"Lost in Delusions"
By: Hellvonvanity @GO
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Lacie loved the forest. It was by far the only place that she would play in, but on this particular day she wanted a little more. She wanted to explore a new plight of land. This was exactly how she stumbled upon the cemetery, usually something like this would scare a little girl like Lacie, but for some reason she wasn’t bothered by it. It was rather simple to her, it was just another place for her to play. Hugging her little bunny plushy, she pulled at the hem of her white skirts, scared that the cemetery would dirty them. However, even though this thought crossed her mind, she never thought about leaving and going home. It was much too interesting, this cemetery would become her new play place. It would be a lot of fun for a girl like her. That’s when she noticed a tiny path that branched away from the cemetery, her own curiosity got the better of her, and Lacie decided to follow it. Glancing over her shoulder once, she remembered Lucci. He had come along with her, but at one point had fallen asleep against a tree in the forest. She figured it wasn’t worth waking him up for, and that she would be back momentarily anyways. Following this little dirt path, she realized that here there was absolutely no civilization. There was no way for anyone to find her if she was to get lost. Shrugging, she continued down the dirt path that didn’t seem like it was ever used. Lacie let her hands run along the wildflowers growing around the dirt road, for some reason nothing living touched the path. Lacie was too preoccupied with her feeling of euphoria, that this simple fact did not come to her.
The path ended abruptly, it ended as fast as it had started. There was a pretty little cottage in the middle of a large dirt clearing. There was no grass, or any flowers in this area at all. The bugs and birds that populated the forest were no where in sight. Not a single sound could be heard. The little cottage looked seemed abandoned, but it wasn’t destroyed, or in bad shape. Skipping towards the cottage, Lacie pushed the door open. The inside of the cottage was pristine, it was clean, not a spec of dust existed. Strangely, there was a random beam of light shined on an object in the kitchen. Or at least, Lacie assumed it was a kitchen. Taking a cautious step into the cottage, she tried to focus on what the object was. On a closer inspection, there appeared to be some sort of sign next to it. Curious as to what it could possibly be, Lacie walked right up to it, not caring about any type of consequence at the moment. Since Lacie, her parents, and her brother lived in a mansion, they rarely had to see each other. Therefore, Lacie was never really educated in anything that had to do with safety with strangers, or not taking gifts from random strangers. Or some of the dangers you could find outside of your safe homes. The object on the plate looked like some sort of mix between an apple and a strawberry... Yet it was wrapped in a colourful candy wrapper. The crisp, heavy parchment paper next to it had two words in swirling elegant black writing. The ink that was used to write it was still damp, and the two words for simply: ‘For Lacie’.
Taking that as an invitation, Lacie pulled the wrapper off of the strange fruit, and took a minuscule bite out of it. A whole bunch of different sensations bombarded her at once. She could taste the sweet taste of strawberry, but there was the crisp sensation that you got when you bit into an apple, there was also a lot of sweetness that you usually related to candies. Lacie was so caught up in the wonderful taste of this strange fruit, she didn’t notice how her heart sped up, and how her vision began to dot with different colours. Within seconds, she was lying on the ground, trapped in whatever dream world the fruit had sent her.
Lucci woke up with a start. There was sunlight streaming in his face, and it was only mildly uncomfortable. Blinking, he tried to look around for Lacie. When she didn’t register on his vision scan, he jumped up in a bit of panic. “Oh dear. Where has she gone now?” Sighing, he began to search the surrounding areas of forest. “Lacie? Lacie my dear? Where have you gone?” A man who has been kidnapped, shouldn’t have to go find his captor. It just simply isn’t done that way. Then why am I in this kind of situation? I could leave if I so felt like... Even though Lucci’s thoughts went in that type of direction, he knew that he could never leave Lacie. When Lacie had first met Lucci, she had seemed so... broken, and lonely. You could tell she was a child that didn’t get nearly enough attention. It was almost heart breaking. When Lacie had proclaimed the fact that she was going to kidnap Lucci and use him as a bodyguard, he only half disagreed. There really wasn’t much left for him to do, and he did want to help this girl.
