A/N: The italics are the author's messages to the reader!

"Almost there now" the boy says to himself. He is running at full speed and getting closer to where he needs to be. Then he hears someone yell "Hit the showers!" The boy stops running, stands up straight and catches his breath. He then proceeds to go to the locker room to change clothes.

Fooled you didn't I. I bet you thought I was going to kill the boy already. Well your guess was wrong! Ahem anyway...

"Darn that practice was tough!" said the boy to one of his friends. "I know it felt like we were in hell; actually, it was probably worse than hell." Both of the boys laugh. "SHOOT! I'm late and I need to get home! See you guys later!"

I'm sure all of you think that you know where this is going, right? Well I'm here to assure you that every last one of your guesses are wrong!

The boy runs to the parking lot and then to his car, starts it and speeds off to home. He drives as fast as he can because he realized moments ago that he's almost late for dinner, and at his house his mother takes no excuses for being late. Driving as fast as his car would go he flies onto a dirt road into the woods, because it is a shorter route to his house.

Ok, take a guess on what happens next, I'm sure you all are thinking 'oh how typical', ok that's enough thinking for you, back to the story!

Driving through the woods he passes trees, trees, trees, trees, a ghost, trees, more trees, trees, trees, an evil spirit looking to reap souls, more trees, more trees, a hitch hiker wanting a ride only to kill another innocent teen, more trees, some more trees, and finally he's home, and just in time for dinner, so he thinks. He sits down at the table and looks over at his mother who is staring angrily at him. "I hope you know you are an HOUR LATE!" his mother screams" Didn't I tell you to set your clocks ahead, it's daylight savings time! Now go to your room as there will be no dinner for you! And I don't want to hear any of your excuses 'Oh I was at football practice; oh I was out with my friends!" She yells as he walks away.

Strange isn't it, yeah even I thought so, and I'm the one who is writing it!

Anyways the boy stomps upstairs to his bedroom and slams the door shut. "I wish I could live a different life" he mumbles. "I wish I could see what another life, maybe on another plain, is like". His room shakes a bit, and it startles the boy " what was that?" he thought to himself. Then there was a knock on his door. Thinking it was his mother he ignores it. Then there is another knock, so he ignores it again. Suddenly his door splinters and goes flying across his bedroom. The boy jumps out of bed and grabs a random piece of plastic tubing he found on the floor, and he slowly creeps towards the door. The closer he got the warmer it became. When he reached the edge of the doorway the temperature must have shot up forty or fifty degrees.

Something didn't seem right to the boy. The temperature was now as hot as if the house was on fire, but there was no orange glow, just a white light emanating from where his door once stood. He stands in the doorway and the white light was so bright it nearly blinded him, and the heat was blistering, but something was making it so he couldn't move from where he stood.

Now before I go on I would like to explain to you that there is going to be a large change in pace on how this story is being told, no more interruptions on my part. Also I would like to say, things may not be what they seem, let your imagination run wild and I will do my best to paint the picture in your head for you.

Standing in the light hurt so much and yet he couldn't move. Then, suddenly the light went out. He was surrounded by darkness and the stench of burning, rotting flesh filled his nostrils. He looked around and saw nothing, not even his own hand in front of his face. He could feel someone breathing down the back of his neck, but he couldn't turn around and see who it was. Fear was overtaking him, his heart was pounding and his knees were shaking. Then candles began to light, and lamps began to turn on, and suddenly darkness disappeared and a royal blue room now surrounded him. There were strange paintings on the wall, all of the same man, doing the same pose, in the same clothes. The only things that were different were the background and the frames. The breathing moved to his ear, but he still couldn't move, then he hears:

"Welcome to my domain!" the force that was holding him in place was no longer there. Then the man in the paintings appears in front of the boy. "A pleasure to meet you young man, you may call me Henry" says the man charismatically. "P-p-pleased to meet you, I-" The boy stutters. " No need for an introduction my boy, I already know everything I need to know about you" he grins" and there is no need for talking, I can read your thoughts."

