The world’s weight felt as though it was collapsing on the young man. He had never before felt such hardship on his shoulders as he did now. Tendrils grasped his limbs as he pulled and pulled with no avail. He wondered what he should do. Every time he struggled, he felt the strain of the slithering masses wane… and yet, when he rested his weary arms, his body only began to be torn apart once more.

All sides, all angles, his body was already contorted after a mere moment of rest. Such writhing beings running themselves over his wrists, shoulders, ankles, knees, and neck. He felt the grip dig into his brittle skin as he struggled, the pain more than a simple ebb on his mind.

How did he end up in such a predicament? Would he be able to free himself? These unanswered questions merely prattled about in his mind as he thought hard, as hard as one could in such a situation.

It felt like eons had passed since he last opened his mind to the past. It was as though all he could remember now was the current pain, none of the memories he could conjure stuck long enough for him to follow them. They were like shimmering, wispy ghosts, creatures that would elude even his most prolonged searches.

His eyes burst open as he started to struggle once more. Teeth gritting together, his face was unimaginable to him as of now but he could only guess the sort of painful expressions he was giving off. With each tug at the tendrils, he only let out the meekest of sounds, noises that seemed to be like faint whimperings.

His surroundings were of no use. Darkness had already consumed the environment, as it had all the prior times he opened his eyes. No matter how hard his eyes glazed over the dark, he could not find a speck of light.

With his ears, he could make out others, people in similar, possibly even the same, position as he. He also heard the last breaths of people as their energy ran out and their existence, known only by their noises, was erased. He also heard footsteps. Labored walking as though a few lucky few managed to find their way out of the struggle. Still, with a few more noises, he could hear some of them falling back into the tendrils and others crashing to the surface as they failed to press onwards.

While the young man spoke nothing, his compatriots of the same circumstances occasionally talked. Some sung songs of a better place, a place far far away from this Hellhole that they have found themselves in. Others sobbed, mutterings of how they could never leave fluttering from their mouths. It seemed that this place was accepting of all, as depressing as that thought was to him. Men, women, children… every single type of human being who could be found randomly on Earth, they were here.

He did not sleep. He did not eat. Perhaps something was given to him to stop these tasks, but nonetheless he only struggled. His constant tugging broke his skin and he could feel a warm liquid constantly leave and flow over his hands and feet.

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His tireless crusade lasted ever on until a specific time, far from the time he began this trial of his, where an older gentleman spoke. He spoke not to him specifically, but to all those who could hear and were willing to listen. And listen the young man did.

“The way out! I know it! All of us trapped here can get out! You just need to try what I say!”

The older man’s voice was husky and felt bare. His labored breathing could be heard as he tried his best to speak out to the perhaps large audience he had around him.

He spoke of a method to get the tendrils off. He spoke of what he did to get them off. The young man knew, to his great misfortune, that the bindings this man had to break were different than his own. The older gentlemen had dealt with a larger and more rope-like tendril over only his neck while the young man had many smaller and smoother tendrils.

The older man spoke of how he had carefully scraped off the parts of his until the tendril was nothing more than a frayed mess. The young man could not replicate this feat. He lost his motivation and his limbs hung loosely to let his tendrils continue to pull.

It was as though his will was lost. No more hope. No more chances to escape. He knew that he could not do what the older man did and he felt miserable…

Even with him letting the tendrils do what they so pleased to tear off his appendages, he felt something. Something strange in the back of his mind. A sudden urge. An urge to fight.

If he couldn’t replicate what the older man did, then he’d have to do something else to break his bonds. But what could he do? They were slick and on his body tugging in all directions.

With the force he could muster, he slammed his hands together behind his back. The tendrils hit each other, nothing happening from such an event. But then the young man started to drag one tendril over another and to and fro he moved. He could hear the product of his work, the tendrils weakening over his arms and less and less pain received.

He worked with ever more fervor as he struggled in a more productive manner than before. Time passed, he continued to work. Even as he heard others come and go around him, he knew he was going to leave. With every little bit of time, he fought against that which once kept him captive.

That is, until one fateful time in the future, his restraints were broken. And he was free. The tendrils seemed to have been interconnected with one another as they sloughed off his limbs and neck.

He was free of the pain. He touched his face and found he was now older, but not quite as old as the gentleman who had spoken to him years prior. His thoughts were free, his restraints were gone, and he stood up from the crater he was held in.

Using his hands, he blindly blundered his way through the environment filled with the sounds of others in pain. He looked out towards the others and, even though he could not see them, he spoke. He spoke of his triumph and what he did to become free. Then he continued on, through the ever expanding darkness, not knowing what would await him next.