Nightmares (Part 2)

TW: derealization, spirits, etc.

I walk out of my bedroom, knife in hand, and open the pastel door. 

“Oh, Natalie!” exclaims Leah as she hears me enter the room. “The cookies should be done any minute, can you go check on them please?” When I don’t respond, she turns away from the mirror and looks at me. Her gaze shifts to the knife in my hand, and her usual smile instantly drops from her lips.

“Natalie?” she asks shakily, her eyes darting around the room for an escape. 

I reach behind me and close the door, clicking the lock, trapping her with me. I slowly walk forward, a small part of me screaming in the back of my mind for mercy. But the voice demands blood. And the blood must be hers.

“Help! Help!” screeches Leah, backing up against the wall in panic. I sprint forward, knocking her to the ground. My knees pin her arms to the ground, using my slightly larger body weight to my advantage. I lift my knife towards her face, lightly tracing her lips as she whimpers.

“Please,” she whispers. “Please don’t do this.”

I beg the voice in my mind to stop, to leave her alone. But he demands her blood. I fight back in my mind, trying to gain control of my body. 

“Please,” she whispers. 

I manage to fight through the voice for a split second, hesitantly speaking to her as I tried to pull my hand away from her face.

“I’m sorry,” I force out. “I promise this is not the real me”

Her bright blue eyes glisten with tears as I lose control and the knife makes its way towards her throat. A flick of my wrist is all it takes to open that one vital artery and allow all of her blood to pour out onto the white carpet. I’m about to do so when I hear the slamming of a door behind me and Peter’s voice echoes through the room.

“Wait!” he shouts, holding his hand up towards me. I whip my head around, not moving the knife from its position on Leah’s throat.

“Natalie,” he says calmly. “You don’t have to do this.”

“He demands blood,” I hiss, baring my teeth at the threat. 

“I know,” he whispers. “That’s why I came. I knew the voice was demanding the blood of your sister. Because I have a similar voice that fights against yours. Good versus evil. Light versus darkness.”

I hesitate, sensing the voice’s subtle rage. 

“Please, Natalie. You need to resist. Look at your sister.”

I glance down at Leah, her blue eyes wide in fear, whimpering at the sight of her beloved sister holding a knife at her throat.

“The voice cannot keep doing this. He cannot keep demanding innocent blood. He will not stop. Come with me, and I can help you.” He reaches out his hand, his bright green eyes gazing into mine.

I reach out my hand, this time by my own control as the voice screamed in my mind for me to stop.

A blinding light fills my vision. Next thing I know, I’m in a marbled black and white room that didn’t seem to have an end. About 10 yards away is Peter, lying on the ground like I was. 

“Where are we?” I ask, gazing around the blank space.

“I don’t know,” he mumbles. I feel an itching sensation at my fingertips. I glance down to see a strange black haze emerging from them. My eyes go wide with fear and I try to get away from the strange black substance pulling through my fingers. Nausea overcomes my body as it spilled out of my mouth, gathering in front of me into a large shadowy figure. Once the last bit of the black substance spills out, I drop to the floor, instantly fatigued. 

I look up to see the black substance clumping together and floating in the air before transforming into a strange dragon-like shape. It whips its head towards me for a split second, revealing it’s bright red eyes.

“Stayyyy out of thissss,” hisses the creature, turning back around to face Peter. A similar substance spills from his fingertips and mouth, except it was a ghastly white, its piercing blue eyes mimicking Leah’s.

“Sooooo, we meet again,” says the creature, its blood red eyes seething with hatred.

“You knew this would happen,” responds the other voice, which brought a small sense of comfort and safety as opposed to the horrid trapped feeling the other one brought.

“Who… who are you?” I ask shakily.

“We are the Spirits,” says the strange white voice. “I am the Spirit of Life, Vita. The opposing spirit that has possessed you all these years is Mortum, The Spirit of Death. We have been battling each other for centuries to keep balance to the Earth.”

