Whisper soft lashes like silky flower petals brushing alongside skin swept against my cheeks as my hazel gaze awoken to the display of beauty personified as the brilliance of the sun rose into a vast array of cerulean, azure with minuscule specks of cobalt before transforming what was once the start of dawn into a stunning combination of vibrant multicolored luminosity, a minor miracle so many took for granted. The sight of such exquisiteness blurred within my vision, futile tears clinging to my lids before sliding easily down my cheeks, internally knowing how undeserving I was to view such magnificence, such splendor.

“Finally awake, I see?”

My eyes swung towards the voice, wiping away my display of despair as I sat up in my bed watching as Maria walked further into the room. “What are you doing here?”

“Filling in when help is needed. Something you want to talk about?” she asked, her grey eyes concerned as she sat at the end of my bed, my chart in her hands.

My fingers gripped the cross around my neck, my thoughts guarded, “like what?”

“I don’t know. How about your sudden departure from here? Or what might have happened while you were away?”

My gaze fell at the thought of the pass couple of days, of all the blame that lied at my feet no matter what rationality removed the guilt from my shoulders I knew that my hands were soiled. Soiled with the blood and agony of those I’d unintentionally hurt. “Talking changes nothing,” I whispered over the painful ache in my throat, feeling stray trickles of immeasurable remorse dribble down my cheeks.

“Candor dat viribus alas.”

Sincerity gives wings to strength.

My grin was humorless, my sight distorted with unshed emotion, “I think I’m so far beyond that by now.” Tucking a stray curl behind my ear, “do you believe in redemption?”

“Of course Anna, no one is too far gone that they can’t be saved.”

My palm trembled as I covered a runaway sob, “and if you’re so tainted your undeserving of it?”

“I don’t think its our place to judge, and if forgiveness is what your seeking only you can stop punishing yourself enough to receive it,” she said softly, her expression as sad as my own. “Anna, what did you do?”

I shook my head in denial, my curls swinging out around my heart shaped face, liquefied anguish dripping from my trembling chin, “Absolution no longer applies to me.”

“Anna-,” Maria said softly her fingers without thought reaching out to grasp my arm.

Gray eyes clashed with hazel as white walls were demolished, trembling chaotically before plaster crumbled like ash around us, stained wallpaper taking its place. Blemished carpet lay scattered with broken toys, while what was once silence was now filled with screams of detestation, of hate. With little arms wrapped around a small battered doll trying to escape the sounds of glass smashing and cries filling the night, small legs encased in pink pajamas rose to rest a wavering chin across my knees continually rocking, as long honey brown pigtails swung out around my chubby legs.

Sobs from a child no one wanted racked my diminutive form as I listened to the violence outside my tiny bedroom before silence ensued; the start of my true nightmare commencing as my despairing heart stopped all together and my bedroom door opened. My gaze took in the almost empty bottle; the initiator of so much unhappiness that lingered in my childhood before it took in the key to my father’s release, my father’s idea of relief, and the crucial piece of cruelty that bruised my skin that my father labeled as love. There in his hand laid his thick leather belt already stained with my mother’s blood ready to sustain order and bestow punishment for a sin never committed.

“Daddy, I didn’t do anything wrong,” I whispered while knowing my tragic pleas would fall on deaf ears as I openly cringed against pillows watching as evil embodied stalked my terrified movements grabbing hold of my petite form yanking me from my covers by my tresses. My doll fell from my fingers, its tiny body hitting the carpet just as trickles of blood rushed to join its plummet.

My vision blurred until what was once indistinct turned unambiguous, the sight of Maria’s tears and frightened expression doing nothing to lessen the massive chasm of guilt consuming what little soul I had left. “I’m sorry.”

Silently I watched as she rose taking the chart with her before slowly walking towards the door as if the glimpse into her past had aged her so far beyond her years.

“I’m sorry,” I pleaded brokenly, no other words seeming to suffice enough to wipe away the pain from her eyes I had once again managed to unwittingly unleash.

She paused at the door, her eyes no longer meeting mine, “Maybe your right. For some, absolution no longer applies.”

Knowing she was truly thinking of her father did nothing to lessen the blow her words dealt. I was beyond help and no matter how sorry I was I seemed to forever damn those around me. “Maria?”

She paused in mid-exit waiting for me to continue and yet clearly intent on leaving my side.

“Where is Clarice?”

