The first thing I’m aware of is the dark. Like somebody just shut off the lights. I squint into the inky nothingness, straining to see something, anything, but my eyes don’t adjust. Tentatively I feel with my feet along the floor, which is oddly slanted, as if the room is being tilted downward. I take a step back, and my leg strikes something hard. I stop. Try to regain my balance. Listen.
There are voices, faint voices, from somewhere above.
I don’t know what this vision is about yet, where I am or what I’m supposed to be doing or who I’m hiding from. But I do know this: I’m hiding.
And something terrible has happened.
It’s possible that I’m crying. My nose is running, but I don’t try to wipe at it. I don’t move. I’m scared. I could call the safety of glory, I think, but then they would find me. Instead I draw my hands into fists to stop the trembling. The darkness closes in, encasing me, and for a moment I fight the urge to call glory so hard that my fingernails break the surface of my palms.
Be still, I tell myself. Be quiet.
I let the darkness swallow me whole.