Stagnation. The state of inaction amongst an unflowing mire. A nauseating state of being. After half a decade of being smothered, I thought I'd wormed my way out of it. Working my ass off not just to move myself, but to try and get anything and everything running in some damn direction. Yet, here I am, against all rhyme or reason. Stagnant.
The wind trickled through the window, and with it countless questions burst forth. With each gentle caress against my immobile form, my mind began to worry. As the scent of fallen leaves mixed with mossy earth hit me, I tried, and failed, to hide. With the calls of various birds, and the rattling of branches against one another, I gave my all to run, yet only let out a sigh. To that last remaining warmth it shoved at me before winter took it away, I lashed out with my entire being trying to kick and shove it away! But all my struggles amounted to nothing more than a slight twitching of muscles.
I'm stagnant, unmoving. The deeper that truth hit me, the more hectic my thoughts became. Yet, in this swamp of wrongness, the fact I can't move felt oddly... right. As for why, any thoughts beyond my anxiety over anything and everything seemed to have difficulty being brought to the surface. Like it had to bubble up through a tar pit for a single moment of clarity before I was lost in the marsh of horrid possibilities this place could hold.
Only after countless moments of my mind hysterically demanding to move at my seemingly unwilling form did my eyelids finally begin to twitch. That alone was harder than figuring out how to open someone else's safe. Relearning how to do the most mundane of actions wasn't helping my mentality that crashed through with the knowledge of this new 'combination.' As my eyes flew open with all the urgency my everything claimed, what greeted me was- Pain! Shit, fuck, dammit, why does opening my eyes hurt so much?!
The windows to my soul quickly clamped shut as I began to writhe while releasing a string of obscenities that'd put any sailor to shame. Or I tried too. As I became a bit more lucid, I realized my 'writhing and cursing,' had simply amounted to a few twitches and whimpers. Bad, this is really bad. I opened my eyes again to try and grasp my surroundings, only to be greeted by another wave of agony. Some floundering accompanied by a soft high-pitched moan quickly followed.
The pain helped. Like getting knocked on the knee, my body's natural reaction to pain was to move, and bit by bit, I figured out how to do so. A lot of haggard breaths and aching everything's later, I was coherent enough to understand I had a migraine. Luckily it began to fade, and I could finally take in my surroundings. All I could say is, whoever designed this room really liked floral designs. A floral canopy adorning a bed with blankets of a similar motif, which obviously paired well with the carpeting and various clothes adorning any and all the furniture.
It'd be cute if it wasn't so damn horrifying. I have no fuckin' clue where in the hell this is! My eyes darted across the room, to the beat of a subdued groan. Why does a place like this even exist?! I scrambled to move, only to find my body still rebelled at any and every action!
Yet the biggest issue was the fact that someone covered me in a damn blanket. It's in the damn way more than anything else right now! Astounding how something so damn mundane is giving me such an issue righ- Shut up, just shut up and move it.
I need to stop thinking too much, and act. Gotta keep moving, bit by bit. I can think after I know I'm safe!
After more effort than I'll ever admit aloud, I finally got the damn thing off, and wiggled myself to the edge of this stupidly large canopied bed. And with one great hurrah, I plopped my feet onto a weirdly soft carpet.
Wrong, wrong, wrong.
Shut up, shut up, SHUT UP!
That feeling of everything not being right surged as I began to take in my surroundings, as if trying to devour what little clarity I had. Yes, I know it's wrong, knowing it's wrong doesn't tell me why it's wrong though, stupid brain! Taking as deep a breath as possible, I steadied myself against the bed. Just looking at this dumb thing makes me wonder what sort of giant it was made fo- Wrong, wrong, wrong-
Shut up dammit!
Another breath to steady myself, not thinking is better. I... I need to... need to find out where the hell I am. Yes! Focus, on, that! Don't think of anything else! I don't know where I am, so I gotta focus on finding out. Inhale, exhale, and move!
Slowly but surely my feet began to wobble along the bed towards the nearest piece of furniture, a nightstand. And with a monstrous leap consisting of me teetering from one makeshift brace to another, I made it! After a bit of haggard breathing I began to inspect my hard won prize! With the conquering of this lovely nightstand I had promptly gained... Jack shit!
Dammit! There's nothing here that tells me anything! Give me something, a King James Bible or... anything that could give me a clue! Not this pile of worthless fuckin' knickknacks! I didn't bother to note a single piece of what was in the drawer of the nightstand. A cursory glance told me it was a bunch of garbage that only mattered to the person who put it there.
With an almost inaudible growl of frustration, I began to move to the next nearest piece of furniture without bothering to close the former. Thus began my arduous journey from nightstand, to chair, to a wall, to rockingchair, to- A bunch of worthless idiotic pieces of furniture that simply told me someone raised a child here. Dammit all!
My most recent conquered piece of this shit-show of worthless information was a vanity. Seriously, please be useful! For the love of all that is holy in this long since forsaken Earth, something, useful! The quicker I can find out where I am, the quicker I can get out of here. Once I do that, I can figure out what's causing the damn boiling itch at the back of my brain. But first I gotta be safe, it's important to be safe, even if I can't remember why.
Rummaging through the various drawers, I once more came up empty handed. I used to be great at rummaging through shit and finding anything of value. Why is it so hard now?!
Steadying myself on the vanity I forced myself to breathe as deeply as possible. Freaking out too much will stop me from being productive. It's fine, I can do this! It's just scavenging, I'm good at scavenging. Looking up onto the vanities top, I began to try and see if anything worthwhile lay there only to be immobilized by what looked back at me. No not what, who. A girl no older than six or seven met my gaze. Her skin was fair, and her hair a deep auburn that neared her shoulders. Plastering her face was a look of shock and terror as her, no my, gray eyes quivered.
My legs buckled as my mind finally let me know how truly wrong everything was. The girl's, no my-hers-ours, head smacked softly against the carpeting which I had never seen before, as I-she-we, began to vomit up a meal I never ate. Neither the girl nor I could muster up any strength to move, as my-our mind got flung to the currents of countless incongruities.
Who, is, Tha- -d, I, sho- not, ri- I, shot- there, was, noth-
who- everyone, Should, ha- -ea- wro-
Not, ME! That's, NOT, M- -ould, be- shouldn't, Be, al-
-ong, wrong, wrong, Wrong, Wrong, WRONG, everyth-
dead
Dry heaving after vomiting up a pool of sickly sweet bile, that agonizing migraine flooded back in with more force than any tide. Luckily, it caused my consciousness to drown away. Occasionally I'd be torn away from the sweet abyss. Someone screamed, my body being moved, I was poked and prodded. In each of these few moments I'd think something along the lines of, 'please leave the dead to their rest, I worked hard for it.' Sadly such pleas never bubbled up, as my consciousness drifted away again and again.
I worked hard... Dammit...
Author's Note: Hey Peeps, I'm currently working on a reworking/rewriting of this. So if you read any chapters after this one and you feel, 'Hey wasn't that covered in chapter 3, why is it being restated in this chapter?' or the like, that's why. Basically I'm trying to condense and refine bits and pieces so only the more important stuff will be left.
That's all, Take it easy, and happy reading.
YOU ARE READING
Agnostic Dreamer
FantasyUsually death is a good deal more... permanent. Or at least that's what Ana thought before waking up in a new body, to new parents, belonging to a new country, on a new world, filled with new rules. With her understanding of any and all things thro...