RED
Blood, so much blood.
It's all she can see.
The once stark white walls were now coated in the substance, a painting of brilliant red smeared across all surfaces of the room. Furniture soaked in the viscous liquid, its reach slowly spreading, seeping, into every crevice like water spilling from an overflowing glass. So much red. The stench of death lingering thick in the air, overbearing, suffocating, leaving no room for her thoughts.
The blood was nauseating but the pain was unbearable.
Her body ached in a way she couldn't describe. Limbs contorting unnaturally as she shook in place, bones snapping and then mending themselves back together in a never-ending cycle. Her blood felt thick in her body, pumping, pumping, pumping, she couldn't think of anything else. It felt as if her veins were on fire.
Her pulse drummed in her head, like the steady dripping of a leaking faucet. Is that even her own pulse? She wasn't sure anymore. Her body felt like death. Her mind was spinning violently images of the bloody room morphed into faceless bodies, scenes, memories? She couldn't tell anymore. What was happening? Where was she? She couldn’t tell anymore. All she had was her aching body and red. So much goddamn red. She claws at her body, begging for some sense of control. Nails tear through skin painting her form the same brilliant red that coated her vision.
Thick, thick blood. Red blood.
Her head hurts.
Her mouth ached with a thirst. Such a strong thirst. Her hands moved to claw at her neck, the thirst burning through her body with an intensity she had never known before. She opens her mouth to scream but no sound is released. Her shaking body is unable to make any noise. Her thought felt raw, had she been screaming before? She couldn’t tell anymore. All she can see is red.
Red, red, red,
RED.
Faith’s eyes jolt open as she lets out an anguished cry, salty tears riveting down her clammy face. Her limbs tangled inside her bedsheets as she sits atop the solid mattress, breath heavy and languid inside her heaving lungs. The lasting residue of her nightmare coating her senses in a thick layer of fear. Her hands reach blindly towards the alarm she only now notices is blaring its obnoxious tune, slamming against it to silence its shrill cries. It goes quiet. Her own breathing now the only sound in the room.
She blinks, slow, shuddering blinks to clear the remnants of her tears as she brushes her sleeve across her face, the dampness now soaking into the cloth. Her legs shake as she kicks the blankets off of her body taking her time moving as her mind is so frayed. Her body, now uncovered, begins to shake less as it adjusts to the cool air of her room. Cool air?
Her eyes snap from their unfocused stare at the floor to her window, once again left slightly ajar. The dark green curtains fluttering gently in the morning breeze, the scent of dew on the wind. Normally Faith wouldn't think twice about her forgetting to close the window but not today. Today her mind is clouded by the paranoia that had been permeating every thought since the start of the attacks.
The brunette quickly scrambles up off the floor and towards the window, shutting it forcefully once her body reaches it. She looks through the window towards the world outside, scouring for something amiss amid the undergrowth. Nothing catches her eye and yet she draws the curtains closed tightly before turning around and surveying her room in a similar manner. The sickening feeling of being watched still permitting her mind even after the opening to the room is covered.
She staggers back towards her bed and falls on top of the mess of sheets with a shaky grunt, her body giving up on trying to support her weight. The tears that had momentarily halted during her panicked closing of the window promptly returning to her face.
Faith sits there in the fall out of her nightmare. Sobs racking her body as she descends into her paranoia-fueled panic. First the nightmare and then the window? What god had decided to forsake her today…
The girl pauses for a moment, interrupting her thoughts as she replays the words back to herself. Wait, what was that nightmare about? She tries harder to remember what has gotten her so worked up but no matter how hard she tries to recall the events of the dream, she can't. All she knows is that it was most definitely a nightmare, she doubts her body would have become so riled up if it was simply a dream. Her memories of the night, although minimal and clouded, were still more coherent than the previous night she couldn't quite remember, and to that, she clung.
She sits there, her body slowly going still as she calms down. Her breathing returning to a more normal level and the panic clouding her mind receding somewhat. Everything in our world has a cause, a root that creates the issue. There is nothing to worry about. She’s simply stressed about what's happening in town with the animal attacks and her newfound friendship? With the two Cullen siblings. (although she would hesitate to call herself friends with them yet, especially with how badly all of their previous encounters with them had gone as of late)
Yeah, that's it. Her dreams must be as a result of the stress of what's happening in her normally mild and subdued life. Faith’s mind starts drifting back to when her family disappeared, she had had similar dreams back then but they were nowhere near as impactful as the ones she was having currently. Usually only leaving her slightly more exhausted than she had been the night before.
