"Teresa," The voice ruffled over her, filled with heat and grief, and even in her sleep, her conscious twitched and she struggled to wake from the dryness of sleep and suffocation, as she struggled to get away from the inescapable rage. In her dream, she was chained to the floor, unable to move, to claw at herself as passion flooded her senses.

"I killed her, I killed her." She sobbed as chains clanked against her legs and burned against her wrists. "Alex..."

"Yes?" A quite voice stirred through the room like a ripple through the water, falling and sinking with a heavy thud.

"Alex?" Teresa gasped and struggled against the chains, but she couldn't move, couldn't rise from her twisted position on the ground. Crippled.

"You're right. You killed me." Although Teresa had not seen it before, there was a door there, and a golden knob was turned. Then, there was Alex, a sadistic smile on her face, her callused hands torn, and scar tissue twisted along her torso. "And now I'm here."

"Where is here?" Teresa felt the chains melt from her body and she struggled to pull herself up, but suddenly her limbs were liquid fire. The air was hot, hot as an inferno, yet suddenly Teresa was shivering, and when she tried to pull her limbs together, she was again crippled.

"Oh, it's not that bad." Alex assured her, and again her eyes were rolling, and when she leaned against the doorframe, pain wracked through Teresa's body, yet she was immobilized.

"Help me," she managed to croak. Yet, as ropes wound themselves around her body again, Alex only sneered.

"Like you, me?" she demanded, and walking forward, she aimed a kick at her face, and Teresa couldn't shy away as the impact snapped her nose. Yet as red and black crossed her vision, she was only bound in ropes.

"No," she croaked and suddenly everything was fading. "Alex..."

Then the girl's face loomed over her, twisted and pockmarked. With a small, twisted smile, she wound a veil that burned like fire against her skin and Teresa was shrouded in darkness and pain.

"Rest in peace." Alex's voice fell like a soft echo, and as her footsteps fell away, her dream conscious faded. She stared at the blackness that shrouded her like a soft blanket, shaking and feeling cold burrow its way into her bones. Desperately, she prayed motion would come into her limbs and she could rise from this horrible sleep that left her alone with her thoughts.

Or, then again, maybe she was awake. Maybe this was it.

"Teresa," A voice filled with the heat of grief that fell over her still form like a gentle breeze that she felt herself tremble to go towards.

"Wake up!" The voice that slammed her up, up, out of bed, standing there and blinking around the shelter around her before her knees gave out and she crumpled to the ground as a streak of red crossed her vision and her limbs liquefied. Breathes that came in short gasps, fear overriding her tired mind.

"What..." her breathe trailed away as she stared at the crude cut faces of her people above her, worry rich in their eyes. Especially Tobias. Tobias...

Teresa spat at the shadow of the boy that couldn't save her. "Is Alex gone?" Her words, straight, true, and to the point like the relentless slice of sharpened blade. Tobias flinched and Teresa felt her tensed shoulders relax with satisfaction.

"Yes," the boy whispered, appearing younger by the minute. Minutes that ticked by as Teresa noticed his shoulders begin to shake and a splash of water landed on her cheek. Pain... pain that killed the will of even the strongest soul. With regret, Teresa reached out and brushed another tear from his cheek, struggling to sit up and grip the bed behind her to stand. Someone behind her offered their hand, she swatted them away. Someone grabbed her shoulder and heaved her upwards and she recoiled, falling limp and stumbling forward. Wiping at sudden wet cheeks, collapsing yet again onto the flattened soil of the dim cave floor, lit with small candles throwing thin streaks of light across the rocky walls. She noticed the flashes of lightning raining upon the Earth with a fury belatedly unknown to man, shaking the world with their roaring thunder, destroying the ground upon which man had once stood.

"There's no point, is there?" Realizing the cliff upon which she had hung from desperately for so long, afraid to let go into the blackness of truth. Letting the hands in the dark drag her from her place in the floor onto the bed, unseen hands pat her body, pull on the covers, leave her all alone.

"Teresa," A single voice that made her heart leap into her throat, drop back down and fall so heavily she felt the reverbrations course through her body.

"No," came the low growl issuing from her lungs in an unreal, uncontrollable voice as she rotated her hips, raised herself on one elbow, and punched Tobias straight in the jaw. She heard him grunt, and stumble backwards in the dark as Teresa fell from her bed and did her best to kick him in the shin. Toppling on top of her, he grunted and leaned his head back on the floor, breathing heavily as a copper taste filled her mouth.

