Hahh! I gasped for air, startled in the musty darkness. Silence beckoned me, as I searched frantically for light, though my hands could only meet a firm surface inches above me...all around me. Tough and unrelenting, yet somehow strong . It felt like rotting wood.
I pounded upwards with my fists, hyperventilating as the sounds of the wriggling white worms enhanced around me, dirt pouring down into my nostrils from a slight crevice in-between the boards over my face.
Someone had tried to kill me! The thoughts feverishly hurtled through my mind and circled back around into a thick lump in my throat.
“Help!” I screamed, before thinking better of it much too long into my cries, and cursing myself for the wasting of precious air, and potentially straining my larynx in the process. It felt bruised and tender, running my hands over it, but no pain. Did someone do that to me? I couldn't even remember how I got here. I couldn't remember...anything!
Who was I? Who...am I?
I shook the thoughts from my head and returned to the pressing moment at hand. Feeling through my clothing for pockets or for any sign of light, tools, or even identification, though not too helpful without a light, I found nothing. This can't be happening. How did I get here? There must be some way out of this situation? These types of things had happened before, right? I had to escape, I had to live!
Mustering up the strength, I began kicking and flailing, and levied every strike I could at the boards hoping for a crack, but none came.
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Taking a moment, I wrestled in thought, wondering what I could possibly do to escape. Suddenly, more dirt poured down onto my face from above. Ptah! I spat out the moistened soil.
Wait...my palms move to the weakened boards, broken and unmended...that's the spot!
Running my fingers over the roughshod wood, I scrambled to yank down any bits of the plank that I could, piece by piece, until more dirt and debris flowed in, which I divvied towards my feet, while taking in mouthfuls of soil, rushing into my nostrils as well. Gruelingly, I broke a hole large enough to squeeze my frame through, but could only hope I had enough air to keep my lungs in tact.
Now was my chance. I held my breath and swam for dear life, in what seemed like an eternity, as I struggled upwards and clawed for the surface world.
Finally, I felt my fingertips tear through the surface. Feeling my chest tightening, I frantically pulled myself through the darkness of the mound of dirt and into the nighttime throes of fresh air, my eyes searing even in the dim light. I could make out a cemetery housing me, and a hazily lit city off around us, though not this particular area, the towering city beyond was more inviting.
As I pulled myself out, I sprawled atop the dirt and faced the starry sky, its tiny lights twinkling effervescently.
I survived. I cheated death. I did the improbable. Alone.
“Well...” A playfully dark, yet whimsically masculine voice chimed in.
I rolled over and backed away from the voice, crawling backwards in fear.
A dark skinned man wearing a lengthy head-wrap, draped in layers of robes, brandishing a staff with a skull on the tip with jewel inlaid eyes, sat lackadaisically upon a nearby headstone, a bracelet filled ankle weighed down, hanging free over it. Behind his floating leg, the headstone read. 'Annabelle Crowley.'
“It's about time,” the man yawned, brandishing a random assortment of gold teeth and lost ones in a wide grin. “Isn't it...Miss Crowley?”