Her alarms beeps again beside her, a warning beep that she had been taking too long to mull around in her thoughts. Her eyes widen in panic as she realises the time, picking herself off the bed quickly, her previous panic almost completely forgotten as she starts her routine.
Faith drags herself through the morning, quickly getting ready for another tedious day at school. She exits her room and begins to walk down the hallway quickly, not wanting to be late for yet another day this week. As she continues down the hallway she passes down all of the usual doors without much thought. But as she continues her trek she starts to slow, her eyes focusing on the ajar door to the left side of her, her guardian Mia’s bedroom.
“Hey, Mia! Sorry about the past few days I was in a bad mood but I'm feeling a bit better now and want to make it up to you if possible."
The house remains silent, her words the only sound filling the air. Confused at the lack of response she calls out once again while continuing towards the entrance to Mia’s room.
"Mia? I said I'm sorry, please don't give me the silent treatment. I'm not a child anymore."
She slows to a complete stop as she approaches the slightly open door. Her mind whirring as the panic from before re-establishes its hold on her psyche. Mia doesn't leave her door open, not now, not ever. In the two years, Faith had known the older woman there had been few constants, don't skip school, don't raise your voice and don't go into Mia’s room
The younger girl had always tried to obey her guardians reasonably innocuous requests, the door to Mia’s room always remaining firmly shut. She had no reason to disrespect her wishes so she never had. But now?
The door was open and the house was unnervingly silent. No sounds coming from the inside its walls except the creaking of its frame being battered by the sound of the storm outside. Faith pauses at the thought, the wind outside whistling violently at the siding of the house. When did it start raining?
The door creaks open slightly more as she walks towards it. Her eyes widen as she looks around the hallway for a source to the sudden movement. Finding nothing to explain the movement she realizes that it was likely just the natural airflow within the house. Shaking the worrying thoughts out of her head she continues to walk towards Mia’s room, this time her pace slower and more hesitant.
She reaches the cusp of the room and looks in to see nothing in the darkness of the room. She reaches her hand into the room and blindly pokes around on the part of the wall closest to the door where the lightswitch to the room is located. Her hand grazes it and she flicks it on, bright fluorescent light filling the small room in front of her.
"Mia?"
She draws back her hand and holds it close to her chest as she looks inside the now lit room. Her eyes studying it for any visible signs of irregularity in the slightly messy room. Most of the room seems to be in order, papers and trinkets strewn around in the same kind of organised chaos that the rest of the house is in. Despite this Faith couldn't help but feel a gnawing worry at the back of her mind.
Stepping fully into the space she takes in the sight of the walls she could not fully see from the hallway. Tacky wallpaper older than herself coats the walls of the room, off-white carpet that had seen better days spread across the floor. The room didn't contain many actual items of furniture. Just a bed, a desk and a few bookcases. Though even without being very full this the room managed to feel full of life due to all of Mia’s possessions.
The brown-haired girl turns away from looking at the bed and moves towards the desk to look at the papers stacked on top of the desks' dark wood surfaces. It’s then when she notices a glimpse of matt black from beneath some documents regarding her school schedule.
Shaking hands brush over the documents as she moves them to the side in order to reveal whatever she briefly caught a look at. Doing so reveals an open phone flipped onto its face, screen pointing down. Placing the documents down and out of the way she picks the phone up.
Huh?
It's Mia’s phone. Faith’s confusion grows as she takes in the fact that it’s Mia’s newest phone, the one that she’s still currently using. Mia never leaves her phone at home when she goes out, Faith having gotten worried about her when waking up alone in the house one too many times over the years.
She presses the power button on the side of the phone and watches the screen spring to life. She navigates from the lock screen onto the main screen, her confusion only growing as she realises that her guardian had been in the middle of attempting to make a call less than an hour ago.
Why the hell was she trying to call Chief Swan that early in the morning?
She turns towards the stack of books that are being used in place of a bedside table, towards the digital clock at the top of the pile. Eight o'clock, so that call was made half an hour before Faith had woken up.
She flips the phone closed and pockets it walking back out into the hallway. Her guardian had to be around the house somewhere.
"Mia this isn't funny anymore. I get that you're probably upset with me but you should come out now! I'm going to be late coming to school because of you!"
She follows the hallway towards the front end of the house that holds the kitchen and other communal rooms. Hoping that maybe she had just been too immersed in something to hear the brunette girl's calls.
