The Monarch Effect (DISCONTINUED DRAFT)

Chapter 1

The night consisted of strong mint, toothpaste, a cold shower and talking with headmates about the day, all while trying to stay fronted and focused. When he was done, Samuel walked out into his room to get his clothes on for bed. When he was finally finished, he clicked off the singing radio and rolled into bed. Alright, everyone, he said inside his mind. The body needs its sleep. Do anything, and you'll be in trouble. He yawned and began to drift off, finding a comfortable position to sleep in while adjusting the covers of his bed.

Hey Samuel! A girl's voice said to him. It wasn't aloud, only heard by him. He answered with a tired "yeh?"

I have an idea, I'll try to meet you in a dream.

"Ahkay, Santha..."

For most, the thought of having multiple personalities may scare some people, and maybe for others, it's a fascinating idea. But, in many cases around the world, this was their daily life. Samantha is one of Samuel's headmates. Or alters. Or parts. It depends on who you're asking. Internally, she looks relatively the same as him, pale and dark blonde, but her brown eyes, frizzier hair, and height are set her apart the most. She's about sixteen or so years of age, and was the more optimistic of them, the rest of the system.

Samuel first met her in a dream, and they've slowly gotten better at meeting each other that way. Dreams can be hard to control, and he was glad she wasn't just some odd character, but an actual person. It started to break down the barriers of his memory, "new" memories of sensations, experiences, traumas. After that, she became a helper, a manager for the inside. Sometimes, it was hard to contact each other while awake, so, tonight, Samantha wanted to try and enter into Samuel's dream and attempt to show him around the Innerworld.

For those who do not know, the Innerworld is a vast place created inside of the brain of a multiple, to give mates what should be a safe place to stay. Samuel has only been inside the Studio, where mates go to front. He can't leave, and if he tries, he ends up in the same exact room through the doorway out. He opens it, steps in, and appears as if he came in from the outside, or through an odd reversed mirror. However, his other headmates can enter and exit the Studio as they pleased. Occasionally, they'll bring him objects from the town outside the Studio, which they called the Secluded City. That's as close as he's ever gotten. No one really knew why, so they agreed that maybe the studio itself was some sort of mate, manifesting as a building of protection, or there was one somewhere that wasn't ready to be seen yet. That's the hope, at least.

    After about 15 tired minutes, Samuel and his friend were able to slip into the subconscious and enter a dream. He was placed at the hospital putting in data into the computer, marking specific things on the sheet of paper before him. Looking down, he noticed something off about his hand. When he looked up, the room had disappeared and became a dark, shady forest with fog that encased the trees. He began to feel scared, knowing he was somewhere he could barely remember. A few seconds after he began walking, he heard a girlish voice coming from behind him.

"Remember, Samuel, it's a dream!" The voice echoed as it cried.

"Santha?" The Host, given the name as the leader of the system, had his first instance of conscious thought this night. He turned to see a girl in a white doctor's coat and with bright green scrubs, her usual fashion which matched his own in reality. Samuel strongly believed he's seen someone who looked like her outside, in reality, but multitudes of the memories he kept to himself are still cloudy, with entire periods of time, such as the year he turned eighteen, simply gone. The amount of memory sharing, as he calls it, in recent months, has still not yet revealed everything.

"Are you ready?" The girl asked.

"I hope so, how're we..." when he looked up, the sky came to have the look of an early November afternoon, with cool air surrounding him, causing a chill to pass throughout his body. Not even a second later, his hand was grabbed by another in a crowd of people walking in the street. He was weaved through the mass, defying it's direction until he was taken to the left side. He was forced up until he was met side by side with Samantha, who kept her grip on his fingers. He saw her smiling in total excitement, feeling it as her grip became tighter.