*FOR CODY*

The amazing Cody Stewart (c) gameboycjp10. Ian and his story and his friends belongs to me...sadly. So, here you have it. A story for a special someone. Hope you like it, Cods.

ADDICTION IS A CURSE
Rated: T - a pool of darkness; a dose of angst and a bang of light
Summary: Ian Sheckler had always been addicted to blood--addicted so much that he'd do anything to get his hands on blood. He starts waking up in the middle of the night, surrounded with bloodshed victims, but the truth is: he's following a pattern he doesn't even know of. What pattern is that? IanCody friendship.
Genre: Horror/Mystery

---

Seasons come and seasons pass,
Life's beneath a looking glass.

----

Her fingers draped alongside of my jaw.

I shook my body. My body was made of raw flesh, oozing blood out of my pores, honey eyes that clutched at my stomach and twisted it part of my intestines until there's nothing left in me. And I looked down to see the ripped flesh of my stomach to expose the tiny blood red butterflies flowing out of my veins. They were so tiny that they were invisible. I tried to catch them but she kept lifting his chin up so that my eyes met hers.

Her eyes were demonic, a sweet ruby red. And I looked back at the tiny butterflies - just like her eyes. "Give me your eyes, Ian," she touched a thick vein at the left side of my face and I flinched at the pain. I could feel the d*mn pressure in the touch, I could feel his blood sugar drop just at that touch and he started to shiver from the coldness that suddenly electrocuted him whole.

She was looking at my eyes, in a look of thirst. Thirst for the blood around my eyes. Thirst for ripping my eyes out of my sockets and I closed them. "Make me yours."

I knew what that meant. I knew what that meant.

And that was why the horror racked through me as quick as possible. "I want to be yours, I want to be yours...I want to be yours..." I kept repeating and as I felt a sharp pain at the socket of my eyes as her fingers ripped them off of my eyes. Everything was black. But I could hear her laugh lightly. And I could hear the rattle of her feet and then-then-then-

She spoke those words. "You're part of the Immerse now."

I could feel my eyes absorbing the words. Two holes that could listen and hear and do everything. I knew what she meant. Part of the Immerse. Part of Hell's Immerse, those who would kill their loved ones. The Immerse...I saw them before...where the child, at the age of twelve, before becoming a teen, must have to have his eyes ripped out of his skull. I knew a couple.

Darrell and Diamond were the ones that my Master had put in charge. If the order was disrupted, he always killed Darry and Diamond's family and anyone with their first and last name. Darrell and Diamond, like everyone else, were the first I saw holding a umbrella over their heads. My Master told me that they thought that the darkness will take away the creativity of their city. They said that you could never paint a real painting when you have eyes because you didn't look at a painting. You felt the painting.

That was art to them. And another tradition was that the bride and the groom must have the same first initial of their names. That was why I liked Isabella, her first initial was that same as mine. Isabella and Ian; I guess I could be part of the Immerse and keep her. But I lost her. I lost her and I lost my creativity and color a long time ago.

When Darry said that he'd marry Diamond, he sewed his eyes in her head and she sewed his eyes in her head until they could see with their eyes. It was told that this was why the expression "when you look at these my way..." they actually do look at things in their ways. That was why there were more colorblind people and people with ocular problems. Because of the sewing and the infections carried in the needles. Sometimes, it affected the brain. Part of the Immerse, (the immerge) was because they immerged two souls together.

When Darry died, Diamond died too. She was ordered to be killed and so were her children. Their souls were supposed to be a part of Darry and that was tradition to them. I killed my mother...and I killed all of my brothers...like the Immerse...

Never give me my eyes back.

I never saw color anyways.

And a thud of my head hitting the table made me open my eyes, in my hands, there was a bloodied knife. I hit my head against the wall reluctantly. I touched at my eyelids and could feel my eyeballs moving through the touch. "Master?" I whispered.

No, Master was here. He left me. He left me.

And he left me all alone with no one and nothing but a bloodied knife in my hand.

I was eighteen years old, scared, alone, sick and I was in a stranger's house. Everything was so hazy and bloody and my head wouldn't stop pounding. My heart accelerated and any thoughts of soothing and life was taken away from me. Ripped at the spot. My muscles tensed, each part of my brain was in complete tension and I felt my intestines rip with blades inside.

GOD, I WANTED TO EXPLODE!

