Jimmy Ferrer

The darkness, the distortion of reality I felt subject to, was gone.

But there was something faint in the back of my mind.

Quiet at first, but once I really focused, eyes closed, letting the water run over me, I could hear it.

1001.

1002.

Oh no.

No, no, no, no, no, no, no.

I opened my eyes, only to be fully clothed, standing on a thin section of tile no wider than one of my feet.

A tile tightrope over a pitch black ocean of water to my left and right, rising against the walls below.

I immediately threw my arms out to the side and stood one foot in front of the other to gain purchase and balance myself.

My heart was slamming against my ribcage.

I had to be hundreds of feet high and this thin section had to be no more than eight inches wide.

The only way I could tell the blackness was water was the rippling and waves as it crashed against the thin wall.

It was oppressively dark here.

Everything a faint dark blue.

Like moonlight through a dense tree canopy.

Even worse, the thin tile platform stretched on out of my line of sight and into forever.

I started moving as calmly and slowly as possible, steadily putting one foot in front of the other.

1,100, 1,101.

Soon the water was above the walls and up to my ankle.