Incomprehensible images drifted through a heavy fog he couldn’t dispel. Remote voices echoed as his own loud breathing bounced off unseen walls. Lying flat, he couldn’t sense what held him—in fact, he couldn’t feel his body at all.

Hypnagogia, he thought. Just sleep paralysis. It will pass. I need to will myself awake.

He strained against the numbness, waiting for his muscle control to return.

Then a voice spoke right above him.

“He’s unconscious, isn’t he? It would be horrifying to be awake while trapped inside a paralyzed body.”

A cold instrument touched his chest.