The Starved

Chapter 3: Sleep in the-

Conner is asleep. This is what he knows. There is no landscape. He runs his hand through his hair. He sees but he doesn't. His head aches. He is surrounded by a black nothingness. He feels a fleeting sense of relief. The medication wearing off. However, this confuses him. Conner is asleep. He is lying in a bed. His body shakes violently. He screams but no sound is uttered. He feels his body sink deeper into the bed until he is encompassed by it.

Conner stands in a forest. The trees are whispering. "Hungry. Hungry. Hungry."

Conner lies in the snow. A blizzard envelopes his bare skin in cold white. He hears the snow under him crush and crackle. He hears the sound of footsteps. Lewis stands over Conner.

Conner is asleep. He reminds himself of this.

Conner sits in a classroom. His body is a child's. He is young. The monster stands in its shadowy form without arms at the front of the classroom.

Blurry vision, Conner tumbles forward. His head slams into a wall. He pushes from the wall, it is old and stained crimson red. He looks to his left. A doorway. He looks to his right. A left or right turn. Conner turns right and comes to the left or right turn. He feels disconnected, like he is watching a film. Conner wobbles as he takes step after step. He turns right. He trips and crashes into the wall to his side. His vision blurs more. He continues down the hallway. He comes to a left turn down steps. They lead into darkness. He travels down them. He calls out to something. Unintelligible. Conner sounds in great pain. He falls halfway through taking his path down the stairs and crashes down them. He lands, his back cracking down on the steps then the straight ground. A wet echo ripples the air. He coughs. He struggles to get up. More so to stand. He holds his stomach. Darkness surrounds him. He calls out something again. Desperate and again, unintelligible.

Conner is asleep.

Conner is in the blizzard once more. His body is frozen. He climbs out of the snow. He glances from side to side. Looking for somewhere to go. An empty, desolate, snowy plain surrounds him. It is darkened by the overhead dark gray clouds. The sun is not visible.

Then Conner slams back into the ground. He falls through the ground. He is back in the out of body film with him in some sort of building. He touches the ground. Wet as if a puddle resides there. He continues and searches with his hand for a wall. He finds one. He phases through the wall as if it wasn't there. He trips and falls sideways into snow. It crushes beneath him, a satisfying crunch of the snow flies into his ears. He feels heavy. He grunts. He cries out. Crystal clear. "Please. No more." He begs.

Conner is asleep. This is what he knows. Conner is not dead. This is what he knows. Conner is not crazy. This is what he knows. "NO MORE," He yells. He is in control of his decisions once more. He picks his body up and stands up only to fall backwards. He drops and his head smacks onto wet solid ground. Unconscious.
Quickly, he wakes back up in the snow. He stands and stares in horror at his surroundings.

Red snow.

A blizzard.

Dark clouds.

Dead bodies.

The dead bodies are Abby and Gregory. Their mouths torn open and their eyes rolled white. Conner whimpers. He puts his hand over his mouth. He retches and feels a chunky liquid squeeze through his fingers. He pukes.

"I suggest you wake up." Gregory and Abby's torn mouths move in sync. Their respective voices speaking in unison.

Conner is asleep.

Conner is not awake.

Conner is asleep.

Conner stands in the darkness. Emptiness surrounds him. He sees, yet he does not see anything. His head aches.

Conner is asleep. This is what he knows.

Conner lies in a bed. He is in a small body. He is a kid. He looks to his left, a light. A purple lava lamp sits in the far corner of his room. Its purple goo floats up and down. A clock light glows to the right of him. The time is blurry. It doesn't matter.

He stands in the snow again. The snow still red but Abby and Gregory's bodies missing. He is still a boy. The boy glances around him. The cold makes him shiver. The boy sticks his arms in his shirt. He holds himself inside the shirt and sits in the snow. He shakes, and his jaw jitters up and down, clanging his teeth together. Two images form. One, with the boy shivering in the cold. The other, of a dark wet room, the one where Conner had been. The two images meld together to create a scene.

A boy sits shivering, silently crying in a dark room. The room is impossibly cold. The wet ground soaks the bottoms of the boy's pants. The boy stands up and stumbles around until he finds a bed and falls onto it. There are no blankets. He curls into a ball. Silently, he cries. His skin becomes covered in goosebumps. He rubs his skin to no result. Still cold. Conner stands watching the scene from afar. Then he is the boy again. He is crying.

Conner is asleep. This is what he knows.

Conner is back in the classroom as a boy. The creature watches him. He looks down at a paper in front of him. It is blank. He looks back up at the creature. It is not there. The ground vanishes, and Conner falls into water. Drowning.

"Hungry."

Conner opens his eyes. He is a man again. He is surrounded by darkness again.
"Honey? Are you alright?" A voice asks. A tear streams down Conner's face. "Honey?" The voice is a woman's. Tears come out like a waterfall. Conner drops down to his knees. His arms and legs limp. "Hey, it's gonna be okay." The woman is in front of him. Her smile. Wide and endearing. Her laugh a tiny sound that filled a whole room. The woman smiled at Conner and held him. "I love you." She says.

"I love you, too." Conner's voice breaks as he says this. He holds on to the woman tightly. The two of them holding on to one another in the dark. "Don't go. Please." He cries.

Then she is gone. Tears come down from his face.

Conner is asleep. This is what he believes.

Conner opened his eyes. He was on his couch. He sat up and stared out his blinds. Slightly in shock. He glanced over at his clock. An hour until four o' clock. He was reminded that he had to be at the school then to speak with Abby. A flash of imagery appeared into his mind. Abby's dead body, mouth torn open. Conner shivered.

Conner is awake. This is what he believes.