What he didn’t realize was that at one point he had suddenly grown to like this little girl, she had somehow captured his affections along with his will to serve her. If only she thought about anyone other than herself once in a while. Having to find her whenever she randomly ran away was beginning to get on Lucci’s nerves. The LEAST she could have done was leave a note. Maybe then I wouldn’t be on this wild goose chase. Breaking out of the forest, Lucci found himself standing in the cemetery, just as Lacie had been earlier. Lucci felt shivers go up his spine. It wasn’t the cemetery that creeped him out, it was just the fact that little Miss Lacie may have found herself alone in this cemetery. Out of the corner of Lucci’s eyes he saw a scarp of bright white fabric, it was shockingly similar to Miss Lacie’s skirt fabric. On a closer inspection, Lucci realized that it was actually part of Miss Lacie’s skirts, and she must have ripped it while trying to get onto this dirt path. The fact that nothing grew on this dirt path did not escape the observant eyes of Lucci. Realizing that Lacie might possibly be in danger, Lucci hurried down the path, practically sprinting down it. Pushing the door of the tiny cottage open, he barely had time to notice anything else before his eyes fell on Lacie, and the impending horror grew in his chest. Instantly he was down on his knees, making sure that she was breathing properly, and that she had a pulse. Glancing around the room quickly, he found the strange fruit, that was still clutched in Lacie’s hands. What was missing from this scene was the piece of paper. The note that was next to the fruit, it had completely disappeared without a trace.
Lucci quickly scooped Miss Lacie into his arms, and he sprinted back to the mansion. There had to be a way to fix this. There just had to be a way. If anyone was truly determined to find out what was wrong with Miss Lacie, it was Lucci. Miss Lacie’s family cared deeply for her, even if Miss Lacie herself didn’t think they did.
Lacie awoke in a strange land. Everything was brightly coloured, and the weirdest part was that she was completely alone. Lacie was hardly ever alone, and even when she was, it wasn’t this eerily quiet. Suddenly a beautiful blue haired woman appeared in front of Lacie. She was dressed in a white flowing gown. “Lacie.” Her voice was beautiful, almost like a thousand chiming bells. “You’ve done something that will now surely have a consequence. You will have to find a way to make this world bearable for yourself, but there is a lesson to be learned. Whether or not you learn it is completely up to you. However, there will be no way to escape this land unless you learn that lesson. I assure you there is no way you can leave here other than learning this lesson.” The lady’s voice was like a thousand chiming bells mixing into a single hypnotic, melodic rhythm. “You can summon almost anything into this world, but it will be taken from the outside world. Think twice before summoning something you might possibly regret.” The lady began to fade away, but Lacie quickly reached out to grab the lady’s wrist lightly.
“Wait! Who are you?” The lady just gave Lacie a gentle smile.
“I am the ruler of this dream world. I am the goddess of the lesson you are about to learn. I am the goddess of selflessness.” The goddess just faded away, and Lacie was left clutching nothing but thin air. With a feeling of complete loneliness, she remembered that she could summon almost anything into this dream world. So she thought hard about her bunny plushy, and it materialized in front of her. Smiling, she pulled the bunny close to her chest, and it made Lacie feel slightly better. Although she wished for someone who had a little more warmth, and could love her back. Thinking hard, Lacie wondered if she could simply summon people. In her head an image of Lucci popped up. His gray hair, and golden eyes were permanently imprinted in her brain already, so it was simple conjuring this image up. Lacie heard a manly grunt, opened her eyes, and smiled widely when she saw Lucci in front of her.
“Lucci!” She instantly jumped at him, giving him a big hug. “I was so scared that I would have to do this alone!” The look on his face was not joy of seeing her again, actually he looked a little horrified.
“What’s... Going on? Miss Lacie? What have you done?” Lucci was horrified by this new change. One second he was hurrying through a forest to get Miss Lacie somewhere safe, but then he suddenly had the oddest sensation, almost as someone had plucked him from where he was standing, and pulled him into this alternate universe.
