Heaven and Hell is pretty cringe, actually: Part Nine

*This story is under my folder “Heaven and Hell is pretty cringe, actually”. Gacha Club character designs are under my forum: https://www.youngwriterssociety.com/topic/117842-my-character-designs-lt-33-3?start=195. Enjoy!*

I’ve been expecting the unexpected as me and Amanda go down the slides, but I didn’t think that I would see this.

We’re both sitting at the end of the pink inflatable slide. It’d be dark, just like everything else is in Hell, except for the white lamp shining above the pink double doors. 

Yes, I’ve been expecting the unexpected, but not this. 

Amanda looks at me, confused. I wish I knew what all of this meant, but I haven’t been to every part of Hell.

So, I get up, bringing Amanda with me because she’s still holding on. I don’t mind. When this is all over I will never get to hold that hand again.

If it ever will be over. I turn around and see nothing. There’s never any exit to the places Hell takes me, never a way out. I don’t want to open the doors but there’s no better option.

Why can’t there be flames and chains? Why all this walking and no purpose? Why-

“What’s this about?” Amanda asks as she pulls me to a sign on the wall next to the doors.

Oh. The sign. I forgot about that. They’re there to describe The Great Horrors…this must be a Great Horror.

Which means we absolutely have to go inside. Those are the rules and I can’t change them.

The sign is white with black cursive letters, bordered by painted pink tulips. I used to like the color pink until Adele started liking it.

Now it burns my eyes and my brain. 

At least it’s not all over the sign. Speaking of which, the cursive is mostly legible:

“Hooray! Huzzah! You made it to the last Great Horror! No demon has ever done this before, so give yourself a pat on the back! 

Yes, you deserve a treat for all that hard work, but wait to receive it. The best treats are what’s given later.

Now if you’re not in a line, go inside and say hi!”

“This is a Great Horror. There are three of them and this is the third. I have to get past all of them in order to get out of here. We have to pass through this one.” I say.

Amanda lets go of me.

“And this will be our way out?” She asks me.

“Like I said before, I don’t know a whole lot. But it should definitely be a way out for you.”

I walk back up to the door and turn the knob. It opens into a pink and white striped room.

We walk in together.

…………………………………………………………………

…………………………………………………………………

In the pink and white striped room, there are display cases of cupcakes, cakes and cookies. A tinkling music box plays in the background and a small chalkboard lists all the menu items on the side that has the register.

It’s a bakery, but there’s nobody here.

“So there are demons hiding?” Amanda asks.

I nod. Most likely, there are. We have to look for them.

There are white tables and seats for two with them all around the bakery. We walk past them, looking for a demon and a way out. The music box drips its melody all along and…someone is eating.

Faintly, I hear chewing. I walk towards where I can hear it the most, Amanda following behind me. I’m hearing it behind one of the display cases, so I go up to the gates that separate the customer from the cash register and open it. We both go behind them.

There’s a bone-white pale woman sitting on the floor, eating a slice of pink cake with her bare hands. No-they’re more like claws with how long and sharp her fingers are. She’s wearing a black dress with pink trim and puffy sleeves. There are black clown lines going down her hot pink eyes, which match her long hot pink hair. Atop her head is a black hat with pale pink roses at the brim.

She’s dressed like a poison cupcake and she doesn’t seem to notice us, from how she gorges herself on the cake. I don’t think I want her to, but-

“Excuse me?” Amanda asks.

The woman freezes, her black snake pupils zeroing in on us. Pink cake bits stick to her face.

She smiles with sharp teeth.

“Customers! Oh goody, I’ve been waiting for customers!” She exclaims.

She jolts right up and wipes the crumbs from her dress.

“Come on now, sit with me!”

Sit with her? On the dirty ground? Because she got crumbs everywhere.

“No thanks. Show us the way out.” Amanda says.

The woman disappears in a puff of pink smoke. Just like th-

“In a minute! Have some cake.”

The woman is right behind us, an arm wrapped around the both of us, a cake slice just like the one she was eating in each hand.

I knock the cake slice over. I wouldn’t eat that if it was the last food item in the world. Far too sweet.

“Rude. But that’s alright. I have more ca-“

“We don’t want your cake.” I snap.

The woman pulls away from us, literally stomping her heels as she walks in front of us. It’s a wonder she doesn’t slip on the cake frosting and crumbs. 

She narrows her eyes at us, her lips turn into a scowl, which makes her look like a wrinkled cake pop.

“Now listen here. I let you have my cake and you threw it on the ground. Nobody nice does that to Isobelle!” She screeches, stomping her foot.

The cake crumbs and frosting on the ground start morphing together into swords and spears. I think I hear the treats in the display cases moving and…a child screaming? I can’t be too sure with all of this noise.

We fly off the ground, because it’s clear that Isobelle is ready for a fight.

…………………………………………………………………

…………………………………………………………………

The treat swords are spinning towards us. I slash them with my claws, black goo spilling from my fingertips.

The black goo boils and burns them, just like the starlight bursts Amanda is shooting out. I don’t know how I’m doing this and I don’t think she does either, but we keep on as Isobelle keeps creating more and more treat swords that grow longer and longer, less like swords and more like vines. They’re everywhere and they smell like fake butter, the way all bakeries smell.

“You!”  Isobelle yells.

But she’s not yelling at us. She’s glaring at…Dane.

Dane freezes up like he didn’t think that she’d notice him. I don’t know when he got here, either.

“Me?” Dane points to himself, a nervous laugh escaping him.

The bakery rattles with treats that form into weapons, my hands are getting tired. I definitely hear screaming now that the music has stopped.

It’s like the screamer is buried, clawing out, calling out-not like. They are.

“Don’t tell me you forgot so soon.” Isobelle grins, making her way towards him with claws covered in red velvet crumbs.

There’s a new sweets sword-vine every second we obliterate one. Frosting is dripping down my wings,caking the feathers together, sealing them.

It’s trying to bury us.

The screaming is still going on. It won’t stop. It can’t stop. It’s muffled but persistent.

Dane stands up straighter as he looks her dead in the eyes and says, “That screaming. It sounds like Naomi.”

My hands slip and the goo hits Amanda’s white wings. She cries out as parts of it burn off.

It’s a small part, yet I was still careless. Careless. I never thought of myself that way when I was alive but maybe I was. I should have known that Adele would want to take her any way she could. I should have been at the house earlier. If I had done any of those things, then none of this would be happening.

But I didn’t, because I didn’t think it would. I watched horror movies where wronged spirits plagued the innocent and still wasn’t prepared for the worst.

“You’re the one who took her!” Dane shouts.

I don’t see the ceiling anymore. I don’t even see Dane and Isobelle on the floor. The treats are everywhere.

“Very good! And I’ll take you too since you dropped by!” Isobelle cackles.

We can’t move. The treats have all bunched up together, pushing us into a prison. Amanda chokes on a mouthful of frosting.

“Not a chance! You’re not keeping both of us!” Dane yells. He runs from Isobelle, off to find Naomi.

We aren’t alive, but I don’t want us to be trapped here, surrounded by treats that taste like the color yellow. I don’t know how to explain it, they just do.

I just wish we could get out. If there was any way out, I’d-

“What did I say about NOT FOLLOWING THE RULES?!”

Oh no. It’s her.