You're Different to Me

Desesitizing

We woke the next day, his arms embraced me tightly. I didn't want to wake up and face these terrors again. I tried to go back to sleep but Frank could tell I was awake. He gently rubbed my back for a few seconds before sitting up and stretching his arms. He reached over to kiss me on the forehead before moving to the edge of the bed to stand. He pulled his pants on and began rummaging through the wardrobe for his jacket. I pulled the covers over my head and kept my eyes shut. He continued to get dressed before walking over to my side of the bed. He gave my shoulder a soft shake trying to convince me to come out. I pulled the sheets down just below my eyes and looked at him.
"Come on sleepy head, I have some stuff to teach you." He said smiling, holding up the mask he had made for me. Frank had taken on a more light-hearted tone while talking about the trials, somehow it did make me feel a bit better. I pulled down the sheets and sat up straight. Frank had already placed my mask and my hoodie on the side of the bed he went to his nightstand to grab his own mask. I pushed my arms through the sleeves and then pulled on my thigh-high socks. I carefully picked up my mask, looking at it as I held it in my hands. I took a deep breath and placed it on my face, pulling my hood up after. Frank reached for my hand and I gripped him tightly. He lead me outside the room and we walked until we made it outside. Ghostface was no longer there, but the blood spatter still remained. I followed him to the familiar gate where he stopped and turned to me. He held my hand upright as he placed the grip of my knife in my palm. He closed my fingers around the weapon and then released my hand.
"Just take your time with things, we'll get through this together."
I gripped my knife and nodded at him then we walked through the large gate once again.
We walked as the scenery began to change around us, the darkness turning to light.
"I made sure we came here," Frank said as we continued forward. We were back at the snowy resort, the first time I had ever met Frank, the first time I had ever been in trial. The icy wind blew against my skirt, snow sticking to my clothes. It felt different, I felt no temperature change, it was the same as Frank's room.
"Follow behind me and well... if you did want to get in on this.." he laughed with a somewhat psychotic tone to his voice.  I tried to clear my head as I ran off behind him. He soon found a group of survivors unaware of his presence. They scattered as he started his sprint with his knife raised. He hit one, causing them to yell before switching to his next target.
"It's the same pain I felt, it's lessened, the entity made sure of it.." I thought to myself hoping to make any kind of light on the situation.  I seemed to have lost track of Frank, trying to keep my mind off of the unfavorable task at hand. I had never seen any of these survivors before, a group of men hardened by the trials. I saw one of them stray, seemingly uninjured. I decided to follow him silently trying to understand how this would play out. He wasn't doing any generators, passing by multiple as I watched him. He turned towards my direction and I crouched behind a rock in hopes he didn't see me. I heard his footsteps grow closer and I was unsure what to do. He stood in front of me and sneered,
"Who the fuck are you?" His animosity caught me by surprise. I had only ever seen survivors run in fear during trial. Even if I wasn't the killer, why did he already seem to hate me so much? I rose to my feet not saying a word. He immediately lunged at me, attempting to punch me dead in the face. I dodged out of the way with reflexes I had only felt one other time. I heard another scream ring out from the distance which momentarily distracted me until I felt a hard numbing pressure against my face as I fell backward. My mask had been hit off my face with a blunt object that my vision was too blurry to see. I quickly held my hands over my face trying to hide my identity.
"You're not so tough, this is a fucking joke." He turned to leave when I saw a blur from my left. The man lay on the ground, struggling against Frank pushing his hunting knife towards his throat. I reached over to grab my mask and place it back over my face before standing up, knife in hand. Frank grunted pushing the knife closer to his throat. He laughed,
"Your first mistake was touching my girl.." he pushed harder. I made my way over to the two of them, my emotions feeling numb. I knelt next to the struggling man as he looked over at me. I whispered,
"Your second mistake was underestimating me." I pressed my palm against the back of Frank's knife and pushed hard, doubling the knife's strength and plunging it into the man's throat. He stopped struggling as his limbs went limp and he lay there in the snow. I pulled the knife out of his neck as I stood up, wiping it on my hoodie sleeve before handing it back to Frank. He hesitated before taking it from my hand. I felt this energy building up inside me, my vision became clouded with a red light. The one thing I could clearly make out was pulsating red areas moving from far away. I held my head in my hands grunting slightly.
