Translucent (15 page)

The headmaster’s office was not somewhere where children in the orphanage regula
rly went. Actually, they never went there. And since the orphanage was such a very big place, it was quite easy to get turned around, especially in the dark coming back from an area of the orphanage where you’ve never been before. When one is guided through a creepy building in the middle of the night to a
particular
room, it is always a good idea to have your guide with you on the way back so that this problem can be avoided. Unfortunately for Karena, he mind was too focused on what had just happened to think about having the teacher accompany her. And that was how she got lost in the orphanage.

As
has been
said before, Karena was not afraid of the dark. She reminded herself of this over and over again as she wandered through the hallways, looking for
something familiar. It did no
good, because of course no one is really afraid of the dark. It’s what
’s
in the dark that they’re afraid of. And in Karena’s case, the thing that was potentially there was worth being afraid of.

Karena went from one flickering pool of light to the
next, trying not to stay for too long in an area where she couldn’t see anything.
But as she went on through the hallway, finding these areas
of light
was becoming increasingly difficult. Where on earth was the staircase? Hadn’t she walked down this hallway before? Or had it been the one going the other way? Turning around, she went back to the
intersection
in the corridor and looked down that hallway. She could scarcely see anything, but from the small illuminated area she
could make out
that this hallway was identical to the one she’d been in before. There was really no point in exploring it.

Karena ground her teeth in frustration. She’d already made several turns, and so had no clue how to get back to the headmaster’s office. When she’d left it she’d been too preoccupied with the conversation, and when she been coming to it she’d been too preoccupied thinking about what could happen. Fool. She was paying the price for it now.

Karena wheeled around and began walking down the hallway she’d been walking down. There was as good a chance as any that the staircase was this way as it was any other way. She’d have to try them all.

She walked down the hallway on light feet, half sprinting at times when she was in the darkest areas. The lights were weak, but they were her only source of navigation as she continued walking. Even in the darkest areas there was still some illumination up ahead.

She
came to an intersection, which was exactly what she’d hoped wouldn’t happen.
Now she had three choices, go left, go right, or go back. Karena turned left, and was instantly filled with dismay upon seeing the hallway. There was no lighting whatsoever. The hall was enveloped in a thick darkness. Turning around, she could see that the other hallway was enveloped in darkness too.

“I guess that means I’m going back then,” Karena muttered to herself, turning around to start heading down the hallway
. She walked about 10 feet, and then stopped at an area bathed in a pool of faint light. A faint flickering light. Karena looked up at the lightbulb suspended from the ceiling, a bad feeling in her gut. She looked down the hallway at the other bulbs. The flickering was increasing, and some bulbs were going out for a second or two before coming back again.

One of the bulbs at the end of the hallway suddenly went out for longer than normal, and didn’t come on again. And then the next one did it.
There was no doubt about it. The bulbs in the hallway were going off one by one, and in moments she’d be in pitch blackness.

There was nothing to do but stand there and wait for the black to envelop her. The lit area was now so small that she could not see but 30 feet ahead of her, and nothing behind her. Karena looked around one last time, seeing if there was something, anything, that could aid her in the darkness. And just as the
absence of lights was about to reach her,
she saw something glinting on the very edge of the hallway, about 10 feet in front of her, something she hadn’t seen before. She ran forward to try to see what it was, but it was too late. The lights all flickered out and she was left alone in the total darkness.

There wasn’t even the tiniest pinprick of light to guide her way, no illumination coming from around the curve in the hallway, or from the moon through a window, as there were no windows. There was simply nothing. Karena instantly stopped moving and stood stock still, breathing slowly.
It was so silent that the sound of her breaths coming in and out sounded loud to her ears. She was careful not to turn around, for fear of getting lost, even though she already was lost.
She thought about where the object on the ground had been in the millisecond before the lights all went out. After
consulting her memory, she figured
it couldn’t be more than a few feet ahead.
It was a long shot that it would actually be anything of any use, but she decided that it was pretty much the only shot she had.

