Breathless Mannequins

Prologue

Sanctura psychiatric ward

Her once golden blonde, braided mane was now replaced with a nest of mouse coloured sticks. She sat crouched over the table, hands tucked beneath her legs, clasping at the chair, white at the knuckles. Rocking back and forth, her forehead almost touching the surface, humming all the while. Her brilliant blue eyes had evaporated into grey pools of nothingness, not looking at anything, focused on an invisible hole of emptiness. Sticks and veins had replaced her athletic build. She was a beautiful woman replaced by a child in the darkness.

She waited patiently for her visitor.
A visitor she had been expecting for 730 days, 12 hours, 5 minutes, and 55 seconds, 56 second, 57 seconds 58 seconds...

Finally she heard the buzz of the security door. Every part of her froze instantly, her eyes fixed before her, not even the slightest blink manageable. She knew that the moment had come to face the evil soul responsible for her being in this torture chamber for the last two years. She was hungry for answers, but not over eager. She was calculated and if the last 730 days has taught her anything, it was patience.

The chair opposite pulled out with a screech and for the first time she jolted upright, looked up, directly into those emerald, stone cold eyes. She already felt vindicated without so much as a word being traded.

Even if she had to stay in this hell hole for the rest of her life, at least she would have had her 60 minutes of glory...60 minutes that would make up for the 730 days already gone by and probably the 5474 days still to come...