Hello my homeboys (or girls, since most of us on this lovely site are of the female persuasion) and welcome to the newest installment of Sleep No More.
A warning – there is a pretty graphic scene in here that may contain nightmare fuel for some people. I will not discuss the circumstances until the end, but please know that I did my best to make this scene… erm, accurate. However, the horror and fear part came first. I have not gone through this experience, so please, no nitpicking. As I said, I did my best.
Besides that note, the only other pressing issue is that I don't own Zelda.
…
He narrowed his eyes at the small box, frustrated by his lack of information.
Link wasn't sure exactly what the nature of the stone was or what it was supposed to do, even after looking at it and holding it for about an hour. All it did was continue to pulse weakly; when Link held the actual stone in his hand, he could feel a slight ticking reverberating in time with the flashes of light, a little bit off from his own heartbeat.
Saria had said it was a key, but he saw no way that this would be able to open something. His slight euphoria about getting a straight answer from someone in this time of only questions was starting wear off, and he was slowly starting to see that Saria had really left him with almost nothing to go on. Screw the secrecy oath or whatever; she had asked him to possibly risk his life. A little more information to go on might have been nice so he could justify it to himself. He was just wondering if he had made an awful mistake when Midna knocked on the door.
"Hey, are you decent? Well, if you're not, then get ready, because I'm coming in anyway," she announced cheerfully, sweeping into the room. Link quickly shoved the box under his pillow before she could see it. She plopped down next to him, promptly saw the photograph in Link's hands, plucked it out of his grasp, and danced away with it.
"Hey, give that back!" Link lunged for her, but she backed away, her brow furrowing and the smile melting off her face. It was quickly replaced with confusion.
"Who are these people with Zelda?" she asked, waving the stiff paper in the air. She stepped nimbly over a pile of clothes and ran out of the room when he came close to swiping it from her hands. He stopped dead in his tracks.
Wait… If these people were Zelda's friends, then Midna might know them too and be able to give him more information. It didn't sound like it, but maybe if he jogged her memory…
"You mean you don't know?" he asked back as he followed her. She shook her head, still staring at the photograph.
"Never seen these people before today. The funky green haired chick is the one that came to your door just now, right?"
He nodded. "Yeah, that's Saria. I don't know who the other is."
Midna shook her head again. "This is really weird. She never talked to me about these people, and we told each other everything."
Link sighed. "You're sure?"
"Double sure." She wordlessly handed the photograph back to Link, and he stuffed in his pocket.
They spoke no more on it for the rest of that day, which passed by uneventfully. Sheik brought home takeout. They watched a romantic comedy because Midna insisted, and then turned it off halfway through because all three of them were laughing too hard at it to take it seriously. They then tried to watch a bad horror movie, but Sheik got bored and ended up playing games on his phone, Midna fell asleep leaning on his shoulder, and Link got up and went to bed around midnight, citing the fact that he had work the next day early.
Surprisingly, he fell asleep almost as soon as his head hit the pillow, the hard shape of the necklace box digging reassuringly into the back of his neck.
His last thought before he passed out was not whether or not he would have a dream tonight; rather, it was of Zelda, sitting on a bench with two people he didn't know, smiling solemnly at the person behind the camera.
Click.
…
The house was sunny and open. The walls were white and clean, and the kitchen was messy, littered with pots and pans and letters and bills and foods.
Despite the ordinary scene, something still felt horribly wrong.
Link watched; a pair of eyes without a body and a pair of ears to bear witness as Saria walked through the front door without a second thought and into the kitchen. Her purse was thrown on a counter, her keys clinking in the depths of the bag, and she kicked off her shoes. The green and white patterned dress she wore billowed around her knees as she walked through the kitchen, calling out her husband's name.
There was no response.
Link felt a sick feeling grow in his stomach as her expression turned into one of concern.
She felt it too.
"Mido!" Her voice was on the edge of a bark, fear starting to creep its way in. "Mido? Are you done packing yet?!"
Link followed unwillingly as she ventured into the living room, her bare feet soft against the wood.