I brought the knife to my eyes.

"Give me your eyes, Ian."

"Yes, mommy," I told the heavy air and I stopped in my position. Mommy? She was my mother? I bit my lower lip and the knife smeared through my mouth inside. I tasted the metallic blood rushing through my throat and burning into my esophagus. I felt even hazier, everything was so blurry and black and lacked color. I felt as if my eyeballs were really thrown out of me.

I told myself that my eyeballs weren't there.

I was deceiving myself. They weren't there. I was in a hallucination where I felt like I had eyeballs. "Here are my eyes, mommy," I whispered to the dense air. "I-I-I-"

"YOU MONSTER!"

And I saw faces. I saw faces but I guess that was part of a hallucination because they were so shocked and horrified and so d*mn real that they can't be real, can they? The girl was slightly short, her hair was a sandy brown and her eyes were a hard solid blue color. And the horror in her eyes were unforgettable.

I tasted the blood in my mouth one more time, as I stepped back and the shining light of the window caught me off guard--then--then I was running. I was always an observer in my mind, my body acted on its own and my mind was distant from my body. Since I was twelve.

Why was I so shocked right now?

I let the bloodied knife fall to the floor as I ran.

I ran from the darkness that was still behind me.

I ran until I was out of breath.

I fell to the corner of the alley, panting, trying to catch my breath as I looked up to find a blonde haired boy with blue eyes that looked like Darry's and I bit my lower lip again. His eyes were wide with shock (just like Darry before he died).

But they were sparkling.

Like a Diamond.

"Your mouth..."

I looked down at the pool of water and looked at my reflection. Studied the ugliness of my face that I tried hard to avoid and-and-and--I saw a smearing grisly smile on my face, cut at the corners with blood but as I ran my hand through the blood, it smeared through my entire face until my entire mouth and cheeks were dripping blood. "Come on. I should take you home."

Home? Where was that?

He grabbed onto my hand and I didn't know this boy at all but he seemed sweet as he led me inside of his apartment. It wasn't so far away. Actually, the alley was so close to his apartment that my mind drifted off when he let me sit on his couch and thrown a thick blue blanket at me. I looked at it as if it was the oddest thing in the world before he grabbed onto a cloth and dabbed it across my face so that the dried blood from my face would fade. "There, you have a good face."

I looked away. And he gave a weak smile that brought a spark of fire in me. But-but-God, the sweet searing blood inside of his veins--I could taste it. I could taste the warmth. The warmth I longed for. I could feel every heartbeat in my ear. Banging and banging and banging, louder and louder. I let my head sink onto the couch's edge and I looked at him as he walked off.

"My name's Cody Stewart by the way."

I tucked myself inside of his sheets and let the silence burn into my body. And he shut the door closed so that I could sleep silently.

But I couldn't sleep that night at all.

Here you go. Chapter 1 has been completed. What do you think, GB? lol.

It's really good so far! KEEP IT UP SAMMY!!!

Yay!

I'll write the next chapter soon.

WRITE SOON! LOL!

As soon as I can, sweetie.

Oh, I finished it today!

Chapter 2 - Skull Crunchers

Cody came back late that night.

He was making himself a cup of tea and stopped when he saw that I was wide awake. He stirred the spoon in the tea and sat on a chair beside me. "Something bothering you?" he asked me and I shook my head. My head released a million cells that zapped my brain into pain and I let out a gasp. He put the mug down at the table and touched my head. "You're burning up." He said. His eyes were blue; glistening and glistening and glistening...

(Blue like the skull crunchers.)

Blue...

And I let the words seep out of my mouth. The memories of my childhood.

--

I was there.

I was standing beside Dr. Love and he was kissing my forehead. Kissing my nose. Rubbing his bloodied hands on my cheeks, as I stood there, immoblized and motionless. Then, there was a sound of a crack. Dr. Love grabbed onto my hand and looked at me with disgust. "Who did you send down here boy? The Skull Crunchers? The Innocents?" he repeated and then he grabbed onto my body and made me cling onto his body. I let my head fall onto his chest. I was only nine years old and I was scared out of my mind. My eyes were looking at his and he ruffled his fingers through my hair in ferocity. As if he was looking for something in my hair.

I was there and I wanted to die.

"The Innocents?" I spoke out.