"That's for Alex." Teresa grunted as she rolled away and managed to stand up. She had recovered surprisingly fast, given what she had been put through, and as she limped back to her bed, she was surprised to feel herself fall again, only realizing this was because of the hand that shot out and snagged on her shin, and swept her off her feet again. Then there was Tobias... looking deeply into her eyes, blinking as they shone black like orbs of pure silicon that flashed in the thunderbolts outside.
"A-Alex..." He whispered, a tremble buried deep in his voice. The hand wouldn't let go as he gripped her ankle, nails digging into her skin.
Their lips touched.
"Oh no you don't." The inhuman snarl that yet again rose from her throat, flew from her subconciouss like the guided, raw instinct of a bird flapping its wings away from the danger. Like the uncontrollable urge to run from death himself, and run she would. Ripping her ankle away from the boy's grasping hands, her lips formed the word in which she could barely spit out.
"Teresa," her shadow from the dim firelight whispered the word with a quiet fury previously unknown. "My name is Teresa, and don't you ever fake the existence of Alex on my body." The words were still quiet, almost taunting, like sparks that rose from the flame suddenly ignited inside. Sparks that popped, crackled, burned... Laughed.
A muffled sob from below.
"Alex..."
"Don't try it," Teresa warned. The shadows surrounding them were silent, shocked, then filled with unquenched whispers. The flames were rising.
"My name is Teresa," louder now, "You shouldn't have let her save us. We save ourselves. We do not rely on others, not really. If we do, we fall. You know that. Don't ever rely on me to remember Alex. I am not Alex. I am Teresa. Teresa." The sobbing from below, louder, the whispers, louder.
"I love you," the whispered words.
Reeling back, Teresa stumbled, fell, raised herself up on one hand. Dropping into a low crouch, she pivoted, smacked his shoulder, raised him up to kick his chest, drop him back down and grab his chin in one, fury shaken hand to glare into his eyes. All sound was mute, the growls and threats suddenly sent her way deadened.
"Listen to me," her voice low and fierce as distant thunder. "Alex... Is dead and-" Then hands were grabbing her and Peter Brooks was glaring at her, fury visible in his eyes.
"This has gone on too long." He growled. "The loss of your friend has transformed you, Teresa."
"Damn right." She snapped back and another round of whispers. Innocent, kind Teresa never uttered so much as a mildly offensive word. "So what, you'll let me go into the wild?"
But Peter was already shaking his head.
"You're part of our group... We don't have a death wish on you, Teresa. We all care about you."
"Idiots," she hissed. She could escape, away from Tobias, who seemed to be going into shock, away from the group's judgement, away from the ghost of her friend haunting her dreams, and haunting her love's lips.
As the countless arms dragged her away, Peter spoke a few hushed words and the whispers circulated just out of her reach. Then her hands were pulled behind her back and she heard the rustle of chains. Cold hard metal clamping around her wrists. More chains lying in wait like limp snakes around her feet.
"Where did you get these, Peter?" Teresa demanded.
"You know that abandoned warehouse?"
"Oh."
Her feet were bound and she was carried to the back, where metal loops were nailed into the ground and the metal around her wrists and ankles were connected to those loops. She was bound to the floor. She was helpless. She couldn't escape. It was too late now. Slumping, she let the tears fall into the brown dirt smudged against her pants.
"You could've made this slightly more comfortable, you know." She called out to no response, to hushed murmurs and tensed shoulders.
Then Peter was there, standing awkwardly in front of her, hands shoved into the pockets of his baggy blue jeans. His brown eyes flickered over the shadow hiding her agonized face, the chains binding her to the ground, back slumped against the wall.
"You had to go all out, huh? Instead of just taking away my right of freedom, you had to take away my right to walk, move at all? Why?" She looked up at him, trying to find the answer in his eyes.
"You know why, Teresa." No regret, no regret. "I can't have the group moving around in fear you'll attack them. And we don't have a slammer to put you in, either."
Struggling to rise, to stand, to be free. Trying to stand, falling. Tugging at her arms bound behind her back, twitching violently, wanting, no, needing, to leave this place, this wretched place. To topple Peter Brooks the way she had to Tobias, desperate. Desperate to hurt someone the way she hurt deep inside. Free... free... and what would she do?
Oh.
"I can't be free," she realized. Wanting, hurting, falling. Phantom fingers clawing at the edge of the cliff. Peter Brooks and Tobias and Alex leering at her, pulling her fingers away from the edge, shoving her into the pit where hurt awaited, laughing. Fading into distant figures, unfathomable specks where light finally disappeared from her world as she kept on falling. With no wings, it was too late to climb back out. She would hit the bottom dead on and shatter into a million broken pieces. Her soul would stare death in the face, mentally, but physically, she would be confined, unable to end it all when the receding numbness went away entirely and she would face it like she would a tsunami head on.
What is it?
"Oh?" The boy stared at her in surprise, his eyes, dark in the night, dark as the silicon pupils of Tobias... lying there. Possibly traumatized. Guilt washed over her.
"When I'm angry, I'm uncontrollable. Dangerous. I can't be let loose or I'll find someone else... love them, too. Hurt them too." Her mind, circling the truth. The truth as hot as a dying star, too much to face now, but someday...
"I can't stay like this forever." The desperation, stirring across her heart again. Fear burned like a hot flame.
"Someday you'll recover," Peter responded with a wince. Clearly, he hadn't been thinking long term.
"Someday we'll all be dead."
"You'll recover sooner than you expect, I think."
"Recover from what? Losing my best friend and then being called her by my former crush whom loved her? Really? Tell me how that'll ever happen?" Behind her back, Teresa's hands tensed and formed fists as she started to shake with fury again. Peter stepped back.
"I had no idea," the whisper that brushed against her softly. "I'm sorry."

