Chapter 8 : The house

GASP

Edward tried to breathe, but air slipped past his lips like water. His chest felt hot and hollow at the same time. He squinted — the room was dark, and the only light was a thin sliver through a grimy window.

There was a small knife stabbed into his chest.

“AGHKK…”

He shouted in pain, but nobody was there to help. His heart beating fast, He grabbed the hilt, but something felt off. Nevertheless, he grabbed it and tried pulling it out. It was too heavy for him. A simple, small knife like that couldn’t be removed? 

“That can’t be…” he thought

It was moving a little, but it was just heavy. How was that possible, that he couldn’t lift a small knife? He rolled over to his side and used gravity to help him pull it out. With each tug, he could feel the knife sliding and slicing his flesh.

UNGHH…

Eventually the knife was pulled out, and he laid there, panting. He was so confused. One second, he was betrayed by his friend, left to die in a burning family diner, and the next, he was in a wooden house with barely any light, with a knife in his chest. It didn’t make sense. He decided to stand up, but when he did, something was off. He didn’t know, but after walking around for a bit, something clicked.

“Why is the furniture so big?”

He immediately looked around, and everything was huge. A chair was larger than him. Something didn’t make sense. Then he looked down. He looked at his hands, his legs, his body.

It wasn’t the furniture that was big.

It was that he was small.

He immediately ran around, trying to find some sort of reflective surface. The room he was in currently seemed to be the living room. He ran into the hallway and found the restroom. After tiptoeing, his theory was correct. He was small. In fact, he was a child. But what was more confusing was the fact that it wasn’t him.

“Who the hell is this?”

This wasn’t him as a child. There was no resemblance. Sure, black hair and black eyes, but besides that, nothing was similar.

“What the hell is going on here!?”

Nothing was making sense. Why was there a knife in his chest? Why was he in a random house? What happened to his body? Just as he was confused, he was scared.

“Ok, Edward, think. Why would there be a knife stuck in your chest?”

“Everything has a reason. This is a child’s body, it doesn’t have the strength to plunge a knife into itself. Someone did this.”

Then the realization hit. This was no accident. It was intentional. A murder. A child couldn’t possibly stab itself, it goes against human nature. It’s way too deep to be an accident, since the body was laid facing up, not downwards, meaning gravity had no hand in this. Someone did this, and they didn’t help the child, so it was definitely intentional.

If the murderer was still in the house, then Edward was in huge danger. And-

…

“Wait, if I got stabbed…”

He looked down immediately at his chest.

…

“What the fuck is going on..?”

There was no stab wound. The hold was completely healed. There was no blood, either. Only a rip in the shirt where the knife originally was. The body was perfectly fine.

“How am I alive?”

Edward slowly walked back to the room where he was originally in. There was no blood on the knife either. It was all gone. It didn’t make sense at all. This shouldn’t be possible.

Suddenly, memories came rushing into his mind.

AGH!

The sudden influx of memories caused his head to hurt. He banged his head all over the wall, trying to get it to stop. He rubbed it, laid on the ground, but nothing was working. All of a sudden, a particular memory played in his head, but it didn’t hurt.

“~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~”

“~~Ka~~as~~~”

…

“Mommy, why is my name Kieran?

…

“Why is your name Kieran?”

“Well, because you’re my child. You are my little baby, my little dark one. I want your life to be so full of mystery, and full of excitement and new journeys”

The mother smiled. She was a lady of slender build. She had black hair, but her face was scratched out, Edward couldn’t see the face. It was like a black scratch filter had replaced her entire face. She had cards all around her, tarots and different cards were seen on the table next to her. Perhaps she was some sort of Tarot reader?

“Why am I dark? Why can’t I be a shiny Knight? I want to be like the Knights we saw last time!”

“Maybe one day you will. When mommy earns enough, we can go live in a nice house in the city. I can send you to school, and one day, you could go to the Aldercrest Academy.”

“Yeah! I’ll be your Knight and I’ll protect you!”

“Yes, you will be.”

The memory stops right away.

Edward, confused, stood there like a mannequin. He was trying to digest all of the information for it to make sense.

“Okay, so “my” name here is Kieran. I have a mother, but I don’t know where she is. My name means Little dark one? And because it means I’ll have an exciting life?”

…

“What’s so exciting about being stabbed in the chest as a kid..?”

Edward started exploring the house, looking for clues. The memories let him know that this was his house. His name was Kieran Morrison. He was a son of a Tarot card reader, and they lived in a small village in the countryside. His mother loved him dearly and spent most of her life trying to make do for him. He is 6 years old currently and helps his mom out at her shop. Your mothers name was Elizabeth. Even though you could remember these things, for some reason, her face was scratched out.

Why was he even here? Didn’t he die? He was transported to some world where he isn’t even him, and was a child. This world had knights and things like that. What exactly was going on? There were many things definitely being hidden from him. The best way to go about this was to find his mother and ask her about what is going on.