Silent, heavy breaths warm the tight space of the tunnel, blowing back into your eyes and making them burn. You huff to blow the dust out of your face, which is clinging to your cheeks and nose for dear life. On more than one occasion, your hand has been caught in a spiderweb, freaking you out, and ultimately causing a lump to form on your head from jumping to the ceiling, which is only two inches above your head. Going dizzy, whether from pain or insanity, you pull yourself along the foot and a half space, a faint ringing thumping in your ears. It almost seems as though the walls are moving, slowly, barely an inch, and closing in on you. For just a moment, your heart skips a beat as you imagine the walls closing in on you, trapping you without even a chance to escape. But you eventually convince yourself that this is just pure imagination, and you continue along.

At least, you hope it's your imagination.

As you crawl down the tunnel, you feel the passage starting to become narrower, until you're basically retracting your shoulders to your sides. Crawling forward with just sheer torso will, you slither across the charcoal stone, blind as a bat, until-

Splat!

You fall flat on your chest, a loud "oof" echoing in the corridor. Your legs dangle above you, still half inside the tunnel, but as the walls shift, a hard, spine-crawling sound signaling the tunnel closing, and your new surroundings emerging to your senses. You quickly pull your legs out before they are squeezed by the walls, and try to stand up, heart pounding through your chest as you try to make out where you are. It's too dark to see anything, and you don't have a lantern. Good going, whatsyourname.

A horrible, pungent smell covers the air like a cloud, impossible to escape. While you try to breathe through your mouth in order to keep the odor out, but the smell is strong enough to leave an aftertaste in your mouth. The air is thick and humid, a sour, bitter taste to it that resembles dust and decay.

Laying on the floor, exhausted, for just a moment, you breathe heavily as you realize just how thirsty and tired you are. Throat raw and sore, tongue dry and rough, lips cracked and puffy. As you breathe, even slowly, the dust that has begin to gather around you floats up, light as a feather, and cover the stone floor. Oh, do you have to get up? Can't you just lay here for the rest of your life?

Something will probably come along—in which something, you mean that monster—and probably kill you if you sit here any longer. But, to be honest, you're beginning to not even care. Even if you were to get up, where would you go? You're blind as a bat, lost, hungry, thirsty, cold, and tired. You can't recall a single thing about your life, and you're in a strange place that has monsters for people. However, you have a feeling that getting out of here will help you. Well, duh, but not just in the sense that you'll be alive, but that you might remember something about yourself.

Picking yourself up groggily, you blindly wave your hand around to look for something to grab onto, a support, and crawl forward a bit. Eventually, you push the palm of your hand into what you assume to be a wall, and hoist yourself up, groaning in agony every inch of the way. Once you've finally stood up, you stumble around a bit trying to find your balance.

It's too dark to see, and you're forced to walk around waving your arms in front of you to keep yourself from bumping into anything. You're fairly certain that you look completely ridiculous, but it's not like anyone else is here to see it. And even if someone you knew was here, you wouldn't recognize them. You can't even remember your Mom, or your Dad. Do you even have parents? Or maybe sisters, or even brothers? It's all very troubling for you, makes your head pound, so you decide not to think about it for the time being.

Breathing in deep and slow, you brush past a wall, the paint just barely grazing your shoulder, and find yourself in what you assume to be a very large room, for the fact that you've been stumbling around for awhile now trying to find the other wall. However, it seems as though there's absolutely no furniture in this area, as well as the floor and walls both being stone, and you assume it has a very high ceiling. What exactly is this? There's no windows to let in moonlight—or sunlight—as well as no candles or such to keep the room lit. Maybe it was some sort of room under renovation? But renovation would mean someone was living here, and the only "people" you've seen are those monsters.

God, none of this makes any sense, and it's only making your temples hurt even more. Why can't you just find a bed? A bed sounds really nice right now. Just take a long nap, one that you hopefully won't wake from, and you won't have to take this anymore.

But, a part of you doesn't want to give up. To keep going on, and have the faith that you'll make it out of this.

You grit your teeth in frustration as you give up your search, falling flat in the middle of the room, and whimpering. All you wanted was to get out of here. Was that so much to ask for? Apparently so. Whatever is out there is coming for you, and you know you have to get a move on, but your legs don't seem to respond as you try to stand up. You just sit there, heels under your weight, without a single care in the world.

No, you should keep going. You finally come to the conclusion that sitting in this room won't do anything, and it was best to just keep moving. Even if you don't know where the hell you're going.

After forcing yourself up, you continue in the direction you were walking, instantly slamming into the wall. Rubbing your nose a bit too violently in anger, you curse to yourself and realize that you had just been walking in circles the whole time. This place is really starting to get to your head.

