The Void
“Hallo, hallo o,” I whispered, the voice mine but an echo. Silence wrapped itself around me like a blanket. A stillness, quiet unlike any I had ever felt, oppressed the air. The light filtering through the bedroom window was bluish with faint flashes of silver shimmer, almost phosphorescent.
I glanced down the bed - what the hell. Where was my body?
Panic, deep raw panic, set in. Choking sobs, gasping breath. What was going on? Perhaps it was the light, the luminous glow.
I jerked up; weird - that was as if someone pulled me with a cord. I turned to get off the bed, weirder still! No pain in my knees, no exertion. I stood effortlessly and walked quickly to the bathroom. Such lightness, I thought. I snapped on the shower and stepped in.
It was much darker in the bathroom, yet that blue luminous light still pervaded. The water felt odd, neither hot nor cold, just nothing. I soaped myself, an odd sensation, actually no sensation. I continued with the shower, intensely wondering about the silence.
I stepped out and grabbed the towel off the heated rail. I loved my fluffy pink towel, but today, it was the strangest colour. Odder and odder. I didn’t feel the soft towel - no warmth, how strange - but I continued drying myself. I dropped the towel into the wash basket.
The uncanny feeling of nothingness descended. The eerie quiet, the luminous blue sheen on the walls, the stillness pressed down like a heavy duvet. I moved to the wardrobe and retrieved my normal work clothes. The dress felt different - how unusual. Never mind, it must be the weather.
I picked up the phone from the bedside cabinet and walked downstairs to the kitchen. The huge sliding doors were closed, but the light - that strange light - was more obvious here. Supernatural. Normally my shadow stretched out on the window, walking to the table, but today, no shadows materialised.
The stillness was overwhelming. I felt a deep sense of dread, light and uneasy. I picked up the phone to see if my boys had been in contact. No signal. Odd - our Wi-Fi is excellent out here in the open countryside.
Suspiciously, I began to walk around. No digital output on the microwave or oven. I checked the electricity, toggling the switch up and down. No lights. This must be an outage. Who to phone, I wondered? I checked the Wi-Fi in the study—out.
No longer interested in breakfast, I walked out the sliding doors into the back door of the garage. Looking intently at the circuit breaker - nothing odd. I toggled the earth leakage switch. No lights flickered on. Convinced it was an outage within the area, I walked back into the kitchen.
I grabbed my bag, phone, and car keys and went to my car. I clicked the fob to open the car - nothing. I tried the door; it wouldn’t open. I clicked the fob again. Nothing. Now I was completely flummoxed. Strange, though, all my stress and anxiety had absolutely no effect on my heart.
The weirdest of all was how the light around rendered every move I made unseen. I couldn’t see myself walking forward or pressing the fob. No reflection. This must be some unusual storm coming.
I looked up. The sky above was no longer the colour of Earth. It shimmered with the unfamiliar, luminous blue, a strange sapphire hue that seemed to generate its own cold light. It was vibrant, yet unsettling. Across the vast, expanse, thin streaks of iridescent violet blended subtly into flashes of cold, clear emerald, giving the heavens a bruised appearance. Instead of the gentle movement of clouds, the upper part contained erratic, shimmering silver veins that occasionally flared into silent pulses.
The light itself felt heavy, pressing down on the world. Everything below was bathed in this eerie, alien glow, making familiar objects look sharp, metallic, and unnervingly unreflective. It was a beautifully strange spectacle, a vivid blue warning that everything in the world had fundamentally changed.
This had such an unnerving feeling within me, but yet no reaction to any senses or heart. This was very worrying. My mind was so alert - more so than normal. It felt as if it was actually in tune with the atmosphere. The flared silent pulses seemed to enhance my thoughts.
Going inside, I dropped my bag, keys, and phone onto the kitchen top. I walked to the boot room and retrieved my trainers. I put them on; again, the odd sensation of lightness, and I couldn’t see what I was doing.
I decided I would walk to my neighbours, not too far away. There was not a breath of wind. Nothing was moving. The leaves on the ground just stayed. Overwhelmed with this sense of not being, I rushed on.
Each footstep was light, almost not there. My breath - I didn’t feel it exiting my mouth. Now I felt panic, but it didn’t manifest with a bodily reaction; it was purely in my mind. Actually, now that I thought of it, everything I had done so far had been a mind reaction.
Again, I looked around. Nothing. Everything the same. I was close to the neighbour. I walked up the driveway. Car in the drive. No lights on in the house. I knocked on the door. Knock - knock. I waited. No one came to the door.
I walked around the back to their conservatory. I found the key in their “safe” place. I went inside. Silence ensued. No one. Absolutely no one. Handbag, briefcase. School bags. All in the hallway. Shoes kicked off, lying precisely as they left them.
I walked into the kitchen. A piece of paper was on the countertop. “My wife and children - gone, just gone. One moment here, next gone. The light is different, can’t get hold of family, friends, or my work colleagues. No electricity, nothing. Phone signal gone. TV not working. If you see this note, we are all gone!”
To check, I walked into Paula’s bedroom. Right in front of me was the huge mirror she always bragged about. Wait a bleeding minute...
Where was I?
I believe this short story was my best of this prompt month so far. I enjoy this immensely but had to research how to explain the sky. Hope I did it justice. This horror month is starting to give me nightmares. 😂😂
We need a part two!!!
Fantastic imagery and spooky feels. Loved this!