The Shadow Walkers

They take the form of humans. They pass us each day; in cities and countries, yet we still don’t know what they truly are, what they truly are. They’ve existed on Earth just as long as humans have, though no one has found out about them yet. Those who have… well, let’s just say that they don’t exist anymore.

They are called Shadow Walkers. They are powerful… and dangerous.

They have powers that can mess with your mind. Whenever a human gets close to a Shadow Walker, their life may as well be over. Because soon after a human comes into contact with one, they begin to go through the procedure, the procedure to their imminent fate. It has seven stages.

Stage 1: Pure Bliss: During their first encounter with a Shadow Walker, the humans instantly start at this stage, pure bliss, also known as Stage 1. You’d think it’d be somewhat pleasant, considering the name, but in fact it isn’t. The human affected looses every memory of any happiness they’ve felt in their life. The emotion, happiness, is stolen from them, so they can never feel joy again. The humans don’t even notice that it’s happening to them, at this stage, not yet.

Stage 2: Hallucination: At this point, the human begins to hallucinate, hence the title of the stage. It starts off with dreams- no nightmares- of horrible things. Blood, twisted bodies and faces, cries for help and then the bloodcurdling screams. None of the dreams ever make any sense. Then they began happening when you are awake. The hallucinations are worse than the dreams. They haunt you constantly, wherever you are, to the point where you think you are going insane. Most people lock themselves up in their homes, hoping that being away from people may stop the hallucinations. But they don’t. And all the Shadow Walkers do is laugh.

Stage 3: Rage: This is stage 3. By now you’d have lost most of your memories. Each year of your life will begin to just slowly fade away. You’ll feel as though your memories are like sand, slipping through your fingers and you can’t do anything to stop it. You’ll forget everyone you once knew, even those you held dear. The hallucinations are still there too, they’re there until the very end. Soon after you’ve lost most of your memories, you become angry, filled with unknown rage. I don’t know why it is, it’s just a feeling you can’t shake off. Since it’s one of your few emotions left, it intensifies. When I went through this stage, I was so filled with rage that I’d throw things around my apartment; I even broke a window once. Once this stage is complete, they steal your feeling of anger too.

Stage 4: Misery: Once you’ve lost all your anger, stage four commences and the feeling of hopelessness settles in. You cry, sulk, and scream. Most people don’t survive this stage of depression, and it isn’t because of the Shadow Walkers but because of the insanity, the images of blood burned into their minds. At this stage, you’ve reached the brink of what you can handle. The human’s end up killing themselves and the Shadow Walkers don’t care. They enjoy watching. If you survive this stage, your feelings of sadness begin to disappear too.

Stage 5: Confusion: If you make it this far, to stage five, the Shadow Walkers finally reveal the truth. The one who has been stealing your memories, that one Shadow Walker who has been watching you loose your sanity, they are the one to tell you. It confronts you, wherever you are, and tells you about them, what they really are, and what’s been happening to you and all about the seven stages. It refuses to answer any of your questions and ignores anything you have to say, and then it disappears. You then enter a state of utter confusion. You can’t think straight, can’t string things together because your mind is so weak. For a while, I wondered why they would bother to tell us, what was the point of it? But now, I know why. Anyone who has survived Stage 4 are considered strong minded, by the Shadow Walkers. In the end, all they want to do is turn you into one of them.

Stage 6: Insanity: By this stage, you’d have almost lost your mind. With most of your emotions gone and all of your memory disappeared, your mind is almost empty. The Shadow Walkers, they leave just one emotion, just until the end. I don’t know what this emotion is, since I haven’t gone through this stage yet, but it obviously isn’t very good. I don’t even know much about this stage, the Shadow Walker only explained it briefly. All I know is that during this stage, you’ll loose whatever is left of your sanity. The hallucinations will get worse and in reality, the hallucinations are actually real. They show what has happened to the past humans, who have either gone insane and killed themselves, or tried to fight back and been killed brutally by the Shadow Walkers. As the name of the stage suggests, insanity consumes you.

Stage 7: Corruption: This is the last of the seven stages. The Shadow Walker explained this to me in one sentence; ‘This will either be the end, or the very beginning.’ With that one line, its obvious what will happen. You’ll either die, or become one of them.

Now, I know I have to fight. I have no choice. I am at Stage 5, almost at the end. But I won’t give in to them; if they want me dead then I’m not going to go down easy. I know there are others out there, those that will battle as well.

I will fight for what I believe in, even if I have to sacrifice everything.

I will not become one of them.