“Well, when I was in this little cottage... I ate this fruit, it was the most fantastic thing I had ever tasted in my life. It made me happy beyond anything you could possibly think. Suddenly I was transported here, and there was this goddess lady who told me I could summon anything from the world outside of this dream world, so I summoned you!” She smiled widely, as only a child could do. She felt no fear about being trapped in this dream world, she was completely at ease here.
“Miss Lacie, did this... goddess tell you how we might get out of here?” Lacie needed to think for a moment. She was much too happy at the time to just be listening to the goddess’s voice that she didn’t really pay much attention to what the goddess was saying.
“She said something about... Me having to learn a lesson before leaving here? I’m not quite sure what the lesson is, but it can’t be anything important. Lucci! Play with me!” Lucci’s face instantly paled, which was quite a feat for someone as pale as Lucci currently was.
“Is there any way I can get out of here? On my own? Or can you send things out as easily as you can summon them?” Lacie’s face darkened a few shades.
“What do you mean? You don’t want to stay here and play with me?” Lucci felt like shaking the little girl. She didn’t understand anything. There didn’t seem to be even a single brain cell inside of that blue haired casing of hers that thought about anyone other than herself. She was a selfish brat, but even so, Lucci felt sorry for her.
“I mean that some of us actually enjoyed living in the REAL world. Please, send me back.” Lacie suddenly felt anger bubble to the surface. She couldn’t stand how Lucci was treating her like a servant. As if HE had any right to order her around. She raged silently, but it was evident to anyone who was watching that she was losing her patience, and so was Lucci. Lucci had stood the girl when she had kidnapped him and forced him into becoming a “bodyguard”, but the worst bit was when she didn’t even bother to think about how anything she did would affect him.
“No! I won’t! You are MY body guard, you will stay and protect me!” Lucci’s anger suddenly exploded. There was only so much one man could take, and he had obviously gotten sick of Lacie’s behaviour.
“Do you EVER think about ANYONE ELSE? EVEN FOR ONE SECOND OF THE DAY, DO YOU EVER EVEN BOTHER? Did you ever think about how I would feel if you just summoned me into this weird dream world of yours? I hope you realize that our bodies are still in the actual world right now. Anything could be happening to them.” Lacie’s eyes widened in surprise.
“You mean... Both of our bodies... Are just sitting in the actual world without anyone looking after them?” She seemed to want to pin the blame on someone, so Lacie instantly found the closest victim. “Lucci! Why didn’t you find a safe place to put my body? What if some sort of freak finds it and does weird things to it?” Lucci rubbed his temple, trying to keep the tired expression off of his face.
“Well, you highness, I was taking your body back home when you so rudely summoned me here, and now both of our bodies are lying in the middle of the forest without any protection at all.” Lacie’s eyes instantly wet themselves with tears.
“Well this isn’t MY fault! Why are you blaming me?” Lucci burst into psychotic laughter.
“That’s the thing! It IS your fault! If you hadn’t wandered off, you wouldn’t have found that cottage, and you wouldn’t have been thrown into this dream land! It’s also YOUR fault that you summoned me here, and left BOTH of our bodies alone and unsupervised.” Lacie flinched away from Lucci’s sudden outburst of anger. No adults had ever treated her this way, no one had ever had enough patience to stay around her long enough to get so fed up that they would rage at her. “Now tell me what the goddess person told you. I want every single detail. Did she even HINT at what the lesson was?” Lacie searched the banks of her mind, trying to stop crying, and to stop her show of weakness.
“Her... her name was the goddess of selflessness... Or something like that. It was stupid, it’s just a name!” Lucci felt a muscle nervously twitching in his cheek.
“That’s the lesson. Right there. Selflessness. It’s to be able to think about ANYONE other than yourself.” Lacie was obviously confused by this very concept. Her whole life she had really only thought about her own enjoyment, even if it meant hurting the people that she loved.
“I’m sorry Lucci... I never realized that... I was so selfish...” She sniffed, and the tears just suddenly all broke over her usually happy surface. “I’m so sorry!” With this last statement, a ringing noise filled the air.
“Well done...” The goddess’s breathy melodic voice echoed through the dream world, and suddenly they were tossed into blackness. When they both reemerged, they were on a path in the forest. They both shared a look. This moment was to never be mentioned ever again.