Teresa glanced up at him hopefully. "Sorry enough to let me go?" She asked hopefully.
"In time."
Teresa growled, and Peter scrambled away. "No need to put a watch on her," he called. "There's no way she can escape, or wreak havoc on us in the night. She's trapped to the wall. Don't worry."
A relieved murmur passed through the cave.
Teresa tried to stretch out her legs but the chains snapped taut. Leaning forward, she felt the cuffs dig into her wrists and pull her back. She let out another growl of frustration as the fire was extinguished and she was left on the floor in the dark.
"You all could've given me a bit more crawl space. That would've been preferable, but noooo, you have to chain me to the point where I can't even stretch. Smooth. Real smooth." Imagining rising from the broken chains, punching Peter Brooks in the dark for what he'd done to her, and then walking out the door in the light of dawn. "I'm gonna talk all night, clank these things binding me all night, and is there anything you can do about it? No. Not at all."
"There's such a thing as more restraints," someone snapped sleepily.
"Come try," Teresa glanced around the dark cave. "I dare you."

"You're making way too big a deal out of this." Peter Brooks rustled in the dark and his shadow stood up.
"Why not just put me in the front of the cave, then, where in case of an attack, I'll just take the brunt of it, huh? Isn't that what Alex did or maybe she sacrificed herself willingly for us? But who cares, right?"
"If you don't shut up..." Peter growled.
"Then you'll do what? Are you going to take away another basic freedom of mine?"
"Basic freedoms were part of the Constitution. The country who wrote the Constitution is dead, and therefore it doesn't even matter."
"Oh, so should we also disregard humanity itself since most of it is dead?"
"Yes." Peter came to a halt in front of her form.
"Oh?"
"We do what we have to do to keep our sanity. Or at least us, not you. We care about you, just not enough to lose our sanity."

"Sanity, humanity, what do you want really?"
"I want happiness." He whispered.
"Well, you ain't gonna get it." Teresa looked up at him, feeling the vicious contentment settle deep in her gut at the words that had escaped her mouth.
The boy in front of her didn't react. His fingers, the only parts of him that were moving, fiddled with his shirt, tearing away a long strip from the bottom of the already oversized Tee.
"Yeah, very attractive, Peter," she glanced up nervously as he leaned forward, and too late she realized he was gagging her. "Hey, why would you - " Her voice cut off as the cloth prevented it from escaping. Then, she felt him slap her. Reeling forward until the chains held her back any farther, held from any movements, held back from talking and movement. Silent and beaten. He hit her again. And again. And then a punch to the face. She jerked forward, choking on the cloth as her body jerked and spasmed. One final kick, and she was unable to say anything, tell anyone what he was doing to her.
"Happiness is what I wanted in life. Don't mock it," he whispered fiercely. Then, walking away as if nothing had happened. Doing the two things she couldn't anymore.
Her tears fell to the dry earth as she realized what had happened. As anger boiled within her, she couldn't utter a single word to let it out. It would build silently within her as she seethed. She couldn't talk, heck, she could barely breathe. Brooks... he hated her, in all truth. That was the only explainable reason. Dream conciouss... come.
Let me drift away into my mind.
Help me.