The World Above

You're wandering in the woods, the shadows playing tricks on your weary eyes. It's late and you're tired. It's dark and you want to be out of these woods already. You're at a fork in the road, but all you want to do is get home. Right...? Left...? You tread carefully to the right, hoping you made the right decision. Right... you laugh a little to yourself in your tired stupor... the right choice by going right... haha...

The dark clouds shroud the waning moon and bats squawk angrily at you as you trip over a protruding root, shaking the ground with a CRASH! You've had a little too much of this forest having wandered and fallen all night. You push yourself off the ground, rolling your eyes and cursing the root-riddled ground. Muttering stupidly to yourself, you venture on, not entirely knowing which way you're going.

You hear a sepulchral voice whispering in your ear... "It is now 11:54 in the world above..."

A cold mist seeps beneath your feet as you walk a little more briskly. 11:54. It's almost time.

As midnight approaches, you know you have but a small window of opportunity to get home, but as the clock strikes midnight in the world above, you know you're stuck in forest for yet another night, wishing you were home, wishing you weren't trapped by the ghosts of your past.

--From "The Cantacles of the Underworld: a special edition tale" by Flynn