She glanced back at me, tears tumbling from her anguished gaze, “she took some time off, and I can understand why she would need it.” Brows furrowed I gazed up at her intently. “Things are different now Anna. You’re to be on room confinement from now on. An attendant or nurse will be with you at all times that you are not in this room. You should get used to being behind these walls I can’t see you ever being released beyond them.”

The door closed with a deafening resonance, the dead bolt sliding into place as tears fell from distraught eyes and the beginning of a downpour commenced outside impeding any further view of the former radiance of the sun. Mother Nature’s showcase beyond my barred in windows was bleak, desolate to behold as was any futile hope, and unlikely prospect I once foolishly in secret nurtured that my future would be dissimilar to the sudden unsightly torrent beyond these imprisoned walls. Absolution was lost as was my tortured soul.

………………………………………………………………….

Hours merged into one another, minutes slipping from within my reach like potentially joyful moments escaped my grasp. I was alone, alone with memories I could no longer elude, trapped with only my desolate thoughts as companions as unforgivable scenes as if pictures replayed in a movie projected splashed across white walls, walls that seemed intent to close in on my trembling form.

My white clothed figure slid further into its corner on the cold tiled floor as morning turned into afternoon and daylight turned into dusk and still every hellish recollection I had once yearned to forget seemed propelled into the air around me, its sight choking the small semblance of innocence I had once managed to contain. Was this the beginning of my end? Was this how my final moments were to be played out?

Days consisting of repetitive despair while dreaded nights of alarmed vigilance composed the evenings until dawn met with sleep and in rest finally did I meet with peace. Human interaction was a thing of a past, the only glimpse of another person came when I was impassively directed towards the showers or when food was brought in only to be removed untouched, and even then I was regarded with fear, with an unsaid wariness as if inside their eyes anything even remotely humane inside me had been removed and the monster remained now released for all to see.

Night crept pass my windows, the glow from the small night light remained a tiny measure of hope; Maria’s last act of kindness before an abandonment that could not be criticized. With my gaze on the moon beyond the bars I silently wondered with Clarice’s continued disappearance had the angels abandoned me too. Did the higher powers view me as a lost cause, a soul too damaged to repair as I found myself whispering yet again, “Andrea…? Andrea, can you hear me?”

Tears comingling with the chill in the air, “Please Drea, please come back to me.” Feeble sobs shaking from within me as cries rang out into the empty space only to continue to go unreciprocated, “Daddy… Please help me.”

I rose onto unsteady feet encircled by horrifying spectacles of terror unleashed, of replayed visions of death I had produced, of screams released, of innocence stolen in the name of protection streaked along the walls like blood flung along the white plaster as the naked soles of my feet pounded against the frosty tile, shadows stretching along corners like fingers intent to clutch victims until I stood motionlessly before my reflection. Curls wild around a face pale beyond any normal recognition, and golden eyes surrounded by pools of darkness no amount of sleep could seem to erase. A hazel gaze drowning, dying in the unforgiving solitude of my confinement while silently waiting. Waiting for that moment for hazel to transform into scarlet, for evil to supersede docility and yet my mirror image remained unchanged as if a final nail in my coffin.

I awoke at dawn no longer noticing the beauty of its sight, no longer rising from my bed, no longer seeing a reason to continue to hope for change. The door to my room opened unacknowledged as Sam; the pretty blonde nurse from the past stalked inside, her thoughts on her own troubles, her thoughts clear as day seeing as I was too weakened to even bother with shields that normally blocked my mind from connecting to others.

“God, what am I going to do?” she inwardly worried, her movements unhurried as she placed my tray on the table near the window. “If Chris’s wife finds out… god I don’t even want to think of what would happen.”

Her fingers unintentionally caressed her stomach as my mind traveled pass mere thought bypassing the consuming internal anxiety until words turned into memories, of vivid reminiscences of the great, decent, ethical Dr. Foster doing things to this pretty young blonde nurse across his desk that no where near resembled work. The framed photo of his wife lying scattered among papers and redundant objects in the moment of satisfying lust, his wife’s captured moment of happiness facing up towards them as if silently watching and yet clearly disregarded…

“He’ll tell me to terminate,” she held back a hidden sob, her gaze tragic. “I can’t… but if she knew, if she found out it would be the end of it all. She would take everything from him, and with her knowledge of his crimes she’d even take his freedom… Oh god, what do I do?”

