Breath Into Me

Chapter Ten

The darkness had swallowed me up completely. At that point I was terrified...I had never been so afraid of anything in my life. Everything had gone away, swallowed me whole in a sense.

Come on Skylar! I shouted to myself. You have to wake up! Shake this off you! Get up!

But I couldn't. As hard as I tried, the darkness encased me as if I were being trapped inside a steal coffin. This was not good. I was dying. I was dying when I was in Heaven and still had a case to do.

Tyler...Justin...

The names of my brother and crush raced in my head. I failed them. I failed to protect them. I failed to salve them.

I heard Lucifer's laugh in my head as all the thoughts raced through my head. I was trapped in the darkness, engulfed by it. I stayed motionless, for there was nothing I could do. It was all I had left. All I could do was lay motionless and listen for any sign that I didn't die.

Please God....tell me I'm not dead. I begged. Not yet....

I struggled against the darkness, fighting for some form of confirmation that I wasn't dead. Until I felt someone grab me, a cry emerging from the darkness.

Tyler? Justin? The question of their names echoed through my head. Another blinding light shone through the darkness, and the only thing I could think of was I'm not dead. I can't be....

And sure enough, I wasn't. No....I was in a far worse predicament. Looking out over the new fields that spread out across my field of vision, my skin crawled and I wanted to shrivel up and rot. "Ah, hell."

Flames licked and jumped up to taste my skin, and the rotted air stung at my nose. The planes of Hell spread out before me, and the Fallen Angels with their Demon counterparts danced their way around me and towards me. The screams of tortured souls rang out from the burning pits that dotted the planes.

"Beautiful; is it not?" I heard Lucifer's voice state beside me.

The saddest thing was, was a part of me wanted to agree. As much as the air was foul, and rotted, it felt good against my skin on the plane. And the red grass that possibly had blood splattered on it's blades felt soft on my bare feet and ankles, hardly even bothered me with a tickle as it moved across my feet and ankles. And the dancing going on around me made my whole body want to join in the dance.

But in my heart, I knew. It was a trap that Lucifer had set up. It had to be, right? Hell was not supposed to be this beautiful, not to me...not to a servant of God. Clearing my throat and shoving all thoughts of the beauty that surrounded me down ruthlessly, I turned to look at Satan.

"Hardly. I've seen much more gorgeous views in Heaven, and it's a view you could never beat."

A melodic laugh escaped Lucifer, making him look as tempting as a calm, piranha filled lake. "Give it time....you'll eventually see it's beauty."

I shivered, but not from cold. From his words. The problem was that I was already gazing at the beauty, and wanted to go dance with the Fallen. But I couldn't. I wouldn't. Tyler and Justin and Joey were waiting for me. Either to wake up from this nightmare, or emerge from hell.

"What am I doing here, Lucifer?" I demanded cooly. I would not give him the pleasure of knowing my thoughts and hear the fear that I felt. I refused to.

"You're here so that I can have back the souls that you so easily stole from me." His voice was like chocolate slicked across razor blades. "Before you came in, I had those two just inches from my grasp, but now you've gone and mucked everything up! Now, I'll make you suffer and watch as I reclaim them!"

He guestired out towards the edge of my vision, where the once solid horizon now shimmered and swirled into a vortex; where the image was of Heaven, where Joey, Justin, and Tyler all were, huddled in the destroyed infirmary yelling at each other. I could see them, and the black, evil, darkness that spewed from their hearts.