Do not go, gently so,<br/>Into the other side.<br/>Do not fret, but simply let<br/>The woe take you alive.<br/>Do not pray. No, never stray.<br/>Far from my hollow road.<br/>Break the skin, and let me in.<br/>And you'll never be alone.<br/><br/>Daniel Tremblay sat in a cold sweat and tried to bring his breathing back under a semblance of control. The soft green glare of his alarm clock winked at him silently, mockingly from atop his oaken side table. Each of its four digits were set to zero. It was odd; even when he pulled the clock from the box and plugged it in for the first time the default time setting was Six AM. Something about the blinking zeroes was oppressive. Daniel felt a strange sense of claustrophobia set in tightly around his shoulders. It wasn't the close quarters of his bedroom as his bedroom was one of the larger rooms of his house, but it was an oppression of time. The mocking zeroes brought time itself to a crashing halt. All around him, the moments tore through his fingertips like air from his lungs and he could feel himself suffocating from their loss.<br/><br/>With a pale, clammy hand he reached for the clock at his bedside and flicked the switch for the radio to the on position. It wasn't music that came forth from the speakers, nor was it the droning monotone of a morning talk show host. Hell, it wasn't even the white noise static that came in with shitty reception. The only noise, the only minute, inconsequential sound that could be heard was a soft, low hum; a frozen note with no beginning and no end. He picked the small device up, sat it down on the bed in front of him, and began switching between the different stations that he had programmed into its memory. It never changed. The same constant, creeping noise crawled into his ears with every press of the button.<br/><br/>He took in a deep breath and flicked the radio off. The hum clung to the room in its desperate struggle to drive Daniel into madness, but with an abrupt glitch, the noise vanished. A new and frightening presence was in its place, consuming the customary silence of his home in the morning hours. Doing his best to ignore it, he reached for his cell phone to check the time and reset the alarm clock, but the same four zeroes sat in the time display.<br/><br/>Inklings of fear climbed up his spine. Pressure built on each disk, atop each vertebrae as if they were nothing more than handholds or footholds to be used to reach the summit of his mind. The alarm clock still flashed its green digits, seeming to grow in its intensity. In a rush of irrationality, Daniel snapped the power switch to off, but the green lights flashed on. He tumbled off of the bed in a tangle of blankets. The clock fell face down onto the floor and his phone clattered somewhere that he couldn't see, but he had no mind for them. A small amber light was all that held his attention now. A shaky hand felt for the outlet behind his nightstand and, with more force than necessary, he ripped the clock's plug from the wall and slammed his wrist into the table's corner.<br/><br/>He swore under his breath as he rung his other hand over the new sore spot in an attempt to rub some feeling into it. Thoughts raced through his mind. He tried to find anyway to avoid what he was going to do next. Bringing the cord out from its dark crevice, he examined it closely, meticulously as if he were trying to solve a puzzle. It coiled around and around until his eyes found the alarm clock, still face down and beneath his deep olive green comforter. "It'll be off, he thought, it has to be off. As he picked it up, he already knew what he would find. The green glare was ever-present as he brought it to his face. The zeroes mocked him in their silent rebellion. They refused to change. They refused to disappear. They simply blinked, and blinked, and blinked…<br/><br/>He stood up suddenly and violently threw the clock into the wall opposite him. There he stood, next to his disheveled bed and in front of a shaded window, contemplating the blankets wrapped around his legs for a long moment. Disorganized thoughts dissipated like vapor under the assault of a new sound breaking into the room. The familiar symphonic ringtone rang loudly, but his phone was no where in sight. Echoes of the song bounced from wall to wall. Sweeping cellos created soundwaves that danced aggressively and he just wanted it to stop. Daniel fell back to his hands and knees to scour the floor for the small device. After head throbbing seconds of searching, he found it pulsating under the bed.<br/><br/>"H- Hello?" He mumbled, opening the phone and placing it to his ear, not even bothering with the caller id.