Into the Void

Chap #4 - Plague of Shadows

"~ But a small voice begs you to stay ~"

I don't need to look from where I have my head buried in Ella's hair to know how close the voids, our parents, are. To hear their wheezing breaths and unearthly screeches of triumph. To feel their icy aura, growing colder as they approach. I taste the stale, icy air as I breathe my last breaths in short, shaky bursts.

It is chilling. I feel not only the physical, but also the emotional pain they imprint on me. Recently closed wounds re-open as I stand so close to the parents I once knew and loved. My heart begins to bleed, not fast and thin like the tears that roll down my face but slow, like thick molasses. I hold Ella closer, bringing her into my body. The parents, our parents, who used to tuck me in at night and scare the monsters from under my bed, are closing in, leering. They glide towards us. I can only hope that Ella hasn't recognized them. Them who used to kiss my scrapes better and read me stories when lightning shone through the sky. Sing me songs. Right up until they lay dead on the ground, light diminished, they protected us. They fought for not their lives, but mine and Ella's. And now they may be the ones to steal them from us.

I remember in one quick flash, the pure love in their eyes. And I knew that they wanted nothing more but to die if it meant we could be safe.

And then they were gone; plunging into the void, leaving their girls alone to fend for themselves as the world we know crumbled into a million-trillion pieces and was stolen away from us in a blink.

Obscured by the darkness.

When I am dead, what will it feel like? Cold, relentless and harsh, stinging me with a thousand needles? Or will it be peaceful, like drowning, suffocated by shadows? And when I'm a void, will I be conscious, unable to control myself as I kill without hesitation? Would I be stuck in the void..forever?

A rasping breath breezes icy air on my ear and I scream in terror, reflex causing me to lash out behind me. My hand doesn't connect, but feels like I just dumped it in an icy bucket of water. I'm glad I haven't eaten anything since throwing up the other day, but I still feel that gagging feeling in the pit of my stomach.

Great, now I'm fantasizing about pizza and sausages, and...

Ella whimpers quietly in my arms and together we wait. Opening my eyes, I look up at the voids, now inches away from us. They are enjoying our teeth chattering, our breath rising in clouds from our lips, our terror...

They take a simultaneous deep, rattling breath, slurping up my radiation of fear like a cat slurps up cream. I once again search their eyes for any trace of the parents I know and love, but instead my grey eyes meet the sunken black ones that are malicious and promise a slow, excruciating death.

Suddenly, they whip around to stare at Lippo, who is standing frozen on the porch. Their inky irises shift from the old runted cow to Grandpa, staring at him as if just realizing his presence. His eyes reflect pain, and he has his hand half-outstretched toward us as if it can save us. Tears trace paths down his dirty, weathered cheeks, silent.

"Run, Stormy, run." His voice cracks and croaks as the voids start back at us, malice in their grins. These can't be our parents, I reassure myself.

I wince, my eyes involuntarily squeezing shut, and wait for the inexplicable feeling to encompass me. Instead, opening my eyes a crack, The voids are turned towards Grandpa as if in a trance. They look like predators, analyzing their next meal. But there's something nagging in the back of my mind...

"Oh, the voids don't want an old fellow like me! Nope, my light is flickering on and off. They think I'm one of them, all of the darkness trapped inside of me from being stuck here alone for all of the years." I knew he was hiding something.