Fear the Nobodies: Part Thirteen

“In the classroom halls” by YaBoiMikesDraws, FurAffinity

>Stella twists her head around like she’s possessed

>She jams a finger in Sam’s direction, lips curled into a vicious growl

>“Sam, you stay FAR away from that crystal, you hear me? You’re not a level six Lazer Lotus yet! Touch that emerald even ONCE and I’ll feed you to the clothes dryer!”

>You writhe in Stella’s grip, twisting like a worm skewered on a hook

“We don’t want the crystal you insane bitch, we just want the plant!” You screech, hoping your reasonable plea will be heard by a responsible adult

>Her snag-tooth grin widens in madness

>“Oh-ho… skinny here thinks he can out maneuver me?” She chuckles maniacally, “Listen pal, you’re the cheese, and me? I’m God’s hungriest rat. Your mind-zog won’t work on me, not any more.”

>Oh

>She’s really… REALLY insane

>Sam can only stand there, arms frozen mid-decision

>“I-I just… I don’t w-w-want to g-g-get inv-involved…”

>Stella drags you like a sack full of cats towards a nearby closet

“Sam-” you sound desperate, voice depleted from fighting, “-the plant. Grab that plant. Run as fast as you can, and-”

>The badger whips you into a janitorial closet door, punching the air from your chest cavity

>“Now you listen to me, cottontail,” Stella’s voice rises to a terse shout as she turns her head back, “you take another step forward towards that crystal and you are FIRED, you hear me? God almighty I will call your fucking parents on a bugged line, even if the alphabet agencies are listening, and chew them out for what a defiant little shit you’re being!”

>This statement pins Sam

>You rasp for breath, loud enough to draw the rabbit’s attention

>Bingo

“You’ve surprised me, cotton tail,” you gasp, “I didn’t think you had it in you to even come with us this morning.”

>There’s a pause – a break in the tension in the air – almost like even Stella is waiting to hear what you’re about to say

“I’m proud of you.”

>“SHUTUP!” Stella roars, jostling your loose skull by your shirt collar

>Sam’s eyes glisten with attention as he zeroes in on you

>Stella, as psychotic as she is, sees your ploy in action

>So she enacts one of her own

>“You gonna listen to this deep-state FUCKO?” Stella drags your banged up body to her side like an over-sized doll, “or your fucking boss? Which of us has done more for you, hmmm? Never forget who signs your paycheck!”

>Sam shakes like an engine spooling up, ripping on his ears as he tries to summon a decision

>“SAM!” The badger snarl, spewing a mouthful of phlegm at you in the process, “now!”

>You force your eyes shut, summoning all the inner strength you have left

>Ordinarily, you’d just bend the knee and give in, admitting to being CIA, deep-state, ZOG, a glowie, whatever

>But now you’re just thinking about how to get out of this crazy badger’s grip, because this is both humiliating-

>-and also assault

>A wild idea comes to mind, something that reminds you of a childhood memory

>You could bite her

>YES

>BITE HER

>You unclench your rather pathetic jaw to crunch into whatever part of her you can get your teeth on

>But you don’t need to

>You drop wordlessly to the floor, Stella no longer holding you in her greasy vise-grip

>The portly badger drops to her knees in anguish

>“BETRAYED!” She cries, “BY MY OWN MINIMUM-WAGE EMPLOYEE!”

>You open your eyes just enough to see a light, chestnut colored blur ripping down the hall

>A blur named Sam

>And by the sound of Stella’s sheer dismay, he’s got the plant – emerald in-hand – as well

>“You little BITCH!”Stella huffs, lumbering to her feet

>She takes one angry look at you

>“Don’t go anywhere, okay? Once I get back I’m stuffing you in the boiler.”

>All you can manage is a confused head-nod

>And with that, she plods off, already badly outpaced by the rabbit

>Jesus Christ

>Your heart booms in your ears as blood flushes to your face

>He actually did it

>Sam was brave

>The absolute madman

>You are Sam

>And you are certain you just fucked up, son

>Your heart pulses in your throat like a kick drum

>You just pissed of Stella something awful, as evidenced by the fact that she’s frothing at the mouth, her eyes terrifically wide and full of predatory hunger as she scrambles after you

>You’ve just got to get this plant to Mike

>He’ll know what to do, right?

>Right?

>God these hallways feel long, don’t they?

