You are Princess (Halloween Story 2025)

Hey all
Here's my attempt at a psychological thriller (this one is supposed to be written as if it's happening to you)

You Are Princess....

You wake shivering, every muscle aching as a chill gnaws at your skin. The room is pitch-black, save for a faint halo of light seeping through the edges of a heavy metal door. You’re locked in.

You try to move, but your body refuses to obey. Every limb feels heavy, powerless, as if you’re trapped in one of those dreams where you’re desperate to run but frozen in place.

You think about screaming for help, but your voice is too weak. Scared, you just stare at the light, wondering how you got here.

Broken, fragmented memories twist in your mind. Nothing is clear. The last thing you remember is sitting in your car. You shake your head, trying to clear the fog, but it doesn’t work.

Terrified that you’ve been kidnapped, you manage to slide yourself into the corner of the dark square room. You feel the walls with your hand, and the cold, damp brick makes you think you’re potentially in some sort of basement.

You look desperately around for a window, but other than the light from under the door, the room is pitch dark.

You strain your ears, desperate for something familiar. A voice, a car passing outside, even the chirp of wildlife. But nothing comes. Only a low, unnatural, dull drone hums through the air, as if the entire building itself is alive and breathing.

Hours pass, and you do nothing but stare at the light through the crack of the door, hoping that someone misses you, that someone is looking.

Then, whistling.

At first, it’s quiet, coming in the direction of the door. As it gets louder and more obnoxious, you push against the wall, trying to hide yourself.

In your mind, you think about waiting to jump anyone who opens that door, but in reality, you barely have the strength to hold up your head, let alone stand.

Footsteps.

They get closer and closer as the whistling gets louder and louder.

Soon, a shadow blocks the light coming in through the door. Someone is there. Someone, maybe the person who’s kidnapped you, is standing just outside.

A sudden tap rattles the metal door, the sound sharp and hollow as it echoes through the dark. The vibration crawls across the floor and up your spine. You recoil, every instinct screaming out.

Tap

Tap

“Are… you… being good…..princess?” A shrill voice says through the door, making her hair on your body stand up on end.

Princess?

You’re a man.

Has this person kidnapped you by mistake?

“Princess?” The man’s voice leaks through the door, rough and broken between long, rattling coughs. A low chuckle follows, dragging out each syllable. “Don’t fear. We will be together soon.”

Terrified, but still able to think logically, you know that you need to gather as much information as possible, so you take a sharp breath in.

“Wh… who are you?” you manage to whisper, your voice raw and breaking.

“Good…” the voice hums, followed by a slow, rhythmic tapping against the metal door. Each knock lands like a heartbeat. “Won’t be long now, princess…”

Hoping this is all just some big misunderstanding, you build up the courage to speak again.

“I…I’m not a princess,” you explain. “I’m…a-a man.”

Silence, all but the man behind the doors labored, heavy breathing.

You wonder if this mistake has upset him. You wonder if he knows that you're a man. You wonder if he’s going to become angry once he realizes his mistake.

“I am…” The man splutters, dragging in a wet, wheezing breath before forcing the words out. “I am a visionary, and I must have his princess… so he can make her a queen.”

Before you can even process the madness, the man turns and walks away, whistling so loudly it drowns out your thoughts. You stare at the sliver of light spilling through the cracks, desperate to understand what he could possibly want from you.

Over the next few hours, or what you think is hours, you begin to gather your strength. You walk across every inch of the cell you're in, trying to look for a window or anything that might help you.

All you find is that the walls are made of what you think are breeze blocks, and the metal door is indeed locked tight from the outside. You don’t even have a bed. Like a dog, this person is forcing you to sleep on just a tatty out blanket that has been placed in one corner.

You place your ear to the door in desperation that you might hear something, anything.

What you hear makes no sense. A dull hum of machinery blends with the gentle clatter of hard plastics and soft murmurs, like a hidden crowd of children speaking in code.

You knock on the metal door. Gentle at first, but you grow in confidence.

“H-Hello….” You say softly through the door. “Is anyone there? I need help.”

Much to your surprise, the clattering of hard plastics stops, and the murmured voices go silent.

“Is…is there someone there?” You ask as your heart thuds in your chest

Slowly, a soft, almost feminine shoulding footstep comes close to the door, trapping you inside the small room.

“I’m sorry,” a weak, almost unnatural-sounding voice says back in reply to your calls for help. “Y-You need to be good. Only harm comes to those who are bad.”

