"Aye! Em&Em!" A loud voice traveled down the hall and shook Blood awake.
He was already standing, somehow, and he found himself in a brightly lit space. The walls were white with blue trim, the ceiling had weird holes littered throughout, and the ground was a perfectly smooth marble.
*BING BONG DING DONG*
"Today the City Kraken's will be contending with our very own Blue Raven's in the local finale for the country wide admittance — if you have the time, be sure to attend tonight!"
Blood looked around in confusion. The woman's voice cut through the air like butter and somehow seemed to spew from multiple different directions.
Spinning his head around, Blood noticed the hallway of doors beside him. Each door was painted blue and a small, rectangular window sat in the top corner of each of them.
He went towards the door, wanting to look through the window, but before he could reach it the door burst open and an army of people stormed out.
"You watch Hunting Dog's last night?"
"I'm still stuck on level ninety-eight, that boss is f****** bulls*** man."
The army of students barged into the hallway, each of them connected to two or three other people, all of them discussing something Blood can't process.
Blood reached his hand forward, "Hey, I was just wondering where —"
But the boy he attempted to speak to didn't acknowledge him. He turned down the hall and left with his two friends. Blood tried again, only to receive the same treatment before a body suddenly emerged in front of him.
Jumping back, Blood stumbled and fell over, but as he tried to avoid the sea of bodies he only managed to twist his legs even further.
Crashing to the ground, hundreds of feet stepped onto Blood and continued walking, but as he looked up, Blood noticed that their shoes were traveling through him and landing on the smooth floor beneath him.
He reached out and tried to grab a boy next to him but his hand sank into the boy's pants and through his leg. Blood tightened his hand in the boy's body, but he couldn't grab anything.
"What the f —"
"Man I hate that class —" a voice Blood recognized suddenly pierced through the hurricane of voices.
"Yeah, it's definitely not the best. I just wish he'd make a slideshow or something, soley reading from the book shouldn't be considered teaching, like, I can do that shit?"
"You? Read? Give me a break."
"Uh oh… Em&Em are fighting again."
"Get the camera —"
"Would you can it d*** weed!"
Blood followed the voices and found a group of people just now exiting from the room that exploded with an army prior. It was difficult to see their faces through the sheer number of heads occupying his vision, but through the cracks of students walking, Blood momentarily saw Emile's face flash through the crowd.
Blood pushed himself off the ground and sprinted towards Emile. He ignored the sea of bodies and ran straight through them, closing his eyes each time he entered another person's body.
He finally managed to spit himself out of the crowd only to find Emile's back turning around the corner at the end of the hall.
Blood raced after him and the moment he caught up, he went to tug on Emile's shoulder, but like before, his hand passed through.
"You guys going to the game tonight?"
"Against the City Kraken's? Are you retarded? They're practically undefeated. They've lost a single game and only because their star player caught the stomach flu. We don't stand a chance," the girl walking next to Emile rolled her eyes as she responded.
"Okay — that's fair, but it'll still be fun just to hangout, get some snackies, you know the deal," one of the guys behind Emile spoke up.
"Emma's just being a brat, we can't come tonight because college essays are due tomorrow and neither of us have started any of them," Emile said.
"Any of them?" A boy asked, shocked.
"Any of them," Emile agreed while exaggerating his voice.
"Shit that sucks, dog. What about this weekend?"
Blood sped up and got in front of Emile and his friends. Walking backwards, he looked at the group of people with Emile.
Directly next to him stood a tall girl. She had long, bleached hair and brown eyebrows. Her eyes were a beautiful shade of blue and she wore ripped blue jeans with a white tube top.
Blood was pretty sure Emile called her Emma.
Behind Emile and Emma walked three other boys. One had a buzz cut and dark skin, his dark brown eyes occasionally looked black in the shade.
Another boy wore a thick pair of glasses and had a face covered in freckles. And the last had long, curly hair with green eyes. His lip had been pierced and out of everyone Blood saw, this boy had the most buttons undone from his shirt out of everyone in the halls.
As he continued to walk with Emile and his friends, Blood took a moment to finally recall the last thing that happened to him. He remembered seeing Emile flash across the wall, the light from his amulet easily attracting Blood's attention.
Knowing Emile would never use the amulet on a dime, Blood rushed towards the camp's wall as fast as he could. When he arrived, he saw Roy on the ground — his body unrecognizable, his limbs twisted and snapped, his expression empty and hollow.
Shocked by the scene, Blood momentarily lost focus and crashed into the camp's wall. Then, he turned around and picked a fight with Emile.
He was angry, which in retrospect didn't seem like Blood at all. Blood was used to war. He was used to people dying, but for some reason Roy's death sent him spiraling.
He turned his back to Emile and stormed off, but before he left entirely, he looked back one last time to really spit in Emile's face and that's when his memories abruptly end.
Looking around again, he saw almost every person holding a small, usually black box in their hand. Their eyes were glued to it like they were possessed and their thumbs sporadically raced away on the little boxes cover.
Emile pushed open a set of double doors and walked outside. Immediately, the blazing sun burned its presence in Blood's eyes.
He covered his face with his hands and blinked rapidly in an effort to adjust his eyes. Once he was able to see, he looked back at the sky and the incredibly bright ball of flames that occupied its space.
With his mouth hung agape, Blood recalled the stories he heard as a child.
The sun was destroyed. It had been destroyed hundreds of years ago so….
"Where the hell am I?" Blood cursed internally.