✘ lost in the flames

[yardbird]

Day I. September 26th

• Narrow Escape: The Shiver [Narrative]
  
• It's Such A Gray Day | Henry Townshend

Day II. September 27th

• Monster Hospital | Anne Cunningham's Otherworld
  
• The Defiled [Narrative]

Day III. September 28th

• Children Shouldn't Play with Dead Things | Alex Shepherd's Otherworld
  
• Home Again, Home Again, Jiggity Jig [Narrative]

Day IV. September 29th

• Full Circle [Narrative]
  
• Folosom Prison Blues {The Penitentiary} | Irene Adler

Day V. September 30th

• Mirror, Mirror | Annie Cresta
  
• Roadkill {The Church} | Nepeta Leijon

Day VI. October 1st

• The Devil You Know [Narrative]
  
• The Repeater I. | Nepeta Leijon {Nowhere}
  
• The Repeater II. | OTA {Nowhere}

Day VII. October 2nd

• The Repeater III. {Nowhere} | Anne Cunningham

Fin

• Breathing Water [Narrative]
  
• Flooded Area | Alex Shepherd

Comments

September 27th | The Defiled

[yardbird]

HERE LIES A LIAR,
LYING TO BONES...
LYING, LYING, LYING...

[yardbird]

It's a maze. One that doesn't seem to have any sort of end or beginning, at that. His senses are still haywire from having his body pumped full of God-knows-what in that hospital. Where Anne has gone now, he has no idea. She was with him before, and now she isn't. He tries to look for her in this place, dragging his feet, though at this point he may as well be hauling his own dead weight.

He doesn't want to be alone. This place hasn't given him much of a choice, when it doesn't seem to value the laws of teamwork. Murphy knows the crush of loneliness a little too well. Even when he does find that he's in the presence of something, he learns fast that he would rather the former solitude so much more.

Murphy doesn't know why this is happening to him again. He doesn't know what this place wants from him that he hasn't had shoved in his face already. He's done his time, and he's faced his demons. Sure, he's not the most guiltless of people, but some part of him wishes there's a reason behind this madness, and that it's not just some sick and kafkaesque joke. Regrettably, it wouldn't surprise him if it was.

Footsteps shuffled down the hallway. Murphy turned his head just in time to catch a brief glimpse of a shadow ahead, rushing from one hall to the next. A door slammed in the distance. Then, a giggle.

Was that a little girl...?

No way, this was no place for a kid to be.

"Hey, wait up!" Murphy calls out and books it, or as best as he can in his condition. His head is spinning, the sickly urge to vomit building in his stomach. He limps when he chases after the child's laughter, makes it several seconds too late to the door. Jiggling the handle, it's locked and doesn't open. "Dammit... Not this again..."

Just how many times is he going to be chasing after...

The door opens.

Murphy stares. The door opens. On its own, no less.

"That's... normal." Or not, but he isn't about to look a gift horse in the mouth. He limps cautiously through the doorway, peering inside.

Nothing much to see here -- it's an empty room. With the exception of a mirror, which covers the entire wall.

Actually, as he approaches the room, he finds that the mirror isn't what he thinks it is at first. Standing in front of it, he doesn't see himself. The room on the other side is almost exactly the same, with a few exceptions.

He can see himself sometimes, flickering in the dark center. Every other split frame-second, however, there are glimpses of something else. Inside, or on the other side, is something monstrous in chains. The swinging lamp just sways, granting minimal light to make out the vague details with.

It's then that Murphy notices that there's something written on the wall behind him. He sees it in the reflection, and he sees it when he checks over his shoulder:

Was it worth it, you criminal?
He looks back to the mirror. The flashing stops, revealing something solid where Murphy should see himself standing.

Bound by shackles, something gray and monstrous is confined here. Its emaciated shape and bony limbs stretch out longer than humanly possible. Both trapped in chains and accompanied by a faceless little girl, clinging to its side. Both are without eyes. Both are watching him -- watching Murphy.

The message makes itself so painfully clear.

You can't ignore it forever.



Everyone knows what you did.
Murphy grips his head. They are no longer just words that he sees in the reflection. Looking at it, the creature seems to be reaching out to him.

The room is so silent his ears pop. He stifles as he stumbles back.

The little girl with no face takes notice to this. She lets go of the gargantuan creature that fills the room with chains and decay. She tilts her featureless head up at him, and for several moments, Murphy feels her reaching inside of him when she touches the glass.

"Wh--" He chokes. "What are you doing...?!"

They never loved you.
The words are clear as ever, bleeding across the glass. Wet and thick, red dribbles down the surface sheet. Murphy is unable to move; he watches as more words begin bleeding across the mirror: "Lying liar she knows you're lying", "Stop lying", "You're lying again", "It's your fault", "They're all dying", "Must pay for what you've done", "STOP DOING THAT".

Murphy feels his throat hitch. "Don't..." He doesn't know why he even bothers. The air is still. There is no reply. He only finds himself pressing back against the wall, sliding sideways until he forces himself out of the room. Wills himself to leave, to keep moving. Can't stop, no matter how much it hurts, or how the truth he's always known heckles on the back of his mind.

They never loved you...