A strong light glared through the crack of the closed door, and the boy finally woke up. For the first time in a while, he'd dreamed while sleeping, and ended up oversleeping. Rubbing his eyes, he got up, only to see that the girl wasn't there.
"@#%$%? Mother? Where are you?" He then realized, and he ran down the stairs. "Did you already leave? Without me?" He called through the hallway, scrambling from room to room.
- I don't want to lose a friend...!
But he was too late. On the kitchen table was a note, written directly on the table's surface. It read, 'Sorry, dear. You were sleeping very soundly, and we had to leave early in the morning, so we left without you. It's been a while since you slept like that. I'll be back in a few days. -Mother'
"...But I only got to play with her for a day... Why's she already gone?" The boy thought it was unfair, but at the same time, he wasn't sure if the girl felt the same way.
- I've only known her for a day. Who am I to keep her here when she misses her family?
In his desperation, he almost missed the clue.
There were drops of blood, in a trail from the kitchen table to the door.
A puddle of blood surrounded the kitchen table. A bloody plastic knife lay on the tiled floor.
He tried to put together the pieces, his head racing.
- Something went into the kitchen table's storage space. The part inside must've been left in there, but there's nothing on this side. Then... is that part still attached to the body?
The boy shivered, and his eyes trembled.
"Blood..." He looked at the door, and with trembling legs, he rushed towards it. Flinging the door open, he cried, "MOTHER! WHERE DID YOU GO?!?"
Of course, there was no reply from the forest, and all was silent. So, he looked at the ground for the trail of blood, but nothing was visible on the dark forest ground. The hard floor inside was very different from the soft dirt outside, which would surely absorb a liquid quickly with the amount of time that had passed.
Despondently, he walked back to the kitchen, and sat down with his head on the table.
- Huh...?
He'd put away all the chairs yesterday, but the chairs were out again. The number of chairs was only one, even though there should be two if the others ate together.
- How strange...
So, he put the chair back in the storage, and when he did, he was hit with a cold shock.
Everything clicked.
A little girl, well-kept and pale, wearing unique, quality clothes, in a countryside village of tan, poor farmers. How would she keep out of the sun?
Cold sweat flowed down the boy's back, and he reached his hands further in the storage. The space seemed much larger than the table really was, an abyss that he couldn't see through. Reaching in, fumbling around, feeling for anything to distract him from the blood. His hands reached something, something as cold and dead as his thoughts. Reaching in, grabbing it, and pulling it out.
- This is...!!!
He screamed. He screamed really, really loudly. He screamed like he'd never before, he screamed like his life was about to end. He felt he really might die out of shock.
Now on the floor, after it was dropped, was a small, skinny arm. Still attached to the arm, unlike the body, was the hand. That pale, delicate hand, stiffly clenched a note. The stiffness felt all too uncomfortable, the muscles contracted tightly.
The boy bit his own hand, drawing blood, and he stopped screaming, while tears replaced it.
He carefully pried the fingers open, trying not to throw up from the cold, stiff feeling.
He opened the note.
The handwriting was simple and neat, but the most important thing was...
- It's in our language... But she can't even speak it, why does she write in it?
A vegetarian with meat eaters. Meat eaters that only eat artificial meat. They eat artificial meat, but have animals out for live viewing. It all made sense.
The handwriting became messy, written with an intensity.
It seemed to be unplanned at this point, with words scribbled out.
They had his body in a cage, pushing it around while calling out prices FOR HIS BODY PARTS.>
The words were written boldly, strongly, indenting the page with the intent to destroy.
IF I WAS A BIT EARLIER>
The boy ripped his eyes off the page, the words were too intense. They were written over and over, overlapping each other and blurring the bolded lines, some places ripping through the page.
I'm sorry.>
That was the end of the note.
The boy started to cry.
He cried for hours and hours, until he couldn't cry anymore.
Day turned to night.
Night turned to day.
Days passed easily, like a breeze moving through the branches of a tree.
He sat there without moving.
Then, he got up from that spot in the kitchen, next to the severed arm that was starting to rot and the note that became crumpled and stained with tears. He got up and went to the door, pulling his weak legs along, without ever lifting his head.
He walked to the door, before turning around. Fumbling around in the dark, he entered the abyss under the kitchen table, crawling through a passage.
Dropping down, he fell to the bottom of a dark cave. Then he climbed up the steep tunnel.
The boy walked through the barrier, towards the light. Emerging from the tunnel, he reached a small village, and there, sat the girl, smiling.
"Let's go, what are you waiting for?"