Faith.

Chapter 16

My ears focused on a quiet whisper in the far distance. Everything around me was shrouded in darkness. I couldn't feel my own body. Again the faint whisper urged me. To my surprise my fingers twitched and I began to feel, coldness. Things slowly coming back to me I realised I was face down on a cold concrete floor. 

"Rose! Get up!" A voice yelled. 

I pushed by body upwards my nails digging into the ground. I quickly realised that this was not the best idea. I fell back to the ground completely helpless. My head felt like it had been forced through a meat grinder and acutely rearranged. 

"Oh my God. Rose, Rose you're alive!" The voice chimed. 

"Could you please, be quiet." I groaned and winced at my own voice. 

"Rose rose you need to try and get the bars open I can't, I can't do anything." The voice began to shake. 

I brushed it off as a strange dream and fell back into the darkness. 

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I was awoken once again by the sweetest smell. It was almost intoxicating. I gave into instinct and despite the horrific pain in my skull I forced myself upwards once more. 

I searched the darkness with my blind eyes fighting to find the source. My body needed it. 

"Rose. Rose listen to me. " The same voice addressed me. 

I blinked a few times until I found my eyes resting upon a pair of burning turquoise eyes looking back at me in horror. There was no doubt that the owner of these eyes was the source of the beautiful scent. I lunged for it not hesitating any longer. 

"Rose no!" The voice yelled as I crashed a against something hard. I jumped back my face and arms burning. What the hell why was my skin burning what is this. 

"Am I... am I in a cage?" I looked around myself as I counted a bar after bar cutting me off from the outside world. 

"Oh thank god Rose you're alive!" The voice chimed once more. 

I found myself looking at a beautiful woman her eyes fading from the harsh blue tone  to a warm brown. Her full lips were parted in a hopeful smile. My throat tightened as I saw her left arm covered in blood.  

"Rose no no no look at me!" She urged. 

My eyes focused on hers and a sentence forcefully stumbled past my dry lips. 

"Who are you?"

Her mouth gaped open is clear shock. "Rose, C'mon. It's me Skye, Skyler, your friend." She choked out tears gathering in her beautiful eyes. "No, no, no, Rose look at me you have to know who I am."

I searched my brain to put a name to the face I was seeing but nothing. 

"Listen lady-" I began to say

"Lady?" She choked out pained laughter and shook her head in disbelief as she slowly sank further into her own cage. "I can't believe this is actually happening." She spoke to herself before balling up her fists and kicking at the bars of the cage hard. 

I placed my hands over my ears my head ringing like a church bell with every kick. "Please, stop!" I begged.

"What are you talking about I've already stopped. Rose, I think the bullet is still in your head." The woman claiming to be Skyler informed me as I gingerly raised my head and uncovered my ears. 

"A bullet? What? Slow down. What bullet? Did that blonde psycho put you here too?" I asked Skyler. 

She looked slightly taken aback. "Blonde psycho?" She muttered. "Mike? Are you serious. Memory loss. Great." She lowered her isoperimetrical face into her palms with a tired sigh. "Isn't this convenient as hell. She can't remember. Great." She mumbled to herself. 

I took the time to look around the room we had been placed in. I couldn't see much from my small cage but I was sure there were three more cages like mine and Skylers. I tried to stand up but with a hit on my head soon realised the cage didn't offer such a luxury as standing. 

I grabbed my head in pain as I collapsed back on the ground. I was in undeniable agony. 

Just then a scene popped into my head of a barrel of a gun and a bullet coming towards me. 

"I was shot. I was shot." I scrambled into the darkest corner of the cage. I was beyond scared.

"Hey, hey calm down deep breaths." Skyler stretched her arm out towards me. 

My throat tightened at the sight of blood once more. Faster than ever before I was on my knees in front of Skyler my teeth piercing her skin. 

"That's, enough now Rose. Rose I do need to live too. Rose!" The girl squirmed. 

With all the humanity I had left I forced myself to let go and once more retreated to the furthest corner of the cage. The scared girl nursed her arm her eyes wide with shock. 

"S-sorry."I managed to say. 

"It's okay you needed that. My powers don't seem to work here. Must be some anti supernatural block or something." She sighed as she dressed her wound with a strip of her shirt.

"Powers?" I narrowed my eyes. 

I almost regretted asking. Skyler burst open with a whole big story of how there were vampires in the world amongst us, and how I was one of them now. I couldn't believe half of this. It had to be made up. That guy Mike had brainwashed this girl and was now trying to do the same to me. I shook my head refusing to believe but somehow. It seemed like it was real. I had no other choice but to believe. As Skyler went on I became smaller and smaller until I was reduced to the most human thing I could do. I cried. Tears poured down my face as I came to terms with being a vampire for seemingly the second time.

 I hugged my knees close and whispered barely audible staring at an empty spot on the ground. "Where are we?"

"I wish I knew Rose bud."Skyler muttered. 

I turned my tired gaze to her and raised an eyebrow. "Rose bud?"

Skyler seemed to get a distant look in her eyes as if she was remembering something and a small smile brightened her already beautiful lips. Her face soon became grim once more. Whoever this person really was. I knew I didn't want to ever see that look on their face again. The sadness was bleeding out of her. 

"The others, they aren't waking up." She tightened her fists and fought back tears of her own. 

"Could it possibly get any more screwed up?" I sighed.

"Tyler heart is too slow. He's dying." Another voice spoke up for the first time. 

Skyler practically flew to the edge of her cage. "Luna! Oh thank God!" 

"Tylers heart is too slow. He is dying." The mystery voice cracked on the last word. "Whatever Azelia done to him-" Her voice broke off. "I'm going to kill her." The voice was filled with an undeniable coldness I didn't doubt for a second that she meant it. 

"Rose?" The voice belonging to who Skler had earlier called Luna addressed me. "Thanks, for you know, saving my life out there in the forest from that life sucking, thing." 

"I did?" I muttered. 

"Yeah, yeah you did.I guess you're not that bad." Luna approached the edge of her cage and flashed a small smile. I would have missed it if I had blinked. 

Without realising I had slipped into a nearly comatose sleep state once more hoping that all of this was just a dream and Id- Id wake up in my crummy bed room. I couldn't decide which would be worse. For this to be real or not. At least it seemed like I had friends here. People I could trust, people I wanted to trust. But I still couldn't be sure. They could be lying to me. 

Only time will show. A loud bang resembling metal being kicked across a junk yard echoed through the room and a blinding light illuminated us all, a black shape approaching the cages accompanied by the heavy sound of what could only be combat boots.