Using the wall as a navigator, you find a flight of stairs in your path, and decide to go up them. You continue along the wall, until you place your hands on something wooden and thin. And, after a bit of searching, you finally find the handle. You don't waste a second in opening the door, shutting it behind you softly, so not to make any noise to alert anything in the vicinity to your presence.

You walk slowly, steadily, so not to bump into any furniture, and eventually come across a candle. The wick and wax are familiar to you, but if only you could light it somehow. Maybe you can use something here? However, you can't see anything, and trying to find a match of sorts in the dark would be impossible. Instead, you just stuff your hands in your pockets, fall to your ass, and huff in frustration.

That's when you discover the tinderboxes in your left pocket.

Oh.

Now, if only you knew when you picked these up. No matter. You light it up, and, while the light isn't intense, it covers a large area, and nearly lights up the entire room. Granted, the room is small, and looks like it could be some sort of guest room. A nice bed sits in the middle of the wall, a single end table next to it, a chair on the other, as well as a cabinet and bookshelf on the opposite end of the room. Other than that, the room is practically empty. However, the area of the room doesn't give much space to put furniture, so it seems even smaller than it probably is.

You don't even care. You just flop onto the bed in exhaustion, rubbing and burying your face into the soft and clean sheets. While you normally would've been worried about clean, dusted sheets, you were just too tried to care. Sleep comes easier than it ever has before.

Still groggy with sleep, you groan and whimper, and maybe also a slight giggling...? You pull at the sheets, cold sweats drenching your body. You're not sure if you're still dreaming, or if you're half-asleep, nor do you know how long you've been asleep. You don't care, and will probably just sleep for another five minutes. However, you find yourself biting your lip nervously, afraid to open your eyes and see a monster standing over your bedside.

You decide to open your eyes, slowly, and try to breathe slow and steady, in case anything actually is there. Nothing. You twist your head slowly to scan the rest of the room, but instead of finding a gross monster over you, you find a pair of blue eyes. And they are filled with surprise.

You shriek and kick whatever it is away, pulling at the sheets to protect yourself. Reaching behind to grab whatever you can, you throw it at the stranger in terror, and a pillow goes towards their head. It land harmlessly to the side.

Whoever, whatever, it is, it's trying to go towards you.

"No, no, no, no, no, go away!" You shriek, "Go away!"

"H-hey, hey, stop!" It calls to you, but you don't listen. However, it's much stronger than you, and it instantly pins you down with its arms. But they're human arms. They feel familiar. "Oh God, I can't believe you're alive... I'm sorry I scared you, but you were sleeping and you looked so peaceful so I thought I could give you a break and stuff, and I mean... what the fuck is up with this place?" It pulls away from you, head buried into its hands, and groans. "I just can't believe you're okay. I'm so glad you're okay. I keep blaming myself for letting you get hurt, I'm so freaking sorry."

You just stare at it in confusion, eyes wide with horror and fear, and the words slowly leave your lips:

"Wh... who are you?"

The blue eyes meet yours in shock, mouth agape and catching flies. "What... what?" It says. "Rose, what do you mean?"

"I... I don't... who's Rose?" You question, slipping back as he comes closer.

"Oh God... no, no, this can't be happening, please tell me I'm hallucinating, like those bugs, please tell me, please."

What bugs? What is going on here? How does this person know you? You're surprised that you've found a human, and apparently one that knows you, but...

"I-I'm sorry if I'm causing you stress, but I honestly don't know what you're talking about." You apologize, but you're not sure if it's sincere or not. The boy buries his face in his hands once more, clutching his hair and remaining silent.

He doesn't speak.

"Uhm... hello?"

And suddenly, he rushes forward and presses his lips to yours.

Shock courses through you as your whole body begins to tingle, especially your lips. He continues, but you try to push him away with both arms and legs.

"Stop... stop it!" You growl, finally managing to push his weight off you and kick him in the gut. "What the hell do you think you're doing?"

He suddenly goes bright red. "I-I'm sorry!"

"What the hell did you think that would accomplish?"

"I... I dunno!" He curses to himself, "Fuck, I just thought... if I... that I could just... I dunno, help you remember?"

"And kissing me is supposed to jog my memory? What are we, a couple?"

"W-well, no..." He gnaws on his bottom lip, and while it does have a vague familiarity to it, you ignore it. "L-look, I'm sorry! I'm sorry, I just was... just so worried... sick to my stomach thinking if you were okay after we were separated, and-"

"Shut up." You command, and the boy instantly shuts his mouth. He's holding his knees to his chest, a fetal position almost, as if he's sacred of something. Which, it seems like he is. You are too, but this seems like something more than just monsters and demons. "What's your name?"

"J-John... but..." The boy named John just shuts his mouth, realizing that his attempts to jog your memory aren't working. To be honest, you're not sure if you can trust him. But you might as well try to get what you can out of him.

