TABLE OF CONTENTS Welcome to the Void by Addison Smith .......................................................................... 2 Anastasia by Desiree Darznieks ........................................................................................ 6
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WELCOME TO THE VOID
BY ADDISON SMITH – MIDDLE SCHOOL WINNER I looked around, my eyes wide with terror. I had fallen into the void- a space of nothingness with only your worst fears inhabiting the darkness. Many children had been condemned to the void, but no one has ever lived to tell the tale. Today’s society is run by The Mannequins. Lifeless dolls with a harsh sense of judgment. No one knows how they work, or how they came to power. But I can tell you one thing- once you’re on trial, you are never found innocent. Theorists say that if The Mannequins are in power much longer, humankind would be no more. Because The Mannequins found everyone guilty, and the only punishment fit for all crimes is execution. Therefore, it brings the worst in people out, neighbors turn on each other and without a second thought accuse each other of crimes the accused didn’t do, just for an extra ration of food. Many people believe The Mannequins are merely puppets being controlled by a higher power. This higher power, however, takes most of our food, leaving many families starving and relying on stealing just to see another day. This was how I was found guilty. I had stolen an apple so my little sister could eat. Soon after, I was thrown into the void with nothing but the clothes on my back. A loud thud and the sound of water jolted me from my thoughts. Shakily, I stood up and walked towards the sound. I kept walking until I saw something that terrified me- the ocean, and I was teetering precariously on the edge of a cliff overlooking the waves. If I took one step closer I would be facing a watery death. Then I felt a hand on my back and next thing I knew I was tumbling into the murky water. Panicking, I flailed my arms and took hold of anything I touched. The thing that had pushed me in looked over the edge with an eerie smile, and I almost screamed in terror. The face I saw had been contorted so gruesomely that it was hardly even human. Flesh was falling off of its cheeks, and the skin around the mouth had been cut away to reveal razor- sharp teeth that were tinted a rather human shade of red.
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My grip started to loosen on the branch that separated my life from death. I should just let go, drowning would probably be easier than whatever that thing has planned for me, and with that thought, I let go. I groaned in pain as my back hit solid ground instead of water. Those awful creatures were surrounding me. Their exposed mouths were open wide and releasing horrible guttural screams. But their eyes were… pleading, as if their body was acting against their will. They all lunged for me, like a wall of flesh coming down on me. I bolted up and ran as fast as I could to escape a gruesome fate. The creatures let out a joyful screech, as if enjoying a chase. Wait… that’s what this is, I am the prey and to them this is just a game. I stopped running and spun on my heels, ready for a fight. I imagined them advancing and me landing blow after blow until I could escape. Taking a shaky breath, I prepared for the attacks. But surprisingly, none came. I looked around and saw the creatures quivering on the ground, like I had imagined them. Except I hadn’t laid a finger on them. Taking the time I was given, I ran. It could have been hours later, or merely minutes until my legs felt as if they had been replaced with jello. Collapsing to my knees, I decided. I would be the first person to escape the void. Not long after my encounter with the monsters, I decided to see how large the void really was. I turned in a random direction and counted my steps as I walked. I had gotten to 100 steps without running into any walls. Maybe the void really is endless… No. It can’t be, it’s not possible. My thoughts wandered, but I couldn’t scare myself about silly things like that. Then I realized something. When I had encountered the monsters, I imagined them afraid of me, but I never laid a finger on them. When I saw them, they were like I had imagined them. Maybe I hadn’t run into a wall because I imagined the void being endless. While I was walking I felt hot, foul breath on the back of my neck, and I quickly closed my eyes. As if what I couldn’t see couldn’t hurt me, I tensed up, preparing to run, but then imagined the creature disappearing. For a moment the breathing on my neck disappeared. As I began to relax, I felt it again. Squeezing my eyes shut, I realized the breathing wasn’t just behind me. It was all around me.
