Crazy Girl In Crazy World

Freedom, In the Dark

Along the mists of time she travelled. And was there. There...

Outside. Outside of the building. Almost time to go in. Standing at the fence, looking out to the expanse of the horizon, just a peaceful field and a loving forest. Of the trees, as old as the trees. They speak to me. I know.

"Hey, Freak," said Alice. "We've gotta go in now." She paused a moment, standing next to Crazy Girl, looking out over the land as well, flashes of lightening and rumbles of thunder in the distance. "Looks like it's gonna be a big storm."

"Something bad's going to happen," Crazy Girl replied.

Alice chuckled. "It always does here."

"No. That's not what I mean. Something horrific will happen. Something will happen, that if you think you're crazy now, you'll be even crazier after. And the worst kind of crazy...insane with grief."

Alice was quiet. She had never seen her friend like this before. She was surprisingly level-headed, but this was a shocking change. "What are you saying?"

Crazy Girl pulled a handful of pills from her pocket. "Why drug me? Why? What did they not want to me to remember...to consider? Why am I here? And when I stopped their madness, I remembered. Alice, there are far more serious problems here than just that a person is crazy." Crazy Girl threw the pills through the fence, out into the wilderness. "The grass can have my defeat. It won't happen again. I was tricked before, oh yes, but I am patient and learn from my mistakes."

Alice, slackjawed with surprise, stared at her good friend. Oh no, she's gone off the meds. Oh god, this is horrible. "I...I don't know what to say. I...uh...They give you it for a reason, to make you better...."

"Not if they want to subdue you. Not if they know that you know. Oh, not us, the flesh and blood who do their bidding, but the shadows in the night that whisper deviousness in their ears."

"Hey, you two!" came a call from the door. "Better get in here!"

And then lightening struck the building. The power went out suddenly and door to the building locked. Inside, through the thick tempered glass came the eerie glow of emergency lighting. Alice looked at her friend. She was glaring at the door. "Whatever happens," she said quietly, "I want you to know that I've always appreciated your kindness."

"Ok everyone!" the orderly, clearly nervous, yelled to seven or so girls that were trapped outside. "I'm sure that we'll be able to get in before it rains. Just sit down and be patient." Just then, a loud crack of thunder sounded, and the occasional raindrop multiplied and became a torrent. Meanwhile, a security guard showed up at the door, and he was trying to open it.

Alice looked at her friend, who was sitting calmly with a stoic look on her face. "They will shoot through the door," she said.

"They don't carry guns," Alice replied. Crazy Girl smiled.

The rain pelted them as they waited. Alice felt nervous. This was taking too long. Way too long. "Don't they have some kind of override for the door?" she asked no one in particular. "We're going to get sick sitting out here."

"There are worse things to get," Crazy Girl said.

The security guard tried to rouse someone on his radio. He looked puzzled. He left in a hurry, running down the corridor and turning the corner in a frantic run.

"Alice, the people on the fifth floor, they're in the locked rooms, correct?"

"Yeah," Alice replied. "Why do you want to know?"

"Is there anyway to get them out?"

"I don't know..."

"It's a long way down from the windows, I suppose."

Alice stared at her. "What? Why are you saying this?" She paused, and much quieter, asked, "Do you know what's going to happen?"

Crazy Girl did not reply.

Suddenly the hallway went dark. Then the beam of a flashlight appeared, bouncing crazily down the corridor. It was the security guard, motioning to the orderly to stand clear of the door.

"Get against the wall!" the orderly yelled as best he could over the thunder. Everyone lined up against the wall as Crazy Girl thought Almost like an excution, which would have been preferable to this.

Shots rang out and the glass of the door shattered. The orderly grabbed a chair and started pounding on the door, as well the security guard trying to kick out the glass. "You can't come in here!" the guard shouted. "The place is on fire. The lightening fried it! I'm going to go back and see if I can get people out!"

"I'm going with you," the orderly shouted back, disappearing into the darkened cavern.

"I'm going in there," Crazy Girl said to Alice.

"You can't, you'll die!" Alice exclaimed.

"That will remain to be seen," Crazy Girl replied. She went through the door. It was smoky and terrifying. The darkness did not phase her. She trotted down the corridor, following the wall, her mind issuing commands to her body. Go Right. Down to the stairway. Open stairway door. Go up stairway. Fifth floor. Out of stairway. To the locks.

For a brief moment, the electricity flickered. Ah, the backup. The electricity flickered again, and Crazy Girl saw the big, red "Emergency Open" button. And as the lights flickered again, she pushed it. The hallway was suddenly filled with the sound of locked doors opening, reverberating eerily down the hallway. These walls held in the most insane of the insane. And in an instant, the electricity came on, and she saw smoke pouring through the now opened doors. What the hell? she thought.

