Till Sunrise┊Luke Castellan

28 .·:· The Labyrinth of Suffering

Reid, Paul. 'Minotaur'. 2021

Words: 1,892

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The forest had never felt colder, even in the midst of summer. The air seemed to thicken with an icy chill, wrapping around Phoebe like a suffocating blanket. Each breath she took felt like inhaling shards of ice, sending a shiver down her spine that seemed to reverberate through every fibre of her being.

Alone beneath the gnarled branches of a towering oak tree, Phoebe fought against the relentless grip of pain. The scent of damp earth and pine needles filled her nostrils, mingling with the metallic tang of blood that stained her clothes.

With trembling hands, Phoebe reached into her small med-pack, thanking the gods she had remembered to bring it, her fingers fumbling as she searched for the tools that might offer her some relief. The lidocaine syringe gleamed in the moonlight as she extracted it, the tiny needle glinting ominously in the darkness.

Gritting her teeth, Phoebe pressed the needle against her skin, the sharp sting of the injection barely registering against the backdrop of her adrenaline. It was a desperate gambit, hoping that the rush of fight-or-flight coursing through her veins would keep her alert long enough for the anaesthetic to block the nerve signals.

Oh, how she wished she had restocked her supply of nectar.

With a weary sigh, Phoebe leaned back against the rough bark of the oak tree, her eyes closing involuntarily as exhaustion threatened to drag her into the depths of unconsciousness. Blinking hard, she fought against the pull of sleep. She couldn't fall asleep right now. She might not ever wake up again.

She sat there in the darkness, the moon casting silver rays through the tangled canopy above, hand pressed tightly to her waist where blood seeped through the cracks of her fingers. The overwhelming feeling of foolishness filled her.

She glanced up at the gleaming stars above her, but all Phoebe saw were big gleaming eyes beaming their divine judgement down upon her. She closed her own eyes tightly, gritted her tears against the onslaught of tears threatening to spill forth.

She didn't sob or wail. Her grief was horribly discreet, a silent ache that gnawed at her insides with relentless persistence. It was a pain as silent and insidious as the bleeding from her unstitched wound, each beat of her heart echoing like a drumbeat of despair.

The forest seemed to close in around her, the trees looming like silent sentinels, bearing witness to her solitary struggle. Their rustling leaves whispered secrets she could not decipher, their branches reaching out like accusing fingers pointing in her direction.

As the final fireworks burst overhead, their resounding bangs echoing through the forest, Phoebe felt like the world was swallowing her whole. She started to imagine the bangs of the fireworks were the earth splitting in two, that it was ready to claim her as its own, as something tasty and ready to be devoured, and she would fall into the gaping abyss.

Her heart wished this would happen, as it pumped painfully in her chest. That somehow that would be easier than this than this heartache.

Because right now Phoebe couldn't tell where the pain in her side ended and the ache in her chest began. They existed as a tangled mass of agony, inseparable and consuming.

She again wished the earth would just go ahead and start eating her. To just swallow her whole.

Or better yet, she wished the moss under her fingertips would start creeping up her skin and engulf her in its verdant embrace.