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Hot tears ran down my face as I thought of my family. If I couldn’t make these creatures leave me alone, I would never see them again. The day I stole that stupid apple that condemned me to this fate played over and over in my head, no matter how much I tried to stop it, to think of something else. Mom called from the kitchen, “Emery! Are you going into town today?” I had just finished lacing my boots when I walked out of the tiny bedroom. “Yeah, I’m going to get something for May, she’s getting worse,” May was my little sister, who had gotten sick, and would not eat anything. I was worried she was going to starve. We didn’t have enough food for my parents and I alone, and she refused to eat anything we offer her. I walked into May’s room, and knelt beside her small body on the floor, “Hey May, I’m going into town to get something that will make you feel better, I’ll be back soon,” Her bony hand reached for mine, and she looked up at me. “I want an apple,” I was shocked, she had hardly said anything. Much less ask for food. I stood up, determined. “I’ll get you an apple. I promise,” Then with that, I left. I never did give May that apple. I wondered where she was now, and if she was any better. Then I felt a clawed hand on my shoulder. Frozen, I held my breath, hoping they would leave. A minute later, I was close to fainting from lack of air. So I took a huge gasp, filling my lungs with oxygen. The creatures screamed and started their advance towards me, I imagined them walking away, leaving me alone. The breathing stopped for a second, and then it started again, only heavier, and louder. I opened my eyes just in time to see countless beasts lunging for me. I screamed, and then everything went black. Waking up to darkness, I tried to move. Only to find that I couldn’t. Something was positioned above my head, and a weak ray of light glinted off of it. The realization came to me quickly, and I struggled frantically to escape. After a minute of frustrating paralyzation, I could move again. But I didn’t have enough time to move before the guillotine came down. 4|Page
I was a fool to think I could escape the void.
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ANASTASIA
B Y D ESIREE D ARZNIEKS – H IGH S CHOOL W INNER Fallen leaves crunched under his boots as he trekked down the path. He couldn’t believe this was the only way to get back to his dorm room. The path through the woods was creepy and dark. He shoved his hands in his pockets with an eye roll and kept walking. He paused when he heard the cry from the woods. It was shrill and heart breaking. He turned off the path, distracted from his mission to get home. Pushing through a few low hanging tree branches, he reached a clearing. A pretty girl, brown hair hanging in her face, was doubled over in the middle. She was sobbing and crying, mud covered black dress hanging around her limply. He pulled out his phone to dial the police. “Miss, are you alright? Do you need some help?” He crept closer to her, still unable to see her face. She looked up at his with big brown eyes and a tear stained face. She didn’t say a word, just let out a ear-tearing cry that looked like it almost unhinged her jaw. He came over towards her, ready to help her. As he approached her face morphed, turning gray and cracked, like an old statue. Her eyes darkened to deep, black pits. Her fingers lengthened into talons. He noticed too late, turning to run just a step too close. She flashed in front of him, pointed teeth grinning widely. He fell back onto the ground, phone dropping from his hand and shattering.
“I don’t know where he is!” I shouted. The policeman on the other side of the phone cleared his throat uncomfortably as I screamed at him.
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“I’m sorry, ma’am,” he muttered. “We cannot report your boyfriend missing until 24 hours has passed.” “But he’s missing!” I screamed with every ounce of power I could put into my words. “Listen, ma’am,” the guy said. He sounded like he was pleading with me. “Stop calling me ma’am,” I snapped irritably. “Listen, Emara,” the man continued. “You’ve just started college recently, right?” “Restarted, yes,” I replied in a tense tone. “Maybe your boyfriend-” “Johnny!” I exclaimed. “Yes, Johnny,” he said exasperatedly. “Maybe Johnny was just out last night, had a little bit too much to drink, and stopped off somewhere for a nap. I’m sure he’ll turn up eventually.” I shook my head even though he couldn’t see me, pacing up and down in the apartment’s entryway. “He wouldn’t,” I defended. The guy sighed. “Call me when it’s been twenty four hours,” the policeman ordered. Then he hung up. I looked at the phone in disbelief. The police had just hung up on me. The front door opened, just about whacking into me, and Jaime tumbled in. She shook her head, throwing her black curls back into order. She looked at me, her hazel eyes filled with worry. “What’s up?” she asked. I spilled out the entire story about how Johnny hadn’t returned to the apartment after his class, and how I was worried because that wasn’t like him. He always called. Then I got to the part about the police hanging up on me, and Jaime snorted in disgust.
