Nyx (Complete✅)

Chapter 18

Beth backed up against the closed door. Her throat felt tight and when she tried to scream, no sound came from her mouth.

The thick, coppery smell of blood was wafting up from the body. Her stomach clenched at the sickening smell.

She felt a dull ache behind her eyes. Her vision blurred and the room seemed to phase out of existence. A black fuzz obscured her sight. White pricks of light swam before her eyes.

Suddenly, she was in a meadow. The grass under her feet was strangely blue. The trees surrounding the meadow looked more like a giant fungus than trees.

Through the teal grass, she could see a powdery red substance. The man was still laying in front of her, his blood mingling with the red soil.

She looked up. The sky was a pale gold color. As far as she could see, there was no sun. From somewhere far off, she heard a strange, low whistling sound. The sound sent shivers up her spine. The noise got louder and louder until it seemed to be coming from everywhere at once. She clutched her ears and sank to her knees. She squeezed her eyes shut, willing the awful noise to leave.

The dull ache behind her eyes intensified to a searing pain. The noise rose in pitch. She let out a strangled yell.

All at once, the ache dissipated and the ringing ceased.

She opened her eyes, she was back in her room, kneeling on the floor in front of the door. Her hair was plastered to her head from the sweaty workout.

Her heart was pounding. She took a deep breath, calming her racing heart.

A single word entered her mind: "hallucination."

She reasoned away her anxiety, telling herself that all of the stress of the previous weeks had worked its way into her subconscious and made her see strange things. She decided against telling anyone. After all, it would just add stress to everything that they were already going through.

She shook her head and rose to her feet. She grabbed a change of clothes from her closet and got in the shower.

The hot, clean water cascaded over her. She took another deep breath. Already, the incident from before was fading from her mind.

When she had washed her hair and body, she turned the water off and stepped out of the shower. She grabbed a towel and patted herself dry. When she was dressed, her long hair made small, damp blotches on her clothes.

She looked at her reflection in the mirror, her mind wandering back to what Liam had said to her at lunch. She felt herself blush just at the thought. "Does Liam really feel that way?" She asked herself as she ran her fingers through her damp hair.

She looked at her reflection again. She gasped. Her eyes were the color of blood and glowing slightly. She squeezed her eyes shut and turned away from the mirror.

She sat on her bed and rubbed her eyes. Her chest had a funny tickling feeling. She hoped that she wasn't coming down with something. She sat there, thinking until her hair was dry.

Beth decided to head back to her workstation and see if there was any work to finish up. She found some things to do and began working. After about an hour she looked at the clock, expecting it to be close to dinner, but the clock read 3 o' clock.

She shrugged and left the PPW. She walked through the hall, now bustling with people, and searched for something to do.

Finding nothing, she started to head back to her room, but she realized that she had wandered farther than she had been before. She tried to remember the way back but gave up after a few moments.

A strange door caught her eye. She had never seen any doors like it. Curious, she stepped closer. It was almost twice as wide as the usual doors.

There was a small keypad to the left of the door on the wall. There were several small, white buttons on the face of the keypad. She pressed a small, upwards-pointing arrow.

Above the door, a circular light flashed green and a bell dinged.

The door split in the middle and slid open. She recognized the inside of the doors as an elevator. She stepped on and the doors slid shut behind her.

She didn't have to press any buttons, the elevator started moving by its self.

When the doors slid open again, she found herself in an unfamiliar hallway, it stretched in both directions, plain, white, doors on either side. The hallway ended in a turn a long way off. As far as she could see, there was no one there.

A door near the end of the hall opened and a lady in a white nurses' uniform stepped out. She held a tray of beakers filled with a clear liquid. When she saw Beth, she rushed over, the tray of glass containers clinking as she walked.

" I'm sorry, but you can't be up here unless you're authorized personnel," She said in a somewhat annoyed voice.

"Sorry. I saw the elevator and I was curious. I didn't know that the other decks would be restricted." Beth replied.

"That's fine. Just stay off of the other floors from now on. Unless of course, you're invited." The lady said, her flint-hard glare softening.

"I will, thanks," Beth said as she turned and stepped back onto the elevator.

This time, she had to push a button before the elevator started moving again. When she reached the main deck she stepped off. She stood there, wracking her brain to try and remember how to get back. A few minutes passed and she still couldn't remember.

She shrugged and started walking in the direction that she thought she had come from.

Eventually, she started to see familiar surroundings and, within a couple minutes, she was back in her room.

She logged on to her holo-desk and checked her messages. Her inbox was empty. She sighed and signed on to the library. She found the book that she had been reading and she selected it.