Chapter 36: Oblivion
A horrible, bloodcurdling scream shattered the night, startling Elizabeth to violent wakefulness.
What the Hell?
She bolted upright in bed, her heart crashing painfully...apprehensively against her breast. A flash of lightning lacerated the night sky, brightening her room in an eerie glow for a split-second before darkness consumed it again.
Liz blinked rapidly, she erasing the imprint of the room from her eyes. Squinting, she tried to define the shapes around her, verifying that it was a bookcase-and not an intruder in her apartment-that she was looking at.
As she listened to the torrents of rain pummeling the roof overhead, she calmed somewhat, only to jerk violently a moment later as thunder cracked viciously overhead, shaking the floor beneath her.
Had it just been the storm? Or had someone really uttered that piercingly frightful sound?
Throwing off the heavy blankets, Liz crawled to the edge of the bed, peering out the slats of the window blinds. Straining her eyes to see anything, her ears focused on picking up any sound that would confirm that what she had heard was real, and not part of the turbulent storm echoing all around her. Or part of some incredibly disturbing dream.
Just as another blast of thunder resounded throughout the atmosphere, her keen ears picked up a prolonged, earsplitting shriek of terror reverberating throughout the small neighborhood of duplexes.
And it was all too real.
Someone out there needed help!
Gasping, Liz jumped out of bed and tore down the hall to the front door, her natural instinct to aid the weaker overcoming all caution. Her shaking fingers scrabbled nervously on the silver locks of her door, making it nearly impossible to release them from their secure hold. Flinging the door wide, she ran out onto her porch and down the steps.
Her eyes darted anxiously about, straining to see through the relentless sheet of rain. Her ears were tuned to anything other than the storm happening around her.
The neighborhood was slowly and sluggishly stirring from hearing the unusual ruckus. Lights were flicking on behind shuttered screens. Questioning voices were calling back and forth throughout the apartments. But no one else was outside.
Wiping uselessly at the heavy drops of rain stinging her eyes, a sudden dread enveloped her as the lights flickered around her before going out, plunging her surroundings and streetlights into darkness-as she pushed further into the unknown.
Alone.
The frigid water rushed over the cement like a restlessly shifting river, soaking the hem of her sweats, chilling her further. Her wet feet slapped the concrete as she pivoted in a rapid circle, hastily searching for the source of what had ripped her from her slumber.
There...
By the gate to the carport, half-hidden by shrubbery.
With her heart lodged sharply in her throat, Liz sprinted to a crumpled form that lay motionless, discarded carelessly in a growing puddle of water. Skidding to a halt beside it, Liz didn't feel the cut of gravel biting into her bare feet as her eyes widened in shocked dismay that quickly turned to paralyzing horror.
She was almost completely unable to comprehend the gruesome sight she beheld.
It was her neighbor, Lauren.
Elizabeth stared in horrified disbelief at the young woman's disturbingly haunted and distorted features-complete terror was clearly etched on her once beautiful face.
Lauren's normally warm brown eyes were devoid of the light of life that was usually contained within them. Now, they stared vacantly-fearfully-up into nothing.
Her tall, sinewy body was twisted into an unnatural position.
The young woman's bruised torso lay bared to the wind and rain. Her blouse lay in tattered ruins beside her, though a single sleeve was knotted around her neck, leaving the veins of her throat bulging under the silken fabric.
Her naked legs were spread as far as the restricting fabric of her jeans and underwear at her ankles would allow, and the sight sent a sickening wave of fierce grief through Elizabeth.
Raped, the chilling word drifted numbly into Liz's mind. She was raped.
Lauren's fragile neck was crushed, skewed.
Broken.
Murdered.
The young woman's arms were splayed limply outward, stiff fingers curled into bloody claws as if she had been desperately attempting to fend her murderer off and had scratched and scratched and scratched until she had drawn his blood.
Evidence...
This was evidence the police would need to find this...despicable animal.
No.
Animals didn't have it in them to do something like this.
This was man-wrought evil.
Liz looked around frantically, searching for anything to protect the only link to discovering his identity. Removing her top shirt, she tore at it, wrapping Lauren's hands quickly, protecting them from the driving rain. If anything, the blood evidence would soak into the shirt. Any skin would be preserved under her nails.
Wouldn't it?
There wasn't any of Lauren's blood pooling in the wallow beneath her lifeless form, but the lack of it made the ghastly scene so much more terrifying.
Goosebumps rose all over Liz's body.
