Hush Little Baby

Chapter 8: Liar

Passed out in the middle of the floor, Anna was barely conscious. Peeling her face off of the ground, she saw a familiar set of pink sandals in a children's size in front of her. Looking up in fear Emily had a hand extended toward Anna offering to help her up.

She brushed Emily off though as she managed to force herself up on to her knees while expecting to see Emily's grotesque face looking down at her, she was surprised to see that something else in the room was capable of getting her attention. Matching Emily's eye line, Anna looked beside her to see Reggie's body lying face down against the wood.

His body didn't move except for a subtle twitch occasionally passing through him and caused his limbs to convulse. Anna attempted to crawl over to his body,  but Emily stopped Anna in her tracks. Emily's eyes were still fixed on Reggie though as if she was protecting Anna.

"Is he?"

"I'll protect you mommy."

"Emily he's my friend."

Finally, Emily cracked and looked over her shoulder at Anna with the skin covered side of her face.

"No, he's not."

Her head whipped back to Reggie as he was finally coming to, and started to moan in pain. Emily walked closer to him as Anna began to panic and attempted to grab into Emily's leg. It wasn't effective. As she swung for the little girl's leg, Anna's hand just went right through it, and it didn't even seem to phase Emily.

There was no way to stop her, Out of Anna's reach now, she watched as Emily squatted down beside Reggie and tilted his head up so he could see into her crimson eyes. A devilish grin crossed her face as she began to manipulate his head, analyzing every little detail of his skin.

"Emily let him go."

Emily listened, letting go of Reggie's head as it bounced off the wooden floor, as she turned her attention to Anna.

"Why?"

"Because I said so."

"Why?

"Because he's my friend."
 

"Why?"

"Stop saying that."

"Why?"

It was going nowhere, and Emily was losing interest in tormenting Anna and started to turn back around to bother Reggie. Thinking on her feet, Anna noticed a bowie knife underneath the podium.

Looking over at Emily, she was distracted with poking Reggie's body with her finger. It was now or never, Anna began crawling to the space underneath the podium. Looking back every other second to keep a close eye on Emily, making sure she wasn't aware until Anna finally reached the knife.

She picked it up and looked at it, the blade itself had rust spots all over it definitely giving it some age, The handle was corse, weaved with a tweed string that had started breaking away from it's adhesive. Yet it was a knife none the less.

Using what energy she had, she got to her feet and positioned the tip of the blade toward her stomach.

"Emily, I'm not playing anymore."

The little girl's ears perked up at Anna's comment as she slowly turned her head around with an arrogant look. Her small hands balled up into fists, her anger seething from her glare as she turned to face Anna.

"Why don't you want to play mo-, what are you doing?"

The little girl's anger was quickly replaced with worry as she saw Anna pressing the rusty knife against her stomach to where Emily had laid her head only a few hours earlier.

"I'll kill her."

"But you'll die too."

"So what?"

"Why would you do that."

"What do you mean?"

Anna was distracted by the girl's statement. As she pulled the knife away from her stomach slightly but continued to stare into the girl's bloodshot eyes.

"Well, how do you know that there's even a baby?"

"Because you said..I...did."

"But Daddy calls me a liar." The little girls look of concern suddenly changed into one of intimidation. "So how can you trust me?"

Backed into a corner, Anna was running out of options, she knew the little girl was right. There was no way she could trust her, and Emily had already healed her once, who says she couldn't do it again. There was only one way out of the situation, and that was to play Emily's game.

"Because you're my...daughter."

"Yay, I love you, mommy."

The little girls face lit up ecstatically as she spread her arms out and ran toward Anna for a hug. This was her chance, it was now or never. As the little girl ran toward Anna, at the last second she moved the knife in front of her, stabbing Emily directly in the heart.

Emily's body stopped as she stood with her arms still spread out as she hesitantly looked down. Slowly her head started to tilt, her once yellow sundress was now half yellow and half crimson, while the knife protruded out of the little girl's chest.

She stumbled back while looking down at the knife that had been lodged in her. Afraid to touch it, she kept looking up at Anna and then down at the blade. Over and over again until she finally mustered up the courage and put one of her hands around the knives handle.

"Ma...ma...why?"

"Go to hell."

The little girl's horrified face turned into one of disbelief, as she affirmed her grip on the blade handle and looked up at Anna. Emily was no longer scared; instead, she began to laugh under her breath.

"We're already there."

With one swift motion, she pulled the blade straight out of her chest, and the knife looked precisely the same as it did when it first entered the little girl's body, not a single drop of blood stained the blade. Emily waved the knife back and forth teasing Anna, as she took a step back while Emily began walking closer to her until Anna reached the edge of the stage. Extending the dagger forward Emily watched as Anna looked behind her, the drop was a lot higher then she thought.

"Emily you don't-"

"I would never hurt you or sissy. I need her for the ritual."

"Ritual?"

Emily smiled at Anna avoiding the question as she retracted her hand, before turning around to face Reggie's body. Anna quickly moved away from the edge of the stage and reached out for Emily, only to have her hand phase through the little girl once again. She couldn't stop her.

Now standing over Reggie's damaged body, she looked down at him and then over to Anna. She gave her a menacing smirk as she raised the knife up in her one hand.

"EMILY NO!"

The words passed through the air but to no avail, as Emily looked back at the body in front of her.

"Goodnight Daddy."