Pain sparked within my back, and I woke up immediately.

My first instinct was to scream, but nothing came out when I opened my mouth. I rolled over to lay on my stomach and bit the pillow to dull down the pain. My shirt added flames to the scorching heat that I felt and I hastily ripped at it in desperate attempts to relive the pain. The innocent shirt came apart in strips of fabric, and it fell into the bed weakly.

I felt something shift in my back, and it made my eyes roll to the end of my head in agony. I leaned over to try and tell sleeping Liam on the ground, but my hand always recoiled on its’ own. I tried again, but my hand wouldn’t even touch him- even when I worked with all my strength. I tried shouting his name, but nothing came out of my mouth.

I went back to my bed with defeat. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw my shirt shredding and saw something dark that stained it.

I lifted my right hand from underneath me and went to touch my back.

I felt something slimy under my fingertips. I then lightly felt around for any wound, but I felt nothing.

Then I felt something move under my skin.

Agony ignited my skin like someone striking a match, and I silently screamed.

Then, my mind flicked to another channel.

With fluid motions, I saw my body step out of bed. It took a step, and then another. With the pain gone, my body moved with no sound under the disguise of night. My body stepped over Liam, and I begged with all my might that he would wake up.

Unfortunately, my plead did not reach his ears.

My body went to my frozen dinner and saw the silverware next to it. It picked up the knife, and I saw the moonlight glint off of it.

I saw a slither of my eye and saw that it was an empty grey.

Oh no.

My body walked to the bathroom, and it responded by turning on the lights. I saw my porcelain skin, but there were smudges of blood on my shoulders and my arms. My body put the knife down and turned to the side.

No words could describe the emotion I felt.

The outline of wings was noticeable under my skin that hid under the blanket of blood. Every second they moved or twitched, scratches would show up on the outside of my skin and heal just as fast. I saw my mouth in the mirror contort with pain as it tried to hold in a snarl.

My right hand picked up the knife and angled it onto my skin. My mouth smiled at me as the knife went deep into my skin and drew a straight line.

The pain lit a fire that surrounded my veins and a scream hurled through my throat that finally woke Liam up.

I gained some control over my body but not enough to stop what I was doing. The pain was unbearable, and it made me feel like I was back in the Oven. Despite my urging, my body stood still as I saw Liam scramble awake and frantically look for me. His eyes landed on me and the item that was in my right hand.

It was a bloody knife.

“Kye” Liam stood up with his eyes on the knife. “Drop the knife, please.”

My mind went back to full control, and the pain came strobing back even stronger. The knife fell from my fingertips, but my feet stood planted on the ground. My eyes blinked furiously through the pain as I tried to regain composure.

“Kye” Liam came closer to me with his arms outstretched for me. “Your eyes, t-they’re flickering” I tried to respond to him but my mind was coherent enough to form words, and I ended up opening and closing my mouth a couple of times in the silence between us.

I watched him stand outside the door but stopped when a sloppy sound knocked at the silence.

I felt like my back was opening up, and sight became a thing of the past. The pain was excruciating, and all I saw was the inside of my eyelids. Choking sounds came out of me and then sounded like a dead man rasping.

I felt something unfurl in my back and slither through the slit.

A new extension of myself fluttered lightly in the air, and I could breathe again.

I looked at Liam. He looked behind me.

I looked at the crimson stained mirror and saw a blurry wing distended from my back. My breathing staggered before picking up to a jog. The wing arched itself like it had a mind of its own and flapped once in the air.

The gust of wind made the shower curtain fly in the air, and my hair came out of its’ loose braid. Hair fell all over me and covered my eyes from the sight. Liam’s shouts were drowned out with the view of splattered blood, creating polka dots along with everything in the bathroom. The drawers under the sink danced under the wind, and the towels that sat on top of the toilet flew around before landing everywhere.

“Liam?” Xavier’s voice rang out. Footsteps shuffled to him, notifying me that it was more than one person. “Where’s Kye?”

I shifted my gaze to Liam, and he had his arms covering his face. Everything behind him was in disarray and looked like a tornado wiped through the room.

Liam pointed at me, and Xavier came to look at me. I saw Donna come into view and put her hand over her mouth. Kyle and Nicole stood behind Liam but did not react.

“Kye,” Xavier tried to coax me out of the bathroom. “Come here, please.”

Instead of following him, my mind flickered to another channel again.

“His eyes, they’re grey,” Xavier said.

“Ever since I woke up, they’ve been flickering back and forth from grey to green.”

“What does that mean?” Nicole asked with fear lacing her tone.

“Something is possessing him,” Liam said with no hesitation. “I’m sure of it.”

My ears drowned out Xavier’s rebuttal and Kyle’s reply. My sight went immediately downward in search of something. I stalked the small area like a zombie with short grunts as my wing covered my right side in a cocoon.

I grew even more confused as to what my body was looking for since it kept wandering the area with little efforts while people were voicing their theories outside the door. My body suddenly stopped in motion once I saw a hint of silver right underneath the sink.

The knife.

My hand grasped it and showed it to the audience. They stopped talking, and all of their eyes widened with caution.

“Kye, sweetie” Donna spoke up. “Give us the knife and come over here.”

I just stared at them.

Then a voice crawled out of my mouth.

“ι тσℓ∂ нιм тнαт ι’∂ вє тнє σиє тσ υиfυяℓ нιѕ ωιиgѕ. ѕσ, тнαт’ѕ ωнαт ι’м ∂σιиg.”

A choir of No’s rang out as my arm reached my back. Xavier and Liam reached for me, but they were too late because I already made another slit.

Another scream tore at my lungs and brought me to my knees as the knife clattered to the floor. Everyone watched in panic as a stream of blood pooled on the ground, and my other wing shuddered with pain. I felt my left wing stir in my skin, and my vision choked me with darkness as I gulped at the air. My breathing turned to rasps, and I clawed at my throat vaguely as the wing found the slit in my back.

The wing sprouted out of my skin like a tree and joined its’ twin.

I looked at everyone, and then my mind turned off.