Terry looked through one of the dirty windows of his apartment at a collecting storm that he hoped might wash him away, just so that he might finally have a little peace. On the secondhand night table next to his bed was a bottle of prescription sleeping pills he'd just gotten refilled, and a glass of orange juice. Condensation beaded on the outside of the glass, and was no doubt working on a nice water ring to add to the variety of other water rings he'd made over the past year.
"Okay," he pled quietly, but desperately with a God that he wasn't sure existed, but couldn't completely discount, "Just one night of sleep without a nightmare, please? One night without waking up with my pillow jammed in my mouth to keep from screaming? Haven't I earned it, just this once in all my twenty years?"
Receiving no answer, never had, of course, he sat on the edge of his bed, dreading sleep, as he had since he was six and started having disjointed, disorienting, terrifying nightmares. There was no fathomable reason for them, as he was not the product of a broken home, not abused, molested, or subjected to the things that screwed up so many other kids his age. His parents were okay, hard-working, and he was an only child.
He scooted back onto the bed, leaning on one side and grabbing the bottle of sleeping pills. He opened it and fished two out, dropping the little, blue capsules onto his tongue, and then downing them with a few swallows of orange juice. He set the open bottle and the glass of juice back on the nightstand and lay on his back, staring up at the ceiling. One pill each night was all he was supposed to take, but one did nothing to keep the nightmares at bay. Maybe two would. Or maybe the whole bottle could do what nothing else seemed to be able to. His parents, frightened for him, had taken him to be evaluated by a psychiatrist when he was eight, and the nightmares didn't seem to be going away. The man had asked him a lot of questions he didn't quite know the answers to, and had, with his parents' permission, put him under with hypnosis. He'd screamed so loudly that he would lose his voice for almost a week after, and the frightened psychiatrist had brought him out of it quickly.
Every nightmare, as far as he could remember, had one central character in it, one alluring, tantalizing, yet terrifying creature. It had no eyes, no eye sockets even, just smooth skin between the forehead and the bridge of the nose. It was tall, about six and a half feet, the shape of the most beautiful woman that he could ever imagine otherwise. It had teeth like a shark, but seemed to have no speech impediment because of it. Its hair was almost platinum, glossy and luxurious. Around him and this creature, fires raged unchecked, buildings all black and melted, the ground charred, torn, broken bodies heaped in piles around him, blood dripping and running and cascading into the earth, screams fixed on the faces of every corpse, all eyes plucked out and fashioned into some bizarre necklace that the thing wore on its naked breasts. The eyes gazed on, somehow still alive and seeing, all looking at him, and he understood that, in some strange way, the eyes were how she could see the world. She stood before him, completely nude, except that she was bathed in blood that never seemed to dry. The nightmare changed constantly, ever shifting, yet she didn't.
His eyes grew heavy as the medicine began to take effect, and he shuddered in dread, because he somehow knew that he wouldn't be spared this night either. Still, even as he still fought against it, he fell asleep. He smelled it before he could see it, the reek of death and decomposition, blood and despair. Then he could see. He lay on the floor of an office building. Ashes swirled around him, as all the windows were melted until they had dripped down the walls beneath them, pooling on the floor. Charred lumps of metal littered the floor, unrecognizable as anything now. He got to his feet and walked out of the room, but then the shadows danced around him, and before he could take another step, he stood outside. The sky was the color of coagulated blood, boiling and flowing along sluggishly above him. And, ever present, was the creature.
"Do you think," it spoke in a silky, alluring woman's voice, "that you can escape me with pills?"
Terry couldn't speak, didn't dare.
It grinned, its shark's teeth gleaming a radiant white, "You can never escape me, boy. You are my plaything, and nothing can take you from me until I am done with you."
Terry backed away, but where was there to run. It was everywhere, could fly, could materialize out of nothing, rotted, corrupted, maggot-infested mind filled only with his torment.
It moved closer, its arms extended to him, its nails long and razor-sharp, so filthy that they promised of disease and infection, "Come to me, boy. There is no resisting me, not by such as you."
He shook his head, still unable to speak, his eyes averted from it.
"Yet you persist," it chuckled darkly, a sound like vomit gurgling in the throat of a convulsing corpse, "How long have I hungered for you, boy? And yet you would continue to deny me, though I could take you whenever I wish. I could, but I prefer you come to me. You would taste so much more delicious."
Terry turned and ran, fleeing from it as he had for years, only to be pursued relentlessly through the death-scape of broken, bloody bodies, empty eye sockets glaring at him as he passed.
"This is the world that I have made," it crowed in perverse delight right behind him, "You should rejoice and be glad in it!"
Terry ran in terror, as he had in every nightmare, knowing that doing so was futile. This time was no exception, as it appeared in front of him, and he scrambled back, gagging.
"Do I not please you?" it cried with glee, "Do I not stir your loins in such lust? Does your blood not boil for my caress?"
He continued to run, drawing in harsh, burning breaths, coughing out ash, and she was suddenly above him, horrible, skeletal wings extended, with crudely-sown flaps of human flesh fused to the bones.
It rode the sky, laughing as he fell, scrambled back to his feet, and ran more, "You may run until your feet are but charred, bleeding nubs under your ankles, and you'll not escape me, boy! I can smell your soul, and I shall follow you to the ends of the earth, until you come to me!"
Suddenly, the shadows raced, and he found himself climbing enormous mountains of dead, yet malevolent rats that bit at him and hissed, and he shuddered as his feet crunched over bones and scorched fur, amid the furious squeals.
And even then, suddenly exploding from the dead rats as if propelled from a cannon, there it was, its arms out and seeking him.
"Your flesh calls to me, boy!" it hissed, "It begs for my caress, it pleads for my lips! Come to me, that I may possess it!"
He climbed-scuttled-clambered over the mountain or living rat corpses, fell down the other side, all the way down to the bottom, dizzy, and then fell from his bed, thumping onto the floor, writhing, kicking, flailing himself awake. He pulled himself weakly to his feet, reeling, his heart pounding thunderously. He collapsed back onto the floor as his legs refused to bear his weight for the moment, and he huddled miserably on the floor, hugging his knees to his chest and shuddering, his breath heaving. As he looked into the gathering morning light, he saw something that he found tremendously ominous. In the corner, on the floor, was a rat corpse facing him. It glared at him with dead, glazed eyes, its teeth bared menacingly... but it was dead. It did none of those things, yet the sight of it offended him all the same.
Once he had strength in his legs again, he disposed of the rat corpse in the garbage chute in the hallway outside his small apartment, using a small dustpan and whisk broom, as careful as possible to avoid touching the offensive thing. There was no way the rat corpse could've followed him out of his nightmare; this one had probably already been there already, and he had just missed it. He showered, scrubbing twice, washing the sour reek of fear-sweat away. As he dried off, he looked in the mirror, noticing the pallor of his skin, the circles under his eyes from the lack of restful sleep. Not much had changed from his childhood. His nightmares had been the sole focus of his life, and he had been unable to make friends. People regarded him as an oddity. He didn't fit in with society, so he existed outside of it, a pale, nervous wreck with long, dark hair, a leanly-muscled young man with no real future to think of. The trust fund left to him by his parents had gone into a savings account, and he basically lived off the interest, using just enough to get by, and he had little dealings with the outside world. There was Cliff, the man who owned this building, who collected the rent each month, the doctor who prescribed his medicine, and a delivery man from the grocery store who brought his groceries. Everything else he needed could be gotten without human contact.
"Who would miss you if you just disappeared?" something hissed nearby, and he whirled, but he was alone. He knew that voice instantly, and was disconcerted by it.