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She had already unwound her scarf and hung it up next to her purse, but stayed standing in the entryway with me since I was rooted to the spot. “I guess the only thing we can do is wait,” she muttered.
Jaime crunched over the leaves. She’d been at Emara’s all day trying to calm her down and reassure her. The only thing that calmed her down was Jaime’s offer to go trace back Johnny’s steps from last night. So now here she was, trudging along some creepy path out of campus in the dusky light. Jaime wrapped her jacket closer around her, shivering in the cold. Jaime pulled out her phone when it buzzed, sighing when there was a panicked text from Emara. “He’s not back yet!” Emara texted. “I just left to look for him five minutes ago, Emara. Calm down,” Jaime typed out, the little clicking noises ticking in the space around her. There was a shrill cry from the bushes beside her. Jaime jumped, nearly dropping her phone to the ground, and whipped her head to look at the bushes. The space around her was silent again. “Hello?” Jaime called into the silence, listening intently for a response. Her skin prickled in the silence and the hair on the back of her neck stood at attention. The air seemed charged with the sort of tension that takes over right as a glass falls and you know it will shatter. The moment of suspense. Another shrill cry sounded from the bushes beside her. It sounded like a baby’s cry. And as Jaime rounded the corner she saw it was indeed a baby. Swaddled in a pale pink blanket and laid upon a pile of leaves was the little squirming child. “Oh,” Jaime said in surprise. Approaching the baby quickly. “Who would leave someone so cute out here all by herself?” Jaime’s voice was a soft coo, causing the baby to cease its shrill crying and smile. 8|Page
Jaime nudged something with her foot as she stood over the child and looked down in confusion. It was a phone, the screen cracked and splintered. Embedded in the spiderweb-like glass was a layer of blood. Jaime hesitantly nudged the phone again, and it lit up. Past the cracks and blood, Jaime saw Emara and Johnny smiling into the camera as the phone asked for a password. It was Johnny’s phone. Jaime pulled out her phone quickly, standing right above the baby, and started to dial. Suddenly the child at her feet flashed and disappeared. Jaime looked down in surprise. There was no way she’d imagined it, had she? There was a childish laugh behind her. Jaime slowly turned, eyes wide, to face the girl behind her. She was about seventeen with long, flowing brown hair. She looked oddly familiar. Her movements were jerking and severe, but hardly made her mud splattered dress move at all. Jaime watched her smile with a fascinated sort of horror. Her teeth lengthened into sharp points when she smiled and her skin started to crack like old concrete. The girl moved faster than lightning to stand directly in front of Jaime. Jaime turned to run, and the girl appeared in front of her. “What do you want?” Jaime asked quietly. The girl slowly lifted a blanket with a sharp, taloned hand and dangled it in front of Jaime. It was a tattered and filthy object, which had once probably been a pretty pale pink. It was a tiny child’s blanket. Jaime looked at the article with confusion. “A child’s blanket?” Jaime asked. The girl let out a shrill cry and rushed forward. Jaime fell back with an ear-splitting scream.
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I paced back and forth by the door. Jaime had left to look for Johnny. I don’t know how she talked me into staying behind to wait for him, but here I was, waiting. I bit my lip. What if something happened to her too? I checked my phone nervously for a response. I got absolutely nothing. I bounced on my toes nervously. Then, on a split second decision, I grabbed my coat and spun out the door. My feet pounded heavily on the stairs as I rushed down them, headed for the path. Maybe if I was fast enough I could catch Jaime. I jogged down the sidewalk. A twig snapped behind me and I whipped around to look. I didn’t see anything between the cars behind me, but could almost seem to feel a pair of eyes on me. I shook the feeling off and continued. There was no one there and I needed to catch Jaime. I jogged all the way to the path, walking through the entrance. Knowing me, if I kept running I’d fall on my face. I decided slowing my pace here was worth avoiding the inevitable face plant. I walked down the path, keeping my eyes peeled for Jaime. There was a screech from the bushes. I furrowed my eyebrows and paused, peering into the shrubs with curiosity. “Jaime?” I asked. Nothing happened. “Jaime?!” I called louder. I took a step off the edge of the path. A girl appeared out of the bushes who was most definitely not Jaime. She had a pretty rank looking black dress and was bare foot. All she did was smile at me. “Hello,” I greeted, hoping to sound casual. Maybe she was on her way to a Halloween party. As the creepiest person ever to walk the face of the planet. Her smile widened. I watched, transfixed, as her teeth sunk down into fangs and her face actually fractured. Amid the stone-like look she’d take on her eyes turned to deep, black pits. “Holy-” I started. I stopped mid-sentence, unable to speak, and started to back away. I ran into a wall of flesh. I jumped and flinched, turning to look at who was behind me. Someone grabbed my shoulders and dragged me behind them.
