" The nuns and monks, they're very serious about obedience and having a holier-than-thou attitude,"
•
As if anyone would have to guess.
" Uh huh?"
"They are really strict and no-nonsensical, and their punishments are, extreme and yes expedient in whipping kids back to docile brainwashed zombies,"
Now she was talking.
I stopped and looked at her, Ramone had stopped too and had her eyes widened, her hands were shaking. She looked....Unsettled and disturbed, a rare state for her.
"They're lots of them, the spinning chair, water cycle, hushed rooms, white noise house, when you disobey or seem like a rebellious one, they put you in one of those rooms, to 'discipline' you,"
" If you're extremely stubborn and putting you under those conditions of discipline isn't working, they'll put you in the Dark one,"
I was shocked, those sounded like really extreme and scary ways to 'discipline' a child.
" Mot...I mean Moriah, your 'mentor' was a pretty wild one then, they took her to all of the rooms and then to the last and worse of them, the Dark one, she stayed a week and changed completely, she even let them change her name like others, it was eerie," Ramone shivered.
I stared in silence, taking it all in shock. The Dark One. I repeated in my head, it sounded ominous.
" But...but I'm pretty sure you haven't gone to any one of them, right?" I didn't think Ramone was capable of any juvenile shenanigans, Ramone was calm and cool headed, she wasn't wild or rebellious.
" Na, they took me straight to the Dark one in the week I got here,"
Immediately?!
I widened my eyes.
" What did you do?" I asked.
" She cut a kid's finger off!" Timon said, shouting suddenly.
I stayed silent for a while, 'cut a child's finger off,'
Ramone? Calm, peace loving Ramone? There was no way she was capable of such barbarity.
" What?!" I shouted snapping back to reality turning to Timon who was suddenly digging beside her.
" Yup," Dusty continued, raising up her hand to show her fingers.
I looked in awe at her hand which in the place of the index was a horrible ugly stump.
"Woah,"
"Yeah, it wasn't that bloody though, she used a heated knife," she said looking at it as though she had only noticed half of her finger was gone.
I looked at Ramone again, her face was calm and angelic looking. I shivered, indeed, looks aren't as they seem.
" But, the rest of us aren't that stubborn, an hour in the water cycle was.... Enough," Imma said shivering violently, as he clutched a stick tightly.
There was suddenly a deafening silence as the trees' leaves jostled and the crows cawed above.
I looked down thoughtfully, they must have been traumatized badly, here.
Ramone's chuckle broke the silence.
"Though it's no wonder they haven't put you in the room,"
I turned to her. I felt like they'd been waiting for forever to confront me on the extravaganties Mr. Nomen lavished here.
"I bet it's because of my rich caretaker,"
" You bet right!" Morani and Timon said simultaneously and excitedly.
"That happens to many kids who get here, they get a little cocky and entitled and sooner than later, their caretaker abandons them or comes once every six months,"
I didn't have a problem, I was a ghetto child and no amount of luxury could stop me from digging in the dirt.
" But in all full pockets that have visited this orphanage, no one has come to your luxurious show of extravagance," Imma said teasingly.
I frowned, obviously they misunderstood.
I said, recalling his pitiable words.
They all gasped.
" What?"
" Oh no!"
" He's such a nice guy,"
" Yeah, he said he needed to do something nice for the children, as no one did the same for he and his thirteen siblings,"
I said, actually feeling a little sorry for him too.
" Huh,"
" That's a full house,"
Short silence again.
" So, I guess he's doing that in other orphanages?" Morani said hopefully.
" I guess, yeah,"
"Wait, so he isn't your uncle?" Timon asked.
" Uh, no... Wait, those things you said about the rooms..." I started facing Ramone. She'd almost succeeded in steering me away after steering me back.
" Hmm?" She looked absentminded.
"Are they real? Did you actually cut Dusty's finger off?"
I looked at the finger again and shivered involuntarily.
Ramone turned from her absentminded look at the sky to look at me with a serious look.
Timon gasped and suddenly burst out laughing, they joined in with Ramone chuckling.
I frowned, I couldn't believe these guys.
"Serious? You guys were playing?"
"Sure, as if they could do that with government social services visiting this place every month," Imma said choking with laughter.
" You should have seen the look on your face," Timon was going wild with laughter.
I sighed, how could I not think of the government officials?!
" Oh, wow you're all having a laugh, then what about the finger?"
" I was born with it, fool," Dusty smiled.
" Ok, so what's really in those rooms?"
" Really, really just some old stuff,"
I sighed again exasperatingly.
Ramone still chuckling moved her eyes to the 7th floor window in the hostel and in front of it, apparently watching them was a tall figure in a dark robe.
Ramone smile froze for a second before she breathed a sigh of relief. Then she turned to Elliam.
"Did you ask anyone else about this?"
I looked at her.
"What?"
"Anyone?"
"No..no,"
"No.... good," Ramone stood up.
I looked at her face in the sun, squinting.
" Be careful who you ask questions,"
And walked off.
I narrowed my eyes at what she said, then turned to the building, I was in time to meet a dark figure leaving a 7th floor window just then.
She was warning me about Moriah.
Maybe I was just being a little paranoid, maybe I was wrong, maybe it was just the old haunted air the orphanage gave, but there was something wrong, something deathly and insidious going on here.
•••••
7:25.
I lay silent in bed, waiting for lights out.
The power was always cut off at exactly 7:30.
Soon the clock ticked 7:30 and my room and the entirety of the hold was submerged into a sepulchral darkness. The pale dying moon being the only source of light.
It was dark, the half moon's rays was suddenly cut off by a dark blur of clouds.
My eyes were wide open, and my heart was beating fastly at the thought of the personal mission I was to go this night, I took deep breaths to lessen the anxiety pressing against my chest and waited for the forlorn creakings of the wooden boards to stop.