Chapter 6: Dreadful News

Everything was so dark. He could see absolutely nothing in the place he was in. It was pitch black everywhere, and poor Justin had no idea where he was.

"Hello," he called out. His voice echoed all around him as if he were in a cave.

"Is anyone here? Hello?"

He kept trying to call out to someone but he heard no response from anyone or anything.

Suddenly a light from above him shined brightly in the form of a small column that formed in front of him. In that column of bright light there was a small figure kneeling on the ground. It was wearing a black dress, tiny black shoes, and had a gray bow tied around its long black hair. Justin realized that it was a little girl. She was facing away from him, so he could only see the back of her.

Then he heard the little girl crying softly with her back still facing Justin. Justin was curious as to why there was only a little girl in this realm of darkness with him. Either way he felt a sense of compassion and sympathy towards the child.

"Maybe she's lost or something," he thought in his head.

He slowly walked towards the sad little girl, and with each step he took he felt the temperature going lower. The air became blistering cold, and as he got closer he started to see his breath.

When he was standing over the little girl he knelt down to her level, and put a hand on one of her shoulders.

"What's wrong kid?" he asked in a gentle tone. "Are you lost?"

The girl gave no response and continued to weep.

"Do you know where your mommy or daddy is?"

Then the little girl stopped crying, and became silent.

"Who are you?"

Suddenly, Justin's hand felt something as he was holding the girl's shoulder. He felt something wet underneath his hand, and when he removed it he looked at it in shock. As he slowly moved his hand away from the little girl he saw that his hand was covered in blood. He gasped as he came upon this grisly discovery.

All of a sudden the girl turned around to face him. Justin screamed when he saw the girl's face because instead of it being a normal human face it was skull covered in blood. The monster child screamed in an inhuman way as Justin shrieked in terror.

"You can't cheat me!" it said in a demonic voice. "No one can cheat me!"

Justin kept screaming even when as he woke up, and jolted up on the hospital bed he was lying on. When he realized he wasn't there anymore he stopped. He panted and sweated as he looked around to see where he was. He saw that he was in a hospital room, and that he was lying in a bed wearing patient clothes. Above him there was a TV in a corner that was turned off.

"What the fuck?"

The door to his room opened, and in came Sadie who looked surprised when she saw Justin awake. She smiled at him.

"Justin!"

She ran to him, and embraced him in hug.

"Oh thank God you're okay. I was so worried. We thought you had some kind of seizure or something."

"My mom's here too?"

They stopped hugging, and Sadie just sat on the bed beside Justin.

"Yeah she's just talking with the doctors, but she'll be so happy when she sees you're awake."

"What happened, Sadie? Why am I in a hospital?"

"You don't remember?"

"Remember what?"

"You were just eating breakfast when you collapsed to the floor."

"Collapsed?"

"Yeah, and you were screaming too like you were in pain."

"Really?"

"Yeah, it was so freaky and then you just blacked out."

"Oh God."

"I know, and your mom was so scared that she rushed you to the hospital."

Justin was so confused and had no memory of that happening.

Suddenly the TV turned on and there was only static showing. Both he and Sadie looked up at the TV with surprise. Justin looked on the desk beside him and saw the remote laying there. Now he was beginning to wonder why the TV just turned on instantly.

"Did it just turn on by itself?" asked Sadie.

"I don't know," said Justin.

Then the static disappeared and the TV began flipping through channels until it stopped at Channel 9 News with TV anchor Bridget Knox.

"…which left Sea World facing legal trouble. To recap our top story a terrible car accident leaves two people dead. We recently received word on the names of the victims and they are 28 year old Deborah Rice and 45 year old Joe Polanski."

While the two of them were watching this Justin's eyes widened as he realized that they were the security guards that were working the day the Aqua Dome collapse.

Meanwhile other people across San Francisco were watching the news including Nolan who was in his room observing it from his TV.

"Apparently while driving they were hit by a speeding car. Police later discovered that driver was intoxicated at the time."

Both Brianna and Tori were watching the news at Tori's house while painting their toenails. They both looked at each other with worry.

"Witnesses say that a few seconds after the van was hit another vehicle rammed into them. The driver claims that he tried to slow down, but was too late and couldn't stop in time."

In the comfort of his living room Jamal was watching the news as well. He looked shocked because he too remembered who those two people were.

"After being hit a second time the van tumbled down the steep hill, which nearly crashed into dozens of other cars. When the spinning van reached the bottom another vehicle was driving by and was hit by the victim's car. The other driver was unharmed, but the other two were trapped in the demolished vehicle."

In a small, unsanitary motel room the man with the messy brown hair who also knew the security guards watched in curiosity. He was also shocked to hear this.

Back at the hospital Sadie and Justin continued to watch the news.