The boy not knowing what to do begins to pinch himself to see if he's dreaming. "Come on my boy, there is no need to do that, this place is as real as your last home. You wished for another life, so I brought you here." He smiles evilly "Now go get some rest, you have a big day ahead of you. Oh, and I recommend writing a letter to your family and friends as I don't think you are going to see them for a very long time." The boy heads back to his room.

Three hours go by and the boy is finishing his final letter. As he writes he reads aloud: "I'm sorry about everything I've ever done to you in the past, I guess that this is the last time you will ever hear from me, so I wanted to say, I love you mom, thank you for being such a great mother. I'm sorry." A tear drops from the boy's eye. "Why... why!" his emotional moment was abruptly halted by the screech of some sort of inhuman creature. He jumps out of his chair and hits the floor "what was that" he thinks to himself. He gets off the floor and sprints to the door. When he reaches the door he hears the fluttering of rather large wings and sees Henry sitting in a chair with his hands folded in his lap. This time he was wearing a white suit.

"Hello my friend, finished I presume. Please let me see you letters and I will deliver them to whomever they need to go to as soon as possible." As the boy hands over the letters Henry grins "Your new life will begin shortly, please have a seat. Would you like some dinner?" he looks the boy in the eye" Roast beef it is!" Henry snaps his fingers and an entire roast beef dinner appears along with a table. Henry looks into the boy's eyes once again. "How did I do it? Well my boys, you will see in a short amount of time, now eat!" The boy eats the dinner and Henry stares him in the eyes the entire time, his smile seems to get bigger after every bite the boy took. "Finished? Good! Now before you go off and start your new life, about your letters. I want to know, did you put all of your emotions into these, yes? Ok good, and what would happen if they were to get lost. Oh no reason, I was just wondering. You would die? Is that what you said? Oh, well, perfect!" He grins, "watch this!" Henry takes out the boy's letters, holds them high into the air, snaps his fingers, and the letters burst into flames. Henry chuckles as they burn. " NO WHY! NO!" shouted the boy. "Welcome to your new life of eternal suffering! Ha ha ha! Also there is one rule I would like to tell you. There will be no screaming here, I mean an eternity of screaming really is enough to kill you. And if you survive for eight days and don't die from what you will go through, then you have every right to go home." He looks into the boys eyes again " no you aren't dead. If you were dead, this would be a lot more painful for you. If you do die here, you will stay here and the pain will multiply, and be a lot worse for a lot longer. Now go, you have a lot to do today." Henry snaps his fingers yet again and a giant beast fly's into the room landing on the floor in front of the boy. This creature was massive. It was nearly 16 feet tall and had a human shape (standing on two feet, upright etc.) and it had a wing span that was approximately 20 feet tip to tip. It also had bright red eyes and sharp black claws on its fingers. The skin on this beast was a very light gray color, almost ash like. On its face, well there really wasn't a face, it only had eyes, there was no mouth, no nose, and how this creature made any noise at all was a mystery. On top of his head were large black horns that were rather sharp. The beast grabs the boy by the throat and begins to fly off with him in its hand. "I hope you have fun with my friends ha ha ha! Oh I would like to speak with you when you are done playing!" Henry says as he waves to the boy and the creature as they fly off.

The beast's grip was tight around the boy's neck, hard enough to break the skin leaving claw marks. It was also making it rather hard for the boy to breathe. But before he passed out they landed in an empty white room. The beast released his death grip and the boy dropped to the floor, and landed with a plop. The pain was unbearable. It was so difficult for him not to cry or make any noise at all, because if he were to, he'll never be able to go home again. The beast suddenly let out a deafening screech and flew away, and then a man dressed in a blue jump suit strolled into the room. The boy cowers into the corner and tears begin to fall from his eyes. He childishly hides his face, hoping that the man would just go away. But he didn't, because the next time he looked up he was right in front of him with a wrench and a pair of branch trimmers in his hands. The boy takes a good look at the man, who strangely doesn't have a face, or at least he can't see one. The man looks back at him, and takes off what seemed to be his face. Underneath it there was a torn apart face with half a jaw and a grin that seemed to be stuck there. The man's tongue was dangling from the side of his mouth with no jaw. What was remaining of his teeth were black and chipped, lets just say that he was hideous.

