Finally Free
Finally Free
If someone asked me the time of my life that I remember most distinctly, it would be my final days. They are etched into my mind, as if they were chiseled in stone. Not because they are the freshest in my memory, but because the events that transpired were so indescribable that I would never have believed them if I had not witnessed it with my own two eyes. I sift through the clearest moments of my being, sorting out the things I remember.
I remember the beginning of it all, when you and I sauntered into your family home to find blood coating the walls and pooling on the wooden floors. It was surreal, almost as if we were caught in a dream world where we would soon wake up. You and I were looking at a crimson art project constructed by someone sick and twisted. You started to hyperventilate, and sunk down to the floor, bloodying your white sundress.
I remember thinking about how hard your parents must have fought. How else could there be blood everywhere?
I remember quietly whispering to myself that It was hard to believe the walls were once a beautiful beige color. The paint was now blended with the dark red of someone's life force. But now... now that life force was all gone. The pictures that had once adorned the walls were on the floor, their glass frames shattered into countless pieces.
I remember walking up to the pictures, and looking down at the now shattered memories. Everyone seemed so happy... nothing like this could have ever happened to people who were so genuinely good and kind. Except that it did.
I remember seeing the bodies of your mother and father heaped onto the floor, almost unrecognizable in their mangled state. Actually, mangled wasn't a good word to describe it. They were more like... broken. They were huddled together behind the coffee table, which now was slick with their blood. My eyes were fixated on the blood dripping down from the edge, slowly gathering and pooling in a small spot on the floor. It slowly spread out, the spot becoming bigger and bigger than it was before. I snapped back into reality when you came running in, screaming there was no sign of your little sister.
I remember when you screamed, the shrill sound echoing through the hallways. Tears ran down your face, but I still felt nothing. It wasn't my family, but they were people I knew well: people I loved like my own family. I was in shock. I do not even think I ever snapped out of that shock throughout the whole following ordeal.
I remember gathering the courage to look at the two people huddled on the floor closely. Your mother’s glazed over and empty eyes were still open, but they stared at absolutely nothing. I squeezed my eyes closed, trying to block out the horrible sight as you ran to the bathroom and vomited up the dinner we had just eaten at an out of town cafe. I would never forget the look on your parents’ faces when we found them: surprised and horrified, with a touch of sadness. They would be frozen like that until their bodies decayed to nothing.
Frozen in time.
I remember when I noticed the message written in the blood of your parents on the wall. No doubt it was scribbled on there by the murderer or murderers. The message was difficult to make sense of, because the letters all seemed to blend together from the blood dripping down from the writing. When I observed it closely, I realized that it was still slightly legible. It read, The little one with us. Come to dessert cave off highway. Desert was spelled wrong, and the wording was awkward, as if they were not exactly sure of how the language was supposed to look or sound. We realized ‘the little one’ was your sister. I knew the desert cave, but not many others knew of it. You did not know anything about it.
I remember the panicked look in your eyes as you dragged me out to the car: a small, compact car that I didn't know the name of. We did not call the police for some reason. Maybe we were too freaked out and couldn't think. I looked back at your house as you pulled out of the driveway, and I had the nagging feeling that it would be the last time I saw it. The faded and dirty roof shingles were illuminated in moonlight, and the white siding of the house was starting to turn green with mold. The maroon front door and the dark green shutters had always reminded me of Christmas. From the outside, the house looked just as it always did. It was difficult to acknowledge that the inside was the scene of a brutal murder and a kidnapping.
I remember speeding down the desolate highway in the darkness, where we were the only car on the road. This was the sole way in and out of the city. We eventually arrived at a part in the road that had a substantial amount of empty space with no underbrush on the shoulder.
I remember the click and the grinding of gears as you hastily yanked the car into park, and threw your door open. You stepped out a bit too quickly, and hit your head on the top of the door. You ignored it, and slammed the door behind you. It was then that I stepped out, and you dragged me towards the desert, telling me to take you there. I did.
