Chapter Text
The first thing I heard was the sound of dripping water all around me. Which looking back on now, doesn't make much sense considering I don't make it a habit of falling asleep submerged in water. But I'm getting ahead of myself. Where was I? Right. The sound of water, a sound that at first is simple to ignore. Rolling over I try to drown out the noise and succumb to blissful empty sleep. But my hand is wet, why is my hand soaking wet? I blink, once, twice. Huh, that's strange. I can count every individual dust particle in the air... I've never been able to see that with even my glasses on. Who am I Spiderman discovering his powers for the first time? I snort embarrassing loud, and i hear the sound echo off of every surface it hits. I smell dirt, sewage, decomposing rats? I sit up so fast i hear my back pop. I've had my pet snakes refuse to eat enough times to know what a rotting animal smells like. I'm in a tunnel? There's stagnant water surrounding me that just looks like I need to do to the doctors as soon as possible. 'What happened to me?' I have so many half forming questions circling in my brain that I have to stop and take a deep breath. I feel my hands shaking so I ball them into fists and stand up. No point in asking questions I most likely won't get answers to right now. 'Why does this place look like something out of a movie?' A confused curiosity settles over me so fast that I have to stop myself-curiosity killed the cat. I do not need to stick around a place that's most likely underground. "I need to get the hell out of here." I speak out loud and my voice sounds foreign. My voice sounds like bells it's so clear and vibrant, it's never sound this beautiful. As if it won't change the next time I speak, I sing a falsetto. Perfect. It sounds so pleasant that I just listen to it reverberate off the walls of the tunnel and back to me. I reach my hand up to my throat in silent awe. I have been tone deaf my entire life, this doesn't make any sense. I feel a scar that starts at the middle of my throat, and I feel my eyebrows knot together. I trail my finger along the scar, it goes up vertically all the way to my mouth and stops at my bottom lip. It almost feels surgically done with how precise and clean the scar is. My eyes shoot to one of the many exits around me, I hear fast foot steps. But they don't sound normal, it's almost like the person is scurrying across the floor. I wait. My eyes never leaving the entance from where the sound is coming from, I feel like an invisible web is attached to me and whoever is coming toward me has the other end. It's almost frightening how calm I am as i feel it. A man, comes into view.. or at least I think it's a man. It's balled headed and hunched over almost walking on all-fours. It's eyes are reflective as it stares at me. It has a feral and animalistic quality to its walk as it comes towards me. 'Stop' I think before I even open my mouth. And it halts where it stands, still in mid stride. I blink a few times, confused. 'Sit.' My eyes widen as this creature literally sits in the pools of water I woke up in. I swallow the spit that's gathered in my mouth and walk towards it. It's deathly pale, with sunken eyes, and it's almost as if all of its veins are visible. Blade. I suck in a shaky breath as realization crashes over me. This has to be a joke? Please tell me I'm on punked and all of my family are about to pop out and laugh at me. I close my eyes and take a minute to breathe because for some unknown reason I know it's not a joke; I'm in the middle of fictional movie that I've watched a million times. NO. I can feel the frustration and anger boiling inside of me as I walk over to the creature and crouch down infront of it. I wrap my hand around its throat and yank it the rest of the way towards me. "Open your mouth." I say through clenched teeth, trying my hardest to drown; the helplessness that I feel clawing its way out; to the back of my mind. I hold my breath and I watch as its scar ripples and opens on command. I move my hand from its throat to watch in morbid fascination as it literally bares its insides to me. I've watched Blade enough times to know what that mouth is capable of. As if anything will change the situation I'm in, i reach out and touch one of its teeth. I hiss as I pull my hand away, blood oozing out of my fingertip. I can feel the pain, this isn't a dream. I let myself zone out as I stare at the creature, I can see the different colors of veins that run all along its face and skull. It's beautiful. I sigh looking away, "Close your mouth." I know I'm deflecting and grasping onto anything that will distract me from acknowledging the truth. But defense mechanisms have gotten me this far, they can't possibly make my situation anymore unreal than it already is. I look back to see it staring at something, i look down. My finger. Well, if this is my new reality I might as well have some fun. 