Dan felt himself falling-not with the violence of a nightmare, but with a strange, serene weightlessness. His body, or what he thought was his body, floated in an infinite expanse of darkness. There was no up, no down. Only the faint pressure of cold, like invisible tendrils curling around his limbs. It should have terrified him, but instead, it cradled him like the embrace of a deep, dreamless sleep.
He didn't know how long he had been here. Hours? Minutes? Time seemed to dissolve in the void. The only constant was the sound of his heartbeat, slow and steady, like a distant drum. Each beat echoed in the emptiness, a reminder of his existence in a place where everything else seemed to melt away.
And then there was the voice.
"Dan," Dr. Lane's calm, soothing tone broke through the haze. It was steady and gentle, a thread anchoring him to something beyond the abyss. "What do you see?"
Dan tried to focus. His mind reached out, fumbling like a blind man in an unfamiliar room. Shapes flickered at the edges of his vision-no, not vision, something deeper, something behind his eyes. A memory? A dream? It shimmered, just out of reach.
"I... I don't know," he murmured, his voice barely audible even to himself. The words felt heavy, as if he had to push them through layers of fog.
Dr. Lane's voice didn't waver. "It's all right. Take your time. Just let it come to you."
The darkness rippled. A faint glow emerged, far away, like a distant star. Dan reached for it, or perhaps it reached for him. The light twisted and stretched, forming something-a figure, a place? He couldn't tell. It was warm but distant, like sunlight filtered through murky water.
His heartbeat quickened, echoing louder now, and with it came a pull-a gravitational tug from within himself, as if the abyss were trying to devour him whole.
"I feel... something," he whispered.
"Good," Dr. Lane said. "What is it, Dan? Don't force it-just let it surface."
The glow expanded, and for a brief moment, Dan thought he saw a face in the light. Familiar yet obscured, as if staring at a reflection on rippling water. A surge of emotion welled up in his chest-grief, longing, fear? He couldn't separate them.
"I think it's..." His voice cracked, and the abyss began to close in again, the light fading into black.
Dr. Lane's voice grew firmer but still gentle, like a hand reaching into the dark. "Stay with me, Dan. You're safe. What do you see?"
Dan clung to the sound of her voice, his lifeline in the sea of shadows. He didn't have an answer-not yet. But somewhere in the depths of his mind, he could feel it stirring.
Something was there. Waiting.
* * *
Dan lay on the worn leather sofa in Dr. Lane's office, his arms limp at his sides, yet his fingers occasionally twitched as if grasping for something unseen. The room was dimly lit, the soft glow of a desk lamp casting long shadows across the pale green walls. The faint smell of lavender lingered in the air, meant to be calming, though it barely registered in Dan's drifting consciousness.
Dr. Lane sat across from him in her high-backed chair, legs crossed, a clipboard balanced on her knee. She observed him with a practiced detachment, her pen gliding over the paper in sharp, deliberate strokes. The faint scratching was barely audible over the metronomic ticking of the clock on the wall.
Dan's breathing had deepened, slow and labored, his chest rising and falling rhythmically as his head lolled slightly to one side. His face, however, betrayed the battle within. His brows furrowed, his lips parted slightly as if he were trying to speak but couldn't form the words. Then, his hands began to move.
