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Something akin to horror filled me at the sight, though I knew “horror” was too insignificant a term. It wasn’t necessarily disgust, though I felt that too, but an emotion words failed to encapsulate. There wasn’t a single definition in the English dictionary that described what I felt as I stared up, up, up into the eyes of the figure.

It appeared to be a…gymnast. At least, I assumed it was, based on the teal leotard and blonde hair slicked into a bun.

It was tall, having to lower its head in order to move through the gym, with gangly arms and legs. Red blotches of color on her legs mixed with pink and white skin, almost as if someone had sewn the body parts of numerous humans together to create this distorted figure. I could distinctly make out what appeared to be a hand sewed into the skin of its left leg. Its face consisted of nothing but empty eye sockets, pure abysses I couldn’t help but stare into, and pink lips sewed together. Though it appeared as if a child had done the sewing, blood dripping from the jagged lines.

And its arms…

At the end of each arm, two puppets dangled, though they could’ve been corpses with how realistic they looked. The right one featured a figure that might’ve been Bianaca, though her skin was gray and her eyes were lifeless. Her arms appeared to be fused together with the creature’s palm, so I couldn’t tell where she ended and the monster began. On the other side, flapping lifelessly across the ground like a dying fish, was…me. Same gray skin, same lifeless eyes, same fused hands.

The creature twisted its head in my direction, locking me in its sight, and then slowly began to move towards me. It almost seemed to prance, though I hated using such a cutesy adjective to describe this horrible creature. Its legs were so long, nearly four times the size of its torso, that it had to curl its legs at the knee in order to move. I heard the thud of bodies hitting the wooden floor as our “bodies” were dragged along with it.

“Oh. Shit!” I cursed, turning on my heel and breaking into a run in the opposite direction of this creature. I had no idea where the fuck I was going, but I had to get away from it.

Before it consumed me completely.

The light became more unreliable the farther away I got from it and the gym, but I didn’t dare slow down, not even when I was consumed by a darkness as black as pitch.

All I could hear was thethump-thump-thumpof the two bodies rolling across the ground. Other than that, the creature was silent.

Mute.

A demented part of me wanted to laugh at what I was being put through.Of coursea silent monster would hunt me down.

Of course.

But any amusement I felt was eclipsed by rage. So much rage, my entire body began to shake with it.

After all I had survived, allwehad survived, I refused to be brought down by some fucking monster. This creature may be my wrath personified, but it wouldn’t beat me.

Light up ahead called to me, and I picked up my pace, my heart racing a mile a minute. The darkness was absolute, oppressive, and I almost feared I would trip over something and face-plant. But if Heath was right, Purgatorywantedto give us a chance to escape.

Which meant I had to trust that the darkness wasn’t hiding any malicious traps.

As I approached the first pocket of light, my pace slowed down, trepidation squeezing my internal organs like a giant, slithering python. Because the scene…

It was familiar.

In the midst of endless darkness was a sandbox, illuminated as if by a giant spotlight. And in that sandbox, I sat beside Bianaca. Her blonde hair was in two pigtails, and her dress was covered in dirt and stains from our time playing. Still, her smile was radiant, even at the age of six, and her eyes glimmered with mirth as she attempted to show me how to build a proper sandcastle.

I remembered this moment.

Some boys at school had bullied me, pushing me to the ground, and Bianaca had moved to stand between us, a fierce scowl distorting her cute face. She’d placed both hands on her hips and laid into them. Once they had been properly chastised, she took my hand in hers and led me to the sandbox, insisting she knew how to build the best sandcastle ever.

It was that moment I’d known I was a goner. Bianaca Steal was going to be my best friend, even if I had to force my friendship on her.

Who would’ve thought I would fall helplessly in love with her less than ten years later? That she would consume every waking moment and every night of sleep? Certainly not that little boy staring at her with hearts in his eyes. He would’ve never suspected that she was his soulmate, the woman he wanted to spend the rest of his life with.

And that little boy never would’ve believed that he’d be “dead” before he turned twenty.

I didn’t dare stop walking completely though, even when the silence behind me became almost deafening. I couldn’t even hear the distinctive clunk of two flaccid bodies hitting the wooden floor. My skin began to crawl as if I’d fallen into a hill of angry fire ants as I broke into a jog once more, leaving the scene from my childhood behind and hurrying towards the next splash of light dwarfed by distance.

My lungs protested my brisk pace, though I didn’t let up. Not even when I arrived at a familiar scene from my high school years.

The moment I realized I was desperately and hopelessly in love with Bianaca.

It was the night of our junior prom, and I’d been asked by Miranda Jenkins. Bianaca had chosen to go with Brett Highwater, a popular and friendly jock. He was the perfect man, and most guys would’ve been thrilled that their best friend had found someone like that, someone who seemed to adore her.

I’d been livid.