Three Nights Remaining

I didn't sleep that night.

Or the next.

Every time I closed my eyes, I felt the presence—the cold, the whisper, the pull of something ancient waiting for me to fall back in. But I resisted. My body grew weak. My mind blurred at the edges. Coffee, energy drinks, pacing the floor, loud music—none of it stopped the inevitable.

On the third night, my hands were shaking so badly I could barely hold a spoon. My reflection in the bathroom mirror had changed. My eyes looked darker, almost sunken. And the mark on my neck? It had grown.

Now the hands in the symbol were stretching farther, curling down my collarbone like they were reaching for my chest.

I tried to talk to someone—my best friend Jay. I needed to know I wasn't losing it.

"You okay, man?" he asked when I showed up at his apartment, pale and twitchy.

"No," I said. "But I think you're the only one who might believe what I'm about to tell you."

He didn't.

Not at first.

But then I pulled out the key.

Jay reached for it, but the moment his fingers brushed it, he pulled back like it burned him.

"Dude… What the hell is that?" he muttered, his face going pale.

"You felt it?" I asked, relief mixing with dread.

He nodded. "It felt… wrong."

I told him everything. The dream. The room. The demon. The mirror. The messages. Even the mark.

He listened. Silent. Uneasy.

"Okay," he said slowly. "So what happens if you do sleep again?"

"I don't know," I whispered. "But I only have one night left."

Jay thought for a moment, then disappeared into his closet and pulled out an old camcorder.

"If something happens… I'll record it. Just in case."

I agreed. We set everything up in his room. Lights dimmed. Camcorder aimed at the bed. Jay would stay up, watch me. Make sure I was okay.

I lay down. The key on the nightstand beside me.

I tried not to sleep.

But exhaustion finally won.

Darkness took me faster than it ever had before.

I was back.

The door was wide open now.

No more banging.

No more whispers.

Just a low hum—like a distant choir humming a funeral song.

The room was darker than before. The tree on the key was no longer silver. It was black. And bleeding.

The hands on the tree reached out, stretching toward me like vines.

I walked through the door.

The hallway stretched forever. The walls pulsed like they were breathing. On either side, paintings of the two women lined the hall. Their expressions changed as I passed. From sorrow… to fear… to rage.

At the end of the hall, the demon was waiting.

No longer kneeling.

Standing tall.

Its eyes were no longer blue.

They were empty.

It didn't speak this time.

It reached out, slowly, hand open, waiting for mine.

Behind it, I saw something impossible.

My body.

Lying on Jay's bed.

Hooked up to wires.

Eyes closed.

Lips slightly parted.

And floating above it…

…was me.

A ghostly, transparent version of myself suspended in the air, the same key glowing in my chest.

The demon looked up at me.

And spoke with my voice.

"You've crossed too many times. Now you must choose."

Then it stepped aside, revealing something far worse behind it:

A massive mirror—cracked, pulsing, and showing a hundred versions of myself.

Each one screaming.

Each one trapped.

Some banging on the glass.

Some with hollow eyes.

One version of me was being pulled backward by dozens of tiny, gray hands.

Another version stood silently, bleeding from the eyes, holding the key like a dagger.

I looked down at my real body—still asleep.

Jay was sitting next to it, wide-eyed, recording.

Then—

The camcorder turned by itself.

The lens shifted toward Jay.

And something stood behind him.

Tall.

Thin.

White eyes glowing.

Claws reaching.

I screamed.

But no sound came out.

I turned to the demon, desperate. "What do I do?!"

The demon smiled. "Wake up… if you still can."

Then the mirror shattered.

A thousand hands reached through the shards.

Grabbing me.

Pulling.

And I—

Woke up screaming.

But not in Jay's room.

Not in my house.

Not even in a room.

I was in the door room.

Again.

Same walls. Same cold. Same silence.

Except this time, the key was gone.

And carved into the wall behind me… were the words:

"One more sleep, and you stay forever."