New data received from the system.
A terrifying void. [The Mist] surrounds everything, a mist with a shimmer that flickers through pale shades of blue and silver-gray. The scene is a near attempt at describing the void, if it can be described. Some imagine it dark, some imagine it misty, and some do not imagine it at all.
He tried to form the word. No tongue vibrated; no air passed through any throat. The thought remained trapped, circling and growing within his mind, which had suddenly become a very narrow place.
There was no darkness. Darkness requires the absence of light, and what surrounded him was not an absence, but a cosmic "screensaver." An infinite gray, saturated with blue "static" noise that hummed at the base of his consciousness like a fly trapped in a bottle.
He tried in vain to remember his name, thinking: Where am I? How did I get here? And what is this place? He could find no clear answers in his mind, only fleeting glimpses of featureless human faces, sometimes voices, and blurred flashes, like the static of an ended television broadcast.
Movement seemed impossible! He tried to rise, to move his head in any direction, but to no avail. He looked to where his hands should be and saw nothing. He visualized the concept of a hand in his mind, tried to move his right arm. He focused all his will on the command: Move, and waited for the end of his arm to respond. It did not. He felt something, not the movement of muscles nor the creaking of joints. He felt a vibration, a faint hum in the space where his arm should have been. It was as if an electric current were flowing through a severed wire. His body was an absolute absence, a muscle memory without muscles.
He lay horizontally, looking up at all that silver blue. He noticed that, aside from the blurry, passing glimpses, he heard no sounds, not even the familiar sounds of breathing or a heartbeat. There was no suffocation; that was the most terrifying part. There was no familiar burning of oxygen deprivation. There was only... a complete lack of need. His consciousness was suspended in the void, drifting without a biological anchor.
The horrifying thought struck him: A problem with my senses? Or perhaps damage to my nervous system affecting movement, sight, and hearing? He tried to direct his perception toward the corners of the void, in all possible directions. He could see nothing new, only the same ambiguous mist.
He tried to scream, but felt no sound escape him. Only a loud thought: Is anyone there? He felt his voice was muffled, or that he had no voice at all. The thought disturbed him deeply. He stopped his thinking for a few moments, beginning to simulate the motion of deep, regular breathing to no avail. He tried to gather his strength, the last thing he remembered... In truth, he remembered nothing. No name or occupation. No events or people, nor what he had been doing before waking up in this numbness, this strange void. It felt to him like events from a novel or a scene from a movie about a helpless person, someone injured in an accident, or even in a coma if that is what happens in a coma. Death was a possibility that could neither be denied nor proven.
No. Do not think about that. Do not let it become your reality. If he were dead, where did this continuous awareness come from? And if he were alive, where was the body, where was the world, and where was the voice that should clothe the silence?
Where am I? he screamed in his internal silence. Get me out of here!
And [The Mist] responded. The neutral gray color shuddered. Slight ripples began to form around the center of his consciousness, as if his fear had a physical "weight" pressing against this gelatinous void. He tried to calm himself. The ripples began to grow violent, a sensation or illusion of dizziness, though in reality, he felt nothing.
He focused on this fact. The only fixed point in a sea of variables.
Then, he felt movement! He did not know what exactly was moving, or how he could feel that movement despite the absence of sound. He was certain that some motion was occurring around him. "Intrusion." Another presence, sharp and defined, pierced his private sphere. He felt a metallic coldness touch the exposed surface of his mind. He tried to look in every possible direction, tried to scream again. His senses failed him, and his voice did not emerge. It felt like a choked thought: Help! Who is there?* For moments, he felt no response. A mixture of despair and panic overcame him. The thought suffocated in the space of consciousness that had become his only prison.
The panic, which had been rising slowly, now exploded. He was conscious; that was the catastrophe. From his right side, his eyes caught the shadow. It had human boundaries and features. It materialized beside him in silence and seemed still for a moment. Then, from the shadow emerged what appeared to be two long hands.
He felt a cold touch on both sides of his head. His vision gradually darkened, and he no longer felt anything...