The Faceless Terror.

While a part of a Writers Forum some time back we had a "re-write something awful" contest to improve participants linguistic skills and to have fun. I found one of the ones I did and figured why not, hope you guys and gals like.

With a jolt and a gasp Lindsay awoke panting and clutching her sheets in a cold sweat. The dream faded from her mind as quickly as she had woken up. She lay in her bed and tried to force her body to relax and heart to slow its rampant pace while she stared at the ceiling, trying hard to remember. With an agitated sigh she gave up her attempts at calming herself or remembering the dream and sat up. She looked over at the clock on her wall and gave a halfhearted chuckle as she stared in disbelief. It was midnight, and remembering her sister Nicole's joking comment of calling it the “Witching Hour” held little humor for her anymore. Waking to see the clock in its first minute of midnight was funny, the first time it happened, but being the fifth night in a row that its happened brought no amount of amusement to her stressed and tired mind. Night after night she had been torn from her sleep by a dream she can never remember, and every night she could gain no further sleep once she was woken up. She let out a defeated sigh. "If I can't have sleep, I'll have coffee." she mumbled to herself as she slipped out of bed and rubbed the sleep from her eyes. As she crossed her living room, headed for the kitchen, she tried hard not to look at her front door. Ever since the dreams started she felt uneasy when around it, when looked at it would send a chill through her that froze her to the bones. "Just winter chills" She would think to herself trying to rationalize it, despite her apartment being properly heated. She forced her mind to focus on the idea of coffee; she ground her beans, filled the filter and water reservoir before flipping the power switch on. Drop by drop the pot filled slowly, there was little to distract her from the door during this time. She closed her eyes and gathered her nerves, glancing over at the door and immediately feeling the chill, and regret, settle in as she did. She cursed herself for having once again looked at it. It just stood there in its frame, as a door should, there was nothing wrong or off about it. Only wood and metal. The locks were locked and chain in place, there was nothing she could see that was amiss and that only brought on more of an uneasy feeling from it. She shook her head and turned back to her coffee pot, only to find it was filled. She stared in disbelief. "It was only a glance for a fleeting moment." she thought, but wondered if it had been more than just a glance. With some effort she swallowed and tried to put the time discrepancy and door out of her mind. Her mug filled she left for the sanctuary of her room, taking a long sip of her coffee in the hope to fight off her chills. As she passed in front of it she slowed in her retreat back towards her room and shook her head. “It's a door, you can't be afraid of doors. This is silly.” She said to herself as she would a child. She turned and walked to it, giving it a look over to calm her nerves. “Just a door.” She said, almost to the door itself. The uneasiness all but gone till her eyes settled on the peephole, the feeling growing worse than ever before. She stepped closer to it, having felt compelled to look out. “The hall light must have blown.” She thought. Only darkness met her eye when she peered out, doing little to settle her nerves. As she started to lean back she caught movement from the corner of her eye and was startled. In her surprise she spilled coffee on herself, the heat going unnoticed as she leaned back in, squinting to focus on what could have been out there. The longer she continued peering out the hole the more she realized that it wasn’t something in the dark but the darkness itself that had moved. It swirled and undulated over and through itself. Her mouth hung open and eyes widened in silent fear as she watched the living shadows. Her eye burned from staring so wide for so long, when she blinked to hydrate it the veil of darkness had faded and melted away, in its place was a figure that filled her with the worst fear of her life, every sense in her body screaming out in terror and the overpowering urge to run. her stomach tightened up with a sick feeling and a sense of dread. Something was very off about this man, or what was trying to look manlike. The peephole had always distorted the image of anyone or anything on the other side of the door, that was expected, but the figure looked far too distorted. Its proportions looked weird and awkward. but that wasn’t the only thing about it that was off. It wore a black suit, one that held a look of fine silk yet held no shine in its dull, cold appearance. Impossibly, behind the figure were nightmarish sickly tendrils that coiled and snaked about. But She found that the worst and most frightening part had been its head. Its face looked smoothed or blurred, its skin was pale as a corpse and hairless. She couldn’t decide if it had no face or if her mind refused to acknowledge or process what was there. Everything about this thing had been wrong and horrible, leaving her sense of reality shattered. there was no way what she saw was real. It had a dangerous, unworldly look to it, so foreign to her yet she couldn’t shake how it somehow felt familiar.