“What the hell are you looking at,” she violently spat before me, her gaze hateful under my silent scrutiny. At my continued stillness our eyes held her sight watering as if she could see her secrets reflected exposed within my gaze, private thoughts she wasn’t ready to confront, skeletons she wasn’t ready to unearth. “Who are to judge me!” she raged into silence, a quietness that was no longer a friend but rather a collaborator with the adversary sheathing her into her thoughts, a mutual haunting we now seemed to share. Unable to face the truth any longer Sam fled the room leaving behind the knowledge of an unborn child lingering into the tranquil light of day along with the comprehension that the door that had imprisoned me now lay unlocked.

“Well, what are you waiting for, a hand written invitation?” my darker essence suddenly screamed into my mind.

I rose onto shaken unused legs that wobbled momentary under the sudden weight before I moved quickly towards the mirror astonished to see crimson tinted iris’s staring back at me. “I thought I’d imagined you. I thought I’d dreamed the whole nightmarish ordeal, but you’re real.”

She smirked cruelly, “and you’re wasting time! The key to freedom has been unlocked. Take it!”

My gaze wildly inspected the room, my shaking fingers grasping my head, my breath coming out in a panicked pant, “I can’t, I shouldn’t.”

“Forget guilt Marie. Leave behind the abyss of repentance you’ve built around yourself! None of this is your fault.”

“How can you say that when so many have been hurt trying to protect me, when so many have lost their lives by simply being in mine?”

“Blame, culpability lies not within you, but with your so called protectors Anna. Think about it, your gifts are unpracticed because they tell you nothing of how to use them, of how to control them. They tell you nothing of who you must defeat and yet they rely on you to defend what they deem as righteous.”

My mind ached from my thoughts being pulled in so many directions, “why should I believe you when you’ve killed, hurt so many?”

“Don’t.”

My gaze rose back to hers, “what do you mean?”

“Don’t believe me. Don’t listen to me when I say embrace darkness, and don’t follow the light. What you want most is to be normal again, right? Then leave all this unwanted chaos behind. The door is right there Anna, you just have to decide on whether your going through it.”

Normal; was that even possible at this point or another ridiculous pipe dream I’d never be able to seize. Was my life ever truly ordinary, or was it just blissful ignorance to all the pandemonium surrounding me?

I had no answers to my questions all I could clearly without doubt comprehend was that I didn’t want to waste my days forever locked away behind these walls, so with determined and yet trembling legs I prized open the heavy door, my curls swinging out around my face as I peeked cautious eyes out into the surprisingly empty hall, and then I simply ran. I dashed without thought out into freedom, into the independence of making my own choices. With the wind kissing my face, my curls blowing out behind me as if the demons themselves chased my flying form I embraced free will while knowing I’d never be able to truly escape my inner troubles.

I heard voices at the end of the hallway coming towards me as I slide to a halt, my feet sliding from beneath me on polished tile at my impulsive stop as I quickly scrambled into a hidden alcove hoping whomever walked pass wouldn’t turn and discover my veiled form. Shadows for once aided my need for concealment instead of its customary disguise of creatures’ intent on the destruction of all that was once pure. My breath held hoping the pounding of my heart would not betray me for it seemed to echo loudly bounding along the walls. Their footsteps were deafening as voices speaking of a normality I dreamed of drew nearer before with relief almost toppling my shivering figure they passed by quickly allowing me to continue my race towards anywhere but here.

I ducked into a vacant room, its sight identical to my own expect that its door lay released as mine was once bolted shut before I glanced terrified eyes back towards the entry. Frozen I surveyed the busy lounge, the other patients free to linger within its interior while nurses tried and yet failed to install some sense of familiarity to their already too far gone mentality.

“Any bright ideas on how to pass this?”

“It’s simple, Marie. You need to use the power inside you.”

I turned crazed eyes towards my reflection, terror eating away at me, “simple? The last time I embraced my powers you came to life and more bodies lied before me.”

“Because you’re like a heroin addict facing the drug again. You overdose on power.”

“I… I overdose on power?” I argued.

“Yes you, because no matter who is in possession of that body the undeniable point is that it’s still your body. Now learn to control it!” Her eyes turned quickly towards the entrance signaling me to be silent as Maria quickly marched by us. “You don’t have much time until your disappearance will be noticed. You have to listen to me, Marie. You know how to enter the mind. I’ve seen you do it.”

“Yes, but how will that help me?”

“You have to go deeper than mere thoughts. You have to enter a realm of their consciousness that controls their every contemplation, their very way of thinking and persuade it to bend to your motivation. Only then will you control actions, will you seize their free-will.”

“You want me to take away their choice, manipulate their sense of truth?” I asked, shocked that it was even a possibility let alone pushing aside my sense of morality and believing in my ability enough to accomplish it.

