Panic Room

Part five; the sixth

Just so everyone is clear, this chapter is written as Luna is "falling apart". Not gonna say why, just remember that.

Thursday; 1998; The panic room; Luna; 00:00

Luna collapsed as she landed back in the Panic Room, remembering her parents mangled bodies. Luna didn't know whether she was crazy yet, but thought that she may have some of her sane thoughts left, as she was aware of the door opening and hands dragging her out. So much death. So much destruction. How many had died, and would have to die, before she caved in? She had just witnessed an entire town dead, their blood on her hands. It was unbearable. Luna looked down and was surprised to find herself tied up. She had not felt anyone touch her. Luna looked up and into the face of Morfran, but sighed and looked down, defeated. "Fine." She mumbled. 

"I'll help you." 

Though she couldn't see him, she could feel him smiling and kept her head down. The quieter she acted, the quicker she could get out of here. She saw three men walking toward her, and stiffened, but relaxed as they cut her bonds. She stayed seated and only stood when she was pulled to her feet by one of the men. She looked up and faced Morfran, trying to make herself look as husked as possible. Morfran turned and walked to the other side of the room, but stopped, just out of sight. "You will, but not yet." His voice floated out of the darkness and Luna froze. "Eventually, once you have broken, you will help me. I have no doubt of that. But until then, you are a safety risk. You may just disappear. Leave my service and never come back. But, once you are completely gone. Once that thin veil you call your sanity has been ripped off and the raw mess beneath exposed, then you will help. But not before. Take her away." With that, a shocked Luna was lifted off of her feet by unknown arms and she was thrown into the gaping hole behind her, as Luna Grace re-entered the Panic Room

Luna sat on the floor, in utter shock, and looked only at the blank wall before her. All at once, the ground flew up and Luna tried desperately to grab onto something other than smooth white floor.

Nothing came to her grasp and she tumbled down and down, closing her eyes and praying that she would not land softly. She had never prayed for death before but now was not a time for old habits and any way out would be pleasurable to whatever lay at the bottom of this dreaded ravine. She began to slow and curled up in a ball as things formed around her. She closed her eyes and touched down, but did not dare to look. What would it be? A pool of lava, a vast ocean from which she had no escape. This was the first thing that came to Luna's mind because the raging storm inside of her was throwing her ocean, her tranquil pool of calm, into a seething creature that begged for release. Luna slowly opened her eyes and looked at a tiled floor. Her first thought was, I'm back in the hospital! It's starting again! But on further inspection she saw she was in a bathroom. Her head was level with a porcelain toilet and next to her was a claw-footed bath tub. She stood and saw a gleaming white sink with a mirror sitting above it and a cabinet above that. She turned and saw a door. She ran for it and started pulling at the handle, but nothing happened. She ran to the cabinet and flung it wide to reveal...

Empty space.

She swore loudly and slammed it shut, but instead of closing, the little door snapped off. She grabbed it and started ramming the door, barging at it, walking back and repeating. Finally she made an indent and threw all of her weight at it but to no avail. She continued to ram at the door and it was then that the tears fell. She had to escape. She had to get out. She finally chipped away part of the door and started scrabbling to get rid of the rest, but stopped and screamed when she saw her hands.

Her nails were gone.

She ran to the mirror and looked at her hands and her feet but there were no nails there. Only skin and tendons. She began to shake and redoubled her efforts to get through the door and, finally, she made it. She had done it! She was free. Her hands didn't matter because she had escaped! She closed her eyes and stepped out of the hole she had made. She opened her eyes and saw...

The same bathroom.

But that was impossible. She had just come from here. There was the claw-footed bathtub and the porcelain toilet and the sink and cabinet but...There was something different here. The cabinet still had its door. She ran back through the destroyed door and into the bathroom she had come from. She sat on the floor, shaking like a beetle on a pin, and realised. She was trapped and there was no escape. She was in this bathroom, and if not here, then the next and the next and however many more there were to follow. Probable infinite, she thought to herself. No escape from this nightmare. Suddenly, her mouth began to tingle and she jumped up and looked into the mirror. Her teeth were itching! 

But no. 

That was impossible! 

She reached up to scratch one and when she took her hand back, her tooth was in it. She began to panic and reached up to scratch more teeth. Before she realised her mistake, three teeth were sitting in the palm of her hand. She threw them and they tinkled in the sink. She tried not to scratch, but it was unbearable, and she found herself pulling on all of her teeth. They came out in her hands and she began screaming, expelling them from he hands and into the sink. After she had pulled out all of her teeth, she looked at her gums in the mirror and reeled back, her hands in her hair. 

She began to hyperventilate and she pulled her hands from her hair, taking great chunks out with her. She screamed and her hair began to itch so badly that she was forced to scratch. She pulled all of her hair out and looked at it on the floor, shaking in fear. Suddenly her leg began to itch and she realised what was happening too late. She reached down unconsciously and scratched, only pulling away when she saw a chunk of her flesh in her hand. She felt no pain, but she saw blood splattering all over the bathroom floor. Her arms, legs, back and face all began to itch as she looked at the blood and she ran to the next bathroom, collapsing into the bath tub and sitting on her hands to prevent herself from scratching. She felt like a thousand ants were crawling over her body and she began to unconsciously scratch her hands. When she looked, she saw a finger from her left hand in her right palm, the bone still visible through the gushing blood. 

"OH MY GOD!" She screamed and threw the finger. It sailed through the air, landing with a soft whump in the sink. She ran to the bath tub and filled it with water, leaping in and soaking her blood covered body. She felt the tingling disappear and looked down into the water. It was deep red and getting darker all the while. She stood from the tub and looked down at her body. Half of her rib cage was exposed and her lung was pulsating grotesquely outside of her body. It was at the moment that she saw her arm white with exposed bone and ligaments stretched between gushing blood, that her sanity snapped. She felt bile rise in her throat and looked down to see her liver pulsing and twisting. She ran to the mirror and threw up blood into the sink. She look up, shaking violently, and saw that chunks of her face were missing. One eye was gone and through the hole, she could see her slowly pulsating brain, grey and twisted. She screamed and saw her vocal chords vibrating in her dissolved throat. She grabbed her empty eye socket and her remaining eye and screamed and screamed.

Suddenly, the ground tipped up from beneath her and Luna began to fall.