"The Innocents, the Bone Crunchers, are part of Horrorland. They're the people, the girls and boys, that created my school and created this place. They work like crazy, day and night, so their children become addicted to the wrong things. Some are on heroin and crack. Some are just sick and tired. Once, they joined together to form an army to kill their parents, to make them see what they haven't seen. So the children did what they thought was right; they ripped up their parents' fleshes and they crunched the bones. They left nothing in their graves but their bones. They didn't bury the bodies. That's why, when you step into the forests, the branches and the leaves are made of human flesh and blood, because trees grew and the flesh was still into the trees and branches. Even the blood. They call them the Innocents because they taught people a lesson. That things that are innocent aren't so innocent after all." Dr. Love said the story with passion; darkness deep in his voice.

"Those...people outside...are adults," I tried to rasp out as I tried to breathe.

I was there and I couldn't breathe.

"The Bone Crunchers' parents once rejoined. They're becoming a part of the Earth and trees and earth; they're looking for any child to break their bones. To teach them a lesson. That's why their symbol is blue. Blue stands for intution and teaching. The children are now at a school called School of the Insane; my school. They believe that they have to build a ladder to reach for happiness and grab onto the souls inside of the air but that's not real. They believe it though." He explained, so smoothly, so silky calm. "They're looking for you, Sheckler. No, don't speak..."

I remained silent as he led me through his wine cellar and clipped the door shut. He looked at me, as I panted and as my heart crushed into pieces at the sounds of the Bone Crunchers' zombied faces.

"I want my mommy."

He slapped me, hard on the cheek and I rubbed that part. "No, you don't, understand?!" Dr. Love bit his lower lip and he pinned me to the wall. "No, shut the hell up." He ripped a bit of my flesh around the mouth and I tasted blood that was drying. "If you don't cooperate, that's what I'll do." He gave a sneaky smirk as he let me fall to the floor. I could only taste blood and I can feel his heartbeat.

"The Bone Crunchers are nearing."

And I heard them break through the doors.

The last thing I heard was the sound of my screaming drowning out anything else as Dr. Love threw a wine bottle at my head.

---

"Shh..." Cody grabbed onto my body and I didn't realize that I was with Cody now. That I wasn't with my Master. I tried to push him off but he won't go. He didn't understand. These stories scared the hell out of me. These stories were as real as him and me. These stories made me feel empty inside out. I looked away as he went back to his mug and started to drink through the mug's contents. "The Immerse?"

"They're also called Eye Slingers. Because when they ripped your eyes out and put them in a container, it looked like a slinger of eyes. A brunch for the eyes. A sort of breakfast. As if it was supposed to be surved to the zombies."

Cody jumped up and he looked freaked out. "Um...sorry, it's just that--"

"I know," I buried my head into the couch's pillow and I didn't care about anything else. I tried to shut up the silence but as the scream of my horror re-entered my mind. My head was pounding with pure pain and I knew that I couldn't remember much of my past. I remembered things slowly because whatever I knew really hurt already. I felt that burning pain at the pit of my stomach. "I know, Cody." I repeated after a while.

"Tell me more about your story."

"I don't know anything about me." It was the horrid truth that I faced all the time. "Injections make me forget."

"That can't be right. I mean, you remembered this, right? Anything else?" Cody tried to brighten the dark mood that hung around us like a sultry cloud but no, I couldn't feel the brighteness in the world in me because I was the devil. Of course, I couldn't feel this way. I clutched at the pillow, remembering my childhood was hard and remembering the other people in Horrorland was harder.

I didn't want to remember my Master.

The more I remembered about my past, the more I knew that my Master was somehow around me.

Laughing.

I clutched onto the pillow, shaking. "It's Ian," I rasped out at the sounds of 'Sheckler' repeating my mind.

Cody tried to help me stop shaking. He grabbed onto my shoulder as I shook from fear and coldness. I looked up at him and he blinked his eyes. He didn't try to avoid me once he really got a look in my eyes. "Ian, it's going to be okay."

I overreacted. I felt the bubble burst. "What do you know!?" I felt pain and anger all my life. I didn't know what happiness was. I didn't know what love was. All I knew was horror and pain and freaking anger that I couldn't get rid of! What did he know about pain? What did he know about me? That I said some freaky zombie stories so I must be a freak?! What did he know?

What did he know...?

--

I

Was

There

Dying.