“Its simple Marie, if you want freedom you’re going to have to take away theirs.”

My gaze dropped from hers, my body easing back towards the doorway as my eyes examined the crowd landing easily on a young attendant whose attention was more focused on the hands of the clock than inducing calm among this level of the mental ward. His lean body clothed in regulatory white scrubs lounging lazily against the wall near the elevator, his emerald irises bored, his thin pink lips pursed; his brown hair tousled falling easily hindering his sight. My vision zeroed in on his thoughts picking through his frivolous need for cigarettes, through his insignificant desires for a new job, bypassing his sordid plans of nailing the girl from the bar after work on towards childhood memories. I dug pass secrets; exceeding undisclosed dreams, the effort exerted causing a sweat to break out across my brow.

“You’re doing great Anna, you’re almost there.”

I could feel myself growing faint, slightly drained, “I, I don’t know if I can continue.”

“We don’t have a choice. It grows easier with practice. Just push a little deeper.”

Swallowing back the urge to purge my stomach of its contents I concentrated harder until finally the mental blockage that lined his thoughts was lifted and abruptly his gaze easily met mine. “Oh my god,” I freaked, knowing I was caught before I had even begun to truly flee.

“Relax, don’t loose focus, Marie! You have him under your influence, now use him!”

Breathing in deeply I implanted, like seeds into the soil, images of Maria asking him to take me to level two and to make sure I stayed at his side. I walked further into the hall hoping with a tentative heart that this worked because I truly didn’t think I’d last another night locked away in that form of hell. He strode quickly towards me, his hands rough as it captured my arm dragging me from my rooted spot nearly toppling me within his pull.

“Now don’t try anything funny,” he replied gruffly, his body hastily leading us towards the awaiting elevators, his badge allowing us entrance. A small glimpse of relief didn’t enter my body until the elevator doors closed and my darker twin stood reflected along its surface.

“Why level two and not the ground floor?” she questioned.

“Too many eyes on the ground level,” I whispered.

“Did you say something?” he asked, his brows furrowed as they gazed down at my scared and yet determined face.

“No,” I swiftly denied.

My easily led captor smirked, “Yeah, sure you didn’t. You mental cases are all the same.”  

The elevator opened, its lobby deserted as I stepped into indistinguishable halls my body turning back to my guard before I yanked away from his touch. I envisioned him going back to level three then expunged the image of me from his brain altogether like a pencil erased unwanted lines. His brows furrowed as if trying to fight the compulsion but swiftly he gave up the seemingly arduous feat, easily following the sequences his mind set before him. 

Without delay I dashed towards shadows never believing in the illusion of silence. There were fewer people on this level for I couldn’t pick out many conversations from the noises around me just an oddly familiar beeping sound. My footsteps were silent and yet resilient as I traveled quietly through the vacant foyer only pausing before sidestepping into a darkened room as nurses walked quickly pass my momentary hiding spot. Here that noise was louder and for once allowing curiosity to get the better of me I walked further into the room that was twice the size of my own.

There was a slight wheezing sound as if breathing was difficult as I parted green curtains to gaze upon the sight of a young girl no older than I was strapped to a hospital bed. Her wrists bandaged, cuts lingering along skin white dressing couldn’t hide, her eyes closed, a breathing tube plunged down her throat, that sound of beeping being the sound of her heart. I slowly began retracing my footsteps knowing how often that this girl had been me when suddenly her blue eyes opened. Her body began to struggle ruthlessly against the restraints; her crazed screams seeming to bound pass the blockage of the tube in her throat as the resonance of her quickened heart beat bounced off the walls into the silence.

“Shh,” I begged her, as footsteps hurried in our direction. I tried to penetrate her mind but I found that to be impossible.

“Anna, you can’t control the uncontrollable. Her mind isn’t intact enough to listen to reason! Hide, hide now!”

My eyes gazed riotously about the room seeing nothing but a chair, a table, and barred in windows on blank white walls. I ran towards what I assumed was a bathroom only to find a closet divided by shelves. Ignoring the panicked sound of the sick girl behind me, and the constant pound of footsteps nearing the room I quickly shoved blankets onto a lower shelve and climbed my small form onto the middle row. Managing to fold uncomfortably and yet concealed onto its hard surface I speedily and yet quietly shut the door just as a nurse and an attendant bounded into the room.

“What did I tell you?” I heard the male attendant yell, his voice oddly joyful. “She’s awake, intent on harming herself. Jill, you owe me five dollars!”

