Walking Among the Shadows: Awakening: Revised Edition (18 page)

The pounding of our feet on
the hardwood floors seemed to echo throughout the house, giving away our exact
location to this evil being apparently sent to murder us. Sarah was still
crying in my mom’s arms and my mom was slowing down, so I began pushing her.
The added weight of her and the hardship we had trying to move was almost too
much to handle. My legs were dripping with sweat and shaking like wooden stilts
with too much weight on them. I was afraid my knees were going to shatter from
the weight, but I kept pushing; still refusing to look behind me for fear of
seeing those talons slashing across the darkness emitting the only light in the
black void that was now our home. I suddenly felt light-headed and started
choking. The air I inhaled was burning my throat and my insides felt like they
were on fire.

“Mom, keep moving,” I pleaded
and then suddenly we ran into the back door. It just seemed like the door was
over a mile away and now we were slamming up against its hard exterior. What
kind of illusions was this evil capable of? I began to realize that if this
thing could manipulate our perception of reality, then what else was it capable
of? My mom was fighting with the door locks, and from the corner of my eye I
saw the glow of the talons moving through the darkness, the glow was beautiful
and almost hypnotizing as it floated closer towards my mom’s…

“Mom, move!” I screamed and
pushed her head away just before the talons ripped through the back door,
shattering wood and metal everywhere. The door was oak with a steel interior
for security, and those talons went through that door like a scalpel through
flesh. We were all on the floor now, scrambling, trying to get away from the
door. The entity was still swiping at it, tearing it to pieces while it hissed
and  screeched in enjoyment at the destruction it was creating.

“Upstairs! We have to get
upstairs to my room and call 911,” my mom said.

It seemed that while the
entity was occupied with the door, its spell of illusion on us was gone, so we
quietly and quickly made for the stairs. Halfway up the stairs the sounds of
the entity screeching and the destruction of our back door stopped. The sudden
silence stopped us in our tracks as we tried to listen to where this thing
could be. After about five seconds my mom grabbed my arm signaling me to follow
her upstairs.

I started moving slowly up the
stairs still straining my ears to listen for anything but all I got was
silence. My muscles were exhausted from shaking with fear and I could barely
keep a firm foothold on the steps in front of me. As I started moving my leg up
to reach for the next step the wood bent under my weight and let out a slight
but clear squeak as the wood protested at the added weight. I gritted my teeth
as the sound of the squeaky step echoed throughout the house. Never before had
this step made one peep in all the years we’d been living in this house and
tonight, when we were fleeing from a force beyond our comprehension this step
decided to betray me. At that moment I vowed if we got out of this alive I
would be replacing and burning this squeaky step the first chance I got.

Through the suffocating darkness
we finally made our way up the stairs and into my mother’s room. It was as dark
as a tomb. Usually through the huge windows in her room, light would shine
through either from the streetlights or the moon, but tonight the window
offered no light or comfort from the outside world. We were trapped with this
thing and the darkness it brought with it refused to let us find any hope of
escape. We stumbled around in the darkness until my mom found her cell phone.
As she fumbled with the phone, trying to get the display to turn on, I found
myself praying that the phone would work and that we would get out of this
situation alive and unharmed. I tried to get my thoughts together, but the
darkness and silence made it almost impossible.

We were all terrified and our
fear acted like an inhibitor to proper brain functions. We were like toddlers
given a task more suitable for college graduates and we were failing miserably.
My mom kept pressing the power button on the phone, but it wouldn’t turn on.
After about eight to ten tries she began to cry and curse the phone for not
working. I could feel her shaking while she knelt on the floor next to her bed.

“Take the battery out and put
it back in,” Sarah whispered.

My mom nodded her head and
began to take the phone battery out. After listening to her fiddle with the
phone for what seemed like forever I finally heard the click of the phone’s
back plate being reinstalled and then she pressed the power button. The light
from the phone seemed to light up the entire room, I looked around quickly to
get a good look at the room and noticed the darkness was reacting very
strangely. The light from the phone didn’t dilute the darkness; it seemed to
fight it. The darkness was cowering to each of the corners of the room and
moving like black waves crashing on the shores of a beach. Also the longer the
light from the cell phone remained, the less terrified I felt. My nerves were
slowly relaxing allowing my mind to expel the chaos that was raging inside my
head and I began to regain control of my thoughts. I started to assess our
situation and that thing downstairs and its relationship with Jason and my
Mom’s familiar reaction to it. Suddenly, I felt Sarah pulling on my arm and I turned
to see Sarah pointing towards the ceiling.

She had a look of confusion
and fear on her face, and when I glanced towards the ceiling I understood her
expression. The ceiling light in my mom’s room was on, had always been on, but
the darkness was so thick and invading that it covered it up like a thick black
sheet covering a window to keep out the afternoon sun. The cell phone’s light
seemed to have pushed the darkness back from the ceiling to reveal this strange
spectacle, but what was even stranger was now that the darkness was pushed back
and the ceiling light was revealed, it’s light still had no effect on the room.

The only light that had any
effect was from the cell phone and I knew that once that light went out, the
darkness, the terror, and more than likely that thing would return. By now my
mom was dialing 911 and through the phone’s ear speaker I could hear the
dispatcher answer…

“Nine-one-one, what is your
emergency?’

Silence…my mom said nothing.
The dispatcher repeated her greeting and still my mom remained silent. The
dispatcher again repeated her greeting and my mom was sitting there frozen.

“Mom? Please answer her,” I
pleaded.

