SOULLESS

Chapter three - The Revealation in the Subway Station

The door slowly opened to a corridor.
The corridor was slightly lit. The walls had a dull brick wall pattern. The occasional bulbs on the arched ceiling quivered and stripped them of any positivity that they had if they had anything at all.
They passed many locked rooms but they walked on.
“Do you know where we’re going?” Lizzy asked Fez.
“No, but I believe we’re going to the right place,” Fez replied.
Ash and Martha held hands together and walked behind them silently.
Tired and bored, Fez waited on one of the doors and tried it but the door wouldn't open.
So, they went on where the boring corridor went.

Presently, they’ve come to a staircase and they felt a relief that at last the corridor came to an end.
They all descended the staircase. They observed that the air here was mustier than the corridor and they had a hard time breathing oxygen now.
They continued to go down the stairs and it smelled very bad, the more steps they took.
Everyone found the smell to be unbearable and covered their nose. It smelled like shit. They neared the end of the stairs.
Stepping down the last stair, there’s a strange feeling in everybody that they’re all nearing the boss fight stage of their journey. It was brightly lit at the end of the staircase by a bulb that didn’t waver.
They all took a look at each other, having reached the final stage of their mystery. Fez suddenly overtook everybody and took right off the corridor, he was shocked at what he saw.
“What do you see?” Lizzy asked. But he was too stunned to speak.
Everybody ran towards him and looked at what he saw.
“What the fuck” Martha can’t help but let it out at the sight of it.

They are standing at what looks like an abandoned subway train station and it is flooded with people. They are not normal people. They had huge red eyeballs and pointed noses that were distorted very badly, and they were almost naked, with the last bits of clothes holding on to their gnarled bodies. They had huge dirty nails that were chipped. Their little mouths repulsively twisted at the sight of normal human beings. It almost looked like their souls were sucked out of them and left on this abandoned subway station to rot. There among the soulless bodies, was their classmate Tyga peeking at them, his teary eyes screaming for help. Upon seeing her long-lost friend, Lizzy let out a yelp and Martha immediately covered Lizzy's  mouth.

Enormous columns towered over the station, casting long shadows across the space. At the center, a pedestal stood proudly, crowned with an emerald-hued statue of a child engrossed in a book.
They descended the four long steps and stood on the station. The right of them was a dead end and contained heaps of gravel. and to the left, they saw a rusted train on the track at a distance.

Though the soulless bodies looked villainous, they didn't try to attack them; in fact they looked scared of them and crawled to a corner and hid themselves. Only their huge red eyeballs are visible now.
Their eyes spoke of jealousy at the same time, begging these humans for help.
It was the most depressing sight they’d ever been to or ever laid their eyes on.
Tearful, Lizzy said “They need to be taken out of this hell,” And yes, the place did look a lot like hell.
“I think it would be a wonder if we got out of this hell,” Martha remarked. 
While she said that, there was a rustle at the side of the station that was hidden from them.
Fez removed a switchblade from his bag and said let’s face whatever that is and save them. They all agreed.
As they all slowly walked on the suspicious ground, they all heard the sound of something breathing.
Their heartbeats got faster as they got closer and after what felt like an eternity they went closer to the train and turned.

Before them, there stood a majestic tree with golden leaves. The tree made a striking contrast to this hellish place and they weren’t sure they'd ever seen a more beautiful tree. But Lizzy was the first one to notice the cold malevolent eyes that lurked behind the shadow of the tree.

The eyes hovered out of the tree and showed itself to its visitors.
“Well, how dare you all come to my place?” The eyes asked them, it had no mouth to utter those words, in fact it didn't even have a body, it was just a pair of cold eyes.
They all were stunned and scared for their lives, they didn't know how they were going to kill the eyes.
“You’re going to pay for intruding on my place” The eyes blinked as it said that.

There was the sound of a march and the building seemed to shake. It felt like every dead thing that the building contained was coming alive to finish them.
“We’re dead,” Lizzy said,
From one of the doors of the train, a claw came out followed by the giant body of a spider and with fury in his eyes, determined to kill them.
Lizzy audibly gasped.
The sight put an end to everyone’s confidence.
Fez came up to the front and pointed his knife at the giant spider. But the spider attacked him with its little webs, initially, he fended himself off by cutting the webs. But the spider gained momentum from the attacks and started shooting multiple webs at the same time. Fez couldn’t defend himself now, and soon, he was covered in webs and stuck to a corner, only his face untouched by webs.
He momentarily looked at his friends with a sad expression, then fell unconscious.

Now, the spider looked at the three scared girls.
Martha threw a rock at the spider. It did nothing except anger the spider even more.
It looked like the spider was out of webs so it approached them.
The spider pounced at Martha and missed it, they realized it had very sharp claws and though the spider was out of the web, it was still powerful nonetheless.
Martha gave a good fight, injuring several parts of the spider with her legs. But the spider didn’t seem to give up. It quickly grabbed Martha's neck unexpectedly and lifted her upwards, her legs dangled without a ground.
The claws dug into her neck making her shriek out of pain.
Ash and Lizzy were helplessly watching all this. Determined to do something, Lizzy searched in the ground and spotted a rock near where Fez was bound. She immediately ran to it and tried to lift the rock, but it was too heavy she looked at Ash.
“Come on Ash, give me a hand and we’ll give the spider a hard blow,” Lizzy said, together they lifted the rock and came up behind the spider. They shared a look at the final moment and thrust the huge rock onto one of the spider’s legs, effectively breaking it.
The spider’s leg was stuck under the rock and it spewed green gunk all over the place.
“Yuck,” Lizzy said
The spider’s hold loosened and Martha fell onto the ground with a thud.

Ash and Lizzy went over to her. Removed the gunk that also splattered on her. And lifted her. Then Ash put her in a corner and tended to her wounds. While Lizzy ran to Fez. She shouted “Fez fez!!!” But he didn't wake up. One frustrated slap woke him up and he said “Ouch, Lizzy!!! knife on the ground” he said.
Then she cut up the web bonds, he was  metamorphosised to his human self.
Then shaking off the remnants, he ran over to Martha and Lizzy followed.
Martha coughed after Ash finished tending to her wounds.
“Martha, are you alright?  What happened to her” and looked around at everyone.
Ash explained everything about his post-mummification period.
“Oh, those spiders!!!” He said.
Suddenly there were scuttles everywhere and they started to see many spiders around every corner of them.
And some even appeared out of the train.
They were surrounded, leaving them no direction except one stair that led to a basement which seemed like a place for escape.
Fez grabbed everyone's hands, made a circle and told them about the plan to run there to escape.
As the spiders slowly started to circle and engulf them, he said “Now!” and they all ran from their deaths toward the stairs.
When they reached the stairs, Fez with one sweep of his hand grabbed Lizzy instinctively and put her first.
But when he did that, Lizzy stumbled and the statue got out of her pocket.
Lizzy balanced herself on the stairs but the statue didn’t and it flew out.
It slowly and dramatically hit one step and another and another…
It did one hell of a cartwheel and at one point it broke and shattered on impact. Causing everybody to gasp.

Immediately after that, there was a powerful deafening sound towards the golden tree and the cold eyes appeared out of the shadow, it was angry, then maddened. Then the fire itself consumed the eyes and then gave its ashes to the ceiling.
The eyes are dead.