I remember leading the way. We pushed through the underbrush while watching our feet and making sure we don’t step on any weird and dangerous creatures in our paths. I do not believe that you cared whether or not you stepped on a rattler curled up in your path, but I watched for both of us.
I remember arriving at the cave, and taking a deep and calming breath before we slowly moved ourselves into its mouth. I sat on a rock jutting out from the cave floor, and folded my hands near my face, with my elbows resting on my knees. It almost looked like I was praying. Where I sat was pitched black. You did not rest or sit down, but you paced around near the direct mouth, where the moonlight illuminated your worried and distressed features. Every five minutes you asked me if I was absolutely sure that this was the correct cave, and every five minutes I told you that it was.
I remember the exact moment that they entered my field of view. They emerged from the deepest bowls of the cave. They were not human: their skin was purple, and they had antennae protruding from their heads. They were only about four feet tall, but their teeth were pearly white razors, threatening to tear us to pieces. The purple creatures all spoke a language that seemed like gibberish: it consisted with a wide array of different kinds of squeaks and grunts. There was just one who could speak our tongue.
I remember when they tried to make a deal with us: they would let your little sister go if we came with them to go retrieve her. They said that then they would let us all go. The one English-speaking creature acted as a translator. I immediately refused, thinking that it was weird how we had to come to where she was being held for them to give her to us, while you rapidly nodded your head in agreement. I slapped my forehead the heel of my palm, realizing how truly stupid you were.
I remember trying to stop you, and you yelling at me about this being our only chance to get her back. Fool. Going with them will not solve anything: it will not save your sister, nor will it keep us out of trouble and danger.
I remember when you went with them anyway, and I decided to go with you. You were my best friend, and I could not't leave you to wallow in your own stupidity when you realized that we were being led straight into a simple but effective trap. They led us deeper and deeper down into the earth.
I remember when we reached the destination: a tunnel of sorts with one heavy wooden door that locked from the outside. The door was rotting and looked like it was about to fall apart, but I knew that it still would be extremely heavy: too heavy for me to move myself. We were led in, and we immediately heard the groans of your sister echoing off the walls. She sounded like she was in severe pain. The cave was dark, with the only light drifting down from a hole in the ceiling. The moon was directly above the hole, and almost acted like a spotlight.
I remember seeing the faint outline of her, but I couldn’t make out any specific details. She was curled up in the fetal position on the far side of the tunnel. From what I could make out, her face was huddled into the crook of her arms.
I remember when you called her name, and she called yours back. Her voice was raspy and she sounded much, much older than the age she really was. Your sister's gasps of pain filled the room.
I remember when you finally realized that they tricked us, and that there was no chance in any distant hell that we were making it home. I knew this from the start, yet I went with you anyway. No matter how hard we fought, no matter how desperately we thrashed and cried, the end of the struggle ended with you and I bound with chains. The chains were tethered to the ground, and our hands and feet were shackled together. They placed me right in the spotlight of the moon underneath the hole in the ceiling. You were chained down about eight feet to my right, and your sister was eight feet to your right.
I remember the following few weeks going by in a complete blur. It might not have been a few weeks: my sense of time was distorted. It could have been months or years, but I don't think so, because I do not believe we would have been able to survive that long. Throughout the duration of time we were there, we learned several things about the hostile creatures who wanted to keep us in captivity. The first of which was the actual reason that they wanted us there. They wanted our pain… our suffering. The purple creatures wanted to feast off of our desperation and fear. They wanted to eat the essence of our pain... wanted to hear us scream. They cared not for the flesh on our bones, but they needed us to suffer so that they could survive.
I remember my only comfort rested in that hole in the ceiling, where I could see the moon above me. I spent countless hours just staring at the moon hanging in the sky. Somehow, I don’t ever remember resting my eyes on the sun in the time I was there: maybe I slept during the day and stayed awake during the night. The stars would seem to mock me, saying they were free and outside and although I was so close to the surface, I would never make it up there.