The man gestured for the boy to open his mouth, and the boy didn't comply. So the man walked right over the boy put his hand on his mouth and pried it open. The boy quickly tried to snap his mouth shut in hopes to bite the man's fingers off and make a run of it, to where he doesn't know. But his attempt at escape fails because once he tried to bite down, the man broke his jaw, to keep him from trying to bite him again. The boy winces in pain and tries with all of his might not to cry as he felt the man grab his tongue with the wrench that he held in his hand. The boy opened his left eye to see what was going on, when he did he realized the man had opened the branch trimmer and was placing his tongue between the two sheers. Before he closed the branch trimmer the man mumbled something that sounded to the boy like " The boss says no talk, so I make no talk!"

At that very moment after he said that he closed the two levers on the branch trimmer and almost in one clean cut, cuts off the boys tongue. It actually took him two cuts to take it all off. This made the pain even worse for the boy. Yet again trying so hard not to scream the boy yells in his head "WHY WHY WHY DID I WISH FOR A NEW LIFE SOMEBODY HELP ME PLEASE...SOMEBODY GET ME OUT OF HERE!" tears begin to flow down the boy's face as he realized the position he is in, if he lives and makes it back home, life will never be the same again, if he dies and stays here, all of his hopes, all of his dreams, and everything that the boy worked for, for his whole life, will be gone forever. This realization in itself was enough to kill the boy, all because of this wish, he now has nothing to live for, but he is hell-bent on making it through these eight days alive so he will never have to go through this again.

Wallowing in his newfound pain the boy sits and silently cries, until he hears the voice of Henry. The boy looks up to see Henry standing in the middle of the room talking to the man. He almost blends in with the walls because he is wearing his white suit. The boy hears Henry whisper "Good job, but don't worry there will be more fun in the week to come, you can go". The man leaves the room and Henry begins to walk over to the boy.

"Get up, I need to speak with you in my office." Henry says to the boy, who was now showing no signs that he was crying. Henry puts out his hand and he helps the boy on to his feet. "You've got balls kid, most people scream their first time here. I'm somewhat proud of you, but I will still enjoy it when I see you squeal like a pig. I'm also looking forward to seeing you living here for the rest of your life! Now if you please walk this way with me."

They step outside of the room and begin to walk down a long somewhat straight, with a few slight curves here and there, hallway, passing by thousands and thousands of rooms that look exactly like the one the boy was just in.

After a good hour of walking in complete silence, Henry turns to the boy and says "we are almost there so stop your crying, and would you please stop wishing to leave. I despise your thoughts, they are driving me insane!" He looks the boy in the eyes "I said shut up! I have a head ache shut your thoughts up!" Henry lifts his right hand and back hands the boy right in his broken jaw, the pain brought the boy to his knees. "Get up we have a lot more walking to do!" He grabs the boy by his shoulder, picks him up and drags him until they reached his office.

They enter his office and it is probably the most interesting room in this entire place. It had black walls with gold curtains. There was a large oak desk in the center of the room and there were 3 golden lamps that illuminated the room just enough so you can see what it is you are working on. The one bad thing about this room is that on the wall directly behind Henry's desk, there were fourteen sets of eyes looking in all directions.

"What are they, well that is my security. If I am ever to leave this room I can see every corner at any time of day. It's how my office stays so safe. Please my boy have a seat," Henry says as he gestures towards a long black couch with a gold blanket resting on it. The boy sits on the couch. It was surprisingly comfortable, and to be honest this would be the last thing he would expect to see in a place like this. "This is where you will sleep, under the watchful eyes of, well he, ha ha, but I must warn you, you will not have a comfortable sleep. You will be haunted by dreams that you do not wish to dream. You will eat no food. You will drink only water, only twice a day. Once when you wake up, and once when you come back in here after a days...fun" Henry laughs and looks at the boy "Now get some, well go to sleep! And I will see you sometime tomorrow"

Strangely enough Henry was wrong. The boy didn't have any bad dreams, but when he awoke, he was in the white room again. As his body woke up all the way he felt a sharp pain on his hands. He tried to move them but it didn't seem to work. So he looked to his left then his right and he saw that his hands were nailed to a table. He begins to silently cry again. His crying was brought to an abrupt halt when he heard the clicking of what sounded to be bones, and he felt a sharp pain in his stomach. He looks down at his stomach and find a small creature, that sort of resembled a monkey but had no skin. It was ripping and tearing at that area. The boy wants to scream but can't, so he does the only thing a normal person would do in a situation like this, he passes out.

