⭑Lis⭑

I was constantly falling. It was like I was in slow motion. The floor beneath my feet was moving away, and it was as if the very fabric of the world was refusing to touch me. I could stand, sit, or walk, but I was still falling.

‎‎The world was in a loop, and I was falling, but I couldn't break. I clung to reality with all my might, like a drowning man clinging to a straw, but they quickly grew tired of maintaining stability, and I fell to the ground.

‎I don't know where the floor is or where the ceiling is. The walls seem to recede, leaving me in a terrifyingly open and empty space, only to collapse onto each other, forming a perfectly aligned triangle. I try to move forward, but I end up turning sideways. It's amazing how easily they can switch planes, and I find myself envious.

‎Everything around me is spinning at a rapid pace. It wasn't easy to find a way out of this labyrinth in the first place, but when reality lost its shape, it became impossible. But I keep searching. If I were in your place, would you give up? I would give up too. But I can't. Puppets don't commit suicide.

‎And I keep falling.

TW/CW: veiled reference to self-harm, insects

Lis lay in the dark, staring at the cracks in the wall, pulling the blanket tightly around himself to keep the cold fingers of the world from reaching his vulnerable body (which was his greatest fear). Or rather, there was only one crack, but it was surrounded by a web of small black threads, like the legs of a spider, making it appear as if there were many cracks. The more Lis stared at it, the more menacing it became: the spider-crack seemed to grow, distort, and press against him.

She was showing him a map of the scars on his body, each eerie curve mirroring the others. So they had noticed them: the bathroom should also be checked for cameras. But he would do that in the morning; he couldn't enter the tall rectangle of darkness at night, lest something wet and sticky touch his feet, gradually spreading across his body, wanting to drown him, to make him a part of this eerie, musty room. He had always been afraid of this place, but that wasn't the point. The fear was more real now.

What if... He wanted to dismiss the thought immediately: the crack exuded a sense of genuine danger. It was, in a way, alluring, drawing him in like a black hole, an irresistible force that he couldn't help but resist, but he didn't want to touch it for fear of what might happen. However, there was no denying the possibility that every inch of the cold concrete beneath the wallpaper was dotted with microscopic cameras. All he could do was thwart their efforts, as they already knew that he was aware of their surveillance. And I know that you know, and you know that I know.... They turned on the radio to stop him from thinking. How clever.

Once Lis moved, there was no turning back. His hand was drawn to those dangerous curves, which felt as cold as if he were stroking a block of ice. There was nothing to feel: the cameras were small and flat. They wanted him to look, and who was he to resist?

He carefully peels off a small piece of wallpaper that's blocking his view, and a sharp pain shoots through his entire arm. Lis immediately pulls his hand back and sees small black bugs hiding behind the wallpaper falling onto his bed. He tries to catch them before they spread further, but the bugs are smarter than he thought. The artificial and possibly long-dead insects immediately turn into red spots on the sheets. They crawl along his knees and fingers in red trails, and Lis barely manages to hold back a scream. Now he knows that his walls are infested with insects. He begins to tear off the paper in quick, jerky motions, not allowing himself to stop so that he doesn't have time to be afraid, but God, it's still difficult to convince yourself that you don't feel hundreds of small legs touching your skin.

The crack is now dirty and wet. Everything around it is dying, and he must remember to write this down in his notebook. A wire emerges from the increasingly large hole. So it is indeed a bug. The only option that comes to Lis's mind is to try to pull it out (it can't be infinite, right?), and he acts without hesitation, trying not to think. The pain is already piercing his head. His vision is starting to darken. That's right. How could he have thought that they would let him do this so easily? Lis begins to pull even faster and harder, but these evil creatures, who have been terrorizing him just because he noticed them once, take control of his body and forcefully shut him down. His nose is pressed against the wet sheet, and he can't breathe, but he can't move because the cold has seeped into his limbs and frozen them from the inside.

