At some point in this nightmare, I have fallen into the deepest exhaustion. I don't know what has happened, or perhaps I don't want to assume it. I wake up with a terrible headache, my groin bloodied and throbbing. An indescribable pain, as if hundreds of tiny, sharp blades were embedded inside me; as if, besides that, there were dirt lodged deep within; and the unbearable sensation of scabs breaking over open wounds makes me stifle a scream of agony.

A profound sadness takes hold of me as I realize that the delicate body of my beloved niece has been violated by this wretched sicko.

I look at him. Lying next to me.

And although his eyes are open and he seems to be looking at me, his face frozen in a stupid smile, I soon realize that he isn't actually conscious, that he isn't here, even though his body is.

I glance at the surrounding shadows and don't find the spectral beings that almost always accompany me. From the corner of my eye, I look toward the cages and see three little girls curled up in the farthest corners of their cells, hugging their knees, sobbing as quietly as possible. One of them looks at me from the side, with sadness and empathy.

The body beside me barely breathes. If only I could, I would kill him; but I am handcuffed and unable to reach for anything, unable to hold onto something.

I sit up slowly, cautiously, and although I am sure the bald man won't notice, an overwhelming terror grips my soul.

The two conscious girls, seeing me move, shake their heads and whisper, signaling me to stop, to pretend to be asleep.

I glance toward the stairs at the back. Every movement wounds me from within, making me cry silently, unable to stop my tears.

I am relieved that it is me inhabiting this tiny body right now and not Dani.

And then...

Suddenly...

Eureka!

The man beside me—I understand—he isn't himself. But something else, one of those shadows surrounding us. Then, thinking my suspicions are sheer madness, I dismiss the idea as ridiculous. But again, I doubt.

"Of course. Of course, it's possible. Of course, it's not ridiculous. How could it be, when I myself am inside Dani's body?"

The atmosphere grows colder, my breath thickens into a dense mist, and I feel a gaze fixed on me from my left side, where only the empty bed lies.

I turn slowly.

Calmly.

Hoping to see nothing and instead discovering the unimaginable.

A grotesque, inhuman figure, atrocious, terrifying, and monstrous, something semi-human, something demonic, incorporeal, stares at me with fascination and opens an ethereal mouth, revealing razor-sharp teeth as if ready to devour me.

With a chilling snap that makes my skin crawl, the spectral shadow vanishes, and the bald man stirs, at first slowly, then suddenly jerks up and yanks me violently. I know that if he manages to violate me again, I will die.

A deafening crash erupts from the direction of the stairs, and a blinding light floods the room, preventing the girls and me from seeing what is happening.

The man and whoever or whatever has arrived speak in an incomprehensible dialect; the girls cover their little eyes with their arms, and I, squinting, try to make out what is happening up there.

The unconscious girls groan, as whatever force has entered descends the stairs, step by step.

One step.

Two steps.

Three steps.

The girls awaken, as if triggered by the presence of what approaches. Our captor, beside me, shouts incoherent things, but the new presence ignores him.

Fourth step.

Fifth step.

A paralyzing fear grips me, and without meaning to, I wet the bed. The bald man looks at me, but before he can say or do anything, the new and far more terrifying presence shatters one of the cell doors with a single blow from its own arm. The girl who tries—unsuccessfully—to sit up meets her end when this new enemy of ours stomps on her face, her dislocated jaw twisting spasmodically as she drowns in her own blood, not even fully conscious before death claims her.

The dragging steps of this thing resonate, while the crying of the conscious girls escalates, and the bald man's frantic complaints intensify.

Another explosion of sound—another cell door obliterated with a single kick.

It seems this killer is a young man... in... in a nightgown? I can't see clearly, but he appears to be barefoot and wearing a nightgown.

He grabs, this time, the face of another girl, lost within her mind, who only manages to whimper at his touch. And with a movement I would have thought impossible, he grips the little girl's face the way an NBA player palms a basketball and smashes her head against the wall. One trembling leg convulses wildly, while a puddle of urine mixes with the blood spilling from her skull, cracked open like an egg against the rim of a frying pan.

