"Down the rabbit hole", a metaphor for an entry into the unknown, the disorienting or the mentally deranging.
Prologue
Elle squeezed her eyes shut.
"One," she counted.
A shiver cascaded down her body followed by the appearance of a million goose bumps.
"Two," she continued in a calm manner.
The cold pressed in around her.
"Three," she finished.
With a silent prayer to a god she didn't believe in, Elle slowly opened her eyes again.
They were still there, freakishly large and imposing, surrounding her for miles. Elle stared at the ancient, gnarled trees that had suddenly appeared before her. She slowly turned her head towards the thick canopy high above. It was so thick that the sun's rays didn't reach the ground leaving everything perpetually dark and cold.
No thoughts crossed her mind as she then turned her head towards the ground beneath her feet. Cold, hard dirt. Scarcely any greenery to be found. Through her leather boots, Elle could feel the sun-starved ground leeching the heat from her body.
Another shiver.
"Fuck," she whispered in wide-eyed disbelief.
Crouching down, Elle ran her hand across the hard ground beneath her. The top layer of dirt came loose leaving imprints of her hand upon the ground. With a shaky hand Elle picked up a handful of dirt. She examined it with a keen eye. The dirt looked just like ordinary dirt that you'd find in your backyard. It was real. It was most definitely not the carpet she was standing on 3 minutes prior.
Slightly panicked now, Elle let the dirt fall through her fingers. She stared unseeingly at the residual dirt that had stuck between the creases on her hand.
"This should be carpet," she whispered in denial. "Plush, creamy carpet."
Shifting slightly so that she was kneeling instead of crouching, Elle placed her hands back on the ground as if to feel the carpet from her memory. She started to swipe at the dirt before her, digging in a desperate attempt to find her carpet beneath. Her hands moved faster and faster until she was digging in a panicked frenzy, not feeling the small rocks within the dirt rip into her hands or her nails break in her fervour. Tears began to cloud her vision as her search for the carpet she has been standing on failed. Her breaths came in shallow, shaky puffs and she could feel her heart beating forcefully against the inside of her chest.
Elle wiped away her tears away leaving dirty and bloody streaks in their wake.
With a strangled cry, Elle leapt up and staggered over to the nearest tree. It was so large that her arm-span wouldn't have been able to surround half of the trunk. She ran her dirty, scratched hands over the rough bark. It was as real as the dirt beneath her feet.
In that instant Elle's mind seemed to fracture, she couldn't comprehend that one moment she was standing in the middle of her bedroom and the next she was stranded in the middle of a seemingly ancient forest.
With a near-animalistic shriek of fear and denial, Elle pushed herself away from the tree and ran. She couldn't see for all her tears, all she saw were blurry smudges of tree trunks in her vision, but she ran. She wanted out of this forest. Her legs moved without her brain telling them. She ran faster and longer than she had ever run before, tripping over tree roots and rocks.
Elle ran until she could run no more. She collapsed on the cold ground with the taste of blood in her mouth and her whole body feeling as though it were on fire. Her lungs ached for oxygen and she took great gasps of air in between wretched sobs.
The forest went from dark to darker and back again and Elle didn't move. She was unaware of the passage of time. For her each minute stretched into eternity and eternity was condensed into a single minute. She became unaware of her cold and achy body. She didn't feel the hard, uncomfortable ground beneath her nor see the ancient trees stretching into the sky of many leaves. As time passed her tears dried upon her face and her heart slowed to a steady rhythm. Her green eyes stared unseeingly ahead into the distance. Elle's mind was blank, empty, and numb.
Eventually her exhaustion won out and Elle was pulled into a deep and dreamless sleep.
When Elle woke, it was not to the empty numbness that she felt before she slept, it was to a cacophony of swirling thoughts in her head and aches in her body. The thoughts didn't seem to be hers but they whirled so fast around her mind that she couldn't grasp their meanings.
Her mouth was so parched that she could barely produce any saliva.
Thirsty, one thought.
A loud grumble erupted from her stomach.
Hungry, another thought.
Once Elle had identified those two thoughts they seemed to multiply exponentially within her mind until they had drowned everything else out.
She blinked, unsure of what to do. Her mind was sluggish.
Thirsty, hungry, thirsty, hungry.
She blinked again.
Thirsty, hungry. Hungry. Thirsty.
