Twisted Memories of a Gray
Starter for @sympathyforsin
Coco had woken Mallory four hours earlier than she was supposed to, shaking her arm, startling her. No one else was awake that she knew of.
"I’m parched Mallory! It’s so cold out in the hallways. Get me a water! Hurry, wake up!!" Coco insisted urgently.
Mallory felt like she had not slept at all after that disastrous interview with Michael. She had tossed and turned the entire night, fighting with herself within as if something was trying to drive its way out from deep within her. She had a strange dream. There had been a thick fog that had practically choked her feeling a chilling darkness. But she had ventured towards the center finding a crying little boy. There was a voice warning her to stay away, that he will kill her but she embraced him, protecting him until she was pulled away. She sat up quickly gasping for air, her blankets now thrown on the floor as she shivered in her long white Victorian nightgown getting up reluctantly out of her warm bed.
"Am I going crazy?" She said to herself as she looked into the mirror in the bathroom, splashing cool water upon pale features before grabbing a robe to make way out into the chilled hallways of the Outpost. She wasn’t sure what was real. Or if what had happened the night before during the interview with Michael had all been a bad dream. She just knew Michael wouldn’t choose her for the sanctuary after that train wreck of an interview.
She couldn’t shake a familiar feeling, of deja vu, when Michael had spoken with her right before the chaos instilled then. As soon as he had brushed his long ringed fingers along her delicate jawline, it was as if something inside of her was trying to tell her that she wasn’t who everyone thought she was. And that she knew Michael somewhere, somehow. But she was frightened. Unbeknown to her, the fear was just a way the identity spell worked to repress her memories. She was afraid of who she was deep inside. The manifestation of power coming from her only made her more frightened of who she was or could be. She remembered the look of shock on Michael’s face. What if she had hurt him? She didn’t want to harm anyone. How could someone so small and meek like her hold so much power? And how could something like that even exist? It was something she had only seen in comic movies.
But there was something else that bothered her. She could feel his confusion and intrigue at the same time ever since she had felt the stroke of his fingers softly upon her porcelain cheek. Mallory had always been one to care about others, even that bitch Coco, but this was an entirely different experience. It was as if she could feel what he was feeling when he had contact with her directly. And at first, it had chilled her to the core. But there was something else deeper, something that had saddened her. It was like a vice upon her heart and thinking about it now, she felt sympathy for him wanting to know why she felt these things and why he would feel that way.
She must have imagined all of this! Was she going crazy? She could swear this place did something to her. All she had felt ever since she had arrived was an impeding melancholy that saturated the walls and halls of the outpost. She felt as grey inside as her clothing.
And now she felt she would be one of the ones left behind, to die of starvation or be eaten by the cannibals. Already she was hungry all of the time ever since Venable had cut their food portions to once a day. Mallory didn’t want to die, but who would want a lowly grey anyway to help in the creation of this new world that Michael had described to her in the interview. She was never tenacious, or the type that would burn down the Tree of Knowledge, using it for firewood like he had stated. She was meek and mild, kind, and had tried to not be noticed. Getting noticed here got you killed. The others seemed to be trying everything possible to get Michael’s attention so that they would be selected to go with him to this so-called sanctuary. But all she wanted to do was hide from him.
She dried her face, her eyes weary and fatigued as she walked out of her door and out into the hallway. She knew her place, and it wasn’t the sanctuary. She wanted to try to get some more sleep after fetching the water for Coco so she put on her gray robe over her nightgown trying to stay warm, her long golden honey brown locks falling passed her shoulders now out of that ridiculous bun. It was cold throughout the corridors at night. She made way down from the top level of the stairs in a spiral that would lead to the main floor hoping that no one was awake yet to bother with her. She gathered up the mineral water, placing it on a silver tray. She made way down the corridor near Michael’s room.
The closer she ventured towards his room, she began to feel that choking darkness that had been in her dream. Her hands began to shake and she dropped the silver tray, as it crashed in front of Michael’s door, the water bottle rolling to meet it.
