The Monster [H.S.]

Chapter 30

"What do you mean himself?" I ask.

"Nothing, just who he should be. Anyway, I don't know if you're brainwashing him or something, but whatever it is, I-I just want you to know that-that well, fuck, I don't know, you're good for him. You make him a better person, and he makes you one."

I stand in shock, his words hitting me like a tonne of bricks. It is the strangest yet best thing anyone has ever said to me. I make him a better person? I'm not sure, but I know for a fact that I'm a different person with him. Not better. I don't think I can be redeemed for the things I've done, but different.

"Okay." I nod, not really knowing what to say, and not wanting to admit it out loud or inside my head.

"If he tells you something about himself, anything, promise me you won't let him go." He says with such loyalty I almost feel like kneeling to him.

"I won't." I promise, and memories of Harry's scars flash through my mind.

Zayn nods once more, a frown returning on his face before he walks past me and down the hall.

As I walk towards the door again I hear a bang, and another, and another, each getting louder. I turn around with haste, and squint my eyes to see through the window in the door at the end of the corridor I just walked down. The glass glows orange and yellow and smoke dances past the glass. My eyes widen in horror as I understand whats going on and I turn and run forward, my legs stretching as far apart as they can to reach the forum. I reach out for the door, my fingertips touching the cold steel before a force throws me against the door, the door flying off the hinges and pushing me forward, heat spreading across my back as I scream. The door crashes onto the ground and my body with it, heat spreading across the whole back of my body and pain. So much pain.

I scream because I don't know what else to do and because I'm in agony. I know another bomb is going to go off and propel me forward again but I'm stuck on the ground in pain. So much pain. Suddenly I feel all my muscles tense and my body shake. My eyes begin to sting and I screw them shut tightly, my ears ringing from the bomb and now my eyes stinging. Everything was going downhill fast.

I force my eyes open and all the pain vanishes. Every last piece of it. My back and my legs don't burn anymore, my ears don't ring and my eyes don't sting. But I'm awake. God, am I awake. I stand up with more speed than I intended and look around curiously. Everything seems to be in a panorama as I observe the surroundings. People screaming and chairs and curtains on fire. The place alive with smoke and every door blown off. Paintings smashed and crooked on the wall, flower vases in smithereens on the blood finger painted everywhere.

"Annabelle!" A voice calls and my head whips round to see Harry looking at me. Blood seeps from a wound on his forehead and his shirt is ripped, blood and sweat trickling down his forehead.

"I know you're confused," he says, but it sounds like there's a partition between us. Everything was so loud but he was so quiet. "But you need to listen to me and, for the love of God, do what I say." I try to focus on him but everything in the room seems to intrigue me. I had never noticed before but the red that coated the walls was such a deep and misty colour. Burgundy? No. Maroon. Definitely maroon.
"Annabelle!" Harry shouts and I turn to look at him. "Focus on me, okay? I need you to put a forcefield around the building." He suddenly became a lot louder.

"What?! How the hell do you expect me to do that?!"

"You have to want it bad enough and then feel it. Look around, Annabelle. People are dying. Children and babies are dying. Horses and shit are dying, food and water is being destroyed! You don't want this, Annabelle. You don't want this war. Tell me how much you don't want this war."

I look around. Destruction everywhere.

My brain seems to click and every thought I have ever had about the war and every feeling seems to come to the surface and pour from my mouth unintentionally.

"I hate this war. I want to end it. I want it all to go away. I want people to survive and I want them to live. I want people to live! I want this war to end, and I want it to end now!" I scream, and my chest seems to be uplifted, my body feeling weightless.

"Scream it Annabelle!" Harry shouts.

"I want peace! I want the burning to stop! I want peace!" I scream as loud as I can, every piece of hope I have ever had it will end restored and amplified. My chest pulses and my body numbs.

Light. Everything is just a bright light. Silence. All I see is light and all I hear is silence. I'm levitating. My head begins to blur and my eyes drop closed, and I fall to the ground.

When I open my eyes I'm standing in the same place, Harry still in front of me but he's looking at me like I'm a God. He drops to his knees and I furrow my eyebrows. When I look around the burning has stopped and everything seems to be at peace, every Terrebit in the room kneeled to the ground staring at me with awe.

Well, shit.

"It worked." I state in a whisper.

I look around the forum as more Terrebit gather into the room, kneeling down to me. Soon a sea of Terrebit bowing is all I see and, to be brutal, I felt awkward, though as they kept piling in I realised something I had never felt before or experienced: I was important. Me. Annabelle Foster. I did not let people down for once. I did something for someone else and it didn't turn to shit.

I scan the room once more, my heart pounding with fear, embarrassment and pride.

Crack, thud smash, crack, thud, smash. One by one the bricks of the unbreakable wall begin to break.