“Shut up,” the nurse laughed before concentrating on the still screaming patient. “What is it Lucy? I know the tube hurts but it has to stay in, and the restraints wouldn’t be needed if you’d refrain from trying to hurt yourself.”

I heard mumbled cries in the darkness before once again that same male laughter. “Tell me Jill, what is the point in speaking to her? That girl is out of her fucking mind!”

“Yeah, well with the right dosage of drugs and therapy-.”

“What?” he questioned pressingly. “She’ll become a productive member of society? Naw, save that fairy tale bullshit for someone who hasn’t been around the block. If and that is a big if, this girl makes it beyond these walls she’ll either end up dead or right back where she started, and that right there honey child is the truth.”

“You’re so negative. How can your outlook be so bleak,” she asked while clearly pushing buttons, checking vitals, the girl’s cries still going ignored.

His snort lacked any genuine laughter as if humoring the naïve, “alright Miss Jill, we’ll try things your way.”

“What does that mean?” she questioned.

“Lucy, sweetie,” I heard him ask the patient, “when you were brought to this room you said someone was after you and the only way to escape was to try and cut yourself out of your own body. Well, I’m gonna do you a favor. I’m guessing the reason your screaming is that you think someone is in this room with you.”

My heart stopped, hoping this would not lead him to where I thought it would.

“You’re an idiot, Aaron,” the nurse joked.

“No, no you said I was negative so lets be ‘positive’ no one else is in this room.” I heard sounds of movement before he exclaimed, “nothing is under the bed.” Footsteps were heard, “They’re not under the table, or under the chair.”

Unexpectedly the door to the closet sprung open, the air brushing my curls from my frightened expression, my eyes widening as I took in the coffee colored male attendant standing brazenly before me. His flamboyant wave of a hand sweeping over the shelves like Vanna White from wheel of fortune and yet his eyes still focused on Lucy, “nothing in the closet either.”

The dark headed nurse laughed, her gaze more intent on her chart than Aaron’s antics. It seemed it was only Lucy who stared at me absorbedly; her eyes untamed, her screams only growing more intense as she tried to alert them to my presence. “God, she really is freaking out tonight. Aaron if you’re done patronizing the mentally ill, could you give me a hand so I can sedate her?”

   Sighing loudly, he moved towards the bed, the door banging back into place enclosing me once again into darkness while allowing my heart to finally continue its erratic thump.

“What can I say? This is what I live for,” he openly mocked as Lucy’s struggles became violent in her fierce determination to be free, and from my small sliver of a view from behind a slightly ajar door I watched her suddenly consume all of their attention.

Realizing my moment to escape I slowly pierced open the closet’s entryway extending my legs to the floor, my gaze focused solely on the other three occupants in the room. My body stiff with minor aches was soundless as I climbed from my hiding place mutely closing its door, and with blue frantic eyes watching my every move as she was forced into submissiveness I hastily crept from her room bolting towards the end of the hall.

I surpassed the stairwell’s metal door at a speed my volatile breathing could barely keep up with, my heart pounding inside my chest as I rested against it hurriedly listening for following footsteps while inwardly relieved at not finding any.

“Cut it kind of close, didn’t you?” my darker self mocked.

“Shut up,” I groaned my hands falling to rest on my knees, my curls sweeping out blocking my view, my body bent as I tried to regulate my breathing.

“Anna, I’ve been thinking.”

Straightening my tired form, my hair falling back along my spine I took in the empty stairwell, my gaze focused on the Exit sign down below. “That can be dangerous.”

“You’re exhausted, winded. Wouldn’t it be easier if I took over? I could have us out of here in no time,” my sinister essence offered.

“As sweet as your offer is, as you made it your job to point out we share the same body, so with that in mind no matter who controls it, it would remain tired. Besides I’ve seen the wreckage of you being free. The fact that I’m trusting you at all speaks volumes on the declivity of my sanity,” I replied calmly as my footsteps descended carrying me that much further towards the exit.

“Omnia mutantur nos et mutamur in illis.”

All things change, and we change with them.

I paused on the bottom step, my mind on my own thoughts barely focusing on our conversation, “your not really daring to lie to me, and tell me you’ve dramatically changed in a matter of days, are you?”

“I didn’t mean me. I meant you.”

I froze at the entrance of the door, my hand resting on its handle. “You’re right, I can’t do this anymore.” I stepped back from its entrance, the sight of freedom so close and yet so far. “What’s the point? I’m no more free out there than I am in here. I don’t want to run, and besides that where would I run to?”