As she passes the kitchen she pauses once again. The faucet is still running and there's food on the counter half prepared.
"Mia? Come on please come out!"
Faith walks further into the kitchen, turning the faucet off and then looking down at the food on the bench. It's nowhere near finished, something must have distracted her enough to leave it. Which is odd behaviour considering that cooking is her favourite pastime, it was usually quite hard to drag her away from cooking.
She turns back the way she came and walks to the end of the hallway. Making her way into the room she scans the living room briefly, not initially noting the major thing wrong with the scene before her. As she scans the rest of the room she feels a breeze tickle her arm lightly.
Her eyes snap back towards the centre of the room, towards the front door thrown wide and open. With shaky steps, she walks towards the open door taking in the scene in more detail now that she's closer to it. The knob on the door is completely fine but the hinges of the door are almost destroyed. The thin metal torn through like a knife through flesh.
She turns around and looks back down the way she came a scream ripping from her throat as she sees a shadowy figure darting across the room, too quick to see any definite deal but slow enough to make he know she was not alone in the house anymore and that whoever was with her was not her guardian at all.
Her feet start working faster than her thoughts, the body’s base level instinct of fight or flight activated. Loud steps smash against the concrete pavers of the street beneath her as she runs away from her home. The sound of the rubber soles of her converse and her heartbeat pounding in her ears, snuffing out any of the sounds that could be heard around her.
Faith doesn't dare look behind her. Doesn't dare check to see if she’s been followed by whatever THAT THING was. All she can think to do is run, run faster than she had ever done so before. At the edge of the block, she loops around the pathway and runs back towards her house hoping whatever was in her house had run the other way in hopes of getting away.
She had to go back.
She can’t just leave that house without knowing where Mia had gotten too. If she didn't she could be leaving her to whoever had broken in. After all, Mia has done for her she couldn't allow that.
Running past her neighbours' houses she finally makes it back to her own house. Preparing to jump her fence and go back into her house and make sure that Mia isn't in there.
She couldn't leave the other woman on her own. She just couldn’t
Grabbing the top of the fence Faith jams her foot into a broken section of planks and hoists herself over the top of the structure. The momentum ends up being more than she had expected causing her to lose her balance in the middle of her ascension and tip over the top of the fence. Crashing onto the hard soil of her back garden, a crunch sounding as she lands directly on Mia’s phone that had been left forgotten in her pocket.
Picking herself up off the ground she turns towards the back of the house. Her thoughts die inside her as she lets out a guttural scream at what she sees.
The body of a woman, thrown into the shrubbery towards the middle back of the garden. Her once light clothes painted a brilliant, vibrant red.
“Oh my god.”
The brunette girl's body shakes as she walks towards the body, the morbid curiosity of being a human taking hold of her mind and forcing her to keep walking closer despite her desire to run far far away from whatever her life has become. Much like all the cars on a road slowing down to watch the aftermath of an accident.
As soon as she’s close enough to see recognisable features on the woman she immediately regrets her decision. It was plain and clear. This was Mia’s body. Despite the destruction, it was definitely her. The body's mangled state and the untouched face left completely clean of that viscous red liquid almost as if it were a bow upon a poorly wrapped gift.
For a second Faith ponders as to whether she could call the entrails leaking out of the woman the ribbon upon the gift. Though as soon as that thought passes her mind so does inescapable nausea at the fact that those kinds of thoughts could even cross her mind at this time. She falls down next to the body, accidentally touching some of the leakage, causing her to dry wretch hard enough for her to fall down next to the body. Barely enough time to turn her head and vomit her guts out in the other direction.
With her stomach empty and her mind full of static she gets up off the ground and makes her way through the back door of the house. Too deep in shock to notice the same red liquid as outdoors painting the walls and floor of the sections of the house that she hadn't checked earlier that day.
Her walk continues without her thoughts once again taking her out of her house and down the street. Not stopping once in her journey despite the numerous overlapping sounds of car horns that blare her way because of her bloody and dishevelled state as she makes her way to her one happy place. The one she had gone to enough in her life for its route to be mapped into her mind like a tattoo.
The woods between her house and her school.
As soon as she steps foot into the forest the smell of fresh air fills her lungs but she coughs it out like its ash. Continuing her walk mindlessly until she finds her legs failing as she falls down against a large rock deep into the heart of the woods. Fingers scraping against her neck in a vain attempt to stop the sobs wracking her small frame. The full intensity of the situation finally hitting her as she realises what she has just borne witness too.