"Mido…" she now whispered quietly. Saria blinked and shuddered, crossing her arms and rubbing her shoulders with slim hands. Her blue eyes darted around the room, searching for something.
They finally alighted on a door in the corner.
Saria took an uneven step forward, and then another. Finally, she burst into a half run, stumbling over to the door and yanking it open. Link could see a deep, bright red seeping out the crack at the bottom, staining the hardwood.
Saria let out a dry shriek and staggered backwards as a body that was once propped up in the closet slumped over and hit the floor with a solid thump. Link could almost hear her heart, pounding and hammering in her chest like a jackrabbit's, from his view right next to her shoulder. He saw what she saw, and what she saw was a head of ginger orange hair stained red, his shirt stained red, his skin and his hands stained red red RED-
Another screech was about to escape her mouth when a shadow that neither of them saw coming came up from behind and slammed something into the back of her head.
Saria fell in what seemed like slow motion, her head snapping forward, and then falling back as she collapsed first to her knees, like she was praying; then onto her side; onto her husband's corpse. A dark hand reached down, picked up her limp hand, and checked her pulse.
Link could hear it then too – thready and panicked, but slowing down. The shadow held her hand in his for a short time, until the beats steadied and settled into a rhythm that wasn't life-threatening. He let out a breath of relief, then bent down to pick her up.
This was the first time Link saw the man – the man that had killed Zelda. He was blurred, indistinct, and his movements were jerky and sharp, as if caught on a camera with a bad frame rate. What he could catch was that the man was bulky, tall; his features were strong, a hooked, aquiline nose dominating his features; his skin was dark, and his hair did not match it. When he moved, carrying the pregnant woman with her swelled belly easily back out the way he came, it crackled and left a trail like flames.
Link's fixed view did not follow it – his sight stayed by the dead body, now lying with its legs tangled in the closet and a hole in its chest.
The vision stuttered and halted for a second, then exploded into heavy darkness. The smell of freshly cut wood, new carpet, and the faint stench of bleach filled his not-nose, and he would have started if he could when a loud scream sounded in his ear like a siren, nearly deafening him.
"LET ME OUT!" There was a loud thump of someone hitting something with their closed fist. The desperate cry was absorbed by the carpet, and it turned into a sob that bled into the air with a blue color. "Please… Oh my gods, please… My baby… I need a hosp-" She cut herself off with a loud, pained gasp that rippled the atmosphere inside the space, and when Saria sucked in more air, Link was drawn down, down, down from his perch above her.
He tried to cry out and grab something, but he found no helping handholds as he fell in silence, and soon he was surrounded by Saria's thoughts and emotions, all swirling around him in an agonized, turbulent storm.
(OH GODS, PLEASE END THIS, IT HURTS)
(!)
(he'll kill me and my baby just like he killed mido mido mido oh no no NO)
(I'M BEING BURIED ALIVE!)
(please, please, please, I need a hospital!)
(sick, baby needs care, sick, baby needs care-)
(he was redredredredred)
(HELP GODS PLEASE I WORK TO KEEP EVERYTHING GOOD AND THIS IS HOW YOU REPAY ME-)
Link continued to float in this otherworldly ether of distilled emotions, feeling like he was going to be overwhelmed and swallowed up by all this horror. It terrified him. He looked for something, anything to hold onto in the formless cloud of her sorrow, panic, and fear.
Something latched onto him then, spearing into him like a sword through the heart as Saria let out a small cry, her fingernails digging into the sides of the box. Waves of pain and claustrophobia rebounded throughout her mind and rolled through her body, and the spike through Link's chest tightened and expanded, leaving him choking.
"PLEASE!" she screamed in a raw voice. "My baby is coming! I need a hospital!"
There was no verbal answer, but Link could feel the man standing outside the small box, studying it carefully.
Saria let out another caustic shriek as something dug into her mind, searching and defiling her thoughts.
If you tell me where the emerald is, then I will release you… Drive you to a hospital… Doesn't that sound nice?
Saria panted, and with the strongest effort Link had ever seen someone give anything, she threw him out of her mind and pulled up barriers that he could feel encasing her thoughts, protecting them. She settled back down, moaning in pain as another contraction tore its way through her.
