What would you do if you were given a tablet that allows you to instantly move through time? I have an idea of what I’d do, since it happened to be my dream of last night.
Let me preface what happened by saying that I am fully used to having nightmares; to the point where they don’t scare me anymore. A nightmare will usually scare you, wake you up in sweat and make your heart beat a lot quicker than usual. I can guarantee you this was not a nightmare.
The start of my dream is really fuzzy, but I remember being in a somewhat large city and being in possession of a fairly simple-looking tablet. It had no buttons, no ports, and seemed to always be powered. On its screen was a horizontal slider with years written above, set to the current year. Another feature of it seemed to make me completely invisible to people around me. They couldn’t see, hear, or even touch me.
I instinctively knew what it did, I didn’t even question why I had it on me. It’s probably due to the “fuzzy dream effect”, for lack of a better term. You all know it, the way our brain is willing to accept anything because dreams are only supposed to be a way to keep the brain busy when there’s nothing else to do.
So I slid my finger across the tablet. I chose the early 1900s as my first destination.
Everything around me started moving in reverse at great speeds, increasing exponentially as time went. Buildings were, well… not exactly torn down, more like “unbuilt”, in order to make place for smaller ones. They were still impressive, mind you. I half-expected wooden houses and taverns, but there were still quite large factories around.
After being satisfied with my sightseeing, I slid my finger to the mid-1700s. It roughly took up the same amount of time as my previous jump in time, and here I was; in the same town, roughly 150 years before where I previously was.
“Ah, so that’s where the wooden houses are.”, I thought. The landscape looked completely different, it now looked like a quite detached rural town we could have today. Get a bit closer, though, and you’ll notice the lack of technology.
I was on an adrenaline rush. I had to see more. So I once again pulled out the tablet and selected a destination. This time, however, I wanted to go big. I slid my finger all the way to the left; I wanted to see how far It would go.
Time began unwinding as it did the previous times, buildings disappearing, leaving place to large trees. But then, something else happened.
While time was still unwinding, everything around me started to shake, more than any earthquakes I’d ever felt. Everything from the floor, the trees, even the damn sky was trembling. I suddenly began to panic. I tried moving the slider back to where it was, but the didn’t fix it; if anything, it only made it worse. It had reached the point where my eyes couldn’t even focus on a single tree anymore because of how dizzy I was getting. I closed my eyes and got down on all fours, trying to brace myself for what was to come.
And then… it just stopped.
The vibrations had ceased. My whole body felt a bit numb.
“I feel… numb? That’s not normal.”, my brain rationalized.
This whole event had a sobering effect on my brain. The fuzziness was completely gone; I now had full control over my thoughts and senses. And for the first time since my dream began, I felt a chill down my spine.
I opened my eyes, and I was now facing a polished white floor. It felt cold to the touch. I hated that. I hated my senses at that moment. It made it feel so real…
I stood up, and I was now in an apartment complex… or it should’ve been one.
Something was off. The floor, walls, and ceiling were completely white, as were the doors along the corridor. It seemed to stretch endlessly.
The only things not white in this hallway were the numbers on the doors and the handles, which were a slightly darker shade of gray. My first instinct was to get the hell out of there using the tablet, but no matter how much I move the slider, nothing changes. Either the tablet is broken, or I somehow ended somewhere out of time’s boundaries.
Now, if you want to stop reading, do it now. Do not take this warning lightly. What happens next is really fucked up.
You have been warned.
After what seemed like an eternity, I opened a door and took a step in.
…
It looked like the inside of a standard apartment. A small kitchen to the left, a table with a few chairs to the right, and a blue couch and a dark gray low table in the living room further ahead with closed dark blue blinds on the opposite wall.
The whole apartment was carpeted with gray carpet and the walls were white. Its only sources of light were the outside light coming from the small opening between the blinds and the almost blinding white lights in the hallway I came from.
I could hear an air conditioner unit make white noise.
The tension I felt was so high I almost felt like I was suffocating. Yet I took another step in. That’s when I started hearing them.
Cries.
It came from the basket on the kitchen counter.
A baby was crying.
The cries started almost inaudible, but got louder and louder, until I heard a “pop”. And then, silence.
I got closer in order to examine the basket, and couldn’t even comprehend what I was laying eyes upon.
There was a baby inside the basket, awake, with its big eyes quietly watching me. It was laying on what appeared to be a mix of blood, flesh, entrails and bones. Before I could do anything, the baby started crying.
Something then started growing out of the side of its head. It must have been so incredibly painful for it because its cries grew louder by the second. I don’t know if it was morbid curiosity or some other fucked up shit in my brain, but I couldn’t take my eyes off as I stared in horror at the baby.
The growth started taking form, and another baby was now growing from the head of the first one.
Then came the pop. The baby’s skull shattered, with now lifeless eyes in its sockets. The baby that had taken its place was watching me in the same manner as the previous one. The dead baby then started to rapidly decompose. I finally managed to take my eyes off of it and quickly stepped back in horror. I put my hands over my ears and closed my eyes the moment I heard the cries starting again.
I knew I had to get the hell out of there. I gathered all the courage I had and moved towards the exit. However, after opening my eyes, I froze. Something was now in the door frame.
I could only make its outline, it looked around my height, but it was way too thin to be human.
“You… are not… supposed… to be here…”, its distorted voice said.
The whole world faded to black… and I woke up.
The first thing I did after waking up was rushing to the bathroom and immediately thew up.
It felt so real. Those cries might haunt me for the rest of my life.
I don’t believe in god, but fuck if I’m not giving myself the most chances to stay out of that place forever.