>Endless walls of red and white lockers, punctuated by the occasional classroom door or opening to another hallway

>Those lockers still adorned with a Spooktober Fest flyer help you mark progress as you run

>Stella won’t catch up, but you get the feeling something isn’t right compels you to keep moving

>Ordinarily there’s at least ONE or two students drifting around the halls before school

>And yet it’s silent as a midnight mass, save for the mad scramble of your paws against the linoleum floor; a steady metronome to help you track the distance between you and what scares you

>“I SHOULDA KNOWN YOU WERE DEEP STATE, SAM!” Stella’s rapidly fading voice reaches your tender ears, ”I’ll get you, Thumper- hey, hey, who the hell are you punks?”

>You throw a quick glance over your shoulders

>Stella is no longer behind you

>You skid to a halt, as if you could leave tire tracks

>The fly trap continues to nip at your fingers like a hungry little shit, but you can’t take your eyes off the empty hallway

>The pain is hardly enough to slow you

>So…

>…where the hell did Stella go?

>A swell of silence fills your ears – an eerie buzz of fluorescent lights and your own hateful internal monologue

>And then…

>…a hellish chorus of deep, throaty growls rises towards you, sending your heart racing

>You pace back a few steps from the long hallway, as if stepping back from an invisible precipice

>To your finely tuned ears, it sounded like… nothing you’ve ever heard before

>That sound was deep and feral, yet with a sustained cadence to it, like someone pulling a very unpleasant note on a cello for too long

>It’s the type of otherworldly screech that spikes adrenaline into your vein; invokes that primal drive to turn bushy tail and run

>It’s almost the same noise you heard in the annals of the school on Friday, just lower and more controlled

>Your eyes are drawn to the end of the hall by a sudden flicker of something dark at the end of the hall

>You gasp

>It’s there for a moment — a black shape – and then it’s gone in a stroke of lightning

>That hellish choir begins again in earnest

>Welp, time to run

>You get a few yards, but skitter to a halt while the sound of something ancient and evil grows closer to you in the space between heartbeats

>It’s almost as if someone were driving nails through your feet, sticking you to the floors

>You can’t move, no matter how much you want to

>It’s like trying to start a car without any gas in the tank

>You look down to see that your legs aren’t even trembling

>It’s their stillness that unsettles you

>That horrible growl daws close, a constant hum like a train gliding down the rails in the rail car yards

>Fuck

>Why can’t you move?

>You thrust your arms forward to try and propel your body in a direction — any direction

>The motion serves to thaw the ice in your veins just a little bit

>“A-Anon?” You weakly call out, finding it a strain to raise your voice above a tired shout

>You worriedly glance around, looking for an out

>The lockers, polished to a high shine, refuse to respond

>The doors leading to rooms you’ve never seen, and are no doubt locked

>The hallways that never end, splitting and diverging, their lengths stretching away from like you, like a point infinitely vanishing on the horizon

>Converging like arteries into atriums of linoleum, white and red

>It all seems so normal, so casual, like it’s always been…

>…all the same

>Just staring makes you dizzy

>Where… where are you?

>A low growl so close that your fur rises forces you to squeak

>Like a scared little kid

>Your lungs drag in gulps of air as your heart ricochets off your rib cage

>Your button-nose wrinkles up

>There’s a flutter in your throat, like you’ve swallowed a humming bird

>Don’t you want to cry?

>You always want to cry

>Like a little kid

>Fighting tears, you turn to look down the left hallway, where that guttural sound came from

>The hallway goes on into what appears to be a watery horizon; as if the laws of physics were decompressed and stretched apart, somehow placing a hallway inside a school that’s longer on the inside than is physically possible on the outside

>This is wrong

>This is VERY wrong

>And the feeling that you’re somehow – some way – the quarry of some primitive, wild hunt, occupies almost all of your emotional bandwidth

>You need-

>Closer now, that growl returns, a rolling snarl that clawed its way out of something aberrant thing’s chest

>-SOMEONE TO SAVE YOU, NOW!

“A-A-Anon!?” Your loose a frantic call, feminine voice crackling with strain, “M-Mike, Alex?! S-S-S-S-Someone, HELP!”

>A blink of something dark at the far end steals your focus before you can scream again

>There’s a slip of shadow the size of a small car moving low to the ground

>Right at you

>You can only describe it as some kind of black dog

>No texture of fur besides darkness

>To your relief the shadow works in a hungry circle, pausing every so often to stare at you with white eyes unseeing

“M-Move…” you will yourself, fighting frustrated tears. “P-Please…”

>Move!