Mia was dead.
Not just dead, mutilated.
Ripped to pieces
The thought just makes her cry even harder mucus filling her throat as she screams in anguish. Nails ripping through her skin as she tries to hold herself together desperately. Her whole world falling apart in front of her once again.
“WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY!”
She screams until her throat is raw and then cry and wails and then starts the process all over again.
In her agony, she doesn't notice the figure who had been following her every move creeping closer to her withering form. The figure who had been keeping their eyes on her ever since before she was even aware of anything out of the usual at all. Eyes that had traced her figure time and time again. The same eyes that had been attached to the body that has been sitting across from her in her room as she slept, so sweetly, so unaware.
What a beautiful creature lay before him. He had been enjoying this game of cat and mouse very much. But sadly it couldn't go on forever, could it? He’d have to end his fun sometime, after all, good things must come to an end.
He’d just have to make sure that it was a brilliant end, worthy of how much fun she had been to play with. The rest of the people in her life were simply wasting her potential as a canvas. That simply would not do now, would it?
Yes. She was much more deserving of him and his methods.
He walks towards his prize. Laying there so serene and unaware.
He had been having so much fun seeing her almost pick up on the hints he was leaving for her. After all, he had been pursuing her for quite some time. It was a shame she didn't notice them sooner. Though he couldn't say he hated taking all of her family as collateral, it was only fair for how long she had left him waiting
He licks his lips as he crouches down beside her shaking form, so pretty terrified.
How good would she taste?
A morsel savoured is surely better than one tasted any other way.
He grasps her arm harshly and turns her over so she's facing him. Petrified green eyes meeting hungry red as the two figures stare at each other, eyes locked in an intense and sudden connection. Faith’s body stilling to a violent tremble as a new wave of shock takes over her body at the sight of the strange new figure in front of her. She riggles slightly attempting to get out of this strange man’s stern grip, eyes going even wider as she feels his grip tightening on her body.
A tongue glides across smiling lips as the figure readies to strike at his target, taking in the final light of fear within Faith’s eyes before he plunges his fangs into her neck brutally. A scream rips from her throat as she flails around violently trying to shake her attacker off but his larger frame keeps her pinned to the damp forest floor she had taken refuge on only minutes before.
Once satisfied with the amount of blood taken from the neck of the girl beneath him he begins to bite around on various parts of her body laughing maniacally every time his feverish assault elicits a scream or cry from her throat.
After what feels like hours of torture her body stills beneath his touch, her blood depleted and his venom taking hold of her veins. Seeing her unmoving form the man picks his body up off the group and moves away slightly to admire his artwork. He grabs a cigarette out of his pocket and lights it before taking a drag and smiling slightly as he looks down at the mess he's made of his target. A brilliant painting of red splattering the ground below him.
The game was worth it for his prize.
He sighs, only slightly disappointed at how long she lasted. For he had hoped she could have lasted a tiny bit longer considering all of the work he put in to get her. His pace is slow and easy as walks away from the scene. Before he can get too far from the girl's body his leg is stopped by a cold force. Looking down towards his now stopped leg he sees a pale limb grabbing his ankle, following to his source he spots the girl whom he thought to be dead. Unable to do anything he watches in horror as his ankle is snapped under the force of the hand, his body falling harshly to the forest floor with a thud. He screams out loudly at the agony, his body on fire with pain.
Unable to move or run he looks back towards his assailant, locking eyes with her once again. But unlike before her eyes a brilliant red, the same red that is mirrored in his own sockets. The pupils fade and distort before the iris swallows the colour of the eye, turning them a harsh and soulless black. The sign of hunger. He starts to kick at her, but a newborn is at its most powerful when it needs to be fed and right now Faith is insatiable.
All he can do is claw desperately at her as she scales his body and digs her fingernails into his arms. Ignoring his desperate, pitiful screams, in favour of looking inquisitively at the small amount of blood she was able to draw from jamming her fingers into him. She leans down close to the blood to take a tentative sniff.
Immediately her gaze snaps from the small wound to the man's jugular as she dives in with her fangs having recognised the scent of her food source based only on newfound instincts. Taking a large chunk out of the man’s neck in her haste, a raw scream ripping through his throat before it soon fades and becomes nothing but a gurgle as the blood spurting begins to fill his throat and lungs. Faith continues her feast without pause, savouring the taste of her newest delight. The heart of the man below her beating slower and slower until it's beats echo no longer.