I stroll out of the elevator and into the bland board room, my leather briefcase in hand. I pause just inside the threshold, a brief bout of dizziness overwhelming me causing my hand to involuntarily seek out an object to tether me to reality.

As q uick as it appeared it vanishes and I find myself on my knees holding loose-knuckled onto a cushioned chair. The only feeling that did not evaporate was an inexplicable pressure in my head but such is to be expected isn’t it? After such a bout of vertigo? Then again...

A modicum of fear envelopes my mind for a moment, adding to the pressure already afflicting me. This is an interesting experience, first a nosebleed; evident of an increase in pressure, then an onset of vertigo; even more evidence of a pressure increase. I inadvertently think of a proverb that accurately fits this instance and the brief flurry of paranoia that has overtaken me, ‘fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice...’

My mind sprints away from rationality with this thought and superstition rules me.

“What in the hell is wrong with me?” I whisper, disgusted with myself. I clap both my hands on my cheeks in a physical attempt to banish these ramblings from my mind. Accompanied with this physical action I try in vain to cease the pointless neuronal firings and emulate a tabula rasa (blank slate) but, a few stragglers cling to my conscious thought.

Thankfully, nobody is inside the board room yet and so I take a few moments to compose my visage and organize my belongings before taking a seat at my designated spot. I open my leather briefcase and pull out my laptop and relevant documents.

I am told by the CEO and a few other members of the Board of Directors that, depending on my performance at this meeting, I would be considered for a position as the Chief Operating Officer which is now vacant thanks to an unexpected resignation.

I steeple my hands under my chin as I wait, staring with blank eyes at the clock on the wall.

Five minutes...

———————

The thread grows closer to its target, weaving around a foreign cityscape with erratic movements, however, the movements are not random. Fields of influence shroud the orderly buildings like a fine mist, invisible to the untrained eye. Although, untrained isn’t exactly the right word for it. No mortal on planet earth could even begin to comprehend the abstract laws that allowed for these fields to exist.

The wandering thread stops before a hexagonal structure and pauses for a moment, scanning the building. Less than a nanosecond later, the thread po ints towards the 142nd floor at a certain seated figure facing away from the window in which the thread seemingly peers.

———————

One minute.

People are funneling into the room now and my current direct superior numbers among them, the president of finance at our company.

He has a sour look on his face but he quickly schools it as soon as he sees me, giving my currently vacant husk a cold smile.

In my mind, I smile with sadistic pleasure at what is about to occur.

This man does not understand me, he treats me like I can be bullied around like the others who work under him but sadly for him, such is not the case.

I will become his new superior and it will be so satisfyingly sweet, a bit of spice to brighten up my life, if only briefly. These are the moments I live for and I would not give my victory up for anythi-

...

A crackling in the deep beyond, an otherworldly dimensional force knocks on the doors of the subconscious.

...

Shivers run up and down my spine and I look behind me, around me, out of the windows.

...

Nothing.

I have the distinct feeling of being watched, not like my superior is so conspicuously doing, but by an unknown assailant who wishes me harm. It is almost predatory in nature and I am the oblivious prey, a proverbial deer in the headlights.

My coworkers and fellow executives are staring at me by this point. I’m sure I look like an absolute mess, sweating from seemingly every pore, arms shaking like the thin branches of a tree in the wind, and my frantic and manic whiplash-inducing scrutinization of my surroundings.

The pressure begins to increase again and a ringing in my ears arises from the prior formal silence.

I look at the person standing nearest to me and ask, my pupils as wide as saucers, “Can’t you hear that. Can’t you feel it?” But I cannot here myself over the incessant ringing. The cacophonous, world-destroying, void-filling, silent ringing!

“What’s the matter Tetal!” Todd Stilte, the CEO, shouts at me in disbelief. I don’t respond, unable to hear him, “Phillips call 911,” Todd barks at an idle aide standing near the door.

I was completely oblivious to this action however, my mind already in descent into the depths of madness.

