Breaking the 4th

“Shatter…”

Shatter lifted her eyes from the ground that had held her full attention and looked around. Hyun was looking at her, a troubled look clouding his handsome face. He waved a hand in front of her face, waving her back into focus.

Shatter swallowed, the feeling of terror paralyzing her.
“What…” she mumbled mindlessly. “Why did we stop?”

She knew the answer even before he spoke.
“Another dead end.” Hyun said, with a raised eyebrow as he gestured behind him with his thumb.

The sensation of déjà vu struck her hard, knocking the breath right out of her.

What was this… What did she just see? A hallucination? It was so vivid, so real.
Shatter looked down at her hands and saw that they were trembling.

She felt it. She can still feel that dreadful sensation of blood dripping down her arm, Hyun’s heart throbbing in her palm. She can still hear him gasping and despairingly trying to free himself over the sickening crepitus of bone. She felt him get weaker and weaker… and remember the feeling of exhilaration.

Shatter suddenly felt sick to her stomach, her left hand clapping over her mouth as she lurched forward.

“Hey!” she heard Hyun yell, sounding alarmed.
Her vision blurred as she gagged and dry heaved.

She felt him come closer and immediately started to panic.
“I’m fine, I’m fine.” she breathed out hastily, pushing her palm out to halt him. She glanced up at her companion and saw him hovering, concern etched into his face. “I...I just need some space to breathe.”
Hyun didn’t say anything, but he backed up and turned away.

Shatter couldn’t help but stare at his back, her mind replaying the bloody images on repeat. It looked real. It felt real, even heard and smelled real. But there he was, standing and still alive. It was just an elaborate delusion; it didn’t happen.

But it will.

That one thought stabbed through her like ice and she couldn’t shake it. It was more than hunch and gut feeling. She had no doubt in her mind, that Hyun was going to die by her hands if she didn’t do something.
Shatter closed her eyes and forced in a shaky inhale.
I have to leave. If I leave him, he’ll be safe. she thought. Or if I can convince him to leave me behind…
She recalled how that worked out before, and she gave up that idea. She needed to find a way, she needed to make sure Hyun was safe...

There was a way. She had dreamt a way not long ago.

She glanced back a Hyun, who had her back faced to her unsuspectingly. Shatter tried not to think of her hallucination, took a deep breath and spoke.
“Hyun,” she said.
He turned to look at her, waiting for her to speak expectantly. Determinedly, Shatter looked him straight in the eye and spoke.

“Be safe.” she said. “Now.”

She saw him scrunch his eyebrows together in a confused expression.
Shatter blinked, and he was gone.



The voices were at a constant hum in her head now, the mumbles and whispers seemed to scratch at the inside of her skull.
“Quiet, quiet, quiet, quiet, quiet.” she repeated under her breath, willing to make it all stop.
Why wasn’t it stopping?

Shatter hadn’t moved from her spot on the ground in a few minutes, primarily because she was just so damned tired. Her knee throbbed, her ribs ached and every inch of her body felt sore or tender. But even if she were to be physically alright, mentally and spiritually she was in worse shape. Why should she bother now? She couldn’t hurt anyone now, she was alone. Why should she fight herself to keep moving?



The voices were loud now, loud and many as they overlapped with one another. Syllables and volumes combatted each other for dominance in her head and it felt as if her skull was going to be torn open.
Shatter sighed and closed her eyes, rolling her head limply back onto the cold stone ground.
She was slowly losing the battle, and she knew it. She was desperately clinging to the last bit of control she had over her mind and the voices were prying her fingers off the ledge.
This is just shit. she thought glumly, too tired to feel angry or upset.

Sharp blinding pain jabbed through her temples like a mean hangover, forcing her to open her eyes. Gritting her teeth against the pain, she tried sitting up.

---crunch.

A strange, out-of-place sound that reminded her of crushed eggshells broke the silence, the sound loud and crisp in the damp air. Shatter bristled, on high alert. She twisted to her right in hopes to get a better view of her surroundings.
---crack.
This time it was much louder and she felt it.
Her breath staggered, and her eyes immediately fell to her right side, right where she had been bleeding.
The sound was coming from under her shirt, but strangely she felt no pain. Gingerly, Shatter pulled at the hem of her shirt, slowly pulling it up to expose the wound.

The bleeding had stopped, and the wound itself didn’t seem too deep. But the skin around it was now completely discolored, to a sickly bluish-pale, and the raw flesh was black as pitch. Thin, thready veins branched out around the gaping wound in a bluish web, contrasting heavily against the unnaturally drained skin color.
Shatter inhaled sharply, fear stabbing into her chest in painful pangs.
The hooded monster had clawed her in a way that curved up toward her rib, making the wound look like a black-lipped smile.
Like the hooded creature.

A horrifying understanding struck her cold.
She was turning into one of them.
...But soon the others will follow, they always do.
What the stranger didn’t warn her about was about turning into one of the ‘others’.

Shatter gingerly pressed at the discolored skin. It crinkled like old wrinkled paper, and it was unnaturally cold to the touch.

“So that’s why you can hear them too.”

A strange squeak escaped Shatter at the sudden voice that resonated in her head, completely drowning out the disembodied voices. But she remembered that voice.

“Looks like the process has begun.” the girl muttered, sounding irritated. “It won’t be long now.”

Panic shook Shatter to the core at the girl’s revelation. She glanced, left and right, up and down the broken church as she searched for the speaker. Not a soul could be seen around her, no one came out from the shadows to reveal themselves. But there was no mistaking that voice; it was the same stranger from her dream.

“Listen Shatter, I can’t hear you respond, since our connection is poor at best. If you’re still able to understand me. And that’s if you aren’t too far gone.” she heard the girl say. “Mind you, I’m not holding my breath; your odds are shit.”

She’s still chatty...and rude. Shatter thought.

“In the miraculous case that you can still hear me, I will say this: for fuck’s sake, keep fighting. I don’t want to have to…”

The stranger stopped talking, cursing angrily under her breath at someone.
“Just keep moving. I’ll come find you.” she said.

Whatever this strange one-way conversation was, Shatter had a feeling she was just hung up on. Slowly, she got back to her feet and warily straightened to a full stand. She still throbbed, ached and hurt all over.
But for the first time in what felt like a long time, Shatter felt better, sharper. Because all she could hear now was silence.