>What, are you afraid to move now?

>MOVE!

>You shuffle just a little to the right, away from the beast, back pressed to the locker

>In a sudden flash of black smoke the beast is gone

“O-O-Oh G-G-God…” you gasp, body still rippling with adrenaline and fear

>You unpeel from the lockers and try to catch your breath

>A flash of black smoke enshrouds you

>The black dog is just feet away, its lightless body swelling to fill the hallway

>You jolt back on instinct, crashing painfully into the lockers

>And as you scramble – no, crawl, like a goddamn worm – to get away, the beast screams one last time, blasting your eardrums

>So you curl into yourself on the waxed floors, palms clapped over your ears, body trembling in surrender

>And then

>The pain never comes

>Ringing silence sings in your ears now

>You sit up to look around

>No… ephemeral-smoke-dog-thing

>Long hallways of nothingness yawn out before you

>Your heart is beating so hard you can hear the veins and capillaries in your ears swelling with blood

“I- I- w-w-want to..”

>You almost say you ‘want to go home’

>But you know that’s not true at all

>You don’t know where home is any more – if you ever did

>So, where do you go when this is all over?

>You almost tear up when a voice in your mind says, ‘On Anon’s couch, watching movies.’

>You shut your eyes and try to think of sleepovers and Dr. Beppers and movies with people you think are your friends

>But you know deep down they all still hate you

>Anon, too

>As he should

>What would Samurai Outlaw — hero of your own creation — do right now?

>Samurai Outlaw would stride stalk these halls, dragging her bat behind rattling behind her like a challenge to any poor fucks dumb enough to answer

>Are YOU Samurai Outlaw?

>With your palms on the floor, your try to press yourself upwards

>Your legs shake like wet noodles – the after effects of adrenaline’s last gasps in your veins – leading to your collapse

>Well…

>You are not Samurai Outlaw

>A voice down the hallway to your right – tempered with familial anger boiling beneath crooked syllables – breaks the silence like a brick through glass

>You launch a foot into the air, and your landing finds you flat on your ass, back against the lockers

>Hate and whiskey speak your name as your courage withers in your chest

>“Sam…”

>You squeak and tuck your head between your legs

>With your eyes squeezed shut to oblivion, head buried in the safety of your knees against your chest, you fear now only that which you can hear…

>You’re too afraid to look. You can feel the a cold shadow hanging over your huddled form, a black guillotine

>You’re afraid to look because…

>…because you know this voice…

>“You know what I can’t figure out about you? No matter how hard I try to teach you right – show you how to stop squealing like a scared little girl at everything – it never sticks. The whoopings I caught for covering for you? The times we tried to run away? That don’t mean shit to you, Sam. You’ll always be…

>…and that’s why – at last – you brave lifting your eyes to meet his

>“…gutless.”

>Eyes like dirty coins – golden-brown, tinged red and stung with smoke, drill down into you

>But now those eyes spill over with a type of hate older than God; hate that makes you whimper out the name of the man somehow standing before you, stepping out of a sardonic memory, dragging a tail of acrid cigarette smoke behind him

“J-Jake…?”

>Your teenage older brother, Jacob Garlen, lords over you, a snarl on his face like he’s about to feed you your own teeth for breakfast

>Dark circles pool beneath his eyes; his eyebrows slope down like razored edges

>He pulls on an ever-smoldering cigarette – the same type dad always smoked – until his proud chest swells with tar

>Black tendrils of smoke curl away from his lips as he exhales

>“Get up,” he commands

>You obey with a frightened squeak, until a sudden jostling of the Earth beneath your feet shakes you to the ground, your strength collapsing old buildings on your side of town

>A gentle tremor from the linoleum floor beneath you rattles the length of your rubber spine

>And the tremors seem gain momentum with every second

“H-How are y-y-y-you… w-w-with me r-r-right n-now?” You stammer, unable to stand on your own two feet

>Tears spring to your eyes – involuntary tears, the same way a sick person vomits

>You really are gutless

“…It’s b-be-been so… l-long…”

>Your brother squats on his heels, eye-level with your snotty and sniveling face, that cigarette dangling from his lips like a white flower

>“Are you fucking crying right now?”

