Chapter One: The Awakening
Luke woke with a start, his chest heaving as though he'd been running in his sleep. A sheen of sweat clung to his forehead despite the cool breeze sneaking in through the cracked window of his apartment. He blinked at the ceiling, trying to steady his breath, trying to remember what had startled him awake.
The silence pressed in, heavier than it should have been. His tiny one-room flat was usually filled with the distant hum of cars or the muffled music of his neighbor's late-night playlists. Tonight, there was nothing.
And then—
Whisper.
Luke sat up sharply, his heart skipping. He swore he'd heard his name, low and drawn out, almost too faint to register.
"...Luke…"
He rubbed his face with both hands, groaning. "Man, I've got to stop pulling all-nighters." His voice sounded louder than it should have in the stillness. He'd been up until nearly two in the morning, flipping through textbooks and half-heartedly reviewing notes for an exam. Stress and caffeine always played tricks on the mind.
Or so he told himself.
He stood, stretching his stiff back, and shuffled across the room toward the desk. His textbooks lay in a messy heap where he'd abandoned them, highlighters still uncapped. He reached to switch on the desk lamp—
Flicker. Pop.
The lightbulb burst, leaving the room in sudden darkness.
Luke froze.
His eyes darted around the room, searching for some logical explanation, some tiny reassurance. But then he felt it: a drop in temperature so sharp it bit through his thin T-shirt. The air itself seemed to shift, vibrating in his ears like a low hum.
And then the whisper came again. Clearer this time. Closer.
"Luke…"
His stomach dropped. His first instinct was to laugh it off, but his throat was too tight. Every hair on his body stood on end as he stumbled back toward his bed.
The phone on his nightstand lit up with a soft glow, displaying the time: 3:00 a.m.
Of course. He'd heard of the so-called witching hour, a time when superstition said the boundary between the living and the dead was weakest. He never believed it. Until now.
A shadow stretched across the wall opposite him. Luke's breath hitched. There was no light in the room—no reason for a shadow to exist. But it was there, dark and liquid, moving against the wall as though it had a life of its own.
He whispered to himself, "This isn't real. Just… sleep deprivation. Stress."
The shadow twisted. Turned. And slowly, it faced him.
Luke's pulse hammered in his ears. He tried to run, but his legs refused to obey. The air thickened like syrup, every step a struggle. The shadow rippled, then lunged, swallowing the room in black.
And then—
The world was gone.
When Luke opened his eyes again, he wasn't in his apartment. He was standing barefoot on soil the color of ash, under a sky that glowed a sickly grey. The air was heavy with whispers, hundreds of voices overlapping, too faint to make out but too loud to ignore.
Shapes drifted all around him—figures that had no faces, only pale outlines that bent and twisted as though they were made of smoke. Some floated lazily; others jerked in unnatural motions, their forms unraveling and re-forming with every step they took.
Luke staggered backward, his heart hammering against his ribs. His mind screamed that this couldn't be real, but the cold under his feet, the biting air in his lungs, and the oppressive weight of unseen eyes told him otherwise.
"What… where am I?" he whispered, though no one was there to answer.
Except—something did.
A figure broke from the crowd of drifting shapes. Taller, darker, and far more solid than the others, it loomed in the haze with deliberate steps. Its body was cloaked in shadows that writhed like flames, but its eyes burned like pale lanterns, fixed directly on him.
Luke's legs shook. His body screamed at him to run, but his feet refused to move. The whispers rose in volume, as though the countless spirits surrounding him were chanting in some forgotten language.
The figure stopped only a few feet away. For a moment, it simply stared. Then, its mouth—or what looked like one—curved into something resembling a smile.
"You… can see us."
The voice wasn't spoken aloud. It slid into Luke's mind like oil, echoing in places no sound should reach. He clutched his head, trying to block it out, but the words clung to him.
"I—I don't understand!" he shouted, panic cracking his voice. "This can't be real! What do you want from me?"
The spirit tilted its head, studying him like a specimen. "You are marked. The boundary has opened, and you will never be free of us."
Before Luke could respond, the ground beneath him shuddered. The faceless shapes turned their attention toward him, their movements no longer random but deliberate, purposeful. They were coming closer.
Dozens. Hundreds.
Luke stumbled back, his breathing ragged. "No, no, no—stay away!"
The air grew colder with each step the spirits took. Their whispers turned into a rising wail that tore at his ears, a chorus of anguish and hunger. The dark figure only stood there, watching.
Luke's vision blurred. His body felt heavy, his chest tight, his mind spinning. The crowd of spirits surged forward—and then—
He woke.
Luke bolted upright in his bed, gasping for air. His sheets were damp with sweat, his heart pounding as if it were trying to tear free from his chest. For a long moment, he sat there, clutching his head, trying to convince himself it had all been a nightmare.
The apartment was silent again. The broken bulb still lay shattered on the desk. His phone still glowed faintly with the time: 3:07 a.m.
It had felt so real. Too real.
As he tried to calm his racing thoughts, something caught his eye. Across the wall, faint but unmistakable, was a mark scorched into the paint: a twisted symbol he had never seen before.
Luke's blood ran cold.
The nightmare hadn't ended. It had followed him back.