CHAPTER NINETEEN
As soon as the lights turned back on and the shadow vanished, Jet found himself in the dining room of the orphanage with everyone. Confused, he looked around the room. Everyone was singing a birthday song for the kids celebrating within the month. And even before his mind could catch up with everything that was happening, the scene changed once more.
The happy and carefree picture-perfect celebration vanished and Jet found himself falling to the ground as a head-splitting pain attacked him. He found it hard to breathe as his sight started turning dark. There was a loud beeping sound in his ears. So loud that no matter how much he pressed on it the sound wouldn't vanish. If anything, it became louder.
Everything was spinning. He could see his little siblings crying his in front of him but he couldn't hear them. The sound was blasting every fiber in his body and he started convulsing. His sight turned red.
White.
And then. . .
Black.
"Jet!"
Jet's eyes flew open when he heard Mina's bloodcurdling scream. As soon as he opened his eyes, all he saw was red. And he found himself inside a nightmare. There was Liam lying down in front of him. His eyes glassy—lifeless and his neck severely wounded.
"Nooo!" Jet cried as he forced himself to sit up. But his head still felt like splitting into two.
"Helllpppp!"
Jet's head spun around and he saw a monstrous creature. Its jaw dislocated, revealing large canine teeth that were dripping with blood. And out of the corner of its mouth was the necklace his parents had given Liam before their death.
His blood ran cold as fear grip him. In the monster's arms was Mina, flaying around trying to escape. Her face tear-stained as she begged for Jet to save her. But before he could even stand on his feet, the monster sunk its teeth in her thin, frail neck. The sound of her flesh ripping echoed in his ears.
Her scream filled the room as Jet cried out. When the monster dropped Mina to the floor like a ragged dog, Jet quickly crawled towards her. He pulled her to his chest. He did her best to cover her wound but half of her neck was gone. With shaking hands, he held her cheek to make her look up to him.
"Please. . . Please. . ." Jet cried his voice breaking. "Open your eyes. Please! Please! Open your eyes, Mina!"
But Mina never opened her eyes. Jet gripped her near as he cried her name repeatedly. He could hardly breathe. He could feel something inside of him breaking. And he could also feel something different started brewing inside of him. The pain became more and more unbearable.
As Jet screamed—a powerful wind blew.
And he found himself back in the dining room with everyone singing a birthday song. It was like everything was just a dream. Everyone in the room was smiling and laughing. Everything was picture-perfect.
"Am I going crazy?" Jet murmured to himself as he looked around the room.
Suddenly, everything stopped. It was as if the world decided to pause itself.
-"You need to wake up!"-
A far, distant voice spoke once more.
-"Wake up, Jet. This isn't your fight. You're not supposed to be here,"-
"Who are you!?" Jet asked as he spun around the room trying to find where the familiar voice was coming from. "What's happening? Please!"
-"You have to wake up!"-
The voice screamed as a figure of a girl with crystal blue eyes appeared in front of him. There was a familiarity in those eyes. But Jet couldn't put his finger on it. As he started to reach for her, he saw another shadow behind her. It raised its hand and from its fingertips came out a rope made of the same mist they were. It extended until it was wrapped around the neck of the girl.
Her eyes widened as her hands tried to pry the rope away from her neck but it only tightened. The eyes stared at him and Jet could see as clear as day the fear in her eyes. As the other shadow started to pull on the rope, Jet quickly outstretched his arms to help her.
But his hands couldn't touch her. She was like air.
-"Wake up!"-
The voice yelled as the other shadow wrenched her away from him.
"Alice!" Jet screamed as he jumped towards her but he found himself staring at a shocked Alec and Ronnie.
~oOo~
Alec and Ronnie stepped inside Jet's hospital room. They both looked around but everything was normal. Jet was still unconscious on the bed. Alec quickly walked towards him and checked his pulse and he breathed out a sigh of relief to see he was still breathing.
"What's wrong?" Ronnie asked.
A loud banging sound echoed around the room and the two of them spun around to where it had come from. The crows outside the room kept on flying towards the window but it was made of special glass, it wasn't going to be shattered so easily.
"Oh shit, oh shit," Ronnie chanted as the crows continued their assaults. "Why the hell are they trying to get in!?"
"That's it!" Alec's eyes widened in realization as he ran towards the window.
"Oh no, no, no! Definitely no! Don't tell me you plan to open that window? There's a murder of crows outside! A murder!"
He unlocked the window and pushed it open. Ronnie cursed him as cawing filled the room. A dozen crows came inside but the rest hadn't. Those that were left outside flew up back to the sky. And those they got inside circled on top of Jet. But one of the crows landed on his stomach.
"Ao!" Alec called, recognizing the small crow.
Ao cawed loudly, aggressively flapping her wings. And as sudden as everything that had been happening since that morning, Ao's eyes glowed blue as she sunk her beak in Jet's chest.
"Alice!" Jet screamed as he bolted upright on the bed.