I remember when the cave started to smell putrid. It was the mix of our vomit and excretion. It was around that time that we all began to become sick.
I remember those things eating once every week. They would not’t just give us little cuts: they would take large pieces of our bodies at a time. An arm, a leg. Whatever they wanted to take, they did. I don't know how long we resisted them. I don't know the number of feedings it took for them to break our spirits into little pieces.
I remember the day we lost all hope. I looked over at you and saw a look of emptiness in your eyes. I could’t see your sister well in the darkness, because she was on the other side of you, but I assumed she looked the same way. I knew that I did too. I felt so empty, almost as if I was dead on the inside, but I could still feel everything around me.
I remember when the infections were worsening in our bodies. I did not’t know about you (and I no longer cared about you), but I was missing an arm and both of my legs. I could faintly see the red, vein-like lines running up the stubs that used to be my legs and arm, and I knew that once they touched my heart, I would be gone. I was anxiously awaiting that day. I did not know how long I could take the pain and sickness.
I remember the day you died. I did not shed any tears, nor did your sister. I usually heard you groaning next to me, but one day, I just heard nothing. That's the only reason I knew your were gone: we never spoke anymore. For what must have been a month after we got here we gave up on conversing, and we just settled for listening to each other groan and cry. I heard the gibberish of the creatures as they came in to take your body away. They sounded angry: I think that they were mad that they missed an opportunity for a final feeding.
I remember thinking wait for me as they took you by your ankles and started to lurch your body towards the door. They didn’t even have the decency to pick you up and carry you out. They just dragged you out the heavy wooden door on the far side of the cave. I couldn’t take my eyes off the marks your body made in the dirt below us. I couldn't stop staring at the marks your body made while it was being dragged away.
I remember later that day your sister stopped groaning as well. This time I turned my head away when they dragged her out. I still did not cry, although I was now trapped in a painful silence. All I could do was look up at the moon and wish for death to grip me and take me away to somewhere better. I had long ago abandoned the hopeless idea of God.
I remember being the last one left. If I could still feel emotions, it would be one of the most horrible feelings I’I have ever felt. All I could do was sit there and look at the sky above me, and wonder how we got into this. I came to no conclusion. The only sound around me was my own heartbeat, fluttering in my chest, mixed with my labored breathing.
I remember the day when I realized that my heart was beating slower than usual. I smiled as I came to the conclusion that this might be my day to lose my life.
I could not’t help but wonder why does it hurt so much? But the happiness was so intense that the pain seemed dulled.
The things were ready for my death. They came into the cave, and began to grow fat off my final moments. They just picked at the remaining parts of my body, trying to make the last bits and pieces of suffering. I was too happy that I was finally going to die to feel it. The fat purple bastards weren't getting much of a meal. I laughed in their faces.
I remember the last thing my eyes saw. I might have been crazy, but the night sky above seemed to have a light shoot up in the distance, and the light snaked across the sky with its tendrils reaching the far sides of my view. It made me almost serene.
Please stop… I begged in my head, I’m ready… please. I’m ready to go.
I remember my blissful last breath. My heart filled with joy for a single moment, and then it just stopped beating. Death overcame me, and I was greeted by a hallway of darkness where you waited for me. There were little blue balls of light all around us: were they other souls? Other people freed from their lives? How many hurt like we did? How many passed away with smiles on their faces?
I remember wondering if we appeared to each of them as just small balls of light, easily ignored and swept over. Just like they were to us. Before I took your hand, I stepped to the side and swept the back of my hand over the tip of one of the orbs.
Their memories exploded into a parade of light and sound around us, and as soon as it had begun, it was over. I just realized that I had seen that soul's last earthly moments.
I remember finally making a crucial observation and beginning to cry with joy: I no longer hurt, or felt sick.
You and I laughed with pure and untainted bliss as I took your hand, and we began to make our way down the hallway. Your sister waited at the end, where a strong wind exploded into our faces, and a light broke through the darkness. Our white clothes danced behind us as we walked toward it, and we left our lives behind.
