Corrupted

Chapter 1

At last, liberated from almost all our fears and pain, we were trying to pick up the pieces and resume our lives of being a normal german family just like the attempts of many others.

My father, Lukas Levi, owned a bakery which fed most of our village. Thankfully, it suffored only minor destructions but was still up and running. On the other hand, my mother Katelyne, who was very busy raising her two daughters and taking care of our slighlty large house, did not show interest in working there.

One dreadful tuesday night, our happy family frame came to an end as it shattered to a thousand little pieces. After a run to the well, Helena was supposed to get back hours ago. I could never erase my mother's panicking face, and how she stumbled on her way out in quest to look for her daughter.

It was 1:00 am, and I was still alone in the house my mind racing with thoughts. Very disturbing images slid infront of my eyes, and a tear was shed unwillingly. 

Unrealising due to the shock that the front door swung open, a cold breeze hit me in my back, and I stared through the tears that were pooling in my eyes at my parents.

They were alone, and there was no sign of Helena. My heart raced so much almost leaping out of my 19 year old fragile chest.  

None of them said a word; they just exchanged gazes, very regretful ones. My ice cold mother held me in her arms while her hot piercing tears fell onto my burning flesh; meanwhile, my father who couldn't take this trailing silence finally broke it by the noise his riffle made and the slam of a very heavy wooden door. 

It seemed as the sun was to never rise again, but the next day it did. Maybe we still had a chance at finding her. She could have tripped and fell somewhere, I convinced myself ignoring the possibilty that she might be hurt because just the thought of that made my heart ache uncontrolably. At 6:08pm, a loud knock banged on the door.

My mother and I jumped. To our surprise, two uniformed men stood infront ouf us.

As they stepped outside, I couldn't hear clearly what they were saying to my mother; I just recall that one very dreadful scream that shriecked out of her tiny burned out lungs, her cries and her sobs.

I ran with as much speed as my feet would provide and collapsed next to her on the rough ground. Not knowing what exactly was making her frantically cry, I assumed the atrocious thruth whatever it was, something bad had happened to my sister.

I can still remember the far figure of my father approching the house, and how he froze standing still in front of this frightning scenery, and how he fell to his knees, his hands on his face unsuccessfully trying to hold back the tears. He kept yelling "No...NOO...Noooo." His screams faintend into barely hearable whispers and sobs still repeating the same word. "No".

After extensive searches, the police found Helena...well her body did they only find. Several minutes later, my mother gasped for air as if she was drowning and her life depended on it.

She rose from the ground gracefully through grief while emptyness wrapped around her fully. Looking at the police she demanded to know. Know what had happened to her beloved daughter. When they wouldn't answer, and with a loud psychotic scream, she ordered them to speak.

We were very determind about seeing Helena for the last time ever, but there was nothing left of her to see. 

The old well was a hundred years old, even though it still provided the best suitable water source.

Over from our house which was centered in the middle end of the village, stood tall the well on the not so far other side. To get to it, we had to cross over the village's market that was always crowded with merchands of all sorts and shoppers of all ages and genders, and then we had to pass over the old riddled bridge that led to the entrance of this somewhat small forest of dreams as we liked to call it.

Its beauty was breathtaking, this wide land, never affected by the dominating season, was always covered with a dense growth of trees and shrubs decorated with very different kinds, shapes and colors of astounding floral beauty; nevertheless, the calming chanting of birds and residents of this place yielded every bit of serenity. In the back of this magical place stood a magestic old oak tree towering over the well. It was a 45 minutes walk from our humbled home back and forth. 

Helena was the most perceptive and attentive of us all. She would never put her life in danger; therefore, she must have had an eased mind knowing that the place was safe, but that was not the case. The sky length trees and the unbelievably thick bushes secluded the place and muffled the screams, which provided the utmost strategic place for the murderer to follow through with what he had in mind.

As the police officers were talking, their stuttering words dripped in regret and grief.

-"She was strartled from the back, and her wrists were tied up behind, bruises on her skin around the questioned area gave the coroner the absolute opportunity to confirm and prove our thesis: the object that helped secure the position she was traped into was some kind of rope of a yet undetermined nature due to the abscence of concrete evidence."

 With my mother unable to speak as the shock took toll on her and made her numb, my father gave them a faint sign with  his head motioning them to proceed.

-"We prefer not to go into any more detail," sighed the police officer as a look of empathy flashed in his blue eyes. I had never stared so intensily before at a person but this was he who knew exactly what happened to my sister and still denied us this right  to know as well, and then with none other than the words I've been dreading all along, he finished with a very cracked, low tone, "may her soul rest in peace."

The two young officers handed my father a piece of paper and quietly made their way, leaving us all startled and breathless. The paper presented some kind of formality that my father had to take care of at the police station the next day.

In a very short length of time, the news seemed to have had travelled around the village. Old and fairly young women invaded our permisses in a matter of hours attempting to comfort the broken family and give support to my mother who was utterly devastated and psychotic. Strangely enough, the presence of these endless people calmed me, and I sat outside emotionless. 

I couldn't feel anything, but then tears bubbled and blurred my vision. I tried closing my eyelids to secure them inside, but that only helped them free fall the more on my cold cheeks that turned to a very dark shade of red.

On the other hand, the men divided themselves into groups determined to find the savage animal who threatened their families and the security of our village. It wasn't that they cared enough about my sister, except for my father, but I believe that their manly ego was hurt. They were the protectors of this once safe place, but they failed to comply at the job acquiered to them, and that's when their levels of testosterone shot skyhigh and the hunt  began.

Since my mother was surrounded by endless flocks of friends and neighbours, I thought that it would be an opportunity to pass the paper my father gave me to the police station as he ordered.

I clung to my coat and ran as fast as I could towards the police station. Once I had arrived, I was shot with very surprised and questioning looks; however, to my relief, the former police oficer remembered my face and greeted me with a very warm and sweet smile. A shiny tag who held on to his shirt suggested the name Brenn. He couldn't have been older than 23.