Three

Everything is cloudy, foggy, and hot. It is all hot. Her skin feels like it is on fire.

Maybe it is.

Trying to comprehend what was happening is complicated for her. The heat. The hard ground beneath her back. The bright orange light trying to penetrate her eyelids. All of her muscles feel like she'd run a marathon. What has happened? Why is she here? Where is she? There is something, something vague, something gnawing in the back of her mind. It is there but unplaceable.

Finally, she forces her eyes open, the first thing she sees is the bright blinding light of an orange sun. The sun is orange? Why is it orange? Not the typical color but orange like the fruit. And she is staring at it, staring at the sun without needing to blink. Slowly she sits up, taking her surroundings in with confusion.

She is in a desert, at least that's what it seems to be. The ground she is now sitting on is hard, red clay of some sort with brown pebbles scattered across its surface. That is all she sees for miles around her. Red clay ground. Not a tree, not a person, not anything else. Just miles of red clay ground and the burning hot sun.

Why is she here? Why is the sun wrong? Why is she on the ground? Why can't she remember anything?

Painfully, she puts her hand against the ground, ignoring the sharp pains in her body as she pushes herself to her feet. Vaguely she can feel tears running down her cheeks as her entire body protests the movements, it's as though every bone in her body is shattered, all the wants to do is scream as she stands.

Her brain is clouded, her vision blurring with tears. She never screams though, something tells her she can't. She shouldn't. She doesn't.

Then, just like that, the pain is gone. The reaches around, touching her bare stomach in shock. The pain is gone. All of it.

When she blinks her surroundings have changed. Now it's cold. Everything is cold and it's mostly dark. Such a sharp change, fiery heat to icy cold. Sunny and bright to dull and dark.

Her gaze wanders around her new surroundings, she's in a cavern. From what she can see there are no exits, just a large pond directly in front of her. In it is a crystal liquid that glows brightly. Lighting the cavern now that she's looking at it. She looks at it and she can't bring her gaze away.

A sharp pain tears through her chest, right at her heart, an agonized scream escapes her as she lurches forward, falling to the ground in front of her.

That sharp pain. Something tells her it was a bullet, a bullet tearing through her heart. Someone had shot her in the back. She gasps and chokes up a liquid she somehow knows is her own blood. One of her hands comes up her chest to feel more liquid seeping out of the wound, pouring out. She holds the wound and a sob escapes her as she chokes up the blood.

The lake in front of her sings to her. It calls to her. She knows. If she touches the water the pain will vanish, oh how does she long to crawl across the ground into the water. Every part of her screams at her to do it. She's been shot. She is dying. The water can save her. Something else tells her "no". It tells her she doesn't deserve it. She deserves the pain. Something tells her she can't do it. Oh how she longs to crawl those few inches to the water, to the healing. She doesn't though. No. She can't. Something holds her back, something in the back of her mind says she can't. Instead she allows herself to collapse to the cold floor of the cavern as she slowly bleeds out.

Then it stops. It is over, the pain is gone, the cold is gone. When she blinks again her surroundings have changed. This is different. A forest. Large trees that remind her of the Redwood Forest surround her. This place is neutral, the temperature doesn't burn or freeze her. The light is normal, not too bright or too dark. In front of her is someone she knows. Someone unmistakably familiar. It is her. For the most part it is clearly her. The same body build, the same tattered tank top, the same shredded black shorts. Except it isn't. The girl in front of her doesn't have her crystal blue eyes but deep brown eyes. The girl in front of her doesn't possess the same black hair she has but golden blonde hair. Something tells her she needs to embrace the girl in front of her. Step into her and accept her.

"We did it." The other girl says quietly. Her voice is rough, as if it has been years since she's spoken.

Did what? What was the other her talking about? "What did we do?" Something deep inside her tells her she already knows.

"You know. Accept it. We don't deserve it. We don't deserve this."

She doesn't want to remember. Everything in her screams at her she doesn't want to know. What has she done?

"Remember. Focus. Remember."

Something in her brain clicks and she remembers. She remembers everything. What she's done. What she deserves. So many people, so much death. She deserves what is coming to her. She can't embrace the other girl. So she doesn't. Tears stream down her cheeks as regret boils deep in her.

"We did it. You did it for me."

"I shouldn't have." She says softly, the only words that matter to her. Her hand rests on her heart, where she'd been shot. Her mind becomes overly aware of her shattered bones.

"You had to." The other her says solemnly, looking all too joyful as the images of death flash across her vision. Her shattered bones, her heart being shot, it all registers in a wave of agony.

It was a mistake. She never should've done it. She did. She hopes she'll pay for it. She deserves it. She should've never listened. Listening was her final mistake. Grave and tragic. Never again. She shuts her eyes and the world around her sinks into darkness.