>He doesn’t cast a shadow in the sterilized light of the hallways

>Why doesn’t he have a shadow?

>He draws the smoke from his lips, examining the embered tip as it whispers cancer into the ceiling

>“I thought I taught you better.”

>His words sting like hornets

>“Thought I taught you how to look out for yourself. Didn’t I say I wasn’t always going to be around to protect you?”

>You wait too long to reply

>“Didn’t I!?” Jacob barks at you, his face suddenly inches from your own

>You see yourself in his eyes – a green hoodie, old jeans, and a forgettable brown splotch of cowardice

“Y-Y-You did…” you squeak back

>Jacob bites down on his cigarette

>“And here I come to find you’re wasting all those empty days and sleepless nights we spent; all the promises to look after each other we made? All those times I took a whooping for you? All the times I tried to teach you to fight back when I couldn’t stop dad? What were they, to you, Sam?”

“Ja-Jac-Jacob I’m s-s-s-sorry, I d-didn’t m-mean to f-f-fail.. I-”

>Your brother cuts loose with a deep cut of rib-sucking laughter, the kind of hateful laugh you’ve only ever heard from dad

>“Nah, nah. You’re not strong enough to stand up to dad; not strong enough to make anything of what little you have… I mean, look at yourself,” he says as he blows a thick cloud of smoke at you, enshrouding you, the miasma coarse against your eyes

>You rub away pained tears

>And when the smoke clears away, Jacob is on his feet, thin body towering over you, dressed in his old flannel and jeans, the very same ones you now own

>His face twists up with raw anger as he stares down at you

>“You can’t even stand on your own two feet.”

>His hand snaps coarsely onto your wrist

“W-W-Wait!” You shriek, trying in vain to resist Jacob’s strength

>“Like always, lil sis, I’ll fucking make you stand up for yourself.”

>Your brother rips you up to your feet like he’s starting a lawn mower

>You try digging your feet in to the slippery linoleum, but Jacob only pulls harder

>He drags you to the middle of the hallway

“P-Please stop!” You plead, feeling like a doll tugged along by an angry child, “Y-You’re h-h-hurting me!”

>“Good,” Jacob says in a cold voice

>All he’s missing is your father’s constant whiskey-reek

>“It’s been years and you’re still the same little crybaby bitch you always were. Can’t do anything right,” Jacob says as he forces you into position

>The ground beneath your feet feels like it’s about to give way

>“You need to be brave, Sam. You’re not a little kid any more,” he says, voice distant, distracted, no longer looking at you, but instead at something down the hall

>His grip on you lingers for a moment longer

>Maybe he’s afraid you’ll run?

“I-I-I’m s-s-sorry- J-J-Jacob, I-I’m t-t-t-trying,” you use your free hand and a snotty sleeve to clean your face

>You can barely keep upright as the tremors swell, like sine waves rolling beneath the surface of Earth

>Jacob steadies you; keeps you from falling

>He’s not punishing you now; his hold slackens

>You’ve never understood your brother well

>You understand the hate and the vitriol – that he gets from dad

>Jacob gives you a gentle, reassuring squeeze

>You turn to look at him – to see the gentler side of your brother

>His shock of black hair billows behind him as sudden rush of steam and air hits you both

>His tired eyes squint at something at the end of the hall

>This is the Jacob you choose to remember; the side of that reminds you of the strength in your blood

>And then?

>Flashes of dad

>“You’ve caused a lot of hurt,” he says, words delivered with the cold precision of a typewriter’s hammer, “and I thought I could make you strong, but I realized something about you over the years.”

>The lockers tremble and clap open, a dumb metal audience watching for the final curtain call

>A shriek of train’s whistle echoes down the hallway, louder than God’s thunder

>Jacob releases his hold…

>“Deep down you’re a coward; a burden.”

>…and it’s like having your tether to Earth cut

“ Dad was right about you.”

