The Hollows, page 19
I tried to scream.
When my eyes flung open, I couldn’t move my arms or legs. They were securely fastened to the bedsides with thick, unyielding wrappings. With all my force, I tried to yank free, but nothing budged.
The softness had left Martha’s face as she stood and she tilted her head. Her eyes were an empty pale gray. Even the rosary that hung from her neck came loose from her shirt, the cross melted and distorted. The second Martha came and stood by the first, tilting her head at the same inquisitive angle, eyes gray and lifeless.
Trying to plead for Sevens, I looked over and saw him on the floor, covered in small, thin slits all over his body, blood trickling from every razor thin wound making a pool around his twitching mass. I tried to scream again, yell for help, but nothing came out. Frozen, I looked back at the Martha’s.
My heart pounded in my chest as everything flooded back. Memories of the house, the Charpiots, their friends, and what they had done to me. Every beating, every touch, every sickening trace of Richard’s tongue against my neck. Vomit rose in my throat.
“You are so ordinary,” The Martha’s said together. “The Gray will be surprised that this is the thing causing so much trouble.”
“Please,” I croaked, “Please, stop.”
Both heads of Martha tilted the other direction and spoke together, “I believe we have found what Serenity fears, Gray. She will be easier to maintain, now. She’s understanding the truth of things. She is understanding that she is nothing.”
The figure came into the room, dressed in a pale white suit. When the completely balding man towered over the Marthas, he was smiling with his jagged, sharp teeth. The Gray stood there breathing me in.
Those people did horrible things to a child, that is unforgivable. And, eventually, when they die, their souls might end up here in this place, locked away in a type of hell in with which they caused you. You are sick, Serenity. But, in light of everything, I can say with confidence, that it is okay. You are okay. Being sick, being damaged, is far from meaning useless. It is actually the furthest from saying you are not worth something. Sometimes the most damaged people can do the most extraordinary and wonderful things. More times than not, it is the sick of soul and the damaged that end up being the saviors that other damaged creatures need.
Day’s voice, his words, his wisdom, flooded back to me as I looked into the Gray’s empty eyes. My heart began to slow as I started to repeat his words out loud, “it is okay. You are okay.”
The Gray stopped and stared, trying to comprehend what I was saying.
“It is okay. You are okay,” I repeated Day’s words again.
The jagged smile left his face. I saw, for the smallest of moments, a twitch of worry around his brow.
“I am okay. I am more than nothing, more than ordinary. I am sick. But, there is nothing you can do to me. There is nothing worse than what has already been done and I’ve beaten it. I’ve beaten them. And you know what?” I asked as I lifted my head so all three of them could see my face. “I’ll beat you, too.”
The Gray fell a step back as though he’d been hit in the chest. A sound of agony whispered from his absent lips. The Marthas tilted their heads towards the Gray as his cheeks sunk into his skull. He fell to the floor and writhed, twitching violently before arching his back at an unnatural angle.
Something big hit the Marthas on their side, sending both bodies colliding into the wall. It leaped over them and began beating mercilessly against their bodies, slamming their heads against the tile. It raised one Martha in the air with its many limbs and brought her skull down with a final, sickening, crunch.
Sevens, bloodied and soaked, fell back to the ground, crawling with what little strength he had left over to my bedside. He ripped and fingered at the straps until my right hand was free. I pulled myself up, untying my other limbs from their restraints. When I was free, I saw Sevens lying on the floor, breathing deeply, a gurgle in his chest with every breath.
“Sevens? Sevens, please get up. Get up!” I came to my knees and lifted his head.
I looked around for something, anything to stop the bleeding. The straps and coatings that the Martha’s had used were gone. There was nothing left in the room but cold surfaces.
He purred in my arms, resting finally against my chest. His many eyes looked up into mine and I didn’t see fear. I didn’t see anger or terror. He just purred once more and I heard him for the last time, “You are okay. You are okay. You are okay. You are okay. You are okay. You are….”
He never finished his last sentence as his head became heavy in my hands.
“Sevens?”
Chapter 11.5:
Music is Key
There was nothing like it in the world. In her world, at least.
The girl looked around and saw all the broken and tattered remains of forgotten toys, dolls, and figurines. Broken glass from missing faces of loss collectibles scattered the floors and a thick film of dust had settled on what few full and solid ornaments that were left. Mountains of discarded objects in all directions, filling up the warehouse-sized room with no empty ground beneath.
Through the piles of someone else’s trash, a sound broke through that she’d never heard before. A repetition of sounds paired together without stopping. They chimed high and chimed low with several pings in the middle that, when put together, strung the most beautiful collection of sounds through the saddest collection of toys.
The girl paused hoping this was not a trap, but she had grown to know better. The short time she had spent in the Hollows made it clear that there was no safe-haven, no solace, and barely any tranquil quiet.
But the sound flowed into her and drew her in. It pulled at her with a hook through her gut, urging her deeper into the mass junkyard. She tiptoed around the barely visible shards on the floor, trying to determine which pile from which the sound originated. The room was larger than she had originally conceived. It extended several more feet long and wide, with collections of smaller piles to maneuver through.
