AN: While working on an assignment, I decided to write this allegory based on four of my memories combined. Please enjoy this story.

A woman walked through a vast and expansive forest in the middle of the day, taking her time in order to delay accomplishing her burden. After all, a burden is to be chained to the soul and not easily discarded.

"Jane, what are you doing?" A man from a bush asked.

"I do not know, man from a bush. I did not even know my name until you just said it now. From what I can recall, they said I must accomplish a burden." She did not stop to idly chatter with the man, for she had a burden to accomplish.

"How can you say that to me, Jane? I have known you for years! You have also known me for years. My name is John, not a man from a bush. Why do you say what you say?" John kept a decent pace with the woman whom he had known for so long, enraged at what words she spouted. It didn't make sense,... how could their be someone controlling their lives so fully?

"Of course I say that! They have hidden my name from me as well as your name too. 'Such a thing' you say, John, but those who write are not 'such a thing,' they are in fact everything. I have no image or face until they write it, and even then I can never appear. I only exist in words." To Jane, nothing was more certain than that of her existence. She stops in the middle of the path, placing a hand on the top of her head. "What an odd feeling... I can now recall you quite well, and at the same time not to the extent at which you speak. It has been years that I have known you, but how many years? I cannot remember, which means they have yet to write it."

"Enough talk of 'they'! We are our own-self, we control our lives and every step we take. You and I have known each other for ten years. How can you doubt that, a time which has always been our past?" The forest around them started to rot and the sky darkened to a smokey black, bringing a heavy atmosphere to Jane and John.

"I'm guessing that you didn't even notice how the whole forest and sky started to rot, John. Did you even perceive the alteration?" It seemed that Jane would not answer the other's question, no matter how hard he pushed. She could only sense an answer that was out of her reach, but growing closer as both of them walked through the rotting woodland. "It just changed in a matter of seconds. Can you not see it?"

"We've been walking for hours and have been moving farther south where the area is bad and decays. Why are you avoiding my question? I will not tolerate this anymore, Jane. I'm going to ask again, why are you doubting the time between us! It doesn't make sense that you can just forget and deny it altogether." With these last words, John's patience had reached its' limit. No amount of sincerity from Jane would qualm his anger about their past being forgotten.

"My god, John, did I not already explain it to you? I don't know anything because they haven't written it. Why is that so hard for you to understand? I-" She stopped speaking because of the thick, putrid trees that sprouted out of the ground as if they were the dead, rising from the fiery pits of hell. Out of everything that happened, this is what John had decided to notice. To Jane, the rising of the forlorn trees brought the greatest truth to conscience.

Terrified, John fell backwards, scrambling to get away from the devilish wood. Jane took several steps toward the trees, loudly laughing at how everything cleverly made sense now.

"I get it! I finally get it! I was never a person to begin with, but you...," Jane turned around with an insane look on her face. "You are a person, you are a little girl, John, not a man."

"How dare you! I'm a man, not a-" John's voice had started to sound an octave higher, he began to shrink in size, his features became softer, and when his metamorphosis had finished, he was no longer John. He was Alice, a 15 year old child who knew only pain and anguish from men. "...You are right, Jane. I can see clearly now that I am what I am, but now I have a different question for you. If I am this, then why do I know you from so long ago?"

"Finally I can give you an answer, Alice." Jane walked to Alice, with an even more crazed expression. She crouched down so that she could see the child at eye level. "You do not know me from long ago, you only met me seven days ago. Actually, it was your sister who introduced us, for as I stated earlier, I am not a person, my true identity is a secret and fear who eats away at your soul. I am the assassin that almost took your father's life, but he was so low that I didn't bother." Fear patted Alice gently on the head and from that simple touch, spread a disease that was likely to kill anyone.

Alice's eyes became glassy and dull; instead of a youthful face, her features showed a torment and pain beyond words. Her whole body seemed to slump into a ball. Nothing could stop this illness that fear spread.

With her last amount of energy, Alice looked fear straight in the face and asked, "Who are they, that you mentioned? Did they write this...?"

With a high pitched laugh, Fear answered her final question.

"You still don't get it, do you? They are your mind trying to kill you with things such as me. Oh, Alice, you'll never escape it either. Fear eats up anyone and everyone."

No longer was there a forest, a path, or anything, all that could be was a little 15 year old girl who quietly and painfully sat in the blackness of her mind, while Fear murmured into her ear.