#one way ticket to hell | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

freckled-words · 1 year

Text

One Way Ticket To Hell - Part Two

I received an ask from @elias00o not too long ago asking me about this fic. When I gave my reply, I could have sworn that I'd posted everything I'd had written for it.

Feeling Ego nostalgic recently, I'd went and found the document. Turns out, I am a lying, liar-pants that completely forgot to post the rest of what I had available.

Now just to warn you all, this story is still not going to be updated after this. If anything, this can even be left off with this part and considered an open-ended thriller piece to prompt others.

But I didn't feel it fair to not share this part of the story, especially with how proud of it I am. This is going to be a REALLY long post too.

You can find part one HERE

You woke with a start, breathing hard and shivering.

Looking around your room, you found your bedside clock and checked the time.

3:45am.

You forced yourself to sit up, and wrapped your blankets around yourself. You ignored the cold sweat on your skin, and the feel of your pyjamas sticking.

This was the 3rd nightmare this week. You’d lost count of how many times it had been this month all together.

There was no explanation for these on-going nightmares that made sense to you.

That nightmare from three months ago had shaken you, especially with that burn that had appeared after having it. As it healed, you did your best to convince yourself you’d gotten the burn from the oven or something else hot earlier in the day, and you just hadn’t noticed. That your nightmare pain had bled through to alert you to it.

It was a weak explanation, but it did the trick to calm your unease.

Just as things seemed to be calming down for you, the nightmares had started.

It was their voices. Whispers in the darkness that sounded like Anti’s maniacal cackle, NateMare’s sing song teases, and Dark’s enraged baritone at your avoidance of them.

Then it had phantom touches. You’d be coming out of sleep, and have the faintest feeling of a cold hand brushing your cheek. Or a set of sharpened fingernails down your arm. The worst had been the overly warm grip on your scar, causing it to sting long into the morning after waking.

This was the 3rd nightmare in which you’d seen them, and had to run.

The first had been through a forest, where NateMare had managed to catch you. His eyes had swum with thick grey smoke, and pulsing black cracks had appeared in his skin the moment he’d touched you. Thankfully, he’d made the mistake of grabbing your scar too tightly, and the pain jarred you awake.

The second had been a short lived, mad dash through a dystopian city street. The buildings had been crumbling, spray painted on every inch, and overgrown with ivy. The roads were splitting with plants growing up through the cracks. The most unnerving part had been the sky. There was no sun, or moon. There weren’t any clouds or stars. There had only been pitch black, with no means of telling if the sky or some sort of ceiling was even there.

Anti had managed to corner you in an abandoned apartment, and you escaped by pushing into the wall and falling out and into the open air. The gut twist of falling had snapped you awake, leaving only the sound of Anti’s swearing in your ears.

This had been a true nightmare. If not for the ground being devoid of texture and temperature, you would never have snapped to the conclusion of it being a dream.

These nightmares were getting so surreal, it was leaving you disoriented and fatigued when you did wake.

You brushed your hand over the scar on your arm, ‘What happens when they do catch me?’

This question, and the unknown answer, weighed heavy on your mind each night.

As you had the other times, you opted to forgo sleep for the rest of the night. Choosing instead to get up and pass the time doing something productive. All the while, drinking as much coffee as you could stomach.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

With the sun beaming through your windows, you felt a bit more human. It didn’t hurt that being in the sunlight was also where you felt the safest. The warmth of sunlight was better than a fireplace, as it wasn’t sequestered to a single space that slowly spread out. In a few short minutes, an entire space was warmed once the sun was out and touching upon it. To you, it felt as though it did the same to your body. Rather than warming from the outside and going in, you felt the tension in your chest ease, and your muscles relaxed, until you were cozy from the inside out.

You had all the curtains and shades drawn away from the windows, letting in as much sunlight as possible while you worked.

Boxes were scattered around the apartment, some closed and labelled with large black lettering. Others had their flaps open, either half full or still empty.

You’d been considering moving for the past couple months. You’d been let go from work not that long ago, as the small grocery store you’d worked for had to unfortunately close. Their sales had dropped over the years, and then a WalMart had opened nearby, and they were finished.

You’d been living in the same small city for the past year. You’d never been fond of larger cities, as the number of people surrounding you could trigger an anxiety attack. Plus with the looming buildings, and crammed traffic down narrow lanes, everything just felt too compressed. You learned at an early age that you were your happiest when you can swing your arms around and not worry about hitting someone right next to you. Being able to walk or bus to everything in under a half hour removed the stress of deadlines. Your favorite places to eat and shop all knew you by face and name, and you never got tired of them, since they kept their selections up to date. It boggled your mind that people can thrive in places where everyone else was right at their elbow.

