THE CYCLE OF TORMENT

CHAPTER XXV: THE KNIGHT IN SHINING ARMOR

When Larson woke up, the first thing he noticed was that his back ached. He groaned as he sat up and he heard popping and cracking sounds coming from his back.

"What the... what happened? Where am I ?" He asked himself as he started to get his bearings. He soon realized that he was back in Jeff's pizza. Surprise overwhelmed him. Did the woman let him go? He looked at the doors and nearly walked towards them, but then he looked back at the ball pit. He still had to save Tabitha. He was not going to leave without her.

After strengthening his resolve, he heard something moving in the ball pit. He took a few cautious steps towards the ball pit. When he looked into the pit, he jumped when something leaped out and landed right in front of him. It looked like a large, black figure. Its body was made up entirely of a black tar, the same tar he'd seen making up those tentacles that dragged him into the ball pit. It had begun to stand up straight and it towered over him. Its body started to shift and change. It began to look more bulky as its limbs and torso thickened. Two shapes that resembled rabbit ears sprouted out of the top of its head. Soon, the transformation was complete, and an unsettled Larson looked up and gazed upon a large, yellow rabbit. Its eyes glowed a dark blue color. It resembled an animatronic character from Freddy Fazbear's. It looked convincing until Larson noticed what was between the gaps of the animatronic suit pieces.

Instead of metal and wires, he saw organic tissue, flesh to be exact. His eyes widened slightly as he looked up at its face. The rabbit creature was now looking down at him. Larson noticed a black substance leaking out of the rabbit's right eye. He took a few steps back in surprise as the rabbit let out a blood curdling roar, revealing many rows of sharp, jagged teeth.

Just as Larson braced himself for an attack, the rabbit and the environment around him dissipated as if it was all smoke. Was he seeing another memory? Was that woman telling him the truth? Was she showing him all the answers he'd been trying to find for months? A part of him felt relieved that he was finally going to be able to make sense of what was happening and maybe solve this case for good.

But another part of him felt the opposite. It was as if he wasn't as thrilled as he thought he would be. He never realized that by uncovering these secrets, he would also have to bare witness to the awful things that happened to who knows how many people. Throughout his career, he'd seen a lot of things that he wouldn't be forgetting anytime soon, but a part of him wasn't prepared for the carnage that would give him what he wanted. He knew it would be more than just gunshot wounds and rotting corpses, but he would be forced to watch it anyway.

Was this really the woman's way of helping him, or was it just a way to break his spirit, a way of showing him that what he was facing was impossible to beat? He wished he at least knew that answer. He didn't care about the case anymore. He just wanted to escape, to find his friend and save her from the vile creature that was keeping them here. He just wanted to go home.

The void he was in was soon replaced with what looked like multiple places at once. He saw schools, cities, farms, and other buildings. Some of the locations he saw looked local enough, but many of them looked as if they were from different parts of the world. Among the mishmash, he spotted the junkyard where he uncovered those corpses. As the images of dozens of different places gave him a migraine, he could always make out the woman that had been haunting him this whole time. He saw images of her watching people, stalking them.

He watched her take different appearances, change her form to look completely different. Wait, she could do that? A confused Larson thought. Just what was this strange woman? As he gazed upon her multiple appearances, Larson noticed that she seemed to favor the feminine clown animatronic form the most, but slightly altering it at times to make it look more animatronic-like.