“Be sure this is what you want, Marie. This choice may not be given to you again.”

Turning back to retrace my footsteps, my voice unyielding in its resolve to face my fears, “I’m tired of letting life chase me away. If I want change I’ll have to get for myself.”

“De Profundis,” Katrina’s unexpected voice sang out into the vacant stairwell, her abrupt appearance before me starling me into immobility.

From the depths of despair, her words translated.

“And yet,” she continued, her expression gleeful, her voice mocking in its distorted wisdom, “cicatrix magnet.”

The scar remains.

Her flowing yellow dress bellowed around her, her auburn waves floated surrounding such gorgeous features, a beauty unchallengeable while such hate lied inside those sapphire eyes. A hatred Katrina concealed easily in front of others only to effortlessly be laid bare under my gaze. 

“What do you want?” I asked; my expression coldly detached.

“Such hostility, such anger in one meant for such greatness,” she teased, “trust me your current transgressions have not been ignored, my dear Anna.” She drew nearer, “Such darkness invades your soul; tell me, can you even tell right from wrong anymore?”

So they did know of my escape.

Glaring into her eyes, “I don’t know. Can you?”

She smirked, “you dare to compare yourself to me? A watcher; a protector of all that is good measured up to a youth too stupid and reckless to recognize the dangerous path she’s on?”

“I know exactly what path I’m traveling, and it sure as hell isn’t the one you’re on.”

Blue eyes widened in delighted surprise, “and so you admit, you have aligned with darkness? I always knew you would. It was only a matter of time.”

I grinned with little amusement, “No, I admit to nothing other than the fact that I no longer answer to you. For me, this fight is over.” I moved to ascend the stairs back towards the second floor only to pause at its doorway at the sound of her joyful laughter.

“Do you really believe that declaring your freedom will suddenly save you from their wrath?” She openly chuckled at my naive notions. “I highly doubt that you can survive this on your own. You can duck your head in the sand all you want but at the end of the day ending ties with us won’t prevent them from coming after you. Poor little Marie, so uneducated, so unaware of everything around you. Timendi causa est nescire.”

Ignorance is the cause of fear.

Katrina snorted unattractively, “Remember sweet little innocent An-na, they are everywhere and we aren’t the only ones watching, but you enjoy your happy delusions,” she replied her haunting laughter echoing throughout the staircase long after she had once again disappeared.

Dazed and more than a little confused, for once blind to my surroundings I bounded into the hallway and unsuspectingly straight into Maria’s strangely unyielding hold, her arms taking seize of my own as a needle was once again callously plunged into my skin.

“Its ok, its ok Anna. We are going to get you the help you need,” she assured soothingly, her voice oddly distant whilst darkness seemed intent to capture my blurred vision, and once nimble appendages became worthless as I slowly collapsed into the attendant’s eagerly waiting embrace. 

…………………………………………………………………………..

The first thing I became aware of was the iciness biting into my skin, its frozen touch literally destroying any warmth I felt inside. My mind was sluggish to comprehend what was going on as my vision slowly cleared, my curls lying in tangles blinding me to my surroundings. My head felt heavy, almost unmovable as I shifted finally noticing the thick leather straps going across my wrists, stomach, ankles, and chest preventing me from further movement. What I found odd was that I was not strapped down on a bed, but strapped standing straight up, my toes straining and yet never touching the ground.

The sound of a door opening and light entering the darkened room caused my eyes to squint against the sudden piercing brightness; Maria’s smiling face filling its entrance with Dr. Foster standing directly behind her. They walked further into the room, the view of Dr. Foster’s office closing with the shut of the door as a switch was flicked and my tired eyes took in the sudden illumination of a single swinging lamp from above us.

“What… what is this? What’s going on?” I managed to whisper, my mind still lethargic, my languid limbs barely moving even though my brain willed them to do so.

They stood off to the side of this white walled windowless room, its spotless tiled floors, the only other objects I could see being surgical tables, cabinets with rows of countless drugs, more extinguished lights, and shiny unused tools. They continued to discuss the chart in Maria’s hands ignoring my questions, and with dread slowly filling my heart for some unexplainable reason I knew something was wrong.

“Please,” I begged, my wrists tender as I struggled with my restraints, my dry tongue coming out to moisten my dehydrated lips. “Why was I brought here? Tell me why I wasn’t taken to my room?”

Maria came forward, her gray eyes tender, her smile warm, that familiar cross around her neck allowing a small sense of relief to enter my body, in her hands a tiny black remote. “It’s okay, Anna. I’m just going to lower you a smidgen, so you’re a tad bit more comfortable.”

