Lost Child/Prologue Dream 3
Apostasy goes to bed exhausted in a room nearby REDACTED and Sori, not bothering to return to her own bedroom at the red court, perhaps because of how much it reminds her of the missing Kale. She feels agitated the dream of her mate still stuck in her mind from before. When she finally falls asleep, her dreams move swiftly into something, pulling her intensely instead of the gradual shift from before. She wakes up as she splashes into water, clutching for breath trying to pull herself to a surface she can't see. Her eyes open and sting immediately at the silty water.
Apostasy squeezes her eyes shut again, and kicks out upwards, propelling herself through the water, lungs burning as they scream for oxygen. The disorientation of the situation is firmly held down by the needs of the moment, getting herself back above water.
Apostasy's head breaks the surface for air after kicking mostly directionless at first, she quickly realizes she's in moving water, a river of some sort, water cresting in rapids, as the narrow river twists about and splits around rocky islands.
Apostasy kicks out towards the riverbank, fighting to keep her head above the water as the river pulls her further downstream. She does her best to avoid being propelled into any rocks, but every now and then still finds herself slammed painfully against one. Nevertheless, she pushes on towards the bank until she gets close enough that the water has calmed enough for her to stand, at which point she slowly walks up onto dry ground. "Where the hell am I now?" she asks, as she looks around. She shivers, and realizes quickly whose body she is in again. Kale's smaller frame is battered by the winds. The sky is grey and overcast, rain is on the way. On the shore side there is a thick cover of trees, but beyond that, a parking lot can be seen, with a few abandoned vehicles.
Apostasy makes her way into the trees out of the wind, and takes stock of the situation. "Right. Kale again. So, somewhere in northern Oregon, probably." She shivers again, and rubs at a particularly sore spot on her side. Seeing the parking lot, she heads over to it, looking about for any sort of signage that might give a clue as to a more exact location.
Apo's skin crawls as she hears a strange howl that hits her to the core, one she recognizes from her childhood. It's off in the distance, on the other side of the river. She knows now why Kale threw herself in there.
Most of the vehicles were left locked, but could be broken into. Two of them open up with no trouble, but no keys inside.
Apostasy winces at the sound of the howl. "Good call jumping into the river to escape that one, Kale..." She rummages around inside the unlocked cars for something that might give a clue as to location.
She sees some general maps of Oregon, food wrappers and other garbage, and a wallet someone stupidly left in a glove compartment, inside it's a young man's picture, dirty blond, listed as 22, and the city/town lists Barton, OR. Looking outside the car Apo recognizes a sign off in the distance, Barton County Park.
Apostasy staggers a little as she sees the sign. "Barton... no... why here, Kale? Why would you come here?" She collects herself, and tosses the wallet back into the car. "Hope you're alright, buddy.... though I doubt it." Overcome by a morbid curiosity, she heads towards the park exit, following the road towards the town, keeping her an ear out for sounds of anything nearby. Apostasy's memory creeps back in, the surroundings familiar. Although she spent a majority of her time either in school, or locked in her room, she did still remember the area she lived in. The town was modest, a major route going through the main hub of the town, which features a weird mixture of farms, and upper class mansions.
Apostasy wanders through the town, looking at the half-remembered sights, and the damage that a year and a half of neglect following the chaos of P-day has done to them. Without really realising it, her feet are taking her on the route to her old home, subconscious memory taking over and following the one path it remembers from this place.
Apostasy remembers some of the chaos that ensued during P-day, the fleeing through the fields, the town being overrun by those... creatures. She has a hard time even visualizing them like her memory is blocking it. They came, and raped, and ate, the town members. Cars with busted windows mark where people where -pulled- from their vehicles. Nearly every house sporting a broken door or window.
As she walks past one car, a small blue hatchback, something like familiarity tugs at her attention. She stops, and stares at the car for a while, trying to figure out why it seems familiar, when realisation dawns. "Sam... they got you too... I'm so sorry....." Tears well up in her eyes as memories of the one person she had in her home town that might have been called a friend come rushing back. She turns from the car as tears run down her face, and continues along the path, moving on autopilot as memories run through her mind, of the excuses she made to keep her friend from ever visiting her house, the lies she told about her frequent bruises.
The town itself is deserted, most of the citizens having been chased in the direction of Portland, the creatures having swarmed the city from the east. The familiar way through one of her neighbour’s cornfield remains, although the tall grasses and weeds having taken root without the corn being maintained.
Apostasy trails a hand against the corn as she walks through the field, by now aware of where her path has taken her. A grim determination sets her features as she continues along the path to her house.
The sights, and the smells are familiar, digging deep into the recesses of her memory. The few years her father allowed her to walk home from school, this very field she wove her way through those days. Over the tall grass Kale's frame has a hard time seeing far into the distance, so the three story house that Apostasy remembers as her own almost sneaks up on her. She shudders at the sight, it's pale yellow paint, thick guttering lining the gambrel roof.
