It's a thing she doesn't want to remember. It's something so horrible that she's tried to wipe from her memory time and time again, but it creeps up on her occasionally at night when her subconscious lets go and when her mind unwinds as she slips away. It's the shadow that doesn't want to depart from her – the shadow of a past event, of a past self, of a darker time. It's a recurring nightmare that revels in the façade of reality. She twists and turns and her heart races and suddenly, everything's dark. Darker than it's ever been before. The night converges with the depths of her mind and some invisible force plunges its hand in and tears the memory from its hiding place, drawing it up and reminding her that she's never really ridden of the darkness that could have very well devoured her and her soul that day.
Spiny fingers linger along her body, drawing against her legs and binding her down, sucking her into the endless void of darkness below. She's sinking; her entire body is being swallowed whole. She's never really thought about how darkness feels until now – she realizes it's cold and constricting and it feels like she's been kissed by Winter herself. Her body can't stop shaking against the fingers that brush against her skin, almost tempting her to give into the inevitable fate. They pull her in as she struggles and strains against the hands that bind her, but they drain the strength from her. Her screams echo into nothingness. She isn't alone in this feat – her friends are receiving similar treatments from similar hands, maybe not as cold and maybe not as condescending and maybe it's entirely different. She doesn't know, she doesn't care – she hates this, hates the feeling of being powerless because it's happened before. She can't save anyone if she can't save herself, and she's come to accept that fact time and time again. Her friends are her power but they're all gone and she's continuing to sink further and further down.
The voices start whispering to her then as she's taken down to her waist. They're congregating and demeaning and this is taking too long, she thinks. The end should be quick and painless. It shouldn't be nearly this terrible. It feels as if she's being pulled apart, muscle by muscle. It feels like her bones are splitting and there's this unbearable heat. It's cold to the point where it burns to no end, and everything aches. The voices get louder – they're not just whispering now, they're yelling and screaming and there's some sort of high-pitched screeching like a banshee being tortured. It comes to her realization that it's her, wearing her voice down from the unbearable pain. The void swallows her whole, devours all of her energy and she's suddenly silenced as the pain subsides.
"This is what you wanted. You, as bearers and seekers of truth, crave nothing more than redemption for the people of your world. I am your caterer. This pain that you feel is not an illusion – it is the truth of what will be if you succeed in defeating me. I am a God… I will not yield to humanity, and I refuse to accept the possibility of your victory!"
But what redemption is there? What could possibly be available to them after all of this is said and done? There is nothing but darkness that extends endlessly, seemingly for miles and miles. Either that or her vision has been etched out. Now she feels it – those sharp, bony fingers are starting to pull at her body again. They're reddish in color, like they've crusted over with blood and had begun rotting ages ago. The tip presses against her beloved track jacket and begins to rip apart the fabric, searing through with something that's like heat but not quite. More like a laser, searing its way through, or perhaps acid in a similar regard. Once that's all said and done with, it seems to disintegrate all by itself, holes widening and eventually leaving her with no fabric to protect herself.
It's disgusting, she thinks. She can smell the death and decay emanating from the hands – whatever they are. The pads of what would have been fleshy fingers press against the skin beside her eyes and pull, pull, pull – like they had the intention of popping her eyes right out of her sockets. Her lips part to plead, to cry out for them to stop, but she comes to realize that not only would no one be able to hear her pleas, she had no voice to plea to begin with. And so she tenses, realizes that maybe this really is the end… and braces herself.
Death isn't kind. He can be under certain circumstances. But he takes you slowly, sometimes ruthlessly. This is one of those instances, she finds. The tip of the finger digs just past her eye but it's sharp enough to tear, and it does. Rubies pour from the slit created in her eye and her vision goes scarlet, pain suddenly drowning out any of her other senses. Her body trembles but she's held down and the bones are sharp. They pierce her skin, make her bleed. The darkness delves further and further and all she wants to do is let go. But they force her awake. Make her realize agony. The fingers press deep into her eyes, into her sockets, and she can feel the blood rush. It's a piercing pain like a bullet through her skull, over and over as the fingers pull out and thrust back, demolishing whatever is left. If anyone were to find her figure, they'd see stabbings akin to that of a pencil in one eye. The other, clear as day, a melted pool of milk chocolate, dimmed with the lack of faith and hope that the spirited girl once harbored.
