Ethereal Awakening

Silence. Absolute. Infinite. A sudden jolt, akin to a bolt of

electricity, seared through Riley's very soul, jolting her into consciousness—or

so she thought. For a moment, she reeled in the dark, gripped by the illusion

of a physical body even as every nerve ending was pared away to atom-thin consciousness.

Her identity—her self—burned white-hot in the void, stripped of words or memory or even

the comfort of pain. All that was left was the panic, pure and crystalline, ringing out in a

silence that contained infinity. She tried to scream, but there were no lungs,

no lips, no windpipe to lend shape to terror. Only the echo of what once was Riley,