I felt this chapter was a little short, but as the great saying goes, "short and sweet"! This has got quite a bit of action it, and things are beginning to fall into place. The one question that remains though is, where did Robbie get his cuts from? And is this "demon" the real murderer at hand?
The Asylum
"You have to pay!" Jade's voice was coarse and harsh. With each word, she took one step forward towards her friends.
"For what?" Andre shielded the others, confronting this demon that seemed to have taken over Jade.
She lunged forward, digging her sharp nails into Andre's temples "For the murder of my daughter!"
She released him so he flung backwards, crashing into Tori.
"Andre!" She cried "Are you OK?" Blood was trickling down his face from his wounds, but he wasn't in any serious pain.
"Why, why would you do it?" Jade demanded. Her shoulder blades were descending out of her flesh as if she hadn't eaten for days.
There was nothing they could do, how could they convince this beast that they weren't responsible for the death of her daughter?
Cat grabbed Robbie's arm "The little girl!" She whispered "The body, maybe that's her daughter!"
Robbie nodded in agreement. The pair slipped out of the room and into the next.
"Jade?" Beck called. The silhouette of his girlfriend in the window didn't move an inch, she remained perfectly still as if she hadn't heard a single word he'd said.
His jacket lay in a heap on the ground, stained with Jade's blood. There was so much of it; it was literally soaking through the material. He realized there and then how hurt she was, and how immediately she needed a doctor. He had to get her out of there...
"Where's that corridor, Robbie?" Cat asked as they tip toed down the stairs and towards the entrance.
"Near the front doors," He replied "It looked like she'd been there for a while..."
Cat frowned "How did you have blood on your hands then? Wouldn't she of rotted?"
"That was my blood, from my cut."
"Do you remember how you got it?"
"No, I really can't." He thought hard, desperately trying to remember what had happened to him.
They stopped, there were footsteps.
"Get under that table, Cat!" Robbie urged.
They weren't expecting who came around the corner...
"Tori, the scissors!" Andre cried.
"No, I-I can't!" Her eyes filled with fear, how could he expect her to kill one of her friends?
He shook his head "No, here!" He grabbed them from her trembling hands.
With one, quick sweep, he cut the rope above their heads and dived to the floor, pulling down Tori with him. A large, heavy curtain collapsed from the ceiling, separating them from Jade.
"Come on!"
They took their chance and escaped through the door.
"How did you know there was a curtain on the ceiling?" Tori panted once they had got down the stairs.
"I saw it when we were exploring the rooms" He explained "Besides, Beck told me this room is where they used to "operate" on patients, the curtain was used for "privacy" reasons."
She scowled "Operate? Pfft, yeah right. They were torturing these poor people! Whatever's inside Jade just wants revenge for the horrible things they did to her! We need to show her that we're not here to hurt her, maybe she'll let us go!"
"Beck!" Cat squealed, emerging from under the table and throwing her arms around him.
"It's so good to see you!" Robbie smiled.
Beck glanced behind them distractedly "Have you seen Jade?"
"She's upstairs..." Robbie whispered "But, don't go up there!"
"I'm going Robbie, I have to!" He disappeared up the stairs.
"Come on, Robbie!" Cat tugged on his sleeve "Let's go get the body before it's too late!"
Andre and Tori were hunched together in the darkness of a small closet.
"Well, at least we're safe in here..." Andre murmured.
Tori smiled awkwardly, shifting slightly to the right so she wasn't so pressed up to him.
"Yeah, but not for long. We have to make a run for it soon!"
"Not until we're certain it's safe, I'm not risking it! I can't let you get hurt..." His voice was firm and adamant.
Tori blushed "Thanks, Andre. You're my hero!" She gave him a quick peck on the cheek "Oh, sorry. Don't know why I did that!" She bit her lip in embarrassment and turned away.
"It's fine, I'm not complaining!" He grinned, pulling her into a real kiss.
