Vicki slouched in her seat with a faux "I don't care" attitude, as was the norm for her. Six minutes left. A horribly evil and unfair bitch of an old woman, a "Mrs. Cunningham", was glaring. Not at Vicki, sitting in the absolute back of the huge room, but at her area in general. "She doesn't know when to quit, does she?" Vicki said to herself under her breath, just below a whisper. "I'll bet she hasn't blinked for six hours. That witch."

Four minutes.

Vicki fingered a chain hanging from her frayed denim skirt to pass the time. Her black fishnet stockings, jet black combat boots, red dyed and spiky hair, multiple piercings, black and white frayed shirt, black makeup (almost always smudged, she cried so often), and her hateful attitude would qualify her as gothic at first sight, but she was a shy person at heart. Crying in a dark, quiet room was her solace, she was a cutter (right inner thigh), she liked dogs (not puppies, full-grown dogs), and she had recently taken up poetry. Dark poetry.

Fifty seconds. Forty-nine. Forty-eight.

Cunningham had her yellow eyes directly on Vicki now. She stared back, calm and unblinking, subtly mouthing "fuck you". Cunningham noticed.

"Victoria Chen. Turn in your test." Vicki glared, slouching in her seat, still fiddling with the chain.
"No one has ever called me Victoria. My name is Vicki."

She almost added "bitch" to that.

"Victoria Chen, I told you to turn in your test."
"Point being?" Everyone looked up. Some sighed, some moaned, some stared at Vicki, mouthing "Don't" to her, or shaking their heads slowly. Several people snapped their pencil in half. They knew what was coming.
"Victoria, do not question m-"
"Vicki."
"Never backtalk to me!"
"The test is almost over anyway!"

Ten seconds.

"Cooperate, or you know what will hap-" Vicki stood up and slammed her curled fists onto the desk.
"What? You're going to punish me and the entire class again?"
"Maybe I will, Victoria!"
Soft murmurs of "Goddamn it" could be heard throughout the classroom.

Five seconds.

"That's it. Leave!"
"And if I choose to stay?"

One second.

Cunningham slowly and ominously grew a small smile, sharp enough to kill a man's soul.
"Then you choose to be forever in a nightmare, Victoria." Cunningham tipped her head towards the left wall, and Vicki glanced where she was pointing, toward the bland, white clock on the wall. 13:00.
"What the f- ugh!" Cunningham's vile scent of cats, mothballs, and old-person vomit (and…sulfur?) suddenly overcame Vicki's nostrils, making her gag. She clapped her left hand over her mouth and nose, and turned her head back towards the front of the class, only to see a pissed Cunningham standing three feet away from her.

"How did you-" Vicki managed to get out through her hand. She began to subconsciously walk backwards, away from the horrible smell and from the now threatening Cunningham. But… how did she get so close? The bitch had been on the other side of the room! Not even the fastest runner in the world could get to the back of the enormous classroom in the three seconds that Vicki had looked away; it was impossible, but somehow, her horrible calculus teacher had pulled it off.
"Witch. You…you fucking… you evil witch…" Vicki stammered, her hand falling from her face.
"Witch?" Cunningham chuckled. "No…Victoria, I am nothing of the sort..." Vicki suddenly noticed that everyone in the class had stopped fidgeting and sighing. They looked forward with no expressions, sitting upright, but with their heads drooping down. The room seemed much… bleaker. Darker, too.
Her attention was brought back to the old woman standing in front of her, and although she was frightened, she naturally began to feel curious. Her mouth disregarded her brain's orders to stay nailed shut.
"What are you doing… What's happening? Why is it so dar-"
"I would stop asking questions at this point, child." By the time Cunningham could open her mouth and let the waterfall of squirming maggots fall from it, Vicki had bolted out of the door and was sprinting down the hallway, crying.

There are two kinds of fear in the world. Fear of the darkness… and fear of what is hiding in the darkness. For example, people who are afraid that their loved ones will be killed are afraid of the darkness. A man who is afraid of dying, even dying a peaceful death, with all of his family surrounding him, comforting him, is terrified of the darkness as well. But… someone who fears spiders, falling down stairs, thunder, or even burning themselves on the stove, is afraid of what lurks in the darkness. …But it doesn't matter what type of fear you have. The darkness will always make you shudder, whether it be it's presence, or it's inhabitants.

Vicki was looking for somewhere to hide; it was her nature, for she was a person that embraced the darkness as her ally, but ran, frightened, at what took residence in it. She continued to run as fast as possible, hearing inhuman, unbearable angry screeching behind her:
"VICKI, RETURN" She wouldn't dare look back, not if God commanded her to. And at the moment, she was weary if there even was a God. Spotting lockers in the hallway, she slowed. They were big enough for her to fit inside, but she was sure to be dead if found inside.
"Bigger space, bigger space, big- AAAH!" She had turned around.

A creature, nothing but mouth, almost large enough to completely block the hallway, blood red in color, maggots falling from all ever it's body, flesh pulsating, and covered in teeth, glared at her with familiar yellow eyes. Vicki could see a shaft of black fire rushing from behind her-- the way out. She was trapped between the darkness and the unveiled creature.
"YOU SHALL BE DEVOURED, VICTORIA," it screeched in a voice that could not have been developed on Earth.
"Vicki," she responded out of habit.