I am somewhere I have been many times. I don’t like coming here-I’m forced when I least expect it.
 
I know when I’m going there. Black clouds swirl around me and a smell of mustiness fills my lungs-like the time I explored my Aunt’s wardrobe.
 
Screaming surrounds me-each shriek tearing through my body, leaving convulsions and goose bumps behind. The strong smell of blood is overpowering and makes me feel nauseous. Feeling lost, I stumble around in arid darkness, helpless, fearful.
 
Suddenly I am pulled off my feet. As I lost my balance, I attempted to turn and see the culprit, my eyes only finding a familiar jacket and hairstyle. My body hits a cold, hard pavement. It is raining, and I’m screaming. My wrist is bent at a hopeless right angle-and not in a good way. My sharp jagged bone has pierced my now pale and pasty skin-a river of deep crimson blood and sweat mixing and flowing down my arm like a small river…
 
I grit my teeth…
 
Shout…
 
And faint…
 
I awoke to the smell of ‘pine fresh’ air freshener, and the usual blare on the radio. As I drive my Mini Cooper, I sense I must be heading for work-Leek is ahead then Alton Towers-not far to go!
 
I’m approaching the junction where the lights always catch you-but I have a great policy-ignore orange lights! I get the occasional horn, but I don’t care. As usual, it’s just my luck to get amber, but I don’t wait for green. Just as I scream past the lights, I see another car-seemingly a clone of mine-shoot past his light…
 
There is no time to think at 50mph…
 
Not enough time to respond…
 
I scream…
 
The cars collide with an orchestra of buckling, twisted metal, as the speed of 50 is reduced to 0 in a second.
 
I feel as though every bone in my body is being destroyed simultaneously. This time, a scream is not enough. A bloodcurdling shriek shoots from my mouth.
 
I hear a wicked bout of laughter, which makes my frame feel like a block of ice.
 
Sounds like someone’s having fun with me.
 
I’m transported again-as fast as a bullet from a gun-into a hard wooden seat. My legs are bent in a small cart, and I feel a cold metal bar against my chest. Over a crackling tannoy, I hear an all-familiar voice, with an all too familiar message.
 
*                     *                    *
 
“Ladies and Gentlemen. Keep your arms and legs inside the car at all times. Enjoy the ride.”
 
As I open my eyes, a sharp tingly-jolt in my stomach tells me the ride has started. I speed past myself operating the controls in the small shed on the platform. A mixture of hardcore cheers and I-wish-I-hadn’t-got-on-this-ride-shrieks engulf the ride train. We zoom around sharp corners on a tilt, then reach a big hill, whiz down a brightly lit tunnel, and are back at the station-lap two.
 
But something is different this time. I am no longer at the controls-where I should be of course-but seem to have disappeared somewhere. Where, I don’t know. I only catch a split-second as we hurtle through the station.
 
We are whizzing around the razor-sharp bends at the speed of an angry bull-this surely isn’t normal.
 
Suddenly everything becomes chillingly terrifying.
 
“Ladies and Gentlemen, please hold on-we have lost power and control of the ride. In…” The tannoy cuts off with an ear-splitting squeak. It looked like it had blown-smoke pouring out. But then, as if by some miracle, the smoke shot past the train-right to the front…
 
The smoke starts to swirl, until a hooded man in a tattered black shawl faded into vision. An acrid smell of death and rotting corpses shrouded the train, and suddenly we were disconnected from the other carriage, met by many screams…
 
 
Of pure terror…
 
We start tearing down the hill at breakneck speed, and through a pitch-black power-cut tunnel.
 
 
We reach the last bend before the station; rising up a sharp incline. The train started to run out of power, and ominously, was rolling back into the path of the other carriage…
 
The brakes don’t stop us. “Oh my gosh” is the worlds biggest understatement.