90 DEADLY DAYS (WEEKLY UPDATES RETURNING THIS DECEMBER)

Chapter 50 (MATURE WARNING)

SO HUGE WARNING!!  THIS CHAPTER IS HELLA RATED R! THIS CHAPTER CONTAINS MATURE MATERIAL NOT SUITABLE FOR AN AUDIENCE UNDER 16-. PLEASE, IF YOU FIND SEXUAL SITUATIONS/MATERIAL TRIGGERING OR DISTURBING, DO NOT READ.

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Chapter 50

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Sleepwalker, a human girl dead to the world. A body shifting from space to space. A body without a mind. Today I realize what I have become. An empty figure, oblivious to everything but her pain. No one knows what it's like to lose everything until they have. Nothing can prepare you for it. The moment it registers, you lose yourself.

And I lost everything, including my soul.

The sun lingers on my skin. While I slept, someone placed me on a rock lying next to a stream. I collapse here, pressing my forehead against the stone. I want to cry but nothing surfaces. No feeling, no love. No humanity.

I can express nothing but hatred. An ugly rage breaks my soul and I avoid the water that carries my reflection. When I see myself disgust wells up inside. I tried to exterminate the feeling with insanity, to throw my mind so far into an abyss that I can barely recall my own name. But grief is a strong emotion. It cages you, forcing you remember it even in your sweetest dreams.

I dreamed Jewel and I were together last night. We stood atop a hill, hand in hand. The end approached from all sides, wailing and howling for our surrender. We stood tall and strong anyhow, determined to make it through. It felt so vivid that I almost thought it was real. But then a hand shot down from gloomy clouds and snaked through the raging storm. The mighty fist clamped around Jewel and stole her away into white oblivion. I cried her name and heard nothing but awful quiet. Not even the caw of a raven.

Nothing but damned silence.

Despite the bitter winter raging in the mountains, a bush of blossoming flowers grows nearby. I kneel down next to it, looking with wonder at the colors emanating from the green. We should banish something so happy and innocent from this nightmarish world. Xaro's toxic nightmare will only corrupt its beauty. I hesitantly brush the feathery leaves.

"Phoenix?"

I stiffen, hearing a voice I have ignored for a long time. For days, it manifested only as a muffled whisper drifting on the edge of my grief. Burrowing deeper into my grief-stricken abyss kept it at bay. There, in nightmarish dark, the gravely tones couldn't find me. They couldn't convince me to finally move on. The husky tone made me feel alive in ways I wish I wasn't, in ways that condemned me. It made me want to live, but there's only death for me now.

Xaro killed everything I ever loved. Now it is my turn. I must follow the line, even if it means surrendering to the Grim Reaper.

I turn.

"Come. We're heading south today," Atol says.

"South..." I repeat. A dagger hangs from his belt. Sunlight flashes on the promising knife. My grieving soul contemplates this prize. A new vision comes to me with a message as clear as a blue sky. Somehow, this weapon will send me to Jewel.

"Could you send me to her?" I ask suddenly

"Send you...?"

"Send me to Jewel?"

Atol blinks, taken aback.

"She's dead, Phoenix."

"I know. But she needs me. I have to find her."

"What are you saying?"

"Kill me. It's the only way to find her."

His expression blackens and he squints, clearly stunned.