out of its reach.

Its weapon was a staff as tall as the agent was, approximately seven or eight feet. The head of the staff was shaped similar to a "T" with double horizontal lines, a form made by two "F"s back to back, with a circle of more back-to-back "F"s encompassing it like a halo. This was the symbol of F.E.A.R., the religious order to whose power which the agent, and the rest of the Earth, submitted to.

Where were they? Where were the Fallen Ones? She had to find them, or else all would be lost.

She looked back over her shoulder, only to see that the soldier was no longer behind her. When she turned back, it was suddenly standing directly in her path. His spear made a swipe at her head, but she was just quick enough to dodge the strike. In leaping away from the attack, she fell to the ground below. The soldier in dark robes advanced on her, its spear raised and ready to make the kill. The masked girl held her medallion, one in the shape of a gold pentagram with petals on each of its five points, before her at arm's length as if it could shield her. The soldier swatted the thing out of her hand as easily as one would an insect, then raised its weapon high. The girl spoke her final words, then she was finished.

It was then that Eve was awakened. Lying across the cool metal of one of the bleacher seats, she took advantage of what little time she had to gain some extra sleep. Because of these dreams of hers, sleep came seldom to her while in bed at night, so she was obligated to get some where and when ever, for how long ever, opportunity granted. Like now during lunch hour, for instance.

But young Eve Black knew that these were more than mere fantasies concocted by her subconscious. These were far too real to be. And she knew all too well that she was not the only human being to experience such strange episodes.

As she always did, Eve took her "Tome" (as she preferred to call it) out from her bag. In reality, it was a black two-inch thee ringed binder. On the front of it, she had painted in gold the same star sigil she had always seen in her sleep. In its bindings, she transcribed these visions of hers, in both words and drawings. Now, taking her pen in hand, she drew the girl whose tragic death she had witnessed on a blank white page, with her tattered black clothes and blackened skin, the horned and pointed-nosed devil mask over her face, the medallion dangling from the chain clutched in her hand.

It was as she then checked her watch that she realized that unless she hurried at that moment, she would be late for class. Not wanting to be tardy, Eve quickly collected her things, slipping her Tome back into her book bag, then unrolled her leather jacket that she had used for a makeshift pillow, slipping it back over her arms, and left the vacant track field to return to the school building.

Her returning presence was met with mocking glances and sneers. Her silence and passion for dressing in black had earned her a less than popular social status, made worse by her "crazy stories", not to mention her familial relation to another former infamous student. Their crude insults were able to be shut out by the earphones she wore, flooding her ears with noisy metal music. She met the eyes and exchanged smiling waves with some of the few members of the student body she considered to be her friends, those who, like her, were ridiculed and ostracized for their being different from the norms, though in reality they were just regular and misunderstood kids who liked to wear a lot of black.

Once she had taken her seat in the classroom, she continued where she had left off in her Tome. In the lines beneath the drawing, she wrote the tale of the girl in the mask, of her daring escape from the Institution, a prison for Wild Ones, those who rebelled against F.E.A.R., to her meeting her end at the end of the horned soldier's spear.

Her focus was maintained by her continuing to listen to her music, despite school policies forbidding students like her from doing so. Fortunately, her long black hair was able to obscure the wires from sight. Unfortunately, this method still was not enough to prevent her from getting caught. Her teacher, a middle-aged woman with thickly-rimmed glasses, waved her arms to catch Eve's attention. Once she had it, her lips moved in muted words as her hands signed for Eve to take out her ear buds. When she did not, the teacher plucked the bud out from her left ear herself.

"You cannot listen to music in class," she sternly told the girl, "Now take those out and leave them out."

Eve pretended to do so, then as soon as the woman's head was turned, she put them right back in. This facade only lasted another couple minutes. The next thing she knew, the teacher had stormed back towards her desk and practically snapped the chords as she ripped them from Eve's ears.

"That's it! To the principal's office," she declared as she hoisted Eve from her seat, "Move!"

With the teacher escorting her, Eve was marched down the locker-lined hallways to the room where the dreaded patriarch dwelled. On the way, Eve clumsily tripped over a loose shoelace, causing her to spill her bag and all its contents to the floor. As she fell to her knees to gather her things back up, her teacher hunkered down as well to assist. In doing so, the woman caught a glimpse of what was inside Eve's Tome.

Once her possessions were recollected, Eve was back to her feet and back to trudging towards her judgment. The entire time she sat before the principal's desk, her mind was elsewhere entirely, lost in wonders and horrors of a world that she visited during slumber. For a good fifteen minutes or more, he didn't even acknowledged her presence, as he was in the middle of a phone conversation that he clearly felt was far more important than dealing an insubordinate teenage girl.

While the old man was too occupied to pay her any notice, Eve wrote. And in the time she spent writing, her free left hand was inside the pocket of her leather jacket, twirling the thin silver rosary chain, rubbing the onyx beads between her fingertips. This rosary was unlike any others, though, hand-crafted by Eve's brother. Instead of a miniature replica of Jesus Christ crucified to the cross of wood, attached to the chain was the star with petals on all ten sides as big as the palm of her hand.

"Miss Black," he finally said to her, "This makes the third time this week you've gotten in trouble for listening to music during class."

But Eve's gaze stayed downwards, remaining unresponsive.

"For that, you're going to have to serve a detention after school tomorrow," he then informed her. This news still did not affect her. All the while he spoke, Eve wished and wished the old coot would just shut his mouth and dismiss her already. "I've also been hearing some... well, not very pleasant things too," he continued, "According to a couple of your teachers, and quite a number of students, you've been telling some of the most outrageous things."

This finally gave her pause. Her writing hand ceased and her eyes warily gazed up through her hair.

"They say you've been coming up with stories about the end of the world and horned men and people called... Oh what was it? The 'crazy ones'? No, the 'wild ones', that's it."

"So what?" Eve snapped, "Who else's business is it but mine?"

"Well, as you know, Andrew came up with stories like yours before he… well, you know."

"Am I in trouble for having imagination? For being creative, unlike all the other carbon-copy clod-heads around here? Hmm?"

"No, Miss Blakk, that's not it at all."

"Then I'm done here."

Her Tome closed with an emphatic boom, Eve rose from the chair and made for the door. Just as her hand made contact with the chrome knob, she was stopped to hear her principal's final words.

"I already called your parents. They're on their way to pick you up now."

This is my adaptation of the Black Veil Brides film, Legion Of The Black, made for their new album Wretched And Divine.

This story is not a literal adaptation of the film, but more just based off of it while adding my own twist of events.

Updates coming soon, so stay tuned