Out of instinct. In the sense that she couldn’t think or do anything in that lonely moment. Out of energy. Out of belief. Out of time. Because even if she tried to move she was not able to. Mariah had no choice in that room as she had no choice in this building. She fell back. She fell down. Not because she wanted to. But because she was pushed backward by the only other woman in the room who grabbed her. And they fell together.
Only it was the younger girl who fell on top of the older woman. Deprived of instinct. Mindless thing like a blinded beast. It happened so fast. An instant. An increment in a passage of time that was otherwise timeless. Like a flash of light. Yes. That’s what Mariah Boucheron glimpsed as she fell behind the girl who had seized her with her hands as if she had erupted in a seizure.
Oh. Right. This girl was no longer alive. Every spasm was involuntary, granted, like the living, but it shouldn’t happen to a dead body, should it? Not like this. So if time was an ocean it was frozen. Mariah had a moment between standing and falling to witness it. To glimpse it. To feel this weightless, heavy thing climb on top of her and force her backward.
Eyes. Always the eyes first. You follow the feet of your dancing partner. Their hands guide you; hand in hand or hand on back. Whatever. However, what you really follow are the eyes. The eyes are your guide. You connect with them. You relate with them. You read them. Windows to the soul.
Only…this young lady had eyes, yes...but they were not alive. Empty. Soulless. No. Something in them that Mariah noticed. Violence. Some unsatisfied desire to…how did puppet put it? Oh. Yes.
Eat. Eat. Eat.
Her eyes bore into Mariah’s. Wide and crazed despite her daze. So close. So far away though. Mariah couldn’t look away even as the girl’s lips shifted beneath her eyes amid saliva strings between her teeth. Mouth opened wide. Chomping. Chanting wordlessly but, in that split second of Mariah’s descent, she could hear it.
Starvation. Aggression. The pleas of someone who hasn't eaten for weeks. Who sees her feast and seizes it. The wailing of a woman trapped between heaven and hell, who moans from the empty pit in her stomach, whose guttural, grisly screams echo from her throat, anguished and endless. Frozen. Alone.
Mariah falls. She is not so lonely though. Skin once hollow, drained of feeling, as smooth as Kayden had discovered when his fingers slid from calf to thigh, belly to breast, shoulder to neck—is the skin of this dead woman suddenly so hot and so cold. The dead girl gripped Mariah’s shoulders with a desire to never let go in just that one barren moment.
Her fingers dug into Mariah’s skin, gripped the flesh, burning, freezing, fingernails digging in as if to pierce and plunge straight through the bone. Yet there was no passion in this. There was only aggression. Violence. Unbridled. The kind that is elicited when a predator pounces on their prey.
This girl was naked. Mariah was clothed. Yet as they landed she could feel the warm chill from her attacker all over. Her dress, once clean and unblemished, was wet, soaked in someone else’s blood, blood that poured from the stomach. Endless. Unbeckoned.
On the floor now. A bead of sweat slides gently down Mariah’s head. Like that string of saliva between the other woman’s teeth as she slobbers onto that head. Mariah can’t think. Can only breathe. Can only scream as this thing moans with the echo of the loneliest ghost ever known.
Moments pass though they aren’t so frozen. They are fast as lightning. As loud as thunder. The girl suddenly thrust her head downward as if to headbutt the woman. No. Her mouth was open so as to bite Mariah’s neck. Quite unlike Kayden, wasn't it?
Her shoulders in its grip, her arms were free enough and she wasted no moment. Mariah seized the creature by her neck, squeezed with all her might, screamed out a thousand galaxies from her own throat, but she did not plead.
In her terror, in her fury, with her need to survive, to not die and become some zombie who haunts this box, this lifeless prison, Mariah roared in defiance. Hers wasn’t hunger. It was panic. It was survival instinct as it finally meets her adrenaline in a rush of blood that her enemy wanted to drink, but Mariah is more determined to live than the monster is determined to eat her.
“NOOOOOOOOOOO! NOOOOOOOOOOOO!”
This thing could not have her. Would not take her. Will not break her. This girl is strong, maybe stronger, her dead weight bearing down on her, but Mariah has the strength of life, not death. So she explodes. Every muscle in her body pumps upward. As savage fangs slam down, loud, cracking, gnashing, mindlessly trying to bite her dinner despite her teeth not being able to reach her, Mariah manages to fend off her attacker. To keep her from eating her.
But Mariah’s hands are bloody. Not bleeding. This wasn’t her blood. Liquid glistening red. From the stomach. From the neck. Her key, still in her grip, jammed into flesh beneath the jaw in consequence from her hands at her predator’s neck. Just then, her other hand, drenched in red, slipped upward, up the chin…and the girl seized the moment.
Something raspy. Something hungry. A sound as quiet as a whisper, as loud as a scream, as if this entity had just then woken up from a deep sleep. No. She wasn’t awake. She wasn’t alive. She simply needed to eat. So her teeth became a blade as she began to wrap her mouth around those bloody fingers to bleed them dry.
