When you closed your eyes, it came out. You could feel it, rising around you as your eyelids fell, encompassing the space around you. It felt heavy, like a blanket of inky velvet was crawling up every surface. The closer your eyes came to closing, the more space it took up. You tried to fight it, tried to remain strong, but it had been too long, and the sweet release of sleep was calling to you, trying to drag you under the dark waves. Soon, you could feel it closing in on you, as the darkness gathered around your bed. As your eyes fell shut, you could feel something brush up against your face, ever so gently, and sharp tingle raced across your cheek.
You jolted awake, and the darkness retreated, back to where it came from. You took quick, heaving breaths, and a slick sheen coated your forehead. You began to pat yourself awake, hoping the pain would make you more alert. You touched your cheek, and felt a small cut in it. The skin was raised and warm, and slightly wet. You hopped off your bed and walked over to your vanity to examine it. Even with the lights in your room off, you could see a touch of blood, streaming down your face. Whatever monster you were keeping at bay, it was getting stronger.
You looked down at the table of your vanity, at the cans of energy drink and discarded mugs. You grabbed the coffee pot and poured yourself a cup. You didn’t add sugar or milk. You didn’t need to, as this was not meant to be enjoyable. You brought the cup to your lips, hand shaking as you downed the entire mug in a few gulps. Still trembling, you poured another cup, and repeated. The mug slammed down onto the vanity, and you began to pace, shaking hands grabbing fistfuls of hair, and pulling. It had been three full days without sleep, and five since it had arrived. And now, with every passing day, it got stronger, and threatened more destruction.
On the first day, it hadn’t done much. A vase had been knocked over, and a couple glasses had broken. On the second night, though, it had torn a picture in your living room, and shredded a chair. You had stayed up all night the third night, waiting for it, but it never came. You figured it out quickly. If you didn’t sleep, it wouldn’t come back. But now, after three days without rest, it seemed to be getting impatient. Even in that small second of weakness, it had torn your bookshelf to shreds, and cracked your bedroom window. Who knew what it would do if you let it out all night.
You still didn’t know what it was, and quite frankly, you did not care. You just wanted it to go away, but you still had no idea how to do that. As you paced your room, you could feel the fatigue returning. You walked over to you chair, but did not sit down. Any stoppage of motion threatened to pull you back under. No, you simply used it to brace yourself as you took off your socks. When you placed you bare feet back on the hard floor of your room, the freezing wood sent a shiver up your spine, buying you a few more minutes of wakefulness. You padded around, uncomfortable, but awake, and decided to open the window.
The winter chill blew into your room, and you shuddered, a chill running into your bones. You hated the cold. It was perfect. Except that you forgot that the colder you got, the more your body slowed down. You only borrowed five more minutes before you started to feel even more tired.
“God damn it.” you swore to yourself, just before you started to yawn. You went back over to your vanity, where a bottle of pills lay open. There were only two left. You knew that one would barely be enough, but if you wanted to hold out one more night, then you would need to save the last one. But then again, you could always but more in the morning. You decided that the latter option was better, and downed both pills. You took them dry, and hoped they would kick in soon, as you continued to pace around your room.
“Please let this work.” you muttered to yourself, hoping to buy enough time to figure out what was going on. You grabbed your laptop, and started looking up every demon and supernatural being you could. There had to be something. You turned the brightness up, trying to force your brain to focus. You turned your radio on, loud, hoping to drown out the sleep clawing at you from within. Music blasted through your apartment, as you sat on your bed, typing away.
You found little that was helpful. Stories about sleep paralysis, and night hags that sit on the chests of people, and demons, but nothing that had any effect on the physical world. Still, you supposed that it was close enough. A demon. That you could work with. You looked up one more thing. A ritual. Maybe you could banish whatever it was. You typed away, the clicking sounds rhythmic and methodical. Clickclackclickclackclickclack. Your focus became razor sharp, as you tried to read the screen in front of you. You had never needed glasses, but the words were growing fuzzy. It was probably the caffeine, or the drugs kicking in. Still, you adjusted the brightness and began to recite the words you saw on the screen. A banishing spell.
As you did, you felt the air around you shift. You hardened your focus, and thought of nothing but the words you were repeating. You didn’t hear the radio, as the words began to blur together, white noise filling the little apartment. You didn’t hear the silence when it turned off, and not a sound filled the room. You didn’t realize that you hadn’t been saying the words aloud, not that it cared either way. It was much worse than any demon you would find on the internet. You didn’t feel it when the darkness slipped out, and surrounded you, devouring you. In fact, you felt nothing at all, as your weak spots cracked, and broke, and you gave into the warmth.
You felt nothing.
You heard nothing.
You became nothing.
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