Volume 1 - Chapter 7: The Voiceless Storyteller

It's been a week since then. Only a week has passed, yet to Cathedra it was an eternal nightmare that replayed over and over.

She could still see the scenes unfolding freshly in her mind, as if her life was a broken movie that was stuck at that moment, repeating that nightmare over and over.

"Miss, for the hundredth time, what happened inside that abandoned building? Who locked you inside and murdered the two victims?"

Every day, Cathedra would find herself inside a room that was bare and empty except for the lamp atop a single table situated in the middle of the room and two chairs where she and the kind police officer sat on at this moment. Day by day, he would question her politely but persistently about the crime that occured that day.

Day by day, Cathedra would stare at him blankly, not uttering a single word.

If her thoughts could speak, they would be screaming at the officer. How she was held by the two delinquents and forced to watch as Diane performed her acts of torture at Kevin and John. How she peeled off their nails first before cutting off their fingers and toes. How she gouged both their eyes out and cut off their tongues. How she stabbed them repeatedly until she got bored because their dead bodies would no longer scream in agony.

But they didn't know the gory details of the horrors Cathedra had to bear alone.

All they knew was that the neighbors complained of the stench that wafted from the building and called the police. When the cops charged inside the sealed building, all they could see was Cathedra at the scene of the crime, trapped for three days with the two mutilated bodies, while she was still alive with only a single slash at her cheek.

They could only guess and make inferences, but no one could ever get close to the truth.

Worst case scenario was that Cathedra, the sole survivor and witness of the ordeal, lost her power to speak.

She screamed so hard that day. She begged Diane over and over again to stop. She cried and wailed and lugged at her restraints, but that seemed to encourage Diane on. Every time either three of them screamed, Diane would close her eyes in bliss, as if she was enjoying a beautiful melody.

She screamed so much for an entire lifetime that her voice wouldn't work anymore.

"Miss, please," the officer begged once more time. He was a middle-aged man with a kind smile and gentle face. He had a bushy mustache on his face that moved everytime he spoke. When he talks to Cathedra, it was like he was calming a scared animal. "I know it's hard for you, but you are our only lead. Just a name would do."

Cathedra stared at him blankly, her eyes lost and alone.

The officer sighed in defeat. The psychiatrist argued again and again that questioning her would make her trauma worst, and it would end up being detrimental to Cathedra's mental state. Today was his last chance. The officer begged the psychiatrist for a week, and his week was up.

"You're released."

Cathedra was taken back to the orphanage that day. Her life now was a before and after. Gone were the days of solitude and loneliness of being rejected by society.

What she suffered now was much worst.

"Why would the officers not think she did it?"

"Considering how she's the only one there, it's only logical to assume she killed them."

"That's so sick, we knew she was mental, but to go so far so as to kill someone. . ."

"Those two were her bullies, she must have done it out of revenge."

"Don't go near her, don't speak to her, she might kill you."

Cathdra heard them all. The whispers. The accusations. How much should they drain her of life before they would stop killing her with their words? How much more do they have to take from her to be satisfied?

She stayed holed inside her room and began to write. She read all the fairy tales she could lay her hands on. She put into words all she saw from the moving picture.

But she did something else other than tell the truth. She wrote a character that resembled her in those stories. At least, even just in her novels, she would create friends that wanted her. At least, even just in her novels, she would be able to live the life she could never have lived in reality.

At least, even if it's just in her novels, she wouldn't be alone.

Day and night she wrote and wrote until she filled pages and pages with words of truth. She wrote until there wasn't a fairy tale lie she couldn't expose anymore.

"The End," she wrote at the last page of her novel.

Cathedra climbed atop her desk chair and hung a noose over the beams. She tied a knot firmly, making sure it was strong enough to fulfill its purpose.

She slipped the knot over her head.

She jumped and kicked the chair off.

For a few minutes she struggled and fought for breath, the way humans were normally programmed to do. For a few minutes, she had enough time to reflect on her short-lived life.

"If only I could live inside my novels, I would be happier than I was today."

The line went taut. The struggling was no more.

The voiceless storyteller has found her salvation with her eyes closed.