1
She began to walk home, more like run home. The moon was still out providing her with a shadow. It ran along side her, just as scared as she. Sometimes behind her, sometimes in front, but nevertheless it stuck by her.
The wind rustled the leaves of the trees and whispered her name as she ran past each and every one. They were calling out to her, but she would not respond.
Her heart was beating in her chest. So much that she could hear it in her ears.
She ran through the labyrinth of streets until finally she came down the dirt path leading to her home. She stopped just before she touched the dirt.
She peered down what seemed to be ten miles of dirt road. The trees surrounding continued to call to her.
"Come into the darkness," they said. She did as they said. She entered the darkness.
2
She was enveloped in darkness. The only things she could make out were the nearest trees beside her, but even then they seemed to be so far off. She walked in silence; the only noise was her feet scraping against the dirt rocks.
Occasionally she would hear a snap of a twig, making her freeze with terror. But then that would be all: just a twig snapping in a forest.
The moon peeked through the forest leaves giving her very little light. She looked side to side in a paranoid panic, expecting something to jump from the tangle of trees to kill her, just as they did her boyfriend. She knew he was dead, she felt it.
She continued to walk every fiber in her body ready for the worst. She felt as if she were to explode with the anxiety of the unknown. But she continued to walk.
Just then she smelt something disgusting, putrid, so very familiar. It made her skin crawl with an unpleasant ease. It was the smell of the rotting corpse. The smell of death.
She stopped where she was and sniffed her surroundings. She was filled with curiosity, rather than fear.
She walked a little farther and discovered the smell was getting stronger. She fought back her urge to throw up, and continued to follow the smell.
3
Walking in the dark isn't fun. Most people get that unsettling feeling that someone is watching them. Someone waiting to tear every limb from their body. Your senses become heightened with fresh panic. Your veins pump pure adrenaline as you fight your urge to run.
But once you see that shred of light, that shred of hope, you relax. You're safe in the light; nothing can get you, at least nothing you can't see.
That's it isn't it? We aren't afraid of the dark itself, we are afraid of what's awaiting inside the darkness. What's waiting for us?
The monster that you imagined when you were so young? Death itself? Your worst fear. That is what is always waiting in the darkness. Fear. The hot feeling that threatens to incinerate your being. Fear. We feed the darkness with our fear. We make it stronger. We make it real.
In the light we are invincible. No monsters dare tread into the light. It's our safety blanket. Our savior. Without light we are hopeless, we are dead, we are nothing. We disintegrate in the darkness. We breathe our last breath in the darkness. And most importantly, we lose our souls in the darkness. Our essence, our sanity. Every emotion we have ever felt is captured within that capsule. And it is all gone, absorbed into the darkness. Because, I think, that's what the darkness really is. Our souls. And we feed those souls with our fear.
4
She couldn't find the source of the smell. No matter how long she walked, she couldn't find it.
Nose in the air, it still seemed to be getting stronger.
The smell of rotten fish. Of maggots crawling their way through the human intestines as it lay rotting. As it lay a pile of flesh and guts, slowly being absorbed into the ground.
It was getting even stronger. It was at its climax. The point at which it could no longer be any stronger.
She turned to her left and seen another corpse.
New forms of life had begun to inhabit themselves upon the flesh of the person. Blood was still leaking from the bodily cavities. Only parts of its face were rotted away. It was hard to distinguish whether it was a female or a male. She looked away and felt what so many people feel when they realize they are alone in the dark. Her spine tingled with hot panic and the hairs on the back of her neck rose to frightening heights.
Once again she ran.
But this time as she ran she felt as if someone were running behind her. No matter how fast she ran they were always behind her.
It didn't matter that the sharp pain began to nest itself in her side. The only important thing was that she run. That she gets the hell out of this place before she became a corpse herself. She could almost feel her flesh rotting as she was thinking these thoughts. She looked at her arms, just in case, and seen that her feelings were right. She was rotting. With a scream of terror, she picked up her pace.
"It's the place," She thought, "only the place. I can't be dying. It's not happening! It's not!"As she thought these words her arms seemed to contradict her, she was dying, she was rotting. Then she smelled it again. That awful smell. But she knew where it was coming from.
She seen in the darkness that light that brings everyone so much comfort. She was almost there, almost home.
6
The door was open.
She walked in, not expecting anyone to greet her. It was nearly two in the morning. Her flesh had gone back to normal, but she still felt that tingle as if it were still there. She ran her fingers absentmindedly over the place where her own rotting flesh had been and half expected to feel that slimy, jelly skin peel back.
She walked in her room and flicked the light switch on. It flicked on for a second then flicked back off, allowing her to see someone sitting on her bed. She opened her mouth to scream, but stopped when the light went back on. It was only Kelsey. She had her head down and she was crying. Her short brown hair was a mess and she was still in her pajamas, but she was bleeding really badly. She looked up and Nicole could almost see the death painted on her face.
"Nicole…" She trailed off. She wanted to approach her, to give her a hug, but there was no definite answer to whether she was alive or not. So much crazy shit was happening she couldn't tell between reality and her own wretched fantasies.
"Kelsey, are you…alright?" She didn't want to ask her whether she was dead. That's just what she needed now, a zombie. Kelsey nodded her head.
"It attacked me, Nicole. I didn't know what to do. I-I-" She burst into violent tears. Her act caused a new batch of blood to flow onto Nicole's carpet. She was real.