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Lacie loved the forest. It was by far the only place that she would play in, but on this particular day she wanted a little more. She wanted to explore a new plight of land. This was exactly how she stumbled upon the cemetery, usually something like this would scare a little girl like Lacie, but for some reason she wasn’t bothered by it. It was rather simple to her, it was just another place for her to play. Hugging her little bunny plushy, she pulled at the hem of her white skirts, scared that the cemetery would dirty them. However, even though this thought crossed her mind, she never thought about leaving and going home. It was much too interesting, this cemetery would become her new play place. It would be a lot of fun for a girl like her. That’s when she noticed a tiny path that branched away from the cemetery, her own curiosity got the better of her, and Lacie decided to follow it. Glancing over her shoulder once, she remembered Lucci. He had come along with her, but at one point had fallen asleep against a tree in the forest. She figured it wasn’t worth waking him up for, and that she would be back momentarily anyways. Following this little dirt path, she realized that here there was absolutely no civilization. There was no way for anyone to find her if she was to get lost. Shrugging, she continued down the dirt path that didn’t seem like it was ever used. Lacie let her hands run along the wildflowers growing around the dirt road, for some reason nothing living touched the path. Lacie was too preoccupied with her feeling of euphoria, that this simple fact did not come to her.
The path ended abruptly, it ended as fast as it had started. There was a pretty little cottage in the middle of a large dirt clearing. There was no grass, or any flowers in this area at all. The bugs and birds that populated the forest were no where in sight. Not a single sound could be heard. The little cottage looked seemed abandoned, but it wasn’t destroyed, or in bad shape. Skipping towards the cottage, Lacie pushed the door open. The inside of the cottage was pristine, it was clean, not a spec of dust existed. Strangely, there was a random beam of light shined on an object in the kitchen. Or at least, Lacie assumed it was a kitchen. Taking a cautious step into the cottage, she tried to focus on what the object was. On a closer inspection, there appeared to be some sort of sign next to it. Curious as to what it could possibly be, Lacie walked right up to it, not caring about any type of consequence at the moment. Since Lacie, her parents, and her brother lived in a mansion, they rarely had to see each other. Therefore, Lacie was never really educated in anything that had to do with safety with strangers, or not taking gifts from random strangers. Or some of the dangers you could find outside of your safe homes. The object on the plate looked like some sort of mix between an apple and a strawberry... Yet it was wrapped in a colourful candy wrapper. The crisp, heavy parchment paper next to it had two words in swirling elegant black writing. The ink that was used to write it was still damp, and the two words for simply: ‘For Lacie’.
Taking that as an invitation, Lacie pulled the wrapper off of the strange fruit, and took a minuscule bite out of it. A whole bunch of different sensations bombarded her at once. She could taste the sweet taste of strawberry, but there was the crisp sensation that you got when you bit into an apple, there was also a lot of sweetness that you usually related to candies. Lacie was so caught up in the wonderful taste of this strange fruit, she didn’t notice how her heart sped up, and how her vision began to dot with different colours. Within seconds, she was lying on the ground, trapped in whatever dream world the fruit had sent her.
Lucci woke up with a start. There was sunlight streaming in his face, and it was only mildly uncomfortable. Blinking, he tried to look around for Lacie. When she didn’t register on his vision scan, he jumped up in a bit of panic. “Oh dear. Where has she gone now?” Sighing, he began to search the surrounding areas of forest. “Lacie? Lacie my dear? Where have you gone?” A man who has been kidnapped, shouldn’t have to go find his captor. It just simply isn’t done that way. Then why am I in this kind of situation? I could leave if I so felt like... Even though Lucci’s thoughts went in that type of direction, he knew that he could never leave Lacie. When Lacie had first met Lucci, she had seemed so... broken, and lonely. You could tell she was a child that didn’t get nearly enough attention. It was almost heart breaking. When Lacie had proclaimed the fact that she was going to kidnap Lucci and use him as a bodyguard, he only half disagreed. There really wasn’t much left for him to do, and he did want to help this girl.