Your plan was to move to the same, somewhat bigger city, that your best friend had moved to. They had reassured you that there were plenty of jobs, and that they could even get you in for part time work with the college bookstore. Things had worked out perfectly, as your friend needed someone to take the spare bedroom in their apartment and help cover the rent.

Your savings were on the meager side, so the smaller rent payments would definitely be a blessing. Maybe, you would even feel safe enough to get a proper night’s sleep.

You taped up another box and labelled it, ‘LIVING ROOM.’ Next to it, was another box labelled ‘JO.’

You’d been putting that one off for as long as possible. Everything contained inside the box were leftovers from your ex. The relationship with Jo hadn’t ended messy, just cold, and awkward. You’d both tried to make it work, only to find that trying was doing more damage than helping. It took two weeks of lifeless texts, and finally, one solemn phone call to agree to call it quits.

There were video games, books, a pair of headphones, and a hoodie in the box. Jo had never asked for any of these things back, but you knew at least two of the games had been a favorite of theirs. You didn’t have the heart to take these things with you. Other than the reminder of a failure, there would be a certain weight of guilt contained in that box.

The moving truck was coming tomorrow, taking away as many boxes as would fit, along with your computer desk, bed and small couch. If you didn’t bring the box back now, it might get brought along by accident.

“You can do this. Just bring the box over, give it back to Jo, and say one more goodbye.”

Your pep talk to yourself didn’t garner much in the way of courage. It did, however, make you realize just how much you were overthinking this.

Shaking your head at yourself, you grabbed up the box and your car keys. On such a lovely day, you just needed to get this done and over with.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The drive took less time than you’d hoped. At each stop sign, and red light, you glanced over at the box and considered turning around.

Your nerves about bringing the box to Jo seemed...intense. In a way that didn’t make any sense. Jo was in no way a threat to you. Despite how things had broken off, you’d never gotten any impression that Jo would want to retaliate in a way that would hurt you. So why did you feel the need to flee?

“It’s gotta be the lack of sleep and too much coffee.”

That was what you finally told yourself as you pulled up to the curb in front of their home. It was a logical explanation.

You had, in fact, drank an entire pot of coffee in a five hour time span. Your heart was just about bursting out of your chest from the caffeine.

Still, you felt yourself resisting the motions of grabbing the box and getting out of your car.

Jo was renting the basement suite from the house’s owners. Which meant going through the side gate, and to the back of the house, followed by a small flight of stairs that lead to the door to Jo’s apartment.

Standing in front of their door, you looked between the door itself, and the doorbell set to the side. Knock or doorbell? If you knocked, Jo might not hear it. If you rang the doorbell, they’d definitely hear it, but then so would the upstairs neighbors. It was early still, possibly too early. What if you woke the neighbors? What if you woke up Jo? They worked late hours and slept in on weekends. But what if Jo wasn’t even home? They’d gone out to meet with friends early on weekend mornings before.

Your anxiety was driving your thoughts into a chaotic circle. Needing to break the cycle, you rapped your knuckles hard against the white door. Too hard. Your knuckles smarted from the impact.

Shaking out your hand and juggling the box, you didn’t hear the scuffle of feet on the other side of the door. Which was why you startled when the door was opened, and Jo peered out at you.

The second Jo laid eyes on you, their complexion paled and they glanced over their shoulder, “What are you doing here?”

You’d been anticipating an awkward hello, or possibly a confused, “Hi?” Their dismay at seeing you, and their question, bled away all your anxiety, leaving behind a knot of discomfort in its place. This had apparently been a rather bad call.

“I-I sent you a text a couple hours ago. I wanted to give you back the games you left at my place.” You lifted the box in both hands towards them.

Jo reached out and took the box, giving you a glimpse of their wrists beneath the sweater they were wearing. Was that dried blood?

With their apartment being set lower down, the sunlight didn’t reach inside the doorway. There were no lights on inside either, casting Jo in near darkness.

Your vision adjusted to the lack of light, allowing you to see the bruising on their neck, and a healing split in their lower lip.

Had Jo not taken hold of the box, it would have toppled from your grip.

“Jo, are you okay? What happened?”

Jo’s lips pressed together as their eyes flicked to the left, where you couldn’t see past the door frame. They pulled the box from your hands and hugged it against their chest. Finally their eyes settled on you. A light of determination shining through where there’d been defeat a moment before, “You need to run. Now! Go!”

