The Hybrid Legacy (Sequel to the Baile Series)

Chapter 12 When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go?

Kenzie

'Kenzie.' A sultry woman's voice spoke right beside my ear. 'What do you want from me?' The woman grabbed my arms and spun me around and I tensed at the girl who looked exactly like me, except her voice was deeper and her eyes were black pools. 'Why don't you run from me?' She sang to me. 'What are you wondering?' She tapped my head. 'What do you know? Why aren't you scared of me? Why do you care for me? When we all fall asleep, where do we go? Come here.' I felt the air suck out from my lungs as I was driven forward and straight through the dark version of myself.

'Say it, spit it out, what is it exactly.' The dark version of myself tried to shove her hand down my throat but I swatted her away, my fists curling for a fight. I wasn't going to be tormented by anyone, including myself.

'You're prayin'?' The setting shifted so I stood in front of the first pew at the front of a church. 'Is the amount cleanin' you out, am I satisfactory?' The darker version threw holy water at me while she wore a long, embroidered priest's robe. 'Today, I'm thinkin' about the things that are deadly.'

I threw a punch at my twisted twin but she caught my wrist and pushed my head down under water. I wrestled against her strength.

'The way I'm drinkin' you down, like I wanna drown.' Her voice was clear and crisp underwater, while I stared into the inky blackness of it. 'Like I wanna end me.' With her hand knotted in my hair she tore my head out of the water abruptly.

'Step on the glass, staple your tongue.'

'Ahh!' I screamed as my tongue bled from a pinching pain.

'Bury a friend, try to wake up. Ah.' My twin shot me in the head.

'Ahh!' I screamed in pain and terror.

'Cannibal class, killing the son, ahh.' My twin stood behind me as she grave her handgun to me, lifting my arms so I was pointing the barrel at yet another version of myself. 'Bury a friend, I wanna end me.' I pulled the trigger against my own will and watched myself fall.

'I wanna end me.' The words poured forth from my mouth like poison. 'I wanna, I wanna, I wanna end me.' I continued to shoot versions of myself over and over, my body not under my own control. 'I wanna, I wanna, I wanna-ah!' I tried to fight the words and the visions. This was my mind and my body and I was in control.

'What do you want from me?' A pair of hands grabbed my face and turned me around so I was looking at my twin again, her blank eyes boring into my own. 'Why don't you run from me? What are you wondering? What do you know?' I struggled against her hold as I could feel my self-control threatening to slip away. 'Why aren't you scared of me? Why do you care for me? When we all fall asleep, where do we go? Listen.' She whispered in my ear while I whispered the same word in another twin's ear. 'Keep you in the dark, what had you expected?' She covered my eyes with her hands. 'Me to make you my art and make you a star and get you connected?' My twin removed her hands I found myself standing alone in a deserted park blanketed by fog. 'I'll meet you in the park, I'll be calm and collected.' The twin's voice followed me as I walked through the park in search of a way out of the nightmare I was trapped in. 'But we knew right from the start that you'd fall apart, 'cause I'm too expensive.' The further I walked the clearer shadows in the distance became. 'Your talk'll be somethin' that shouldn't be said out loud.' I walked cautiously between headstones and copies of myself that had their mouths bound with white cloth. 'Honestly, I thought that I would be dead by now.' Dozens of girls who looked exactly like me spoke perfectly despite their mouths being gagged. 'Calling security, keepin' my head held down.'

'Bury the hatchet or bury your friend right now.' I spoke with them as I stood over an empty grave. 'For the debt I owe, gotta sell my soul. 'Cause I can't say no, no, I can't say no.' Hands pushed my back and I fell into a coffin, the lid slamming closed and cloaking me in darkness. 'Then my limbs all froze and my eyes won't close and I can't say no, I can't say no.' I thrashed in my wooden prison, the voices in my head telling me to stop and give in.

'Step on the glass, staple your tongue' I felt myself being moved so I was lying vertical. 'Bury a friend, try to wake up.' The coffin lid swung open and I fell out to find myself surrounded by mirrors that reflected ghostly versions of myself, all except the one directly opposite me.

'Cannibal class, killing the son.' I spoke and moved exactly like my reflection, black ink consuming my sapphire eyes. 'Bury a friend, I wanna end me.' I pressed my hands to the mirror, the darkness infecting my limbs after my mind like a disease. 'I wanna end me, I wanna, I wanna, I wanna end me.' My hands slipped through the mirror like water. 'I wanna, I wanna, I wanna.' I stepped through the mirror, unaware of what was stepping out with me.

Orla

'What do you want from me? Why don't you run from me?

What are you wondering? What do you know?

Why aren't you scared of me? Why do you care for me?

When we all fall sleep, where do we go?'

For the thousandth time I opened someone else's eyes, beating another's heart.

"How are you feeling?" A face loomed over mine.

"Awake." I smirked.