'Lick.' I think as I bring my finger towards its mouth, there's a rumble in its chest as its tongue lulls out and swipes it over my wound. The veins in its head and face seem to disappear in the blink of an eye. I have to physically stop my mouth from dropping open. He, it's a he. And he looks like a regular bald man you would see on the street now, besides the primal posture and reflective eyes. He doesn't look feral anymore, dare I might say he looks satisfied, complacent even. A drastic change from the creature I saw moments ago. If a few drops of my blood have made this puppet so content, what does that make me? I touch the scar on face, I've see this movie a millions times, I know that these things are never satisfied with the pints of blood they consume. I know they need to feed every two hours like clock work. Why am I here? What purpose do I have to be is this fictional world? To feed these things like a mother, offer them my blood like I'm giving them milk from my tit? "You can't be serious." I spit out, like a bad taste in my mouth. And as quickly as I am disgusted, panic sets in as I hear more scurrying footsteps coming towards me. FUCK. Act natural? No. Hyperventilate until you pass put? Seems likely, with the way I can't control my breathing. My intake of air cuts off as I feel Smeagol brush up against me and curl into my side. My eyes shot down and my hand rushes up holding the top of his head, to push him away or pull him closer, I'm not sure. I close my eyes and wait for however many are coming towards us. Five scurrying foot patterns and one steady set stop outside of the exit. I'm amazed that all it took was a little focus to hear how many there are. I release the breath I was holding and slowly open my eyes. What I see has me taking an involuntary step backwards, god he's perfect. Surrounded by his offspring. The aura of deathly power radiation off of him is almost intoxicating. When i move my puppet moves with me, my eyes are too forced on the man infront of me to notice. But he does. My puppet sensing my turmoil or tension, and starts to give off a warning growl. My eyebrows furrowed together and my eyes shot down to him. "Stop." I say, sounding far calmer then i feel on the inside. He stops, but curls further into my side like a parasitic shield. Satisfied that I have him under control my eyes slowly drift back up to a shocked gaze. But it's quickly masked with an unreadable expression. He staring at me for what seems like a lifetime, but in reality, it's only a couple of minutes. Fed up with the silence, I break it. "Uhm...." My eyes immediately drift away from his, giving up dominance to him, "Hi." I finish, dumbly. My eyes flickering back up to meet his for a moment before dropping to look at his chest instead. "How?" A raspy voice fills my ears. I inhale sharply, ignoring the hairs that stand up on my arms. My eyes immediately find his before i can stop myself. Staring into his glowing white eyes feels like looking at the white light at the end of a tunnel, in retrospect I would find it funny for thinking of it that way because he was pale white and standing at the end of a tunnel. But instead, I'm glued in place opening and closing my mouth like a fish, trying to think of anything to say. And i want to slap myself for blurting out the first thing that comes to me. "That's a good question." The sarcastic remark hangs in the like the putrid waste that clings to the walls of the tunnel. It's thick, unforgiving and leaves me wanting to scrub myself clean until my skin is raw. Before this man sprints forward to rip my head off, word vomit spills out of my mouth faster then i can stop it. "My name's Jasmine, I woke up not to long ago right there," i point to the floor. "And then this guy came, long story short, i cut my finger on his tooth when I told him to open his mouth, I let him lick the blood off because fuck it, why not. And now he looks normal again but thinks he's my metaphor and literal shield." I bite my bottom lip to stop myself from talking any further. Watching the movies and seeing how this man acts are two completely different things. 'Stay.' I think to my puppet. "I'm just gonna leave now, you can have him back." I put my hands up in surrender and start to back away from the situation. I step into what seems like a hole over me to the surface, because I'm cast in rays of sunlight. I feel my face scrunch up in confusion as a look of wide eyed shock flashes across my could be executioners face. I pause in my retreat, letting curiosity get the best of me. "What? Why are you looking at me like that?" But before he can even think to respond, realization hits me like a bar of soap in a sock. But instead of voicing the fact that I understand what's happening, i try to put on a poker face. Judging by the way his not existent eyebrows raised, i failed. Pretty sure I only ended up looking suspicious. "Look," i started slowly, ringing my hands together infront of myself to calm my nerves. "I, I, I...." i couldn't stop myself from taking another step back as I started to get lightheaded and black spots consumed my vision. I felt myself falling to the ground.