O.A. - Ruby

Levy’s breath caught in his throat at what he saw in the center of the room, a metal cage, as in the picture.

“It turned out to be much easier than we thought.” came Sandra’s voice.

Because of the echo, Levy could not figure out exactly where it was coming from.

“What do you want from me? What do you want from all of us?” he asked the emptiness in a trembling voice.

“Don’t pretend to be a fool you saw what awaits each of you. That is what I need. Only then can I enter your world.”

Levy took a few steps forward and saw the source of the voice; a creature with Sandra’s appearance peeked out from behind the cage like a small child playing hide-and-seek.

Levy slowly took a lighter from the back pocket of his jeans, but did not dare to use it yet, since he was still about seven meters to the cage and he could not calculate his strength.

“Is there no other way?”

“Even if there is, it is not interesting for me. What could be better than watching your torment?” The creature came out from behind the cage, “Do you think you die after death? The beauty is baby, that here you will be dying forever. It will never stop.”

“But what’s the point?” Levy slowly took two steps forward.

“For this place to live it needs to be nourished.” the creature opened the door of the cage and made an invitation with its hand. “Well? Will you do it yourself or should I help you in?”

Levy struck the lighter, set fire to the Molotov cocktail and threw the bottle at the monster but due to the terror that held him back and his shaking hands, the effect of surprise did not work, the creature caught the bottle and laughed.

“What, you wanted to set me on fire?” the vile creature continued to laugh. “Do you think I’m afraid of fire? My, oh my! I am fire!”

The creature smashed the bottle on the floor and stepped into the puddle of fire.

“I am the damned fire!” It howled in a voice that no longer belonged to Sandra.

What happened next can only be described as an eerie performance. The fire completely engulfed the creature, but at the same time it was clear that it did not hurt it. The creature flew up above the cage and spread its arms in the pose of a crucified Jesus. Its eyes lit up with a bright light and a flaming liquid that resembled lava flowed out of his open mouth.

While the creature floated in the air, the fire reached the walls. Levy realized that, most likely, only a miracle would help him get out alive.

Part 4

The support group meeting was supposed to start in 25 minutes, and I still hadn’t found the building I was looking for. The GPS navigator in the phone pointed to a building complex that has a bunch of buildings that are not displayed on the map, one huge series of continuous labyrinth-like-courtyards.

“Are you lost?” I heard a somewhat familiar voice coming from somewhere behind me.

Turning around, I did not immediately notice the bearded bum I had met recently. He was sitting on some steps by an old rusty door on a large sheet of cardboard. He looked exactly the same as when we had first met. I was sure that his smell had also remained the same, so I decided not to come closer and keep my distance while talking to him.

“Yeah, hello. I’m looking for the eighth entrance to the thirteenth building. Can you tell me, am I actually moving in the right direction?”

“I recognized you! Thank you for the food you left for me! You still look sad.”

“And you are still alive,” I somehow burst out.

“Yeah, you know… There are good days and there are bad ones. I’m feeling better now and I’m not going to die at all. Not today, not tomorrow, not anytime soon.”

“That’s great, you’re great!”

I felt a rolling wave of either melancholy or sadness, probably because he remembers our conversation. Yes, most likely, this is what upset me but I don’t know why. I felt that understanding the reason was somewhere very close, I just needed to dig a little deeper but now I don’t have time for that, because I need to find the damn thirteenth building with a frickin eighth entrance .

“So can you tell me how to get to the thirteenth building?”

“It is located behind that one,” the bum pointed to the building behind me, “but to get there, you need to return to the roadway and go in from the other side.”

“Thank you very much.”

“Are you going to a psychologist?”

“How did you know?”

“You’re not the first one who can’t find that building. And psychologists work there.”

“Do you live here?”

It’s a bum, dumbass! He’s homeless!

“Not specifically in this place but in the nearby courtyards. There are still entrances without combination locks, many awnings under which you can wait out the rain and I just like it here.”

“Then I think I’ll see you again. All the best!”

“And all the best to you,” the bum smiled. “… and, don’t be sad!”

I! AM! NOT! Sad! It’s just my face.

“I won’t.” I mumbled and headed in the right direction.

The room for the meeting or the session, I don’t know what to call such an event, turned out to be very similar to a school classroom. The tables were all placed along the walls to provide more space in the center of the room. By the entrance was a table lined with empty plastic cups, disposable plates, a thermos, an electric kettle and a large plate full of shortbread cookies mixed in together with candy in wrappers. There was also a box with blank stickers on the table. As a large middle-aged woman who noticed my confused look explained to me; I had to take a sticker, write my name on it and stick it on my clothes so that it was clear what my name was. Then, when everyone is assembled, everyone will take a chair and sit in a circle.

That’s not how I imagined everything.

To be honest, I was hoping to see some bright, outstanding personalities. Nice guys with tattoos and girls like Amy Winehouse 11 11 Amy Jade Winehouse (1983—2011) is a British singer and songwriter, critically acclaimed as one of the leading British female performers of the 2000s. , but the circle turned out to be much more boring, I would even say that it was somehow insipidly so.

To the left of my seat was the large woman who had given me the little briefing ten minutes ago. The sticker suggested that her name was Lydia. I won’t be surprised if she’s some kind of Lydia Petrovna or Lydia Ivanovna and a teacher of Russian language and literature at some school.

To her left was a handsome man of about 40 with a short haircut. His jacket had a sticker with the name Roman. I dared to assume that he was the psychotherapist leading this group. On the one hand, it’s nice that he’s so cute but on the other it means that I will hardly succeed with him, since he is a “doctor” and I am a “patient”. Eh…

The next was a girl named Lisa. Her most distinctive feature was a crooked nose apart from that, at first glance, she was an ordinary, unremarkable girl.

A tall man with curly black hair sat next to her. On his sticker, the name was written in very clumsy handwriting, so I could not make it out. I decided that he was probably a computer science teacher at some university and the students probably love him because he doesn’t give bad marks.

To his left was another girl but it’s better to immediately describe the three girls who were sitting next to him. I assumed that they came here most often and already felt at home here. This could be seen by their behavior. Alena, sitting next to the curly haired man was short, with long hair pulled into a ponytail. She smiled too much for me.

Natalia was sitting next to her. A tall woman with thinning hair dyed black. Another distinguishing feature she had were her nails, the length of which, in my opinion, she had gone too far with. And there were more than enough rhinestones on them.