“But… why me? Why us?” I ask, glancing at Peter.

“We each have to possess a living soul in order to fulfill our duties. My duty is to provide the Earth with living souls. He was simply supposed to wipe out those who have taken the lives of others, those who have done nothing but wrong to the world. But he took advantage of that, using you to take the blood of those that do not belong to him.”

“The blood of the innocents,” seethes Mortum, “is much sweeter. But you would not let me feed on the souls you created. You are the one who is supposed to create the perfect souls on this Earth. It is not my fault if you made so many innocents. The Earth can spare a few.”

“The blood of the innocent is not for your taking!” shouts Vita. “We deal with this every few decades, Mortum. And you always go to take another victim that you can force to do your bidding. It’s a constant cycle, one in which you will always lose.”

“Is it?” says Mortum, as he lunged straight for Vita, knocking her to the ground. Peter narrowly dodged the fight, crawling his way towards me. 

“I need blood! And you cannot take that from me!”” shouts Mortum, as what seemed like red veins wrapped around his body. “It gives me power! It gives me strength that you cannot possess! And now, you shall taste defeat!”

Mortum towers over Vita, opening his large mouth, bits of blood dripping onto the bare floor. Vita’s smoke-like figure seems to pull itself towards his mouth. She tries to get away, but it’s too late. The last of her body disappears into his mouth, and the previously marbled room turns completely black. 

Peter and I huddle together in fear at what we just witnessed. Mortum whips his head towards me, his red eyes glowing brighter than ever, the red veins encircling his body beating to an unknown rhythm. 

Mortum starts walking towards me, his voice already becoming muddled with my mind.

“No!” I shriek, scrambling away from the creature. An invisible force pulls at my body as I grasped at the floor in desperation. “Peter!”

At the last minute, Peter grasps my hand, holding on as the invisible force pulls me closer to Mortum.

“Don’t let go! Don’t let him take me again!” I yell.

“I won’t!” he shouts.

“Yes you will,” says Mortum. “If you don’t want me to bring Annie here.”

Peter hesitates at the mention of his mentally ill younger sister, not wanting to haunt her with the battle of the spirits.

“Peeta?” I shout, truly scared he will let go of me.

He gazes back at me and pulls hard, trying to free me from the creature’s grasp.

“I gave you a chance for mercy,” bellows Mortum, “and you refused. If the Spirit of Life herself could not defeat me, what makes you think you can?”

With that, Peter loses his grip, and I fly through the air straight towards the Spirit of Death.

“Natalie!” shouts Peter. I floated in the air in front of Mortum as his blood-like veins wrap around my body.

“No!” I scream, trying to get away from the horrid creature that haunted my life. 

“Submit to me once again, my slave,” whispers Mortum as part of his shadowy figure forces its way back into my mouth. Fear overwhelms me as the darkness makes its way into my body, taking control of my limbs and my mind. The indifference immediately sets it, accompanied by the sudden thirst for blood, the same thirst Mortum claimed to suffer from. I turn around, coming face to face with Peter, my eyes completely black, shadowy wings protruding from my back. 

“Natalie?” asks Peter tentatively, slowly backing up.

My voice is deep and disconfigured as a single word leaves my lips.

“Blood…”

A hear a small whisper in the back of my mind, barely audible. 

Do not fret, it whispers, and I only have a moment of confusion before the light blinds my eyes and my body becomes numb.

I fall to the floor, the black wings disintegrating, the black room now marbled once again.

“How?!” shouts Mortum, now back in his spirit form. His red veins fades to a dull red, a few of them shrivel from lack of blood.

“I’ve told you before, Mortum,” says Vita as she faces Mortum. “Life cannot live without Death, and Death cannot live without Life. We cannot defeat the other, no matter how hard you try. But I can contain you.”

A hole suddenly emerges from Mortum’s side, white light emerging from it.