And so Link floated in her barricaded mind, wishing he could scream along with her when the waves of pain ripping through her slight frame turned even more acidic and agonizing. She stopped banging on the sides of the coffin like box, focusing on muffling her cries of pain with the palms of her hands. The tang of sweat and blood filled the box, along with the foul odor of excrement as she struggled to push.
The man came back occasionally – Link could hear him waiting outside the box. There was the occasional prod at Saria's mind, but it was quickly withdrawn when confronted with the maelstrom that Link was trapped in.
He thought he was going to go mad.
Eventually, hours later, with one final heave, a lurch, and an agonized moan, there was a quiet, heavy sound on the carpet of the box. There was a soft anticipation in the air, and Saria would have moved to see if her child was alright, but she was too exhausted; the box was too small, fit her too closely.
So she waited silently, her breath expelling between her teeth like frantic devotions. Her anticipation infected Link, and he soon found himself praying that everything would be alright.
(please let this be just a dream)
When the frantic, piercing squalls of a newborn didn't fill the air, a broken and bleeding mother sobbed her heart out instead.
...
It was dark outside when Saria landed on the ground with a hollow thud. The grass matched her dress where it wasn't stained. Her eyes were blank and empty, but Link could still hear her breathing, rasping in and out fervently.
(please)
There was a whistle, and then a low groan. Saria curled on herself, her hands clutching and clawing at her empty stomach. The booted foot smashed into her arms, and she cried out weakly as they snapped, started to swell. They stayed on top of her, cradled by each other.
I can bring them back… If you'll only tell me where it is…
Saria shook her head, her eyes staring up at the starless, dark sky. It stretched out for an eternity…
"No. You're a liar." Her head rotated to look away from the man, straight into Link's eyes. "Monsters can only take life away…"
The man grunted, and with one last kick to her side, he left her to die, alone in the grass with no stars above her head.
…
[WAKE UP! WAKE UP!]
Link started upright, drenched in sweat. Everything continued to swim around him, but he shook it off and turned towards the hulking silhouette in the middle of his bedroom. It was the wolf, its blue eyes wide and frightened as it cowered in the middle of the mess, but this time, it was different.
Someone was riding the wolf, sitting astride it like a great horse. Link didn't have time to see who it was before the wolf bounded past him and through the wall, barking out, [FOLLOW! FOLLOW!]
He did as he was told, throwing himself out of the window and feeling the ground meet the palms of his hands and knees with a numbing, smarting pain. He scrambled to his feet and stumbled after the wolf, padding in front of him. It looked behind itself to make sure Link was following, but it was only when the figure astride its back gave it a small nudge with its heels that it howled and broke into a loping sprint. Link gasped, then raced to stay with the beast. It stopped occasionally to allow him to follow easily, but not once did it allow him rest, and not once did the figure on top of it speak to him or even spare him a backwards glance.
He mindlessly followed, even though he had no herd or pack to stay with, and once he began to come back to himself, he found himself in a familiar part of town: Zelda's neighborhood.
In fact, there was her house.
(scratch scratch scratch)
He stopped dead in his tracks, leaning over and clutching the stitch in his side.
(scratch scratch scratch)
He looked at her house again, dumbfounded as the raspy noise continued to creep out of the door, hanging open. Broken yellow tape fluttered against the siding of the house, hissing as plastic slid against plastic.
(scratch scratch SCRATCH)
[FOLLOW?] the wolf barked out hesitantly. Link looked up to see the beast standing only feet away, its rider staring at him with huge, indigo blue eyes. Her windblown hair glistened with red in the moonlight, as did her pale, bare shoulders. She patted the wolf's head, murmuring something in a soothing voice. She turned her face back to Link.
"Ennnnnnnhhhuh…" Zelda whispered sadly. She slid off the side of the wolf and walked towards him. Her feet were bare, and a white, flowing dress, as pale and shimmery as the moon, covered her down to her ankles.