When the boy wakes up, again, he is back in the black office with Henry looking at him. "Good morning" he says with a smile. "I thought I would actually let you sleep for a while, seeing how you put up with so much, and haven't made a single sound." His smile disappears "but don't think that I will be this nice to you for the rest of the time you are here for. You still have three days left" he looks the boy deeply in the eyes. "Yes I kept you asleep for some extra time, I thought it would make an interesting surprise, take a look at the changes that have occurred in the past few days." The boy quickly begins to examine his body; he looks to his legs, to find that there is a lack of them. He nearly let out a wail as he finally felt the pain of the two cuts that cut off his legs. Then he remembered that he can't talk so all he did was silently cry. "Keep looking there's more" Henry says with an evil smile on his face. The boy quickly realizes more pain through out his body, he lifted his shirt to see cuts and gashes from what seemed to be a whip all over his torso. He looks up to Henry rather quickly and asks in his head, what happened. Henry looks him in the eyes and says "Well, do you remember my friend in the blue shirt. Well lets just say he enjoyed himself torturing you. He set a rather large stone block on your legs until they shattered and then he removed them ever so brutally with his nice not so sharp rusty axe. Then just for kicks him and I took whips and made sure that your unconscious body was covered in blood by the time the day was finished. And of course the whipping went on for the past few days, look." Henry picks up a mirror and the boy looks into it, seeing a mangled cut and bruised face, with a broken jaw missing a tongue and many teeth, and we can't forget the cuts from a whip. This was the boy's new image. Reality hits him yet again, if he makes it through all of this, his life will be significantly different, and nothing will be the same ever again. "Oh yes, I almost forgot, would you like your legs back, seeing how they are...or...were yours". Regardless if the boy said yes or no Henry pulls out, from under his desk, a pair of mangled, crushed legs. The look on the boy's face turned from sad to horrified in a matter of seconds. Just under a week ago, he had been running on those legs and using them, not ever thinking he would lose them, and now he is looking at them, severed from his body. Henry laughs as he throws them on the floor. The boy nearly screams, but resists. "Go back to bed there's more fun planned for tomorrow." Henry says as he begins to walk out of the room " Oh and don't try and run now, you are almost done with your stay here." He cackles as he walks out of the room.

The boy not knowing what to do, yet again, sits there and lets what's left of the tears fall down his face. He thinks to himself as he sits "what's the point, I'm never going to survive in here, and when I go back home, everything will be different. No one will recognize me. No one will ever believe what I've been through, and I probably will end up dying sooner than I ever thought, why me, why me!" the boy then slowly drifts into sleep, and reality fades into a dream. A dream where he is sitting at the dinner table with his family, his mother sitting across from his father, and his sister sitting across from him. Everything back to normal, the way it should have been, but then, Henry appears and begins to slowly stroll into the room smiling the evilest smile the boy has ever seen on his face. As he walked into the room he begins to slowly take out a piece of paper, and he reads.