The pain throbs as if insects have crawled under his skin. Soon they will reach his brain, and that will be the end. They will hear with his ears, speak with his mouth, and see with his eyes.

A curious eye out from the crack.

I don't have schizophrenia, but I do have hallucinations and delusions, and I've also gone through something like depressive psychosis, so I want to verbalize my experiences and make them into something artistic. I decided to start with Time.

‎Time has changed. It's frozen like jelly. I've been looking at the moving hands and realizing that it's an illusion.

‎They've done everything to make me overlook it, but I'm no fool. They're constantly trying to manipulate my reality, hoping I'll fall for their tricks. I don't know what will happen if I fall into their trap. It's definitely not going to be good. I don't know where it comes from, but I'm certain that death would be a much better option than what awaits me. Although, if I think about it, I'm already trapped. What else can I call it when I have to think about every action I take so that I don't make a mistake but also don't seem too smart to them? They know, they definitely know, that I understand everything. They just like to play with me.

‎At first, I wanted to call it a time loop, but it's not... the same. The events never repeat themselves. How do they not get tired of putting on a new show for me every day? But I know there's no more time. I mean, there's no more present tense.

‎My mother came into the kitchen, as if sensing that I was thinking about it too much, but this cheap trick didn't distract me from my thoughts. I know she's not here. When was she really here? Yesterday? Tomorrow? A couple of hours ago? Or maybe a couple of minutes? I'm unlikely to ever find out what's going on in the real world, not the one that's being carefully presented to me. But the feeling of unreality knocks the ground out from under my feet every time, if there's any ground there at all.

‎I feel like I'm floating in a void. I could go forever without breathing or moving. My heart isn't beating right now, but it's not because I'm dead - that would be too easy. It's just that time became transparent in those four-tenths of a second when everything froze. It's because it's afraid of life. But life as a phenomenon no longer exists, and it has taken over my world, which has shrunk to the size of a single kitchen. There's nothing left for it to fear.

In addition to having strange, feverish dreams, I also had two sleep paralysis per night. At first, I was lying on my stomach and there were some devils around me. I couldn't turn my head, so I mostly felt their touch and heard a little whispering. Most of all, I remember the moment when they slapped me on the back with both hands (it really hurt, dudes).

At some point, I became so scared that I started asking Hecate for help, remembering that she was also the patroness of the dark forces and would be able to protect me. And lo and behold! She really came. I got a chance to move, and I rolled over onto my back so I could look around the room. I stood in front of her and she instructed me. I didn't remember her words very well, she only said something about trials. It was the most peaceful moment of the whole night and I was able to sleep for a couple of hours.

Then I had a sharp aversion to Christianity, I wrote quite a lot of poems dedicated to renouncing it, and condemned everyone who wore a cross. I'm still terrified of churches. That's when I discovered Satanism.

But the era of Satanism has also passed over time. I tried to study Buddhism, was interested in Hinduism, even looked towards Slavic paganism, but over time I returned to Christianity and even almost fell into religious psychosis. I went to a kind of church for a while.

There have been periods of atheism too, but mostly I'm of the opinion that all gods exist, from Allah to Poseidon, and we just choose which one to worship.

And so, after the second period of Christianity, Hecate called me to her. I used to dislike Hellenism, but it practically forced me to study ancient Greek myths. I won't go into details, but this call is very strong and I want to follow it.

And I am not ready to give up Jesus, I perceive him as a father and I love him very much, but the path of a Christian is not close to me, and I accept Hellenism as a religion with much more enthusiasm. Can I honor Christ and Hecate at the same time and how can I not offend any of the gods?

I live somewhere. There is one hallucination, then a second, a third, a fourth. You walk along it, and gradually you stop perceiving it as something cozy and safe, because "oh, a huge dead dog tried to kill me here" or "oh, spiders started crawling out of here last time to get into me." This place is getting more and more dangerous, and now you're afraid to stay there alone. In a panic, you run away, rent another apartment, a dorm, anything rather than return to this abode of horror. But then...

The cycle repeats again. And again. And again.