"Kelsey, what attacked you?" Nicole moved closer.
"I don't know." She had stopped crying and she looked at her innocently. "I'm so scared." Nicole swallowed and tried to think of what to say. She was scared too, but if she revealed that to Kelsey then she was sure that that would make her situation even worse.
"I need you to tell me what happened," Nicole coaxed. Kelsey shook her head vigorously, her eyes widened and she gasped for breath.
"Kelsey, what's-what's wrong?" She calmed down. She took a breath and-
7
-tried to go back to sleep. She'd been up all night on the computer talking to her boyfriend that she didn't realize how late it actually was.
She lay in bed thinking of all the wonderful things they said to each other. He really was a great guy.
She moved so she was lying on her back and looking out her window. The moon was so bright out tonight. The clouds floated endlessly in the sky and the stars watched as they traveled along the never-ending sphere. She took another deep breath and closed her eyes. Her body filled with warmth as she gently drifted into a deep sleep.
She was dreaming about her boyfriend when she heard a scratching at her door. She didn't have any pets. She opened her eyes and listened to the noise.
It continued to scratch. She could almost see the deep marks it was imbedding in her wooden door.
Then the scratching stopped and she heard a new noise. Something fumbling at her doorknob. She could hear the rumble and shaking of the door.
Paralyzed with fear, Kelsey stayed where she was. She closed her eyes and could do nothing but listen to whatever was making the noise. Her heart beat quickened and beads of sweat were forming on her forehead.
Then the shaking stopped and her door slowly swung open, creaking and whining as it went. Protesting to this unusual calling.
Head still turned to the window she watched as a shadow slowly grew upon her wall.
The moon is so bright, she thought, although when she recalls this story sometime later she has no recollection of ever thinking this.
She closes her eyes again and takes in a deep breath. She holds it in.
She feels something touch her feet gently, but she does not recoil. It slowly moves up her legs and caresses her abdomen. It finally settles for lying on her chest.
She gasps for air, but finds that the mass of this unknown creature is slowly crushing her to death. It lets up just enough for her to catch a few breaths then lies once again on her chest.
Slowly she slips into the darkness and enters euphoria.
Do you like it here? Some unknown voice asks. It is much deeper than any voice she has heard and it frightens her.
"Where?" She asks aloud.
There's no need for you to speak. We can talk using our minds.
"Where?" she asks in her head.
In the darkness, of course. Here. You don't need to breathe or worry. Here in the darkness. She looked around her and discovered that she no longer felt the uncomfortable sensation of anxiety. She felt a tinge of panic, but she wouldn't remember it. "It's ok, I guess. I mean…"What? It asked. What's wrong here? It sounded almost scared.
"Well, it's not what I'm used to. That's all. Didn't mean to frighten you."
You didn't frighten me.
"Well, ok. Can you take me back now?"
Why do you want to go back? It's so nice here. No worries…
"I know, but I'll miss my friends and family. I don't…I don't want to be here." She remembered this panic. This one started low at her spine and gnawed its way up.
No.
"What! No you have to." She felt a sharp pain in her chest and the darkness began to turn a little gray, then it turned back to black.
"I don't want to be here!" She screamed. She was frightened now.
NO!"Take me back, take me back, take me back! This isn't real; it's not real! I'm in bed asleep. Take me back!"
She opened her eyes and struggled under the unknown weight. The pain returned in her chest and she swam between darkness and reality. She bit her bottom lip until she felt a hot liquid run down her chin.
She fell to the floor gasping for breath. She looked up and couldn't believe what she was seeing. She saw her father. But it wasn't her father, his eyes said so, it was only his body.
"You bein' a bad girl?" He asked.
"No, daddy," Kelsey answered instinctively. He took a step closer and Kelsey seen it wasn't her father. But it was too late. He hit her across the face with his open hand. Fresh blood spilled down her chin.
"Do I need to whip you?" He began to take off his belt.
"No!" Kelsey screamed. All her childhood fear resurfaced, but she seen her fathers body begin to disintegrate and turn into what it really was. It was a mutant. It's skin was black and charred, as if it were burned. It's eyes were the only thing you could really see. Red as blood. Red as her blood. Instead of a belt it held a whip. Its tiny little head was bald. It walked with a hunch.
She gasped with fear and tried to get up. It threw the whips end at her and successfully hit her thigh. Blood hit the floor with a horrible splat! It felt as if razors were cutting her thigh open.
She pulled herself up, despite the pain, and ran.
She ran into the kitchen, fully aware that something was behind her and turned on the light.
The mutant uttered a yelp of pain and scurried into the living room where there was no light. It watched Kelsey with it's menacing eyes. It raised two fingers in a V-shape to its mouth and stuck its tongue out in an obscene gesture. It cackled then disappeared. Disgusted, Kelsey grabbed a flashlight and ran outside.
8
Nicole was for loss of words. She thinks she may have seen this so called "mutant" before. She remembered what she had seen behind the bushes. How its back was still hunched when it had changed positions.
"But could that possibly be what Kelsey was talking about? Could that "mutant" have left Kelsey's house and come for me?" She didn't share her thoughts with Kelsey. This was too much for her already. Kelsey had stopped crying. Nicole cleansed her wound for her and she was slowly drifting into sleep.
"Don't let it get me, Nicole. Please, not again. Leave the lights on, it hates the light. The dark…it loves the dark…the dark…" That's when she left Nicole to her own thoughts.