Awake. In the sanguine halflight, the cloying heat. Illumination cuts through only where it grows to a fever pitch, and the earth itself boils. Her own glow long since loured, something inexorably wrong seeping into the tone at the edges, a sickly corruption eating away at her body and mind, whispering the formless concept of its hatred into the edges of her psyche. The ground rumbles and shifts, warping and writhing beneath her feet. How long has she been here? Has she ever been anywhere else, or was it all a dream, some tormenting illusion of a place that never was, a life that never could have been, all to pain her for the amusement of the hating, hungry thing that surrounded her? Step by step, one foot ahead of the other. No turning back, lest she discover what waits behind. But to move forward is unthinkable, untenable. Every inch brings new horrors, screaming, crying. People lost to the world, bound by the twisting tissues. Faces she remembers, faces she forgot, faces she never knew. Desperate to escape, she turns and tries to return from whence she came, clawing at the calcified growths that bar her way. Hours are spent, fingers bleeding and broken, and when she finally breaks through - all she sees is the same chamber she stands in. She looks back at herself. For all the scars and wounds her psyche bears, it holds nothing to the decay of her soma. The light at her heart crawls outward, pulsing veins of languid light seeping slowly into her flesh, rotting the corrupted, sullied flesh they touch. Her gaze lingers for but a moment before she turns and takes flight. How many steps has she taken? How long has she been running? Where does it end? Every footfall is silenced, sinking ankle-deep into the viscera. Eyes watch her, mocking her with their disinterest as they roll at her passage, half-lidded in indifference. The endless tunnels ripple and narrow, forcing her ever forward. Frantic to make them stop, she lashes out. A wild swipe of a hand, the broken splinters of bone jutting from the edge of her fingers catch it, and it pops. They swivel wildly, settling on her. No more disinterest. No more disdain. Now, they hate. And the tunnels begin to close in tighter, as she runs. The tunnels grow narrower. The space around her thins. Ever y step more desperate, each inch harder and harder. The gro und squeezes her feet as she moves, folding tighter around th em as they sink. Bone crunches even as she lightens her step. Folding. Tightening. No space, nowhere to go, she claws forward. There is barely the room to stand straight, shoulders pulled inward to sque eze forward. Tighter and tighter. Less and less. No longer can she even rema in facing forward. Back and fr ont alike press against the wa lls. Breathing grows strained a nd difficult. Splintered, broken bone grasps desperately for re prieve, for air, for safety and fr eedom that never comes to be. It folds tighte r, and she be gins to suffo cate. no spa ce no space no spaceno spacenospa acenospac enospace nospace nospac enosp aceno space She emerges, at last, into the chamber. So many times she has been here; and yet, it is new. Alien. The magma roils and bubbles, broken feet finding purchase on lumps of seared rock. She looks upon the baleful horror before her - and it looks back. She sees it, a single yellow eye, so vast she could almost walk through its pupil. And it sees her. Past the broken flesh, it looks into her soul, the formless whispers planted for so many hours taking hold. Etched upon the terminus of her ego, she feels the breadth of its hatred. Of the spite and contempt in which it holds her, holds all things. Friends and loved ones reach for her, feeble arms half-consumed by the beast, and she reaches out to take one - and twists it. The faint crunch of crumpled bone, an anguished sob, and she feels only hatred. Disgust. Disdain. Again and again, one after another, time after time, hour after hour. The whispers pull back. The frayed edges of her soul burn with their absence, a seething wound. She tries desperately to reach out for it, to wrap herself in its hatred and hide from her actions, but it gives her no clemency, no separation, no excuse. It leaves her to face what she has done; and she cries. For the first time since entering, if indeed she ever entered at all, she cries. The light dims, over the hours. In its absence, the stone cools. The burning orange fades to the red of cinders, and to blackness. And she awakes. In the sanguine halflight, the cloying heat. nightmares make a great medium for more experimental writing. good stuff.