"There's a fire in the building!" Crazy Girl yelled. "All of you have to get out of here!" She ran a little down the hallway. No one answered. The hallway was quickly filling with smoke. Then it registered: there were no other personnel up on this level. They would have noticed her. She frantically ran into one of the rooms. Smoke was pouring in from the vents. She saw a person laying in the bed. I think I know her. Lilly. "Wake up!" she yelled, trying to rouse the girl out of the bed. And then she stopped. No...movement? No, that wasn't it. She touched the girl again.

I don't feel anyting coming from her. Crazy Girl checked for a pulse. There wasn't one.

Suddenly a scream echoed in the hallway. Crazy Girl ran out. "I'm over here, where are you?" she yelled. "In here!" came a slightly muffled noise. The air in the hallway was now thick with smoke. Crazy Girl dropped to her knees, and starting crawling in the direction of the voice. "Keep yelling!" she called back. "Over here!" the voice responded. "You're getting close! I can hear you! Oh, god, please, please help me!"Crazy Girl found the room. A young girl was huddled on the floor, laying, sheets over her mouth. She handed Crazy Girl a torn portion of a sheet. "Follow me out," Crazy Girl said. They made it back to the stairway, which was clear of smoke.

"What the hell," Crazy Girl said after removing the mask. "Why is it so fucking smoky up here?"

"The vents," the other girl replied. "These ones are linked to basement. Right after that lightening strike, smoke started pouring in. Everyone ran. They left us."

"Shit. That's horrible. C'mon, run down the stairs, we have to get out now."

"That's not the half of it," the girl said as they ran down the stairs. "They drug everyone at night. I don't take it, but they don't know that. I guess now they will."

When they got to the first floor, it was even more thick with smoke. On hands and knees, they crawled their way down the corridor to the hallway with salvation on the outside. Halfway to the door, Crazy Girl hit her hand on something.

"Oh, my god, it's the security guard!" she exclaimed. "We have to help him. Here, take his flashlight, I'll try to drag him to the door."

"You won't be able to," the other girl said.

"She's quite right, you know," said a hissing voice above them. The girl looked up and froze, backing away to the wall. The sight of the creature scared her. His pallid skin looked like it was covered in sores, the slimy smile that spread across his diseased lips revealed yellow and rotting teeth.

"Shut UP you little scummy beast!" Crazy Girl yelled, as she pulled off the guard's boots. She looked up at the other girl. "Ignore him. He can't hurt you." The girl sat against the wall, frightened and frozen. Crazy Girl stepped over to her and grabbed her. "DON'T pay attention to him," she yelled. The girl's gaze shifted over to Crazy Girl. In a small voice she asked, "You see him too?"

"She knows who I am," the hissy voice said.

"Stuff it," Crazy Girl responded.

Crazy Girl grabbed the guard's arms and dragged him along the floor. She heard a shout from outside, "Oh, thank god!" She laid the guard down, went over to the door. "The security guard is right there," she said to a person outside. There were now more people out there, many huddled against the fence. "Get him out, I'm going back, someone else is in the hallway." She ran then, away from the protestations of the people at the door.

The creature was now leaning down to the girl, speaking in soft tones. The hallway behind him was glowing yellow, the fire consuming as much space as it could. Crazy Girl kicked him. "Go away, motherfucker," she said. Turning to the girl, she said, "You have to get out of here. Now. Just run down the hallway, the door's open."

"What about you?" The girl looked so scared and lost.

"I've been waiting a long time for you," the creature said. "Now, you will take the punishment that is yours, and yours alone."

To the girl, Crazy Girl whispered, "Just go. Don't worry about me. I've got a score to settle with this little beast."

"Going to fight, eh?" he said.

"You don't fuck with me, and your kind should know that. I am but energy. Without the shell, I am complete."

The girl's eyes widened. "You...you're glowing," she whispered.

"Get out!" Crazy Girl said. The girl got up and ran.

Crazy Girl walked up to the creature. "Go on, asshole. Do your worst. Do you think I care? It is all just merely pain, and pain? Ah, that is what I am used to."

The creature laughed. Crazy Girl shoved him. "Laughing at that, are you? Don't think I'm tough enough? Ha. I've died a thousand deaths, and will die a thousand more. You can torture me all you want, but it won't matter. It won't matter because whatever you could do to me is less harsh than what I've done to myself. So fuck it. Kill me, and I will be invisible, and in the unconcious realm, more powerful. So go right ahead, you fucker."