Though only partially aware of ceramic breaking, her mind sluggishly worked out that something had happened around her which drew her away from the peephole. As she stepped back from the door her foot landed on a shard of her mug, the pain making her gasp in the breath she never noticed holding. she was unsteady and light-headed, before she knew it she slipped in the spilled coffee around her and was sent to the floor. As she lay on the floor looking up at the ceiling her mind worked to process what had happened, soon rationality started returning and everything crashed back to reality. It took her a moment to realise she was screaming at the top of her lungs, screaming at the memory of what she had just seen through the peephole and from the pain in her limbs. She turned on the floor and rolls to her hands and knees to claw and crawl away from the door. The only thing her mind could do was let out screams of terror and pain. The image of the creature burned in her mind. She knew it was real, but her mind refused to accept it, something like that couldn’t be real. Her thoughts were interrupted by the sliding and soft clack of metal which froze her where she was and her scream in her throat. She looked back and felt her blood run cold as the second deadbolt moved slowly and allowed the door to creak open. The creature snaked its sickly tendrils between the door and door frame, opened just enough for them to fit as it delicately searched out the door chain. It was getting in. She fearfully whimpered and got up, limping lightly as she ran to her room for safety. She closed the door and pressed her back against it. The creature unlocked the chain and gently pushed the door open, its hinges lightly groaned from age and unoiled use, the chain banged against the wall. She stifled a cry as she heard it enter, her instinct to hide overpowering her as she quickly grabbed a chair and wedged it against the door knob and turned to her closet. She pulled them open but before she could enter she was stopped by what she saw. Instead of her clothing she stared down at the dozens of pages tacked to the wall and scattered on the floor. Confused she knelt and picked some up to get a better look at them. In the dim light coming through her window she looked them hastily over and found they vaguely pertained to something like that creature, but with how crudely they were drawn and how dark it was she couldn’t tell for sure. But she felt as though she had seen one of these before, not that long ago. The wooden floor outside her door creaked and brought her back to the reality that she wasn’t alone, she looked over and saw the handle being turned. She opened her window and tossed out one of her shirts before she crawled over and closed the closet doors with her inside. The chair gave a soft rasp as it was slowly slide along the floor and wall. She crawled to the back of the small closet and her hand landed on something thin and hard. Holding it up she saw it was a thin charcoal pencil, she looked between it and the bifold closet doors. The creature silently had made its way to the room and its shadow was cast against the doors as it looked out the window, she clutched the pencil and closed her eyes tightly praying it would take the bait and leave out her window. She was trembling with fear as she looked up and screamed, the horrid creature's face inches away from her as it leaned into the closet, tendrils rushing towards her. After that, there was only blackness. “Nicole?” A gentle and warm voice wakes her. She jumped slightly out of surprise and the folder that was sitting on her lap fell to the floor, the photocopies of crude drawings spilling out. She looks around fearfully. “I didn't meant to scare you like that, are you alright?” The doctor says gently. She looks up at the doctor and sighs, seeming confused and embarassed. “Yes, I'm sorry. it was just a nightmare but....never mind” She stops, trying to remember details of her dream but shakes her head, giving up before proceeding to gather the pictures. fighting back tears she remembers where she is and why. She received a call from the hospital on her sister's behalf, neighbors heard screams from her apartment and called for help. The police took Nicole to the side, wanting to discuss what could have happened to her sister, using phrases like 'self-inflicted' and 'psychotic break'. Nicole asked if someone had broken in and did this to Lindsay, but the answer she got was that the police had to break in to get to her. The front door was properly locked, her bedroom door was barricaded lightly, and she was found in her closet. “Are those the pictures she was found with?” The doctor asks as he helps gather them, snapping her from her thought. Finding it hard to speak with the tight lump in her throat she just nods and clutches the folder tightly. The doctor tells her that Lindsay is sedated and sleeping, but she can go see her. She nods again and follows him, everything washing over her as she felt her mind reeling from all the information about her baby sister, feeling numb as she was lead to her sisters room. Not fully grasping the situation or what the police and doctors told her, her mind was swimming until she saw her sister with her own eyes. As the sight and understanding washed over her she couldn't hold back the tears she had fought off since she first got the call about Lindsay. She almost collapsed, stumbling a little and only recovering from the doctor catching her. She turned away and clung to the doctor, unable to look at her sister any longer. Lindsay's head was wrapped up, the gauze pads placed on both ears and eyes were held down by the bandages to keep from developing infections. They could only speculate that she or someone else drove pencils into the girl's ears, but they couldn’t shed any light on why. Her eyes were clawed at with a low chance of her recovering her sight. Her hand was lightly bandaged, it and parts of her leg and feet were treated for mild burns and cuts. Finding bits of her mug her in feet and limbs. As Nicole choked back her tears she turned from the doctor to look back to her sister. she gave a startled scream, pointing at the window. The doctor looked to where she was pointing then helped her to sit. "I could have sworn someone was out there." She was embarrassed and The doctor seemed very confused and walked to the window, looking down for the same reason she knew it was impossible for anyone to have been out there. the room they were in was on the third floor so nobody could have been out there. Nobody.