(SCRATCH SCRATCH SCRATCH)
"Immmme uh waaakuh uhhp…" she mumbled. She was hazy, her outline shuddering as she got closer. It was like she was shattering at the edges, disappearing. The wolf began to fade as well.
Link was frozen to the spot as she clasped a pale hand around his neck, pulled his head down, and planted her lips on his.
She was freezing cold, the absence of warmth as painful as the absence of life. And then she was gone.
Link started backwards, his eyes snapping open as the sleep-like haze faded abruptly from his mind. He collapsed onto the grass beside the sidewalk, heaving in huge gulps of air. As the vision faded, he looked around in astonishment.
He wasn't in his bed. He was right outside Zelda's house, with no shoes on his dirty, bleeding feet, in his pajamas. Alone.
He pushed himself to his feet, rubbing his eyes frantically. He looked around again, astonishment slowly icing over him. Zelda's house was nearly eight miles from his. Had he slept walk that far?
There was no way…
Link shook his head, trying to clear the exhaustion from his thoughts. He started when a siren exploded to life behind him, a police car turning the corner and speeding past.
[FOLLOW…]
And so he did, even though his feet smarted and his side ached. He still followed, as siren after siren sounded their call in the middle of the night, waking people from their slumber. Soon, a couple of people, also in their nightclothes, were venturing out next to him, shooting the road curious looks as an ambulance wailed its way into existence to accompany the police cars.
The small, shambling procession soon came to the vacant field where the police had stopped and set up camp, rolling out their yellow tape and shouting out gibberish that made no sense to Link at the moment.
All he saw, all he could concentrate on, was a flash of bloodied green and white skirt in between the dark of uniforms, pooling around two pale, red streaked legs.
He melted backwards, his stomach turning as he remembered the horrid end the green-haired woman had met. Link hovered around the back of the crowd of observers like a shadow, his face pale and his eyes empty. He started and let out a small hiss when a hand clapped on his shoulder. Link looked over to see two confident golden eyes and a meticulously curled mane of copper hair.
"Fancy seeing you here, Mr. Greene…" Aveil Spears muttered, her smooth voice slithering under the noise of the crowd. Link shrugged her hand off and scowled, crossing his arms to ward off the chill that the police woman had seemed to bring with her.
"What do you want?"
She leveled her intense gaze at him, her yellow eyes gleaming red and blue in the lights of the squad cars and ambulance. "I want to know what's going on, Mr. Greene, and I want to know why you're here when I know you live miles away."
He swallowed and opened his mouth. "I couldn't sleep, so I went on a walk."
She nodded slowly, looking him up and down; he could feel her satisfaction when she saw his pajamas and bloodied feet. "Alright, Mr. Greene, whatever you say." She turned a little bit away from him and lifted her chin to see over the crowd better. "Oh dear. You might want to move out of the way." She grabbed his arm tightly and wrenched him out of the way as paramedics came through, pulling a stretcher with them. The lump in the plastic body bag was small, but Link thankfully couldn't see inside it.
"You know, the woman they found dead here was eight months pregnant. She gave birth before she was left here to die – we can't find the baby though. Shame," she murmured. Link turned to her, his mouth slightly open.
"Why?" he asked blankly, not really knowing what he wanted her to say back.
She shrugged. "How do you expect me to know why? Who can fathom the reasoning of a monster?" Aveil bared her teeth at him in an unfriendly smile, her eyes narrowed into an ugly sneer that didn't become her. "I'll be seeing you soon, Mr. Greene…"
She sauntered away and ducked into a dark car with blacked out windows
(the better to watch you with, my dear)
and drove away.
Link watched her go with a sick, heavy pit in his stomach. The ambulance soon followed, the sirens now silent, because its passenger could not be saved with all the speed in the world.
...
If anyone has maieusiophobia/parturiphobia/lockiophobia (that's fear of giving birth. It's got three names. Ain't that cool?), then I apologize for that chapter. Also, for those of you who were not aware, women in labor will tend to shit themselves while they're pushing. Sorry for that nasty little detail.
But yeah…besides that. I killed off a pregnant lady. Please don't judge... Only review, and tell me what a horrible person I am.
Until next time,
~Eva