The Thing Beyond the Door

Arthur's feet felt heavier with each step, as if unseen hands were trying to pull him back, whispering warnings in a language he couldn't understand. But he moved forward anyway.

Eleanor's grip on his wrist tightened. "Arthur, what the hell are you doing?" she hissed, her voice barely above a breath. "We should—"

He cut her off with a glance. "Stay here."

She stared at him, hesitation flickering in her wide eyes. But when she spoke again, her voice carried a cold certainty. "No chance in hell."

Arthur let out a sharp breath through his nose, but there was no time to argue. The door at the end of the hallway stood ajar, gaping like a mouth leading into the abyss. The space beyond it was impossibly dark, the kind of blackness that swallowed everything whole.

The whispers had gone silent.

That was worse.

Arthur reached the doorway, his fingers twitching as he hesitated. Every instinct in his body screamed at him to turn back. But he wasn't that kid anymore—the one who ran from shadows, who trembled at the unknown.

He pushed the door open.

The darkness inside moved.

Eleanor sucked in a sharp breath. Arthur stood frozen as his eyes adjusted—or at least tried to. The room beyond the door was supposed to be the guest bedroom, but now… now it felt wrong. The dimensions seemed off, stretching and twisting in ways that defied logic. The air inside was thick, suffocating. It smelled of dust, old wood, and something rotting.

And then—the whisper returned.

"Master… come closer…"

Arthur's breath hitched. This time, the voice wasn't distant. It was right in front of him.

Eleanor grabbed his arm. "Arthur, step back—"

Too late.

A cold, bony hand shot out of the darkness and latched onto his wrist.

Arthur barely had time to react before something yanked him forward. The world spun, and suddenly, the darkness devoured him whole.

-------------------------

Arthur hit the ground hard.

The air was thick with dust, choking him as he gasped. He scrambled to his feet, heart hammering against his ribs. The room was gone. The hallway was gone.

He was somewhere else.

The floor beneath him was stone, uneven and cold. The air smelled ancient, heavy with decay. He tried to see, but the space around him was dimly lit, shadows pressing in from all sides. The only source of light came from above—a dull, reddish glow filtering down like dying embers.

Arthur turned, and his breath caught in his throat.

The walls—if they could be called that—were lined with figures.

No, not figures. Corpses.

Bodies hung suspended in midair, their limbs limp, their faces obscured by shadow. They swayed slightly, as if moved by an unseen breeze.

Arthur swallowed hard, every muscle in his body screaming for him to move, to run. But where? There were no doors, no windows. Just the endless rows of hanging bodies, stretching into the dark.

And then—

One of the corpses twitched.

Arthur's pulse spiked. His hands clenched into fists as he took an instinctive step back. The body jerked again, its movements slow, unnatural. Then another one moved. And another.

The whispers returned, curling around him like a sickening lullaby.

"Master… you have come at last…"

A figure stepped forward from the darkness.

Unlike the others, it wasn't suspended. It walked. And as it approached, Arthur felt something deep, primal, claw at his insides.

The figure was tall, draped in black, its face obscured by a hood. But beneath the fabric, something shimmered—a grotesque, shifting mass of twisting shapes. Not flesh. Not bone. Something else.

Arthur's throat went dry.

The figure stopped mere inches away. The shadows around it moved, pulsing like a living thing. Then, slowly, it raised a hand—long, skeletal fingers curling toward him.

Arthur couldn't move.

"It is time," the voice whispered, though the figure's lips never moved.

Arthur's mind screamed. Time for what? What the hell was this thing?

Then, the figure's fingers touched his forehead.

The world collapsed.

A tidal wave of something crashed into Arthur's mind. Visions. Memories. Not his own. His knees buckled as raw, ancient knowledge poured into him—images of burning skies, of screaming souls, of a figure standing amidst the carnage, wreathed in black flames.

And at the center of it all—

A pair of eyes.

Eyes that burned like dying stars.

Arthur knew those eyes.

He tried to scream.

Darkness swallowed him whole.