"And what is my name, again?"

"Rose." He says, a smile to his lips this time. "It's a really pretty name!"

Rose... huh. Maybe that's why those rose petals sounded so familiar? Could've been just a coincidence, but who knows when you can't remember a thing. For now, you decide you will believe the boy until you have reasonable doubt that your name isn't Rose and you don't know him.

"Okay then, John, what are we doing here?"

"Oh! I, uh," he trails off, as if he was trying to think of how to explain it, "well, uh, I think we were doing some sort of favor? I can't remember exactly what we were supposed to get now, but I guess we can't really get it now if you don't remember, huh?"

"Stay on topic." You say.

"Right. Um, anyway, uh, We got separated, and I dunno what happened to you after that. Well, I guess I actually do: you got amnesia. But I guess you already know that, heh, heh... I'll just shut up now."

You contemplate on his words for a moment, his face eagerly waiting your response. You're not sure what to make of this, but it couldn't hurt to pry some more information out of him.

"I, uh," he suddenly continues, "I... I escaped after the closet, and I think I ended up going up the stairs. I figured that's where you'd go to get away, so I took that route. But when you weren't there, I thought about going back down to go get you, but I knew you probably would've scolded me for doin' so. So I just wandered around the house, which was really dark, and I think I was going insane for most of it. When I saw you lying here, I was pretty sure I was hallucinating again, and just sorta sat here to make sure you were real. Seems you were since you didn't disappear and are now talking to me, heh."

You raise an eyebrow, a throbbing coming from your arms now. You grit your teeth in pain, but do your best to ignore it. John, however, notices, and his eyes trail down to your arms. "Oh... oh shit... oh fuck you're hurt, and it's my fault." His hands go forward to hold yours, but you pull away. You're not sure if you're liking this guy so far.

"Look, I appreciate what information you've given me, and while I'm not completely certain if I trust you or not, I suppose I have no choice right now."

He just nods solemnly, getting off the bed and straightening out his outfit. That's when you notice that he has the same pajama medieval-esque theme, but blue colors with a wavy symbol on it. That can't be a coincidence, can it? Unless everyone else wears those things.

His eyes seem to be trailing over your body, and while you would've slapped him for it, it seems he's mostly gazing at your wounds than your curves. And, this time, you feel bad, making it feel as though looking at you hurt was killing him on the inside. You're not sure why, but, after all, while you don't know him, he must know you. Somehow.

"So... is it okay if I stay with you?" He asks sincerely, scratching the back of his head in anxiety. "I know I probably didn't give a first-impression. Or, well, second-impression, since I already know you, but you lost your memory and stuff."

"I would rather go through these horrors with someone else than by myself, even if it is a complete stranger." You admit, leaning back on the bed in exhaustion. "Do you mind... if I just rest more?"

He nods and give a soft, "Yeah," sitting down next to you and facing the other direction, careful not to invade your private space. You groan in pain as you lay back down, trying not to irritate your still-healing wounds, and yawn.

"Tired?" He asks, trying to make some form of conversation.

"Yeah." You mumble, mouth buried into your pillow.

"Y'know, I'm probably going to apologize to you about a thousand times until you remember. And then probably a million times after that."

You're not sure what to say. "That is, if I remember."

He seems hurt. "Yeah, if."

You wish you could remember. You really do. Despite not even knowing him, you hate to see him this sad and depressed. It seems as if he genuinely cares about you. Or maybe not. It could be some sort of ploy to either... well, do things, or to even kill you. You're not sure you trust him, and you refuse to fall asleep in front of a stranger. But you're too tired to care, really, and you're pretty sure you could just wait until he falls asleep to slumber yourself. In all honesty, you're not sure if meeting him was a good or bad thing, but you really hope you can remember soon.

Your lips still burn from that kiss, and you're not sure if you liked it or not. It didn't spark anything, memory-wise, so you're not sure what to make of it. To you, it was a total stranger walking up and kissing you. But there was something more to it, as if you liked it...? That sounds stupid, but you can't help but wonder... who is this guy? And how exactly does he know you?

"I hope you remember soon, though. Even some of it would be okay. I miss you."

A pang forces your heart to skip a beat at those words, gripping your chest in agony as you hear the hurt in his voice. It seems as though he really cares. You're just glad you're not alone anymore. It makes you wonder what he's seen in this house. Is it the same as you? Or was he lucky, and has yet to be exposed to the horrors? You really don't care, but he seems a bit too goofy and stupid to have seen what you've been through. And he didn't have any blood on his clothes, from what you could tell. You, on the other hand, are drenched in it. No wonder he freaked out about your health.

You just really hope you can remember soon. Maybe not for your sake, but for his sake too.