The Last Few Steps
A pungent scent of fresh grass flooded the girl's nose. The scent was then followed by the feeling of the soft touch of grass underneath her hands, and a gentle wind tousling her hair, strands lightly brushing against her face. Her senses slowly stirred awake.
Wait… wind??
Her eyes snapped open.
A fully white, hazy-looking sky came to her vision. It wasn't hazy like clouds—no. It was the kind of haze her mind couldn't grasp, like a memory slipping through her fingers. If she were to close her eyes and try to recall it, she knew she wouldn't be able to.
She shot up quickly, instantly feeling slightly dizzy from the abrupt movement. Beneath her, a field of luminous grass stretched infinitely, and it let out an eerie glow that allowed for no shadows. Scattered among the blades, a few stark white flowers bloomed, fragile yet untouched. Her surroundings seemed almost like an empty canvas, blank and unyielding, waiting for something to be created.
"Where…am I?" the girl breathed out as she continued to turn her head and take in the endless white void that surrounded her.
A low hum thrummed through the emptiness, neither near nor far, a presence that seemed to be woven into the void itself.
The girl felt her fingers clasp around the threads of grass on the ground, clutching them in her hands. She felt a strange sort of panic, yet at the same time a strange sense of peace. Something was stopping the panic of being in an unknown place from fully reaching her. She felt a strange sort of comfort that made her want to just lie back down and rest in the soft grass without a care.
No need to worry about other people…or responsibilities. She was alone…Only the hush of solitude… and a still, perfect peace.
Just as she felt her grip on the grass loosening and her brain becoming more foggy and lazy, she caught movement in the corner of her eye.
A white butterfly drifted toward her, its wings fluttering like strokes of watercolor bleeding into the air. It glided down and landed on her finger, which still rested on the ground. She felt its faint weight, distant and feather-light, as she gazed down at it.
Her body didn't feel lazy, exactly. It felt light. Unburdened, as though gravity itself had forgotten her. As though she were floating.
But the comfort shattered the moment a sharp sting flared in her finger, right where the butterfly had rested. It burned, sudden and vivid, as if she'd been branded.
Suddenly, she felt a chill spread throughout her body…She wasn't alone.
She turned more frantically in the empty field, fear crawling up her body, the freeing feeling the quiet emptiness from earlier brought now replaced with fear at the realization that the white void wasn't as empty as she had originally thought.
The wind picked up, stronger now, sending blades of grass and strands of her hair whipping wildly around her. As she looked down, her shadow stretched across the ground, too long, too sharp, despite no shift in the light. It felt... wrong. As if it didn't belong to her.
On instinct, her body turned—and she ran.
She left her shadow behind, detached and still. The earlier warmth, that soft comfort, dissolved into fear as an indescribable, sinister presence pressed in behind her. Something wrong.
She ran and ran across the endless white field, time unraveling around her, the world stretching like an endless void with no edge in sight.
Her lungs burned. Her breath quickened, brain swimming in a strange intoxication. She dared a glance back in her hazy state of mind, and saw her shadow growing towards her, chasing after her…reaching for her, approaching faster and faster, not slowing down despite how she was.
She gasped, her breath catching in her throat. Her flight response screamed at her to run faster, but her body refused. She was slowing down, growing weaker. The endless white field still stretched around her as if she had never moved at all. She dared another glance back as her previous desperate sprint had become a jog, her ribs burning. A shadowy hand was on the ground stretching out towards her, mercilessly closer and closer…
She felt her heart beat distantly in her chest, a shudder taking over her body as one of the fingers from the dark, outstretched hand grazed her foot, an unbelievably icy chill spreading goosebumps where it grazed.
As it touched her, she fell over roughly, her foot growing weak by its touch as if corrupted. It wasn't just cold. It felt wrong, like her flesh was being rewritten under its grasp. Her body rolled, carried by the momentum of her previous running. The silent humming noise that was the only thing present in the void felt as if it were overwhelming her senses as it filled her ears, seeming to grow louder and louder as her rolling ceased, her throat squeezing painfully as she gasped for breath.
The shadowy hand on the ground paused momentarily as her eyes caught it resting a few feet away from her before slowly stretching towards her once again, the fingers outstretched and reaching towards her.
What would they do once they reached her? She wasn't sure, but something about them felt so unbelievably sinister, she felt as though she had no other option but to run from it. It seemed as though it threatened to rid her of her entire being.
She turned and tried to stand, only to tumble down the foot that was touched unusable, a grey color spreading slowly over it like ash; it felt detached from her body. She clenched her teeth and began grasping at the grass in front of her, dragging herself forward.
Honestly, she wouldn't be able to outrun the evil presence…the thought came to her vaguely as she continued to desperately drag her body forward, clutching the soft white grass in her hands in the process. Maybe she should stop–stop trying. All this effort seemed pointless now that she thought about it…she had to have been running for what felt like an eternity, but had gotten nowhere. There seemed to be no end to this place.
What was she even fighting so hard for anyway? It wasn't like life was even that great…maybe she should be thankful that this evil hand was offering her an easy way out… what's the worst it could do?