Your eyes grow wide. This must be another person captured. Your mind races with questions, but the adrenaline coursing through your veins makes it hard to concentrate.

 “W-Who are you!? Where are we!?” You ask, forcing yourself to stop at just those questions.

Oddly, you hear the voice begin to sob, but it’s robotic-sounding, like a machine trying to emulate true human emotions.

You become desperate from the lack of response

“Hello!? Can you hear me!? I don’t know where I am! I need help!”

Silence as you listen to them sob, but eventually they reply.

“I…I…. was a boy called Liam.” The voice replies, sounding as if those words weigh heavy upon their soul. “The man….” The voice continues, as if even referring to them hurt physically, “Calls me…. N-Nova…. I’m his special helper.”

“Liam,” you say desperately, pushing your ear so hard against the cold metal door that it hurts. “P-Please, can you help me?”

“N-Nova,” they correct you. “D-Don’t call me Liam. I’ll…I’ll…. I’ll get punished or…or….dismantled.”

Before you can respond, frantic movement erupts outside the door. Nova’s sobs turn into desperate, panicked cries.

“Please stop! Don’t! No! I wasn’t doing anything!” You hear Nova weep.

Your stomach knots as you press my ear harder against the cold metal, straining to hear. Heavy footsteps pound toward the door, each one deliberate and full of menace. The air presses in, suffocating, as if the thing outside is right on top of you.

“Bad girl!” the voice booms, cutting like a knife with its ferocity. “I let you out and this is how you repay me!?”

Nova pleads desperately for forgiveness. You even consider banging on the door to draw attention, but before you know it, Nova’s voice falls silent.

There is a sickening scraping of metal and a muffled struggle.

A hard plastic clatters to the floor, and I gasp, frozen in sudden fear.

Then suddenly everything goes silent. No sobs, no cries, only the dull hum of the building vibrating through the floor.

I press my ear to the door, listening, but there is nothing. Not a single sound. My heart races and my hands tremble. I know the man is out there somewhere, and I can only imagine what has happened to Nova.

You sink to the floor, back against the wall, trying to calm your own shaking body, knowing the door is the only barrier between you and the horror that has just passed.

You shuffle back to the corner of the room and collapse onto the blanket, trying to make yourself as small as possible. Tears slip down your cheeks for the first time, cold against your skin, while your body shakes uncontrollably in shock.

Time passes slowly.

You don’t know if it’s hours or days that have passed, but you measure the passing of time by how many times you’ve gone to the toilet in the corner of your room.

You haven’t eaten or had any water. Your body feels like it is slowly wasting away, but worse, the thirst spins your head, pounding with an unshakable headache.

Just as you consider drinking what pools in the corner of your cell, you hear the faint sound of whistling. Slowly it approaches, as if to mock you. Eventually, the whistling gets louder, and before you know it, the footsteps stop just outside the door, blocking the light once more.

“Princess…?” the man says, making you push back against the wall in fear.

You say nothing, unable to build up the courage or energy to use your voice.

“Princess…?” the man repeats and then coughs. “It’s time,” he taps the door twice. “Will you be a good girl?”

Delirious from the lack of sleep, water, and food, you manage to just bring yourself to say. “P-Please let me go.”

“I’m going to free you…” The man replies, only tapping the door one time. “Good girls get treats. Bad girls do not.”

He coughs violently several times, and there is a thud against the metal door, as if the man has collapsed and is using it to support himself.

“Princess…” he says, slurring his words. “I have high hopes for you.”

Struggling to process his words, you gasp as the metal door creaks open for the first time. The hinges shriek in protest, and the heavy slab swings wide, slamming against the wall with a metallic thud.

Blinding light floods the room, forcing you to shield your eyes. Through your fingers, a large silhouette looms, its movements stiff and almost robotic. As your vision adjusts, you squint against the glare and realize there is not just one figure, but three.

However, before your eyes can adjust, you're picked up off the floor by very cold hands by your arms. You try to fight, but you don’t have power in any of your muscles. You are dragged along the floor with your feet scrambling behind.

“Be a good girl,” a voice in your ear whispers as you’re dragged from the room and into the next.

Still dazzled by the light, the rest of your senses go into overdrive. You can smell burning flesh and plastic. You can hear the hum of high-powered electricity, and the entire room vibrates.

Eventually, they strap you to a cold, unyielding bed. A harsh light glares down into your face, blinding you, and panic surges as you thrash against the restraints. The straps bite into your skin, holding you fast, no matter how desperately you struggle.

