(Rose)
Why is the devil after us? Maybe it's still as I suspected Fruya admits. Maybe we trespassed on a territory, and we simply shouldn't be there. It may very well not be after us particularly. We're toys, preys, food, or perhaps only nuisance. Bugs that are bothering something bigger.
My hips are shaky. Fruya leaves. Ann comes in the room next.
I can't look at her. I'm too shameful, for a few very strong reasons. My head is down and I can't move. My shame overpowering me paralyses me.
She comes to sit next to me and asks me how I feel. I don't really want to talk about it. I'm still very confused about myself or about her.
She tells me to take my time and leaves too. I feel weird. I still don't understand her.
Outside, the sun is setting. I fear that with the night, the horror will resume.
As I see Fruya sharpening sticks and hardening them in the fire, I understand they do too.
I sit quietly aside her. Ann and her poor daughter are elsewhere. Fruya looks at me, but doesn't judge me. How shameful I feel.
After a few minutes looking at her skilful job of stick sharpening, I dare to ask.
How had the demon spoken to her?
She looked at the sky and then at something by the wall. She told me she had seen a different Victoria, older than ours, alone.
A different Victoria.. But the same monster soon after. I ask her if she killed someone because of it.
I don't like how she looks at me now... She goes by the wall and grabs something. She brings it to me. It's the rusty sword...
As she hands it to me, she sharply replies, no.
I'm the monster. I want to leave. She tells me then not to go. Did she understand what I had in mind? My face is probably ashen.
I look at the sword in my hand, and drop it.
I don't want to remember that feeling, of it stuck between bones. Woe is me, as she used to say.
I go to take a walk. Again. I want to leave.
Time passes. I think I doze off in the woods for a while. As I go back to the house, I hear the child crying. Ann comforts her.
Charlotte cries that she misses Victoria. Ann shuts her up. She mustn't talk about her sister anymore.
They lied to me. All of them.
For some reason, they chose to make me believe that the demon was acting accordingly with everyone. They wanted to make me believe that I didn't commit that murder, but was becoming insane however.
I want to vomit, again.
Closer. Closer.
I manage to keep standing. I feel as if blood is raining from the sky. I hear a scream. I think it's mine. The face of a monster is close to mine.
I think I ran away. I see flames. A wall is falling down.
Victoria is laughing, a larger black monster behind her.
I doubt. I think it's the other one. The screams deafen me. The body is ripped apart in front of us. The dismembered pieces fly at us. Charlotte...
Fruya sets fire and retreats with Ann. I can't move. I see pieces of the child lying so close.
The monster jumps at me. I'm too slow to react and its jaws grab my left hand. I fight it off.
The most searing pain imaginable burns my fingers as they are being ripped apart. I feel the bones being crushed, the flesh being teared away.
I hurt my throat screaming my pain, but it's almost sweet next to the one in my hand. I'm pulling myself out, ripping my own skin despite a numbing pain.
I've lost an undetermined number of fingers, and feel like my hand is in molten iron.
I'm going to collapse; I try to run. I can't think anymore. I don't know where I am.
I see Alan. I'm scared and run away again.
The monsters are everywhere. It's almost night time.
I'm utterly panicked. I don't understand what my eyes perceive anymore.
I saw the gun. I jump on it. The rifle. What's left of my left hand grabs it, but it hurts horribly. My other hand gets a good hold on it, and I resume my running.
I saw Fruya's torch, I try to go after her.
I trip and fall. The rifle shots the ground and the noise deafens me. I'm dizzy. I crawl. My hand is in flames I think.
I hear Victoria as my strengths abandon me.
- Oh mother, sister, let me repair your mistakes. Let me bring you freedom.
There's fire everywhere, but I managed to reload the rifle, slowly, under my fallen body.
I turn over, panting, exhausted. I see fire everywhere. A darkness blacker than night emerges, with the pierced face again.
I shoot roughly at it. The recoil of the weapon hurts my shoulder in the ground.
The monster falls on me like a wall or a giant tree trunk would. It covers the sky. I'm swallowed by night.
~
I fear I'm dead.
I see nothing. I don't feel my body. I'm trapped. I think I felt that way once before. Is this over? I want to cry.
Will I dream that I'm back on my train as I die? That everything is fine?
No. Nothing is that sweet.
The pain in my left arm grows. I can't rest. It's night. I'm alone. I'm injured. I'm in danger. I'm scared.
I try to move. It's like I'm plunged in thick wax. I can hardly breathe.
My left hand feels as if it's against a burning piece of metal. The more I move it, the worse it feels. I'm alone. I'm powerless.
No. I'm better than that. My name is Rose. And if my parents gave me that name, it was not about beauty or fragrance...
I never give in easily... I should never give up.
I'm convincing myself a bit.
I fight off that situation. My right hand is moving. I think I'm inside the monster. Its body feels soft but very viscous.
I can move a little. Is it dead? Did I kill it? It seems unlikely... It doesn't look like the beasts at all. It's something else.
My right hand pierced a skin, and fluids are pouring out. I'll drown in it soon if I can't move. I push. It slides a bit. Then the skin keeps ripping itself like an overfilled bag.
I take a deep breath and dive inside when it opens itself over me.
It's disgusting and stings my hand, but I can move.
I grab bones like I would a ladder and pull myself up. There's an opening and I get out. I feel the coldness of the night.
I must look like a bloody monster. I get out.
There are ashes around, some are still warm. Some of these woods burnt. So did that thing. It burnt. May it remain forever in the fires of hell from now on.
My hand is all gooey, covered with so much sludge that it looks like a palm. I know some fingers are missing inside...
It hurts less and now that it's covered in grease or fat, it doesn't seem to bleed. I'm not sure it's the best sanitary choice to leave it at that, but I don't have the courage to clean it right now.
I'm leaving. I'm walking through the burnt woods. Only a little part really burnt.
It's quiet.
I wonder if Ann saw her second daughter die then. A glimpse of hell.
I'm alone.
~