A tall, slim, pale man walked into the hospital slowly. The city never slept—because sleep killed.
He had dark circles under his eyes from sleepless nights, a faint, cold expression carved by countless Somnic Lucid Tests. His black cloak hung around him like a shadow refusing to leave.
The hospital doors hissed open. To Aiden, it was just another day of hell.
People filled the lobby — dead and almost dead — men, women, children, all wailing for help.
"Doctor! Help! She won't wake up!"
"My son's been sleeping for three days — his hands and legs are gone, but his eyes still move!"
None of it made Aiden twitch — not even once.
He'd seen this a hundred times. Fear had its own scent here—metallic, cold, and almost sweet.
A nurse approached — average height, brunette, her eyes dim from too many night shifts and not enough sleep.
"Mr. Cross," she said softly. "This way."
He followed her in silence, each step heavier than the last — as if the building itself remembered every nightmare that passed through its halls.
Somewhere deep inside, Aiden wondered if he'd left part of himself behind last night—or brought something back.
They reached the elevator located near the counter crowded with grieving parents.
He glanced once — then looked away.
Their stories didn't touch him anymore.
The elevator ride was unsettling. Aiden and the nurse stood apart, both focused on the same problem — staying awake.
Minutes crawled by. They forced their eyes open, fighting the pull of sleep — for now, it seemed to work.
"Ouch." The nurse flinched, raising her trembling hands. They shook — not from cold, but from the drugs keeping her awake.
Aiden said nothing. One cold glance was enough to make her steady herself.
Soon, they reached a vast hall lined with lucid pods, and IV drips — everything designed to keep the world awake.
Hiss
The elevator door slid open.
White curtains framed rows of platinum tables, each covered with syringes and glowing fluids.
Aiden stepped out first, hands in his pockets.
Step. Step. Step.
He stopped halfway through the hall. The air stank of chemicals and sleep suppressants.
The nurse followed, face blank — almost lifeless.
Then, from behind a curtain, a woman emerged: brunette, glasses, white coat. A scientist.
"Mr. Cross, what a pleas—" she began, hand extended.
Aiden brushed past her. "No time for pleasantries," he said coldly.
His eyes were fixated on where the scientist emerged.
Now inside, he took a glance at the chemicals and fluids she was busy with. Soon after, the scientist joined, as well as the nurse.
"Helen," he began, "I need an update."
She didn't reply right away, just cleared her throat.
"Sir, what I mean is, the fluids aren't working anymore. They seem to reject human blood cells."
Aiden's gaze deepened. It was like his mind had just opened a thousand tabs at once. "Reject?" he repeated, as the word lingered in the air like static.
Helen hesitated but then nodded, clutching her clipboard. "The serum's composition starts breaking down when it enters the bloodstream. Instead of keeping the neurons active, it... Well, it attacks them. We've seen a spike in cranial hemorrhages, neural decay, and what appears to be... cognitive looping."
Aiden then frowned. "Looping?"
"Patients start reliving the same memory repeatedly—like their brains get stuck in one fragment of their dreams," she explained, her voice trembling slightly.
"They stay awake... but it's not consciousness anymore. It's more like... mechanical awareness. They move, speak, even breathe—but their minds are trapped somewhere between sleep and wake."
The nurse shifted uneasily, bracing herself. "It's spreading, sir. The more we inject, the faster it collapses."
Aiden inhaled slowly, his jaw tightening. "So, the Somnus fluid is mutating."
Helen nodded again, almost whispering. "Either that, or it's evolving on its own. The structure keeps changing every time we synthesize a new batch. It's like it's... learning."
That word hung in the air for too long. Learning.
Aiden's hand brushed the edge of the metal table. Cold. Sterile. Familiar. He stared at the glistening vials, the thin tubes pulsing faintly with luminescent blue. Something about them almost looked alive.
He turned back to Helen. His voice was quiet, almost ghostly.
"Show me."
She opened up a large computer, the light reflecting in their faces.
Her fingers flew over the keyboard, and soon, some figures and theories came into view.
On screen were the inner anatomy of humans before they took the serum composition, and then after. Their bloodstream started tightening and decaying. Aiden's gaze widened a bit but returned to normal.