He took a step back from her. She suddenly realized that the smoke was very thick, that there was fire brewing not far from where they were standing. She started coughing. I'm going to die here, and better a crazy hero than a fool. She laid on the ground, gasping for air. All I wanted was love, was peace, was everything. Now I will be gone. Who will come for me? An aunt? Uncle? My grandmothers? I am passing out, will it be like they say? Will I see my life before me? Her hand reached out...and touched something. The world went black and as she lay with one more shred of conciousness left, she thought Now I drift to the heavens and stars....

The Dreams Came Back

It had been a long time. Escape had felt so good. She didn't run away from the place, she was swooped and saved by, of all things, a demon. Reunited with the family, and beginning to put pieces of her life back together, she never felt better. She wasn't gone long.

But she mistakenly believed that the ghosts were behind her, figuritively.

It was long enough after the horrid memory of the place had faded, long enough to feel herself and comfortable again, when one night changed all of that.

A city of Gold, she had said. A garden where there huge statues, and a building, and they chased her out. My god. What on earth was she doing in Wicked's world, in his gardens? What was she doing in the City of the Light, now a City of the Dead? I thought it was all made up in my head, the beautiful Garden of Statues and the horrific City of the Light. They were but visions, visions that tied in nicely with a poem or story. They don't exist. They can't exist. Is it just a common theme of people? This is too weird.

But then she couldn't breathe. So she went outside, feeling a bit squirrley. Smoke a cigarette, inhale deeply, the night was odd and electrified...

And then someone called her name. She looked around. No one was out there. Not even skateboarders or people walking into another place. No one at the windows of the apartments.

How could I ever forget his deep voice? And why on earth would he use my real name? No, that can't be it. It's just my imagination like it was the past hundred times. There is no Black Jacket, not the demon but not the human. The thing with my friends is contageous. Has to be. He never existed.

So she went back inside. But then she couldn't breathe again. So back outside she went. In and out. She was beginning to wonder what the hell was going on.

But then she had a dream, after her friend told her that she should tell the psychic about this, and it felt decidedly ominous:

She knew the City streets well by then, but mostly as a place of horror, the only place she ever visited in the daylight, the gold now a light dusted color, a color of a neglected place. But in this supposed dead City, a wolflion, multicolored, cartoonish, and thin, walked across her path, saying something that she could not remember, but it was certainly an admonishing tone, and then it peacefully walked away and then disappeared as soon as she blinked.

All in her head. This is all..in...her...head. "We should talk," the psychic said. No, no, we shouldn't, and in fact, I may have said too much already. Too much. Shooting off my mouth again, what will it be this time? A car accident? I get cancer? What? What will be my punishment for saying anything? Or are they looking for the person? Like in my story...looking for the one of the prophecy of some sort, and really, it's not who they think it is? That I thought that just for talking to me, Black Jacket may be in trouble with his "Excutives"? To use us to find the person that they want, although they would profess to never want to step foot on our ugly planet and even come close to touching a dirty primitive violent human, that they sent their specially trained operatives to whisper in deaded sleep about what they must do? To hide the talisman trinkets that control the humans?

No. That's all made up...made up in her head, in story she dreamed of...while listening to music. Yes. A story. That's all. There is no real City of the Light, there is no real Garden of Statues. It's not real. And it's not something that's unheard of in anyone's imagination. It's not real. She must believe that it is not real. She must believe that it's just a story, step back away and not involve herself in her friend's predicaments. A flight of fancy, that's all. Nothing to see here, keep moving along, nothing to see.

Forever

She was walking down the hallway. Suddenly, a girl bolted out of her room. Isn't that Amber? she thought. Low and behold it was, and her hair was on fire. People rushed to Amber, to put out her hair, but as she had run out of her room, she left the door open. Her bed was on fire. Smoke poured into the hallway, but the flames from the bed were still visible, casting an eerie orange glow in the room. Flames.

Flames. They merrily danced around, a wicked dance of joy, for they had found food, a blanket here, a matress there, a veritable feast for the hungry fire, the dance of joy at the beast from the hunt. The flames licked greedily, for they could not be satiated until every scrap of material was comsumed, no waste, for they had known hunger and were eager to devour all that they could. It is their nature...

She was against the wall, just staring into the flames. The fascination. It's always there. I think it's who I am, but in a past life? Or their life? Or something, on the edges of memory. I am sensitive to fire. I know when there's going to be one. I dream of fire, and it obliges me. The fire in the house....dreaming of fire....

She wasn't in the hallway any more.

