Nightmare Canvas: Blue

Her eyes stung with every step as she braced herself against the mountain's biting winds. As she walked, her feet sunk deeper and deeper into the snow until she was waist deep and could no longer move her legs normally. Her teeth chattered and she hugged herself tightly as she stared out at the smoke in the distance.

"I need to get there."

Her jeans were soaked from the snow and her legs felt both numb and as if they were being pricked by thousands of needles. Despite this, she still pushed forward, losing her balance here and there. She would look behind her every so often to check the progress she made, only to see that her tracks were covered up by the blizzard blowing in behind her. When she looked ahead, the smoke hardly appeared as if it were getting any closer.

She took a deep breath, the frigid air burning her lungs, and pressed on. Her life was on the line, and she needed to remain persistent. The blizzard that was once behind her was now a new obstacle she needed to face. Fog started to roll in as snow fell heavily from the dark clouds overhead, leaving her with little to no visibility. The water that welled up in the bottom her eyes from the constant stinging was now frozen, as was any mucus that ran from her nose.

Surrendering to the elements, she closed her eyes and fell forward into the snow, hoping death would be swift. However, the ledge under her started to crack and without warning, she found herself rolling down a portion of the mountainside and into a snowdrift. She could barely feel her fingers, but managed to dig her way out of the snowdrift and crawl forward.

In front of her was a crystal clear body of water. She reached her hand out hoping it were some sort of hot spring only to realize the surface was frozen. With a quick inspection of the area through blurred eyes, she could see the body of water was far too small to be a lake and was surrounded by snow-covered evergreen bushes. Directly across the pond from her was a small village. In the center of the pond was an older man in heavy leather and furs sitting on some sort of stool and fishing from a hole in front of him.

"Hey!"

She called out to him, but received no answer.

"Sir, help me! Please!"

She crawled forward out onto the ice, ignoring the loud cracking beneath her. The man looked up in her general direction, his eyes devoid of emotion. As he stood up and walked in her direction, she smiled, hoping to finally be saved. Her smile soon disappeared as the man walked past, no, walked through her as if he were a ghost. She looked behind her and watched as he dug through the snowdrift she just crawled out of and revealed a blue hand. On the wrist was some sort of beaded bracelet that the man removed before falling to his knees and sobbing.

Before she could learn more of the situation, the ice beneath her shattered and she plummeted into the clear, blue water. To her surprise, the water felt warm and restored some color to her frostbitten hands. Feeling the strength return to her body, she attempted to swim upwards only to have a strange current pull her down, deeper into the dark abyss.

The further she fell, the less she found herself being able to breathe. She felt as if her breath was literally being taken away, but as if she were drowning. The feeling was more like something squeezing her chest and crushing her lungs, made worse by her frequent gasping and desperation to get to the surface of the water. By the time she could finally breathe again, she was faced with the words wake up in blue, neon letters.

As she reached out to touch it, the world around her morphed from the strange depths of the pond to an empty living room. All colors drained from the room right before her eyes except for her clothes. They did, however, drip vibrant blue and green watercolor onto the floor where she stood. Confused by this, she removed her soaked cardigan and wrung it out in front of her, forming another puddle of the blue-green liquid.

She knelt down and placed a hand in the puddle, the liquid feeling more like an oil-based paint than a watercolor. For the time being, she didn't care. She covered both of her hands with the paint and began dragging them across the walls, spelling out the word help as many times as she could. Stepping back into the center of the room, she took one good look at her work before the words wake up appeared again, floating in the center of the room.

She walked away from it, fighting the urge to touch the neon sign, but her attempts were futile. It called to her, flooded her mind with unintelligible whispers that only quieted down when she approached it. Reluctantly, she reached for it and the world around her shattered like glass, leaving her in the dark.