Two Worlds

Prologue.

He opened his eyes slowly, his sight clouded, his eyelids heavy and twitching.

Out of breath and sweaty.

He was lying on the floor, flat on his belly. His whole body hurt. His skin prickled as if a thousand ants were marching all over his body. A headache throbbed in his ears. His temples were pounding, his ears ringing, until they slowly deafened. He tried to move a hand, but his movements were disarticulated, his thoughts uncoordinated. His mind empty, foggy and confused.

A warm string of blood trickled down his face. He painfully craned his neck, scanning his surroundings.

Where...?

He was in a dark room with broken furniture scattered along the walls, as though something had exploded in the middle and shoved everything to the sides. Shattered pieces of wood pierced his skin. Torn sheets were spilled on the floor. He breathed in dust, wood, the acidic smell of sweat.

And blood.

As his chest heaved, hard and heavy, he gritted his teeth and propped himself on his elbows. A sharp pain in his side screamed. He winced and reached for the burning sensation.

Blood.

He was wounded. Bleeding.

What had happened? Where was he? Questions popped into his mind, but the answers were so slow to come. Dancing around in his mind, taunting him, but running away when he tried to grasp them.

He clenched his teeth, his hazy head too heavy for him, weighing tons. He tried to look around, saw a dark figure lying on the floor, immobile. Distinguished legs and hands.

Who...?

Something moved on the other side of the room, swift and quiet.

He froze and listened. Caught signs of breathing. Clothes ruffling. Pieces of glass clinking as someone pushed them away.

He tried to find the source of the noise, a panicked prey searching for a predator in the dim flickering light. Tried to silence his wheezing breath. Until he saw her.

A slim figure clad in a white fur coat stood there, olivr skin peeking through her sleeves, her eyes full of malice.

And everything rushed back to him.

The woman. His father's drinking sprees. He and his mother hiding. His father's fists. Father stabbing mother. The rage . The bat. The blackout.

The woman was still here.

But what about his mother?

His heart almost skipped a beat. All the elements linked together. The thick smell of blood. The figure lying on the floor. The woman on the other side of the room, still standing while he was crushed to the floor.

He had failed.

He hastily started crawling toward the figure on the floor. Toward his mother, fueled by fear and despair. Ignoring his lungs that screamed for air, his heartbeats that hammered against his chest, his wounds that begged and screamed and pulsated. A broken thing swimming against the tide. Sliced apart, broken, miserable.

Terror increased with every centimeter he got closer to her. And so did the scent of blood.

Coppery and rusty.

The more he crawled, the more he realized how hopeless the situation was. He was wounded, unable to defend himself. He didn't know if his mother was safe. He had failed to protect her.