On 6th March 2004, I woke up in a hospital.
At least, that's what it felt like.
But even in that moment, I wasn't sure if I was truly awake.
My eyes opened slowly, heavy as if they carried the weight of something unsaid. The first thing I noticed was the ceiling—white, cracked in places, painfully ordinary. The smell of antiseptic filled the air, sharp and clean, yet strangely suffocating.
I turned my eyes slightly.
A clock hung on the wall across from me. Its ticking was steady, almost mocking in its calmness.
12:45.
Time was moving forward.
Yet I felt stuck.
I lay on a narrow hospital bed, unable to move much. My body felt weak, distant, as if it belonged to someone else. I tried to lift my hand, but even that simple act felt exhausting. There was a strange disconnect between my thoughts and my body—like my mind had returned before the rest of me.
Fragments of memory surfaced.
An accident.
The word echoed in my head, but nothing followed it. No images. No sound. Just a hollow space where something important should have been. Every time I tried to force the memory back, my head throbbed in protest.
Then the dizziness came.
It wasn't sudden—it crept in slowly, wrapping around my thoughts. My vision blurred at the edges. A sharp pain spread through my head, then settled deep inside my chest, heavy and unbearable, as if something was pressing down on my heart.
I gasped for air.
The room began to distort. The walls seemed farther away than they should have been. The ticking clock grew louder, then quieter, as if reality itself couldn't decide how real it wanted to be.
And then—I saw her.
A girl in a school uniform stood in front of me.
She wasn't supposed to be there. I knew that. Hospitals don't have schoolgirls standing silently near beds. Yet she felt real—more real than the room around me. Her face was blurred, like a memory I had seen long ago but never truly understood.
Her eyes met mine.
They were filled with something painful—fear, confusion, sorrow, and something else I couldn't name. Her lips trembled slightly before she spoke.
"Why… why you?"
Her voice wasn't loud.
But it echoed inside me.
I wanted to ask her who she was. I wanted to tell her I didn't understand. But before any words could leave my mouth, the world around me began to collapse.
The hospital room faded as if it were being erased.
Darkness rushed toward me.
I felt myself being pulled, dragged into something vast and endless—a void with no direction, no sound, no light. Panic surged inside me. I tried to scream, to move, to resist—but my body refused to respond.
My voice was gone.
My control was gone.
Slowly, my thoughts dissolved.
I wasn't falling asleep.
I was being taken.
I sensed movement—not through space, but through something deeper, something beyond understanding. It felt like my existence was being transferred, stripped from one place and forced into another.
Then, suddenly—
Impact.
A powerful force struck my body, knocking the air out of me. Pain shot through every nerve, and I collapsed onto a cold surface.
I gasped.
Air rushed into my lungs as my senses returned. My heart pounded violently, as if reminding me that I was still alive—wherever here was.
I looked around.
The place was unfamiliar, silent, and wrong. There were no walls, no ceiling, no clear sky. Everything felt distant, stretched, unreal. A faint darkness surrounded the space, shifting slowly.
Then I noticed them.
Shadows.
They hovered around me—formless, tall, and still. They did not walk or move like normal beings. They simply existed, watching me with an awareness that made my skin crawl.
I stood there, frozen.
I didn't know why I was here.
I didn't know how I arrived.
And I didn't know if I could leave.
Yet deep inside, something stirred.
A quiet feeling—unsettling but familiar—as if this place knew me. As if I had been here before… or was meant to be here.
My voice finally broke the silence, barely more than a whisper.
"What is this?
Where am I?
What are these shadows?"
The shadows did not answer.
They remained still—
watching me with patience.
As if they were waiting for something.
As if they were waiting for me to remember.