(So, I am continuing this and hopefully will finish it soon. There isn't much more to do with it really. After this chapter, there may be two more. But, who knows. Que sera sera. )
Terra opened her eyes slowly as her alarm resounding in the background. She looked at the time on the clock, 7:00 a.m. She hit the snooze button and closed her eyes. She had not gone to bed the night before until 4:00 a.m. Before she had challenged the demon, Freddy Krueger, to a murdering contest, she was clearing one murder victim per night and she had enough time to sleep and maintain a healthy façade. Since the game started, Freddy had been upping the ante by killing two or three per night. Three seemed to be his limit. Terra presumed he was either limited by the amount of time people actually slept or by some sort of physiological limitation.
The lack of sleep was having a heavy toll on Terra in numerous ways. Overall, the lack of sleep was making it difficult to maintain her façade at school. She may be able to lie her way through a few sleepless nights by blaming it on tests, but people were starting to become curious. The lack of sleep was also causing her to make stupid mistakes while killing victims. Terra assumed this was part of Freddy's plan: step one was to tire her out and watch her suffer to keep up with his murders and step two would be to watch her lose after trying so hard. She knew she was in the role of a puppet and he was the master, but she also knew even Pinocchio had his day.
Ultimately, Freddy was helping her accomplish her goal just as, she assumed, he was using her to further his goal. She had to admit it was unsatisfying to have someone else "help" her kill these people, but having Freddy as a second murderer left a larger and more difficult trail for the police to follow back to her.
Her alarm went off again, the added snooze was over. Terra sighed heavily and prepared herself to deal with the day. As she got up, she reached under the bed and retrieved an energy drink from the stash she stored under the bed. She drank it quickly and hurried to school.
As usual, the school was buzzing with various streams of steamy gossip, although, everyone was deeply concerned, mostly for themselves, about the steep increase in the murder death count. It was clear everyone in town was afraid of what was going on, and the school was being devastated the most.
Terra had noticed it before: Freddy was interested in the school students. She hadn't thought much of it in the beginning, but she began to notice since it was causing issues at school. Terra walked over to Jeanie, Eva and Katie and casually listened to their conversation.
"Oh! Terra, I am glad you came early. You are still coming over tonight for the sleepover right?" Jeanie asked excitedly.
Terra was confused for a few reasons. She didn't remember agreeing to this sleepover at Jeanie's house. And, Jeanie's tone was strange. It was as though she was excited to have people over, but also, she really needed to have people over.
The sleepover posed many problems for Terra. If she had been on her A-game, Terra would have planned ahead to be able to participate in the sleepover, but now, she had a few hours to think about how she was going to sneak out of the sleepover, kill her victims and get back into the house without anyone noticing she was gone. She began to feel a bit groggy from the stresses which forced her blood pressure to rise.
"I haven't really been feeling well, is there any way we can do this some other time?" Terra asked as she rubbed her furrow, slightly moist brow. Her body was beginning to show signs of her stress.
"DO IT SOME OTHER TIME?" Jeanie asked in disbelief. "Don't you even remember why you are coming over?"
Katie and Eva recoiled slightly from Jeanie's abrasive response, but Terra barely moved. She expected Jeanie to react in a violent manner, and she was by no means in the mood to put up with it.
"My parents are going out of town, Terra. I am having a sleepover so I won't have to be alone with all of this murdering stuff going on in town." Jeanie said in a tone which expressed fear and agitation.
"Well, can't you just spend the night at Katie or Eva's house?" Terra asked nonchalantly.
"Terra, we already covered this. I have special medical conditions which I need to follow at my house. One of the blanket conditions is I cannot be around cats. Both of these two have cats." Jeanie said haughtily. "If you are sick, you can sleep all you want at my house."
There was awkward tension between the four girls as they stood in the hallway. It was obvious Jeanie was annoyed and would not take a negative answer from Terra, but it was also apparent Terra did not want to go. Katie and Eva seemed to puzzle over Terra's apparent medical distress.
"Look, Terra, you did promise Jeanie you would come. If you are not too sick, why not just come along? It is a sleepover after all, there should be too much stressful stuff going on." Katie said, trying to ease the situation out.
Terra hated being pushed into this spot, but she hated not being able to plan around this problem either. She had no choice. She was going to have to go to the stupid sleepover at Jeanie's house. Katie did bring up a good point though, it was just a sleepover. It wasn't as though they would be running around town doing things. They would probably be in bed by 1 in the morning and that left enough time to squeeze two murders in. She just had to hope Freddy only stuck to two murders as well. She was nervous and it made her heart beat erratically.
