Chapter Text
Edwin ran.
His heart was hammering in his chest, a terrified fluttering. He was aching, bleeding and out of breath, but still he ran as fast as his beaten legs could take him.
If he stopped, he would be caught.
Edwin couldn’t remember a time where he has been at rest, but maybe he never had? Maybe he had been down here for eternity, his distant memories only another form of the endless torture.
Edwin ran.
How long until he reached the exit of the dollhouse? He had taken this path many times, always venturing a bit further, finding a way out (or, more often, finding other horrors too great to describe, standing petrified until the spider caught up and ate him. Those were the only times he was somewhat relieved to see it. It was terrible but at least it saved him from having to watch other people’s torments. Torments much worse than his for people much worse than him.)
Edwin ran.
There, the exit sign, a beacon of hope glowing in the dusty darkness. Edwin sped up, the giggling and chittering of the spider distant but ever-present behind him. He pushed open the door and slammed it shut behind him.
He wanted nothing more to collapse to the ground, to catch his breath, but he couldn’t. The spider wasn’t bound to the dollhouse, and he knew that if it caught him here it wouldn’t just devour him, but also all the other souls gorging themselves on the food that tasted like sand. Edwin had tried it once, after a particularly exhausting chase, hoping it might give him some fresh strength. It hadn’t, but still all the others kept stuffing themselves until they couldn’t anymore and continued after that. They were pathetic and disgusting, but Edwin still couldn’t let the spider have them.
He struggled to get to his feet and started to push through this display of gluttony. By now, he had made it to this room so many times that the vomit hardly bothered him anymore. His only goal was to get out.
The next room was different, and even though he had seen it before, it was a lot more unsettling. Edwin barely remembered his life, but he recalled that such scenes would have been unheard of. People writhing on the ground, covered in nothing but blood, and moaning? He knew it was different to them, just another trick of Hell, but it made him extremely uncomfortable.
“Please!” The gasp was one of many, a symphony of debauchery, but Edwin looked around to see where it had come from. A hand grasped his thigh.
“Oh god, please!” The man moaned and looked up at Edwin, pleading for something Edwin couldn’t give him. His hand crawled further up his thigh, leaving a trail of blood in its wake.
“I cannot help you!”
“I need it, need you…“ the man muttered frantically, hands wandering further.
Edwin tried to wrench himself away. „Let go of me!“ The touch burned, his skin only protected by a thin layer of fabric. Edwin’s body had been mutilated beyond comprehension many times before, but this seared right down and into his bones.
The man pulled him down and suddenly, people were touching him everywhere. Grabbing his arms, slippery fingers glistening red under his shirt.
Edwin needed to get away.
Standing up wasn’t an option, he was being held tightly by too many arms to count. Swallowing the bile rising in his throat, Edwin let himself sink to the cold floor and began moving with the others.
It had never gotten this bad before. He’d made it to this room on several of his escape attempts, but he had never gotten so tangled in the mess of limbs. Half stumbling, half crawling, Edwin slowly moved to the other side of the room, bloodstained hands tearing at his clothes and burning his skin. After what felt like an eternity, Edwin finally managed to reach the door and slipped through it. The cool air and the silence were heavenly, and he felt his body relax. The spider was still chasing him, but at least this particular form of torture was over.
This would be the last time he went through that room.
Edwin started walking at a brisk pace, avoiding the eyes of the figures staring blankly at him. From what he had gathered, these were the souls waiting to come into Hell. Edwin couldn’t help but wonder what they had done in life and if they deserved being here. He knew he could give them a preemptive taste of their torments by ringing the bell shining on the reception desk, but he wouldn’t.
Curiosity had gotten the best of him before, he wouldn’t become the punisher of another batch of souls, no matter how terrible they had been.
He made his way across the lobby, weaving through the people standing still as statues until he arrived at the double doors leading out.
Edwin hesitated.
He had never made it this far before, the spider always catching him before he could, and he didn’t know what awaited him in the next room. Would there be another form of torture for him? Or would he finally, finally be free?
He took a deep breath. No matter what was waiting for him, if he stayed here for too long the spider would catch him.
Edwin opened the door.
A long staircase spiralled up to a rectangle of light. Edwin wasn’t sure if it was an exit or not, but a glimmer of hope bloomed in his chest. He started running towards it, his legs aching, his lungs nearly giving out, but he couldn’t stop, not now. He was already halfway there and becoming more and more certain this was indeed the way out, when he heard that dreaded giggle several flights of stairs below him. It was fast, faster than him. Edwin gathered the last bit of strength he had, forcing his battered body to keep moving, nearly tripping and falling off but catching his balance in the last moment.
He simply had to reach that exit.
The spider was getting closer but so was the doorway, a stone floor and roof facing a field of grass visible behind it, the spider was catching up with him, he had to reach that exit, the giggling was getting louder, Edwin didn’t dare turn around to see how close it was, the doorway was right there-
Edwin threw himself through the exit and scrambled for the door to close it, the stone was heavy but he was fuelled by panic and managed to slam the door shut, catching what was hopefully the last glimpse of the spider he would ever have to see.
Edwin was free.
He collapsed to the ground, laying there unmoving and slowing his breath.
Bit by bit, he started to become aware of his surroundings.
The stone against his bloody clothes, a faint pressure where they should have been hard and cold.
The sweet smell of honeysuckle the bushes around him should have been emanating but didn’t.
A gust of wind carrying dry leaves through him instead of over him.
So he was definitely dead.
Edwin hadn’t even been aware of it, but somehow he must have been holding on to a sliver of hope of being alive again if he just got out of Hell.
They had killed him then. Simon and the others - their names and faces coming back to him, the way they had tied him down and had started chanting, a hateful, horrid sound.
His memories rushing back home, Edwin curled up and began to sob.