“No!” he shouts as hole after hole develop on his body. “I will be back, and I will rid of you once and for all!”

With that, Mortum disappears, leaving us alone with Vita in the marbled room, which now seems predominantly white.

Vita makes her way towards us, the tips of her wings already fading. 

“What will happen now?” asks Peter, helping me up from the floor.

“Not much can be done. I can erase these memories, but can only do so at midnight. Do not worry, Peter. Annie can remain untouched by Mortum, as long as she remains innocent and pure. Leah will be okay, and everything will resume as it once was. Except…”

“Except what?” I ask, a small catch in my voice.

She slowly turns to me. “You cannot live.”

“What?!” I exclaim, tears filling my eyes. “Why?!”

“Mortum’s job is to get rid of those who have done nothing but hurt the world, killing innocent lives…”

“But that wasn’t me! That was Mortum! What about Leah?!”

“She will not remember you once the sun sets.”

“No,” I choke out. “It can’t… it can’t end like this!”

“I’m sorry. You have until sunset to resolve what you can, say goodbye to whoever you need to, although they will not remember. But you will.”

“I’m sorry,” whispers Peter, placing a hand on my shoulder.

“I can ensure that your passage into death is safe. I will do what I can to protect you from Mortum, but death is something he is more familiar with than I.”

“But…”

“We do not have much time,” she says, her white wings already fading into the air. “Fix what you can, say what you must. You have until sunset.” Her voice fades with her body as a white light floods the room. For some reason, I smell smoke, the distant sound of an alarm ringing in my ears. I open my eyes and find myself back in Leah’s bedroom, flames licking up the sides of the walls, smoke clogging the air. I start coughing immediately, covering my mouth with the front of my shirt, a small tightness in my chest increasing with every breath. I reach out towards a coughing and trembling Leah. Seeing my hand, she shrieks and backs up further into the wall. Tears fill my eyes, partially from the smoke, partially from the imminent fear on Leah’s eyes. 

Fear of me. 

Peter reaches forward and yanks Leah by the arm, half dragging, half carrying her out of the room. I follow behind them, glancing at the large fire in the oven before bursting out the door. Leah is clutching Peter on the floor, sobbing into his shirt. I kneel down next to her, not realizing the knife still in my hand. I toss it aside and slowly reach out towards her.

“Leah,” I whisper. She glances up from the comfort of Peter’s shirt, her bloodshot eyes meeting mine. 

“Please believe me when I say it wasn’t real. I don’t have time to explain much, but you will not remember any of this soon, or me.” I glance at the orange sky, the tightness in my chest growing as the sun lowers further into the horizon. 

“Just know this,” I choke out as I try to inhale the seemingly oxygen-deprived air. “I will always love you, no matter what. Even when you won’t remember me.” My fingers buzz and start to go numb, fatigue suddenly overtaking my body.

“Keep an eye on her Peter,” I whisper, my mind becoming foggy and muddled.

“Always,” he whispers back, his eyes fluttering closed as his lips lightly brush against mine. Warmth momentarily fills my body before cold and darkness flooded it, and I could just catch Leah’s bright blue eyes gazing into mine before they close, never to open again.

I can hear his voice, eerie and anticipating as darkness swirls around me.

Come to meeeee, he whispered. You cannot escape now. You will always be my little slave, and there’s nothing you can do about it.

I could hear someone screaming, maybe it was me, as his blood red eyes gaze into my soul, the red veins reaching out towards me.

Not on my watch, come a different voice. Mortum’s eyes get smaller and smaller as they get farther away, the darkness encasing me turning into a white light, filling me with peace and joy.

I cannot do much, says Vita. But I can keep you here, safe and at peace, for all of eternity.

I inwardly sigh as beautiful colors fill the air. Shades of violet and blue, yellow and green, all blend together to form a beautiful flower field. Leah’s laugh echoes in my ears, Peter’s soft lips make contact with mine, and all of my fears and worries disappear into the flurry of colors.