My mom was looking around the
room frantically  realizing that once she put the phone to her ear the light
from the cell phone screen would go out. Then the darkness and that thing would
return and we weren’t sure what new horrors were waiting for us once my mom
began speaking into the phone? She continued to look around the room and then I
noticed her staring at the closet on the other side of the room. She pointed to
both of us and then towards the closet. I shook my head in protest; I was not
going to leave her alone out here once the light went out. She looked at me and
in her eyes I could see pain; the thought of her answering the phone and harm
coming to us was too much for her to bear. I knew she was ready to give her
life for us, but she didn’t want us anywhere around if it was to come to that.

As much as I wanted to stay I
knew I needed to keep Sarah safe, I would be the last line of defense and
whatever might come through that closet door would have the fight of its life;
if I was going to die protecting Sarah I was going to make it count. Nothing
was going to come easy for my attacker tonight. I leaned forward and grabbed
Sarah’s hand and pulled her away from my mom’s arms. Sarah was still crying and
didn’t want to leave her either, but after a few hard pulls on her arm, she
kissed Mom on the cheek and turned away walking towards the closet. I headed
towards the closet after Sarah, and right before I closed the door I looked
back to see my mom looking back at us. Tears were falling from her eyes,
reflecting the cell phone’s light making them appear like streams of silver
running down her face. Through all the terror of what would possibly come next,
she forced a smile and silently said the words “I love you.”

I made Sarah sit on the floor
towards the back wall of the closet while I got on all fours in front of the
closed closet door. It was very quiet besides the faint sound of the dispatcher
still saying, “Hello, are you there?”

Then the light went out and it
felt like the air was suddenly sucked out of the room. I jumped back when I saw
the darkness starting to pour in under the closet door like a weightless goo. I
quickly grabbed one of my mom’s coats and covered the space under the door,
trying to keep this diseased darkness out. I could hear my mom through the
darkness pleading with the dispatcher to send help. She was sobbing now as the
dispatcher tried to calm her down with no success. Then there was a loud boom that
shook the entire room and I could hear the bedroom door exploding. Pieces of
wood slammed up against the closet door, making loud banging sounds and  violently
shaking the hinges on the door. My mom began screaming at the top of her lungs
followed by the high-pitched screech of the dark entity trying to speak again.

“Where is she?” the entity
asked. “Where is she?”

My mom was still screaming,
but the entity’s voice could still be heard clearly over her screams.

“Tell me where she is and your
death will be quick. Toy with me and I will savor your death for hours. Tell me
now, I won’t ask you again.”

Its questions were answered
with louder screams of terror. I wanted to kick open the closet door and
protect my mom, but doing so would jeopardize Sarah’s life and I loved her too
much to leave her defenseless against this evil thing.

“You think you are strong and
the love for your children will keep you silent. I will show you how wrong you
are; I will show you a level of pain and suffering you can’t possibly imagine
and right before I take your life I will make you betray them. And before death
takes you I will make you watch the pain your silence brought on your children.
Yes, I can feel your fear, I can taste it, its flavor is wonderful. I will
enjoy feasting on your pain.”

Then I heard the agonizing
screams of my mom as that thing began to attack her. He was clawing into her
flesh with those talons and all I could do was listen to my mom die a horrible
death to protect me and my sister. Over her screams the entity moaned and
laughed in enjoyment at the pain it was causing her. It was almost like it was
experiencing some kind of sensual rush from her suffering. Sarah was overcome
with grief, crying while constantly whispering, “Mom, Mom, Mom” over and over
again. The coat I placed under the door started to dissolve right before my
eyes allowing this strange darkness to seep inside the closet. The situation
was devastating and normally I would be frozen with terror but miraculously I
was far from that. The feelings of determination and purpose began to build up
inside of me. Something was awakening in me and slowly things became clearly
than they’ve ever been.

The room felt like it was
spinning as my fear began to subside giving way to a more potent and powerful emotion.
Tears rolled down my face as a warm feeling came over my entire body. Suddenly
I felt a deep emotional yearning for my sister and my mother. Hearing my mom’s
screams and listening to my sister’s heart breaking as she listened to our
mother being tortured sent a tidal wave of empathy through my body. I wanted to
protect them and see them safe and alive from this ordeal. Their safety and
well-being became more important than my own.

I didn’t care what happened to
me and how much pain I would have to endure saving them both, all that mattered
was keeping them alive. It felt like waves of fire were hitting my chest over
and over again, engulfing me in an emotional state I’d never experienced. I
moved towards the back of the closet and held Sarah’s head in my hand and
kissed her on her forehead. I knew what I had to do and I was willing to do it.
As I placed my hands on the closet doorknob I realized exactly what emotion I
was feeling. It was love, pure and uncorrupted and this love sent waves of
energy through my body. This love I felt was so intense it shook the very
foundations of my being. This love was so potent and engaging that it seemed to
take on its own consciousness and soon it will materialized into a power that
I’d never known.

Walking out into the room I
immediately felt my body temperature rise covering my entire body in sweat. The
heat coming from my body became so intense the sweat on my arms started to boil
and turn to mist.

What’s happening to me?

My body temperature was rising
drastically as I felt my fingertips become numb; and then I saw it. The entity
was astride my mom on the bed, clawing at her with those glowing weapons of
evil. The closer I got towards the bed the hotter my body became, until my skin
began to give off a glow similar to the light that the entity’s talons emitted.
I was becoming light headed but unlike previous times I didn’t feel faint,
actually I was more focused than I’d ever been. By the time I was at the foot
of the bed the light and heat coming from inside me was so bright, the entire
room was engulfed in it and the darkness that covered the room was dissolving
and peeling away like the outer skin of an orange.