Carly: Chapter One

Dear Carly

Don't you get fed up with seeing the same old shadows every night? You know that human figure in the dark that terrifies you so much, that you wake up convinced there is a vampire ready to suck the life out of you in your room?

These dreams are not real.

They are just figments that your brain shapes while it tries to make sense of your past. Figments of all those horrible people who hurt you in the past.

Last night when you were sleeping, you woke up on the bathroom floor in a terrible state, and you locked yourself in there.

You don't remember....huh?

You were frantic when you woke up, because you couldn't open the bathroom door, and you were certain that you went to bed after your shower.

How many times did you smell your armpits, just to check that you had a shower the night before and that you hadn't dreamed it?

The night before, you woke up and checked all of the doors, probably at least fifty times because you were convinced that there was someone in your house, ready to murder you.

I can sympathize with you on that one, after all of the crazy exes you have had in the past who have done bad things to you. You went back to bed, though you woke again within an hour screaming at your family to leave the house because we were being invaded by giant spiders!

Carly, Carly, Carly!

Here is something you need to know.

These dreams are crazy!

No, your brain isn't wired wrong, and you are not going insane, but isn't it about time you stamped them out before you crack up?

Look, Carol, sometimes life makes you feel nuts, but you are not the nutty one here; those people from the past are the ones who deserve to live in a nightmare.

You need to clear your mind, lady!

Get it out into the world and make those people rattle their bones for what they have done to you, yes you could rattle their brains but it's very clear they don't have any.

People with proper brains, don't hurt other people.

It's crazy and foolish that I have to watch you go down the drain every time you have these nightmares.

The multiple ghosts you see every night are your ex-boyfriend's brains exploding with rage because they can't stand seeing you happy.

Sock it back to them!

Pack up their heads with the filth they put in your mind, and put it back where it belongs,

In their minds.

They will continue to torment you if you don't.

I mean come on, they obviously, have some crazy wired psychic mind if they can haunt you like this.

Are you going to dig your own grave, and die at their expense because you choose to mentally torture yourself over something they refuse to be accountable for?

They are cowards Carol, cowards!

Worthless pieces of shit! I would not use my expensive toilet roll to clean it up.

Why bother anyway when they prefer the cheap stuff?

When you first saw these shadows, you pelted glasses at them in your sleep. Can you not throw your mind at them in the same way? You should know that you can't hurt a ghost with a glass, but you can hurt a ghost when you scream.

The other night you cried out, and this is what you said.

"Go away, you fucking wine robber or I'll exorcist you into space!"

I have a witness. Your husband and grandkids were awake, and they heard your screams.

But into space, Carol?

Are you trying to end the world by sending these ghosts from your nightmares up there?

There are gases in space! They could use them to stink the stars out, or even end the earth by lobbing space manure at us!

I remember back to a few nights ago when you were dreaming of being in a band and singing on stage. You were singing happy songs about love and life; that was until your drummer turned into a vampire and tried to eat you.

Duh? Didn't you see your bag of weapons sent from the guardians who watch you from above?

I mean, come on Carol!

You've had these dreams for so long, you must know that your role is to slay them, and not just them, but everybody else's nightmares left behind by their exes too.

The guardians above created a prophecy about these dreams. I'll read an excerpt for you.

"There is one girl, chosen from birth to slay all vampire and ghost nightmares that the world's humans have. She will be the only one with the powers to do so, and she must dream everybody else's nightmares, and slay them too. For, if she fails; all of these dreams will come true and every person in the world will fall madly in love with vampires and ghosts, who will go forth and destroy the good dreams, and the real world."

I'm not joking!

You are having these nightmares for a reason. You were chosen to have them so that you could stop them, and stop them from becoming real. If you let them become real, they will dominate the world, and the world will be no more unless you stop them.

"What if I die in my sleep?" you ask.

The answer is, you won't.

You will transcend into someone more powerful each time you do. You will come back each time you have these dreams, and your role will be the same;

to slay all nightmares.

Carly finally woke up.

She couldn't tell whether she had just dreamed about the events, or whether they were real. She headed to school and dismissed her thoughts. She was used to these nightmares anyway, they occurred every damn night.

"You're late!" the teacher told her, but before Carly could answer, the teacher's face distorted in front of her, and she saw a vampire with fangs. Carly wasn't sure whether this was real, or a nightmare that had intruded her daytime thoughts.

She thought that she was dreaming until she opened her mouth to speak and the creature lunged at her.

To her surprise, her body spin-kicked the vampire in the face before she could stop herself.

The vampire lunged forward again.

"You can't stop us!" he shouted at her, but before he could say another word, Carly shook her arm and a stake flew at the speed of light, straight into the vampire's heart and dusted it.

She stood there staring at the grey ashes on the floor in horror.

The prophecy said that her nightmares would only come true if she had died, but she hadn't died!

Or had she?

Had one of the shadows in her dreams killed her, or was the prophecy a warning about things to come?

She had no idea.

Lunchtime arrived fast, but Carly's appetite had died fast. She didn't want to eat. She wanted answers, and fast!

She headed to the toilets first and threw some cold water over her face, then she paused for a moment to touch her skin. Her skin felt fresh, and she knew that she was still breathing.

"Maybe the prophecy was wrong," she told herself aloud whilst staring at herself in the mirror.

"What!?" a voice next to her asked, surprised to see Carly Jones talking to herself.

Carly was too preoccupied to notice who was standing behind her.

"Carly, are you alright?" the voice asked again.

"Oh! Hi Jessica. Yes, I am fine," she answered.

Carly rushed out of the door before she could be interrogated any further.

She made a plan to visit Alex Cross, her guardian after school to try and explain what was going on.

There was a reason why he called himself her 'guardian,' and she figured that it might have something to do with her nightmares.

She wasn't going to rest until she found out.

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