Darned to Heck

Puzzle

I hadn't really planned what I would do once inside the wall but I instantly realised my mistakes. The biggest mistake I made, was also the worst, and the most obvious.

The panic didn't settle in until after a few moments had passed and I realised, quite dramatically that liquid rock isn't a suitable substitute for oxygen. I choked and gagged as this sudden realisation hit me with my first breath. The rock joyously flooded my lungs like syrup made of lead. Filling and suffocating me I felt them burn and swell as the rock expanded into every inch of them, weighing them down like cement balloons. They heaved against my rib cage and dragged me through the rock, I felt myself sinking, lower and lower as the hysteria consumed me.

My brain, flying a damned aeroplane of panic with two engine fires could not form any way out of my predicament. I AM DEFINITELY GOING TO DIE HERE, TRAPPED IN A WALL, ALONE, FOREVER. I'M DYING, THERE'S NO WAY OUT OH MY GOD THIS IS HOW IT ENDS...

Somewhere in the back of my head a little voice screamed at me that even if I died I wouldn't stay dead. All I had to do was get the shit out of my lungs and stay calm. Easier said than done.

Ok ok okookookkokokok ok calm the fuck down. I focused my panic into the rock, hoping to convey some sense of urgency. Rock, I NEED you to get out of my lungs BEFORE I DIE.

The rock stopped swirling around inside me like a puppy rolling through a meadow and began to retreat, slowly, and very gently. Before forming a little pocket of air around my mouth and nose.

"Than- *cough* fu--*cough* for tha-*cough*" I spluttered as my lungs attempted to reform themselves into a more natural shape. "Don't you ever try something like that again you hear me?" the rock eddied and flowed around me sheepishly, like a dog that had been caught chewing the sofa. "Jeesus, ok *cough* that agh, that is probably going to *cough* bruise." The rock tingled and danced over my chest, pressing into it and humming. "Oh no no no, what do you think you're *cough* doing?" it continued to butt into my chest, and I got that familiar questioning tingle. "Right *cough* fine, but I swear to god, any more fu-" I lost my words as my entire chest was wrapped in a fluid, tingling bear hug. The vibrations reverberated through my chest and tingled through my body, down my arms, legs, through my hands and fingers. The vibrations lessened and took my pain with it, but also the sense of my entire body. Where I ended and the rock began became impossible to tell, I lay suspended in the rock, but I was also part of the rock.

Woah...

The sudden and intense nothingness of my surroundings crashed into my conciousness. There was no light, no sense of vision. I was staring into the depths of a never-ending night, like an endless hole that you could fall into but never come out of. And a silence so profound I could hear my heart beat in my chest, the rush of blood under my skin. I could hear my bones move against each other as I brought my hand to my face. I could hear my eyelids as they blinked back the darkness in disbelief.

And then I could feel it, I could feel the consciousness of the rock, not just the wall that I was in, but the mind of the whole structure, the entire building was communicating through my body. I couldn't see a thing, but I could sense through the rock exactly where I was, where the walls were, the ceiling, the floor. I could see in my mind a plan of the entire building like a 3D blueprint mapping out endlessly in front of me. I found I could search through the rooms in my mind, narrowing them down to the one I had just been in. There were people in there, well demons. I could sense three of them, pacing. Muffled conversation filtered through the walls, it sounded like the voices were travelling through water. I strained to make out the words and the rock seemed to understand, amplifying them like tuning into a radio station.

"That little bitch..."

"Where the hell did she go!? Out of the window?"

"She couldn't have gone out of the window you imbecile, it's got a locking charm on it."

"Are you sure she's not under the bed Atticus?"

*slap*

"OW!"

"Yes I'm SURE she's not under the bed Trivius you moronic p-."

The demon who had been hit hissed like an angry cat.

"Stop this. Atticus, inform the runners. Get a message sent to his Lordship. Tell him that the girl is missing and that the guard have been informed."

"Yes sir."

I sensed the Atticus's quick exit from the room.

"This is not good sir..."

"Indeed it is not Trivius. Get this mess seen to."

"Sir."

Trivius left the room.

"This truly is quite the puzzle." The last demon spoke to himself, walking around the perimeter of mirror shards glimmering on the floor.