What he didn’t realize was that at one point he had suddenly grown to like this little girl, she had somehow captured his affections along with his will to serve her. If only she thought about anyone other than herself once in a while. Having to find her whenever she randomly ran away was beginning to get on Lucci’s nerves. The LEAST she could have done was leave a note. Maybe then I wouldn’t be on this wild goose chase. Breaking out of the forest, Lucci found himself standing in the cemetery, just as Lacie had been earlier. Lucci felt shivers go up his spine. It wasn’t the cemetery that creeped him out, it was just the fact that little Miss Lacie may have found herself alone in this cemetery. Out of the corner of Lucci’s eyes he saw a scarp of bright white fabric, it was shockingly similar to Miss Lacie’s skirt fabric. On a closer inspection, Lucci realized that it was actually part of Miss Lacie’s skirts, and she must have ripped it while trying to get onto this dirt path. The fact that nothing grew on this dirt path did not escape the observant eyes of Lucci. Realizing that Lacie might possibly be in danger, Lucci hurried down the path, practically sprinting down it. Pushing the door of the tiny cottage open, he barely had time to notice anything else before his eyes fell on Lacie, and the impending horror grew in his chest. Instantly he was down on his knees, making sure that she was breathing properly, and that she had a pulse. Glancing around the room quickly, he found the strange fruit, that was still clutched in Lacie’s hands. What was missing from this scene was the piece of paper. The note that was next to the fruit, it had completely disappeared without a trace.
Lucci quickly scooped Miss Lacie into his arms, and he sprinted back to the mansion. There had to be a way to fix this. There just had to be a way. If anyone was truly determined to find out what was wrong with Miss Lacie, it was Lucci. Miss Lacie’s family cared deeply for her, even if Miss Lacie herself didn’t think they did.
Lacie awoke in a strange land. Everything was brightly coloured, and the weirdest part was that she was completely alone. Lacie was hardly ever alone, and even when she was, it wasn’t this eerily quiet. Suddenly a beautiful blue haired woman appeared in front of Lacie. She was dressed in a white flowing gown. “Lacie.” Her voice was beautiful, almost like a thousand chiming bells. “You’ve done something that will now surely have a consequence. You will have to find a way to make this world bearable for yourself, but there is a lesson to be learned. Whether or not you learn it is completely up to you. However, there will be no way to escape this land unless you learn that lesson. I assure you there is no way you can leave here other than learning this lesson.” The lady’s voice was like a thousand chiming bells mixing into a single hypnotic, melodic rhythm. “You can summon almost anything into this world, but it will be taken from the outside world. Think twice before summoning something you might possibly regret.” The lady began to fade away, but Lacie quickly reached out to grab the lady’s wrist lightly.
“Wait! Who are you?” The lady just gave Lacie a gentle smile.
“I am the ruler of this dream world. I am the goddess of the lesson you are about to learn. I am the goddess of selflessness.” The goddess just faded away, and Lacie was left clutching nothing but thin air. With a feeling of complete loneliness, she remembered that she could summon almost anything into this dream world. So she thought hard about her bunny plushy, and it materialized in front of her. Smiling, she pulled the bunny close to her chest, and it made Lacie feel slightly better. Although she wished for someone who had a little more warmth, and could love her back. Thinking hard, Lacie wondered if she could simply summon people. In her head an image of Lucci popped up. His gray hair, and golden eyes were permanently imprinted in her brain already, so it was simple conjuring this image up. Lacie heard a manly grunt, opened her eyes, and smiled widely when she saw Lucci in front of her.
“Lucci!” She instantly jumped at him, giving him a big hug. “I was so scared that I would have to do this alone!” The look on his face was not joy of seeing her again, actually he looked a little horrified.
“What’s... Going on? Miss Lacie? What have you done?” Lucci was horrified by this new change. One second he was hurrying through a forest to get Miss Lacie somewhere safe, but then he suddenly had the oddest sensation, almost as someone had plucked him from where he was standing, and pulled him into this alternate universe.
