Fearful Things

Seasons: Winter

He forced his way through the snow that clung to his feet, his staggering figure the only imperfection in the pristine white sheet covering the ground. He tripped, and his arms flew out, sinking elbow-deep in the snow. The freezing shock held him tightly in place as the cold seeped into skin and sent a tingling burn through his body. He sat there for a long while, letting out pathetic gasps that dissipated into puffs of frost. How had he gotten here? Not too long ago he was walking down his neighborhood street while enjoying the first snow of the year, so light it didn't even stick. But soon the dusting turned to a flurry, which turned to a blizzard. He couldn't see an inch in front of his face as the ice rapidly piled up around him. He pushed through the freak weather to take shelter in his home, but he walked and walked and walked with no such luck. Just as quickly as it started, the blizzard vanished without a single house, road, or soul in sight. He was alone in an endless white expanse. Since then he'd been wandering, trying to figure out where he was or find anyone, anything, that could give him a sign of humanity. A large black snake wormed its way out of the snow where he still sat and slithered over his hands. He recoiled and shot up, quickly resuming his lurching trek through the wasteland.

It must have been hours. Was it even the same day? The sky had become a strange alien gray that he'd never seen before, and the sun dipped just below the horizon as if in permanent dusk. The ever-present thrum of city life was absent, and it was so quiet the crunching of snow under his feet was like crashing cymbals. He trembled against the frigid air pressing in heavily around him. The world wasn't just still, it was dead. Was it even still turning? He'd had no idea how crushing emptiness could feel. Panic began to set in. Where was anything? Even if he somehow roamed into some uninhabitable corner of the city, shouldn't there be trees? Animals? Something? His rapid breaths obscured his vision with fog. Then the wind blew.

It cut through the air like a knife, and for a moment he thought he was being skinned alive. It stung as if every oxygen atom surrounding him suddenly became a needle digging into his flesh. He wore a thick winter coat, but he might as well have been naked. It froze not only his muscles, but even the thoughts in his head, leaving him a lifeless ice sculpture in the snow. This wind, however, was not just a movement of air, but a messenger. A cruel, cruel messenger that left him with an idea that dropped his body temperature even lower. He hadn't gone anywhere. It was all still here. He stumbled forward, half running and half crawling, flinging snow as he went. All of the buildings and cars, all of the people, they were still here buried underneath the snow. He pawed desperately at the white slush like a stray dog, but every time he managed to make a dent even more would surge forward to fill it. That blizzard had come and gone and drowned the world in ice, leaving him alone, oh God he was all alone—

CRAAAAACK

His body stilled, understanding the danger before his mind did. He looked down to see his own terrified expression reflected from the thin layer of ice beneath his feet. His eyes slowly followed the frozen floor into the distance, and a deranged giggle escaped his throat. There wasn't any body of water this large within miles of where he started. Maybe he wasn't home after all. Movement below him forced his gaze back down. Something—thousands of somethings—squirmed violently in the water under him. He instinctively pulled back in disgust but stopped when the spider web of cracks at his feet grew several inches. The things in the water tangled together in a giant knot of...worms? They fought each other, bashing their intertwined bodies into the ice. A new crack formed in front of him, then another, and another. He took a step back, trying desperately through his terror to balance on the creaking ground beneath him. Just before he could fully shift his weight, the wind blew one final time. It was a light breeze that caressed his back and gently pushed his teetering body forward. Before he knew what had happened, he was face down on the ground.

His stomach, his palms, the entire left side of his head, every inch of his body that touched the ice lit on fire. The needles were back and red-hot, pricking into each pore and eating away at his skin. He trembled and whimpered as the tears pouring from his eyes instantly froze and covered his face in frost. The worms were still there slamming into the thin barrier separating them. He could feel it vibrating against his skull now. The cracking didn't slow down at all but became even more intense. He tried to pull away, but the ice refused to release him. His skin stuck to the ground, stretching and deforming each time he tried to yank himself back. BAM BAM CRACK BAM CRACK. He roared as flesh and muscle tore and snapped, leaving half of his face stuck to the ice like a sick mask. He was just grateful his bones couldn't feel the cold. He tried to rip his hands from the frozen floor, but he was too late. One last ram from the creatures, and the ice shattered below him.

As he plunged into the water, he realized they were all wrong, so wrong. Hell wasn't hot at all, it was cold, cold, cold, a cold so extraordinary it made you forget anything else existed except the pain. A cold so burning they must have mistaken the ice for flames. His heart, his lungs, even the blood in his veins froze in place, but for some reason his brain kept going, as if something didn't want him to miss this experience. The fluid in his eyes had solidified, forcing them open so he had no choice but watch the hole he fell in grow smaller and smaller as he sank. One of the worms floated in front of his face, and the ring of sharp teeth made him realize he was looking at a massive leech. It latched its mouth onto his right eyeball and began to suck. With each gulp, his eye crumpled and collapsed in on itself like a deflated balloon. He vaguely felt thousands of pin pricks all over his body as the leeches tried to guzzle up the remaining fluids in his body. Enough of them had gnawed at his stomach that flesh gave way to a massive hole. All at once they swarmed into the cavity, squirming over each other to find the juiciest pieces of him. The force of it made his body begin to swing around. He begged his dead limbs to move as the last remaining light above him disappeared from his sight. With his lips fused together and no air in his iced-over lungs, he couldn't even scream.

He was blind now, the darkness so thick he couldn't see the leeches biting onto what remained of his face. He sank deeper and deeper and wondered if Hell even had a bottom. Would he still feel the cold even when the leeches scraping against his eye socket reached his brain? Or would only his senses be preserved by the ice? As he contemplated this eternity, the abyss moved. The inky blackness twisted and shifted as if it was alive. He saw things peek through the dark, things that resembled eyes and teeth that were even bigger than him. He realized the abyss was alive, and it was opening its mouth. If he could have cried in relief he would have. The idea of icy damnation threatened to drive him mad, but he knew Hell would have never given him such a pleasant ending.

The leeches released him to avoid becoming a meal themselves, but he only felt sad that they would never know how warm a stomach could be.