Through the Looking Glass [bocadelinferno]

Nov 09, 2005 15:20

I could see the symbols in my mind... all of them there, jumbled up together like- like momma’s soup, the one she used to make on Sundays. Things didn’t quite make sense anymore, and I was lost again, so lost, and so alone just like I had been before- ...before what? I tried to scribble everything I could remember on the walls of the cave, over and over; the numbers and letters that made up the mathematical and quantum equation that had brought me here in the first place, along with things I tried hard not to forget because... because they were the only things that I had left, the only things that made me almost human in this place, and not just some animal lost somewhere in an alternate dimension for five years- or was it longer than that...? I closed my eyes and tried to remember the words in the book: Plrtz Glrb... or was it Glrb Plrtz. I wasn’t sure anymore.

Poor little Fred- fell right into the rabbit hole and now she’s lost through the looking glass in a time and a in a place where monsters live, there are no white rabbits and there are no cats with creepy smiles that disappear into thin air, or caterpillars that smoke... how does the story go?

I kept trying to find the click, trying hard to make sense out of things, trying hard to remember something that I had lost- memories that made me... me. And every time I got close, every time the blur began to focus the pain would come, making me feel like an empty shell, the skin so hard and cold, like the walls of the care. My hands hurt from etching out the letters, words and numbers on the walls and floors of the cave-- and just as I finished the writing the story, my story, everything became a blur and began to fade as fast as I had put it there.

So lost.

I began to scribble on the walls again and as always, the voice in the background began to speak, it was low at first, barely a whisper until it started to take shape, take form and become recognizable. Almost familiar?

"So, ah... So, you don't wanna talk to me?"

I continued to scribble trying to ignore it, trying not to lose my sanity but, it was too late for that now, don’t it. "I can't, huh?"

"Why won't you?" He said and I could almost remember his face. But just like the letters would fade away so did the memory of him.

"Because - you're not real. - Or I'm not real. Somebody here isn't real and I suspect it's you. So if you're not real, that means that my head came off somewhere back there or here or just somewhere and that means I'm dead now. Dead. And with me being dead and you not being real I can hardly be expected to have some big conversation with you at the moment, because it's just a little too much pressure, alright?!"

There that made some type of sense didn’t it? Sure it did- it made sense to me.

"You've been here a long time."

Had I been here a long time? I couldn’t remember how long was a long time... weeks, months, years? "Always. - Not always. Maybe this is all just a dream..." And just like that, his voice faded away once more and I was alone in the cave, the drawings had all faded, and I was stuck in this one spot just like before... had there been a before? So lost.

I leaned against the wall, and slowly slid down onto the floor of the cave, my eyes getting heavier and heavier until I closed them, trying to find some kind of peace, but there was none... and I could see the symbols again in my head, all jumbled together like the soup momma used to make on Sundays... Déjà vu? And then there was nothing but the darkness, the cold and the pain that traveled up through me, liquefying all my insides until there was nothing left of me but an empty shell...

...
...
...

"...a house of death... Why did we go there? Why did we think we could beat it? Its evil,
Wesley. It's bigger than anything..." I could feel the pain traveling through my whole body, it was burning me whole, from the inside out, "Oh, God! I sinned. I've sinned, and I'm being punished. I don't know what's wrong. I never got a B minus before. Uhh! Sorry. I'm sorry. Make it stop!" And just as unexpectedly as it began, it started to subside and became a little bearable, but pieces of me were missing... lost through the pain,

"Uhhg! I’m with him!" I cried out. But I wasn’t, I was alone- no, I had been alone, in Pylea, but I wasn’t there anymore. "That was bad, but it's better now. You won't leave me?"

"I would never leave you." He said through the darkness. He was still here, holding on just like he said he would.

He hadn’t left me- I had left him. I hadn’t been strong enough, I couldn’t fight it- the plague that had invaded my body, I couldn’t hang on, and it was all my fault, in the end, it had been my fault. Getting lost, dying... hurting everyone I loved; and this is what it was all about now, wasn’t it? I had to pay, I had to feel the pain over and over again, I had to re-live all my failures again and again, and see the look in their faces as I started to fade, the look of pain on his face, Wesley’s face as I took my last breath, re-live every failure, every nightmare, and every painful memory in every waking moment of every second of every day even in death. This was the guilt that consumed me until there was nothing left but an empty shell, with no beginning and no end.

Feigenbaum.

I woke up with a start, and I looked around trying to remember the dream, had it been a dream? Was this a dream? If it was, it didn’t feel like a dream. I got up and looked around, trying to figure out where I was, and then I remembered. The Hyperion. I couldn’t quite recall what I had been doing before, or what I was supposed to do now, but something didn’t feel quite right.

"You are absolutely right, Freddles," I tilted my head just a bit and saw a figure by the doorway holding a drink with a pink umbrella in his hand. I instantly recognized the voice, the face, but something inside me was flashing red, and a sudden nauseating feeling of fear fell over me.

"Lorne?" I asked in a small voice.

"Well, who else do you think it would be? You silly Technicolor science girl," There was a pause, and he took a sip from his drink and then smiled at me. Slowly his face began to change, the green pigment of the skin was replaced by the soft pinks and browns of us regular folk, and I froze, my heart beating faster than I could count. "Professor Seidel?" He replied to his own question in a different, yet utterly familiar voice.

I shook my head, the fear and the sudden feeling of hate petrifying me on the spot. "No! no... it can’t be... You’re- you’re... Charles, he- you, you’re not real."

"I’m what? Dead? Charles what? Killed me? You’re right, you are absolutely right Winifred, he did kill me, so yes- I am dead. And all because of you. You made him into a killer. And I am as real as you are now... want me to prove it to you?" He asked and began to step closer towards me. I tried to breathe, the run, to think of the words that would send him back to the gates of hell where he belonged for doing this to me and all those other students. But we were both already there, now, weren’t we? As he got closer he began to chant, the words becoming all too familiar for me, and my eyes opened up wide. His voice became stronger, louder echoing in my ears until a portal began to appear, ripping open through the floor, almost as if there were a giant hole in the world. I tried to grab a hold of something, anything... I tried to run, but there was nothing there, there was nowhere to run to, and there was nothing around me anymore. He walked right above the portal and finally stretched out his hand to grab me.

"Time to fall through the rabbit hole again, Winifred." He roared as he pulled me into the portal. "Time to go through the looking glass again."

I screamed. I was falling again, falling right into the portal just like that first time. I had failed everyone again. I wasn’t strong enough. I was getting lost again. So lost. I was letting everyone down, I was hurting everyone I loved, and it was all my fault. Because I had failed to live, and had died. Because I couldn’t be strong. Because I couldn’t hang on.
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