The Descent

You are suspended, weightless. The sky is a muted gray, as if the sun has long forgotten its place. Above, the clouds stretch endlessly, the air thick with something waiting. You float, and beneath you—beneath you—nothing but black. The ocean, dark and endless, stirs beneath the surface. The waves churn, rough and violent, yet distant enough to not yet touch you.

There’s no sound, only the slow rhythm of the water as it crashes far below. The silence is heavier than the weight of the sea itself.

You begin to sink.

It’s imperceptible at first. A gradual shift, just a pull at the edges. You try to move—find stability—but something tugs at you, pulling you downward. Slowly. Too slowly.

The water creeps closer, inch by inch. The cold starts at your feet, a sharp bite that spreads upward, as though the ocean is marking you. You can't stop it. You try to raise your feet, but they are already soaked, soaked in the cold, heavy pull of the dark. The sensation of weightlessness slips away, replaced with the inevitable descent.

The water rises. It’s subtle, relentless.

You feel it at your ankles, at your shins, then knees. It presses in, cool and thick. You’re sinking deeper, still too slow, still too steady. Your breath becomes shallow, each exhale colder than the last. The waves slap at you, but they don’t crash. They only press and pull, press and pull. They’re coming closer.

The terror gnaws at your ribs, squeezing the air from your lungs, but you can’t move, can’t escape. The cold runs up your thighs, now. It wraps itself around your waist. You try to step back, but the sea is unforgiving. You try to rise, to escape, but with each movement, it pulls you deeper.

The water creeps past your waist. A sensation now—not just cold, but suffocating. It rises steadily, mercilessly, swallowing you whole, bit by bit. It moves so slowly, a constant, relentless crawl. And each inch feels like an eternity.

The waves are still far off, but they’re closer now, closer than they’ve ever been. They tug at you, drag you further. Every second, the pressure builds. You feel the weight of it on your chest. There is no air, no escape. Only water, cold and endless.

It moves around your ribs, over your stomach. The cold consumes you. You can’t breathe, not the way you should. Every movement feels like it’s dragging you further into the depths. The sea is not just rising—it’s swallowing you whole.

Your chest tightens. Your legs don’t move anymore; they’re not yours. You don’t even feel them, don’t feel the sensation of sinking, only the coldness. The panic gnaws at you—an animal hunger, frantic, desperate—but it’s all-consuming. You feel the water climb your torso, your shoulders, and you can’t stop it.

The surface of the ocean presses against your neck, against your throat, a cold and heavy weight, relentless and suffocating. It presses against you, like hands. Like something pulling you into the depths. You cannot breathe. You cannot scream.

The water is over your head now, the cold like a thousand needles. You’ve stopped struggling. There’s no point. The last of the air leaves you, and everything goes still.

The water encases you entirely. You are lost, unseen. There is no more sound, no more movement. There is no longer you.

Only darkness.

You disappear, swallowed whole, leaving no trace.