With this single moment in time, the realization dawned on us that we were finally free.
Finally free…
I remember the beginning of it all, when you and I sauntered into your family home to find blood coating the walls and pooling on the wooden floors. It was surreal, almost as if we were caught in a dream world where we would soon wake up. You and I were looking at a crimson art project constructed by someone sick and twisted. You started to hyperventilate, and sunk down to the floor, bloodying your white sundress.
I remember thinking about how hard your parents must have fought. How else could there be blood everywhere?
I remember quietly whispering to myself that It was hard to believe the walls were once a beautiful beige color. The paint was now blended with the dark red of someone's life force. But now... now that life force was all gone. The pictures that had once adorned the walls were on the floor, their glass frames shattered into countless pieces.
I remember walking up to the pictures, and looking down at the now shattered memories. Everyone seemed so happy... nothing like this could have ever happened to people who were so genuinely good and kind. Except that it did.
I remember seeing the bodies of your mother and father heaped onto the floor, almost unrecognizable in their mangled state. Actually, mangled wasn't a good word to describe it. They were more like... broken. They were huddled together behind the coffee table, which now was slick with their blood. My eyes were fixated on the blood dripping down from the edge, slowly gathering and pooling in a small spot on the floor. It slowly spread out, the spot becoming bigger and bigger than it was before. I snapped back into reality when you came running in, screaming there was no sign of your little sister.
I remember when you screamed, the shrill sound echoing through the hallways. Tears ran down your face, but I still felt nothing. It wasn't my family, but they were people I knew well: people I loved like my own family. I was in shock. I do not even think I ever snapped out of that shock throughout the whole following ordeal.
I remember gathering the courage to look at the two people huddled on the floor closely. Your mother’s glazed over and empty eyes were still open, but they stared at absolutely nothing. I squeezed my eyes closed, trying to block out the horrible sight as you ran to the bathroom and vomited up the dinner we had just eaten at an out of town cafe. I would never forget the look on your parents’ faces when we found them: surprised and horrified, with a touch of sadness. They would be frozen like that until their bodies decayed to nothing.
Frozen in time.
I remember when I noticed the message written in the blood of your parents on the wall. No doubt it was scribbled on there by the murderer or murderers. The message was difficult to make sense of, because the letters all seemed to blend together from the blood dripping down from the writing. When I observed it closely, I realized that it was still slightly legible. It read, The little one with us. Come to dessert cave off highway. Desert was spelled wrong, and the wording was awkward, as if they were not exactly sure of how the language was supposed to look or sound. We realized ‘the little one’ was your sister. I knew the desert cave, but not many others knew of it. You did not know anything about it.
I remember the panicked look in your eyes as you dragged me out to the car: a small, compact car that I didn't know the name of. We did not call the police for some reason. Maybe we were too freaked out and couldn't think. I looked back at your house as you pulled out of the driveway, and I had the nagging feeling that it would be the last time I saw it. The faded and dirty roof shingles were illuminated in moonlight, and the white siding of the house was starting to turn green with mold. The maroon front door and the dark green shutters had always reminded me of Christmas. From the outside, the house looked just as it always did. It was difficult to acknowledge that the inside was the scene of a brutal murder and a kidnapping.
I remember speeding down the desolate highway in the darkness, where we were the only car on the road. This was the sole way in and out of the city. We eventually arrived at a part in the road that had a substantial amount of empty space with no underbrush on the shoulder.
I remember the click and the grinding of gears as you hastily yanked the car into park, and threw your door open. You stepped out a bit too quickly, and hit your head on the top of the door. You ignored it, and slammed the door behind you. It was then that I stepped out, and you dragged me towards the desert, telling me to take you there. I did.
I remember leading the way. We pushed through the underbrush while watching our feet and making sure we don’t step on any weird and dangerous creatures in our paths. I do not believe that you cared whether or not you stepped on a rattler curled up in your path, but I watched for both of us.
