Emptiness... The gentle sound of the running water from a calm river enters your ears and echoes inside of your hollow body. At the distance, you can hear birds singing happily and warmly – almost as if they were declaring their love for each other –, for a brief moment you can relate to their feelings, however another, colder, emotion tries to scream louder from within you.

  Flapping wings fly closer and then become muted, waking you up just a little more for your eyes to open. The soft clouds are but mere blurs in the crepuscular and orange  sky, such a beauty brings you the same sensation of comfort that one would experience by sitting near a fireplace during a cold winter night.

  Unexpectedly, a flock of birds briefly flies through your field of view, being then followed by a weak sound of something hitting a piece of metal. The sound repeats, now having a rather annoying ring to it and soon another repetition comes, followed by another and another and another... With each repetition the ringing becomes more annoying to the point of starting to spread an acute pain throughout your body, intensifying exponentially until – eventually – you lift your torso from the ground abruptly scaring away a crow that seemed to be on your chest.

  Sitting now, you instinctively begin to run your fingers from the base of your neck to the tips of your shoulders, looking for something, only to be immediately stopped by an agonising pain on your right one. Looking at it you can see a shining metal piece sticking out from it, which causes an unbearable pain inside your arm even with the most careful of movements.

  Common sense would counter-recommend removing it without the use of proper medical tools, however your left hand moves on its own and wraps around the exposed part of the metal piece, first pulling gently but then – after realising it would only make it more painful that way – using a little more force… Hélas, it is to no avail as the piece seems to be stuck in a bone.

  Still set on removing it however, you draw a deep breath and pull it again but now with all your might, reaching success but the sweet taste of victory is immediately soured by a pain that forces your lungs to expel all – and some more – air that filled them in an obnoxious scream, as well as your whole body to lock in agony, proceeding to shake sickly a mere fraction of a second later.

  Still sitting and shaking in agony but now with the addition of feeling light-headed, you scrutinise the metal shard, or more precisely, the black as petrol substance running and hardening as a crust on the part that was inside the wound in your shoulder.

  You try to understand what exactly is this substance and how exactly it came to be inside your flesh – along with the metal shard – but images…  Flashbacks! Of terror and violence dance before your eyes causing your heart to palpitate sickly and you to drop the damned object whilst crawling back, as far away from it as possible.

  Yet, growls and horrid screams begin to surround you, growing louder and more numerous by the second, in turn provoking  you to get up with considerable difficulty and start running towards the forest south of your current location, tripping and falling repeatedly along the way.

  With the trees and bushes completely hiding from sight the river and clearing from where you came from, voices begin calling a name amongst the screams and growls as branches hit your face repeatedly. Enveloped by fear you make a blind turn to the left and – a few – metres after, you trip and fall face first into a small gravel road. You can feel the blood running down your face but fear once again forces you to get up and resume running whilst the voices become clearer:

-        Ori...

  Gunshots echo from somewhere near, obstructing the voices, however only for a short while:

-        Ori- Ori...

  With the metallic screams coming closer, the voices increase exponentially in response as well, and, whilst absolutely muffling the growls that seem to grow distant, the name which the voices call for becomes explicit:

-        O... Ori... Orion!... Orion?! ORION!

  Not being able to recognise such name or handle the voices any longer, your nightmare draws closer to an end when the ground beneath your feet begins to shake increasingly and a scream- No, a roar, a horrid roar provokes you to look to the side mere moments before being run over by a large silhouette that, upon impact, knocks you down carelessly.