…

Peculiarly, I saw some sort of light-greenish figure standing on one of the balconies across from me. It looked like it was made of styrofoam. It glowed but didn’t produce much light. Something looked wrong. It had a clear path to me, and I wasn’t sure if it noticed me yet. I guess I am right here, obvious and open, but I could look like hanged wash. My head was wrapped under my covers, so I had that going for me, too. So, I peered at it. I almost didn’t want to look away from it. Not from like, a hypnotic standpoint, but from a predator-to-prey perspective.

It moved in place. It looked like it was marching back and forth. As I focused on it, I realized it looked like a young boy with overalls and such on. Does it notice me…I can’t tell. It’s certainly not going anywhere. I don’t want to take the risk, though.

Is it a prank? Is it alive? Is it an animal? What I was witnessing folded into layers of confusion, especially because of how robotic that thing acted. I didn’t have another frame of reference for this thing, plus I didn’t really want to find out.

As I try to sleep, I occasionally peep one eye out to check if it moved. Every time I do, I find enough adrenaline and focus that it's difficult to slip out of consciousness. Trying to sleep, checking the status of this strange entity, and snuggling back into a comfortable position became a cycle. It became an extremely tiring cycle, but one I couldn’t pass out to.

The cycle went on for what seemed like hours. What’s worse is that I felt like I was being watched by so many more eyes than whatever that annoying sentient nightlight might have been doing. I was in a standoff. I needed to sleep. I needed to defend myself, too. But I wasn’t sure if I needed to, as I had no evidence beyond a hunch that I was or was not alone.

Sleep-deprived delirium began to set in.

I needed to go to sleep. There could be any number of things that could kill me out here. I’m like a sitting duck; I could die at any moment. There could be thousands of them out there, professionals, amateurs, paid, ideological: who knows. I feel like I have a target on my head, my back, and everywhere I’m exposed. Who knows what they’re after. I could be wanted for hundreds of reasons.

Inner dialogue went on like this without my full consciousness or consent. I simply had thoughts flood into me from a completely deranged and foreign point of view. I didn’t know who they were, but I, Ishmael, was only on the outside looking in. I was awake. I wasn’t sleeping. I certainly wasn’t dreaming. I was wasting time. There was no way to break the trance only with my internal resources, either. Something had to change, but the sun wouldn’t rise, the strange glowing…thing remained, and my body wouldn’t give out.

Although I have no recollection of when this happened due to my perception of time being sieged by this foreign influence, I began to try my hardest to compete with the strange delusions infecting my mind.

I really should revisit the question of who or what exactly I am. Although I look like the residents here, speak their language, and have a general idea of how to operate their everyday things, I don’t feel the same as them fundamentally. They don’t appear to feel I’m the same as them, either. I can’t put my finger on it, though. If anything, I feel like there’s some sort of organ or mental cog in my mind that others have. It’s as if I’m missing a component to my thinking, or maybe I’m thinking in a way they’re not. I don’t know what I can’t know, though. It’s like wondering how other animals see when their eyes are clearly different from ours. In some sense, I could understand the comparisons and differences on a meta-level, but there’s just some divide that can’t be bridged.

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You know what, I forgot to ask more folk here what they know about places outside of the City. I can’t believe it. Both groups swept me up in their little tasks in a way that made me forget the whole reason I joined them. I just wasted days of being here. Maybe, on the other hand, they weren’t in a curious mood. Not my fault, then. Or maybe it is where I should have forced the question and left. What if they were protecting me from zombies, though, or worse yet, they were the only survivors I would have found at the time?

My mind raced as I continued to stare at the glowing figure across from me.

I wonder if they have books somewhere. I wonder if there’s anyone who’s like, really old and might know more than anyone else. I wonder if I could spot the difference between someone from and not from the City if there is anyone. Now that I’m thinking about it, I’ve wasted so much time already. I could have broken into one of the farmhouses…well, maybe not. I could have sleuthed more in Phoebe’s hideout…I guess I didn’t have time. I feel regret, I think. I feel like I should feel regret, but I don’t think I could’ve done anything differently. I could’ve done something different. Well, maybe not. I don’t know!

Internal rambling compounded so much that my mind became like a river while it rained. I believe, although I’m not sure, that level of chaos let my body rest. In other words, I blinked, and time felt like it had passed substantially.

Now, there are more of these…things. Three directions: north, west, and south. Incredible. And they won’t go away. I want to call out. What if they haven’t noticed me, though? What if I was in, like, a horror film where the moment I said something, the suspense would break, and I would be killed? I could try throwing something at one if I had something I could throw.

The cycle continued. It felt like the haunting grip of night wouldn’t let go, no matter how much time passed. Every slight breeze threw off my ability to sleep. Every time a hair on my body moved, I nearly freaked. No matter what effort I put in, nothing could make the night move forward.

Maybe sleeping above ground in the City includes their own personal haunting. That can’t be good for me. If anything, I’m not sure I’m convinced nearly anything in the City is good for me. I can’t just beat around the bush when thinking on this. It’s Nick. It’s what I did to Nick. I want to own up to my actions; I did that with my own two hands and body. When I was thinking through my actions, what set of thoughts took control of my thought processes felt extremely foreign. “Ishmael didn’t think about doing that,” is what I felt afterward. I can’t shake it, and I can’t help but think that could become a trend.

Some sort of foreign agent that makes me act- I don’t know what they are, where they come from, and overall, I don’t know what kind of enemy I’m facing. I don’t even know where to start to figure that out or if anyone else in the City experiences that internal struggle. Even if I did tell others, possibly that foreign agent could make me unable to communicate my conflict. Maybe it is a feature of the City. Maybe the environment in the City sets up situations that require any inhabitants to respond in particular self-destructive ways that betray who they are. It’s like giving a hammer to a carpenter who only has screws. They get screwed.

There’s nothing stopping me from betraying myself right now. I don’t know where it came from, I don’t know when it’ll happen again, I’m not sure if I can rely upon anyone to make progress against it, and overall, I’m not even sure at what point who I am ends, and that foreign entity begins. Maybe that entity isn’t even sentient but rather comes from exposure to the City itself. I don’t know.

I know I should be figuring out what goals to focus on going forward to make use of my limited time, but all I could think of is to figure out why I’m wrestling with myself and how to get me to stop. If I have to leave the City, so be it. If it requires help from someone else, so be it. It seems obvious- what more could it push me to do? What acts that go against my nature could I be forced to, possibly even without my knowledge of doing? In the worst scenario, could I become that thing…I witnessed?