“Move!” the man commands, standing over you. “You two dolls, stand aside and let me work!”

The cold hands let go of you, and that’s when you feel a prick in your arm. Something is being injected inside you. Instantly, your skin starts to burn and your heart races.

“Stop!” you scream, “Please stop!”

Your body feels heavy like stone, and before you can do anything more, darkness clouds your eyes, and you drift off into a deep sleep.

You fall, not into sleep, but into something deeper and stranger. A void. Your body vanishes beneath you, yet you’re still there, suspended in blackness.

Then you see yourself.

Your body lies strapped to the bed below, chest rising and falling, lips slack, pale under the harsh light. You float above it like a ghost tethered to nothing, watching helplessly.

You try to move back down, to sink into yourself, but invisible currents pull you farther away. The bed grows smaller beneath you, the straps biting into a body you can no longer control.

“Wait!” you try to shout, but your voice makes no sound. Only silence.

The room stretches and warps. The walls elongate like shadows at sunset. The humming machinery twists into hollow moans, echoing all around. Your floating self drifts upward, away from your body, through the glaring light until it burns white-hot and swallows everything.

And then you hear it.

The whistling.

It seeps into the dream like poison, curling into every corner of the void. The sound hooks into you, dragging you sideways through the blackness, and for a terrible second, you feel as if you’re being reeled in like a fish on a line.

Then humming

Like the humming before, but much louder. Like it’s coming from inside your head

There’s no escaping it. The low buzzing hum is all you can hear.

Your eyes snap open.

Light floods your vision, but it doesn’t sear like before. Everything seems sharper, as if your eyesight is in 4K. Yet the rest of you is wrong. Cold. Numb. Hollow.

You try to move, but still, you cannot. You can’t feel anything holding you down, but you just can’t move.

Then it really occurs to you….

You can’t feel anything at all!

Not even the cold sting of the air.

“Ah…” the man’s voice says somewhere in the room. “You’re awake.”

He looms above you, and for the first time, his face comes into perfect focus. Every crease, every blemish, every cruel line carved into his skin. This is the man who has kept you locked in that cell, the one whose voice has haunted every moment since.

“Let me—” you begin to shout with outrage, but your voice is different.

Not a single vibration from inside your throat. Just the artificial sounds of a woman’s voice emanating from your location

You struggle, wanting to bring your hands to your throat, but you can’t move.

“Yes, yes, yes….” The man smiles down at you. “Princess, let me show you what you’ve become!”

With a mechanical groan, the table you lie on moves you upright, and from across the room, a mirror stares in your direction.

For a moment, your mind refuses to accept it. Then the truth settles like ice in your chest.

You are no longer… you.

A doll stands where you should be. A full-sized female doll with blazing ginger hair that gleams under the light. A skin-tight bodysuit wraps around a flawless hourglass figure, hips wide and chest full, sculpted with a precision that feels cruel.

The face is delicate, symmetrical, almost beautiful, if it weren’t sculpted from plastic.

You scream out in terror, but the sound is detached, like you’re speaking through a computer.

The man as he circles you slowly, admiring every detail. You even see him touching the doll’s body in the mirror, but you cannot feel anything. You’re like a brain, trapped inside a fish tank, looking out into a world that you no longer feel part of.

“Plastic and silicone,” he says, as if savoring the words. “Every inch of you. Perfect. A princess made real and mine to keep forever.”

“You have been reborn,” he whispers. “No longer that grotesque…thing. Now you are a perfectly sculpted piece of art. Your femininity radiates from every angle. You are my princess!”

And as you stare at the reflection, as the truth coils around your thoughts like barbed wire, one unbearable realization rises to the surface.

You cannot feel your body because you do not have one.

Tap.

Tap.

Tap.

The man’s fingers drum the table, slow and deliberate. But you do not hear it with your ears. You feel it. Each strike lands deep inside your skull, like knuckles rapping on the walls of your mind.

“Stop!” You yell out repeatedly as the tapping continues, like he’s torturing you from within. “Please stop!”

“Stand,” the man commands with a cough.

Your body jerks upright before you even realize you’re moving. Stiff limbs creak, the sound like popping plastic.

You stand on legs, but feel as if you’re floating. In the mirror, you can see yourself moving the doll's body, but it doesn’t feel real. It’s as if you're in a VR world.

Your head turns with a slow, mechanical drag. Your new face makes no expression, no sign of the horror screaming inside you..

Tap.

Tap.

Tap.

