Free Alexis: Evil Reborn by Nolan Barcroft

The NEED
    By
    Chase Boehner
     
    Alexis wiped a hand across her sweat drenched forehead. The fire blazed through the toy factory and the blare of the alarms echoed through her panicked thoughts as she tried to make sense of what was happening.
    Seconds ago an explosion tore through the small factory, interrupting her routine at the assembly line where her quick, nimble fingers checked the dolls for defects before heading on to packaging. The blast, immediate and fierce, ripped through the assembly room in a flash of heat and pressure. The aftermath left overturned equipment and melted plastic dolls everywhere.
    Alexis grunted as she gasped for air that burned her lungs with each inhalation. Pieces of sanity broke through as she took in her surroundings. One of her arms was caught under the overturned metal belt, pulped in a mess of blood and flesh.
    “I don’t want to die,” she said, her voice cracking like dry, dead leaves.
    Alexis was stuck, pinned by the heavy machinery, and the slow realization of impending death crept across her flame blistered face. What was left to do but die before the shock wore off and the pain overwhelmed her, leading to a slow torturous death?
    Cries reached out for help, for comfort and reassurance, but her voice would not join the chorus. Weak and raw, it rattled, and the fire heated breathes she had already taken were rushing her toward darkness. She felt the icy fingers of death squeezing her lungs and heart even through the searing air. Hot tears streaked from the corners of her eyes as she began to give up.
    A minute passed in slow ebbing pain as her vision narrowed and the blackness of oblivion closed about its edges. A foot away from her she found her last focal point. The head of an Emma Doll, its plastic, raven locks already melted and one side of its tiny, clementine sized head melting until a nickel’s worth of space had opened.
    She laughed, hoarse and hacking, as the absurdity of a life wasted was reflected back at her through the tiny dolls disfigured head. It was fitting, she thought, to die staring at the ridiculous little toy she had wasted so many years of her life on assembling.
    There was movement in the dolls head; the quick flicker of a snake-like tail, black and scaly.
    “But how?” she rasped. In these final moments it was the how that bothered her, not her imminent death. The heads were solid pieces of plastic. Fifteen years on the assembly line had taught her that much about the product. She could write it off to hallucination if, in fact, the movement was not escalating as it did now.
    The tail vanished from sight and a small, leathery head emerged from the melting opening.  A tar black, cracked tongue darted out and licked at the scorched air. And its eyes, red and alert, had fallen on her. A flurry of blurred motion confused her momentarily, and then it was there, clawing at her agape mouth and forcing itself down her damaged air way. 
    She would have screamed, if that was an option, but she was beyond producing sound now. If the strange little creature wanted to curl up inside her and die with her, then so be it. There was nothing left to fight for, so she welcomed the encroaching dark as it swept over her.
    Her eyes flew open, and suddenly alert she moved, fighting against the belt pinning her down. She shifted on the floor, aware of the orange blaze consuming everything around her, and braced her legs against the overturned equipment. She could see her exposed skin blistering under the intense heat of the devouring flames. Suddenly she didn’t accept death as the final answer. Gritting her teeth beneath her splitting lips, she shoved hard and her arm tore free at the elbow leaving the ruined flesh behind to burn into ash.
    Something’s off, she thought as she stumbled toward freedom. She should be dead, but step by step, moment by moment, the increasing inferno caused her less pain and her vision was clearing up. Looking down, she saw her clothes were