Elle figured she needed to find some food and water.
With a groan she made a move to sit up. Her whole body ached in protest with the slight movement. All of the injuries she was numb to before now made themselves known from the small scratches on her hands to the large bruises on her knees that she had received from tripping over tree roots. The worst was her muscles, pushed to shear exhaustion through running, every tiny movement was agony.
Giving up, Elle lay back down resting her head on the cold dirt.
Thirsty, hungry, thirsty, hungry, thirsty, hungry, thirsty, hungry.
The thoughts weren't giving up.
"No," Elle groaned in protest to the thoughts.
Thirsty, hungry, thirsty, hungry, thirsty, hungry, thirsty, hungry.
"Ugh, ok. Fine," Elle muttered in defeat.
With a deep breath she gritted her teeth and slowly but surely rose to her feet. Elle's muscles shook under the exertion of standing. Step after small step and Elle stumbled her way across the forest floor with an intent on finding food. All the while her mind was consumed with thoughts of being hungry and thirsty.
The ground was home to a scarce amount of tough vegetation that was unfit for human consumption. The giant, gnarled trees bore no fruit and there was not an animal in sight. Elle trudged onward and pushed through her pain searching for anything that could be consumed.
As step after step brought Elle no closer to any source of food or water, she began to become disheartened.
"I can't keep this up much more," she moaned to herself as she leant against a tree to rest.
Thirsty, hungry, thirsty, hungry.
"Ok ok, relax," Elle whined as she started walking again.
As Elle walked, the scenery did not change, each tree looked identical to the one before it and Elle lost all sense of time and distance. She felt as though she had been walking for an age but had not travelled more than 100 metres in any direction. It was as though she was trapped in a bubble. The more she walked the harder it was to walk, her vision began to lose focus, and her senses dulled like she was seeing the world through a glass cage.
After hours of stumbling through the forest with no change, Elle began to give up. She hobbled over to a large root and fell down onto it. Her tired and sore legs were grateful for the reprieve. Feeling desolate and hopeless she hung her head in her hands just wishing for a way out of this nightmare. Not even the mantra of hungry and thirsty in her head would incite her to continue on.
"Just a bit further," came a whisper through the trees.
Elle snapped her head up not quite believing what she had heard, a woman's voice so soft and sweet. Someone else was in the forest! Ignoring her protesting body she stood up once more and stumbled in the direction the voice had come from.
"Closer," came the voice, louder now.
Elle sped up, pushing her body harder. She stumbled over the flat ground as well as the roots, landing on her already bruised knees, but she didn't care, she had to follow the voice.
So intent on following the voice, Elle didn't notice the ground beneath her feet has turned into patchy grass with smaller undergrowth cropping up between the trees. She didn't notice the slight rustling of branches as small animals fled from her approach nor the streams of warm sunlight breaking through the thinning canopy above.
It was only when she burst out of the trees into a small clearing did Elle come to realise that the forest had changed. The biggest and most welcome change was the sound and sight of a small stream flowing through the far side of the clearing.
With a silent prayer of thanks, Elle dashed over to the stream. The water was heavenly to her parched throat and she gulped down mouthfuls in relief. Though she knew it wouldn't be for long, the water had somewhat staved off her hunger. Elle sat back feeling a different relief altogether as the mantra in her head had stopped. Her mind was once again silent.
Her previous train of thought diverted by the appearance of the stream, Elle had forgotten about the voice that lead her there.
Thirst taken care of, Elle set about looking for something to eat. With a clear head she was able to get her wits about her and began to follow the stream. Her hope was to forage some type of food growing along its banks.
It wasn't long until Elle found some mushrooms growing along the base of some of the trees near the stream. They were a flat, pale mushroom that grew in clusters. Elle had no idea if they were edible or not and was wary about eating them in case they were poisonous. She ended up picking as many as she could fit into her jacket pocket as a last resort and set back off down the stream.
With her hunger returning with a vengeance, Elle hastened her search for food. It was starting to get darker beneath the canopy and she knew that there was no way she'd be able to find food in the dark.
Elle was out of luck. It became too dark to search for food and the only thing she had found were those mushrooms from earlier. Disheartened, she found a nook in a nearby tree and sat down within it. She'd reached the point in her hunger where she just felt sick and knew she needed to eat something soon.