"Alright, I am really tired though, so I may crash early." Terra said and hoped she may be able to get the girls to go to bed earlier.
"Ok! Everything is all set then!" Jeanie said smiling brightly since she got her way. "I am going to go to the office to drop off a paper, I will see you guys later."
"Oh, I am heading that way too. I will walk with you." Eva said and followed Jeanie swiftly.
Katie and Terra stood in the hallway alone as the other two walked to the office. Terra knew Katie was eyeing her and debating on whether she should ask Terra questions and what types of questions she should ask. Katie was intuitive. It caused some issues for Terra.
"Are you ok? You seem really sick?" Katie finally asked.
"Yea, I am fine. I think I caught a really bad bug." Terra replied tiredly.
"Yea?" Katie asked skeptically.
Terra hated people who were too nosey, because they were only interested in helping themselves in some way in Terra's opinion.
"Well, if you need anything just let me know. I know Jeanie may seem self-interested and Eva not interested enough, but we will be there to help you when you need it." Katie replied frankly.
Katie's honest, good-natured response caused Terra to recoil. Katie wasn't going to pry into Terra's life. She was just being supportive for her friend. Terra didn't know how to respond. She nodded slightly a few times and Katie smiled in return. The two girls stood there for a little while. There was not much time before class.
"I really appreciate it." Terra said to Katie but her eyes wouldn't meet Katie's.
"No problem." Katie responded instantly.
Terra had never had someone be so kind to her. In her life, she had only experienced exile from a judgmental society. She tried not to let it get to her too much. She needed to stay focused on completing her goal, and to do that, she was going to have to have unwavering strength which would mean controlled emotional and mental states. Terra found it slightly amusing when she thought about the offer again. Terra could use the help, help winning her murdering contest, but the thought of Jeanie, Eva or Katie joining into the contest to help her was a hilarious concept.
"Yea, I didn't want to say anything around Jeanie," Katie started and destroyed the silence, "But, apparently the police have been finding more and more evidence for the one murderer. It appears he is getting sloppy for some reason."
Terra was frightened and annoyed. She grit her teeth and tried to hide her frustration.
"What kinds of evidence are they finding?" Terra asked as casually as she could muster.
"Apparently, the murderer left a handprint at one murder. The murderer didn't wipe the blood off and left a print. My dad said this fact told the cops the one murderer is a woman." Katie stated.
"Really? How does a handprint tell them the murderer is a woman?" Terra asked nervously.
"Well, according to my dad, the size of the hand was proportionately smaller than a man's hand and since a child couldn't really do all of the sneaking in and murdering, a woman murderer is the most logical deduction." Katie explained casually.
Terra winced at her own stupidity. Of course, that would make sense. If she had her right mind, she would have caught that instantly. Though, if she had her right mind, the police wouldn't have her handprint. At least she wore gloves during the murders, so there weren't any fingerprints, but a hand print was still too much.
"What other evidence have they compiled?" Terra finally asked after should could calm herself and retain her composure.
"Well, there were a lot of small things. The handprint was the biggest find though. My dad says the murderer is either getting lazy, cocky, or super tired from all the killings. I tend to zone out sometimes when my dad talks about the case information. I know I should be attentive and find things out so I can protect people with the knowledge, but it becomes really frightening after a while, you know?" Katie said.
Katie's honest, scared eyes met with Terra's and it caused Terra's heart to pang and a shiver to go down her spine. Admittedly, she felt bad for making Katie feel this way. Out of everyone, she felt Katie meant what she said and would do anything to help others, especially her friends. Terra tried to block away her emotions. She was not sure what she was supposed to say to Katie.
Luckily, the bell rang, and it was time for them to move on to class. Terra was saved by the bell.
"Well, at least we can look forward to having a fun time tonight right?" Katie said with a weak, scared smile.
"Yea." Terra replied half-heartedly.
She watched Katie walk ahead of her to class and she wondered what she was going to do. For a moment, she pondered her actions and her feelings towards her actions. The moment was short-lived, as she weighed the situation and her feelings, blood-soaked memories transposed themselves onto her thoughts. She narrowed her eyes and was determined to see the rest of this through. She had come too far to turn around now.
The night would surely be interesting.
(I am ending this here. It was a significantly anti-climatic chapter, but it is necessary filler for the next portion. I mainly just want to get this one out because I hadn't done anything in a while. Look for the next installment soon—ish).
