I opened my eyes. It felt like I`ve been sleeping forever. I sat up and looked around. It was pitch black everywhere. The lights are gone, I assumed. "Mom! what happened to the lights?", I screamed. Nobody replied, absolute silence. "Mom! Dad!", I screamed again, this time much louder. Nothing happened. It was so quiet that the sound of my own breaths seemed maddening to me. I got off my bed and started looking for the light switch. But the tenebrosity of the whole room made it impossible to find anything. "Mom! Are you home?", I screamed as loud as I could. At that very moment, I could hear someone crying. A woman, it sounded like a great tremor overtook her. She mumbled incoherent things, and suddenly I could recognize her voice. It was my mother. "Mom! Where are you? Why are you crying? Wait for me, I`m coming", saying that I started running towards that sound.
I ran and ran, like my feet were born to travel. I tried to follow the voice. I thought I`d stumble, as I couldn`t see anything. But I didn`t. How would I? Everything around me was like a dark void, total nothingness, no matter how far I went. I screamed and tried to call my parents, but nobody seemed to hear my voice. I felt like I was trapped in a prison, a perfect cube, where blackness was absolute and no trace of light anywhere. I tried to focus my mind and think clearly. "I have to get out of here, there has to be a way out, I just have to find it", I said to myself. My eyes had started adapting to the darkness, I could see a bit now. I started looking for an exit, a door or a window, anything. Suddenly I heard footsteps behind me. I looked at the direction of that sound. I saw a mysterious figure, wearing a black hooded cloak, walking slowly towards me. "Hey there sir, can you please direct me to the exit? I think I`ve lost my way", I said to him as nicely as I could. But he didn`t seem to listen to me, he kept walking. I asked again and again, until he passed by me. He might be leaving this place, thinking of that I started following him. I was walking closely behind him, but he didn`t seem to notice me. He kept walking slowly and I kept following. We walked for hours, maybe even days, he stopped at last. Then he disappeared, into thin air. I looked around, hoping to find him, but he was gone. My only hope to get out of this prison was gone. I couldn`t deal with it, I felt like I`ll be trapped in here forever. Thinking of that made me desperate. I started running again, in search of light, in search of hope. And I found it, after hours, may be days. A door, and light, white bright light on the other side of the door...hope. I pushed that door and got outside as fast as I could.
There were a lot of people. All black clothes and white waxy faces, with puffed red eyes, every one of them. I found my parents. Mom was crying as if her brain was being shredded from the inside. Dad was trying to hold her, but he was sobbing too."Mom! Dad! I`m here", I called them, but they didn`t even look at me. I started walking towards them. But before I could go near them, something caught my eye. A casket, a big black casket, and all the people were parading around it. I looked at it, it was open. And someone was lying in there, with his eyes closed, as if he was asleep, lifeless. It was me, it was my funeral.
I couldn`t believe my eyes. I tried to touch my face, but my hands just passed through. I tried to scream, but it seemed like I had lost my voice. I tried to run away, but it seemed like the absolute horror completely paralyzed me. I couldn`t move a bit, I just stood there, utterly terrified, looking at my own dead body. It seemed like I was standing there forever, when I heard someone calling my name, "Simon! Simon!". I looked around, trying to find the person who was calling me, but nobody even seemed to notice me around there. The voice started getting louder and scarier. But nobody seemed to listen to it except me. It made me even more terrified. I tried to run, but it felt like someone or something was holding me back. And the ground beneath me started to disappear. I started falling down. I tried grabbing something, anything, to avoid the fall. But it was inevitable. So I kept falling, into a dark void, into nothingness, like the one I got out of. And someone whispered in my ears, "We`ve got you. You belong with us now".