Adrian's hands wouldn't stop shaking.
It wasn't exhaustion. It wasn't fear. His body was rebelling in ways he couldn't explain. His skin tingled, his muscles twitched, and sometimes he swore his fingers bent in directions they shouldn't.
At first he thought it was just the Dimensional tricking him again—another cruel illusion.
But then he saw the marks.
Thin, spiral-shaped bruises blossomed across his forearms, glowing faintly beneath the skin, as though his blood itself was swirling in endless circles. When he pressed a hand against them, they pulsed—alive, synchronized with his heartbeat.
Mine, the whispers cooed.
He stumbled backward, pressing his body against the wall, only to feel the wall press back. The surface molded against his spine, warm, almost pulsing, as if the Dimensional itself had veins.
Adrian screamed and tore himself away, leaving behind a faint imprint of his back etched into the wall.
---
The hallucinations followed.
His reflection appeared in any surface—shimmering puddles of static, slick walls, even his own shadow. Always staring back at him. Always grinning just a little too wide. Sometimes, the reflection would mouth words before he did. Sometimes, it spoke instead of him.
One moment, Adrian whispered: "I can't do this anymore."
And his reflection, lips curling into a spiral grin, replied:
You already are.
---
But the worst was his body.
His fingernails grew brittle, black veins curling beneath them like cracks in porcelain. His right eye twitched violently until the iris began to shift, its color bleeding into a faint silver spiral.
He clutched at it, hyperventilating, certain it would burst from his skull.
And then—just as suddenly as it began—the symptoms would vanish. His hands normal. His eye clear. The spirals gone.
False hope, over and over.
The Dimensional was testing him.
---
Sleep finally claimed him like a collapse, though it wasn't real rest. His dreams were bodies folding into spirals, mouths whispering his name in chorus, the air itself chanting his heartbeat back to him in a rhythm that was not his own.
When he awoke, Adrian found the bruises had spread—spirals coiled up his neck, faint but undeniable.
He pressed a trembling hand against them.
And for the first time, he didn't just hear the Dimensional's voice.
He felt it vibrating inside his chest.
You are opening, Adrian. You are almost ready.
---