Chapter 2: When Eyes Water
Fists of rain collided against the car frightening the live bait within. What the hell do I do?! She saw sitting in the driver's seat was a man, who appeared out of nowhere and stared into her brown eyes. She could feel her soul withdrawing from the window of her eyes. If her legs could give way now, now would be the time. She swallowed hard and tried to make sense of the situation. A hand crawled up her arm as she pinched herself. The jolt of pain surged through her arm. She bit her lip. Fine, this isn't a dream… a nightmare at best. She felt as if she were going to be torn up into indistinguishable pieces and left for dead. Dead? How many times did I cheat death? Why would I be afraid now?
She sank deeper into the seat; the doors were locked with voices of the sky silenced her cries… and she sat with a ghost. Her left hand slithered to the handle, grasping it, prying it open but all was in vain. Pulling it a little harder didn't seem to help. Maybe, she thought, if she played along with this thing it would just let her go resuming her life down a path of nothingness. Suddenly, the car shook tossing her from side to side until the door swing open sending the poor girl crashing outside into the unforgiving storm. She didn't say anything except crawl onto her knees touching her scrapped chin; blood mixing with rain.
"This is all a bad dream," she thought trying to lighten up the situation. "Nothing could be this bad… I've been in worse…"
She turned around and the parked vehicle was gone but was substituted with a man in dark uniform, blazing red eyes piercing hers. They felt like arrows shooting at her constantly preventing her from escape. She wiped the rain out of her eyes hoping her imagination wasn't at the circus but what she saw was a man in front of her advancing towards her but each step he took, the puddles didn't ripple. At all. She inched backwards with her hands divided waters in the puddles; she stared and bit her lower lip. Her breathing too, slow down bit by bit; besieged by fear. The man in the dark uniform took another step closer as rain showered down his head, hair covering those blood red jewels. Medium built he was intimidating probably standing at around six feet and biceps magnified by the rain.
"What's your name?" he spoke gruffly overpowered the screams of the sky.
"The hell would you like to know?!" she screamed, picked up a rock and threw it.
It tapped him on his chest but that didn't bother him, "Tell me your name, human."
"Screw you!"
She took off. Her hair was pasted in her face while the wind coerced her in the wrong direction but she pushed through trying to escape. She thought her mind had completely lost it imagining a man running after her in the storm. She wondered what if this was all a dream? A dream that she would wake up again, sitting in some alley on the street, begged for money and food? She had no idea while running, she began to slow down into jogs then slow strides… there she went again… dreaming of what was happening to her. A strong hand emerged through the curtain of the rain, grabbing her shoulder, snapped her from the depth of her thoughts. She was forced to turn to her predator. Before he spoke, the skies above screamed once more allowing him to question her one more time.
"I know who you are, tell me your name," he demanded. "Now."
She scowled but the pressure from the hold caused her to release a small squeak. "I… I don't have a name…" she answered, lowering her head. "Never had one. Everyone calls me, 'Maiden'."
"So, it is you…"