There is Something in the Dark

There is something in the dark.

That’s the first thought you have.

You can hear it breathing somewhere in your room – a low, rasping kind of breath that catches on itself and makes a strange sound when it inhales. A… popping sound, or… No, more like a clicking sound. That was it. A clicking sound. 

Click. Click. Click.

It’s a horrible sound to hear suddenly in the night. The kind that sounded far away and yet right there in your ear like it was coming from right next to you. It raises goosebumps on your skin as you lie there in the dark, listening. Counting the seconds between the unsettling clicks of its breath, only you keep losing track of time for some reason. 

How long has it been there? How long have you been awake?

You were unconscious just moments before, you swear it. Asleep, caught in a nonsensical regurgitation of information that you’d subconsciously gathered during the day and would never be able to recall again come morning. You’d been dreaming. You’d been safe. 

How long has it been watching you sleep?

Click. Click. Click.

The realization that you’ve never heard a human being make sounds like that, like that clicking gurgle the thing in your room kept making – it keeps your eyes glued shut and your body still in your bed, even as your heart begins to race. Your hands, instinctively clutching at your sheets, begin to sweat. The sleepy haze in your head is fading like fog in the daylight, but you only feel colder as reality sets in and you begin to understand, you are awake.

You are awake, and there is something there.

You’re too afraid to open your eyes.

Click. Click. Click.

You’re afraid to see what is watching you – because you can feel it watching you, its gaze like a weight on your chest, or like cold fingers down your spine – but more than that, you are afraid to let it know that you are not asleep. You are afraid of why it is there, why it has come for you, and what it will do to you when it realizes you’re awake. You know, somehow, that is what it’s waiting for. It wants you to open your eyes. It wants you to see it. 

Click. Click. Click.

You try to control your breathing as the adrenaline creeps in. Your body knows what your mind is trying to reason away – that you are no longer safe there, in the safest place that you can imagine, that there is something in the darkness with you. Despite your best efforts, your hands are shaking and your breath is labored. You know that your eyes are squeezed too tightly shut to appear asleep… and you think that it may even be able to hear your heart beating against your chest, it’s pounding so hard.

You wonder, for just a second, if it already knows that you’re awake. 

A second is all it takes for terror to grip you.

Click. Click. Click.

Your eyes spring open, foolishly searching the darkness. The blue sliver of moonlight through the window is just enough to reveal outlines and shadows that stretch too long over the darkened walls. Click. Click. Click. The television has already gone to sleep and you don’t remember the last time you were this scared of the dark. The last time you were really afraid. There’s a sickening chatter from the corner of your room, like bones clattering together inhumanly fast, and you quickly realize it was never the dark you were afraid of – it was this.

Click. Click. Click.

There is something in the dark.

You can make out a figure of someone – something standing there in the corner, perfectly still. Humanoid but obviously not a person. It’s darker than the shadows that surround it, like it’s made up of darkness itself, and it’s huge. It’s… tall, taller than any man, wider than any man, with horn-like protrusions coming out of its head… or maybe it’s hooded? You don’t know. It’s weird but you can’t really tell, like your sight is playing tricks on you. 

As soon as you laid eyes on it your vision went weird, fading in and out slowly, like you were blinking too hard or falling asleep. Click. Click. Click. You weren’t, you swear you weren’t, you couldn’t even if you tried right now – it was that thing. It had to be doing something to you, and… god, it was looking right at you.

Click. Click. Click.

You can’t see its eyes or make out anything in its face, but you know it’s looking right at you and you know, you just know it’s been staring at you for a while, watching you sleep. The darkness feels too open all of a sudden, you feel vulnerable as the dread wells up in your chest when it starts to move. Its whole body shakes, like it’s vibrating or seizing – and you’ve never seen anything like that before, but you know it’s not right. That things don’t move like that – like a glitch in a video game, or like it's shivering or something.

Click. Click. Click.

You need to get out. You know you need to get out. Your fight or flight is in full effect and you know you need to run. You only have one thought, and it’s to escape that room immediately.

Click. Click. Click.

You throw off the blankets and get out of bed, running toward the door. Your limbs feel weird, too light or too heavy, unburdened but clumsy. You’re too scared. You’re moving too slow, somehow, even though you’re running for what may have been your life. Click. Click. Click. You don’t know why it’s taking so long to get to the door, but you keep moving because you can still see it out of the corner of your eyes, its head tilting towards you – still unnaturally shaking in the corner as the chattering grew louder. Click. Click. Click. You realize a high-pitched whirring has filled the room as you finally grasp the door handle and –

No.

God, no…

You’re back in your bed.

How are you back in your bed?

Click. Click. Click.

Your eyes flicker over to the corner and, Jesus, it’s closer. It’s closer than it was before, glitching, chattering, faster. You don’t think about it being closer, you just throw off the sheets again and rush for the door. You need to get out, you need to get the fuck out before it got you–

Click. Click. Click.

Jesus, fuck, it happened again. You’d reached the door, but now you’re back in your bed. How are you back in your fucking bed? You don’t understand what’s happening, just that it’s closer again, like it’s moving when you look away, and you need do something, anything to get away from it -- 

Click. Click. Click.

The whirring is louder but you can barely hear it over your heart beating so hard it feels like it’s going to explode. You look the other way, at the window beside your bed, before you remember you’re on the second floor. You can’t get out that way. You look back at the door.

Click. Click. Click.

You gotta get out of there –

Click. 

But you made a mistake.

Click. 

You looked away from it for too long.

Click.

Somewhere, in the back of your panicked mind, you knew that. You knew that. You felt it the second the situation went from dire to hopeless. Your whole body froze. Your heart may have even stopped beating.

It was right there.

When you went to throw off the blankets again, it was standing right there. Right beside the bed. Looking down at you, like… You don’t know what. Nothing has ever looked at you like that. It stood there for what felt like forever, looming over you, looking down at you… Waiting. God, what was it waiting for?

Click. Click. Click.

You try so hard not to blink. You try harder than you’ve ever tried anything in your life, because you know what will happen if you do.  

And you can see it now. A figure in the dark, yet somehow perfectly, terrifyingly clear. The void-black, bumpy skin stretched over its knobby bones as it hunches over your bed. The coarse black fur growing out of its impossibly broad shoulders. The two black holes in its head where its eyes should have been, peering down at you. 

The ominous red around its wide mouth.

Click… Click... Click.

You try so hard not to blink, but as your vision begins to sliver, you see its long, crooked teeth as it smiles down at you.

Then it all goes black.