Carrie White sucked in a breath, the air scraping like sandpaper against her dry throat. A crushing weight pressed down on her chest, and she blinked against the blur clouding her vision, struggling to bring the world into focus. Dread stirred deep inside her as shadowy shapes swam before her eyes.
A dull pounding echoed through her skull. Flashes assaulted her mind: stones hurtling through the air, glass shattering in a spray of glittering shards, oak beams cracking apart as the house collapsed.
She shifted, her left shoulder screaming in protest. The debris pinned her down, digging into her ribs. She gasped, eyes dragging across the fractured dark.
Something blocked the faint light above her. She reached upward with searching fingers. They brushed a nightgown’s familiar cotton. Beneath it lay ice-cold skin. The breath stalled in Carrie’s lungs. She pressed harder against the rigid flesh, shaking it with desperate care, but the cold had already settled.
Dark auburn hair blanketed the wreckage, pale grey strands framing a hollow face. The woman’s lips, once full and pink, now wore a bruised, dark-blue stain. Her eyelids were heavy and papery. The white gown molded to her slight, gaunt frame, half-claimed by debris.
A guttural scream clawed its way out of her. She pushed the lifeless, cold form away and collapsed back against the rubble, her chest heaving.
“M-Mama…”
The body didn’t breathe or stir.
“Wake up, Mama…” Carrie dragged herself forward, knees scraping into the grit. She gripped the stiff shoulders, shook hard — the head lolled to the side. Her arms buckled beneath her as she slumped forward and buried her face in the dark, tangled strands. She pressed her lips to the waxy scalp. Tears burned hot tracks through the dust on her cheeks, blurring her mother’s features.
Something warm and sticky seeped between her fingers. Carrie lifted her hand, her stomach dropping—her palm glistened crimson in the pale light.
The memory broke through—a steel arc slicing through the dimness—the knife driving into bone as her mother smiled through the pain. The last breath rattled free.
Carrie shivered, hand pressed over her mouth. She fought to steady her breathing. The sickness clawed upward. No, no, this isn’t real. Mama is fine. She leaned in, meeting the icy brow with her forehead, and closed her eyes.
“She earned it.”
Carrie flinched, every muscle locking.
“H-Hello?” Her razor-edged breaths cut into the dead air, but the darkness only deepened. Mama isn’t dead. None of this is real.
“Deny it all you want. Reality still bleeds.”
The walls of her lungs closed in. The ruin pressed around her, splintered beams hemming her in while the void swallowed everything beyond. Stale wax hung in the air first - her mind recoiling before she could stop it. The Prayer Closet closed around her.
Carrie clung to her mother’s body. Her hands dug into the cooling skin, searching for warmth and finding none. The Prayer Closet unraveled—stale air, pressing walls—and the ruins reasserted themselves. An orange flicker slashed through the abyss.
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Killer Instinct: Carrie Unleashed
Fanfiction"Every soul has a breaking point. Some emerge to become something else. Others become something far worse." The shadow of the Black Prom Massacre still suffocates Chamberlain, Maine. Though the world believes Carrie White perished in the flames, the...
