The Sixers: The Huntsmen of Death

Chapter 32

It had been about a week since we arrived to Kansas, the land of never ending wheat. Josh had not said a word to me since the car. I didn't expect any less. I wouldn't want to talk to me either. I made him become something he never wanted, a choice with no option.

Josh never left his brother's side when we got to the house, not even to eat. I would deliver his meals to him as he watched over our brother's body. He refused to say anything, barely looking up when I came in. He was detached, distraught and there was nothing I could do to help. For once, I felt helpless. I knew nothing I could say or do was going to change that.

Elijah came in to feed and take care of Jeremy when he wasn't helping the others train. A tube was connected to his throat to feed a liquid into his body. Jeremy could breathe fine on his own, so a respirator wasn't needed. I couldn't bare to think how active his brain was. I hoped it was just a darkness, like a deep sleep. I hoped he wasn't dreaming, because that meant he was stuck in a continuous loop of nightmares and thinking, trapped inside his own mind unable to break free. Being trapped inside your own mind is a burden, a torture I probably would never survive.

The greatest nightmares and hauntings come from your own mind, a place where your demons hide and chase you. They tug at you, eat at you, and sometimes drown you until nothing is left. The world will never be as demonic as the demons that reside in your dreams and the deepest parts of yourself. Being stuck there is like being forced to endure hell. Underneath everything, in the deepest parts of your mind, the demons are there. When you fall off the path, they will be there to grab you, to torture you. Generally, you can escape. You wake up, running away from the demons inside you. For Jeremy, if he was dreaming, he wouldn't be able to escape.

He would be stuck in the darkness, fighting for his sanity against everything he's ever buried. He would be fighting alone, unable to scream for help and there was nothing anyone could do. If he woke up, he wouldn't ever be the same. Facing your demons, fighting them every day, does not go without changing pieces of yourself. I can only hope that he saw a darkness, nothing but a black screen.

"You ready?" I turned to face Maya whom smiled gently.

I took another quick glance in between the door and the frame peering into Jeremy's room. Josh was passed out on a sofa chair next to Jeremy's bed, drool free-falling onto his black Nike sweatshirt. "Yeah," I replied before breaking myself away from the door.

I followed Maya through the old southern house, a mansion in my opinion. It smelt of a flower like a tulip and hint of lavender. There were flower beds around the house that filled the house with a spring-tasting smell. Sunlight beamed through the house, by the large and vine decorated windows. It felt open, a little too open between the windows and spacious rooms.

It was three stories with about fifteen rooms, the biggest being a ballroom on the first floor that was now the training center. It was designed in white walls with extravagant plaster decorative molding on the walls in the shape of flower vines and arrows. There were pictures along the wall portraying a younger face of the family that once lived here. Chandeliers hung from the ceiling, lavish carpets laid across the floor, and the floor boards creaked at random times. If I believed in such things, I would say it was haunted, but I didn't.

Though there were nine of us, the house still felt empty or bare. I barely saw Darren, though I didn't want to see him to begin with. The others I would briefly see on the stairs or in the hall, but other than that, I barely saw them. I would bring food up to my room, not wanting to engage in conversation with the rest of them. It wasn't like they ate together anyways. They were mostly either in their rooms, the training room, or outside running, so it wasn't like I was missing much anyways.