down to insanity

"It's not going to kill you" Ben told him.

He'd heard it several times before, that it's perfectly safe, it won't kill you or give you flashbacks every time you crack your back. 

Ben continued on about how it makes you feel like a kid again, full of curiosity and joy, and it seemed like Nick was starting to come around on the matter. 

"Well maybe I'll try one and see how it goes." Nick said as he took a small piece of paper and placed it on his tongue.

The next day, Nick was awestruck. Why are people so against this? It's wonderful, everyone should try it and then maybe we would all come together and make peace instead of war. He started taking it every few months, wanting to keep the magic but not overdo it. 

A couple years went by with nothing out of the ordinary until one day, when Nick had a life changing trip. It wasn't life changing in the sense of becoming a new person, or becoming some higher entity, but it opened his eyes to something more than reality.

One night Nick was at home enjoying his stuff when he felt restricted and heard what sounded like someone talking over his shoulder. He looked over to an empty room, when someone else whispered something from the other side of the room. He whipped his head around and began to worry when he saw there was nobody to be creating these noises. 

He tried to stop and take a calm breathe, and to tell himself that it's just the drug playing tricks on him, but was interrupted by what sounded like a group of people all whispering about Nick. They barraged him with sentences he couldn't understand, speaking in a language that sounded english, but none of the words made sense to him. 

For a moment he forgot that he had taken something that was causing this and he began to panic. He felt surrounded, and had to escape. He called up Ben and had him pick himself up to take his mind off of it.

For the rest of the night they hung around and tried to stay occupied, but the voices followed Nick until he went to sleep.

The next day, Nick awoke to a quiet room. No more voices. He shook it off as a bad trip and moved on with his life. The next few days he went through his normal routine, as if he hadn't been pounded down to a fearful creature a few days before, until something caught his attention out of the corner of his eye.

He spun around to catch what made the little movement, what looked like a rabbit jumping behind a tree, and assumed that's all it was before moving on. But throughout the next week, there would be a subtle movement out of the corner of his eye, and when he turned to look, there was nothing that could have made movement. 

Weeks went by and these little movements were more normal to him now, and while he would try to catch what made the movement, he didn't put in as much effort. One day though, Nick managed to see more than he had before.

He caught the outline of something. The size of a garden gnome. It ducked behind a sign before he got a good look at it, but he was positive he saw something. He went to look but there was nothing there, and this bothered him more than if he had found something. There was nowhere for it to disappear to. He had not taken his eyes off the sign as he approached. He would've seen it run away. 

For the rest of the day he thought about what he saw and tried to come up with an explanation, but there was nothing to explain it. The next day, Nick managed to catch a glimpse of it again, but this time noticed it's lack of detail. It wasn't like anything he had seen before. It resembled a blob. Just a dark grey blob with no particular shape and jerky movement. 

Over the next week Nick became obsessed with these little creatures which he started to call "NAME HERE". He began asking people left and right if they had ever experienced anything like that, often to be met with a response as if he had escaped a mental facility. Nobody had any idea what he was talking about until he asked Ben about it.

Ben hadn't experienced them before but he had heard about them. Supposedly they were little creatures who existed in a fuzzy area where most living things couldn't even process that they were there. Almost as if they were living in an alternate world to ours, and that the only people who had ever claimed to see them were those who indulged in various substances. 

Nick sat there amazed as Ben told him this, and he couldn't help but think about how to be able to see them better; take more substance.

Ben said this was a terrible idea, that the little figures are most likely from the leftover chemicals in your brain creating stimulus that isn't there, and they should go away on their own. But Nick didn't care.

Nick went home that night, and pulled out two little pieces of paper, placed them on his tongue, and prepared for a 'hunt'. 

He went out for a walk that night, and the creatures were everywhere. Except they were different now. They were full of vibrant colors, shapes that he hadn't seen before, they moved freely about without care that they could be seen. Nick couldn't believe his eyes. 

He walked up to one and it quickly scurried away.

Another did the same.

The third, Nick got down low, slowly moved in and let the creature check him out first. It neared his hand as though to smell it, jumped up and then climbed into Nick's open hand. The creature allowed Nick to study him before hopping down and slowly walking away, as if to lead him. 

They walked for what felt like hours, into the forest nearby, off the trails, and into a cave that looked to have existed since the dawn of time. They went in, and Nick immediately exited alone. He had a look on his face as though he had just seen color for the first time, and walked home with a single thought occupying his mind.

"They're real."