The man’s fingers strike the metal table again. Each tap drives deeper into your skull than the last. You feel it echo inside your head, like a pulse you can’t block out.

“Are you my princess?” the man mumbles between long breaths. “Are you my Margaret, brought back from beyond to be at my side? Forever, my lovely princess?”

Then your eyes shift, unbidden, to the far corner of the room.

And you see it.

Your old body.

Lying on the table, pale and still, your chest sunken as if the breath had been stolen. Hair matted with sweat, hands curled at your sides, mouth slack. It looks like a mannequin, but it’s you. The body this man has stolen from you.

None of it makes sense. Desperate, you lurch toward your lifeless body, hoping against reason that if you reach it, you might somehow slip back inside. But you barely manage two stiff, halting steps in your new doll form before the man’s will seizes you, freezing you in place.

Tap.

Tap.

Tap.

The man’s fingers slam harder now, each strike like a hammer on glass inside your head. The burning panic in your mind stutters, replaced by a numbing fog. Your limbs lock mid-step from the sharp pain in your mind.

“No!” the man says. His voice is calm but sharp enough to cut. “Y-You are my princess! W-Why do you yearn to be that thing anymore? You have the body of a goddess!”

Your head pivots back toward him in one smooth, puppetlike motion. Inside, you’re screaming, but nothing comes out except a faint mechanical hum.

“Put me back.” You say, wanting to scream out emotions, but you can’t even cry.

Tap

“No, you’re not.” The man replies, having to catch himself from falling, as if your defiance pains him

“Put me back!” you repeat, trying to pull yourself from the doll's body in any way you can

You claw at the skin-tight suit and the slick silicone beneath, tearing and raking at yourself in a frenzy, but nothing gives. No seams, just smooth plastic. A scream tears from you, popping and crackling, like a speaker on the verge of breaking.

“Put me back!” You shout once again, causing the old man to sigh and cough in frustration. “Put me back in my body!” You rage

“Princess”! The man shouts, coughing and gasping for air. “You are not—”

“I’m human!” you shout again, trying to rip the hair off your doll's body! “I’m human!”

The man’s face twists and collapses into a grimace. His cough rattles in his chest, and he lowers his head in disappointment.

“Why,” he growls, voice cracking, “I just want to be with you again, princess!”

Tap.

“But again, you reject what I’ve given you!”

Tap.

“I’ve given you life again, princess!

 TAP.

The tapping isn’t just noise, it’s knives inside your skull, slicing through your every thought as if he’s touching a pressure point.

“STOP!” you scream, but it comes out garbled, static-laced, the voice of a machine crying through a broken speaker.

“Another failure,” the man spits, coughing so hard he nearly doubles over. “Another one who doesn’t understand her place.” His eyes flicker with rage, “You’re not my princess. You’re another mistake!”

He stumbles toward you, his eyes burning with a feral, almost inhuman rage. The aggression there is something out of a nightmare, something demonic. Your body jerks involuntarily as he lunges, his hands seizing you with brutal force, dragging you where he wants you to go.

“Well, if you don’t want me,” he hisses, dragging you across the room. “You’ll go where all the others go. With the other failures who want to pretend they aren’t my Margaret….”

He reaches for a massive steel door at the far wall, one you hadn’t noticed before, and heaves it open. Hinges scream like tortured metal. The light beyond is dim, greenish, sickly.

He shoves you inside. You stumble, nearly falling as your stiff limbs hit the floor.

And then you see them.

Rows upon rows of dolls. Hundreds. They line the walls and huddle in corners. All have eerily similar hourglass figures, sculpted faces, and blank, plastic eyes staring emotionlessly. Yet, they step back in fear.

They all cower as the door opens, their blank faces turning toward you in perfect unison.

“No…” You whisper through the static of your own voice. “No, no, no…Please!”

The man laughs as she shoves you inside. “No, you’re my property now. You’re a thing. Like the rest of these failures!”

The heavy metal door slams shut behind you. The sound echoes like a gunshot.

On the other side, the man’s coughing laugh rattles through the steel. “So unfortunate,” he wheezes. “We could have been happy together.”

A lock snaps into place as the man sighs and walks away.

The room grows silent. Only the low hum of unseen machinery and the faint, mechanical whimpers of the dolls fill the air.

You stare at them, at all those expressionless faces. They’re not mannequins. They’re not toys. They’re people. People like you.

You’re trapped. Trapped inside a doll’s body. Trapped among dozens, maybe hundreds of others.

And for the first time since you woke in that cell, true terror blooms in you….

You’ll never be human again.