At her words and a flick of her finger to my horror the metal table I was strapped to begin to recline, mysterious feelings of unease causing me to thrash about violently.

Her understanding eyes met my tearful gaze, “Anna calm down, everything is under control.” Maria’s fingers serenely moved to check that my straps were still firmly in place as my hazel eyes finally took in the huge tank full of water that had lain concealed behind me.

My breath coming out in a series of irrepressibly terrified gasps, tears leaking from the corner of my eyes I gazed on in horror at the water on each side of my head, my body lying constrained on a sliver slab like a person would lie on a driving board; half of my trembling form lying directly over the water.

Panicking, I turned back to her still placating eyes, “I can’t swim. I can’t… swim! You have to take me back to my room.” My arms twisting wildly under the binding, “I’ll be good. I swear I’ll be good!”

“Oh sweetie,” she whispered laughing as her form bent over mine, fingers moving slightly to caress my curls, her touch oddly burning. Up this close I could see Gray clearly fighting to conceal scarlet before she straightened, a thin yellow lining now surrounding her figure, and that still oddly cheerful smile resting on her lips. “That’s what you said last time.”

Maria’s finger hit the remote’s button, my eyes widening in horror at the sudden decent of the slab, my mouth opening to release a scream before cold water encased me and all I tasted was liquid determined in its quest to fill my already burning lungs.

Hazel irises’ took in a vision of nothing but navy surrounding me as alarm filled my heart, already beyond frightened I jerked violently against the unmovable straps. There was an intense stinging in my chest, bubbles rising from my lips on towards the surface, my curls swaying out around my panicked features, my gaze intent on the surface of the tank; that lamp light above glowing like a beacon I couldn’t reach.

My movements became listless, my thoughts oddly indolent as blackness began to capture the edges of my sight and when all the fight began to leave my quickly inert form I felt the table at last swing from beneath the water finally allowing air to revisit my lungs. Coughing uncontrollably, water pouring from my body, my teeth shaking in the frozen air my gaze met the eyes of the man who was clearly not Dr. Foster wondering how the hell I was going to get out of this one.

Everything about Dr. Foster seemed the same and yet oddly different, from his flat lifeless brown eyes, to his thinning auburn hair, to his narrow pink lips as he began to speak, “Oh, how I have waited to meet you, Marie. It has been much too long of a wait, I assure you.”

I just couldn’t understand it. There was no flicker of red in his eyes, no yellow lining, no shadows crawling against his skin, and yet I knew without a doubt that his inner essence was dark, malevolent.  

“You obviously aren’t Dr. Foster, so then who are you? What are you?” I asked; my voice raspy, shaken.

“Who I am is not important. What I am, is. All you need to know is that I am a breed older than anything you have come into contact with, and that includes your supposed Step father.”

Oh god, that thought alone terrified me far more than the water ever could. “What is it you want from me?”

He grinned, his teeth sharper than a normal human’s incisors, “What makes you assume I want you at all?” His fingers took the remote from Maria’s fingers, a sight that instantly sent my body into panic. “I want answers.”

“Please,” I begged, eyes glued to that button, “I want nothing to do with this battle. I choose neither side.”

Heartlessly hitting its surface, the bed once again reclining, “Sorry Miss Cortez, but I’m afraid you’re firmly encased in the middle of it.”

This time they held me under longer, visions of myself as a little girl playing with Andrea taking over my mind. My curls braided in long pigtails, my powder blue dress blowing out around me as I chased after my big sister’s long legs. My fingers extended reaching out towards hers and just as our skin touched the image dissolved and I found myself once again choking on a mixture of water and oxygen.

Rough fingers grasped my curls snapping my head back so that brown eyes could meet mine only for features to become livid at not finding whatever it is he hoped to discover. “Do you think it wise to play with me, Anna?”

Shivering, my voice stuttering, “I, I do-don’t know what it is you want?”

He laughed, “And maybe you don’t, but she does.” He began to pace leisurely before me, his eyes never leaving my exhausted appearance. ‘Tell me, when you went after Gary who was it in control?”

I froze, my mind finally realizing the intent in his torture tactics, “Why does that matter?”

“Answer my question, Anna,” he insisted his finger already moving towards that button.

“Please, don’t!” I begged, “I was.”

“You, or your darker essence?”

Breathing briskly, “you already know the answer to that.”

