Author's Note:
OK, this is my first story posted on FictionPress - be kind!

OK, I'm not entirely new to the scene, I've been posting stories on for almost a year now.

Anyway, I really hope you like this story, I'm quite proud of it.

Sorry the type is so small, I'll correct it when I have time.

Just a warning, it's not for the faint-hearted! Don't be fooled by the beginning, it's very dark.

Enjoy!

The Storm © 2007
by The-Truth-Will-Strike-You-Down, AKA Bonnie

Hello, child. Come, do not be afraid, for though I am hideous you can see I cannot move. There is no trap waiting for you as there was for me. Sit. Now I will tell you a story…

Life before the storm was sweet. I would walk to the brook, a bubbling spring of merry busyness and never-ceasing activity. I would watch the fish as they supped their water, flitting through the slender tendrils of weed that grew like maiden’s hair from the streambed. Trees by the water offered shade and I would climb into their boughs and rest from the sun. Then, leaping down I would meander along the stream’s edge until it broadened into a ford where I would leave it. Over the rolling hills I would run along my way through the grass and back until I reached the garden. A sunny place of safety and security, basking in the light of an effervescent, ever-present sun, filled with flowers that smiled at me, showering sparkles and shimmering pollen through the air. Bees following those golden trails, drawn to the blooms, their gentle hum my lullaby. Inside the garden was the house, wrapped in ivy as though it were a shawl. Inside the house was warm, the fire swayed and shimmered like grass in a breeze and I could lie upon a bed that would envelope me in sleep.

Nothing could have warned me what was coming.

It is a long time, now, since I was young and did not know of the horror that had been chasing me. It had been there my whole life, hiding in the silver shadows that followed me. I had no thought for them then, living in my happy dream before the storm arrived, that howling that woke me from my contented reverie.

But the storm came. It stung me, crippling my body and twisting my mind until I became what you see before you. I can still clearly remember the transformation of my awakening; I was beside the stream, listening to its sweet gurgle, when I realised something was wrong. There was a sound, a constant high-pitched screech and as I listened it grew louder until I had to cover my ears. The scream of wind, whipping my hair and clothes, tearing the surface of the brook into flame-like tendrils full of twisting black weeds that snatched at me, leaving oily marks. The fish leapt from the water and lay upon the bank where they gasped for oxygen, their mouths growing wider and wider until before my eyes they flipped inside out, burst into flames and crumbled into black ash. As I tore my eyes from this atrocity I realised why I was in shadow: the trees were being blown, their boughs leaning over me and casting me into darkness. I staggered backwards, watching as they wrenched at their roots, their leaves torn from them so that they looked flayed, like skeletons. Then as I watched they seemed no longer trees at all but hands, reaching out for me, determined to hurl me into the ghastly water of the stream I had once loved. I turned and fled through grass that turned to gorse as I ran past, bloodying my legs and hands, though I would not stop. At last I reached the garden but it offered no refuge. The pollen that had looked so beautiful now clouded the air so that I could not breathe, the bees’ hum had grown to a whine that, together with the howl of the storm, filled my head like a tidal wave. Coughing, I staggered towards the house, the walls of which were crawling with ivy that grew at such a rate it looked alive. I reached it, by now so smothered in vines that the door was almost lost. I wrenched it open and stumbled inside, slamming it behind me with such force that some tendrils of ivy that tried to follow me were severed. Though the door was closed the storm did not cease. The wind ripped through the house, hurling furniture and objects from room to room, though somehow I managed to remain where I was. I sunk to my knees, shaking, holding my head as the noise pounded through me. Without even meaning to I began to scream as well, adding my voice to the din that was tearing my dream apart. I felt my body convulsing and warping, my mind seemed to be exploding and imploding at the same time. The sound rose to a shriek and I toppled into blackness.

It is hard to imagine I was once as young as you are, now that there is no movement in my limbs, so little breathe in me that I can barely speak, no willpower to chase my thoughts as they fly from me. I feel suffocated by the mere effort of existing. I am shrouded in a choking black fog, unable to wake from this nightmare that I have learnt to accept is…

…reality.