But that sound. What was it? She tried to listen for other things, monsters and breathing, but that tune was all she heard.
The unnamed girl heeded through the piles, slowly progressing towards the particularly soothing noise. The sound reached a new collection of sounds that caught her off guard, and in her distraction, she lost focus on her footing and stepped on a particularly sharp piece of broken porcelain, cutting her foot.
“Ah!” The girl pulled her toes up and picked the piece out of her cut and flicked it down with the rest. The sound was distracting, but pleasant, and utterly perplexing.
Her footsteps became lighter and more deliberate with a newfound purpose. Something about the reverberations drove her though she could never understand why. Nothing about it made sense. Why the random noises? Why the random clang and chime? Why in that order?
Her moth showed itself through the shadows. It danced and rolled joyously in the air, guided by the music. In its aerial ballet, it fluttered down and landed on the section of the pile she found herself in front of, still spreading its wings to the subtle chimes of the rings beneath.
The sound grew louder at that one particularly sad pile of what looked to be a part of a glass menagerie. The see-through zoo had been trampled and swept together with broken zebras and broken lions, both predators and prey’s bodies mixed together and unidentifiable. One single, whole glass panther lay at her feet.
A single hope.
She picked it up and it reflected light back in her eyes, though there was no light in the room. It reflected, nonetheless. It was the single, most beautiful sight she had laid eyes on since waking in the Labyrinth, and she was not sure why it was given it to her.
The warmth in her chest was reminiscent of the time she found her pet. A little Routook, barely old enough to have grown its first limb, wiggling on the ground like a big, furry plush worm. It cooed and squawked with its mouthless sounds. She had not a clue where it came from, but it showed up on her doorstep from out of the night. Her father told her to put it back, that the pack was probably looking for it. But, every time she tried it would end up back on the doorstep, cooing and nestling up to her feet. She remembered taking it with her, watching it grow. Petting it by her bedside as it purred and developed its vocabulary. It would do fun riddles with her and keep her company during times of loneliness. She missed him and hoped he was still okay with her gone.
Only then did she realize the sound had stopped. She sat there in the quiet, holding on to her fragile hope clutched tightly to her chest. With her foot, she kicked around a few of the pieces, but soon realized that it was going to take more effort to find what she was being pulled to.
“Forget it,” The girl told herself. “It’s not worth it.”
But something pounded away at her head, telling her it was. Something, maybe her subconscious, maybe even complete delusion, eagerly pushed her forward and thwarted her denial.
She bent down and, with one hand securely fastened around her glass figurine, she dove her other hand into the glass. Small stings from tiny cuts jolted up her arm, but she did not stop. She couldn’t. Something had overtaken her body, driving her madly further down. Fingertips tracing where the bottom of the pile should have been, farther than the bottom of the floor. Relentlessly digging, now, raking up handfuls of glass and half-creatures and shoveling them behind her.
Starting to convince herself that she was going insane, she slowed down her fury. There was nothing at the bottom, she started to think. The sounds were in my head, that’s all.
Even as she warned herself of this, her fingers scratched against something solid and metal. In a panic, she threw away the surrounding pieces with her bloody fingertips and wrenched free a small, square box.
Her hands were almost big enough to cover the entirety of the box. She was sure something this small could not have made the noises she had heard. The outside was tarnished and worn with flakes of rust and was covered in smaller and larger dents. The corners looked as they had been hit so many times that they were nearly rounded at the edges. But, even in the dim light, she could see the pale purple coating and small blue accents on the trim like something you would give to a teething child to ogle and distract.
Thumbing at the outside, she tried to test its density, squeezing her fingers and thumbs around the back and front, to which it had no give. Running her thumbs over the base and then the sides, a crack became visible in the middle. A perfectly straight, purposefully made crack that broke at the center, connected to unseen hinges in the back.
Taking a deep breath, not sure what she might find inside, she closed her eyes and prepared before lifting the lid.
There was light. A small bulb no bigger than a pinprick, but enough to hurt her eyes and make her squint. As the top lifted, so did a figure of a small dancer, dressed in a pink dress, propped up on one leg. The moth landed lightly on the lid and when the top was opened as far as it would go, the dancer began to turn.
The sound hit her chest with a mixed torrent, an icy-hot surge from beneath her skin. A combination of pings and chimes, circulating together like the dancer, connected end to end in a tone that made her jaw drop. Nothing like it had ever been heard by her ears. As the dancer turned, the chimes played in a rhythm and beat, pulsating with the sound of her heart.
Her eyes watched as the dancer danced, as the sounds moved her in circles. In her mind, she saw drawings she made as a youth, a movable and audible creation of art, swirling in the wind that she could only feel in her heart.
The unnamed girl watched, moved by the sounds, picturing them as waves and dancers, laughter and joy. Thoughts of childhood smiles and loving as tender as the embrace of a mother, caressing her mind and warming her body in a way never possible the Hollows.
