Frigid fingers caressed my face, sinking their fangs deep into my bones;
"Sweetie, do you know what punishment means?"
The blood-curdling smile transformed capriciously, shifting between states of amusement and rage. Her emotions freely revealed themselves through her facial muscles, they no longer lingered in the depths of her eyes.
"Dear me, there's no point in asking, right?" She plucked my cheeks like dough;
"Your face tells it all—you look forward to it, right?"
Cupping my face with both hands, she abruptly pulled me closer. The distance between our faces was a finger's width—my finger's width.
Then, those slender fingers trickled upwards and through my sun-like hair; they rubbed, mingled and stroked my scalp past the few hairs. While doing so, she began nodding her head;
"But."
Her smile sckened.
"You need motivation for your punishment, right?"
Those oceanic eyes told me all I needed to know, I knew exactly what she was about to say-
"So how about this: You do the punishment with your sister to reduce the time by half, or, you do it on your own."
"You're smart enough to know what I mean, right?"
"You're not stupid enough to pretend to be dumb, right?"
She pulled back, creating a subtle yet noticeable distance between us;
As though to prove to me;
You have a choice.
"So, which is it?"
She paused.
"With sissy?"
And paused again.
"Or alone?"
She opened her arms with her palms ft open. "Choose."
On one hand: One ball.
On the other: Two balls.
She lifted the single ball. "Alone?"
Then the two, "Or together?"
Whilst I was given time to contempte, she raised her head and began mumbling to herself; no, mumbling to herself is inaccurate, she was feeding me information;
Attempting to-
"How sad... If you do the punishment alone sissy gets to py all day... Have fun all day... It would be wrong for only Alora to suffer, right...?"
Corrupt me.
"I'd choose to do it together. How could she have fun on her own... Right..?"
Influence me.
"How could sissy take it all for herself... Right...?"
My mouth had, at some point, scked open, so I shut it; I steeled my burning yet simultaneously frigid nerves; my contradictory peaceful nerves;
And reached for my choice.
She stopped her mumbling.
She stared between my outreached hand and my choice.
"...I see."
She smiled quaintly as she crushed the two balls and tossed them aside. "So this is your choice."
Holding the single ball, she fiddled with it, and then, with a twirl of her hand, the ball disappeared before my eyes.
"Let's go to your punishment then, shall we?"
Picking me back into her embrace, the dy trudged onward to the bedroom door.
She's taking me to another room.
Pnting her hand on the doorknob, she stared down at me. "Ready?"
I y still.
But.
Deep within me, a faint throbbing emerged.
Creak...
A faint fear blossomed as she turned the doorknob.
...No.
I unknowingly tched onto my mother's arms.
...No.
But my thoughts meant nothing in the grand scheme of things; the door fully opened, revealing my punishment: my dreaded, horrifying punishment.
...No.
I hurriedly looked up at mother, pleading to her with my eyes.
...No.
As.
"Welcome back, sweetie."
There was no way out.
For I had returned to our empty, bnd room; our initial room; the decrepit clock and calendar; the dry crib.
...
"What's wrong, sweetie?"
...
"Did you miss it? If so, you can-"
"No!"
I fiercely spat my first word;
No.
Never.
"Hehe~ As expected of our sweet, sweet Alora... You're smarter than you look~ Isn't that... right~?"
I stayed silent at her words.
There aren't many words I can put together with my cking teeth anyway.
"As, punishment is punishment..."
The dy pointed at the calendar as she said, "You see that? Once it reaches the end of the month, you can leave, okay?"
I counted the days;
...Twelve days.
I have to stay in solitary confinement for 12 days.
"She will come to care for you thrice a day for those 12 days; she won't speak to you nor comfort you. Only bathe you, feed you, and change you. Got it?"
I nodded.
"Good."
Taking a few steps forward in this room, she y me down in the white crib.
"I'll see you soon."
Turning around, she left me behind with no more words to spare; again, I was left in this silent, dreary room.
But this time;
Alone.
...
It's fine, it's only 12 days, it's short.
Crunch.
A nail split from my fingers and stabbed into my gums as I bit; the taste of blood kept me at full alert with my thoughts wildly firing.
It won't be that bad.
Crunch.
Another splinter cut my lip from the centre line, drawing blood that promptly spttered onto the white bedding of the crib; I'll be fine.
-----
How long has it been?
My eyes drew themselves to the clock.
2 hours.
I moved them back to the dreary, white bedding.
It's only been 2 hours?
