This was a short story I wrote while applying to college in 2019.
I licked my cracked, dried-out lips and peered through the spyglass. A dull whisper of wind whooshed past my ears, though the air was deathly still. Something felt off. Leaning forward over the ship’s wooden rail, I adjusted the focus onto the horizon, far ahead. The spyglass drifted upwards, and I adjusted it downwards, but a blurred brownness suddenly dominated the lens. I lowered the spyglass to see it was the rail. How could the horizon be lowering? The murmuring of the wind grew louder, until it was an assault on the ears. Yet I still felt no breeze. I shrugged and turned around to head back to my cramped cabin when the small boat suddenly pitched forward and I was thrown off my feet headfirst into the wood rail. My ears screamed, ringing, my limbs flung limply about, my vision filled with static, and then darkened.
Gradually, the darkness receded into the edges of my vision, and a deep purple replaced it. I stood and recovered my bearings. As the scene before me sharpened, I grew increasingly confused. A lavender mist hung sickly over rows of teeth-like gravestones jutting at odd angles from the uneven crimson soil. The gravestones were violently etched with a crude, evil language much, much older than humanity. The air seemed to suck the heat from my body and I shivered. The sky was black, yet everything was lit from all angles, unnaturally. I could not see ten paces ahead for the fog. I took a step forward, and a tortured silhouette came into view, stilly writhing in pain. Its branches were barren and leafless. I took another step and could now see the tree was bone white and without bark. The limbs reached towards the midnight sky, as if frozen in a desperate plea to a forgotten god. I took yet another step towards it, and a small red light caught my eye. Lodged in the tree, at the center of a grievous and ancient wound, was a luminous object. My hand stretched forth to grasp it. With a bit of force I extracted it from the tree. It was a slightly warm, blood-colored figure, carved from translucent quartz. Looking closer, I noticed the figure was faceless and smooth, holding some sort of sharp object in its hand.
A loud cracking sound suddenly filled the air. I looked up to see one of the tree’s largest branches unfold, its knobby fingerlike form outstretched to point behind me. I turned around to see what it was pointing at: only five steps behind loomed a pristine obsidian crypt. Devilish sculptures were contorted on its walls, and the entrance was an even blacker void. The cool wind caressed my face, and I felt an evil presence surrounding me, pushing me through the entrance and running down never ending jet-black stairs until the purple light faded behind me and I could only feel my legs propelling me forwards until the ground below disappeared and I was falling in darkness, until I opened my eyes and sat up in my bed. Too abruptly. I slammed my head against the ceiling and shouted. I threw the cotton blanket off and rushed upwards towards the light. The deck was still, and my sail drooped lifelessly, but the sky was blue and I could hear the waves crashing. I breathed a sigh of relief that it was just a dream. Still, the sky was oddly textured, brightly streaked by turquoise and white. I retrieved my spyglass from my pocket and looked through it. The sky was moving. I turned it upwards to look at the sun, which glimmered dull blue. This was not the ocean, I realized with a start: I was behind a massive waterfall that dominated my view. I returned my spyglass to my pocket, amazed, but it fell out and rolled across the deck. Something else was already there. I reached deep, and in horror brought up the red figure, a wide grin plastered over its disgusting faceless face, its silent laughter echoing in my ears, its long fingers clutching a dagger poised menacingly above my palm, arcing downwards so slowly that I couldn’t stop it. I felt a light prick, and a bead of blood grew above my skin.
You have reached the world’s end, the smiling mouth proclaimed. None but devils play past here. And with a disorienting sensation, I was peeled away from my body to find myself back home, sunbeams dancing through the shuttered windows. My fishing coat rested in one hand, the doorknob in the other. It was morning again.
I placed my coat back on the coat rack and decided to stay home to rest that day. I was feeling a bit ill.