“Well, when I was in this little cottage... I ate this fruit, it was the most fantastic thing I had ever tasted in my life. It made me happy beyond anything you could possibly think. Suddenly I was transported here, and there was this goddess lady who told me I could summon anything from the world outside of this dream world, so I summoned you!” She smiled widely, as only a child could do. She felt no fear about being trapped in this dream world, she was completely at ease here.
“Miss Lacie, did this... goddess tell you how we might get out of here?” Lacie needed to think for a moment. She was much too happy at the time to just be listening to the goddess’s voice that she didn’t really pay much attention to what the goddess was saying.
“She said something about... Me having to learn a lesson before leaving here? I’m not quite sure what the lesson is, but it can’t be anything important. Lucci! Play with me!” Lucci’s face instantly paled, which was quite a feat for someone as pale as Lucci currently was.
“Is there any way I can get out of here? On my own? Or can you send things out as easily as you can summon them?” Lacie’s face darkened a few shades.
“What do you mean? You don’t want to stay here and play with me?” Lucci felt like shaking the little girl. She didn’t understand anything. There didn’t seem to be even a single brain cell inside of that blue haired casing of hers that thought about anyone other than herself. She was a selfish brat, but even so, Lucci felt sorry for her.
“I mean that some of us actually enjoyed living in the REAL world. Please, send me back.” Lacie suddenly felt anger bubble to the surface. She couldn’t stand how Lucci was treating her like a servant. As if HE had any right to order her around. She raged silently, but it was evident to anyone who was watching that she was losing her patience, and so was Lucci. Lucci had stood the girl when she had kidnapped him and forced him into becoming a “bodyguard”, but the worst bit was when she didn’t even bother to think about how anything she did would affect him.
“No! I won’t! You are MY body guard, you will stay and protect me!” Lucci’s anger suddenly exploded. There was only so much one man could take, and he had obviously gotten sick of Lacie’s behaviour.
“Do you EVER think about ANYONE ELSE? EVEN FOR ONE SECOND OF THE DAY, DO YOU EVER EVEN BOTHER? Did you ever think about how I would feel if you just summoned me into this weird dream world of yours? I hope you realize that our bodies are still in the actual world right now. Anything could be happening to them.” Lacie’s eyes widened in surprise.
“You mean... Both of our bodies... Are just sitting in the actual world without anyone looking after them?” She seemed to want to pin the blame on someone, so Lacie instantly found the closest victim. “Lucci! Why didn’t you find a safe place to put my body? What if some sort of freak finds it and does weird things to it?” Lucci rubbed his temple, trying to keep the tired expression off of his face.
“Well, you highness, I was taking your body back home when you so rudely summoned me here, and now both of our bodies are lying in the middle of the forest without any protection at all.” Lacie’s eyes instantly wet themselves with tears.
“Well this isn’t MY fault! Why are you blaming me?” Lucci burst into psychotic laughter.
“That’s the thing! It IS your fault! If you hadn’t wandered off, you wouldn’t have found that cottage, and you wouldn’t have been thrown into this dream land! It’s also YOUR fault that you summoned me here, and left BOTH of our bodies alone and unsupervised.” Lacie flinched away from Lucci’s sudden outburst of anger. No adults had ever treated her this way, no one had ever had enough patience to stay around her long enough to get so fed up that they would rage at her. “Now tell me what the goddess person told you. I want every single detail. Did she even HINT at what the lesson was?” Lacie searched the banks of her mind, trying to stop crying, and to stop her show of weakness.
“Her... her name was the goddess of selflessness... Or something like that. It was stupid, it’s just a name!” Lucci felt a muscle nervously twitching in his cheek.
“That’s the lesson. Right there. Selflessness. It’s to be able to think about ANYONE other than yourself.” Lacie was obviously confused by this very concept. Her whole life she had really only thought about her own enjoyment, even if it meant hurting the people that she loved.
“I’m sorry Lucci... I never realized that... I was so selfish...” She sniffed, and the tears just suddenly all broke over her usually happy surface. “I’m so sorry!” With this last statement, a ringing noise filled the air.
“Well done...” The goddess’s breathy melodic voice echoed through the dream world, and suddenly they were tossed into blackness. When they both reemerged, they were on a path in the forest. They both shared a look. This moment was to never be mentioned ever again.