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“Run!” they shouted. I followed without question. Anything to get me away from whatever I’d just walked into. There was a hair-raising howl from behind us that sounded like it’d been ripped from the girl’s chest. Something flashed in front of us and I screeched, starting to back track. The person next to me grabbed my arm, yanking me back onto the path, and swerved us around the danger. I was pulled along as I stumbled, catching glimpses every moment or so of the creature. The person next to me whipped out a bottle of something, splashing it in an arc over my head to hit the thing. It gave a wail of pain and paused for a few moments, letting us get ahead. We made it off the path, dropped onto the edge of a city street. The person next to me slowed their pace, still pulling me by the arm. I looked behind me as we walked down the sidewalk, waiting for her to jump out again. “She won’t follow us this far yet,” the person behind me said. I looked up at them. It was a boy about my age with blonde hair and a muscular build. His eyes, an insanely light grey, almost a silver looking color, were flickering nervously across the street. He led us towards an apartment building. I regained my mind, stopping to yank my arm from his hand. He spun to look at me with confusion. “I don’t know you,” I reasoned. “I’m not following you into a random apartment. I need to go find my friend.” I started to turn. “Your friend is dead,” he said sharply. I glared at him. “She wasn’t as lucky as you are. Now, I suggest you follow me inside or I’ll just leave you out here to face that thing alone when it follows you. And, believe me, it will follow you.” He spun again and headed for the building. I peeked at the dark street behind me for a few seconds, the stone grey face flashing inside my mind, and scampered after him down the sidewalk.
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I followed him all the way up the four flights of stairs and to his apartment. He held the door open for me to let me in as I approached the doorway. I hesitated. He sighed at me and his look softened a little. “Listen,” he muttered. “I’m not going to hurt you. I’m trying to help.” His eyes looked less scary when they were like this, more gentle. I stepped inside with a little nervousness, watching him closely. He closed the door behind us and bolted it. Then he moved past me into the apartment, flipping on lights. It was a simple apartment decorated in mostly black and white. It looked like he hadn’t bother to decorate at all. He must have just moved in. I looked around the studio apartment. It was oddly neat for a teenage boy my age. “You could at least tell me your name,” I pointed out. He looked at me from the kitchen counter with raised eyebrows. “Would that really make you feel better?” he asked. I shrugged. “It’d be a start,” I said quietly, moving to take up residence on his couch. He moved around in the kitchen a little bit, but I wasn’t really paying attention. I figured I was already too far gone if he was really planning to hurt me. My eyes flickered over the room, not really taking it in. I kept seeing that girl over and over again. I wondered if that was what Jaime had run into. Or Johnny. I had a sinking feeling that I already knew. The guy made me jump, coming to sit next to me on the couch. I gave him a nervous glance. He held out a mug. “I don’t drink tea,” I responded, figuring he was trying to calm me down. “It’s not tea,” he answered. I took the mug hesitantly, holding it in my hand. When I took a sip I discovered it was hot chocolate, not tea. I wrapped my hands around the mug now. The guy smiled. “Ambrose,” he said. I looked up from the drink. 12 | P a g e
“Excuse me?” I questioned. “Ambrose. My name?” he pointed out. I cleared my throat uncomfortably. “Oh,” I muttered. He took a sip of his own mug. “I met Johnny,” Ambrose said casually. I perked up. Ambrose sat back against the couch next to me, brushing his thumb over the lip of his mug. “How’d you know Johnny?” I prompted. Ambrose pressed his lips together. “I met him at a bar last night. He’d stopped on his way home for a drink. I recognized you immediately on his lock screen, so I slid over to talk to him,” he said. I looked at him warily. I was sure I hadn’t met him before today. Maybe I really had been picked up by a serial killer. “You… recognized me?” I asked slowly. He looked up at me. “Oh! Sorry, that must sound creepy. We were in high school together, Emara,” Ambrose said. I looked him over. I didn’t remember him at all. “I know, you don’t remember me. I avoided you.” “Why would you do that?” I asked. He looked at my mug with a small smile. “A girl after my own heart,” he said, pointing to the mug. “You prefer hot chocolate over tea or coffee. Why is that?” I looked down at my mug. “I don’t know.” “Oh, you know,” he accused. I swallowed loudly. “After my parents died in a car crash, I was taken to the police station. Hot chocolate was the first thing they gave me,” I murmured to my drink. There were a few beats of silence.