The house had been on fire once. They had lived there for years, but when that happened, her family had been forced to relocate. Most of their stuff had survived, so in that sense, they were lucky. But she had known it was going to happen. She had come home early. But like so many things that she knew, she never wanted to believe it. Not long after, her mother died. She had known that was going to happen, too. There was so much that she just knew, and it really puzzled her. It always puzzled her. How did she know these things? And those dreams? God, the dreams she had, vivid and frightening, about things...

And then she saw him, admist the flames. Well, It, actually, since it looked more like a demon sent from hell. Who could forget the greying, puetrefied skin, the nobby bumps that ran from the forehead to base of the skull at the neck, and the red eyes...but the voice...that alone sent shivers up her spine. She had seen him once, at the foot of the bed, and he had whispered, I will kill you. And she had almost commited suicide, related to really depressing events, most of which had to do with a drunken stupor. Had that just been in my head, or was I really pulled from the bed like I think I remember? But then she felt the chills, and as people rushed into the room to put out the fire, she heard a faint whisper: I'm not done with you yet.

She ran. Didn't matter where. Outside, preferably, because it wouldn't be there. And as soon as she hit the warm air of the outside, she felt it: There is going to be a fire here. There will be a storm. People will die. I will hear them screaming. People will die. People will die because the demon wants me to perish. Oh, God, I don't want to be here when it happens....

For Him, at Least

She remembered.

And that was important. But she never really let that she remembered. She couldn't.

She remembered the fellow, and the conversation they'd had. And out slipped, "Vore, s'u wa me'ame". Just out of the blue. Something she had remembered and had always said to herself, when drunk. The words of a seeming ghost that echoed in her brain. She knew what it meant, and like a lot of their language, was not translatable. It was a feeling more than words. "I understand and I know in my heart you wrong and confused." Not to be confused with "Vo'ei, s'u wa' a'me'ame"...[vowei, swoo waw, ah meh, ah me]..."that which i know is intrinsically me"...a confession of love, so deep and profound. Not a "I love you" or even "I understand you", but a "I understand you so much I'm looking into a mirror reflection when I see you." An opposite of the same understanding, mirroring a lover so much. They were easy to understand, once you knew how logically emotional they were. But her slip revealed her. And she was sure he had heard it. Because he had asked something then. Of course, being drunk, she didn't remember what he had asked, but now it was clear: He knew. And now she was in "the house without walls, but with constraints", a perfect metaphor for an "institution" as any. The same questions that she refused to answer, by people who looked like her but could be their agents. She refused to answer because she knew of "Wicked", of the mirror. Hell, of anything. But now that she remembered, the questions that the "therapist" asked became threatening.

"Av, verome, mir wats'su mere" she thought. ["Electricity of God, in a moment"]. They had a God, but it was not the god that most humans believed in. She knew that. That is what made it hard for her, becuase she believed in their god more than hers. But she also knew her bible well enough that God wasn't always fire and brimstone, that at times, God allowed evil. And that was their concept: That which is most evil is God, and that which is God can be most evil. But even then, in the limited words, was not the full description. It was a feeling, of awe, of wonder, of pain so unbelivable, of joy so estatic to make you manic for life. She thought she had come up with the concept on her own, but it had been their influence. And maybe that's what they wanted to know about.

And then there was the storm...God's own electricity that spurred the weirdest episode in her life....

She Knows

Crazy Girl knew.

Finally, she knew.

She had been in a parking lot. A small one.

And she had insulted a "militia man". He had amitted as much to her friends. But he was the the one who turned her in. God only knows what he said, but she knew it was him.

After arguing about history that he clearly didn't know, he turned her in for being smarter or more intelligent than he was. She had a degree that he didn't. And now was she was here.

They had come in a van. Not black or white, but a van of nondescriptness. Like in "The Handmaiden's Tale" but more "1984". The Shadows, who control more than anything....they are the 1% who own 85%. And she knew that...about the decendants. She was one, but not one of privelivge. That made her "dangerous". "If you deny it," it had been whispered to her, "you will be nothing more than a novel threat." She had been careless. She talked about the "talents" freely. And now she was a threat.

She had left the bar because the ex was there with his new flame. She didn't want to be there. So she went out to her car, and a guy was there. The same guy that she had had an arguement with. And he had not been pleased with that, especially when she quoted from texts. Walking out to her car....and there was a van. People got out...and hurt her. Slap! Against her head. Out like a light and the next thing she remembered was the room....the stifling room. Shadows....
"shado'on, me'sn, vie mir'a mir'a'mein'me, mosra,tosnn, so'vre, ah'me."..."you are who I am, why do you treat me as if I am not? Not one, but one, so be it, so mean it..".

And the thuderstorm happened....