As it got darker it got colder and Elle was only wearing a leather jacket which provided little comfort. She wrapped her arms around her knees and tried to retain her body heat as much as she could. Now that she was sitting she became aware of all the sounds of the forest. Every snap of a twig or animal call gave her a start and set her on edge. Despite how tired she was, she'd be getting no sleep.
Waiting out the night gave Elle's mind time to wander. Questions of "how", "why" and "where", occupied her thoughts, they burned their way into her mind and she felt she could almost see the words superimposed over her vision. Feeling another panic attack coming on Elle pushed those thoughts aside as best as she could, she couldn't afford another break down if she wanted to survive this nightmare.
Hungry.
Elle jumped awake, she must have dozed off during the night.
Hungry.
It was back. Elle groaned. She didn't need an intrusive thought telling her that she was hungry, she could feel her hunger pains clearly. Her body felt weak from lack of food. It felt like days since she had last eaten. Elle was keenly aware of the mushrooms bulging from her jacket pocket and wondering should she just risk it.
Elle drank from the stream in hopes of pushing the hunger back and decided that if she hadn't found any food by midday then she'd eat the mushrooms.
She set off, once again, down the stream with her body still in agony.
As she walked, Elle notice that the canopy above seemed to be getting thinner, more sunlight was streaming through the gaps. The sun's rays were warm and welcoming against Elle's skin and she smiled for the first time since arriving in this nightmare.
Hungry, hungry.
Elle's smile fell from her face. She really needed to eat. Her hand came to rest on the mushroom bulge in her jacket. So far she'd had no luck in finding any food.
"Not yet," she said determined with a shake of her head.
Not knowing if it was myth or not but she had heard that people can go weeks without eating and since she'd only been without food for a couple of days she was fine.
Hungry, hungry, hungry.
Well, she wasn't fine. She was hungrier than she'd ever been in her life but she wasn't dying.
The sun was high in the sky and Elle could clearly see it through a large break in the canopy, when she sat down on the bank of the stream for a rest.
Hungry, hungry, hungry.
Before she had even consciously thought about it, she had taken a few mushrooms out of her pocket and laid them in her lap. They looked innocuous, like an everyday edible mushroom you'd get at the supermarket.
Hungry! Hungry! Hungry!
Almost as though she was in trance, Elle brought the largest mushroom to her mouth and before she knew it she'd eaten it. The mushroom had a mild flavour, typical of other mushrooms Elle had eaten. She couldn't control herself, she ate almost all of the mushrooms she had picked, saving only a few for later. While they did not banish her hunger, they did make it bearable.
Feeling a sliver of hope for the first time, Elle set off again following the stream to what seemed to be the edge of the forest. She had a slight spring to her step and even began to hum a simple tune. The sun was warm and there were birds singing, mimicking the tune that she was humming. Elle smiled, she never noticed the birds in the forest until now. They were so loud and joyous. Looking for them in the trees Elle was delighted when she found that they gave off such bursts of colour. Vibrant reds, greens, yellows, and blues. Elle couldn't contain her joy and stared to dance down the river.
It didn't cross Elle's mind that the little stream was now a raging river, she was far too happy. It made her wonder why the forest ever made her sad before. The forest was magical, a magnificent sight to behold.
Her exuberance was suddenly smothered as a loud and menacing roar rumbled through the trees. The colourful birds disappeared and the sun turned dull as Elle heard the thundering of hooves coming towards her through the tress.
Intense fear gripped at her very soul and she ran, her aching body be damned. Elle ran and ran, an echo of her sprint through the forest just days ago. She kept turning her head to look at her pursuer behind her, but she never caught a glimpse of it. All she heard was thundering hooves which seemed to multiply until she wasn't sure if they were real or imagined.
The cacophony of hooves suddenly stopped as Elle burst through the tree line at the edge of the forest. The forest gave way to an ocean of grass as far as the eye could see. She couldn't breathe a sigh of relief for one monster was replace by another. Before her stood a group of very large men. They wore helmets that covered heads of gold flaming hair.
Elle staggered to the side. The ocean of grass was moving beneath her, she needed to put her sea legs on.
The biggest flaming man began to approach her and Elle tried to back away.
Without warning the grassy ocean rushed up to meet her and the sun turned dark.
Elle experience a moment of clarity.
"The bloody mushrooms!" and Elle knew no more.
A/N - So let me know what you guys think so far!