Where Red was in her nightmare - original photo taken bu Supergear Studio on ShutterStock, altered by me in Procreate
Song: everything i wanted (instrumental) - sing2piano / Billie Eilish (Everything I wanted/ Piano Karaoke Instrumentals)
Word Count: 1524
*Warning: very heavy gore in this chapter*
"So how did you like dinner?" I looked over at Akia as she waltzed into my bathroom, already in her pajamas as she sat down on the end of my bathtub.
I shrugged, turning back to the mirror and continuing to brush my teeth. "It was okay. The food was good," I spoke, the sound coming out muffled around all of the toothpaste.
"Well, that's good. Are you okay?"
"Mhm. Well, as okay as I can be."
"That's good. You ready for bed?"
"Absolutely."
"There's the Red I know and love." Akia and I looked over as Eiden emerged from the hallway, coming in to sit on the toilet lid.
I frowned, spitting out the toothpaste. "You all have your own bathrooms, can't you go in there?"
"And skip out on bothering you? No way."
"well, you're going to have to, because I'm going to bed." Before the two could utter another word, i darted out of the bathroom and into my bedroom, shutting out the lights as I did. With a sigh, I crawled in the large, soft bed that awaited me. As soon as my head hit the pillow, I drifted off into a dreamless sleep.
You see, it was only dreamless because instead of dreams, I had nightmares.
***
"You're a failure."
My eyes snapped open, only to be met with darkness. At first, I thought it was my room, but as I sat up and looked around, I knew it couldn't be. My room doesn't have blood-stained grass as a carpet.
"You've disappointed us all."
I glanced around quickly, trying to find the source of the voice. Nothing seemed to stand out, except for the fact that I was lying in a dimly-lit circle of red grass. Where am I? How did I get here?
"You've left us all to rot."
Climbing to my feet, I looked around again, before cautiously taking a few steps forward. The light that shone on my surroundings seemed to follow me, so, warily, I began to walk into the darkness.
"You were supposed to be the hero."
I continued to walk, the blood on the ground gradually becoming more and more fresh as I went on.
"You were supposed to save us, but instead, you let us all die."
I stopped. My mind began to click into place. I know that voice, I know it well, but who does it belong to?
"We were all slaughtered because of you."
I began to walk again, the grass beneath me becoming much more red than green. Soon enough, I noticed something in the distance, something that made my feet stop involuntarily in fear.
"It's all your fault."
Slowly, I took a few steps forward, the bloodied foot I saw revealing to show a full body; or at least, what was left of it. The body was so mangled that it would be beyond recognition, if the head wasn't perfectly intact. The head that belonged to Eiden.
"It's all your fault."
I kept going, soon stumbling across another corpse, this one belonging to Akia. You couldn't tell easily, her entire body was skinned, but the clothes that somehow were still on her were undeniably hers.
"It's all your fault."
I kept going. The next corpse was Levi, his entire body dismembered and left bare. Well, bare apart from the numerous bloodstains that were still accumulating from the pooling blood.
"It's all your fault."
I kept going. Sarai, Bordeaux, and Emery were next, all grouped together into a pile of tiny bits of flesh, muscle, and bones, their heads perfectly placed on top with an eternal expression of fear.
"It's all your fault."
I kept going. Casper was dismembered too, all of his body parts hanging from seemingly nowhere by blood-stained ropes. His head wasn't there, until I tried to walk again. The falling body part startled me so much that I fell to the ground.
"It's."
I looked around fearfully, the multiple murder scenes teleporting to form a taunting circle around me, all the heads of my dead companions facing me. Haunting me.
"All."
I felt my chest tightening as the sound of snarling wolves began to echo beyond the inky blackness. With short, quick breaths, I crawled back on my hands to the center of the circle that formed around me, looking around and trying to avoid setting my eyes on those of my friends.
"Your."
The darkness slowly crept in, swallowing the bodies, before it quickly receded, like a tide at a beach. The corpses were all gone, and all that was left was the dark silhouette of a woman. No, it was a dark silhouette of Nonna.
"Fault!"
A white toothy grin shone from within the face I couldn't see. As she screamed the last word, Nonna charged at me, talons suddenly extending from her hands. The bird claws were fixated on my neck, but just before she wrapped them around me, my body collapsed into the ground, falling into an abyss of the same darkness that was above.
It didn't last long, however, before I landed on a soft, squishy, and moist pile of something. I took a few quick breaths, before I attempted to stand up. As I pulled my hand away, I caught a glimpse of a red liquid sticking to it. My eyes widened as I fearfully stood up and looked around. I was standing in a field of mangled, mutilated, and annihilated bodies, up to my knees in corpses as far as the eye could see. The corpses weren't still; hands still crawled across the pile and mouths still open in pain. I tried to scream, but I could only manage a small squeak. I could only stand still as the detached limbs made their way up my body and to my head: plugging my ears, covering my mouth, and digging into my eyes as the words "all your fault" echoed around me.
***
I woke up with a scream of pain, looking around my room. There was no blood-stained grass, no field of corpses, nothing. I quickly looked at my hands, they weren't covered in red as they were moments ago. I felt around my face, my organs weren't being mutilated like they were only seconds ago. I tried to let out a gasp of relief, but I couldn't manage to between my hyperventilating.
"Red!" I looked up at my door fearfully as Eiden and Akia barreled through. "What's going on?"
"Dead," I whispered, "you were dead!"
"What, no! Red, we're alive. We're right here." Akia consoled as she ran to my bedside. Eiden followed and the two pulled my shaking form into their arms.
"You were dead. Everyone was dead."
"No, we're all okay."
"What's happened?" We all looked up as Nonna entered the room. I let out a fearful gasp and scooted back on the bed, Akia and Eiden letting me go in shock. "Red? What's going on?"
"Stay away!" I screamed the second Nonna began to walk towards me. I clawed at my neck, trying to protect it in case the talons appeared again. What she stopped, I spoke again; "you were-you had claws. You were going to kill me! You were going to kill be because I killed them!"
A brief moment of silence passed, the only sounds being my shaky breaths that tried to hold back sobs.
"Red, what are you talking about?"
"It's all my fault," I murmured.
"Red?" Eiden pulled me to him again as Akia desperately held onto my hands.
"It's all my fault."
"Nipotina?" Nonna walked over and sat on the bed, still wary enough to keep her distance as she stared worriedly at my shaking form.
"It's all my fault. It's all my fault. It's all my fault!" The dam I had built up to keep my tears in broke, a waterfall pouring from my eyes in between sobs. "I can't do this! I'll kill you all! I did kill you all!"
"Red, it's okay," Eiden consoled, running a comforting hand up and down my arm. I didn't notice it, but Nonna managed to scoot closer, carefully grabbing my hand. I flinched away when she did, only relaxing when Akia held my hands again. "You didn't kill anyone. We're all right here."
I looked up and around the room, tearfully meeting the gaze of Eiden, Akia, and Nonna. Slowly, my tears began to dry, my breaths began to slow, and my body began to stop shaking. With a few deep breaths, I finally began to calm down.
"See?" Akia carefully smiled at me. "It's all okay."
"Yeah," I whispered, "all okay."
"You're safe, Red. You're safe," Nonna spoke up, placing her hand on top of mine.
"I'm safe."
"Try to get some sleep, okay?"
"...Okay."
Something told me I wasn't going to get much sleep tonight. Maybe not even for a while.