The Forest of Black Leaves

AN: I couldn’t bring myself to stop writing after all.

            I awoke the next day still on the floor, body aching from the events of the night before. It was the middle of the afternoon, at least a few hours before the sun would start to set, so I made my way back to the forest where I was attacked.

            When I arrived I found no trace of neither the art student nor the man he thought I was in league with. That is, until I turned to leave.

            When I turned to leave I saw the art student lying motionless on the ground. He didn’t appear to be breathing, and when I checked him for a pulse there was none. The knife he used to attack me was in his jacket pocket. When I reached for it he stood as if being lifted by puppet strings. Behind him stood the man, motionless as ever.

            He was controlling the art student somehow. He made the art student reach for the knife and disembowel himself with it. He made him turn and present himself to his controller, who absorbed all the spilling blood from the dead student’s body, before absorbing the corpse itself. I couldn’t stop myself from convulsing at the sight of it all.

            When I came back to my senses the man was gone and it was completely dark. My phone, on the brink of death, told me that it was well after sundown. Then it died.

           The trees became a maze in the darkness of night. I couldn’t find my way back at all. I wandered for hours and hours to no avail. I realized I was not in the same forest at all anymore, but in his world. I walked for days, starving, on the verge of dehydration. When I grew too weak to continue walking, I fell to my knees, and a hand pierced through my back, through my heart, out of my chest. His hand. It pulled me with all the force of hell, into the man’s body. He absorbed my life force.

            I am now but one soul among souls innumerable struggling for freedom from the man’s dark subconscious.

AN: I’ve completely lost track of time since I first started having this nightmare. But this most recent iteration was different. I didn’t wake up when he grabbed my neck at the end. Instead I remained in the dream as Dirk Rossman lifted me up, drawing my body into his. I felt fangs pierce my neck, draining me of my lifeblood. Once I had been devoured to the last drop of blood, he threw me aside, another corpse for the pile.

I am certain that this is a vision of my fate. I am to die by Dirk Rossman’s hand. I can’t accept it. I’m leaving this house, this area, this country, as far as I have to go to be free of him and his unworldly power. I don’t know why he chose me, but I will defy him to the end.