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“I know,” he said. I looked at him nervously. He was making himself seem more and more like a stalker. “I know because someone else hit your parents car. Another couple. The man was drunk.” “They both died,” I said. He nodded. “But their four year old son lived without a scratch,” he pointed out. He sat forward and looked at me intently. “The four year old boy that sat next to you at the police station, drinking hot chocolate.” “Were you…?” I trailed off. He nodded. “I avoided you, Emara Davis, because I didn’t want to face the person my father left parentless,” Ambrose said. I stared at him. “Then why am I sitting on your couch?” I questioned. He grimaced. “There was a detail you left out,” he reminded. I clenched my jaw. I knew what it was. My aunt had told me never to bring it up. “I know,” I choked. Ambrose nodded. “Your mother was pregnant,” he said. I bit my lip. He looked at me intently in the silence. “Do you know what a tiyanak is, Emara?” I looked at him with confusion. “Am I supposed to?” I asked. “Probably not,” he admitted. “A Tiyanak is the spirit of a child whose mother died before birth. This specific child is cursed because it was not given proper rights at the funeral. It haunts and kills those responsible for its death or the people who got to live when it didn’t. Or sometimes they lure travelers off their path and murder them. They can shapeshift into children, into what they would have been, or even babies. But they always attack in their true form. They’re unbelievably fast and merciless.” I stared at him. “You’re-” 14 | P a g e
“No,” he said, cutting me off gently. “I’m not crazy. You were with me tonight. You saw that thing.” I opened and closed my mouth a few times, trying to find what to say. “Are you saying…” I muttered. “Are you saying I just got attacked by my baby sister?” He nodded. “Unfortunately,” Ambrose said. I felt my hold on my mug slip. Ambrose reached out and caught the mug as it fell, setting it on the coffee table in front of me. I put my head in my hands. “How do you know?” I asked past the curtain of hair cascading around my face. “My uncle, who was also an alcoholic like my father, was killed by it. It killed my best friend trying to get to me. A few weeks ago, your aunt was killed in a mysterious crash. It killed your boyfriend trying to get to you. Then it killed your best friend. And now, it’s after us,” he explained. I looked up at him. “How did you know to find me?” I asked. He laced his hands together. “I knew that your sister had something to do with this after I saw her kill my uncle. She held a pink blanket up to him before she tore into him. I saw that pink blanket they gave you at the police station. I put it together,” he said. He was right. They’d given me the pink blanket that was supposed to be my sisters at the police station. “How did you know it was a tiyanak?” I asked. He rolled his eyes. “This is the twenty-first century. The internet, clearly,” Ambrose scoffed. I gave him an unamused look. “In the woods, how did you know to save me? How did you know I was there?” I asked. He unlaced his hands to rub his eyes tiredly. “I heard Jaime scream when I was walking by the path,” he murmured. I raised my eyebrows. “I didn’t hear that,” I said. He nodded. 15 | P a g e
“I know,” he murmured. “She was being dragged away as I arrived. And then you came jogging in.” I had to fight back tears. I looked up at the ceiling, biting the inside of my cheek. “Emara?” Ambrose asked. I looked at him. He looked concerned. “Are you alright?” “How do we kill it?” I asked fiercely. Ambrose looked at me with shock. “You want to kill it?” he asked. I nodded. “If it’s going to keep hurting people I think we have a responsibility to stop it. So how do we kill it?” I questioned. He stared at me. “I, uh, don’t know,” he muttered. I rolled my eyes. “You ran into the woods to save me but you didn’t know how to kill it?” I asked. He grimaced. I sighed and leaned back onto the couch, rubbing my eyes. Ambrose leaned back on the couch next to me. A few hours later I woke up with my head on his shoulder and his arms wrapped around me. I blinked my eyes open, groggily looking around. I jolted to attention when I heard a baby’s cry. “Ambrose!” I exclaimed, shaking him. He jolted up next to me, hair falling into his eyes. “What? Emara?” he asked. I grabbed his arm when they baby’s cry sounded again, just louder. He met my eyes with wide ones of his own. “Time to go,” I announced, jumping off the couch with determination. He scrambled up after me. There was a childish laughter from outside the door. It was the happiest thing I’d heard in a long time. I numbly started to gravitate towards it. I snapped out of my trance when Ambrose grabbed my arm, yanking me back towards him. I looked up at him, shocked. He shook his head and started pulling me towards the window. I stood, watching the door, as he shoved the window upward. A shadowy figure flashed through the door.
