Work Text:
Sean dreams of trees.
Tall trees that stretch endlessly into a pale grey sky. Fir, pine, birch. The branches reach out their bony, grabbing fingers, and the spaces between shine with the eyes of dead girls.
They won’t stop looking.
( pleasestoplooking— )
Time is stuck here. The sun hangs just over the edge of the horizon, burning orange between skeletal trunks like hot iron bars.
It’s golden hour.
A photographer’s dream.
A nightmare.
You only have an hour, his fearbrain tells him, only an hour before sundown. Only an hour before dark. Only an hour before HE catches you.
And he will catch you.
Sean dreams of horses.
Graceful, thundering, horrible beasts. Oil black coats stretched tight over muscle and sinew. Steam rolls off their backs, snow flurries at their their hooves.
(beautiful but not free.)
One tosses its head as if reined by an invisible hand. Froth spills from its mouth and its dead girl eyes roll impossibly far into its skull. The herd converges, crashing, exploding toward him.
Their bodies clash together into a tide of black and their braying turns into screams. Necks shorten, limbs thicken, bones crunch and joints p o p. Human arms sprout from their backs, and from their bellies, supple human calves. Fur peels (DECAYS) to skin. The screaming is all around him now, in the sky, in the trees, in his head—
Sean stumbles back as The Lovecraftian creature claws toward him. Half-human maws gape in a chorus of anguished voices and gnashing teeth. Run, they say. Run! HE is near!
Sean flees. Branches whip into his face and thorns snare at his clothing, but he doesn't stop.
The golden glow runs pink, then red; harsh lines in white snow. Ice fills his lungs. Then
n o t h i n g .
He hangs weightless in the void and hears someone whisper:
He has caught you.