The ringing of silence has been relentlessly compounding. It's growing at an unprecedented rate—a terrifying rate. It incessantly annoyed me like tinnitus, nagging at me like a strict, unwelcomed teacher.
How has it only been that long?
I gulped.
I swear it's been a day already...
Taking a deep breath;
Let's do this instead: 12 days is 288 hours; for me, it's 266 now.
266 hours is...
16,000 minutes?
16,000 minutes is...
160,000...
Multipled by 6...
96,000.
No, 960,000.
That's seconds.
...
That's a tremendously long time.
So;
1, 2, 3...
I started counting.
I had to do something to fight this boredom, to survive these 12 days. Staring at the clock would be agonising, so I'll count the seconds instead. I'll ignore sleep and not bother counting it against the timer; that way, the time will run out faster than I expect it to.
10, 11, 12...
Like that, I began my extended isotion;
My unbearably boring isotion.
...And.
...Alora hadn't even noticed she miscalcuted from the start.
-----
37,999...
37,901...
37,902...
...Did I mess that up...?
Shrugging my shoulder, I continued the count.
37,903...
Counting the numbers and keeping track is a much more cumbersome and tiring task than I'd expected it to be; the brain starts to convolute, merge and mess with the numbers, making it harder to maintain a consistent count.
I'm sure I've messed up somewhere, but I'm not too sure about that. There's a chance I've also skipped numbers.
Tap.
My chubby fingers tapped the white bedding.
37,927.
Tap.
There's not much else I can do in this crib except walk around in circles.
Tap.
37,945.
Tap.
Bored.
Tap.
I'm bored.
Tap.
I'm really bored.
Tap.
I want to do something.
Tap.
I want to see my sister.
Tap.
I want to-
Tap.
What number was I on again?
Hm...
Oh!
Yeah, that's right:
37,001, 37,002...
The count continued.
-----
Cck!
The door to the room shut behind the maid.
Alora was left behind once more.
Yet, if one entered this room, they'd notice something odd.
Life.
Or the ck of it, that is.
No form of breathing, movement, or rustling could be heard emanating from the crib; it was eerily still, silent.
Till you'd step toward it; till you drew a look at the creature residing within.
Their mouth spasmed with incoherent words; their eyes were eerily still, gazing directly at the crystal light on the ceiling. No movement, almost no breathing, and no signs of a healthy baby;
Only counting.
Nigh-incoherent, mumbling;
But counting nonetheless.
"205,788..."
Dig your ears into her mouth, and that's what you'd hear.
A number.
"205,777..."
Then another number.
"205,791..."
And another.
An almost irregur counting pattern echoed from her lips; at times, the number would spike by over a thousand, and at others, it would fall by almost another thousand.
But.
It was rising.
Steadily but surely;
Rising.
Yet amid this counting;
The life in the eyes of this creature;
The light in their pale, inhumane eyes;
The golden shimmer of their hair;
It all seemed dreary, dull.
...Not long left.
206,791...
Count.
206,799...
Don't stop counting.
206,800...
Keep my mind active.
206,810...
Don't give up.
-----
Thud.
A dull noise echoed emptily; it reverberated and singed every corner of the room.
Thud.
It repeated.
Thud.
Mindlessly.
Thud.
Soullessly.
Thud-!
And ended with a strong, dreadful impact.
Soon after, amid the now loud silence, a new noise spread;
Drip...
A liquid of sorts spttered;
Drip...
And shattered.
The maid stepped through the room with a fresh set of clothing, diapers, and food; her steps were calm as she approached the crib, the pristine, regurly washed crib-
No.
The red;
The wine-red;
The crimson;
The blood.
She stared down through deep eyes at the monstrosity standing in the corner of the crib. Her eyes silently gazed at the tiny pool of ruby-red liquid covering that same corner, at the strands of flesh peeled and scattered across the bars of the crib.
Her eyes were glued to the bloodied little thing.
She stood for a moment and waited.
Moments ter, the monster noticed her;
It turned its head backwards and peered at her through bloodshot eyes, through the veil of red spiderwebs echoing around her still, white pupils.
The thing paused for a second but didn't stop the nigh-incomprehensible mumblings.
The number had grown vastly since the first time she heard it.
...Used to this series of events, it raised its arms; it was asking her to lift it.
And she did as asked.
She continued her task monotonously as commanded.
Once she raised the thing into her arms, she could hear the number vividly in her ears.
There, it whispered.
There, it chanted.
Ominously, whilst brushing its lips across her earlobes;
"568,321..."
BrokenNose
