Huddled in perpetual fetal position, she gazed listlessly out at her pitch-black surroundings. Somewhere deep within the lonely recesses of her tired mind, a memory stirred, reminding her of who, where, why she was.

Blind and deaf, she could only feel. And that was torture enough.

A whisper tickled her ear and she froze, a sickening shiver racing down her fragile spine. She was losing time, losing hope, losing her mind, she knew. A fog of palpable dread enveloped her body, and she shuddered as cold, leeching, ghostly fingers tapped at her failing heart, mimicking its frantic, dead-and-alive staccato beat.

But suddenly, somehow, there it was. A timid ray of sunlight, warming her numb face. She reached out desperately with blind fingers, hardly daring to hope, and opened her mouth in a silent plea: a fatal mistake.

Laughing, It raced in through her open mouth, crawling its way deep into her frozen heart. All warmth disappeared, all feeling disappeared, and she cried out.

But it was already too late.