Page 101 of Darkness

I still can't say anything, but I nod into his chest. I pull away from him and give him a nod, letting him know I’m ready. I follow him through the gate, and I can already smell it. The smell of blood, piss, and vomit. This is the smell no one ever wants, and I don’t think it will ever leave me.

“You get used to it,” Lincoln jokes, trying to lighten the mood.

“I don’t want to,” I reply as we reach everyone else. Hayden and Logan are the two who move to stand either side of me.

I look around at this hellhole. Everything Cain said about this place was correct. It feels, looks and smells like what I’d picture hell to be. The coldness gives me chills knowing many people have died here, and if I was a supernatural person, I would say the chilly breeze hitting my body right now is that of those who died here.

“Remember, no one can see you, but they can hear everything.” Lincoln tells us as the big, and I mean giant door opens. Even with only one inch open, I can hear the roaring of people in there shouting.

The sounds echo in my ears of people abusing each other, and that cold icy breeze which hit me not too long ago hits me again, but this time it feels as if I’ve been hit with icy water a few times.

This place is where the devil would happily live, and my boyfriend grew up here.

God, he grew up in this hell, and once his grandad died, he was alone here. I wipe the tears away, thinking of him being here by himself, fighting to survive. Looking around, the whole Pit is a circle with cage after cage, going up floor after floor. They are all closed with metal doors. Even through the metal I can hear them shouting.

I can't Cain anywhere. Why can’t I see him? I’m beginning to panic.

I bump into Lincoln when he stops walking, then quickly I take a step back from him. I jump when I hear someone screaming. Everyone but Lincoln looks around. The scream is that of someone in pain, but Lincoln doesn't even bother looking to see what’s happening.

I hear a chant starting with numbers and I look at Lincoln. “They know Cain is fighting, they know who he’s fighting. Those are Yang’s numbers.” I spin around wondering how many people are down here? I look at each cage and wonder, how many of these cages hold women?

“Why are they chanting his numbers?” David asks.

“Because he’s playing mind games, and his son has been telling everyone, his dad is fighting the boss, and if he wins, then he will let everyone walk free. Yang wanted The Pit from the start, but Cain killed the boss first.” Lincoln looks up a few floors and I follow his sight, and my heart drops when I see Cain walking down.

My eyes don’t leave him as he looks up at the night sky through the small gap at the top of this hellhole. I hear Lincoln, reminding us.

“Don’t leave here, no one goes in the middle. You go in the middle, you die, stay here no matter what.” The sentence is just a reminder of what he’s been telling us all day. This time he looks around. “You break the rules, no one cares, you're the boss's family, you’ll die. Stay with her.” Lincoln walks away from us all, but I have my eyes fixed on Cain as he meets Lincoln in the middle of The Pit.

This is the first time I look at it. It is covered in blood and God knows what else is on there. I’m going to say this place is never cleaned, but then I suppose this is why it’s called hell.

Cain hasn’t looked over at us, but I haven’t taken my eyes off him as he talks to Lincoln who's shaking his head at him.

“He doesn’t look good.” I hear Mason, and I try to ignore them, because I can see he doesn’t look good. His eyes are red, almost like he hasn’t slept in days, or maybe he’s been in the fucked up white room.

I watch Cain talking to Lincoln. Something feels wrong, I can feel it. Lincoln cups his face and shouts at him, and Cain shakes his head at him.

“Should I be worried?” I ask more myself, but everyone turns to me. That means everyone is thinking the same thing as me.

“It's Cain, he’ll be fine. Right Dad?” Declan asks. The words escape with a shake. You can hear the worry in his voice at the state of what Cain looks like right now.

“He's fine. He's got this.” David tries to reassure everyone.

Cain shakes his head at whatever Lincoln has told him. When we left this morning, Lincoln said nothing to us, or hinted at anything being wrong. I suppose being in this place you learn to hide your feelings about everything. Cain does it well.

So whatever Lincoln is talking to him about, he didn't want to tell us, or he's just seeing what Cain says about the situation first.

But the only thing I can think about is, is Cain even going to come to us, say hello or just see how we are? It might sound selfish, but I want him to be close to me.

Part of me is relieved when they both walk over to us.

“You look like shit.” Hayden's the first to talk to him. There was me thinking Hayden was the one who would have been more supportive towards Cain.

Once Cain looks at me I try to smile but it’s a weak one. “Are you okay?” That's the only thing I can ask him because if I talk even more I might start crying, and that’s the last thing Cain needs is me crying. All I want to do is go down to him and tell him it’s going to be okay.

“As good as can be.” He looks between us all and I have no idea why, but my gut is telling me something's wrong and David feels it too. He asks Cain.

“What’s wrong?”

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