Death hasn't come yet. He's not nice this time around. He lingers in the paths around her; he's apparent in those serpentine arms that hold her in what seems like the darkest oblivion. A vice grip, one in which to make sure that she doesn't struggle and escape further down into the abyss of nothing. But she's long since lost the strength to fight back. Her body is a mess of mauled skin and severed muscles, exposed bone and bloodstained porcelain. Her lips are bruised, her stomach is cut open. Her chest has been cleaved asunder, torn by those same sharp fingers that have been holding her almost like a mother would her newborn child. Her ribs are yanked out of their proper sockets and thrown away to reveal her lungs, her ragged breathing, and her slow-beating heart that seemed to miss its previous fervor.
Those hands linger over her form as if whoever was controlling it were contemplating something. What a beautiful living corpse. She bleeds in all of the right ways. The way she writhes and the certain way that the crimson drains from her body is downright addicting. Those nails start to push into her arms, deep into her veins, reaching in and digging, hooking along before pulling right upward with such force that it rocks her entire body with unbearable, white-hot pain. Her lips part to cry but once more, there's no retaliation, no sound – desperate need for redemption but empty pleas. The skin slices open at the proper command, fibers torn apart from one another, veins rupturing and blood leaking out like a fountain, spurting from the bottom and making its way toward the top.
"Sons of man… Feel the wrath of a thousand curses…"
The heart that beats in yearning for some type of savior quivers. Her lungs are constricted, rotting appendages curving around the bloodied organs and almost teasing her in the way they only know how. She can feel Death's smile curving along the darkness before the finger plunges past the tissue, cutting cleanly across and allowing the blood to splash into the new hole it made.
The air doesn't come to her know. She gasps and tries, but the slit in her neck and the blood conjuring in her lungs is too much. Whatever air she has left is trapped in the in-between, and her fingers try to furl into fists, but the strength has been lost from her arms, muscles, veins and nerves having been split right open from the very point, the broken nail of each finger.
She chokes then. Can't breathe – her body convulses violently and the arms don't try to hold her down this time. The blood pools in her mouth and she doesn't even have the strength to spit it out. She gargles, spews without her knowing – her body is retching, her blood is sloshing everywhere with her open chest cavity and there's nothing she can do but pray for the end to come faster.
Death is approaching. Death has finally come to whisk her away into the moonlight sonata, weaving her soul into a star and throwing it up into the sky to compensate for the millions of thousands that have blinked out. Her soul is bright, strong, lively – the way she had been her entire life. She can feel it being taken from her body the way a professional does, careful yet quick, reaching in with the needle and twirling it like spaghetti on a fork, plucking out and crafting it into something wonderful.
It's too bad that it will forever be stained scarlet, tarnished by her own means. An unfortunate yet eerily beautiful difference from that of the millions of other stars, some who are more fortunate and some who are less.
Death takes her then. He coils his arm backward and charges for the throw, twisting his wrist before hurling it into the air like a fast curveball. It lands in place and she twinkles with the reminder that she's always going to be there. The martyr who smiles in the sky for her leader and her friends who never made it out alive.
Her body shudders then and she's thrown out of her slumber with a high-pitched scream. Her eyes shoot wide open and she feels the sweat having soaked into her skin, head-to-toe from what it seems. Her navy comforter, having promised to keep her warm, abandoned her late at night when she kicked it off. Her eyes scourge the room and her fingers prod at her arms, her chest, making certain that this is reality and not a dream. The pain splits through her skull like the blade of an axe, cracking in and she almost wants to buckle underneath the pressure. Whimpers and sobs escape her as her arms wrap around her form, body too weak as she collapses back against the sheets that are slightly dampened.
Her eyes squeeze shut and her breathing remains shallow as she inhales, exhales desperately, so happy that her lungs aren't punctured, that her throat isn't cut, that everything's alright. It's late into the night and she knows – nobody's in the house but she can see the moon as it hangs low from her window, curving alongside its myriad of stars, dancing along in an eternal waltz.
But there's that one star that lingers out there, smiling toward her and almost mocking her in the way that it shines so brightly.
Death's smile never left her.
It probably never will.