The Starved

Chapter 5: Benevolent Phobia of Reality

Conner felt everything around him spinning. His head throbbed, and his body pulsed in and out of reality. One moment he felt as if he was in the hallway with the creature, another he felt outside of it. That area surrounded him in darkness. The creature watched him. It kneeled to be closer to Conner's eye level. It had a strangely human form while being completely inhuman. Its statement not a moment earlier rung in Conner's mind. It could've killed me. Why hasn't it? Conner felt a muffled, numb fear rise in him. Not from the fact that he could die soon but the fact that he wasn't dead already. His head ached.

The creature watched him still. Conner felt his body leave him. His mind became even more numb. Do I have a concussion? That would suck. Conner felt the urge to laugh, he almost forgot the creature was there. But is it there? Monsters aren't real... I'm just relapsing. Conner tried to sigh to this thought, but his chest contracted, and he coughed violently instead. The creature didn't move, only watched. "You said you're hungry," Conner croaked. "So, why am I still alive?" Conner's left ear was deaf, lying in a pool of his blood. He thought for a moment that he could get out of his predicament by talking, but that wasn't the reason he was talking to the 'monster'.

"I'm hungry." It responded, its multi-voice completely still for a moment as if it was one voice but not.

"I know that." Conner tried to yell but ended up coughing instead. "Is that all you can say?"

"No." Conner, even in his numb state, felt a shock travel through him at the creature's response. "I want to eat you." The 'monster's' face deformed for a second, splitting apart. Rippling apart like if you disturbed a still lake. Then it reformed.

"So," Conner swallowed. "Why am I still alive?"

"I don't know." The creature's form broke apart entirely. It roared, its multi-voice quaking the entire hallway. Conner felt his heart stop and start as if he was getting severe CPR when he was still alive. The creature didn't move. Then it was completely solid again. "I do not know."

Conner barred his teeth, not only in pain but for a question he had been asking himself. One he was scared to get an answer for, one that terrified him either answer he got. "Are you real?"

"We are." The creature's voice devolved into a singular child's voice, a boy when it said this. A giggle followed the statement that became deformed and layered. Conner wiggled his arm out from under his side, He felt his shirt become slightly heavy as it dripped blood that it had only partially soaked up. He pushed himself up and leaned his back against the wall. The 'monster' only watched him, its eyes twirled and warped. Pure white black holes that devoured its surroundings.

"Ah." Conner still pushed the thought of the 'monster' actually being a monster away. He refused to believe it. It could just be my head... tricking me by saying in this form that it's real. Conner sighed, cringing from pain and his thoughts. Conner glanced to his right, down the hallway, but it was obscured by a shadowy envelope of darkness not far off. He twisted his head to view his left but again was greeted by the same sight.

"We're hungry." The 'monster' stumbled backwards, suddenly on its back, no longer staring at Conner. It stared at the ceiling. Its head appeared to melt slightly, then it reformed again. It roared again, Conner felt the same vicious CPR pounding in his heart. It became still again. From its sides formed two arms on each side. It pushed itself back into its position of a kneel in front of Conner. Its head twitched to the side. "I'm hungry."

The 'monster' watched him endlessly, never stopping it appeared. Only watching, with a few sparse twitches every now and then. "You took that bite out of Mark, didn't you? The boy yesterday." Conner gave up on trying to refute the monster's existence for the time being because for the time being it was real. But, it can't be real. Conner reminded himself.