Crimson Stains

The corpses.

Three sets of eyes that were once full of light now lifeless in the vast land of dark. Yet Cielo could still see them, hear them, feel them reaching out to him. Speaking to him.

The voices.

He used to be fairly good at tuning them out. It had been a week since Cielo had first heard them but it felt like an eternity. Now, he heard them whispering to him every waking moment and haunting his dreams when he slept.

Forget about them, he told himself. They deserted you. Never loved you anyway.

Then Cielo locked his eyes on something else, beyond his family.

There was another body, another voice just out of his reach.

Now he looked down at his best friend’s dead body and felt a salty river threatening to take over. Stop that, he scolded himself. It’s just a stupid nightmare. Not worth crying over. It wasn’t even real.

“Oh, but his death is very real, isn’t it?”

Cielo couldn’t help but flinch as a cold hand rested upon his shoulder, murmuring in his ear. A frigid wind blew past him, the cold enveloping his every atom.

Cielo wasn’t surprised. This was standard dream protocol, he was sure of what would happen next. But knowing what’s waiting for you doesn’t make the fear of it any less real. The wind tightened around him, consuming him, chanting.

Wouldn’t it be easier to end it all now? The wind seemed to jeer at him.

This time he couldn’t stop the tears from coming.

***

Cielo jerked awake to find himself in bed, shivering in a cold sweat. A sharp pain shot up his forehead and he cried out loud. Then immediately covered his mouth. He didn’t need the neighbors to come around asking questions.

His face was damp, though whether it was from tears, blood, or perspiration he couldn’t tell. Probably a combination of the three, he decided.

His hand automatically went to the lamp resting on the small table beside him. Cielo switched it on, and was immediately blinded by light. He switched it back off again.

Like he needed light anyways.

He felt beside him for the bandaid roll he always kept close. He had an annoying habit of thrashing out in his sleep, and although his head hurt like hell it was a welcome distraction from his dream. From the thoughts whirling inside his head.

Cielo slid out of bed and grabbed some antiseptic cream, which he used to wrap his head in a hasty bandaid. Trancelike, he then tore the sheets off his bed and replaced them with fresh, clean ones.

He tossed the crimson ones off to the side, laundry to be done in a distant future. Usually he wouldn’t be bothered doing small things like changing sheets, or washing clothes, but he hated blood. Everything about it terrified him; the smell, the feel, the dark-red fear it brings.

Fear had been coming in waves for Cielo, ever since that night…

No. He would not. He refused to think of that now. He refused to think of that night, or his dream, or the many, many other dreams before that.

But still. The voices threatened to consume his mind, and no matter how much he tried to push them away they just came back, stronger. More persistent.

Cielo sat back down on his bed and tried to calm his spiraling mind.

Deep breathes. In, out, in, out. Just like Raul had taught him so long ago.

Oh god. Raul.

That was one thought Cielo could never keep away, no matter how hard he tried.

The scary part was, he wasn’t sure he wanted to push that thought away.

Keep breathing. In, out.

It was a sure recipe for sleep, but at that point, Cielo didn’t care. Anything to get out of his own head.

He felt himself, drifting, drifting, away, and suddenly he was back in the phantom world.

In a nightmare world.

And then the dream begins all over again.