The Gate ⋈ A Stydia Story

[ 01 ] chorus of horror

It was a kind of coldness that chilled her to the bone. It seemed to consume her, tinging her heart with darkness. The chill that came so quickly felt as if it was slowing down her pulse, stopping the flow of blood to her veins like a river freezing over. It felt like icicles had found refuge in her limbs. She felt no clothes on her body, only the unbearable weight in her chest and prick of the cold.

Lydia let out a slow, shaking breath that later hitched in her throat as she saw the air that escaped her lips as a puff of smoke. The tips of her toes crunched on dry, frozen leaves as she shifted. The air around her felt tight and constricting, sucking every ounce of energy she had left out of her. Her eyes suddenly began to work, and Lydia noticed she was surrounded by trees, such as the ones in the preserve. But the trees around her seemed to cave in, with long, barren limbs that wanted to reach her. The atmosphere was void of color, and everything around her seemed to be cloaked in a feeling of darkness.

'Lydia,' A voice drawled, whispering in the depths of her ear. It sounded as if the voice was coming from behind her. She turned her head, the bones in her neck creaking so painfully it felt like they were breaking. The rest of her body followed until she was facing the opposite direction, greeted by the same grim trees.

'Lydia,' The voice whispered again, this time to Lydia's right. She turned quicker, just fast enough to see a head of brown hair duck behind a tree.

One foot branched out, dry earth cackling beneath her step. The other foot followed, slowly stepping forward into the forest. Her pace quickened and her heart remained cold, but it felt like the muscle was ripping inside of her, pulling on her arms and legs with such great strength that she wanted to cry out in pain. But her voice wouldn't work, and no cries came. Lydia just kept walking.

She walked faster and faster as the voice continued to whisper, 'Lydia, Lydia, Lydia,' It got louder and louder, and the head of brown revealed a girl's body, with milky white skin. The hair was long and flowing, swishing this way and that with a sound whizzing in Lydia's ear that reminded her of an arrow.

The girl kept ducking in and out of the trees, and Lydia began to run, hearing the sound of arrows growing louder and louder. The voice kept saying 'Lydia, Lydia, Lydia,' and it sounded more and more familiar to her, one she had heard before. The girl Lydia was following finally stopped hiding in the trees, now just scampering on bare legs through the wood. She wore a short white dress that flowed with her, and Lydia's eyes couldn't help but watch the way the fabric bounced and shifted with a certain familiarity.

Frost covered Lydia's lips and the whispers turned to screams, constantly saying her name. Arrows kept flying by her head, and as Lydia ran after the girl, she spotted a Fleur de Lis carved raggedly into the bark of a tree. The sound of her own name over and over was overwhelming, and she felt something sickeningly warm crystallize to ice in her ears and below her nose. She felt to her knees as unbearable pain shot into her skull, but the girl kept dashing forward as if nothing was happening.

Lydia's hands scraped into the ground without her eyes leaving the girl, forming letters in the mud that felt familiar to her fingers. It spelled out a word, but she didn't bother look, she was too captivated by the girl. The screaming became louder and louder and Lydia's hands shakily flew to her ears trying to block out the horrible searing pain that ate her alive.

Then it stopped.

The girls running, the chanting of her name in ghastly voices, the formation of ice on her skin.

Everything came to a halt and all sound seemed to be shut away. The dark haired girl stood a little ways away from Lydia, back facing her. Underneath the girl's hair, a flower of dark Crimson liquid stained the purest white fabric, the first shred of color Lydia had seen. One droplet of the liquid fell from her dress and hit a dry leaf on the forest floor. The sound of it dropping echoed throughout the empty forest.

Lydia shakily stood to her feet, before running towards the girl. She felt pain course through every corner of her being, the most horrible one settling in her heart as if someone was plucking on her heart strings. One arm was outreached as she tried to reach for the girl, whose blood kept hitting the ground. As she finally drew near, the girl turned around. Her face was gaunt and deprived of life. Lydia felt a word, no, a name roll of her tongue as a sound ripped through her throat.

'Allison.'

As soon as her fingertips touched the girl, Lydia was swung forward, through her as if she was nothing but air. The ground came close to her vision as if she would collide with it, but Lydia just passed through it, swinging through until she was on the other side.

The other side had no cold. It was not cold, nor was it warm. It wasn't anything. There was nothing around her, just void blackness. She couldn't feel the pull of her fingers towards the ground, or the touch of her bare skin. But her eyesight was still there.

The world around her was nothing but black, traveling on in all directions for an eternity- except ground. There was a familiar depth of her vision of the ground, but it traveled until it reached a horizon.

Her ears suddenly filled with a howling noise- no, a chorus of many horrifying voices in a sickening harmony. It was louder than anything she had ever heard, and filled every part of her body with the vibrations of the sound, wracking her bones.

She felt a presence of something looming behind her. Lydia turned around, and a short distance away there was a tall, black structure. It was a shade darker than her surroundings, and the air around it was tinged with the color of blood. As she walked towards it, the singing seemed to only intensify. It kept getting louder as she moved, until she was only a mere 5 feet away, it stopped.

A creaking sound resonated through the void, as a crack of blood red light escaped the structure, evenly split down the middle.

The light grew bigger as the two sides seemed to open upwards like a door. She felt an emptiness open inside her, filling to the brim of her heart with a sudden darkness. Slowly, the howling choir crept back into her ears, and the world faded to nothing.

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She shot up straight, breathing ragged and harshly. The sheets clung to her like a straight jacket. Her eyelids creaked open, and the world around her wasn't hazy with darkness. The haunting voices weren't there anymore.

She heard a giggle. The white dressed girl scampered out her doorway. Lydia's legs suddenly remembered how to work and she ran out of bed, but was caught in the strangling sheets and toppled to the floor. The girls bare feet scampered down the hallway, and she heard her whisper,

"Lydia,"

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The Gate
[ 01 ] chorus of horror