“I’m going to do you a favor Anna, and tell you something no one else seems to feel you deserve to know.” He grinned sinisterly, “It’ll be like a game of twenty questions. I’ll ask you one and in return I’ll gift you with the answers you’ve been searching for.” 

Even to my sluggish mind I questioned those motives, “Why would you do that?”

“Because honestly,” his gaze held mine, “by the time I’m done with you, you having a small grasp of knowledge won’t even matter.”

Dread filled my tired body wishing for once I hadn’t turned Katrina away.

“Now Anna,” he began, his fingers trailing along my face, his fingertips burning my skin, “Whose idea was it to escape?”

Tears seeped from my lids, “there was no escape. A spirit took possession.”

He laughed in wonder, “so developed and yet so unskilled.” His eyes took in my fearful expression, “Okay, a deal is a deal. You are a rare variety of darkness and light. It runs in your ancestral line like your hazel eyes and dark curls.”

Wondering if there could be truth in a demon’s words my crazed eyes held his, “how is that possible no one in my family can do what I do?”

He smirked at my ignorance, “No one that you know of. Are you still in existence when she is in control?”  

I blinked frenziedly trying to come to terms with his sudden subject change, “I am always here. My father never showed any knowledge of this world until his death, neither did my sister, and my mother views me as a monster. There is no way she has unknown powers, so who does?”

His finger’s caressed my necklace, “your Abuela on your mother’s side, she had… many gifts. Gifts your fragile mind could never began to comprehend. She left this to you, did she not?” He didn’t wait for confirmation just laughed as he fingered my cross, “It has cerulean stones incrusted into its silver, an ancient stone the old ones believe to be used for protection. Doesn’t seem to be working for you, now does it?” he mocked. “She must have sensed that one day a power so great beyond anything foreseen was coming, how misguided she was. A warrior for light; your grandmother was an admirable adversary. Fought until her last dying breath protecting your mother, but you… you on the other hand are weak, frail, disgrace to her name. How quickly you give up on the cause that she died to protect.”

“My mother… she never told me-.”

“And she wouldn’t. Timendi causa est nescire.”

Ignorance is the cause of fear. It was the same line Katrina had used.

“Your mother foolishly believed if she kept your ancestral curse a secret then it couldn’t touch her daughters, that if she ran from that life it would never taint the normal existence she wanted for you, a childhood with a mother like hers she never had. I have heard rumblings, but I must know is it true you too have a burning touch, the eyes of thirst when she is awakened?”

“Yes,” I whispered, my mind trying to grasp all I had been told, all that had been withheld from me. “Did my grandmother have this dark piece of her inside her too?”

“No,” he grinned happily at the mention my darker self, “she wasn’t blessed to have a portion of us residing within her.”

“Blessed?” I asked in horrified confusion. Cursed was more like it.

“Oh yes, for you see you are the future, Anna Marie. You are what all demons yearn to be. The ability to have skills of light and dark, to overpower either side, to travel to worlds darkness is denied access to.” His gaze filling with excitement almost to the brink of tears, “don’t you get it, you are the key to complete freedom, and as soon as we can understand how such a combination of evil and good came to lie beneath such beauty,” he whispered, his fingers grazing my skin. “The sooner we can replicate the very essence that is you, grow an evil army that shall be unstoppable. And you my sweet, you shall be the key, the answer, the mother to it all.”

Disgusted and frightened of the looming future he spoke of I gazed up at him in unmitigated horror, “no… that can’t be.”       

“No, not can’t, but will be,” he corrected swiftly, the smile just as hastily leaving his creepy features. “Just as soon as I relieve you of your saintly identity, of course. There’s no way you would ever choose our side willingly, but I’m guessing with enough… persuasion I can force the other part of you out. The fraction of yourself that revels in the tainted perversity you cringe at, the side that will only be too happy to unite with a winning team.”

His finger slid back onto that fucking button, grinning insanely down at me. “You see, telling you of the past won’t matter. Telling you of the future won’t change it because… its not you I want,” he spat sadistically into the stifling silence right before hardheartedly submerging my resistant form back into the icy water.

……………………………………………………………………….

What did you guys think? I finally revealed some of Anna’s hidden secrets. More to come… I actually need to plan out the rest of my story. I still have a lot I want to put in it but if you wouldn’t mind I have a question. Do you think I should end this story with one book or turn it into a series? I’m not really sure so probably if I get no response I’ll leave it as one book :)

Oh and how awesome is it that I uploaded in just a week lol it was a lot of work but fun. Hope you enjoyed it…

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Until next time…