Dahlia

I'm actually super duper proud of this, it has taken a long time but I've been working in it non stop cause I thought it was turning out very cool! If you're interested.... I have JUST opened an Instagram account if you wanna give it a peek! Here's some of the WIPs!!

  Almost immediately, she noticed the interior of the shelter was much… wider than it looked from the outside. For one, she couldn’t even see the walls to either side of her, but there was no way it was that dark in here. Still, her eyes weren't fully adjusted yet, so it was probably fine.

  “Here, kitty kitty,” she called into the dark. No meows or pawsteps could be heard, but she knew it was here, she’d seen it slip through the crack in the shelter’s door. At least if it ran out, Kris was still there to catch it.

  Hopefully.

  “Come on, where the hell is it?” she mumbled to herself. She had half a mind to give up and head back to Kris, but before she could take another step, a loud slam echoed throughout the shelter.

  Dess whirled around, but there was only darkness.

  The door had been closed.

  “Shit, shit,” she muttered as she ran back the way she came. She barely saw the door through the darkness before nearly crashing into it, stopping herself just in time.

  “Not funny, Kris! Come on, open up!” she shouted while pounding on the door, but even as she said it, she knew there was no way that scrawny kid would have been able to push it closed, not after she’d had to use all her strength to pull it open wide enough to enter.

  Then suddenly, to her horror, the ground began to shake.

  She fumbled around in the dark for some kind of handle, a lever, a latch, something, but all she felt was rusty metal. Was there seriously no way to open the shelter from the inside!?

  Panicking, she abandoned her search for a handle and took to shoving the door. “Come on, come on,” she pleaded, but the door refused to budge. The ground was shaking too much, she kept slipping. She went back to pounding on the door, pummeling it with all she had, praying Kris or someone else outside could hear it.

  “Open the door! Kris, come on, please, open the door!”

  The shaking got worse, and the shadows seemed to sweep in and surround her, becoming darker, yet darker.

  Paralyzed with fear, she stopped, and she could faintly hear slight banging from the other side before suddenly

  Dess was falling.

  She was falling, down, down, down, without any end in sight.

  Looking all around her, she could see nothing but black. Nothing surrounded her but the profound darkness that only seemed to be getting darker, if that was even possible.

  She couldn’t tell which way was up. She couldn’t see, feel or hear anything aside from the sound of air moving quickly past her as she fell, further and further down.

  Until she suddenly wasn’t.

  Dess wasn’t sure exactly when she had stopped falling. Everything looked the same, being covered by the same darkness. But there was solid ground beneath her feet, even if she couldn’t see it.

  It didn’t feel like the concrete of the shelter. It didn’t feel like the dirt of the forest, either. It didn’t feel like wood floors, stone paths, carpet, moss, snow, or anything she’d ever walked on before.

  It didn’t feel like anything.

  “Where… Where am I?” Dess whispered to herself.

  “Hello...? Anyone...?” she uttered shakily. “Is... is anybody out there...?”

  No response.

  Summoning her courage, she cried out into the vast darkness.

  “Someone!? Anyone!? Can anyone hear me!?”

  …

  No response.

  She sank to the floor, curling up on herself, trying not to start crying.

  “It's dark.” She didn’t know why she was talking to herself, but it helped anyway.

  “It's so dark here.”

  Feeling the tears welling in her eyes, she gave one last try before giving in completely.

  “Someone, anyone, if you can hear me…

  “Say something... please…”