Karena
slowly bent down to the floor and began to crawl, using her hands to probe the ground like a blind person would.
The object would be there soon, whatever it was. She could only hope that it would be something
worthwhile
.
She inched forward painstakingly slowly, making sure that she didn’t miss a single spot that was five feet away from the wall. She remembered that it was relatively close to that side of the wall, so there was no n
eed to extend her reach further.

Finally, Karena found it. It was an angular, sharp object, with lots of spiky, protruding edges. Karena felt her way around the object and found that it was about a foot long, though she still had no idea what it could be. Could it
, by some miracle,
be a flashlight?

Karena continued to feel the object, looking for a switch or a button of some sort. Instead, she found a place near the back of the object where it abruptly rose up. That was strange, because Karena hadn’t remembered the object being very tall before
, but then again, she’d
only seen it for a split second. The rise was long, and it appeared to be a smooth surface covered with some sort of flaky material, though she couldn’t guess what it could be.

And then, a horrible thought struck her. Karena stop following the object
’
s path upwards and felt around on the floor near to where the object had been. There was another object, this one cylindrical, in the promising shape of a flashlight. Fingers shaking, Karena felt around desperately for the switch, knowing that time was of the essence. There was a button near the bottom and she pressed it.
To her relief, a beam of beautiful light projected forth from the end of the flashlight, and she almost felt like kissing it. But instead, she grasped it in her hands and raised it up to look at the object she’d been feeling before.

It was a leg.

Karena gasped and reeled back, falling onto the floor and crawling away. She shone the flashlight in the other direction so that she wouldn’t have to see it, but she instantly realized that this was a bad idea, because the Sandman could then sneak up on her
all the more
easily. She shone it back at where he had been, only to find empty space. He wasn’t there anymore.

Karena slowly got into a crouching position, and then stood up, shining the flashlight in a circle slow
ly around her. She went around a full
360 degrees, searching everywhere, but he was nowhere to be found.
She realized that he must be behind her, and staying behind her as she turned in a circle, taking advantage of the
slow
speed at which she was moving. Karena readied herself, and, after counting to three in her head, whirled around as fast as she could, shining the flashlight where she’d been sure he’d be. He wasn’t there.

And then the area before her went pitch black, and it took her a moment to figure out that the flashlight was no longer in her hand. She turned back around, but there was no beam of light anywhere. The Sandman had snatched it from her and turned in off.

Now she felt more vulnerable and exposed than ever. It was clear that the Sandman had no trouble seeing in the dark, and so she was as helpless as
an upside down crab on a fishing boat
.
She slowly reached behind her and felt the wall, being careful not to make any sudden movements, even though she knew not doing so would make no difference at all. She found the side of the hallway with her hand and proceeded to move the rest of her body back so that she was flat against the wall. She then decided to go right, moving down the hallway slowly, figuring that getting back to the headmaster’s office was her best chance.

Suddenly, she bumped into someone, and she immediately recoiled
,
retracing her footsteps quickly back
in
the way she’d came. She didn’t even bother flattening her body against the wall this time, instead just keeping one hand on it as she ran along. She knew that he could teleport, and so
she
refrained from running at full speed for fear that she would bump into him at any second.

But she didn’t bump into him. Instead, she felt the
bones of his hands grasping the back of her
neck and pulling her back, abruptly stopping her flight. She felt herself being pulled towards him, and she could imagine the look on his face, though she could not see it. She didn’t need to.

But suddenly, she felt more hands grabbing her.
In moments all her limbs were held and she found herself suspended in the air.
What was this? Had the Sandman suddenly grown more limbs? Of course, this wasn’t beyond him, but Karena suspected that this wasn’t the case. There was something else going on here.

But she didn’t have time to stop and dwell on what technique the Sandman was employing now, so blind with fear and panic she was. She lashed out with her left arm, since her right was being held by a hand. She found the Sandman standing behind her and she connected with his rib cage, though not with the power she would have liked. It seemed to have no effect on him. Desperately, she thrashed wildly with all of her limbs
,
trying to break free from his grip, and she managed to get her right leg free, which she then used to kick the hand that had been holding her. Obviously, he could feel no pain,
and so all she could try to do was to forcibly get him off her, which didn’t seem very likely.