And, whatever happened next, no one would be able to see Mariah bleed, nobody would hear Mariah scream into the light, to cry into the night—into those bloodthirsty eyes.
Only it was the younger girl who fell on top of the older woman. Deprived of instinct. Mindless thing like a blinded beast. It happened so fast. An instant. An increment in a passage of time that was otherwise timeless. Like a flash of light. Yes. That’s what Mariah Boucheron glimpsed as she fell behind the girl who had seized her with her hands as if she had erupted in a seizure.
Oh. Right. This girl was no longer alive. Every spasm was involuntary, granted, like the living, but it shouldn’t happen to a dead body, should it? Not like this. So if time was an ocean it was frozen. Mariah had a moment between standing and falling to witness it. To glimpse it. To feel this weightless, heavy thing climb on top of her and force her backward.
Eyes. Always the eyes first. You follow the feet of your dancing partner. Their hands guide you; hand in hand or hand on back. Whatever. However, what you really follow are the eyes. The eyes are your guide. You connect with them. You relate with them. You read them. Windows to the soul.
Only…this young lady had eyes, yes...but they were not alive. Empty. Soulless. No. Something in them that Mariah noticed. Violence. Some unsatisfied desire to…how did puppet put it? Oh. Yes.
Eat. Eat. Eat.
Her eyes bore into Mariah’s. Wide and crazed despite her daze. So close. So far away though. Mariah couldn’t look away even as the girl’s lips shifted beneath her eyes amid saliva strings between her teeth. Mouth opened wide. Chomping. Chanting wordlessly but, in that split second of Mariah’s descent, she could hear it.
Starvation. Aggression. The pleas of someone who hasn't eaten for weeks. Who sees her feast and seizes it. The wailing of a woman trapped between heaven and hell, who moans from the empty pit in her stomach, whose guttural, grisly screams echo from her throat, anguished and endless. Frozen. Alone.
Mariah falls. She is not so lonely though. Skin once hollow, drained of feeling, as smooth as Kayden had discovered when his fingers slid from calf to thigh, belly to breast, shoulder to neck—is the skin of this dead woman suddenly so hot and so cold. The dead girl gripped Mariah’s shoulders with a desire to never let go in just that one barren moment.
Her fingers dug into Mariah’s skin, gripped the flesh, burning, freezing, fingernails digging in as if to pierce and plunge straight through the bone. Yet there was no passion in this. There was only aggression. Violence. Unbridled. The kind that is elicited when a predator pounces on their prey.
This girl was naked. Mariah was clothed. Yet as they landed she could feel the warm chill from her attacker all over. Her dress, once clean and unblemished, was wet, soaked in someone else’s blood, blood that poured from the stomach. Endless. Unbeckoned.
On the floor now. A bead of sweat slides gently down Mariah’s head. Like that string of saliva between the other woman’s teeth as she slobbers onto that head. Mariah can’t think. Can only breathe. Can only scream as this thing moans with the echo of the loneliest ghost ever known.
Moments pass though they aren’t so frozen. They are fast as lightning. As loud as thunder. The girl suddenly thrust her head downward as if to headbutt the woman. No. Her mouth was open so as to bite Mariah’s neck. Quite unlike Kayden, wasn't it?
Her shoulders in its grip, her arms were free enough and she wasted no moment. Mariah seized the creature by her neck, squeezed with all her might, screamed out a thousand galaxies from her own throat, but she did not plead.
In her terror, in her fury, with her need to survive, to not die and become some zombie who haunts this box, this lifeless prison, Mariah roared in defiance. Hers wasn’t hunger. It was panic. It was survival instinct as it finally meets her adrenaline in a rush of blood that her enemy wanted to drink, but Mariah is more determined to live than the monster is determined to eat her.
“NOOOOOOOOOOO! NOOOOOOOOOOOO!”
This thing could not have her. Would not take her. Will not break her. This girl is strong, maybe stronger, her dead weight bearing down on her, but Mariah has the strength of life, not death. So she explodes. Every muscle in her body pumps upward. As savage fangs slam down, loud, cracking, gnashing, mindlessly trying to bite her dinner despite her teeth not being able to reach her, Mariah manages to fend off her attacker. To keep her from eating her.
But Mariah’s hands are bloody. Not bleeding. This wasn’t her blood. Liquid glistening red. From the stomach. From the neck. Her key, still in her grip, jammed into flesh beneath the jaw in consequence from her hands at her predator’s neck. Just then, her other hand, drenched in red, slipped upward, up the chin…and the girl seized the moment.
Something raspy. Something hungry. A sound as quiet as a whisper, as loud as a scream, as if this entity had just then woken up from a deep sleep. No. She wasn’t awake. She wasn’t alive. She simply needed to eat. So her teeth became a blade as she began to wrap her mouth around those bloody fingers to bleed them dry.
And, whatever happened next, no one would be able to see Mariah bleed, nobody would hear Mariah scream into the light, to cry into the night—into those bloodthirsty eyes.
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