Inside

The Detective saw memories of his childhood as he walked past this idyllic landscape. He saw memories of the past, the present, and the future. He saw memories that were not his. He saw everything and he saw nothing. He walked through beautiful plains, through places that smelled of heaven. What did heaven smell like? No, on second thought, not of heaven, but of what he imagined earth had been before there had been metal homes scraping against the sky, and gravel roads, and huge metal horses running along the roads. The sound, the sound, oh, the sound. He could live here forever, and never miss anyone and anything. He almost sat down a few times, but he knew if he sat down, he would fall into a wonderful slumber, and when he woke up, he knew, he felt, he knew, that he would wake up and begin a life anew here. In this place. The sound was of wind over plains, whistling joyfully. The smell was of greenery, greenery that he felt under his feet as his bare feet walked on the ground. He had felt an urge to take off his boots a while ago. So he had. He was walking barefoot, and he had never felt more at home.

There were animals around him, that was to be expected. These ones felt different. They looked at him with what felt like morose eyes, a sadness as if something had been taken from them. They looked back down after a few brief seconds of staring to munch on the grass again. In front of him stood woods. Again, he felt strange. A shiver down his back, up his neck, tingling. As if something had been taken from him. He almost walked in.

But stopped. Foot on a rock, his foot in pain. Blinding, splitting, for just one second, and in that second, he was looking at the woods. Tears began streaming down his eyes. The woods shifting, for just that second, he saw the darkness that had eaten away at the place, and that now dwelled within. He felt a dancer that had once danced in them, he felt the savior who had once come to find her. He felt the shadows that had trailed him, and with him, had entered the woods. He felt them about to swallow the two when they met. He felt how the savior just vanished. The dancer fled. Untouched. 

The pain stopped. The second was over. He blinked once. Then twice. He shook his head. His eyes hurt from seeing without sight. His head, his head spun. He heard a grumbling from inside the woods. His insides, something ancient within him, screamed. His feet trembled. For a brief second, he felt the hunger coming from within the forest. For a brief second, a shadow covered the sun, and he felt the only light that was coming came from within the forest. He looked around him, the animals were staring at him, intelligent eyes, concerned eyes. He stepped inside.