Terror. A dimension mirroring the living one--but morphed to reflect the imagination of its Overseer. And the current Overseer... has refused to relinquish her power for centuries, tormenting her souls--"terrors"--into becoming... zombies.
Arielle f...
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
"Hear me, Arielle; go find the rebels."
"Wh... what?" She was groggy, her vision blurry, and her mouth full of clumpy dirt and flaky grass. Arielle pressed her hands to the ground and heaved herself up into a semi-seated position. Semi—because she couldn't quite see, and her balance was off, her head spinning as if she'd ran in circles for three days.
Three days—was that how long she'd traveled? She had no sense of time or space. Where had she arrived? And why did it smell like burnt toast?
Rubbing her eyes, she tried extending her legs out before her, stretching them. Each limb was sore, her muscles tight, and tingles in her extremities prompted her to shake out her hands. She regained some circulation in her fingers and toes, and her blurry vision slowly dissipated.
Blinking away the tears that had clogged her eyes—likely from being blasted through a dizzying portal—she peered ahead of her, desperate for a landmark, a sight to give her an idea of her surroundings.
She found a landmark, all right; but not one she'd expected to ever see again.
The house—the one she'd been inside, in the Void, the one she'd dreaded living in for the rest of her ghost days. The one she'd died in, and worried she'd never be able to escape.
It started to come back to her; how, for a split second, when Penny snatched her and yanked her into the rip in the atmosphere, she'd been happy to not have to be in the house again. To not have to stare at the sepia-hued walls and the paleness of her fingertips and the charcoal-colored stains on the tips of her shoes.
Yet here she was, in front of the building that haunted her. She was a ghost, but the house was the real specter, creeping in her shadow like a poltergeist seeking to taunt her until she lost her mind.
"I did lose my mind." She scratched the back of her head, gawking at the edifice before her. It was a good yard away, but she'd recognize that structure anywhere.
Had she even traveled into Terror, as Penny had wanted? Or was she still in the Void? Maybe her soul couldn't pass through, and she'd been launched outside instead, barred from traveling between dimensions. A side of her slumped in relief, because the notion of Terror petrified her. But then again, she didn't want to wait in the Void for her soul to rot and to become as begrudged and bossy as Penny.
Penny.
But something was off, here. That burnt toast stench, for one. And a heavy, heated power charged through the area.
Something was different. Something in the air—it wasn't glacial and morose, as it had been in the Void. There was a scent of spice, a crackling energy, a sort of smoke looming all around.
Arielle peered down at the grass—and gasped.
It was green. Not gray, not black—a vivid green, like shiny emeralds, like forests of pines. But not quite healthy—the tips of the blades of grass were brown, as if rotting or burned.