The bald man no longer complains. Motionless, he simply watches the events unfold while a pair of conscious girls scream in terror. The man in the nightgown, now standing in the cells across from the bed, turns to look at me and smiles. Half of his head is shaved, and in the bare spot, a fresh scar with stitched sutures bleeds slightly. The nightgown, which I can now see clearly, is actually a hospital gown. As he turns back to one of the conscious girls' cells, she begs for her life while a demonic laugh echoes from the visitor. With his back to us, he reveals sagging buttocks that jiggle like jelly with each step. He tears the door down and enters like an enraged bull charging into the arena, rushing in at full speed, and, with brutal force, punches the poor girl over and over again. By the third blow, she collapses like a limp marionette. He does the same to the other girl, leaving them both sprawled on the ground, dead or dying. Then, he moves on to the unconscious ones, finishing his rampage until, with no more hells left to unleash, he turns to face the bald man and me.

He grins, climbs onto the bed, and advances toward us. He licks my face, and paralyzed with terror, I become a mere spectator to what seems to be my inevitable death. My body arches in disgust and fear.

He turns to the bald man and shoots him right in the stomach.

"Get out of there!" he says, slow, loud, spectral.

The bald man writhes in agony and collapses on the other side of the bed, kicking wildly. I watch him in panic, and suddenly, I feel the gaze of the Enemy. When I look at him, he is still staring at me with that deranged, terrifying smile.

He doesn't move.

He doesn't say anything.

He doesn't blink.

He just smiles at me, and as I'm about to scream in terror, the bald man stirs beside me. But I don't look at him—I'm too afraid of the man smiling almost on top of me.

"Am I dead?" the bald man asks. The figure keeps smiling, unchanging. "What am I doing here?" The smile continues to paralyze me, but I can do nothing but stare. "Do I still have cancer?" the bald man asks, lost, knowing nothing at all.

It's as if he has just woken up from a coma. And if anyone knows what that's like, it's me.

The smiling figure tilts his head, turning only his face toward the bald man—nothing else moves, like an animatronic robot executing a precise facial motion. Then, he says something incomprehensible and lunges like a predator seizing its prey. It looks as though he is devouring the bald man's face, but in reality, he presses his lips against his, sucking something from him. When he finishes consuming whatever he has stolen, the bald man vanishes, collapsing like a discarded piece of clothing thrown to the floor while undressing.

He turns his terrifying eyes toward me and says:

"In láak'ech. A láak'en."

He shatters the handcuffs and yanks me by the hand, dragging me up and out of the basement at lightning speed. He throws me into a truck, places his palm on my forehead, and I black out.

It feels as if the mere force of his touch has shattered my bindings, releasing me from Daniela's body. That sudden release flings me into a vast, weightless void—a calm emptiness, though at incredible speed. But in this boundless space, neither distance nor velocity inspire fear. Only peace. I sense the wind rushing past my ears, yet there is no wind.

No sound.

No motion.

Nothing.

I am suspended in a dark emptiness, weightless, and nothing hurts.

Far away, my niece's crying resurfaces, then fades again, barely audible. Terror floods me once more.

Stupidly, instinctively, I try to retreat into the safety of a physical form, but there is nothing. I am alone with my thoughts—nothing, nothing, nothing else.

I want to regain consciousness, and as I cling to that thought, that feeling, the desperate urge to return to that battered little body overwhelms me. I fight for it, anchor myself to Dani's body once more, and just as I do, just as I reclaim my place, the nightmare ends. I hear the truck moving, surrounded by shouts, wails, curses, profanities, and sobs filling my ears.

My captor pulls me from the vehicle, slings me over his shoulder, and carries me up a forested mountain—or at least that's what I believe, what I feel.

Then, the sounds of nothingness take over as I sense the damp cold of the clouds. I hear the night birds, the restless chickens, the frightened pigs, the uneasy oxen as we pass. Straining with immense effort, I manage to pry open one of my eyelids and glimpse the vast expanse of green and blue at the mountaintop where we are, while this repugnant being carries me over his shoulder.

In the distance, an eerie, wretched little house stands—blocks of concrete with wood grain patterns and a triangular sheet-metal roof, like an arrow pointing skyward. That place, starkly contrasting with its surroundings, awaits us next to a water reservoir fed by a small lake at the mountain's peak.

I know that place will be my terror.

Behind it, a small corral comes to life with the frantic sounds of terrified animals.

Where are we?