Starting a new life inevitably gets difficult. But not usually as difficult as it is for Sam, who wakes up in a nightmarish version of his new home to find that his wife is missing... And something is hunting him in the shadows.
"We have to sign for the transfer. I cannot keep him here any longer. It's been months." Dr. Carter said, just after my last session. Not that they weren't aware that I was still in the waiting room. It didn't matter to them. We were a dime a dozen, and it was only a job for them. Poor people. If only they'd known. Jobs.
"I think I can get him to open up with a little more time. Give me two weeks with him. Please." Dr. West said. He was always trying to help.
"I don't think it's a good idea." Dr. Carter replied. She was always cold and professional. I never liked her. "All the data you have gathered still couldn't explain his fascination with the symbols and maps. Your great breakthrough was also—we agreed I wouldn't use terms like this. The board is up in my ass about it. But it was laughable."
"But we did find—What were the names? Myong Joon-hyuk and Cha Seung-Woo, just like he said."
"Those people disappeared more than two decades ago. He could have found the info on the internet. It's not a well-known mystery, but... Look, Dr. West, maybe it's time you let go."
"But I can feel we are so close. I know it. We can still find the body of the wife. He wants us to know. He just doesn't—"
"Enough. I'd already signed off on the papers. You have one more week. They are still looking for the dog that might have bitten him, it may lead to the body somehow but there's nothing we can do. You're a good kid. Go home, get some rest. You are overdoing it."
"Yes, Dr. Carter." The younger doctor finally succumbed.
After they left, I was escorted back into my room. I was happy to see that Dr. Carter arranged for some more paper and new crayons. They still thought that I might commit suicide if I had anything sharper around. If I'd wanted to die, I wouldn't be here in the first place.
I couldn't die. There was so much to do. I needed to work on the details. I couldn't stop. Not until it was perfect. Through the symbol and the maps, I might be able to go back and find whoever did this. There must be a superstructure out there. I didn't destroy it. I think. I had to warn somebody. I had to do something, anything. They probably thought I'd just want to get out, but I didn't. Not through their flimsy door, anyhow. Maybe, deep down, I did want to die. But I had to go on. There was nobody else but me. I knew I would never find Angela or any of the others. It was probably for the best, anyway. They were almost certainly dead by now. Good for them. They didn't have to live with what I knew. It was coming. I just wished I didn't have to either, but I was still here and I had an obligation to see this through.
They should have let the creatures take me. I was ready for it, anyway. That was the perfect moment for me to let it end. They were only animals. There would have been no cruelty involved. It would have been clean. But the fuckers didn't let me die, and now I have to live with knowing their horrible plan. I'd seen what they were seeking in the superstructure. I only got a glance through the gap. An impression, really. But it was enough.
When I opened the door by the crater, I didn't realize I was opening it in the wrong direction. Not that it mattered, it was probably just a coincidence. Who knows what we did that brought it on us. Who knows what they did. Standing there, looking into the gap, I didn't see my wife or John. I didn't see the hangar either. I saw something much more terrifying. I saw stars. Countless galaxies. All the darkness and all the light. All the life. There was so much life out there.
But it's what I'd seen lurking between the stars. Between light and dark. In the gap between space and time. Oh God, I should never have seen it. Nobody should have. And yet, it was merely a glimpse. It looked like an enormous nebula, dwarfing the greatest galaxies out there. It must have been a coincidence that it was in the shape of a perfect triangle, with a ceaseless whirlwind of unnatural, unthinkable colors inside it, like looking through a window into a hurricane.
From the whirlwind, things, maybe arms, maybe threads, were reaching for the stars all across the universe, suffocating, strangling everything. They all came from within this horrible gap between realities.
Then the enormous eye in the middle of it looked right back at me.
Then I closed the door.
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