Her soul seemed to drink in the life from the metal box. And when the song ended, there was an emptiness, a new hole in her heart that she was desperate to fill once more.
Over and over, she opened and closed the box, listening to the same winding tune to the point of tears, joyous tears. Happy tears. Nothing had ever sounded so pure, full of life, of hope, and of dreams.
Opening the box again, she closed her eyes and vanished in it, leaving the terror and dread behind, curling up in its single small light that produced the most wonderful sounds in her world. She thought of days of her past. The hallways of her burrow, the drawings on the walls that now moved in concordance with the music.
She thought of the doors to her rooms, the faces of her long-forgotten parents, the smiles of her friends. The girl thought of the world she wanted to belong to, one where the sounds and chimes never ceased.
When the box was finished, something broke inside of her and she sat on the ground, unworried by the glass and trinkets and broken toys. How long she sat there, she never knew. It could have been minutes or hours, but in the total darkness, she let the sound of the night sink into her in a daze.
The words written underneath the dancer said ‘Music Box’, two words that she would now hold tighter than dreams, tighter than her fears, clutching to the warmth that filled her belly, heart, and soul.
In the night, she sat and remembered. She remembered the darkness and how it came for her. She still remembered dark’s smell.
How it tasted.
How it crawled over cracks and bones, licking and creeping, slithering and writhing. She remembered how it overtook, enveloped, and enslaved.
She remembered her past, her fears. She thought of the times not too long ago being lost in the dark woods and concrete alleyways, about nearly drowning, about the things that eat the night. She thought of the swarms of insects, the cracking of walls. Images of bullying boys, and being alone in the dark.
Thoughts of the shadows beneath the bed and being left by her parents alone in the shadows came last. She thought of the progression, just as the music progressed, from the very beginning. When finally opening her eyes, everything became clear.
She knew her way to the center of the Labyrinth.
As the epiphany jolted her mind, something else jolted her senses. A rumble, deep and threatening, looming over the air in the room.
Then the Iktomi roared.
Chapter Twelve:
Once Alone, Twice Abandoned
I held Seven’s body for the better part of an hour, crying and cleaning the blood off him to the best of my ability. Nothing would have surprised me more than the fact that no tears had fallen. The shock had set in and all I could do was stare at his body, seven closed eyes and seven limp limbs. He seemed smaller there on the floor. There was nothing more I wanted than to be able to pick him up and carry him through a hundred doors until I could find Day again. But I couldn’t. And, in my hopelessness, my helplessness, I just sat there with him, not wanting him to be alone even though he had already left this place long before.
How long it took before convincing myself I had to leave, I couldn’t tell you, but the quiet finally became too much, only hearing my own breath and my own blood pumping in my ears. It’s enough to drive a person insane. I pulled myself off of the floor and took a final look around. The door I had been forced to enter was gone, nothing but solid wall remained. Only one door behind, that which the Marthas and the Gray had emerged from. No telling what was behind there, but with it being my only option, all there was left to do was suck it up and walk through.
I pulled the door open and took one more glance backward at Sevens. A knot was forming in my throat and my nose was feeling as if it was about to run, so before my body could convince itself to stay, I turned and walked into the darkness.
My eyes were heavy when they tried to focus on the next room. A chilled breeze blew through before I saw the hallway for what it was. The floors were covered and smeared with a dark liquid that reached the walls and sprayed the ceiling. A sick smell followed the wind, thick with copper and sharp decay.
To describe this feeling is one of the most difficult things to do. I smelled the blood and the gore, but my eyes were becoming so heavy and tired that I nearly didn’t care, all until my stomach became so clenched and rumbled so loudly that it woke me back up again. The putrid stench with my painful hunger made me both want to vomit, and then eat it just to have something back in my stomach again.
My mind was fuzzy and then showered with what felt like ice down the back of my neck, both refreshing and then painful. Unwillingly, my jaw clenched shut and locked.
I was so tired and so hungry that the only thought I had was getting the fuck out of there.
Pulling one door open and finding nothing, then another, then another, all covered in concrete or brick, I roared obscenities at each individual blockage. The last possible chance was a door at the end of the hall. It was bigger than the rest and made of solid brass, looking heavier than I think I could manage on my own. But, with no other choice, I ran to it and pulled with everything I had. The brass door unlatched and opened an inch. Then another. With every struggling scream, it budged just a little more until it was wide enough to barely fit my small frame through.
I shook my head, trying to rid myself of the oncoming sleep and keep pushing forward. Not a single door led to the outside, only more hallways, more blocked doors, with only a single useful one at the end of their halls. They all looked the same. It must have been twenty passages I walked before my head felt too heavy to hold up. My body swayed underneath the weight of exhaustion and my stomach bellowed loud enough for my ears to hear its agony.
“There’s no use in running,” a whisper came from behind me.
Whipping around, I looked wildly down the hallway. The passage looked exactly like all the others with nothing in sight.
“I don’t know why you even try,” A different voice said a moment later.
Nothing behind me, nothing in front or to the sides. No one behind the closed, useless doors that were blocked with concrete. Nothing anywhere.
