Vision in Red by Sajjad Rasool - HTML preview

Vision in Red

The knife passed through the black form as if it were smoke.

The creature didn't flinch. It reached out a hand —a hand with too many fingers—and touched the groom's forehead.

The groom froze. His eyes rolled back. And then, he unraveled. Like a sweater being pulled by a loose thread, his existence simply came apart. His body swirled into a spiral of gray dust and was sucked into the creature's chest.

The bride screamed. A silent, world-shattering scream.

The creature turned to her.

It walked toward the platform. It climbed the steps.

Layla scrambled back, pressing herself against the trunk of the sycamore tree. She looked up at the branches, as if hoping the tree would protect her. But the leaves were turning gray. They were falling like ash.

The creature stood over her. It leaned down.

Amal wanted to close her eyes. She wanted to look away. But she couldn't.

The creature didn't touch her. It just... waited. It waited for her terror to ripen. It waited for her to realize that no one was coming. That there was no God, no army, no husband who could save her.

That despair—that absolute, crushing void—was what it wanted.

Layla ’s head dropped. She stopped fighting. She stopped screaming. She just sat there, weeping silently.

The creature leaned closer. Its face—that smooth, blank mask—stopped inches from hers.

And then, the mask opened.

It wasn't a mouth. It was a vertical slit that tore open the blackness. Inside, there was no throat. There was only a swirling vortex of white light. A negative star.

The creature inhaled.

Layla didn't dissolve. She was pulled. Her spirit, her soul, her name—it was dragged out of her body in a stream of silver light. It flowed into the creature's maw.

Her body remained. But it was empty. It was a husk. A shell. It sat there for a moment, perfectly still. Then, like a sandcastle hit by a wave, it collapsed into a pile of dust.

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