Through a Nightmare, Darkly, a Supernatural fanfic

Good Evening, Internet! Von-Pants here, again.

Theme: Explore the concept that the decisions an individual makes provide greater signifigance to their life.

An assignment for English Extension, with a damned word limit, of all things.

I hope you like it.

When Chris looked into the mirror he saw a stranger staring back at him. His eyes had deeply pronounced shadows, his cheeks had become gaunt and his face and hands were pale and drawn. Despite taking an extra number of showers and even resorting to raiding his mother's makeup box, he looked...ghostly. Like he was only marginally alive. He splashed ice cold water over his face, willing for the umpteenth time to look again and see himself somewhat more real, solid. For the umpteenth time he was sorely disappointed, and so he dragged himself to his bedroom.

He could still glimpse the pure terror fresh on Emily's face when he closed his eyelids. Her eyes were wider than they'd ever been, her hands white from the pressure of holding on to the roof gutter. It bent under her weight, bent and fell free, Emily falling with it. Every time he tried to rest she was there, again, screaming his name. Every time. Sleep became a luxury, something he missed dearly. He hadn't slept in two weeks for deathly fear of the nightmares which would grip him and that gut-wrenching sense of guilt, the knowledge that it was his fault she had fallen from the roof of the house, his fault she had struck her head on the water tank, his fault she now lay in a comatose state in the sterilised ward of a hospital. The insomnia was his fault too and there was only one way to fix it, that way being through the nightmare he had avoided for so long.

Locking the door of his bedrrom, he summoned his courage for what he was about to do. Chris collapsed onto his bed, the trauma weighing heavily on his heart. Shuddering, he closed his eyes only to open a door. Not his bedroom door.

It was to an average door as a house cat to a tiger, much larger and much more intimidating because he couldn't know what to expect, couldn't even imagine what he's find. He only knew it wouldn't be easy, nor would he find it pleasant. Carved in a curious chicken scrawl, which he recognised as Emily's, was a sentence set in gold: "Those seeking redemption."

Him, then?

He took a tentative step through and was enveloped in the dark.

He emerged on...his roof? It certainly looked like it at first glance, but as he took a closer look he noticed with shock that it was much, much larger. A rising slope of roof tiles, ascending to impossible heights: what could only be called a mountain, the edges of which dropped so far into darkness that to fall would mean death. Terror gripped him as the wind howled, Emily's shrieking echoing around him. Her screaming filling his ears, his mind, his senses until he felt numb. Biting his lip against the freezing gale, he began the steep, impossible climb.

"If you want atonement, you're going to have to suffer for it, Chris" her voice (could she ever sound that spiteful?) whispered mercilessly.

When he reached the top, after what was surely forever, the summit was perfectly flat. His legs burnt and red-hot pain coursed through his lungs as he gasped greedily for breath. The shrieking had, by now, dropped to a murmur and everything was eerily still. And there, waiting, was a woman. She was tall, slim, and raised a delicate eyebrow at his approach. She had sharp features hidden behind a curtain of black hair and wore a robe of the same colour.

"State your purpose, child."

Chris' heart seemed caught in his throat but he managed an answer.

"I'm...looking to fix it all, to wake her up, I guess. I have to." His tone became more certain.

She laughed airily.

"Is that right, dear boy? And how shall you accomplish such a task? I'm loath to let my quarry go."

Chris didn't know, he told her, and asked her name.

"I go by many names. Catatonia, Trauma, the greek call me Koma, but you," she said "may call me Madam."

"Well...Madam, how can I fix her?"

Madam laughed again, as if it were all so amusing.

"Why bother? Life is so fleeting in any case. Why, your life could be compared to, say, this!"

She opened a pale hand and upon it burned a tiny flame, flickering furiously. His eyes followed it as it danced upon her open palm, and he didn't question how her hand remained uncharred. By now he knew mundane laws did not apply here.

"It burns so very brightly, does it not? But it can be extinguished like...", she blew lightly: it died instantly, "that. No matter what you do in your life, it has no point. Death is inevitable, so why do you even try?"

"If I don't I'm damned. How will I forgive myself? If I want to live, to actually live, I have no CHOICE!" He shouted. His shout echoed for a painfully long time.

Her look hardened and she drew her lips (thin, tight lips, 'how DARE you' lips) into a snarl.

"You alone must fix this, boy! I make no paltry deals with you humans! You want to sleep again? There are ways to wake her up and if you are desperate enough, you must WORK for it." she hissed.

With a decisive flick of the hand Madam flung him, dismissed him, and he fell down, down until he came to the edge.

He gripped it, wondering whether falling would truly bring death.

And let go...

To find himself back to reality, drenched in cold sweat and tears.

"Redemption is attainable" Two voices echoed from the far reaches of his mind.

"But you must suffer for it."

Fin?

In short, he has to be the one to wake Emily up. It is possible, but he will have to oversome adversity and blame to do so, and even then he might not be entirely forgiven.

Thanks for reading.

Won't be continued.