chapter fourteen

At first, he couldn't tell where he was. He was lying down, in what felt like grass. He tried to get up, but the horrible pain in his side forced him back down. He coughed. Blood came out of his mouth. He was hurt from the fight he had engaged in with himself.

He saw himself there again, standing above him, looking down at him. He looked at him.

Blaine looked back. "I guess it wasn't a dream, after all. . ." He said, wiping the blood from his mouth. He could barely speak. "We actually fought?" He chuckled. "It was real?"

The other Blaine offered him a hand, and he accepted it, and was pulled to his feet. "Yep."

"Where are we?"

"Look around you, Blaine."

He turned his head and looked. There were trees, and houses. He saw a mailbox.

The Halorens

He was outside his home. Less than a block from the convenience store. He wasted no time. The moment he realized where he was, he started walking towards his goal. And then he saw her, standing there. He looked hard to see who it was.

"It's your Mother, Blaine."

He saw a child standing next to her. It was himself, as a child. They were walking away, towards the convenience store. Blaine limped along after them.

"Are you sure you don't want to go to the school for the performance, honey?"

In his dream, the performance had been in a theatre across the street that didn't exist.

"Yeah. I want to go outside tonight. Silent Hill is so cool at night. Everything's quiet."

The turned the corner, into the parking lot of the convenience store. Blaine was following them as fast as he could, dealing with the pain shooting up and down his body. As he turned the corner, he watched them enter the convenience store. . .

And he heard a gunshot. "No!" He yelled. Another blast. He ran to the door. It was locked. The sign had been flipped over, so it read "closed".

And he saw himself inside, on the ground; eyes wide open in shock, his breathing in short, quick bursts, blood coming out of his mouth. Blaine remembered the pain. His stomach flared, as if he'd just been shot. He forced himself to look up, through the glass. The assassin stood there, the gun smoking in her hands. The one who had shot him.

His mother.

He stood at the window, his mouth trembling, his body shaking uncontrollably, but his eyes refused to look away, no matter how hard he tried to dissuade them. He watched as his Mother turned around, to look at the convenience store owner, Kelly's Father. She laughed, as she leaned in and kissed him. Then another gunshot sounded.

"No!"

Her eyes widened as well. She backed away, her mouth gaping open. Then two more gunshots and she fell backwards.

Kelly's Father stood there, with the gun in his hands, smiling. He took out her I.D. and put it on her body. He started walking to the entrance.

Rage was Blaine's dominant emotion now, and he was shaking the door violently, trying to open it. "Yeah?!" He yelled. "Come here, you son of a bitch!"

But the man stopped. He seemed to hear something. Blaine could hear it too; the sound of breathing. The Blaine who was on the floor was still alive, so he turned, pointed his gun, and fired. All of the sudden, they were gone. The Child Blaine was gone, his dead Mother was gone, and the convenience store was empty.

Blaine wasn't shaking the door anymore. He fell to the ground, on his knees, still shaking. "No. . ." He muttered. "It can't be true. . ."

His other self put his hand on Blaine's shoulder. "Blaine. . ."

He shoved it away. "No!" He yelled. "This is all your fault! Get the fuck away from me!"

Then, he felt something cold, on his chest, and it spread until it wrapped around his back and through his insides, until he was chilled to the bone. Something had passed through him. He turned around, and his Father walked through the convenience store door, turned and looked at him.

Rock-a-bye baby on the tree-top. . .

He laughed. "It's too bad he couldn't quite finish you off, isn't it?" And he walked to the back of the store, through the double doors.

When the wind blows, the cradle will rock. . .

Blaine raised his crowbar and smashed the glass. "Get back here!" He yelled as he unlocked the door from the inside. Everything seemed to slow down as he ran through the store, the horrible memories of his childhood flashing through his eyes. Everything was cold and dead, and the store seemed abandoned for centuries.

"What if they made a mistake! She's never going to die! She's my Mother, she's not allowed!"

He opened the double doors, and an impossibly large hallway stretched before him. Without hesitation, he ran. The walls seemed to twist and bend, as monsters crawled from them, coming for him. They bled, covering the floors that Blaine steeped on, so that for every step he took, he was accompanied by a splash. Then the rain began, coming from the ceiling, hard, soaking Blaine down to his bones.

When the bow breaks, the cradle will fall. . .

And yet, he kept running. The hallway grew longer as he ran, the monsters reached form him faster and stronger. More than a few times, he felt the cold, bloody hand of one of them grabbing his shoulder, trying to destroy him, but he pushed them all away with previously undiscovered strength.

"Maybe if you two weren't so fuckin' ungrateful!"

His feet hit metal on the ground, and he knew that it was changing again, changing to the world that had haunted his dreams, and had slowly slipped into the ever-changing reality that was Silent Hill. If Blaine ever had a vision of Hell, this is what it would look like; rusted mesh floors, unspeakable beasts hunting for you, as the walls twist and turn, bleeding, and a hard, cold rain pelting him relentlessly.

And down will come baby. . .

And then he could see it, just vaguely, in the distance, far ahead of him. It was the door to his house, the door that had been locked, that he never wanted to open. But if he didn't open it now, he'd never have another chance. Before he knew it, he was in front of the door, the door that held all the answers, all the questions. Blaine's hand trembled on the knob, not sure if he wanted to know what lay ahead of him.

Cradle and all. . .