"Why are you showing me all this?" he asked, cold, his gaze shifting subtly from the screen.
Both Helen and the nurse exchanged uneasy glances.
"Mr. Cross..." Helen began, "We are afraid the drugs aren't working anymore."
There was silence. The words aren't working anymore, still clinging to the air like a jealous lover.
"What do I tell the Vigil?" he asked again. Aiden was indeed a man of questions. He asked a lot and spoke too little.
"Sir—" Helen started, then hesitated.
Cough, cough.
The nurse started coughing up blood and bone particles.
"Evelyn!" Helen shouted and held her before she collapsed to the floor—blood smeared Helen's lab coat, but that was not her thought right now.
"What's happening to her?" Aiden asked, his voice was deadpan, but somehow had an iota of concern in it.
Helen was still shocked by what she had just witnessed. Her eyes moved rapidly, trying to piece together theories and logic that could link to Evelyn's state.
"Don't make me ask twice." He said, his voice darker and colder.
"It—" Helen's voice faltered. She wasn't ready to show Aiden this part of the news yet. "It's... like the serum is mutating—rewriting itself."
Aiden frowned slightly. "Rewriting?" he repeated.
"Yes," she said, voice trembling as she wiped the blood off her gloves. "At first, we thought it was just chemical resistance, but the samples—" she gestured at the computer—"they're thinking. The blood doesn't just reject the serum; it adapts to it. Like it's remembering every drop that ever entered the vein."
She zoomed in on the digital model of a human hand, the veins glowing faintly blue. "Watch this."
The highlighted veins began to contract—slowly at first, then violently, like invisible hands squeezing them from the inside. "This isn't infection or necrosis," she said. "It's a reflex. Almost like... pinching."
"Pinching?" Aiden repeated softly. His mind flickered back—Evelyn in the elevator, wincing, whispering 'Ouch', her fingers twitching like they'd been caught by invisible wires.
Helen continued, her tone shifting from clinical to shaken. "We think... the serum triggers something dormant in the Somnic nervous system—something that mimics the sensation of touch. But not human touch. It's as if... the body starts to feel something else touching itself from the inside out."
Aiden's expression darkened. "You're saying the serum's alive?"
Helen's silence was louder than words.
"The lab samples display rhythmic pulses, almost like a heartbeat," she said quietly. "But they beat... out of sync with the patient's. As though something else is breathing through them. Some of the staff started calling it the Second Pulse."
She glanced at Evelyn's collapsed body. "Sir, if that theory's true... she didn't just collapse. Her body might be responding to something we can't see."
"Explain in detail, Helen," he commanded.
Helen gave a gulp, she hesitated, then glanced nervously at the monitors. "There's more," she whispered, lowering her voice as if she was afraid the walls could hear.
"When the Second Pulse begins, the brainwaves change. It's not just a coma or neural failure anymore—it's synchronization. The brain starts to resonate with frequencies we can't trace. We thought it was interference from the Lucid Pods at first, but… It's not coming from here."
Aiden's eyes narrowed. "Then from where?"
Helen swallowed. "From within their dreams."
She pointed at the monitor. "Every time the Pulse activates, patients' EEGs show inverted waves—patterns that shouldn't exist in waking humans. They match no known sleep state, not REM, not lucid. It's as if their consciousness is phasing into something else entirely. And the serum… it opens the gate wider."
She clicked another window. A faint sound filled the lab—an irregular heartbeat, low and distorted, like someone breathing underwater. "We recorded this from a patient's neural link," she said. "That's not their heartbeat. It's the sound of whatever's echoing back."
For the first time, Aiden's composure shifted. Barely, but enough. "Echoing back?" he asked.
Helen nodded shakily. "They hear whispers right before they collapse. The same phrase every time—'Stay awake. It's waiting."
She looked down at Evelyn's hand. Her fingers were still twitching slightly, pinching the air, even in unconsciousness. "Sir, I think the Second Pulse is the mind's defense. Something's pulling them from the inside—from the Somnic Plane itself. And the serum doesn't suppress it anymore. It amplifies it."
The room went silent.
Even the machines seemed to hold their breath.
Aiden's voice dropped an octave, colder than before.
"Then we're no longer fighting sleep," he said. "We're fighting what's inside it."