"I am here to claim the lives of the entire family, I'm claiming this household! Now everybody on their knees, not you boy, you stand here with me. Take this knife in your hand boy, and do as I say, and maybe your life will return back to normal in your real life." The boy tries to resist but can't because something seems to be controlling his every move. He begins to slowly walk towards his family, knife in hand, then Henry says:
"Kill them all, cut off their heads!" the boy walks over to his father and begins to slice his head off, then to his mother. He begins to scream in his head.
"No stop, wake up, this is only a dream, wake up!" but he can't, the dream doesn't stop until there are three headless bodies lying on the floor.
" Good my boy, now pick the heads up and give them to me, so uncontrollably the boy picks up the heads and gives them to Henry, then, he wakes up out of his sleep. He wants to scream but he doesn't when he sees Henry standing over him with a bloody knife and a bag full of something. "Good morning again, did you enjoy your dream?' Henry says, then stairs into the boy's eyes "yes? Good, well it would be nice for you to know that what you saw wasn't a dream, look here. Henry pulls out the bag and dumps them on the floor, and there laying on the ground were the heads of his family. Henry chuckles. The boy tries his hardest not to scream in pain and disbelief at what he just saw; he tries so hard it begins to hurt. Then Henry shouts out, "come there is more to be done!" He snaps his fingers and the winged beast comes and picks the boy up and takes him into a room with a large screen. "I am going to leave you four in here," says Henry as he walks through the doorway. He then takes out three other chairs and neatly places the heads on them. "Have a nice time you all, I will be back in a few minutes."
Hours go by and the boy is crying his heart out and is trying to not believe the fact that he just killed his entire family, he begins to look around the room for something that will kill him, but the room has rounded corners and there is nothing sharp. The boy then thinks to himself:
"Why me god why me, I didn't mean to wish for this, please god get me out of here..."
Henry then comes bashing into the room and screams "He cannot help you here, this is my domain! Now sit back and watch this!" Henry turns the screen on, and the boy sees the dream he just had, and he is now watching over and over the slaughter of his family "I want you to remember something before this next day is finished, I am a terrible liar." Henry whispers. "Get some rest, tomorrow is your last day!"
Thinking nothing of what he said the boy slowly drifts off to sleep, and yet again he has the dream he is killing his family. This disturbs him so much he begins to cry again; because that is the only thing he has left to do. When the boy awakens Henry is there looking at him.
"Come with me!" he says
He grabs the boy by the throat and drags him out of the room, back into another one of those white rooms but this one had a stretching rack with rusted iron shackles on it. Then the man in blue limps into the room, picks the boy up, and securely straps him on to the rack.
" Since today is your last day, I figure ill end it with a bang" Henry laughs, as he signals to the man to start turning the wheel. The boy is in immense pain now and is trying so hard not to scream. "Go ahead scream, I promise you will be set free, and I won't kill you, just scream, and it will all be over, actually no, say mercy, and I will send you back home, back to the way you once were. Come on you know you want to, just let it all out, say mercy and I will send you home." The boy shakes his head, he knows he only has one more day of this and he is done.
As the hours go by the boy is experiencing more pain than ever before, but is holding it all in, until he hears.
"Say the word my boy and I promise with all of my heart I will let you go."
Henry says in the most sincere voice possible. The boy doesn't know what it was, but something changed his mind and made him believe that he was telling the truth, so with whatever energy was left the boy mumbles
"Mercy..." and then Henry tells the man to stop, he unhooks the boy, waves his hands and chants some sort of incantation and the boy is back to normal.
"Stand up my boy, you are all finished" Henry says.
"I am, you mean its all over, I can go home!" the boy shouts
"Yes, go home, and see your family, they aren't dead anymore, everything will be ok" Henry snaps his fingers and the boy wakes up in his bed, the door back to normal, and the temperature as he remembered it. He jumps up and runs down stairs and sees his mom sitting there at the dining room table. He runs to her and says

"I'm so sorry mom, I'm so sorry, I will never be late again, and I love you so much. Please forgive me!" he gives her the biggest hug I think anyone has ever seen.

"Of course I will honey, just don't be late again" his mother says with a smile on her face. The boy nearly cries after realizing the fact that all of that time he was gone, only took up an hour or so. Suddenly there is a knock on the door. "I'll get it," the boy says as he jumps up and runs to the door. He opens it to find that he is now staring down the barrel of a twelve gauge shotgun. He looks up to see who it is, but can't see the face in time. Whoever it was then pulls the trigger and the boy hits the floor, headless.

When he wakes up he's back in the black office room with Henry looking at him again. "Remember what I told you before... I am a terrible liar...your time here was nowhere near over, your eternity has only begun." Henry laughs as the boy screams and lies on the floor in a tantrum. "Your time here wasn't up when you spoke, so now as I promised, you will live here forever!"

I know you are probably all upset at me right now for what I did to him, but reality is reality. In life there are no happy endings, there are no fairy tale-like lives. There's only reality, and reality is never what you want it to be.

A/N: Well if you have reached the end of this story, you're probably feeling pretty creeped out, I know I was. Any who, I hope you enjoyed it! Thanks for reading, all though this is not my story.