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It was a toddler with beautiful and long brunette curls. She was wearing a puffy black dress, spotted with mud. She smiled and laughed at me. I smacked Ambrose in the back to hurry him up. “Emmy,” the child called. Her voice was high and musical. She walked at me slowly, occasionally making a movement that was just slightly too fast or unnatural. I heard the window slide open behind me and Ambrose was gone, standing on some sort of fire escape. The little girls face morphed as I stood there in horror. Her face cracked and turned to stone, her teeth becoming fangs. I was transfixed, staring into her deep black eyes. She reached out towards me with a clawed hand, holding up a little pink blanket. It had a blood stain on it. “Emmy, play with me,” she called. But this time her mellifluous voice had a raspy, deep undertone. It raised the hairs on my neck and sent a chill through the room. Someone grabbed my hips from behind and dragged me through the window frame. “Emmy!” she shrieked, her voice almost like a murderous shriek mixed with a child’s sweet and desperate call. “Move!” Ambrose ordered, ripping me out of her sight and pulling me down a flight of metal stairs. Once I couldn’t see her, I focused back in on what I needed to do. I needed to run. I darted after Ambrose, his hand clamped around mine. We made it to the bottom of the stairs and ran to the end of the alleyway, gasping for air. “What...now?” I asked between breathes. Ambrose shook his head. “We’re going to have to keep running,” he said. “She’ll follow.” I shook my head. I couldn’t run forever. “We need to do something,” I insisted. Ambrose gave me a distressed look. “I don’t know what to do,” he said with dismay. I bounced on my toes, looking back at the apartment window. I almost thought I saw a flash of brown hair.
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“You said she’s jealous of our lives?” I asked. He nodded. “But the only reason she’s here is because she never got proper recognition after she died?” Ambrose nodded again, giving a nervous glance to the window above us. “The blanket,” I said. He looked at me in confusion. “You said she held the blanket up to your uncle before she killed him. Was he drinking with your father before the crash?” Ambrose nodded. It all clicked together in my brain. I grabbed his hand and started leading him down the sidewalk. “What?” Ambrose asked. I smiled at him like a maniac. Because I’d figured it out. “My aunt was the one who arranged the funeral. She ignored my mother’s pregnancy because she said it was too heartbreaking for everyone to bear. Your uncle, according to my sister, caused the accident because your father was drinking with him. Johnny and Jaime were a part of the life she wasn’t, so she took them from me,” I explained. I started heading back towards the path. “So you’re saying she’s targeting people that she blames?” he asked. I nodded confidently. “So what about the blanket?” “We had bought it and were on the way home when the accident happened. It was supposed to be hers. She’s showing it to people because she thinks no one remembers her,” I said. Ambrose grabbed me and spun me to face him when we made it to the edge of the path. “Where is it?” he said, catching up to my thought process. I heard an echoing child’s laugh bounce down the street. I laced my hand with Ambrose’s. “My apartment,” I said, nodding my head back towards the path. He looked at it in dread. I peeked down the street to see a little girl skipping in a black dress. “Ready?” I asked. Ambrose nodded. We both took off at the same time, hands gripped tight, and ran down the path. I heard a baby’s cry echo out of the trees. I didn’t even pause. Children’s laughs echoed
