Chapter 2 – Teddies and Twisted Tales
Allie sits at the dining table and looks at the food available. The table is as long as the room and is set up as a buffet. Despite the small crowd of kids taking the food, it automatically replenishes out of thin air. Allie takes the chicken and a salad with caution and eats it in the same manner.
“So?” Ellie asks, “How do you like it?”
“It’s delicious!”
Allie thinks there might be something more to it and coughs some of it out.
“There isn’t any magic in it if that’s what you’re thinking.”
The sound in Ellie’s voice appears to be honest, so Allie eats. She tries every that looks appetizing until she realizes that she’s been eating for a while now.
“I knew there was something to this food,” Allie says as she pushes her plate aside.
“This isn’t any magic at all. I would know. It’s just that your home doesn’t have food like this place. Why do you want to leave this place? Isn’t it nice here? You have always delicious food on the table, there’s always a new friend to make, and we can’t die. I’m not good at making friends, but since you’re here, I finally have a friend.”
“I don’t want to make my family and friends back home worry.”
“Who cares about them now? You have me with you.”
“I can’t always be with you, Ellie. I have to give other people my love and attention.”
“Why? I need more attention than your friends and family. I don’t have anyone who loves me like you do and mother.” Ellie hugs Allie. “My lack of friends is the reason why mother and the master convinced me to be their lure for them. Every single kid hated me after I brought them here except for you. Please. If you get back your blood then die, I’ll have no one to be with.”
“I promise it won’t be that way. Excuse me.”
Allie walks out of the room then sighs. She walks into her room and into the closet to continue her search for her picture. The room she finds herself in is a large toy room with various toys that are twice the size of her. The room is as large as two backyards while the toys appear to be cute and cuddly and looking at them makes Allie want to play with them. What’s most different about this room is that it has actual color to it with no black, whites, or even greys in sight. There are other kids in the room and they’re playing with the toys and taking them out of it. Everything here appears to be safe, but Allie resists the urge to play with the toys. Her desire to touch them weighs heavily on her, which gives her the impression that the toys must have magic in them.
The more she resists them, the more she wants to touch and hug the toys. Allie has never seen toys like the ones she sees in the room. Elegant dolls, fluffy stuffed animals, and detailed figures. The further she goes into the room, the more appealing toys she sees. By the time she reaches the next door, she’s sweating with dozens of toys surrounding her. It’s as if they’re begging her with their stare to play. Allie forces herself to go into the next room.
This next room isn’t as cute, appealing, or large as the last. Instead, it’s a library with rows and rows of books. The are three floors with different sections of various books from around the world that covers every genre imaginable. Some of the books in the library are rare ones with few copies existing outside of the house. The colors are no longer colorful as they were in the toy room. Now they are filled with the normal colors of a library with browns, blacks, and white lights to illuminate the room.
Still feeling the after-effects of the toy room, Allie stumbles around the room while darting her eyes around for possible danger. A snake with a barbed wire body comes out from the bookcase with a book for a face. When it opens its pages, a blank face with a smile shows itself.
“Let me tell you a story,” it says as it envelops Allie into its pages. “This is the story of the little mermaid.”
Allie is now dressed as the little mermaid and the scenery around her manifests as the creature talks about it.
“She wants to get the prince, but his heart is taken by another. At the wedding ceremony, she decides to dance her best for their happiness. Dance little mermaid, dance your sorrows away.”
Allie remembers this story differently, but she dances as the creature says to. What she forgets is that the little mermaid feels as if she’s walking on knives, which is one of the prices of walking with human legs. Allie too feels this pain in her legs but bears through it until things start to change.
“After all the pleasantries, the little mermaid is told that she doesn’t have to die. If she can kill her prince and his wife, she can live. She is handed a knife to carry out the deed. Will she?”
Knowing her story, Allie tosses away the knife and jumps into the ocean and out of the story. Back in the library and her normal body, she takes more care of where she’s walking. The storybook serpent comes out of the shelves again.
