Orphanage || Story Time || Part 3

Fern went straight to the adoption apartment of the orphanage to get Iva in anyway possible. Her hands were trembling as she saw the exact woman smiling at her who had attacked her in her dream. The woman was the principal. Her name, Agnes Crowell, made Fern shudder.

"Yes? What do you want?" She spoke in an authoritative tone. Though she was smiling, her words were stern.

"I-Iva...I want to adopt her." Fern replied.

The principal made a face but quickly forced a smile, "Sure. Right this way."

The principal took her to another office. Soon Fern found herself filling forms. One after another. Then they kept telling her to submit them to different offices. It was relentless. She stayed busy for a long time. Once she was finally done, she was told that she would get a reply in a week.

She was annoyed, but went home. As she sat on her couch and looked at her phone, she saw several emails from her work. Her boss had sent her an email saying that they are cutting all these off days she has taken from her total annual holidays. He also stated that she should respond soon, or he may be forced to fire her.

Fern stared at the email. She had taken no days off at all. She checked the calendar. It said 5th of March. Her jaw dropped. March?! It was February. She started to look around her apartment and realized that things were off. Food in the kitchen was spoiled, and everything was covered in dust. She kept looking around frantically when her eyes fell on the mirror. She looked extremely weak and tired. Her bones stuck out, making her look extremely malnourished.

That's when she realized how hungry she was. She went to the kitchen again and found herself some packaged foods that were still good. She ate it all. Once she was done and looked in the mirror, she gasped. She had already gained weight. Her bones weren't showing like before. What was going on? How can someone gain weight with one meal if they were as malnourished as she was? She lay on the couch to rest for a while, as she was exhausted and quickly fell asleep.

This time, she only saw the man. He looked even more exhausted than before. It was again from the third point of view, but he was talking to her, "You are too late. I don't know if you can save anyone or not. Iva said she can't be saved anymore. She felt too upset to show up this time." He sighed and looked away, "We don't have enough powers to show everything to you. Agnes is too strong. She mastered witchcraft when she was alive. I...wait...Oh God! Iva stayed behind to distract her! Not because she was too upset!"

He started to pace around, "Okay, I need to use this time properly then. Okay! Agnes died thousands of years ago. Iva isn't alive anymore and is a spirit. She's stuck here. I am still alive, but I am stuck here. Here's another entity that's stuck here. You need to see it."

The scene changed, and it was back to that haunting principal office. The man was sitting at the desk. He pointed towards one human sized big ice cube that was installed as part of the floor, "That's Iva." Pointed to the second, "that's me." He points at the third, "You should look into that one."

Fern was forced into that room. Not watching it from a third person's point of view. She felt pounding in her head that was making her sight blur, but it was far better than last time. Probably because Agnes was occupied with Iva. She walked past the man towards the ice cube. She crouched down and looked inside. The person who stared back at her was HER. Fern inhaled sharply and was back to where the dream started from a third person's point of view, staring at the man. 

The man spoke, and one could hear how he was losing hope, "Iva has been here for decades now. I am the newest one here. You came up with this idea of reaching you, but you can't talk to yourself. It seems that if you don't do something soon, then we both will be stuck here forever, too."

The man tossed a stone, and it vanished in mid-air. "Agnes manages time in whatever way she wants. It's hard to survive in that school while you are in your flesh form. That stone will keep you aware of the time, so she wouldn't be able to make your head swirl with moving time weirdly. You will have it when you wake up."

Fern wanted to ask how she could stop her. Current knowledge had nothing to do with how to defeat her. She felt like struggling, but couldn't feel her limbs moving.

"I know. I know! But I don't know how to defeat her!" The man yelled and started to pace around again. "She's gonna come here any moment now. I don't know! She is a witch! Read Wizard and Oz, melt her with water, burn her, stab her with wood. I don't know! Just do something!"

Before he could add anything else, Agnes appeared and rushed towards the man to attack him. Before she could reach him, Fern woke up.

She was covered in sweat and breathing heavily. She looked down and found herself holding the stone.

The stone made it all too real, which meant if she failed, she would be stuck in hell forever!