I could not tell if I was awake simply by opening my eyes. In my mind, a nightmarish fog drifted around my body, but I only knew it was there from the  damp wind that occasionally brushed my skin. At least, I hoped it was only fog, for the darkness encased me too perfectly to see what lay around me.

Lifting a hand to my face, or at least I think I did, I shivered at the lack of resistance. My body was weightless, and every move merely made me feel as if I was about to drift away into the depths above or below me.

I did not even know if anything lay beyond me, but it scared me more to remain where I was than to continue on. Therefore, I held my breath (if I was indeed breathing at all), and I took a cautious step forward. Nothing terrible seemed to greet me, so I began to wander onwards, mastering this fear of the unknown, or at least maintaining some manner of control over the darkness.

I had not gone far before I realized that my footsteps were making more sound than they should, echoing endlessly as if in an enclosed chamber. I stopped, hesitating, but the beat continued on without me, thumping and moving again in rhythm. I took another step forward, and I found myself walking in time with the massive reverberations, everything falling prey to the will of the vessel’s heartbeat.

This thought scared me, so I began to run, abandoning caution in favor of desperation. The heartbeat continued on, heedless of my panic.

The fog began to sweep faster by me now, stinging my arms with tiny shrapnel of ice and other freezing materials. I shivered, and I wished for a coat around me, but none such appeared.

The cold forced me to slow my pace, but still, I tried to keep moving, for fear that I would freeze where I stood if I lingered longer. The temperature was dropping at an exponential rate…it felt like I could barely lift one foot in front of the other.

And then, I realized that I could no longer lift my feet at all, for they had frozen to the ground. Still, the maniacal beat of a monster’s heart filled my ears, and as the ice began to climb my legs, I realized in terror that the heartbeat could be none other than my own. 

I willed it to stop, trying desperately to block out the noise…but my own body betrayed me yet again. The ice had reached my chest now, slowly suffocating me and blocking out the air that filled my lungs.

I panicked, screaming wildly into the darkness, but I could not even hear my own voice over the sound of the heartbeat. It was growing louder and louder and louder…

And then I jerked awake, pulling my blankets away from my body in distaste, wondering how I could possibly be this sweaty, yet still be dreaming of freezing to death. Shivering again slightly at the thought, I pulled myself to a sitting position and began to dress. There was no way I was going back to sleep again after that.