Terror. A dimension mirroring the living one--but morphed to reflect the imagination of its Overseer. And the current Overseer... has refused to relinquish her power for centuries, tormenting her souls--"terrors"--into becoming... zombies.
Arielle f...
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Penelope hadn't lied. She wasn't what she'd said, nor what she'd seemed to be. There were so many more answers she hadn't given Arielle, so many mysteries to unravel. So many things she'd left unsaid, hanging in the air, leaving Arielle clueless. For her own sick, twisted pleasure.
But despite all her secret powers, all her insane goals, Penelope was a coward. Instead of explaining, instead of confronting Arielle's queries and replying to them, she'd dragged Arielle into her dimension. The realm where she had strength, where she resourced, and where she controlled everyone.
Penelope was a nightmare impersonated, a tyrant, and though Oscar claimed she wasn't evil, Arielle thought otherwise.
"Fuck."
Arielle was pacing back and forth, her sneakers slamming onto the concrete of the under-the-bridge room. Since she'd declared she'd locate Penelope and end her, she'd been restless, unable to sit still. Oscar had folded up the blanket, and was rummaging through the locker for a suitable weapon for her. But from his grunts and low-voiced curses, it was evident he hadn't found anything decent.
"She's the devil." Arielle huffed, and Oscar spun from the locker to squint at her. "What? She is. You can say she's not evil all you want, but she does have fucked up intentions. She's stealing souls, she's transforming them into zombies, she's hoarding them all for some war she won't explain—"
"—she's not the devil, Arielle." He shut the locker and sighed. He was empty-handed, meaning Arielle would have to continue relying on him until they reached the next safe-house, where they'd hopefully find something useful for her to use as protection. "Plus that stuff, that religious crap... it's not real. No God or Heaven or Hell... it was a shock to me, too, because my family believed in all that, but here we are. Penelope isn't a devil, or a god—she's an overpowered terror who refuses to relinquish her rights."
"And that makes her devilish, Oscar." Arielle marched up to him and jammed a finger into his enormous chest. If she'd pressed any harder, she had no doubt her finger would have bent in inhuman ways. His torso was so hard, so firm, she pulled away and chewed on her lower lip, unsure why'd she'd needed to make her point by touching him.
"Devilish or not, she's the boss down here. We dislike what she's doing, and in truth we don't know what she's doing, but we don't have much of a choice, do we?" He moved away from the locker and headed to the stool to retrieve his bag.
Arielle rotated to watch him, but didn't move from her spot. "I want to change that. I want to do something—"
"—you don't think others have tried?" Oscar's voice trembled with irritation as he slung his bag over his shoulder. "Rumor has it there are corpses all piled up in the foyer of that house. Want to take a guess at whose corpses those are?"
Undeterred—despite a chill that crawled down her spine at the idea of being a corpse in Penelope's residence—Arielle crossed her arms. "They were from older times. I'm... fresh meat."
