2:00 AM
The stench of charred flesh woke me. Fire cluttered the bedroom as it's smoke filled all the fire missed. I couldn't see past the gray and red -the haunting painting splashed from The Devil's own fingertips- and when I tried to shout to my family (I have three kids, a wife and a halfbreed wolf) I was choked to silence. Stepping around in the inferno was a kind of fear I've never quite felt before, at least not in its entirety and I was sure I we were all doomed.
I managed, Painfully, to make it out to the hall. The rest of the cabin was mirror image to the bedroom. I had no way of knowing if everyone was alive. I couldn't go on much longer, my lungs became dry and I was starting to lose all of my senses. I tried to march on through the flames but with only a few steps to my name I fell to the ground, laying in the burning flames, as unconscious as I was before I woke up to hell.
2:30 AM
My eyes opened and expecting to find myself in a hospital bed, surrounded by annoying doctors telling me not to worry and to relax, I quickly jumped up as if to force an escape. I was on the floor where I fell in the flames and the fire was gone. Nothing seemed to be damaged and there was no longer any stench of burning skin.
Under the assumption I simply had an intense nightmare and acted it out in my sleep, I made way back to the bedroom. When I found the bedroom door I noticed the hinges have been melted, as if the fire was real, but it couldn't have been real or I would be dead. I tugged on the door as hard as I could but it wouldn't open. No doubt the melted hinges where to blame, so I left to the kitchen in search of something to numb my worry.
I reached for a bottle of Jim Beam and pulled it out. Before I could even twist the cap it slipped from my hands and shattered at my feet.
2:45 AM
I grasped a towel to wipe dry the whiskey and as I bent over, I slipped. The endless shards of glass punctured into every spot of my legs they possible could and though the pain should be immense, I felt nothing, and not a single drop of blood poured.
I sat there thinking of my situation and I noticed a shadow pass my left. I quickly jumped up and ran to chase it, but to no avail, it was gone.
2:58 AM
I couldn't quite grasp the event. The only explanation that came to mind was still being asleep the night before and none of this ever happened, just stuck in a lucid dream. Though that didn't seem true, it's the only conclusion that I could understand.
The shadow came again, but not to pass, it stopped dead in the hall. It made its way towards me.
3:00 AM
The shadow was now at my feat and no longer a shadow. It was something hideous, standing ten feet tall with the ears of a wolf, the face of a man, the figure of a leopard, hands of bone, hooves instead of feet and the eyes of an owl. Every instinct told me to run, but I couldn't in the least bit. As if my body was made of cement I just stood there.
The creature groaned while opening his mouth to speak. “In each moment a choice is to be made, no life is free of choice, and every choice is to effect the outcome of that life.” Said the creature in a voice unlike any other, sorrowful yet proud, deep in it's tone, strong enough to rattle the entire planet. “How long did you think you would go without your choices catching up to you? Have you not wondered why you have not searched for you family, why you have not spoken, why you have done nothing but observe your surroundings?” It continued.
I tried my best to speak to the creature, but no words would come.
“I am a Collector, I collect, life. To give all their rightful end.” Said the creature. “You spent your life focused on your work, you ignored your family, you cared more about the shoes on your feet then the pain those around you have felt, each night ripping themselves apart because of you. Because you didn't care about them, and never would.” The creature continued. “Worry not... You no longer have a reason to worry, you are where you belong now, alone.”
The creature walked back to the hall and stopped to speak once more before it's leave. “Perhaps now, you will care.”
It left, and never again would I hear a voice other then the one in my head. The rest of eternity would now be spent in solitude.
Reply With Quote