"Frank... I'm seeing things, over there it's moving." I pointed to where I saw the redness in my vision. He looked at me and cocked his head,
"Get them." I felt my legs break into a sprint with unrelenting stamina as my body took control instead of my brain. I raised my knife in the air, just as Frank had when the redness turned into a person. He emitted the same aura as the last, overconfidently laughing as I chased behind him. He quickly vaulted a window, but I vaulted it faster. His cockiness seemed to fade away as I became within arms reach. I lunged on top of him, plunging my knife deep into his back, pushing it in with both hands. I swiftly stood up ripped out my knife and sprinted again. Within a few seconds, I found the last one, taunting me as I drew near.
"You're just a little girl," he laughed, " you couldn't take me on if you tried." He stopped running and tried to drop a large pallet on top of me. I slid myself over the fallen wood with one hand, landing a hit on his side. I felt my vision go black for a few seconds as I grunted holding my head. The red blotches were gone but my body kept going. I walked over to the man swinging my knife around in my hand. The large metal door that I had seen all those weeks ago flung open next to him. He tried to crawl as I put my foot up against the hatch, kicking it shut in front of him.
"What are you waiting for? Too fucking delicate to finish me off? I mean shit, what could I expect from a weakling like you. I couched next to him feeling my muscles tensing in my arms. I grabbed the back of his shirt, miraculously lifting him with one arm onto my shoulder. No matter how much he struggled, he could not shake my grasp.
I threw him with all my might onto a large nearby hook.
"You're not worth the effort to kill with my own hands," I said turning around and walking away as I heard the large claws of the entity rip him apart. In front of me stood Frank, seemingly waiting for me to speak. I ran and hugged him unable to say a word. He held me tight as I buried my face into him.
"I'm really proud of you love... you stood up for yourself, and you put those bastards in their places." He said while hugging me tighter. I lifted my face slightly to look up at him,
"What- what did I just see? What did I just do?" My voice trembled slightly.
"It's the frenzy, it resides within me too. It's our power of the realm to carry out the process of the trial. You've gained a new instinct. The entity had recognized you as one of us." He sounded comforting. The thought didn't seem to sting as much, though I was still uncomfortable with the title.
"I'm... I'm not a killer." I said trying to convince myself more than Frank. He held my face trying to comfort me more.
"Let's head back okay? We can clean up your clothes." He held my hand trying to walk with me. I hadn't even realized the mess I had caused, the entire front of my body, from my mask down, was splattered with fresh blood. I looked down at my trembling hands that were leaving stains on Franks. He looked back at me as I hadn't started walking yet. I shook the thoughts out of my mind and forced my feet to take me forward as the light began to fade to black again. We walked through the wooden gates of the camp and approached the campfire that now had an unsettling reputation in my mind. We took a detour and walked to the back side of the cabin where a small lake glistened in the moonlight. Frank took off his bloodied jacket while kicking off his shoes and waded into the water. He held his hand out to me, inviting me to come with him. I pulled off my shoes as well, pulling my arms out of my hoodie and pushing it over my head. I stepped into the lukewarm water as Frank picked me up bridal style and waded through the water. It felt like my tenseness melted away into the water as I let him carry me. I leaned my head back submerging my hair in the weak current. Frank slipped my mask off of my face allowing the water to flow against my skin. He took off his own mask, gently throwing them onto the shoreline by our discarded outerwear. He washed his face with the water and slicked back his hair. I hung on to him as the water was too deep for me to touch.
"I used to come here a lot after trials, to cleanse myself and put my mind at ease. That was when I sensed you." He said looking down at me.
"I felt you were close, and that's when I found you that night in the field." It was hard for me to imagine how close I had gotten to the killer's realm without realizing it, and how lucky I was that Frank was the one to find me. He picked me up in his arms, holding me to his chest while holding me up by gripping the bottom of my thighs. I wrapped my arms around the back of his neck resting my head against his shoulder,
"I'm glad you found me."