I apologize profusely for the wait...
enjoy
Intercession
He was halfway down the sturdy carpeted stairs before Alvin realized that he had absolutely no idea why he was heading down in the first place.
After Theodore had fetched him, he had simply followed his feet like thunder follow the storm. Sighing deeply, Alvin stopped and turned toward the younger chipmunk expectantly, giving his brother time join him in the middle of the stair way before he inquired.
"What's waiting down there?"
Theodore stopped on the step just above him and it suddenly struck Alvin that, even if he hadn't, his little brother would have still cleared his head by an inch of so. When had he gotten so big?
…And so scared?
The stouter chipmunk was visible shaking and, he noticed, hesitant to look him full in the face. Alvin was only able to catch snatches of watery jade between the heavy lashes of his brother's lowed eyes and, when he spoke, Theodore's voice wavered in and out as if carried by the wind.
"M-miss. Miller is down there…in the living room… a-and maybe D-dave? (Alvin's ears perked) but I'm not sure. She asked for you… We should say thank you, you know. F-for that c-cake she made us..." Theodore hiccuped then and the rest of his sentence was gone from Alvin, trampled beneath some indiscernible stuttered murmurings.
Alvin let the unspoken blow pass him like a petty wind, his mind hinged tightly to one revelation and one revelation only. Dave? Downstairs?
Their prodigal Guardian…had returned?
Possibly! He reminded himself. Possibly! Theodore had said he wasn't sure but…He felt a certain persistent tugging in his stomach. He didn't know why, but the mere thought of seeing Dave made him anxious and Alvin couldn't quite discern if it came from excitement or fear.
He brought trembling hands down to his own belly and could feel the cold sour liquid of both churning in there. Alvin searched though the jumbled storage of his mind. He hadn't seen Dave since…since…
Lights! Bright white lights! Bright Bright BRIGHT! Too bright!
Blinding! He could not see!
Alvin was bound and moving. Fast! Bumping and spinning bellow lights of fire. The smell of some strong something invaded his nose. There are creatures here. Pale masked mouths attached to blue rubber fingers. COLD! Cold hands!
Get off!
"Can you hear me? Can-"
Get off!
"-hold him steady! Get the sedation needle on standby..."
"What's happened? What's happening? Oh God!-"
In. Out. In and out! Riding on wind and swirling air.
Where was he? Those voices. One came from the creature, but the second one…
Why couldn't he MOVE?
"Alvin Seville. If you can hear me…can you blink? Are you aware of your surroundings? Are you-"
Too cold! Too BRIGHT! Too MUCH!
"My God! Jesus! My boy!-"
Gone are the creature's metal tools, concerned wet earth eyes replacing them. He knew them! So familiar…
"My BOY!-"
Dave?
Brown earth irises widen into a depth-less sinkhole.
"Alvin!"
"ALVIN!"
Alvin awoke to a chaotic world of feinting eggshell walls and a firm tightness in his chest. He looked down. A fist, thick and furry clutched desperately at the material of his shirt and he couldn't fathom why…
"Alvin! You're going to fall down the stairs! ALVIN!"
He felt himself jolt backwards violently and when his head snapped forward again, Alvin became acutely aware of two things at once. The first was that he could no longer feel the friction of the thick bristled carpet beneath his feet, and the second was that he was falling!
"Ah-!"
Alvin instinctively thrust his pelvis forward to fight against the gravity that pulled him over what he knew to be the sharp incline of jutted stairs behind him. He pivoted forward just as Theodore attempted one more frantic yank and the momentum sent them both tumbling upward. Alvin into his brother and his brother into the stairs behind him, Both coming to rest with a massive thud that seemed to shake the rafters.
Surprisingly, Alvin saw that it was Theodore that scrambled to his feet first. When he himself tried, a nasty flash of nausea forced him back on his side. What the fuck had just happened?
"Y-you fainted! You just..!"
Alvin tilted his head up. Too fast! The ceiling above him dipped and erupted into a whirlwind of lights. Lights… Alvin could just make out his brothers jerky animated form in the pockets of brilliant white that spotted his vision. He had seen lights. In his memory.
Was it a memory?
"I was t-talking and all of the s-sudden your eyes rolled back …"
Alvin eased himself into a sitting position, wincing at the pain in his ribs. He thought back on the spinning and the smells. Thought back on the shinning creatures with rubber hands and covered mouths. "No", something in his psyche whispered softly, urging him. Not creatures...