<br/><br/>That same, dreary, droning hum howled ever-so quietly through the speaker. It seemed to almost say his name, but that couldn't be real, could it? It's just a power outage of some kind. Everything's fine. He did his best to believe his own thoughts, but it was a hollow faith that he placed there. Small spots of pain bloomed on the bell of his ear as he pressed the cellphone harder to himself, hoping, begging some unnamed force to send a voice through the receiver. None came. He knew none would ever come. Clasping the phone shut, he dropped it to the bed and put his hands to his face.<br/><br/>He dressed quickly and did his best to ignore the increasingly tight feeling of anxiety that tried to smuther him. Daniel found some hidden determination to put the weird events of the morning behind him, but no matter what he tried, they never let him be. As he pulled a fresh band shirt over his head, alight knock seemed to come from all four walls. Frozen, he stood staring into the mirror. The Blue October logo on his shirt was of simple design with the lyrics "I used to fall, but now I get back up." Sprawled in cursive across it. Tired eyes roamed up to his own face in the reflective surface. As he watched, one tear formed in the corner of his right eye and began slowly sliding down his cheek. He reached up and brushed the spot on his face, but his fingers were dry when he pulled them away. He looked quickly back to the mirror to see that the teardrop was still there. Instead of himself however, instead of anything that would have made sense to see, he saw the very image of madness.<br/><br/>There he lay, sprawled upon the bed with limbs tucked to his side. At first, it seemed like some trick of the eye, but as it slowly increased in fervency, he could see little movements beneath the flesh of his stomach. Daniel stood in awe as it continued. The reflected world showed as his body began jerking up into the air. The movements of his flesh grew in intensity like jagged bones trying to escape their fleshy prison. In a burst of blood, what he could now tell were pale white fingers with piercing charcoal claws were tearing through the flesh of his belly. Long, gangly arms thrust through the bloody opening and began to pull the rest of its sickly white body from the wound. Its head was covered in sparse and brittle black hair that clung to his blood upon its frightening face. It turned gruesomely, the sickening cracks of its bones causing Daniel to wince involuntarily as he watched his mirror-self become a mutilated mass. When it stared into him with veiny white eyes, he flinched backward and fell onto the bed. Pain throbbed in his knee as he flung himself to the far side of the bed and collided heavily with the hope chest he kept there.<br/><br/>An uneasy moment of calm settled over the room. Taking a last deep breath for courage, he peered over the bed. He let go a deep sigh of relief as he saw his own face staring, frightened, back at him with wide eyes. Then there, another knock, but this time it came from the floor and ceiling simultaneously. After picking himself up from the blue and purple carpet, he pressed his back firmly against the wall. Knock, knock. Daniel flinched as he felt the pounding in the wall. He didn't want to believe it, but it felt as if the knocking sensation came from directly behind him. The image of the white"thing" that crawled out from within his reflection's innards crossed through his mind again. Its eyes bugged out from its mottled face and a lipless mouth opened and closed sporadically. Thick fangs filled its decayed mouth and a bloated and swollen tongue licked over them with no rhyme or reason. Is it here? It can't be. It isn't real. He hoped and prayed for any reason that might explain what was happening. Maybe it's my medication… Yeah, that's it. With his back against the wall he walked toward the bedroom door and opened with trembling hands. Nothing. He sighed once more in relief.<br/><br/>The stairs down seemed steeper than usual as he crept toward them. For a long moment he stood like a statue lording itself over a garden. All was still, and he was but a dream amongst the memory of his home. An explosion of noise rocked the house. And nearly sent Daniel crashing down the stairs. He hung precariously from the banister with one arm and knotted his fingers through his hair in an attempt to relieve the pressure that so suddenly thundered behind his eyes. The walls shook as some unseen thing slammed again and again and again into them. The walls were going to come down around him, he knew it. The house was going to shatter into an immeasurable amount of splinters and bury him beneath the inanimate carnage. This is where he would drown; crushed beneath the weight of the home that kept him safe in the recent years.<br/><br/>"Stop it!" He shouted so loud that his lungs burned in his chest. "Stop it! Stop it!!! STOP IT!!!" In his hysterics, he lost his footing and tumbled down, down, down the stairwell, and into unconscious bliss.