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around us and bounced off the dark trees. The trees loomed overhead like angry prison guards and the cold air whipped around us. I heard a call close by me of “Emmy!” Ambrose was ripped from my side. I stopped and whipped around to see her rip him off his feet. She was a teenager again, what she should have looked like today. She had one taloned hand around his ankle. She swiped down at him and he threw up an arm, earning a large gash across his forearm. I bent down and grabbed a rock, chucking it at her. It sailed right through her. I looked around frantically. Ambrose shot a look back my way. “Run!” he screamed. She raised her hand to strike down again. “Anastasia!” I hollered loudly. She paused and whipped her head up, staring at me with her bottomless eyes. “Annie!” I screamed. She tilted her head to the side and bared her fangs at me in a snarl. “Come and get me!” I taunted. I took a step backwards. “Emmy,” Anastasia growled. I opened my arms up. “Come and get me, Annie!” I shouted. I started backing away and she flashed off of Ambrose, standing a few feet in front of him. Her appearance seemed to grow darker the closer she got to me. “Who forgot about you?” I yelled. I kept backing away while Ambrose watched on in shock. “Em-” Anastasia started. “Who left you behind? Who decided you were nothing?!” I shrieked. She wailed at me in a way that shouldn’t have been anatomically possible. Anastasia started for me and I took off in the opposite direction. A childish laugh tinkled across the dark path next to me. I stopped and whipped around to face the monster. But she wasn’t there. She wasn’t anywhere that I could see. But someone else came running up, blood dripping down his arm.
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“Come on, crazy,” Ambrose said forcefully, grabbing my hand and dragging me with him. We ran to the edge of the path rapidly. A random jogger met us at the other end, looking at us with concern. “You need to get out of here!” I yelled at him. He gave me a panicked look and turned to go. But he ran right into a little girl in a black dress. Ambrose had to drag me off as he started screaming. We ran back to the apartment, pounding up the stairs. My hands shook with fear and adrenaline as I unlocked the door and tumbled inside. “Where’s the blanket?” Ambrose questioned. I led him back to the bedroom, riffling through the trunk at the foot of my bed. I found the blanket in no time. “Here,” I said triumphantly. He grabbed it from me. This one was clean with just a few tiny rips in it. ‘Anastasia’ was embroidered in gold along the edge. “That’s how you knew her name,” Ambrose realized. I nodded. There was an echoing laugh outside my window. I grabbed his arm with wide eyes. “Are you sure this will work?” “No,” I said, voice shaking slightly. Anastasia, still a teenager, flashed into the room. An invisible force threw Ambrose away from me and he slammed into the wall, crumpling to the floor. Anastasia advanced towards him with a fanged smile and her sharp hand holding up the blanket. “Annie!” I shouted. She ignored me this time, having learned her lesson. “Anastasia!” I shouted. I ran at her and tried to grab her arm. I did actually, but it shocked me and I fell to the ground. “Emara!” Ambrose called. I sat up and watched my sister head for him. His eyes were focused on me, worried. He relaxed a little bit when he saw me sit up. I scrambled to my feet with haste and jumped in front of Anastasia, blocking her from Ambrose. Anastasia lifted her hand to strike at me but I held up the blanket. Her face went slack and she paused. I saw a few bloody tears start to drip from her black eyes. Her pointed hand lowered slowly to reach out for the blanket. When her hand touched it, there
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was a bright flash of light. I closed my eyes and turned my face away. There was a piercing scream and a haunting baby’s cry. Suddenly everything went still. I opened my eyes slowly. She was gone. I whirled around kneel in front of Ambrose. “Is it over?” I asked. He shrugged. He lifted a hand to lightly touch a cut on my face. “She was about to kill you,” I said. He nodded. “And you were looking at me.” He smirked a little bit. “I had to make sure you were alright,” he muttered. I reached down and helped him to his feet. He wrapped an arm gently around my waist and I let him lean on me. “I think I am,” I replied.
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