Apostasy slows down, and stops, as she comes up on her house. A cold shiver runs down her spine as an enormous sense of trepidation overcomes her. She mumbles, "It's just a house... it's just a house..." as she clenches her fists tight and starts to move forwards again, towards the door.
The front door is actually intact, open and unlocked though from the party that was being thrown for her father. Back behind the house is a large yard and a pool, with a guest house made out of a converted barn. Both her aunts’ families where in town, her father's sisters always supportive of their brother.
As Apo moves up towards the door and steps inside, the ghosts of sounds whispering through the air; children laughing as they play, her aunts and uncles talking, the splashing of people in the pool... all the sounds of that fateful day when everything went to hell. Floorboards creak underfoot as she makes her way slowly through the house, peering into the rooms as she passes by.
The downstairs of the house has a wide open kitchen area, with glass looking off into the back patio, the glass door shattered and the glass strewn about. The large dining room takes up much of the front of the house, and there's an entertaining room with a wet bar that her dad loved to use. Apostasy moves behind the wet bar, looking for the rifle she knew her father kept there, loaded and ready to use at all times. She takes the weapon before moving up the stairs, comforted in some small way by the presence of the weapon.
Up the first flight of stairs brings her up to the master bedroom and the study. Her father's room makes her shudder, the plastered over dents in the wall where her mother's head broke the gypsum. The study is dark and foreboding, equally reminding her of her father.
Apostasy moves quickly up the stairs again, spending as little time as possible in what amounted to the centre of her father's domain as possible.
Apostasy comes to the top floor, her room, and it's complex locking system with four deadbolts and a chain, the hole she kicked in the door to try to get free still boarded over.
A sudden fury comes over Apo as she sees the door, and she sets the gun aside before forcefully tearing it from its hinges and throwing it aside. She steps into the room and looks over her meagre possessions, the room seemingly unchanged from when she escaped. The few books she was allowed sit on top of the dresser, which is securely attached to the ground to prevent her moving it. A couple of ragged stuffed animals sit on the bed, water stained from her tears when she cried into them as a young child, in the years before the tears stopped. She shudders and leaves the room quickly, before the lingering despair and terror sink into her mind.
Apostasy remembers to grab the rifle before returning down the stairs. She stops when her senses detect something out of place, some kind of snuffling downstairs on the bottom floor.
Apostasy freezes on the stairs, and very carefully checks the safety is off on the rifle. She holds it up against her shoulder as she starts slowly down the stairs again, constantly scanning for the source of the sound as she moves.
The sounds echo in the back of apostasy's mind, the heavy breathing, the sound of multiple nostrils from a single twisted creature. She remembers now, what they looked like. The deep jet black skin, mottled with patchy stringy fur. Big jutting tentacles always searching and feeling. Their eyeless gaze with four large nostrils that they used to guide them.
Apostasy almost misses a step as the memory of what the creatures look like flashes back into her mind, the action creating a loud creak and thud as she barely rights herself. She instalty freezes in place, barrel of the rifle pointed unwaveringly at the stairs to the ground floor, as she waits to see if the creature heard and wants to investigate. Her every instinct screams at her to run, but trained reflex keeps her steady and grounded, awaiting what comes next.
The creature comes into view around the corner, tracking a scent toward the staircase. It's many tentacles reaching out, feeling at the walls, with the two longest ones acting almost like hands, the cupped and clawed shape reminiscent of a squid's.
The rifle cracks as Apo fires, the bullet aimed right between where its eyes should be. She cycles the action and fires again, this bullet aimed a little lower.
The creature's brain opens onto the floor, however within a short few seconds it's melted into the ground in the familiar pack manner.
Apostasy blinks. "Shit. These things are a pack mind? Things are about to get really interesting, I think..." She waits for the remnants of the creature to evaporate away in the usual manner, and then quickly heads downstairs, alert for sounds of more incoming. She heads straight to the wet bar and grabs the box of ammunition for the rifle, reloading it and then shoving more bullets into her pockets. "Think... think... gotta get somewhere safe... where?"
Apostasy begins to feel dizzy, the familiar feelings of Kale rejecting her, and she begins to vomit up the same blackness she remembers from before.
This time her faithful companion isn't in sight as her last memories of Kale are her looking up and seeing legs, and shoes. Her father's shoes.
Apostasy jolts upright in her bed with a cry of "KALE!" She looks about. "No... no, I need to go back... I need to get her out of there..." The last thing she saw suddenly rises to the forefront of her mind. "How could it be him? I saw him... I saw him changing... he should be one of them..." She climbs out of the bed and starts getting dressed. "Need to get up there... have to save her..." She grabs Silverfang and places it into its straps on her back as she heads out the door, but stops with her hand on the doorknob. "No... stupid... playing right into his hands. Need to bring other people." She calms herself a little, and heads out the door.