She grasped the next patch of grass in her fist, still dragging herself forward as her mind continued to flow lazily. Where was she dragging herself to? She wasn't sure…just away.
But still, what was she even scared of…would the hand eat her? It was a hand, so she doubted it, and even if it did, she felt a bit detached from her body for some reason at the moment. She had all her senses, but it was as if they belonged to someone else, and she was just spectating… like she was playing a VR video game or something. So even if the hand was gonna rip her apart, it probably wouldn't hurt too badly.
Why did the hand seek to harm her anyway…
Her crawling, although not stopping, began getting slower and less desperate as the questions continued to fill her head.
The hand had chased her all this time…for what? It kept up with her sprinting and didn't slow down at all, yet now that she was crawling, it wasn't reaching her. Was it playing with her or something? Honestly, rather than struggling for nothing and being this evil presence's plaything until it got bored with her, it might be better to just let it rid of her. It was kind of pathetic now that she thought about it. Putting in all that effort to run away when the result was inevitable.
Her mind went to all the horror movies she watched now and then, when the victims crawled away, the monster following them as if mocking them. She honestly felt more sadness for them than fear at those scenes cause they were wasting their energy as the inevitable would happen and they wouldn't be able to get up to run away.
She should stop…stop struggling. She should at least try to be at peace in her final moments, right?
The hand in front of her gripped a patch of grass tightly, but didn't pull herself forward, her desperate attempts at fleeing coming to a stop. Her heart beat furiously, her body screaming in fear, begging her to run as she tried to calm it down, trying to calm her body down so she could at least not have awful last moments. She began taking breaths in and out, trying to calm her nerves.
The icy touch from before reached her, sending an intense fear through her entire being. Her attempts to calm her breath and heart rate did nothing as they only picked up uncontrollable fear and dread, overwhelming her senses. The icy feeling spread as she felt a heavy presence gripping her leg, climbing up her body slowly. Well looked like she wouldn't be able to die in peace after all…damn. She couldn't overcome her body's instincts.
She stopped bothering to keep her head up and let it fall to the soft grass– a speck of purple flashed over her eyes.
Purple?
She raised her head, looking for the speck of nonwhite her eyes had caught before. Not seeing it, she turned her head, her body feeling heavy, the cold presence continuing to climb up her, threatening to corrupt her, consume her…do whatever evil existences did, she didn't know.
She turned her head to the left, straining, and was still met with the sickening, blinding white. Was she wrong? She slowly turned her head to the right, and the blinding glowing white was still the only thing present. Wow, did her mind lie to her to give her some hope–typical.
As she was about to give up, however, she once again caught the speck of color as she turned her head once more. In front of her, a purple flower sat peacefully surrounded by white ones.
It seemed to be a bellflower, a dark purple color that glowed brightly…even brighter than the white ones that surrounded it. Its glowing flickered, dimming, then brightening furiously once again…almost like a dying fire….a dying soul.
Without thought, the girl crawled towards it, her legs unusable to the cold evil presence, having reached up to half her body by now, crawling up more and more cold yet seeming to burn her, consuming her. However, she pulled herself forward, crawling towards the bright purple light the flower gave off, her movements desperate once more.
She could've sworn it wasn't there before. How could she have missed it? It was a beautiful color, probably the prettiest she had ever seen, a mysterious dark purple orchid tone. She grasped it like it was a lifeline… probably because it was the only hope of a lifeline she saw in the deafening white that surrounded her.
Just a few more steps…a few more pulls..
She thought to herself, clenching her teeth, ignoring the numbing pain, the previous thoughts of giving up absent, as the bright purple flower reflected in her eyes dimmed and brightened. The sinister presence, however, didn't stop the burning, and coldness came up to her chest now, the majority of her body turning a weird type of gray color. Like ash or stone.
"Cmon….So close"
She groaned roughly, pulling herself forward, unstopping. She was just a few feet away now, just one more reach…one more…
She could live…she could make it…she just had to reach forward a few more times….just a few more.
However, the girl always found the last steps the hardest to do. The final dish in the sink—left behind, too exhausting to scrub. The last paragraph of an essay—rushed, sloppy, as if all the effort before it had drained her dry. The last lap of a marathon—the aching pain from her legs trembling suddenly becoming more evident, lungs burning, passion and fire crumbling to dust right before the finish line.
That's always how it always was for her…and this time was no different.
Her desperate crawling slowed again, unsaid thoughts of doubt about whether she should keep trying and what she was even trying for, flooding her mind. She was pathetic…she probably wasn't even worthy of living and did not even have enough desire to try the few extra seconds it would take to reach the flower. Though, then again, reaching the flower didn't guarantee anything.
Her previous desperate grasps forward were now slowed and lazy; the pain of the sinister presence crawling up from before now became more evident as she moved. It felt distant from her, but it still wasn't pleasant.
She was going to die….
A bitter-sounding laugh echoed.
A velvety, chilling voice, sounding cruel and disinterested, sounded in her ear:
"That's all? You're giving up already?"