Thoughts and feelings fade into abstractia, unable to be translated into coherency. I am turned into a visceral beast by the force invading my being and I am unable to stop or resist it. I would normally have felt unbridled rage at such a sense of helplessness but I am currently feeling and experiencing everything and nothing all at once.

(Although I was not privy to this information at the time of… this, I was convulsing on the floor of the meeting room and subsequently frothing at the mouth. My coworkers were confused and a bit frightened to say the least and more than a few were on their phones frantically talking to someone. Todd had ceased standing around in shock and was now tilting me to my side so that I did not choke on my own saliva and my current superior was looking very confused but triumphant all the same. One word to describe the scene? Chaotic.)

In my mind space, thoughts and feelings become a bit orderly again and the first semi-coherent thought I muster is, ‘FF.. U. UU... CKKKK. WHHAAT, I,,SS... ME..... HAPP. ENED, TO ME’

Even as I am becoming more cognizant, the pain refuses to diminish and I am left screaming like a stuck pig. But I cannot hear it, the reality distorting ringing and abyssal pressure still present in the battlefield of my mind prevent it.

I still have no clue what is happening and perhaps it is better that way. (The complete picture of what had been done to my mind that day still remains unclear in some parts but it was not a superficial pain to say the least. The pain and suffering permeated throughout my entire being and the monster responsible for this cared not in the slightest. It was unspeakable, despicable, and I would not wish this torment on my most lauded of enemies.)

Eventually, after what seems like millenia but is more likely only a few minutes, the pain begins to subside and I feel a presence I have never felt before. A connection to something although I do not yet know what.

It seems to me some sort of higher being, a god perhaps. The presence of this... existence, not only spoke of power, but was practically its definition. I feel instinctively compelled to worship and obey this existence but perhaps the connection is still developing or maybe it is weak but I am able to resist against it and form a makeshift mental defense.

This realization and discovery is only happening in a corner of my mind, the rest still enveloped in excruciating pain. My mind and mental faculties are gradually being released from pain’s poisonous grip and my senses are returning to me.

I can hear again, taste the blood in my mouth, feel my clenched-sweat-slick fists, smell the salty-sweet scent of my heavy perspiration, and see the shapes of blurred figures running about me, presumably paramedics.

I exist within a blurred state for quite some time as my mind continues to recover from the pain and mobilizes against the foreign being trying to control me. My progress is slow and arduous but my defensive mental wall that had been hastily erected at the junction of the connection is now something I can be proud of. (Worth noting that this is a metaphorical wall. A more accurate representation would be that it is a conscious effort from the mind to repel abnormal interference. I made the wall analogy in the hopes of making this process easier to understand.)

It seems as though the connection had stopped growing for now but that did not mean I would stop watching it. Any sudden influx of energy and it would be all hands on deck.

I believe I was in a coma since entering the hospital but it was a bit hard to tell as all of my brain’s energy was focused on either the pain or the foreign invasion. Therefore, when I eventually wake in an ICU bed, I am slightly surprised.

I look around the room, not moving my head, with heavily squinted eyes as the light sears my retinas.

The pain still lingers but compared to what came before, it is less than nothing. In fact, it is almost pleasurable, euphoric even. That may make me sound like a masochist but I believe these feelings only arise as a result of the immense relief I feel that this... experience is over.

Alas, problems remains. The Connection, the health maladies that may result from the Invasion, and of course my botched presentation.

The latter occurred through no fault of my own, I know that much, but it still weighs heavily on my mind.

The most efficient path forward, with my damaged psyche and poor physical condition, is to simply take things one at a time. I would fall into a panicked and overwhelmed state otherwise.

A split second had passed since my awakening.

‘Are my eyes deceiving me?’

Indeed, a haze still permeates my vision. I blink a few times trying to rid my eyes of the film coating them.

Sitting beside me, ostensibly reading through a sheaf of papers, is my brother.