Page 102 of Apathy
Her ginger hair bounced around her shoulders as she stepped around the large rock in between the two trees. I couldn’t see her eyes, but I could feel her energy matching mine. As soon as she reached where I stood, we started walking together, going deeper into the woods, further away from the crowd.
“I missed this.” I was the first one to break the silence between us. “I missed us.” I looked at her.
She looked down at the ground, as if contemplating her next words. “I did too. It’s been too long, and it feels as if all of us just… drifted apart.”
“Yeah,” I agreed. “I didn’t think it would happen this fast.”
“Mmhmm,” Lauren mumbled. “I think this is okay.” She suddenly stopped. “I’ll just go around the tree and you can go there.” She pointed toward the larger tree not too far away from us.
Without waiting for my confirmation, she took a step back and started walking toward the tree behind us, while I started heading to the one further away. An owl hooted as soon as I stopped beneath the tree, announcing its presence.
“Shush.” I snickered, unbuttoning my pants, and crouching down to pee.
I could still hear the faint sound of music, and the rustling of leaves as the wind whooshed between the trees. I pulled my pants up and walked back to where we separated. The feeling I never wanted to feel again crawled all over my neck, and even in my drunken state, I knew it wasn’t because fucking unicorns were observing me.
“Lauren!” I called out, but no answer came.
“Lauren?” I walked toward the tree where she went, but when I looked around, she wasn’t there.
I jumped as the owl hooted again, my heart racing a thousand miles per second.
“Skylar…” My name all of a sudden came to me on the wings of the wind howling through the forest. The hair at the nape of my neck stood up, my eyes widening, my hands shaking. “Skylar,” echoed again around me. A cacophony of sounds, of female laughter, and a shriek breaking through the night made me sprint in the opposite direction.
Fuck, fuck, fuck, I chanted in my head, running through the forest, evading the trees in my path. I had no idea if I was on the right path. I had no idea if anyone would hear me if I called out for them.
But most of all, I had no idea if I was imagining it.
Laughter came from behind me, a sinister feminine laughter, and I ran faster and faster, sweat beading on my upper lip even under the cold October night.
“Skylar!” a singsong voice called out again, cackling, taunting, coming closer.
And that was when I saw them.
Three figures standing next to each other, cloaked in red robes, their faces hidden behind white masks. Expressionless, cold, eerie, otherworldly.
I turned left, but three more were there, already waiting for me.
“No, no, no.”
I swiveled around, coming face-to-face with one of the masks.
They were surrounding me and whichever side I turned, they were there. Red robes and white masks. The two in front of me tilted their heads, coming closer and closer, creating a circle around me with the other hooded figures.
“Let me go!” I tried pushing through the wall they created, but their hands stopped me, pushing me back to the ground. “Please,” I cried.
“Sanguinem Sacrificium.” They started chanting in unison. “Sanctum Sacrificium.”
“Just… Please!” I pushed myself backward until my back hit the legs of one of them. I tilted my head and looked up, twelve white masks looking down at me.
“Sanguinem Sacrificium.Sanctum Sacrificium,” they continued, uncaring of my cries, disregarding my pleading. “Two will become one. One will become many.”
“Get the fuck away from me!” I started pushing myself up, but the one standing behind me pushed me back to the ground.
“The Union is about to start.”
“What Unio—” I tried asking, when something pierced my neck from the right side. “Ouch.” I shook them off of me and pressed against the place where they pierced me. I looked to the side, only to see the needle held by one of them, lifeless eyes staring back at me.
“W-what did you do?” I slurred. “What is this-s?”