I remember arriving at the cave, and taking a deep and calming breath before we slowly moved ourselves into its mouth. I sat on a rock jutting out from the cave floor, and folded my hands near my face, with my elbows resting on my knees. It almost looked like I was praying. Where I sat was pitched black. You did not rest or sit down, but you paced around near the direct mouth, where the moonlight illuminated your worried and distressed features. Every five minutes you asked me if I was absolutely sure that this was the correct cave, and every five minutes I told you that it was.
I remember the exact moment that they entered my field of view. They emerged from the deepest bowls of the cave. They were not human: their skin was purple, and they had antennae protruding from their heads. They were only about four feet tall, but their teeth were pearly white razors, threatening to tear us to pieces. The purple creatures all spoke a language that seemed like gibberish: it consisted with a wide array of different kinds of squeaks and grunts. There was just one who could speak our tongue.
I remember when they tried to make a deal with us: they would let your little sister go if we came with them to go retrieve her. They said that then they would let us all go. The one English-speaking creature acted as a translator. I immediately refused, thinking that it was weird how we had to come to where she was being held for them to give her to us, while you rapidly nodded your head in agreement. I slapped my forehead the heel of my palm, realizing how truly stupid you were.
I remember trying to stop you, and you yelling at me about this being our only chance to get her back. Fool. Going with them will not solve anything: it will not save your sister, nor will it keep us out of trouble and danger.
I remember when you went with them anyway, and I decided to go with you. You were my best friend, and I could not't leave you to wallow in your own stupidity when you realized that we were being led straight into a simple but effective trap. They led us deeper and deeper down into the earth.
I remember when we reached the destination: a tunnel of sorts with one heavy wooden door that locked from the outside. The door was rotting and looked like it was about to fall apart, but I knew that it still would be extremely heavy: too heavy for me to move myself. We were led in, and we immediately heard the groans of your sister echoing off the walls. She sounded like she was in severe pain. The cave was dark, with the only light drifting down from a hole in the ceiling. The moon was directly above the hole, and almost acted like a spotlight.
I remember seeing the faint outline of her, but I couldn’t make out any specific details. She was curled up in the fetal position on the far side of the tunnel. From what I could make out, her face was huddled into the crook of her arms.
I remember when you called her name, and she called yours back. Her voice was raspy and she sounded much, much older than the age she really was. Your sister's gasps of pain filled the room.
I remember when you finally realized that they tricked us, and that there was no chance in any distant hell that we were making it home. I knew this from the start, yet I went with you anyway. No matter how hard we fought, no matter how desperately we thrashed and cried, the end of the struggle ended with you and I bound with chains. The chains were tethered to the ground, and our hands and feet were shackled together. They placed me right in the spotlight of the moon underneath the hole in the ceiling. You were chained down about eight feet to my right, and your sister was eight feet to your right.
I remember the following few weeks going by in a complete blur. It might not have been a few weeks: my sense of time was distorted. It could have been months or years, but I don't think so, because I do not believe we would have been able to survive that long. Throughout the duration of time we were there, we learned several things about the hostile creatures who wanted to keep us in captivity. The first of which was the actual reason that they wanted us there. They wanted our pain… our suffering. The purple creatures wanted to feast off of our desperation and fear. They wanted to eat the essence of our pain... wanted to hear us scream. They cared not for the flesh on our bones, but they needed us to suffer so that they could survive.
I remember my only comfort rested in that hole in the ceiling, where I could see the moon above me. I spent countless hours just staring at the moon hanging in the sky. Somehow, I don’t ever remember resting my eyes on the sun in the time I was there: maybe I slept during the day and stayed awake during the night. The stars would seem to mock me, saying they were free and outside and although I was so close to the surface, I would never make it up there.
I remember when the cave started to smell putrid. It was the mix of our vomit and excretion. It was around that time that we all began to become sick.