"And as if things couldn't have gotten any worse for them, gas was leaking from the destroyed vehicle. The gas was lit by a stray cigarette which created a trail of fire leading to the car and caused it to explode instantly. Other witnesses claimed that they could hear a man screaming from inside the van before it blew up, only to be silenced in the fiery blast. This tragic incident left both Rice and Polanski dead on the scene. Coincidently both of the victims worked as security guards at Sea World but were fired after another incident occurred where the newest attraction, the Aqua Dome, collapsed and killed dozens of tourists. Apparently they lost their jobs after not responding fast enough during the incident. That's all the news we have tonight, and until next time I'm Bridget Knox reporting live from Channel 9 News. Good night and stay safe."

Justin and Sadie couldn't believe what they just heard. Both of the security guards are now dead? How horrible it must have been for those two.

"That's horrible," said Sadie.

"I know."

"But doesn't it seem strange that out of everyone else that could've died on the road only those two were killed."

Justin thought the same thing too. It is strange that they were the only ones that died. And then his mind flashed back to when he collapsed in the kitchen with him screaming while lying on the floor. Right then and there he realized that he wasn't having a simple breakdown. When it happened he felt so much pain surging through his body like he was on fire. He came to the conclusion that he was experiencing the security guard's "deaths." He couldn't explain it, but deep down he knew that it was the truth.

Around nighttime Sadie decided to head home, and Justin went back to his house with his mom. They came in through the front door, and his mother put a hand on Justin's shoulder.

"Are you feeling okay baby?"

"Yeah mom I'm fine. I'm just a little drowsy that's all."

"Well I want you to go straight to bed alright. The doctor's said that you should get a lot of rest and drinks lots of fluids. And until you feel better you are not allowed to leave this house under any circumstance. Got it?"

"Yeah mom I got it. Goodnight."

His mom kissed his forehead and looked at him with concerned eyes.

"Goodnight Justin. See you in the morning."

Justin headed up the stairs, and went straight into his bed room. He was so tired and yet he didn't really do anything today besides sleeping in a hospital. He sat on his bed, thinking about what happened to Joe and Debbie. He kept thinking about how he felt the pain they experienced when they died. But most of all he was thinking about the scary dream he had of the demon child ranting about how they can't cheat it.

"What did it mean by 'you can't cheat me'?" though Justin.

So many questions were rambling in his head, when something caught his eye. He saw on his desk the pile of paper that he had seen this morning. It was the same pile of paper that Justin was curious about since he had no idea where they came from. So he got off his bed and cautiously walked towards his desk. He picked up the pieces of paper, and looked closely at the one on top of the pile.

On it was a drawing of some kind of explosion and three people being consumed by the blast. One was standing in the center of the blast while the other two were in front of him being incinerated by the explosion as well.

At first Justin looked confused as he examined the drawing, but then his mind flashed back to the day of the Aqua Dome disaster when he had a vision where the podium exploded and killed Edward Novak and the two security guards. When Justin snapped out of it he flipped through the other papers, and saw that all of them had sketches on it.

The second one depicted a guy being impaled in the head with a wooden stake with blood splattering everywhere. Justin then remembered that this happened in his vision as well when Jamal got hit in the head with a piece from the podium after it exploded.

He flipped to the next one and saw that it had two people being impaled by something huge and sharp. One of them was a guy wearing a football jacket with short hair. Justin immediately knew that it was Nolan. The other person who was behind Nolan was a girl but was covered in shadow. There was no clear image of the girl and no identifiable characteristics. He could only tell she was wearing a skit and has long hair. Justin could assume from this that it was either Brianna or Tori.

He flipped to the next drawing, and saw the glass of the Aqua Dome shattering and torrents of water flooding inward. He saw that in the direct path of the water there was a figure standing there. Again it was covered in darkness, and Justin could only see that she was wearing a skirt and had long hair as well. Justin then remembered that when he was climbing up the emergency ladder he heard a girl screaming just as the glass wall broke. So again he assumed that it was either Tori or Brianna.

He flipped to the next one which showed two people falling downwards into the rising water. He could also see two sharks circling in the water. When he examined the drawing he saw that the two people were Sadie and the brown haired guy he bumped into earlier that day. He had almost forgotten that he left the Aqua Dome as well. He only knew of this after Sadie had told him that day.

He went to the next drawing, which was also the final drawing. There was only one thing on there, and it was a shark that was opening its mouth really wide like it was about to chomp down on something. And then Justin remembered why. His mind flashed to the final moment of his vision where he slipped off the ladder and was falling down. A shark jumped up from the water and opened its jaws as it was about to eat him up. This made Justin shiver a little because he could only imagine how horrible it would have been to be killed like that.

He stared at the drawings with fearful eyes as he looked at the horror that each of them depicted. In his hands he was looking at everything that had happened in his vision. His hands were shaking so much from fear that the papers slipped through his hands, and fell to the floor. He didn't even notice this because he was too busy shaking in fear. He was so scared and confused at the same time. He didn't know why this was happening to him, but he did feel that somehow Debbie and Joe's sudden deaths are somehow related to this. He just couldn't place his finger on it. The only thing he did know that something strange and terrible was happening, and that somehow it was all related to him in a way.

The next chapter will really bring out the carnage, so stay tuned for my next update. But for now write some reviews on what you think of the story so far.