It all started with a single, strange dream, a nightmare. Mia could hardly remember it the next morning; only flashes of broken images lingered – a hallway that seemed to stretch endlessly; walls lined with mirrors that reflected no light; and faint whispers calling her name from somewhere deep within the dark.
She shrugged it off, blaming a late-night horror movie and too much coffee, but it returned the following night – only to last longer and be more vivid. She found herself walking down that same path, her bare feet cold against the polished floor. Again, the mirrors stretched on either side of her, empty and dull, reflecting neither her nor anything else around her. This time, though, the whispers had grown louder, and the sound seemed to come from the other end of the hall. She kept walking, trying to get closer, but the whispers only retreated, slipping farther and farther away. When she woke, she felt as if she hadn’t slept at all.
On the third night, the dream intensified further. Now, there were doors lining the hallway: each one was slightly ajar and revealed shadows of something moving, something shifting out of sight. Moreover, she could hear soft footsteps echoing from someplace behind her. And when she tried to run, her body felt sluggish and as if it were weighed down by something she couldn’t see; with time, the whispers grew louder and louder. They formed words, but none of which Mia could quite make sense of. That is when she decided to reach for a door, just to find her hand passing right through it.
By the time she awoke, her hands were shaking, and her mind, clouded with dread. She could still feel the cold of that hallway on her skin. The sensation lingered with her all day, chills running up her arms as if she had never really left the dream.
For the next week, the nightmares became an unbroken chain of terror. The hallway grew longer each night; the doors became darker; the whispers assembled into clear voices speaking to her in a somewhat garbled language. In her tries to avoid the horror, Mia tried everything, from forcing herself to stay awake to gulping down energy drinks, leaving the lights on, and even watching cartoons until dawn. But exhaustion always won out, and each night, she found herself back in that hallway, trapped within those walls.
And then, one night, something changed.
This time, she wasn’t alone. As she moved through the hallway, she saw a figure standing at the far end. It was cloaked in shadows, tall and thin, with no discernible features except for its eyes — pale, empty, and staring… directly at her. Mia tried to turn back, but her body wouldn’t obey; it was as if she were drawn towards the figure. Her feet would move of their own accord as though the floor itself was pulling her forward.
“Mia…,” the voice was clear – a sharp, bone-chilling hiss. She wanted to scream; she even tried, but no sound escaped her lips. Then the figure reached out: one bony, twisted hand extended toward her; it had long, creepy fingers curling like claws. And just as it was about to touch her, she jolted awake with a pounding heart, trying to break free of her chest and a body drenched in sweat.
She couldn’t go to sleep again, so she sat in bed, knees drawn up to her chest and eyes fixed on the dark corners of her room. Every shadow seemed to shift, and every creak in the walls sounded like footsteps. Although she had the lights on, it wasn’t enough to drive away the feeling that the figure was still watching her somewhere just beyond her sight.
Over the next few days, she again tried everything to avoid sleep: She drank endless cups of coffee, kept her mind occupied with work, and even went for midnight jogs to keep herself awake. But how long could she fight nature? Her body was weakening; dark circles ringed her eyes; her hands shook with every small task. Even friends and colleagues began to notice her exhaustion, absent-mindedness, and the occasional terrified glances she would cast at nothing in particular.
She could feel herself unravelling. It was as if the hallway was seeping into her mind and staining her thoughts with its darkness.
At last, after five sleepless nights, her body betrayed her, and the exhaustion dragged her under while she was watching TV on the couch in her living room, fighting to keep her eyes open. Not surprisingly, she slipped back into the dream, and this time, she knew there would be no waking up until it was done.
There she was, back in the hallway – only now the walls were closing in; the doors slamming shut one by one; and their echoes reverberating through the darkness. The figure was also there – closer than ever, and its dead-staring eyes fixed on Mia.
And then came the familiar hiss, “Mia…”. It stretched its clawed hand toward her; she tried to back away; her feet were frozen; her body was rigid. And for the first time, she felt it, the cold touch, ice-cold, against the skin, creeping up her arm.
She jerked awake, gasping, her heart racing. But this time, the relief was short-lived, for she could still feel that chill on her arm, and it was spreading slowly across her skin. And then she saw it.
There, on her wrist, was a faint handprint as if someone had gripped her with fingers of frost. She scrambled back, staring in horror as the print began to darken, leaving an icy blue bruise that spread up her arm.
Suddenly, her room started getting cold, unnaturally so. It was so cold her breath fogged in front of her. Then the lights flickered, dimming to a sickly yellow. She heard the whisper again, but this time, it wasn’t coming from within her mind. It was real, filling the silence of her apartment.
“Mia…”
She turned towards the voice, and there, in the shadowed corner of her room, the figure from her dreams was standing, flickering like smoke, shifting between solidity and shadow. She scrambled backwards, pressed against the wall, chest heaving with terror. And the figure began to move toward her, again with its hollow eyes locked onto hers, its twisted fingers reaching out.
She closed her eyes, hoping, wishing it would disappear, that it would all be a mere dream, and that she will wake up from this nightmare. But alas, when she opened them, the figure was inches away, its face mere breaths from her own.
“You can’t escape the path, Mia,” it whispered in its cold and hollow voice that sounded like leaves scraping over stone. “You’ve walked it every night… and now, you’ve brought it with you.”
The room seemed to dissolve around her; at once, she was back in the hallway. But it was very, very different this time, for she was wide awake. The figure proceeded to take her hand with an icy grip and led her down the narrow corridor, past the doors that slammed shut as they passed. Mia’s vision blurred, and she could feel herself slipping, her body weakening. Although she tried fighting it, even tried to pull away, but her limbs were out of energy, and her mind was clouded with draining drowsiness.
The last thing she saw was the figure’s face, staring back at her with a twisted smile as it led her deeper into the never-ending abyss.
Days later, her friends would report her missing, her apartment empty except for a faint smell of cold air and a darkened, mirror-like stain on the floor where she had last stood. And somewhere, down an endless, mirrored corridor, Mia’s footsteps echoed on, fading slowly into silence.
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