Characters Chanting

"Hey Wren." one of them sneers.

"Are you starving us again? Or getting us stabbed?" they laughed at the cruelty of their own words.

"No! I didn't mean to hurt you. It was a story. It was to be told for fun. I didn't think anything in them would happen."

"But here we are: me, you, Jax and Anika. What did you think you could do? Come into our world and take us from the life we had, just throw us to the wolves."

"I told you! I didn't know what I was doing! Please, you have to believe me."

"You should know better than anyone; stories are truth disguised as a lie." Said Anika. "I'm going to ask you one single question. You answer and we let you go. You panic and Tinzin will be your guest." I stared at the red haired demon in front of me. I knew what he could do. I had given him that power after all. "I'll do anything. Just ask the question."

"What is happening and where can I find him?" She shook me into a heap on the floor. Now Jax spoke. "No, this is another demission. We're not going to find him." I nodded. "This place we're in is the only thing that exists." I whispered.

"You have the will to start to build a world bigger than what you have seen in your entire life yet when faced with something truly dangerous you don't even lift a finger." Said the Demon, Zin.

"Go away, you're just my imagination."

"No." they said in unison.

"No what? No to you being my imagination or no to giving my life back."

"I can't give your life back." replied Jax.

"Why?"

"Because you have taken your own."

"What? I'm dead?"

"No, you gave your sanity away in exchange for us." Anika, suddenly calm, answered, "tell us the end. What happens? You gave your life for our stories. Now we want them back. Let us live out our fates."

"No, I can't."

"Why?"

"Because then I will be lost."

"We don't care. You are insane. We aren't. Give us back our will and stories so you won't have to wonder about the voices. You won't have to question fate. You can know everything is real and nothing is a mistake. Give us our own place to be and you, in turn, you will gain yours."

I took a breath. I opened my mouth, but I didn't know what to say. How could I bring them to life? Who was I to write a book of anything? Why would anyone want me to be their author? I wasn't good enough. "I can't."

"Then we stay." The demon whispered and disappeared. I never saw them again but they are always driving us forward. They crawl behind me eyes and confuse their universes with my own. They beg me to tell them the end but I don't know where to start or where to begin. I struggle through the dark, not knowing what is real and still, the voices are here.