"It's weird, I can't hear anything. Can you?" asked Peter, half frantically looking to both his left and right.
He was walking as he spoke but, when no response came from his daughter, he quickly stopped moving and turned around; only to see that... He was left there completely alone. No living sign of Malia whatsoever, "Malia?" he questioned, panic rising through his guts, "Malia?! Where are you?" he demanded in a more desperate tone.
That did him no good since, Malia still was a no-show. He flashed his eyes blue to gleam the area around himself, in hopes that he could perhaps catch a glimpse of... Anything at all. At that moment his fears won him over, and he wasn't only thinking of Malia in particular, he was ashamed to admit it but, at that instant he truly only wanted to feel another presence by his side.
"Something the matter, Peter?"
He froze upon hearing her voice, he never thought he'd ever hear it again, if not only in his head from times to times, when he reminisced on the old days, "Talia?" he uttered in shock, unable to turn around, unable to face her. For many reasons, he couldn't get himself to look his late sister in the eyes, not after all the nefarious things he'd done years after her extinction... To his own family.
"Isn't this what you wanted, little brother?" she asked condescendingly.
"No!! I didn't... I... I wanted none of this!" he stuttered the words out the best he could.
"Well, did you think that this day would never come? Did you really think you could escape the consequences of your own doings?"
"Where is Malia? Where is my daughter?"
"Malia? So, you found your daughter after all? That poor child, she could have gone several lifetimes without ever needing to know who her father was...,"
"Shut up! Shut up!" he screamed, in a mix of anger and plea.
"I did my best to protect her from you! Seems to me... That my best wasn't enough," she said.
"You! You took her away from me!"
"Can you really blame me?"
Could he really ever blame her? For protecting his own daughter from him? He'd always wondered, how different things could have been, if Talia never took that memory away from him. Perhaps she would have perished in that fire like the rest of his family? He immediately shook that thought away, but he couldn't shake his sister's words off.
When he'd laid eyes on her, he realized that he had already turned around and... When he did finally get a chance to take a good look at her; he thought... Of many things. He thought her traits had hardened, he thought her eyes had darkened... But in the midst of all of that he thought... That he'd missed her.
Was she even real? Never mind that, he couldn't focus on such questions, for his guilt flooded all and any part of his being. He began to remember all the cruel words he'd spoken in her regards, both to her face and behind her back; how he relentlessly tried to take the leadership of the clan from her, only because he thought he was entitled to such power. How he'd always undermined her authority and looked down on her ways, believing she was making them weak in the eyes of their enemies, but what happened to them after that?
"Well, this might not be what you wanted, but it sure as hell is what you deserve!" she cut his cogitations short, "Total and utter loneliness," she added.
Right then, he felt a tight hand grip at his ankle, his eyes instinctively darted down, startled by how freezing that touch was. Odd, since said hand made contact with his jeans and yet... He felt like it was locked right onto his bare skin. That wasn't the end of it, he lost all control over his breathing when he realized who it was, crawling on the cold hard ground.
"Laura?" his voice trembled.
Her right hand hooked around his leg, she managed to glare at him beneath all the dirt, filth and unkempt hair covering her face. He stumbled a few steps back before falling on his behind, his back sustained by a large tree trunk.
"Did you miss me, Uncle Peter?" she said in an unhinged tone, as she strained her arms to pull her weight forward, she had no legs to do so, her body simply stopped where her lower back was supposed to be, she crawled closer and closer to him, she dragged her hanging insides along with her as she moved.
"I am sorry, I... I am so sorry, Laura..." he apologized profusely between his breaths, he shook in his spot as the memories of what he did to his own niece, on the night of a full moon, bulldozed any other aspect of thought in his mind.
"I don't want your apology! What did you do to me?" Laura demanded ragingly.
"What did you do to my daughter?" Talia yelled out, " What did you do?" she screamed louder.
"I... I killed her, I killed... Her," he cried.
"Killer! Once a killer... Always a killer!" Laura berated him.
"Again! Say it again!" They both howled, their shrieking echoed loud in his head, it'd gotten so bad that he had to put his hands on his ears.
"I Killed her! I did... I am sorry, I am sorry..." he repeated and repeated like a broken record.
"What the hell are talking about? Peter! Peter! It's me! Wake up!"
That was another familiar voice, but his brain couldn't process it fast enough, not when he was in that state; what did they mean by wake up?
"Peter!" the voice called ou to him again, "C'mon! I think I found a way out," it said.
After a few more seconds stuck in that condition, he felt a moderately strong blow to the side of his face and finally decided to look up, "Malia? Is it really you?" he pleaded.
"Yes!" she answered that a bit too fast, "What do you mean?" she added.
"I thought... I," he tried but she spoke again.
"We were walking, and you freaked out all of a sudden, out of nowhere but... Forget it for now, I think I found a way out, look over there,"
She pointed towards an enlightened gap in the middle of the dark gown that covered that entire world. He saw it, then he saw... That there was no Talia or Laura around them, just him, and Malia crouched on her knees Infront of him. It was then that he realized that all of it, was nothing more than an illusion, a trick designed to mess with his mind, with his feelings.
He felt a tug on his arm, Malia was urging him to stand back up, in order for them to run towards the gleam of hope a few dozens of feet ahead of them. So, they ran in its direction like there was no tomorrow for them. They leaped, throwing their bodies onto what they believed was the exit from that hell hole.
They crashed on a hard, wooden surface. After a second glance once they stood up, it appeared to be floorboard, one that was all burnt up and damaged that is. As they took a more considerable look around them however, they began to seriously doubt that they had successfully landed outside the illusion.
They were in a house, that had been burned to a crisp, they could even catch whiffs of scorched objects' souls. They recognized that house, at least Peter did, how could he ever forget it? "Please tell me this isn't real," he begged under his breath.
"Wait, are we...Where I think we are? This is...," asked Malia.
"The Hale house...," he confirmed.