Don’t Go Into The Mist - Blog Posts

There are figures in the mist.

Haven’t you noticed them? They loom at the edges of your vision, perpetually on the edges of sight. They wander as if lost, moaning with their silent mouths, pleading with their wispy hands. But every time you whirl around to get a closer look, they dissolve into the air, only to reappear the second you turn your back.

Do you know what they are?

No one else knows. We know where they come from, we know they’re dangerous, but we don’t know why they follow humans. There are theories of course; some say they’re chasing after the one thing they’ve been given a taste of that was cruelly ripped away from them- a soul; some say they’re hungry and nothing else can satisfy them; some even think they aren’t harmful and their dangerous reputation is simply misunderstandings. I know better.

They come when you look into The Mist. Looking into The Mist is fatal. See, these creatures, they know when someone is looking, and they flock to you the moment they sense the change. Something about them forces you to keep looking - perhaps because there are so many, or because you’ve never seen them in plain sight before - but, nevertheless, you keep looking. And The Mist, it sears itself into the contours of your brain, slinking it’s tendrils inside you through the receptacles of your eyes and through your skull. It wisps and twirls through you as it likes, shifting, shaping itself, and always followed by a soft thickening of the mist inside you. You’re allowed to look away then, because it’s started. The creatures absorb themselves back into the silver shade they came from, and you’re left wondering why they were there in the first place.

You go about your business as normal, but even you can tell you’ve changed. A strange fog rests over your mind, pushing, pressing, but you push back. You can’t be out of action, after all. You have a life with friends and family and a job, and it’s not appropriate to take sick days just because you feel all foggy. The defences of your mind are weakening. The figures don’t follow you any more. Their purpose has been fulfilled. However, it doesn’t stop you from seeing them. You spot them following your children, their friends, their teachers. No longer do they have to hide, but you seem to be the only person they’re not shrinking from. That’s the first symptom.

The second symptom is when you get the urges. This would be once a month or two has passed, and you’ve forgotten about The Mist. It’s made your forget. Nobody can suspect anything, after all. The urges cry into your mind, a constant command for you to return. Return to where? You don’t know. But you want so desperately to return, you feel it echoing within every fibre of your being (or is that the mist within chiming again?). So you start wandering, trying to find your place. You go up to people, hands clasped, telling them you’re lost and you’re trying to get somewhere but you don’t know where. You never find it.

The third symptom is very similar to the second symptom, but it has its differences. For instance, the second symptom hits you in strong, irresistible waves, while the third is like an insidious presence in the foggiest corners of your mind, a susurrus that never pauses for breath. The third symptom tells you to follow, so quietly that your brain takes it as its own and executes this without your noticing it. You start to shadow your coworkers, a strange blankness in your eyes, and when they call your name, you don’t respond. You start to follow your children to school, staring after them without replying when they say they love you. You even follow customers around the shops you frequent, when you should be collecting groceries for the next week. Sometimes, you catch yourself, but you have no memory of what you were doing before. The urge to return is still strong within you, but you don’t realise because it coincides with the need to follow, and so you think your strange feeling has finally disappeared. You call yourself cured, unknowing that the gaps that you are you are growing shorter and shorter.

The fourth symptom is the final step. This is the step that enables The Mist to pull you within its clutches, where you never escape from its strangling embrace. You start to fade. Your coworkers that before would have greeted you every morning, start to ignore you. When you greet them, their eyes slide right over you as if you aren’t there. They see only an empty space. Your children no longer see you, only a monster that used to be their parent. Your eyes mist over, the fog within them finally showing in your physical form through a familiar silver. Your brain becomes yours no more, only belonging to The Mist. Your fingertips fade away, becoming transparent, and your skin turns pasty and grey. Your hair, before a shiny, luscious thing, now has the permanent look of dampness to it. You remember now. You know your true purpose. You serve The Mist. You leave your house, and return to your true home, to become fully incorporeal to those who view you. And you never return.

So, dear reader, beware. There are figures in the mist.

This the image prompt I used!