It says, “Let me tell you a story.”
She tries to avoid it, but the serpent catches her no matter how fast she runs.
The serpent says, “This is the story of Alice in Wonderland. She has just cried a river of tears and must dry herself off by running a race with several other animals.”
Allie starts to run with the animals but is having a hard time to because of her wet dress.
“It looks like Alice needs more motivation.”
The river of tears floods into the forest Allie is running in. Distracted by the sight, Allie trips and is caught up by the river of tears, which turns into a river of teeth that chews her up.
After her excruciating death, Allie wakes up screaming on her bed with her best friend ready to embrace her.
As Ellie embraces Allie, she says, “Stops this Allie! I was hoping that the toy room would hypnotize you so you would at least stay here for a while, but you had to go and die again!”
Allie pushes Ellie away and gets out of her bed.
“I’m not going to give up! You’re not my best friend if you want to keep me here for the rest of eternity!”
“You don’t know what you’re talking about Allie! I am your best friend because we can spend forever here without a care or worry!”
Ignoring Ellie’s words, Allie walks back into the closet. She makes it through the toy room again the same way she did last time with the same level of difficulty despite her going through it already. In the library, the storybook serpent gets her again. Allie now has it in her mind that she has to go through the stories the serpents put her through. That would explain why this room is smaller and looks easier to get through than the past ones.
The serpent says, “Let me tell you a story. This is the story of little red riding hood. She goes to deliver some things for her grandma, but the wolf has eaten her and taken her place in the grandma’s bed. Little red riding hood doesn’t know this as she enters her grandma’s house.”
Because of what was said, Allie has a foggy head as to what happens in the story.
“Come sit next to me,” the wolf says.
Allie does this. She wonders why her grandma looks so different and remembers that her real grandma doesn’t live in the woods. Instead, her real grandma lives by the shore. She remembers that her grandma told her a version of this story. Once she remembers everything, she takes a knife from her skirt and cuts the wolf’s throat and makes him into a coat.
“That’s not exactly how it’s supposed to go, but whatever. I’ll just add it to my collection.”
The storybook serpent lets Allie go. Disappointingly, she doesn’t take her wolf coat with her. Further into the library, another storybook serpent catches Allie.
“Let me tell you a story. A young woman marries a man with a blue beard. This man appears to be very ugly, but he is wealthy and has status within the country. The two are married and the woman is allowed to go into any one of his rooms within the castle except for the one she has a key for. What will she do?”
Allie is standing in front of the door she isn’t meant to go into. Without thinking, she goes into the room and finds the decapitated bodies of many young women along with various bloody tools and torture devices that were used to kill them. Allie takes a machete from the tool rack and finds her husband who is currently sleeping and cuts off his head. She then shaves off his blue beard.
“That’s not exactly how it’s supposed to go, but I liked it. I’m going to add it to my collection. I feel anxious for the man you are going to marry.”
Allie is let go out of the storybook but wastes no time in getting trapped by another one.
“Let me tell you a story. There is a woman who loves to dance in a pair of red shoes. Unfortunately for her, she can’t stop dancing. What will she do?”
Knowing the painful thing she has to do, Allie tells a nearby executioner to cut off her feet and he does. The shoes keep dancing with her feet in them and dance away from her. The executioner tells her that she has suffered enough because of the shoes. Allie knows she has to go to church and does. Her old feet try to block her from entering, but she throws them aside and makes it into the building and out of the story.
Once she’s out of the story, Allie gets her feet back and she appears back in her room.
“Did…did I beat it?” Allie asks aloud.
“…You did, Allie,” Ellie responds.
“That means I’m close to my photo! I have to get back in-”
“Stop!” Ellie throws a knife that cuts Allie’s right arm. “You aren’t going to leave me. I don’t care if I have to pin you to the bed with knives. I don’t care how many times I have to kill you. I want you to stay with me forever. Please!”
“Oh no…”
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