For the first time that night, she felt perfectly safe.
The body was rotted alright, all the way down to the bone. There was no flesh remaining, but the awful stench was still wafting around the room.
Cat shrugged "Well, it has been..." She took her time to work out the correct number of her fingers "73 years!"
"I guess." Robbie was clutching his nose with his sleeve.
"What are we gonna do with it?" Cat wrinkled her nose in disgust.
"Well, this ghost, demon, whatever it is! It's obviously seeking revenge for her daughter's death. Maybe if we reunite them, it will convince her that we're good, and that we didn't kill her daughter!"
Cat giggled "Look where that got them in The Woman in Black!"
"Don't say things like that, Cat! It's not very reassuring!" Robbie whimpered as he began wrapping the skeleton in an old rug and carting it back out of the room.
From behind the door, Beck could hear Jade as she struggled with the curtain. Her voice was much lower than usual, and he realized instantly that he wasn't dealing with his girlfriend anymore, something even worse than Jade's moods, which was saying something! He knew that he had to be prepared, that trying to save her life could cost him his own, but it was worth it in his eyes.
He knocked on the door warily "Jade...?"
The screams of distress stopped immediately.
"Who is it?" She demanded "Is it one of you murdering cowards?"
"No! It's Beck! Jade, it's me. Your boyfriend!" He pleaded.
The door swung open "All I had was my daughter, and they took her away from me! You took her away from me!"
She lashed out fiercely with brute force, tearing his arm and scarring his chest.
"Jade, no!" he cried in agony as his limp body hit the wall.
Tori jumped back, breaking the kiss "Did you hear that?"
"Fireworks?" Andre grinned lovingly
"No! I heard Beck, I think he's trouble, come on!"
They rushed out of the closet and up the stairs, bumping into Cat and Robbie on their way.
"What the hell is that...?" Andre asked nervously, pointing to the rug.
Tori frowned "That does look dodgy, Robbie."
"It's the little girl, remember?" Cat croaked from behind the group
"Yeah, me and Cat think it might be her daughter. She may be our only ticket out of here." Robbie explained.
Andre helped him to lug it up the stairs. There, they found Beck, battered and bruised on the floor.
"Oh god, Beck!" Andre bawled.
A dark shadow stepped forward into the light "Looks broken, doesn't he?" Jade smirked, stepping onto his stomach deliberately.
"You're evil!" Cat cried.
"15 years in a prison like this and you ought to be! They told me that they'd look after us, me and my daughter. They promised to keep us safe! And then came along the needles and the pills. They poked and prodded us endlessly, testing unauthorized drugs on our weak bodies until we could barely move. Then they expected us to trust them, expected us to not defend ourselves when they came close. Of course we were gonna hurt them back! Wouldn't you? But they didn't have to get her involved; she was nothing to do with it! Only seven years old when they drugged her so high she turned blind from the agony and insane with the torture of it all. They told me they were going to make her better, but she never breathed again! I never saw her sweet face again! I never even got the chance to say goodbye to her..." She wept in response.
"You can see her again though, you can say your goodbyes, and then let it all go! You can be reunited!" Robbie promised as he threw back the rug.
They all gasped at what they saw...
Ooh... What did they see? Find out in the next chapter! I'm sorry to say that chapter 6 may be its last! I have the ending well thought out in mind, and I have a feeling I might be able to squeeze it all into one final chapter! All answers will soon be revealed, and if you're still confused by the 6th chapter, just let me know in the reviews and I'll try my best to make sense of it! For all of you that haven't see the Woman in Black movie (which I do not own by the way!), they basically try to reunite the ghost with her son who died in the marsh, and it doesn't end too well... Also, someone asked in their review to include some more "Andre and Tori" fluff in it, so I have (sorry to those of you who don't like sloppy stuff like that!) So, there you have it! Second to last chapter of The Asylum is finally finished! Hope you like it and please review! Thanks! Amber x