Blame

Lost & Found

"Come with me."

Mister Afton grabbed onto the sleeve of the jacket Elizabeth had put on earlier, effectively dragging her along with him as he jogged to the front of the slowly departing group.

"Attention," he somewhat yelled, "Attention, everyone. This is important."

He waited until all of the performers and crew members had stopped in their tracks before continuing.

"Has anybody seen Laura in the past..." he spared a glance at his wristwatch, "fifteen minutes? Because that was when I last saw her, and she doesn't appear to be among you all."

If Laura had decided to head off somewhere else, she surely would have said something about it to somebody, because that was just the type of person she was. And it was unlikely that she would just wait around outside by herself after everyone else had gone. Not only had it started to lightly rain, but it had gotten pretty cold and her outfit didn't exactly cover a lot.

Everybody looked around at each other, confirming that the blue-haired woman was not with them. Slowly, a lot of "no"s and "not for a while"s started to fill the air.

Once they all fell silent, the air became very tense.

After taking a deep breath, Mister Afton spoke again, "Could the lot of you do me a favor and search around the general area? I have a bad feeling crawling up my spine."

Without hesitation, the group split apart and started to search.

A few of the crew members had flashlights on their key rings, but for the most part, it was dark.

Surely, she was still around.

She had to be.

Right?

What if she was now somewhere far away from where they were?

None of them were all that familiar with the town they were currently in. 

Was she really okay, or had she gotten hurt somehow?

It was only another four minutes before they got their answer.

"Mister Afton, we found her!" Arlen yelled.

Once more, Elizabeth was pulled along by the ringmaster.

She really wasn't sure why he kept doing that, but she didn't really care all that much.

She was far more concerned with seeing whether or not Laura was okay.

By the edge of the forest connected to the grass field was a small group. Their backs were facing them, and they formed a half-circle, consisting of Arlen, Yenn, Freddy, and Jeremy, who was one of the crew members.

Freddy stepped aside to let Mister Afton through.

Elizabeth remained behind him, easily seeing over the top of their heads.

There, illuminated by Jeremey's keychain flashlight was Laura, splayed out somewhat awkwardly on the wet grass.

There were pretty nasty gashes across the fingers and palm of her right hand, down the front of her left forearm, and along her cheek.

A couple of large dark bloodstains decorated her blue corset.

A small smiley face with a round nose was carved into the skin right below her collarbone.

"Is she... dead?" Yenn asked slowly, seemingly afraid to bring his voice above the low whisper it was at.

There was a small stretch of silence where everybody seemed too afraid to try and either confirm or deny the dancer's death.

Eventually, Mister Afton took a step forward and lightly prodded her with his foot.

Laura shifted ever so slightly let out a particularly bad sounding cough, seemingly unaware of their presence.

"Sh-sh-she's a-alive," Freddy announced.

Everybody let out a sigh of relief.

"But she might not be for much longer if she doesn't get medical attention. That's a decent amount of blood," Arlen said.

"Does anybody know where the nearest payphone is?" Mister Afton asked.

"I do," Yenn spoke up. "I used it last time we were here."

With that, he sped off.

Rather quickly, anybody who wasn't already by the French woman's side made their way over.

They did their best to stop the bleeding.

They did their best to keep her awake.

Despite the fact that it worked, and that she was still somewhat conscious when the paramedics finally arrived, nobody got a word out her.

When she was finally off to the hospital, when they were finally left only in the company of each other once again, everybody retreated back to the shelter of the dark tent.

"Wh-wh-who could've d-d-done this?"

Nobody responded.

At least, not at first.

"You know," Arlen piped up, "it didn't pop into my head until just now, but I think I might have an idea of who the sick, twisted person is."