I remember those things eating once every week. They would not’t just give us little cuts: they would take large pieces of our bodies at a time. An arm, a leg. Whatever they wanted to take, they did. I don't know how long we resisted them. I don't know the number of feedings it took for them to break our spirits into little pieces.
I remember the day we lost all hope. I looked over at you and saw a look of emptiness in your eyes. I could’t see your sister well in the darkness, because she was on the other side of you, but I assumed she looked the same way. I knew that I did too. I felt so empty, almost as if I was dead on the inside, but I could still feel everything around me.
I remember when the infections were worsening in our bodies. I did not’t know about you (and I no longer cared about you), but I was missing an arm and both of my legs. I could faintly see the red, vein-like lines running up the stubs that used to be my legs and arm, and I knew that once they touched my heart, I would be gone. I was anxiously awaiting that day. I did not know how long I could take the pain and sickness.
I remember the day you died. I did not shed any tears, nor did your sister. I usually heard you groaning next to me, but one day, I just heard nothing. That's the only reason I knew your were gone: we never spoke anymore. For what must have been a month after we got here we gave up on conversing, and we just settled for listening to each other groan and cry. I heard the gibberish of the creatures as they came in to take your body away. They sounded angry: I think that they were mad that they missed an opportunity for a final feeding.
I remember thinking wait for me as they took you by your ankles and started to lurch your body towards the door. They didn’t even have the decency to pick you up and carry you out. They just dragged you out the heavy wooden door on the far side of the cave. I couldn’t take my eyes off the marks your body made in the dirt below us. I couldn't stop staring at the marks your body made while it was being dragged away.
I remember later that day your sister stopped groaning as well. This time I turned my head away when they dragged her out. I still did not cry, although I was now trapped in a painful silence. All I could do was look up at the moon and wish for death to grip me and take me away to somewhere better. I had long ago abandoned the hopeless idea of God.
I remember being the last one left. If I could still feel emotions, it would be one of the most horrible feelings I’I have ever felt. All I could do was sit there and look at the sky above me, and wonder how we got into this. I came to no conclusion. The only sound around me was my own heartbeat, fluttering in my chest, mixed with my labored breathing.
I remember the day when I realized that my heart was beating slower than usual. I smiled as I came to the conclusion that this might be my day to lose my life.
I could not’t help but wonder why does it hurt so much? But the happiness was so intense that the pain seemed dulled.
The things were ready for my death. They came into the cave, and began to grow fat off my final moments. They just picked at the remaining parts of my body, trying to make the last bits and pieces of suffering. I was too happy that I was finally going to die to feel it. The fat purple bastards weren't getting much of a meal. I laughed in their faces.
I remember the last thing my eyes saw. I might have been crazy, but the night sky above seemed to have a light shoot up in the distance, and the light snaked across the sky with its tendrils reaching the far sides of my view. It made me almost serene.
Please stop… I begged in my head, I’m ready… please. I’m ready to go.
I remember my blissful last breath. My heart filled with joy for a single moment, and then it just stopped beating. Death overcame me, and I was greeted by a hallway of darkness where you waited for me. There were little blue balls of light all around us: were they other souls? Other people freed from their lives? How many hurt like we did? How many passed away with smiles on their faces?
I remember wondering if we appeared to each of them as just small balls of light, easily ignored and swept over. Just like they were to us. Before I took your hand, I stepped to the side and swept the back of my hand over the tip of one of the orbs.
Their memories exploded into a parade of light and sound around us, and as soon as it had begun, it was over. I just realized that I had seen that soul's last earthly moments.
I remember finally making a crucial observation and beginning to cry with joy: I no longer hurt, or felt sick.
You and I laughed with pure and untainted bliss as I took your hand, and we began to make our way down the hallway. Your sister waited at the end, where a strong wind exploded into our faces, and a light broke through the darkness. Our white clothes danced behind us as we walked toward it, and we left our lives behind.
With this single moment in time, the realization dawned on us that we were finally free.
Finally free…