A chill ran down his spine, sharp and deliberate, as if the very air had turned against him. His breath grew shallow, uneven—each inhale a struggle, each exhale a quiet surrender. He tried to turn, to search the corners of the room, but his body felt no longer his own. It was as though invisible threads had wrapped themselves around his limbs, holding him in place.
The shadows began to shift.
At first, it was subtle—barely noticeable, like a trick of the eye. But then they deepened, stretching unnaturally along the walls, merging and separating as if alive. The darkness no longer belonged to the absence of light; it had a presence now… a will.
His pulse thundered in his ears.
“Who’s there?” he tried to speak, but his voice broke before it could fully form, dissolving into the suffocating silence.
A faint whisper answered—not from any direction he could trace, but from within, curling through his thoughts like smoke.
“You felt it… didn’t you?”
His heart skipped.
The temperature dropped. The air grew heavy, pressing down on his chest. He could almost see his breath now, faint and trembling in front of him. And then—just for a moment—he caught it.
A figure.
Not fully formed, not entirely real, but unmistakably there—standing just beyond the edge of sight. Its outline flickered like a dying flame, bending and warping as though it existed between moments.
He forced his eyes to focus.
But the more he tried to see it, the less certain it became—until suddenly, it was gone.
Or perhaps… closer.
A sharp pressure gripped his wrist.
He gasped.
There was nothing there—nothing he could see. And yet, the sensation was undeniable. Cold. Tight. Possessive.
“You opened the door…”
The voice again—clearer now. Closer.
His mind raced, searching for reason, for logic—anything to anchor himself. But the room no longer obeyed the rules he knew. Time felt fractured. Space felt wrong.
“What do you want?” he whispered, barely holding onto the sound of his own voice.
A pause followed.
Long enough to make him wish it hadn’t.
And then—
A soft, almost amused response:
“To remind you… you were never meant to forget.”
