Death. What happens after it? What lies beneath the surface?
Poor Arielle Daniels stumbled through dangerous hoops to figure this out. She wakes in a new place--the Void--and discovers that what waits after death are layers, dimensions, and sadly...
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"What the fuck is going on here?" Penelope swept in from who-knew-where, but Arielle could have sworn she'd come from the upper-floor balcony. Her eyes were that terrifying blood-red shade, and her hair was wild, her cheeks flushed, her spine rigid.
"Hey, he's—" Arielle barely had a second to open her mouth before Penelope shoved her aside with a quick flick of her wrist. "Wait, stop!"
Penelope whooshed over to float before Benny, hands on her hips as she studied him. She had her back to Arielle, concealing her expression—but Arielle hadn't forgotten her snarl, the ravaging rage warring in her gaze, the dangerous twitch of her eyebrows.
I guarantee that's what she looks like right now.
Benny perked up, blinking at the figure in front of him, but powerless to see it. "There you are." He tried so hard to be fearless, to not let Penelope's burning energy affect him, but his flinches—one, two, three of them—showed otherwise.
"Oh, you were waiting for me, were you?" Penelope growled as she lurched forward and squeezed Benny's middle, her hands pressing into his shirt, his skin hissing from the contact.
"Fuck!" Benny cringed and attempted to weasel out of Penelope's hold, but she was firm, her fingertips digging into the fabric of his shirt, keeping him in place. He fidgeted and flailed and kicked—but Penelope felt nothing, gripping onto him, branding her handprint onto his body.
"Stop!" Arielle skidded over and sought to knock into Penelope, but she fell through her, unable to make contact with her tense arms. "The fuck? I thought ghosts were able to touch one another?" She shook it off and instead slithered between Penelope and Benny, glaring at the former. "Stop! What are you doing? You're going to kill him!"
"Good." Penelope hardened her grip, and a reddish glow gyrated around her, swirling as a gust whipped up her back, through her hair, and up towards the ceiling. "He's not supposed to be here. He's not scared enough, and he needed to leave, but he came back." She looked through Arielle as if she weren't there, proceeding to apply pressure to Benny's upper waist, smirking as he writhed and whimpered in pain. "He can't find out. No one can."
Arielle groaned and rolled her eyes. "Okay, but why are you so obsessed with this? You know you can just... ignore him, right? Let him say his piece and stagger off to the car? He's drunk," she pointed at the liquor bottle on the floor, "and grieving his friend, Kylie. She was killed tonight, did you know?"
To Arielle's shock, Penelope released Benny and slithered backwards. She sneered as she bent and stretched her fingertips. "What?" The red glow faded, her curls returned to their usual spot, dangling over her shoulders, and her face drained of its blushing maroon shade. "How are you aware of this?"
Arielle's chin sank. "We... were talking. Well, he was talking, I... was screaming." She gulped. "You said the only way humans could hear us is if we screamed, right? So that's what I did."
