Silent Echoes

Chapter Three - And Sometimes, The Bear Gets You

In a situation such as this, one would expect a normal, sane person to run and panic. But Alex is not known for being particularly sane. He walked through the hall nonchalantly, taking occasional bites from his almost finished bar. Dull red and amber light tiredly halted the advance of darkness, the eerie glow gave one the feeling of being hunted.

"I feel like I'm in Outlast," he murmured, he absentmindedly brought the bar to his mouth before realising that all that was left was a wrapper. "Huh... Finished already? She wanted my soul for a crappy bar that didn't even taste good or last more than five minutes?"
He shook his head sadly, it would seem that even demon children couldn't understand the importance of a good and equal deal.

His phone buzzed again, caller ID unknown it read, still he decided that it wouldn't hurt to answer it. "Heyo, Alex here, may I ask who is calling?" He inquired.

A distorted voice answered. "I am Procter, you must listen, you are in terrible danger-"

Alex cut the voice off in an instant. "You're Procter? The guy who almost interrupted my chocolate bar?"

There was a sigh on the other end. "Your bar Isn't important right now. Did you see her yet?"

"Who? Can you stop being so cryptic? You're not Batman..... Are you Batman?"

For a second Alex was sure he heard Procter pray silently, there was wince. "No... I'm not Batman, just focus please. This is important, listen please, I'm begging you."

Now was Alex's turn to sigh. "Fine. I'm bored though, where did everyone go? And why was that girl so weird?"

Procter groaned. "I can't do this any more, they were right, you are a pain. Just do me a favour and look for the spider, and listen for five." The call cut abruptly, Alex glared at his phone. "Talk about rude." He muttered.

Slipping the gadget into his pocket and looked around, he was lost. And this Alex, is why you don't walk in the dark....

He headed towards the nearest map. Just need to get my bearings..

His eye twitched, this was starting to get ridiculous. Ignoring the map he kept on walking forward... And immediately hit a dead end. In front of him was a door that read STEP INSIDE.

Nope.. I see where this going...

Turning around to backtrace his steps, he was only slightly surprised to bump into a blank wall. "I knew this would happen." He said shaking his head slightly. He took a deep, self-reassuring breath and stepped forward, the text had changed, it now read Good boy, you're learning. He scowled and pushed the door open, behind the door was a small dark room with a long metal table in the center.

"Hello!" He called out. No response, he called out again, louder. "Hello!!!" Still no answer.

Something rustled in the dark, the little light in the room started to violently fade. Shafts of light shakily disappeared, then, as if by dramatic cue, the light died. Alex shivered and stayed still, something was in the room with him and it was breathing sharply, almost like it was looking for something.

He held his breath, there was a snort of frustration and then a hard thump followed by two harder thumps. The thing grunted in what sounded like anger before briefly going silent, a few moments later a warm exhale of moist, stale air hit Alex's face. He inwardly shuddered, the thing gave one last snort before slinking back off to where ever it came from.

Almost immediately the dim light returned, Alex remained still for a few seconds before relaxing, his shoulders slumped in exhaustion. He walked towards the table and leaned on it, his peripheral vision caught sight of something nailed to the table with a big, rusty metal stake. "What now?" He grumbled.

The stake seemed to be deeply embedded into the table, bits of metal, sharp and rusty jutted out at all edges, the table itself seemed to have buckled slightly. Suffice to say it must have taken a ridiculous amount of strength to hammer it in, Alex involuntarily shuddered again.

He looked closer, the stake held a note to the table, ripping the note off as he inspected it, reading aloud. "First to rise, last to fall? How nice." His eye twitched, non of this was making any sense whatsoever and it was starting to irritate him. "Wait... How come I'm so cool with this?"

Instantly the room fell into darkness and the floor heaved then gave way. Alex screamed as he fell to his doom.....

************************************

...Or not, ever had that feeling of falling when you dream? Annoying isn't it? Alex was thinking the same thing as he peeled himself off his hospital room floor. He clutched his throbbing head, muttering curses under his breath. He took a deep breath to steady himself and immediately grimaced at the taste of morning breath. "Better freshen up or I might actually upchuck."

He got up and headed to the small bathroom, the moment he got within touching distance, the door slammed open. The force threw him halfway across the room, from the snap he assumed he broke something.

Erika stepped out of the bathroom grinning. "Alex! Guess what."

He clutched his side in pain and glared at her. "What?"

Her smile grew even wider. "We're going to visit Grammy!"