The eerie way in which the empty shell of the woman she had known lay there, disturbingly still as the rain fell unchecked against her glassy eyes staring sightlessly up at nothing and how her horrendously and repulsively mangled body became cold not from the chill of the rain but from its lack of life...directly and alarmingly reminded Elizabeth of a sinister scene out of a horror film she had watched as a teen.
But this wasn't a movie-this was violation. This was death.
And it was undeniably, devastatingly real.
Icy fear swept through Liz, leaving her chilled to the bone and shaking. Suddenly she just couldn't be out here alone anymore. Someone had to call the police. Someone had to help her! She opened her mouth to yell for aid-
And suddenly her feet flew out from under her as she was forcibly slammed onto her back.
Stars exploded behind her eyelids, their multicolored radiance blinding her as her head cracked against the wet cement. Through the agony she was dimly aware of heavily muscled thighs straddling her middle as she sank bonelessly beneath the weight of them.
The wind had been knocked out of her-she couldn't breathe!
A man's dark laugh of ill-intent filled the air.
The sudden nausea she had felt was replaced by a surge of panic as she frantically struggled to catch her breath. Blinking rapidly, she fought past the bright blips of lingering stars obscuring her vision from the hit she had taken to the head and, now, from the lack of oxygen she was experiencing.
Whipping her arms free, she tried to defend herself from her attacker-just as Lauren had.
Her sharp nails fought desperately against the malevolent bulk suffocating her. Wildly seeking to catch purchase, she bit and clawed into the bastard's fragile skin.
She could feel the warmth of his blood spotting her fingertips as she tore at his flesh with everything she had.
Even through the driving rain and over the roar of the adrenaline pounding in her ears she could still hear him laughing maliciously at her ineffectual efforts to try and wound him. The man was thoroughly enjoying her failure.
Reveling in it. Getting the thrill he needed. By feeding off of her fear, his disgusting obsession...his craving...was being quenched with each second that passed.
As his grimy paws came down to grasp her wrists and hold them far too easily above her head, a spark of outrage so intense it made her physically shudder ignited beneath her panic, and with that, a tiny bit of air was sucked down into her squashed and starved lungs.
Her fury burned brighter and brighter as she found her breath again. Both her rage and the piercingly cold air that filled her body cleared a way for rational thought to emerge.
Snarling, she frantically thrusted one leg up like Red had taught her years ago, trying to throw him off balance so she could dislodge his grip. But she had remembered what to do too late in this frenzied and jarring confrontation. The man had her completely immobile...she was hopelessly pinned down by the hard muscles in his legs and arms.
Hissing desperately, she spat into his leering face.
"What a little wildcat," he grinned cruelly.
Using one hand, he slammed both her wrists to the cement, bruising them painfully. The thick fingers of one hand crushed her bones and tendons while his other curled into a fist before it brutally connected with the tender side of her head.
The harsh blow sent Liz's ears to ringing discordantly, and she was now more than helplessly disoriented. Even more flashing spots of sparking light erupted and multiplied, overwhelming her ability to see clearly even though her eyes were wide open. And just as abruptly as her vision had ruptured into lurid, pulsating lights, those very lights were now beginning to quickly fade around the edges of her perception...leaving her mind reeling with agony and terror.
Everything was getting so fuzzy. So sluggish and dark.
So cold.
She was numb. Too numb to even scream for help as the rapist began hurriedly tugging at her clothing.
The storm raged around them, but Liz could distantly hear Bronn madly barking, furiously sounding the alarm. She was vaguely aware of the metallic zipper of his pants whirring down his bulging crotch, the sound of it overwhelming the confused and muted shouts of her neighbors.
They seemed so far away.
And then the morbid thought came to her like it would come to anyone in such a paralyzingly frightening situation-she was actually going to die like poor Lauren had before anyone did anything.
Suddenly something-or rather, someone-powerfully rammed into the two of them like an enraged, charging bull. Her attacker was airborne for what seemed like several drawn-out seconds before he landed heavily in a muddy splash a couple arm lengths away from her. Then he was savagely rolling and scuffling with her ferocious rescuer...
A robustly lean man who had long, silvering hair.
Elizabeth panted, purposefully widening her eyes as she attempted to watch the two men fight, trying so desperately hard to stay awake. But the tantalizingly sweet fingers of darkness finally and completely shrouded her sight as oblivion enveloped her.
The very last things she was aware of before she unwillingly plunged deeply into unconsciousness was the sound of a sickening crunch of bones, a man's shrilling howl of agony, and the pelting raindrops relentlessly needling her face.
Notes:
Thank you, Daniel and Jami, for reading through this chapter and helping me clarify and edit. I appreciate it so much!