“Jo, what are yo-” You took a step towards them, and a visible line of grey appeared around their throat. It went taut, becoming a noose. Jo was yanked from the doorframe and into their apartment with a strangled cry.

The smell of thick, burning smoke drifted out from the darkness.

Some would argue that there was no way to identify smoke the same way you could identify a cologne.

You would prove those people wrong.

This smoke carried an exact hint of burnt flesh to it. It’s color brought to mind metal that could withstand all conditions. It would have to, in order to obey the impossibilities it could be shaped to.

Your eyes watered as you staggered back towards the staircase.

“No.”

“We really need to stop meeting like this Sweetheart.”

More plumes of smoke billowed out from the apartment as one of your nightmares stepped outside.

Your hand went to your mouth, reflexively suppressing the scream that threatened to leave your gut.

The relaxed set of his shoulders didn’t match the hunger in his smoking, brown eyes. It was the hunger of a predator that had locked his sights on his prey, and knew he had it cornered.

Your free hand gripped onto the railing, steadying yourself as you lifted your left foot and stepped up. Slowly you shook your head, allowing words to get past your lips, “You’re not real...Th-this is another dream...Another nightmare.”

His grin softened in mock sympathy. Taking the three steps needed to close the distance, he leaned in close and whispered, “That was before Sweetheart, this is now.” His hand lashed out, grabbing hold of your arm, “I learned my lesson from that last time. I can’t go squeezing that tender spot too hard.” His hand had gone straight to your burn scar, which was concealed by your jacket.

The fabric of your jacket smoldered, wisps of smoke drifted into the air, and your skin ignited into blistering agony.

The nightmare of getting the scar flooded your mind. Dark interrupting the concert. Anti murdering everyone in the audience, and NateMare catching all the people trying to run away. Just before you’d woken up, his hand had latched onto your arm allowing him to burn your skin with his touch.

The last time NateMare had caused you this pain, you’d woken up. You weren’t waking up now. The pain continued, spreading along your arm as the sleeve of your jacket burned away from his hand.

Adrenaline flooding your veins along with panic, you managed to wrench your arm back hard enough to free it from his hold. You barely kept your balance as you twisted and scrambled up the stairs two at a time.

You didn’t dare look back as you shoved open the gate. Even in your rush, your fingers registered the rough texture of the wood, feeding you more proof that this wasn’t another nightmare.

You’d barely rounded the side of the house when you had to stop. You lurched forward, nearly toppling onto the cement driveway.

A young man with green hair sat on the hood of your car. He tossed a familiar, wicked dagger between his hands as his luminescent green eyes found yours.

“This can’t be real, this can’t be happening.” Your voice sounded distant to your own ears, but Anti’s delighted, warped, giggles sounded clearly in the still air.

Knowing NateMare was going to reach you any second from behind, you got yourself moving. You pivoted away from the car’s direction, and changed your course to the street and the next nearest house. If you could find anyone else about, then surely this would end. Surely they’d disappear.

Your feet remained firmly planted as your leg attempted to lift. Looking down, you saw shadows writhing over your feet. Shadows that extended in the direction of the sun, instead of away from it. Without following their trail, you knew who you’d find on the other end.

You pulled again, and again, desperately trying to yank your feet free. The force sent you back, straight into a set of waiting arms.

Anti’s cold dagger pressed against your throat, contrasting the warmth of his breath against your ear, “You’re a real pain in the ass to track down, but not impossible.”

His arms remained firm, keeping you upright and immobile as the shadows at your feet began to spread up your legs. With each inch they travelled, your legs became increasingly numb. You tried to twist in Anti’s hold as panic clawed at your mind.

Freezing hands cupped your face, pulling your sight from the creeping shadows. Meeting Dark’s, flat near black eyes, brought reality crashing in.

This was not a dream. They were here.

“I warned you. You couldn’t escape us forever, not even in your own realm.”

The shadows went over your hips, and rushed up to your chest. All the adrenaline that had been helping you vanished. Cold, lead filled your limbs. If Anti were to let you go, you’d fall to the ground.

Your eyelids fluttered as your vision darkened.

Dark’s right thumb brushed over your cheek, “Sleep Y/N. We’ll take care of you.”

NateMare came into your field of vision, just behind Dark’s shoulder.

You couldn’t fight the pull, your only protest a feeble, “No...Please…”

You closed your eyes, and sleep overtook you.

#Darkiplier #Antisepticeye #NateMare #Markiplier #fanfiction #jse anti #natewantstobattle #One Way Ticket To Hell #Youtuber Ego #love letter to Nightmare on Elm Street

9 notes · View notes