Karena continued to kick and punch, but every time she got something free, something else was taken again, and she’d have to fight all over again to get that free.
But finally, Karena managed to get both arms free,
after much toil and struggle in the dark,
and she managed to grab the bones of the Sandman’s arms, and somehow managed to hang on even as he tried to detach her.
Since she was no longer entirely in the air
, she used he
r
own body weight, combined with the force of gravity, to pull the Sandman as hard as she could and send him sprawling to the floor. He landed partially on top of her, and Karena pushed him off, surprised to find that he didn’t resist.

It was then that Karena realized what was happening. Her legs were both still being held by the Sandman and she knew now that he must have duplicated himself rather than grow more limbs.
Karena wondered why he didn’t just finish her off though.
He obviously had the power to, so if he was trying to kill her then why didn’t he? There was no reason for it that she could see. And why was he letting her defeat him?

In minutes, Karena was able to get her legs free and she jumped to her feet. Out of the dark, more hands reached for her, but this time they didn’t come as a surprise.
Karena punched her way through the mass of Sandmen, knuckles ripping through their skin and colliding with their cold bones.
They were all around her, a
swarm, closing in
quickly.
And no matter how much she fought them, there were always more coming, and they would alway
s get back up from the floor to
rejoin the fight. There was
an endless supply of them, and Karena began to wonder if this nightmare would ever end, her in the dark, fighting unknown creatures that could kill her at any moment, and the fact that they were simply choosing not to kill her somehow made the situation worse, more hopeless. There was no end in sight. And when the end finally came, it wouldn’t be good.

Finally, though, Karena someh
ow tore her way through the web
of bones and found an area where there weren’t many of them. She was almost through. A few more collisions and she had broken free and was sprinting down the corridor as fast as her legs would carry her. She had no idea where the hall would end in the dark, but she couldn’t afford slowing down. Instead, she stuck her hands out in front of her to feel when there was a turn in the hall.

Her fingers suddenly jammed into something, and she realized that it was an intersection. Quickly, she turned left and ran forward, only to crash into another wall.
Wiping blood from her jaw, she realized that i
t wasn’t an intersection; instead it was a right turn. She turned 180 degrees and sprinted once again, going down another hallway. There would be an exit somewhere. And then, once she escaped this place, she knew where she had to go. Back to the hall where all the children slept was out of the question; there was no way she’d be safe there. She’d have to get to Shawn’s house.

Karena crashed into another wall hard, and
she was reminded of the time all those years ago when she’d crashed into the bus she’d been trying to catch, in order to save her parents. And yet, it somehow didn’t feel like it was that long ago, even though it was, quite literally, a lifetime ago.
For her, events just blended together so that everything was a blur and picking out individual things was practically impossible.

She didn’t know how long she ran. It went on in this manner for a while, though, with her feeling her way in front of her with her hands, never knowing when she’d crash into a wall and have to turn.
It was an absolutely terrifying experience.
Before this, she’d had no idea how big the orphanage was.
After a while she began to wonder if this even was the orphanage, or if she’d somehow been transported elsewhere.
Several times a hand or two grasped her in the dark, but she was running quickly enough that she was usually able to get out easily. Once, she stumbled blindly into a group of the Sandmen, and for a moment she was afraid that it would be a repeat of what had happened before with her getting caught
in a swarm of them, but luckily
she stopped running and fought her way through fairly quickly before continuing on her way.

Finally, just when it seemed like there was no hope, Karena suddenly realized that she was able to faintly make out her arms held out in front of her. This giving
her encouragement
, she ran on and turned another corner, this time without even having to crash into it, to find that there was a window at the end of the hallway. Desperately, she sprinted the final length to it. She was on the second floor, but she’d find a way to get down. That was the least of her problems at the moment.

Karena made it to the window and leaned her head out. It was even easier then she’d thought it would be. There was a pipe running down the side of the building right next to the window, and she wasn’t even that high off the ground. All she had to do was grab the pipe while standing on the windowsill and slide down easily to the floor.
Karena breathed a deep sigh of relief to be out of the dark hallways, but instantly recovered and realized that she had no time to rest. The Sandman was still
on her trail
after all.
In moments she was ru
nning across the moonlit yard of
the orphanage, on her way to Shawn.