"Doctors." He spoke the word aloud, knowing it deep down to be true as soon it left his lips.
It had been in a hospital. He was sure of it. That was the last time He'd saw Dave? The night of the crash? He lowered his head again, this time to think. Bits of the memory came floating back in alert strips of demanding dialogue.
"…hold him steady!… some sort of blunt trauma…"
"-don't know. Apparently, he was found wandering…no, we're talking miles away from…"
Try as he might, Alvin couldn't summon the rest and trying to do so made his head pound loud painful melodies against his eardrums. Made him bury his face deep into the folded crook of his furry elbow. His thoughts sounded clearer in the self-made darkness.
Miles away? From what? The crash? And who exactly had been wandering? Simon, because he'd failed to pick him up? Himself after the wreck? His mind struggled to comprehend all that those few lines could possibly mean.
"A-and Y-you just…just fell!" Above him, Alvin heard his brother take a deep shaking breath and then, in a low broken whisper that, Alvin imagined, was meant more for himself:
"I-I wish you would let me h-help you…"
Although he could not see him, Alvin pictured Theodore bringing his fidgeting thumb to his mouth to gnaw at the cuticle there. Something He'd often witness the youngest Seville do when the other was faced with something potentially overwhelming. Back when the world made sense, It was during these crucial times that either he or Simon would intercede. Each ,for once, working under the common goal of easing their little brothers burden before the weight of it became too much.
Who could have guessed that now they had become the greatest burden of all…
It struck him them. There in the darkness, freshly unearthed like a coal miner stumbling across a diamond. Theodore wasn't the one with the problems. He may be dealing with the holes marring his memory, but Theodore wasn't.
All this time he had been chasing Simon for answers when, really, it made more sense to seek out the one person who wasn't missing or angry or… Alvin swallowed hard, crazy. He had the one true source of information right in front of him this whole time! He just been too lost in the grey chaos of his own reasoning's to see it.
Ignoring the ache in his temples, Alvin snapped his head up, a question bursting against his lips… and froze.
Theodore was tense before him, worry pinching the flesh above the bridge of his nose and weighing down the corners of drippy jade eyes. His younger brother, visibly miffed by the sudden lapse back into silence, opened his mouth to speak …
And just behind him, it's roaring voice harsh and jagged against Theodore's soft concerned one…
A
monster
Did
Too.
"What do you mean, Alvin? "
"What do you Mean, Alvin!"
An animal shot from Alvin's belly, clawed its way up the walls of his throat and pried his lips apart in the form of a violent scream. He had only a split second to witness IT standing there rigid and pale and terrible before he felt himself being snatched off the ground…
And brought face to face with a demon.
The creature before him was waxen and contorted, its pale lips stretched into a wet dripping snarl that displayed rows and rows smashed bloody teeth. Above them, an inky mass of twisted bone and cartilage marked where its nose once was. Only one flared nostril remained intact, the other having seemingly been torn from the right side of its face, taking a chunk of cheek, ear and silver hair with it.
It was the eyes that held him, though. It was the eyes that stole his breath and kept Alvin from attempting to pry off the moist icy claw of a hand that twisted the burgundy wool of his shirt.
They were bulging, wide and grotesque, the pupils frozen in an expression of pure terror. Each dripping iris was covered in a thin soapy film that stretched itself across the entirety of the monster's swirling stormy eyes.
Swirling grey eyes.
Simon's eyes.
"NO!"
Alvin pushed forward then, summoned all of his cold crippling fear and horror and disbelief into motion and rushed forward with all of his might. He was desperate to rid himself of this thing! This creature that was surely not his brother, but a monstrosity enveloped within that thick reeking smog of copper, mint and rain!
And so Alvin pushed until he could no longer feel the carpet beneath his feet.
His fist connected with a wet sickening 'TWACK' across its swollen jaw and soon both he and the monster were tumbling down the stairs, Its damp fingers wrapped around his neck and Theodore's prolonged terrified scream punctuating every sharp jutting step they struck.
The next chapter may well be the last. Now's your chance to submit your final assumptions on exactly what you think is is going on! I challenge you to think deeply on it.
who knows... perhaps your guess will be the right one...
Rewiew and we'll see.