SUNNYVALE

(15) NOBODY CAN EVEN READ DAMN ROMAN NUMBERS

Abby's eyes open, and everything about her vision was dark and seemed unreal.

She immediately felt the grass and dirty first grounds under her whole body, especially in her hair, as her eyes are barely even seeing the sky because of all the trees, that seemed even bigger than usual. Grunting, she tries to turn her head, but an unbearable pain bursts out from her face, especially around her eyes.

Crying in pain, she nonetheless manages to turn on her side, this time only seeing black dots blurring her vision. It takes her around five minutes to calm her breathing and mind, as she very slowly gets on her knees, trying to overcome the pain taking over her whole body. It wasn't quite physical or muscular, but rather came from the inside - a very odd sensation she had never experienced in her life before.

Suddenly, that's when she sees it: a shadow in the shape of a huge snake - far bigger than in her craziest nightmares, a creature coming from the underneath of Hell it seemed so. Every muscle of her body freezes, as the huge shadowy animal was approaching slowly, with a very high pitched hiss coming out of its mouth.

Abby doesn't move: she knows that such a big creature - so big that its body was bigger than Abby's size when seating - would only kill her if she moved. The creature slowly moves around her, surrounding her, and this high-pitched hiss suddenly turns into a slithery voice whispering:

Abigail...

As Abby's blood turns cold, she just only closes her eyes before the serpent surrounds her completely before releasing its grip. Sighing in relief, Abby opens her eyes and realises the creature had just vanished.

"What the fuck..." she whispers, getting over the pain because of stamina, getting up slowly.

She immediately feels a weird sensation in her eyes, and as she turns around to look around her, she almost lets a scream out: in between two trees, a human body was hanging with its wrists nailed to the wood or each one of them - but it wasn't a regular body, as all blood had been drowned out of it, only remaining was a sack of skin stretched out, and it makes Abby want to puke.

Suddenly, she realises: she knew this face, as it was Allie Long's - the body that disappeared two years ago, visibly the first victim.

This time, Abby cannot hold her nausea any further and throws up away from where she was standing, her body folding in two. Once she is done, she just walks farther away from the hanging body in a very Jesus-like position, until she realises there is an old inscription craved directly on the wood: MDCXCII - aka 1692.

Her eyes still burning, Abby whispers again:

"What the hell..."

She suddenly hears the voices again, getting closer and closer, whispering her name: Abigail... Abigaillll....

Only now does she decide to run: and so she does, not knowing where she'd go, still overwhelmed by the surrounding voices, that seemed to be so close yet so far from her. She lost every ounce of calm and courage she had, as she had never run that fast in her life - in the way, she even got a few scratches from trees, as well as some falls on the ground, cutting her knees and elbows.

Eventually, she finds her way out of the Black Forest, where she had been this whole time.

She gets to her house, breathless, and immediately runs to her room, praying that her father wasn't here - which he wasn't. She lost her phone, she lost everything, with no memory of what happened after the shadows knocked her unconscious. She locks herself in the bathroom, before jumping as she sees her reflexion in the mirror:

Her iris were red, and tears of blood were rolling down her cheeks. Her face seemed different - so different.

At that very moment, she knew that there was only one person she could talk with about the traumatic experience she's just had, and it did not overwhelm her with happiness: she needed to get her story straight to where she had been those last three days, because she knew her disappearance coincided with Caitlin Foord's death, so the cops would interview her.

She opens her laptop and frenetically types:

To: Tierna Davidson

Come to my place ASAP, it's a fucking emergency!!!

***

Sam frowns.

"Sam!" Kristie exclaims, visibly losing patience.

Sam is snapped out of her trance, as she watches her sister and her father stare at her with concern.

Shaking her head, she just said:

"Sorry, I got lost in my thoughts."

Kristie frowns - she knows her sister too well.

"As we were saying" she says, visibly both annoyed and concerned, her eyes going from her father to her sister. She stares right into her sister's eyes, continuing: "The police found weird marks on Caitlin's body."

"They haven't identified which animal it was yet?" Sam asks, turning to her father.

The man nods.

"No, they haven't: those marks are very unusual, but once again it could've been caused by wild animals since her body was found near the Sauerbrunn family's estate, in the West."

"The Sauerbrunns'?" Kristie repeats, frowning, "Aren't they an influential farmers' family in Westside?"

"Yes, they are - and although we never could get a warrant, I can bet you a hundred dollars each that they are not only rising cows and corn in that estate..."

Sam and Kristie exchange a look.

"Do you mean..." Kristie starts, but her father immediately answers:

"Drugs, yes, most likely Marijuana."

"What does it have to do with Caitlin's murder?" Sam asks, concerned.

"We don't know yet, but I brought the whole family into questioning at the station - you know, no Westsider is ever innocent, and as far as those murders goes, I can't see a good person from the Eastside being a serial killer, so..."

This somehow upsets Kristie.

"You don't know that" she coldly lets out, annoyed.

"I'm sorry, what did you just say?" Bob Mewis asks, every ounce of smile leaving his face all at once.

But his older daughter isn't scared of him the way Sam is.

"You're just assuming it's someone from the West because that's what we've been told our whole lives" Kristie goes on with confidence and recklessness, standing up to her father. As his eyes turn dark, she adds: "I, for one, don't think they're all so bad: I mean, the kids we've met at school are just regular kids."

Bob Mewis gets up, angrily, before harshly saying:

"You have no idea what you're talking about, girl, so I highly advise you to just shut up and stay in your place."

With his menacing eyes announcing just yet another violent encounter, Bob Mewis persuades his daughter to stop talking, before leaving the house, loudly closing the door behind him.

Sam and Kristie exchange a look, but neither talk to the other for the rest of the day.