(A/N): This is the point where we meet the six children I talked about briefly in the previous chapter's A/N. AKA, the ghost children.
And they also sing in a cappella six-part harmony.
You know you've been rotting in jail for too long when you can sing a cappella in six parts when you're the only one on your part (MUSIC IS WAAAAY HARDER THAN IT SEEMS).
Of course, they ARE ghosts, so they already have a magical essence around them, so it's probably easy for them.
CHAPTER TWELVE: GHOSTS
When Coraline came to, she was extremely disoriented, as she opened her eyes to find that the room she was in was just as dark when she closed her eyes as it was when they were wide open. Her head hurt and her bones ached, and it took a little while to be able to move. Pins and needles spread through her legs as she tried to stand up.
As her eyes adjusted, she saw that the room she was trapped in was around six by six feet and had a five foot high cieling. She slowly explored the space she was in, feeling every wall, looking for a crack or something, a mark of a door, to at least show from which direction she was thrown in. That way, she could possibly surprise whoever was going to retrieve her and make a getaway for the door and flee the Other World. Seeing as she hadn't returned to the Real World while she was unconscious, she knew that this was no longer a dream.
She traced the room all the way around. The walls were seamless.
Which was why it made Coraline extremely curious when she heard a magical wind she couldn't touch or feel blow through the chamber.
A supernatural, six-part harmony in a minor key started to hum through the small room, and Coraline, too scared to know what to do, slowly turned around to look at the source of the noise.
Six faintly glowing, tattered figures pulsed like a heartbeat near the far wall. They had a spiritual air around them, and Coraline didn't know whether to fear them.
One of the figures turned around and pushed some misty hair away from her eyes.
Her button eyes.
The girl gasped and her hum dropped outof the chord, which made the others realize something was wrong, and one by one, their notes dropped out as well, as they turned to look at the first girl.
The girl simply pointed at Coraline. Coraline feared the six children, all who were revealed to have button eyes. She shrunk up against the wall, not knowing what they would do to her.
Then she realized all of them were floating roughly a foot off the ground.
They were ghosts.
Once she realized this, Coraline relaxed slightly; she figured that the dead children couldn't - and wouldn't - hurt her.
One of the boys, with short, messy hair and broken glasses, asked her,"You... you're still... alive?"
Coraline nodded fearfully.
A second girl, with neck-length curly hair, responded to her nod. "'Tis wise to keep silent, since the beast-lady could be listening," she whispered.
"Who are you all?" Coraline asked quietly.
A third girl and a second boy, both with straight hair and similar appearance, began to sing in two part harmony.
"Our days are done...
Our past has fled...
We are alone...
We are all dead..."
The first girl and a third boy with curly hair continued the song.
"Our hearts are gone...
Our souls still here...
Their beats were numbered...
We just appeared..."
The first boy and the second girl took over from there.
"Here in the dark...
Here in the night...
And now we must...
Fear all the light..."
The rest then joined them in six-part harmony.
"We are all dead...
We aren't alive...
We chose to stay...
And so we died...
We now lie here...
In the dark and the dust...
Not feeling love...
But knowing lust..."
The ghosts held the last chord until it faded with them. After disappearing completely, they faded back, and were arranged in a circle around Coraline, holding her in the center of the chamber.
"Soon one more soul...
Shall join our ranks..."
Everyone except for the first boy and girl dropped out.
"Unless the girl...
Has what it takes..."
The rest joined again to conclude the verse.
"And frees us all...
And with her takes...
Our souls and hearts...
Our eyes and stakes..."
They went into the final chorus, and one by one dropped out.
"We are all dead...
We aren't alive...
We chose to stay...
And so we died...
We now lie here...
In the dark and the dust..."
The first girl sang the last two lines alone.
"Not feeling love...
But knowing lust..."
She finally faded away, and joined the others near the wall, slowly pulsing with a heartbeat, one that they no longer had.
"Please help us, Miss," they all said as one voice.
"I will," Coraline promised.
Suddenly, the wall she had been leaning against disappeared and she was pulled out of the chamber.
(A/N): I'm actually thinking about making sheet music for this. I already know the melody, it's just putting in the harmonies and stuff. Interested?
As for the cliffie, it's not much of one. Kinda obvious if you've seen the movie, which is what this is based off of.
In other news, I made an extremely epic drawing (two of them, actually) that spoil the endings of both plots.
Kinda. One has more obvious spoilers than the other one does.
I might take pictures of them and upload them on DA (I would have to create an account) or maybe crate a new blog for information on my fanfictions, including drawings I've made, info about my stories (such as better, more in-depth summaries - I KNOW I need better summaries, some of them are so BAD!), which stuff I'm working on, and fanart of my stories (if there ends up being any...).
I'll post a link on my profile and in the A/N of one of the chapters when I set it up.
Carry on with your lives, now!