I woke to the cold of tile under my skin. Opening my eyes, I found myself in a small, tiled room. "Hello?"
A voice comes from next to me. "Glad you're finally awake," she says. "I was afraid you'd died."
"What the fuck is going on?" I say, pushing myself to her and linking my arm with hers. "Where are we?"
"Ow! No clue. But somebody cuffed my hands behind me."
I shrink back. "Oh, I'm sorry. I didn't know." I gently move my hands back to Cybill's, trying to free her from them. But they're too tight around her wrists, and they're steel. I sigh, looking around for something to help break them.
A boom echoes through the small, tiled room; the noise originating from outside the walls. Before I have a chance to react, it happens again. "What is that?"
Then the lights turn off. I shrink into Cybill, staying calm on the outside while I panic internally. "Something's here. Something's wrong."
There is just the faintest, flickering glimmer of red under the bottom of the door.
"What's that scraping?" Cybill asks.
It sounds like the world's biggest fingernails on the blackboard of life.
The noises became louder and more insistent. The lights flickered. Blood began to seep out of the cracks in the tile.
I frantically looked around for something to help her out of the handcuffs. I could find nothing except a sledgehammer; something I knew would break the cuffs, but I was afraid to hurt her.
"I think if you hit the pipe, at least I won't be stuck here," Cybill suggests, looking around more frantically as well.
The blood begins to pool on the tile, oozing closer. The screeching stops at the door.
I was terrified and couldn't think for more than a passing second that I could accidentally hit Cybill's hands. I smashed the hammer into the pipe several times before it finally broke, splattering us with water.
"Step backwards, underneath your hands so they can be in front of you," I said, rising and pulling the pipe away. "Here." I hand her the broken pipe and grip the sledgehammer.
The door to the room busts open. I whip my head around. My eyes widen and the hand not holding the sledgehammer grips one of her wrists.
"Oh, crap, oh, crap." Terrified, Cybill races to get around the cuffs, although I know my grip is nearly wrenching her shoulder. I don't notice.
He's huge. And ghastly. The pipe would be a cruel joke against his bare hands, much less the giant knife he drags through the doorframe bringing it into the room.
My survival instincts somehow turn on underneath my terror, anticipating the creature's move as it raises its weapon.
Even though I pull Cybill with me, I shout for her to duck anyhow but fall to the ground right before the wind whips with the force of the attack.
"Come on!" I scatter to the monster's side and run past it.
Sometimes you get lucky. Cybill landed awkwardly, tripping over her own feet, and the knife somehow shears through the chain of the cuffs.
Cybill scrambles out the door as it tries to pull its weapon out of the floor, and nearly crashes into my legs before she gets to her feet. "Run!"
I race down the dank corridor, my eyes moving fast between the darkness. I keep making sure Cybill is still behind me, and the last time I do, I nearly run into a wall.
I stop and stare at the offensive cement. There's no other escape. Suddenly, the wall disappears and the corridor becomes longer, heading toward a light. I look back at Cybill, ready to run; before I see that the creature is no longer behind us. I touch her arm to alert her, my eyes trained on the place it previously stood.