>Jacob steps aside, letting you ride the vibrating tiles alone

>His face is more jagged than flint, determination etching its cold reflection on his once innocent skin

“P-P-Please!” You cry, trying to inch towards your brother for safety, hand outstretched

>“Hold,” Jacob commands, as he balls his hands into fists, a primitive warning to stay where you are

>So you do

>A pinhead of light at the end of the hallway winks into existence – an angry, yellow nail attached to something much larger

>You freeze in place, joints locking up with a familiar type of helplessness

>The heavy, blocky body of a freight train emerges from the end of the hallway, momentum carrying all forty angry tons of steel towards a singular point between your eyes

>Christening the front is that yellow light, growing wider by the second

“Jacob, I-I-I can’t m-m-move!” You plead the truth to Jacob

>“This time you’re going to get it right,” Jacob replies, his voice mechanical and cold, breaking above the tremors into a shout, yelling above the clapping lockers and the metallic whoosh of a train baring down on his little sister

>The train whistle shrieks again like a peel of sick, rib-sucking laughter

>Like a challenge

>There’s the sound of steel ties bracing as hundreds of metric tons of power and kinetic energy streak across a floor without any tracks

“JACOB!”

>“Hold!” Jacob commands, “wait for my signal!”

>You couldn’t disobey, even if you wanted to. Your entire body stops up, like a small desperate machine whose gears were fed with rubber cement

>“HOLLLLLDDD!”

>The train is so loud now that you can barely hear Jacob, but hear him anyway you do

>“HOLDDDD!”

>And then…

>…everything goes quiet

>No rushing wind, shaking Earth; the lockers clap and clack open to a deaf audience

>Even Jacob – shouting for you to hold – can’t break through

>All you see is the train baring down, steam peeling from its front like a dragon’s seething maw

>So it’s not even a conscious decision at this point

>It was autonomy – a primal defense against the absurd and vain urges that find us marked cowards, thieves, wolves, and whores

>Your powerful haunches explode beneath you as you launch yourself off to the side, stumbling, then crashing head first into a row of lockers

>Pain resonates throughout your skull, like the ringing of a dull bell

>You turn swiftly onto your back

>Jacob leers, standing in the hallway where you once stood, his face half-drowned in disappointed shadow, eyes glowing red with hate

>Another pull on the train horn

“L-Look out!” You scream at him

>It’s happening again

>How could you let this happen again?

>The cigarette smolders agelessly between his lips as he locks his cold stare on you

>“That’s no dodge, you fucking coward.”

>With that, your brother disappears – snuffed out like an old cigarette as the train streaks through him

>He becomes a puff of smoke, his memory and spirit scattered

>There’s a blat from the horn

>The train rolls on

>Your eyes slam shut and you clap your palms over your ears to stifle the noise

>But not just the noise

>Jacob can’t be here when your eyes open, you promise yourself

>After what feels like enough time your eyes break open

>No Jacob standing around

>No smoke

>No train

>Just…

>…the silvery ring of silence… save for the sound of sneakers squeaking off the floor somewhere in the distance

>You shake your head a little, like you’re shaking off the weight of a dream

>A very unpleasant dream

>That’s what everything was, right? Just a dream? A hallucination?

>Your heart is still hammering in your chest like it wasn’t a dream

>The venus fly trap writhes at your feet

>It nips at your furred fingers as you lift it with trembling fingers

>The sound of sneakers against the floor is closer, but you don’t feel like you have the strength or even the drive to find the source

>The ghost of Jacob’s words haunts your mind like an echo haunts a cave

>“Deep down, you’re a coward; a burden.”

>Just like it was back then all those years ago

>“That’s no dodge, you fucking coward.”

>Even his face…

>…that bright flash of anger, and then the icy-stillness of his features?

>It was just like a smoldering flame ready to be kindled by our every failing

>You could have sworn he was dad

>You’d cry again (like the wimp you are), but you feel too badly-shaken to do anything but point your eyes to the floor

>And what?

>Wait for someone to swoop by, and save you, oh princess?

>Useless

>Welp

>Hopefully whoever is racing down the hallway will just put you out of your misery

>“SAM!”

>A familiar voice graces your ears like light graces the darkness

>“GO! SAM! GRAB THE FLY TRAP! FUCKING RUN!”

>Like some hero out of legend, Anon skitters around a nearby corner, his arms swinging, legs pumping

>He aims his wild sprint right at you, and by the time you’re on your own feet you can see his expression

>Terror

>The wild sounds of tile-cracking, manic pursuit tells you Anon isn’t alone

Oliver Hart

Author of Foxing, Leaves of Fall, Liquid Courage, Beating the Heat, A Red Winter, Weber’s Gambit, and many other stories. He primarily writes hmofa, but dabbles in most genres. Interests include, writing, reading, technology, and music.

Stories: Foxing, The Leaves of Fall