Pre chapter authors note

  P.S. For best effect, play these tracks while reading.

  (All available on Spotify)

  ?? BEHELIT – Hoshine Rei

  ?? Sinking – Bo Redome

  ?? Scavangers dive – Bo Redome

  *Crash*

  A loud shatter came from Isaks room. A glass of water had been knocked down from its stable footing, littering the floor with many shards.

  The room was filled with homey furniture you'd expect for a boy his age. There were various forms of artwork hung on the walls, childhood trophies and medals placed peculiarly amongst his book-filled shelves, and a thick, locally made, fuzzy carpet, now ruined by the fragmented glass scattered across it.

  It was dark, but not unsettling. The room glinted faintly in the moonlight entering through its bedside window. It shone across Isak's face as he lay there, motionless.

  He was located in his bed, tucked neatly in between a soft blanket and his linen bed sheets. However he wasn't sleeping, he was as awake as one could be.

  Because he felt something: A presence, grasping him tightly.

  It wasn't in his room though, it wasn't anywhere; Nowhere besides inside Isak’s very being.

  It felt like hundreds of pounds pushing against his skin all over his body, like he was compressed into nothingness without it giving up.

  Like his inner self and organs were pushing back against the force, causing an excruciating pinch of his body's outline.

  Like if his innards were pulling against themselves, as if his every nerve and fiber was trying to tear free from the aching prison of his body.

  Why him?

  Why now?

  He tries snapping out, but his body doesn't answer.

  His limbs instead distort, defying all laws of physics and anatomy, bending backwards and back as his fingers curl and twitch uncontrollably.

  He could feel his bones break and heal over and over again, bloody tears streaming out his eyes and down his cheeks.

  It was the most painful experience of his life.

  A loud ringing noise suddenly pierces his ears, drowning out and muffling all other sounds in the background.

  If someone were to reach out to him he wasn't even sure if he would notice-

  He feels weak, hopeless. He tries denying his movements to no avail, pushed down by an invisible force of unimaginable weight.

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  And the worst part? He genuinely had no indicators that something like this was going to happen, especially not now;

  His homeland, the city of water, was in a state of static and hope. There were no bad apples amongst its people, there were no casualties of nature, there were no disturbance of the peace, none at all.

  Even their protector, the city’s vessel, was healthy and active.

  Yet here he was.

  Lying broken in his bed losing all sense of self.

  Grasped by a murderous intent beyond his fragile understanding.

  He’s taken over by utter despair as he clings to life like a rabid dog, unsure if he would live to see another day.

  He didn't even have any control over himself anymore, even his faintest of pleas weren’t met.

  All he could do was watch as his body helplessly crushed itself over and over again.

  He just lay there, screaming in between his blood-filled breaths, praying to god that someone, anyone, anything could hear him.

  He could even feel his mental state being torn apart.

  His memories distorting as new and unsettling images appeared in his head.

  But it wasn't random, it was with intent and direction; almost as if intentionally transfigured.

  But it was only Isak that was distorted. Distorted into something inhuman.

  He saw himself. Himself and his family, framed in the photo that used to hang in his room, now warped.

  He towered above them, monstrous, not in size alone, but in presence too. Pale skin stretched over bone with a spine of thorns piercing his back, his face covered in cancerous growths and scattered eyes.

  And worst of all:

  They looked up at him not in fear.

  But in worship

  His vision suddenly shifts as the pressure ravaging his body gets exponentially worse. Through his bloodstained eyes Isak now observed something he couldn’t even begin to describe

  His mouth steadily fills up with blood, Making him struggle to breathe – gurgling for air with the spiteful taste of blood.

  Is this the end?