Clyde's mind felt like it was being shredded apart. Every blink of his eyes twisted the world around him, distorting, glitching, unraveling. His body burned with static, muscles jerking with an electric jolt that he couldn't control, as though something inside him was fighting to break free.
He had no idea where he was. The alley. The rain. The city. None of it mattered anymore. This was no place he knew. No reality he recognized. It was a place between worlds—a dimension neither here nor there. Black and white pixels flickered in and out of focus, the very air felt like an old video game running out of memory.
"You're not supposed to be here."
The voice came again, louder now, more urgent. Clyde spun around, his senses stretched thin, trying to find the source, but there was no one. No shape, no sound, just the empty void that stretched endlessly around him.
"Who are you?" he demanded, his voice shaking. "Where am I?"
But nothing. No response. The silence was oppressive, crushing. Then, out of nowhere, a screen flickered to life before him. His face. But it wasn't right. It was distorted, pixelated—like a corrupted reflection of himself. He reached out instinctively, but his fingers passed right through the screen like smoke.
"Run!!!"
The voice surged again, this time from every direction, vibrating through his very bones. Clyde's breath hitched, his body trembling as the words echoed around him.
He staggered backward, his thoughts spinning in chaos. Was this real? Was he dead? What was happening? His memories flickered—broken, fragmented—like shards of glass scattered across a dark floor. He could almost remember his life, his identity, but it was just out of reach.
Then, from the void, a figure stepped forward. It looked like him. Or at least, a version of him. A twisted reflection, a shadow. The figure's eyes locked onto his, cold, unblinking. It stood too still, too quiet—like a photograph frozen in time, trying to breathe.
"Who are you?" Clyde whispered again, his voice barely audible, trembling with fear.
The figure didn't answer. Instead, it reached out, its hand cracking like shattered glass. The touch was ice-cold. As soon as the figure's fingers brushed against him, pain exploded through Clyde's head. Images rushed in—his death, the accident, that horrible memory he couldn't quite place.
"You were never supposed to wake up," the figure said. Its voice was twisted, a grotesque echo of the one that had haunted him earlier. "You've been... rewritten."
A shockwave of electricity slammed into Clyde's chest, and he collapsed to his knees, gasping for breath. The figure moved closer, its form glitching, distorting with every step. Each time Clyde tried to focus on it, the image blurred, flickered, like a corrupted file he couldn't quite open.
"Wake up!!!" the figure screamed, its face morphing into something monstrous—part machine, part glitch. "Or you'll never leave."
Clyde's eyes snapped open. He was back. The alley. The rain. The chill of the pavement beneath him. But everything was different. The world felt off—wrong. The shadows were deeper than they should have been. The rain fell too loud, too heavy. His heart raced, but it wasn't just fear. There was something else, something that didn't belong.
A voice echoed in his mind, low and frantic.
"They're coming."
Clyde stumbled forward, legs weak, his vision spinning, each step uncertain. But one thing was clear: he wasn't alone anymore. The thing in the void, the glitch—it was real. And it was coming for him.
And now, Clyde had no choice. He had to run.