My name is Esme, and this is the story about how my mere existence almost brought the world to an end.
Now that doesn't actually seem physically possible, does it? Well, yeah, but it still happened. It was weird, and terrifying, and traumatic, but it was real.
It all started a normal Wednesday in the middle of April. I woke up to the sound of hard winds outside the window and rain pattering on the windowsill, my bare feet barely visible on the opposite side of the bedsheet. I was tired, my mind fuzzy.
After laying in bed for a while, I turned myself around to look at the clock. The old, analog, alarm clock said half past five. Precisely half past five. No more, no less. Although I wasn't sure about the reliability of that clock, it'd been around since uncle Frank was a baby. So I sat up, yawned, and then walked up to my desk in order to check my phone.
Half past five, no more, no less. Precisely half past five.
The room was dark and small, partially because the lights were out and partially because it was very cloudy outside. My desk was old, as was my little bookshelf. Both were in opposite corners of the room, while my bed and the door were in the other corners, the bed next to the bookshelf and the door next to the desk.
Then, suddenly, my phone's screen went entirely black. As surprise caught me, the window slammed open and I was dragged outside by a hard wind. Except this wasn't outside. Everything was dark. There wasn't a single light, not the sun, no street lights, nothing. It was all pure black. I felt no solid ground, either. If it wasn't for the complete lack of stars I'd think I was slung into outer space.
Then, I had a feeling of growing fear, twisting and expanding in my mind, stretching out to the rest of my body. Slowly, I lost the ability to move even a muscle. The air around me was getting colder and colder until finally it felt like I'd been facing Medusa in a staring competition and then been thrown down a glacier and left there for a thousand years. I couldn't move, I couldn't breathe, it was incredibly cold, and I was incredibly afraid.
Someone was watching me. I felt a cold, dark, ruthless, presence eyeing me, paying attention to every detail about me. It's gaze penetrated my soul, looking through my mind, my every memory. I couldn't see it, I couldn't hear it, but it was there.
That's when I heard it. A cold, rattling voice reached my mind. I heard it more mentally than through my ears.
"I will be waiting for this moment, Esme El Sayed."
And then I woke up.
And then I woke up.
