It Chapter Three: The Offspring

Prologue

Fear.

A short yet striking word.

It's so easy how the word rolls off your tongue like it's something you can easily overcome. You really don't know how scary fear is until you feel it.

It's like this fear traps you. Controls you. Limits your sense of reason and freedom. It's like it's chaining you up and breaking you down until it makes you crack.

Have you ever felt so much fear that you're scared you might not wake up the next day? Have you ever felt so much fear that you think that at any moment you could die? Have ever felt so much fear that you think even breathing can come to bite you? Have you ever felt so much fear that you think your dreams have a dark and scary meaning?Have you ever felt so much fear you're scared of even yourself?

If your answers are all yes then it seems you're a lot like me.

Sometimes I just don't feel like my body really belongs to me, like someone's controlling me and has planned out everything from my birth to my death, forcing me to live in the nomadic hell I would call my life.

I don't know who my dad is and all my life I lived with my mom, if you can even call that abusive and perverted woman my mother. She claims that she found me in a sewer tunnel in a town called Derry because at that time she had somehow gotten lost in the tunnels due to her dirty job of being a waste cleaner. I was apparently a new born and my cries were so loud that she couldn't ignore. She then took me in and 'raised' me, but every single chance she got she always reminded me that I was adopted and would always stay an adopted child.

I would've just preferred if she just left me to die so I wouldn't have to wake up everyday wishing I didn't as well as relive the dream I always keep having.

It's a lucid dream, because I know I am dreaming, but I just can't seem to wake myself up. Everywhere's pitch black for a few seconds before a beacon of light shines down a good distance in front of me. My legs then work against my will and I find myself running towards the light. As I grow nearer I start to notice the silhouette of a tall man, shoulders forward and head slightly down. I look to his left and see a big red balloon clutched in his hand. At this point in my dream, I realized that my heart thumped uncontrollably, either in fear or uncertainty the more I approach the figure. My legs then abruptly stop just in front of the man and he slowly raises his head and looks up at me. His gaze then lands on mine and I could make out a pair of bright and yellow eyes staring at me and making me very uneasy. Now, I start to notice that this person before me is a clown and a creepy one at that.

Even if he was a clown, I knew the entity before me wasn't human, anything but it. I wasn't sure if it was the clown's whiteish skin tone or the fact that it was shuddering but I knew it was unwell. Orange and slightly ruffled hair covered the back parts of its hair and left its large forehead bare and bald. Red lines ran down from the top of its eyes and stopped at the corners of its mouth. Its clothes were in tatters and stains hugged the fabric of its outfit making it grayer than gale. The clown wore oversized shoes with balls at the tips that slightly jangled and its eyes were deep and sunken but still held that dangerous and creepy stare.

"Join me, Hazelwise" The clown croaked. Its voice reminded me of that of a grandma's but deeper.

It extended its free hand in front of me expecting me to take it. This was the part of my dream where I was forced to make a decision, but I always rose from my slumber in a cold sweat before I could.

On some nights, I didn't dream of the clown and I was thankful for those nights. Not dreaming about the clown was what I always looked forward to doing.

However, I had no idea how important I was to the clown's schemes.