The fog sank low and thick very rapidly, giving the air a biting chill which ran teasingly down John's spine. It wasn't right, like a single sharpened fingernail dragging across his skin. It made him call out into the white void in hope of something comfortable, something familiar, just beyond his reach.
"Hello?" he yelled into the mist. There was no answer.
He heard a sound, faintly, like a trickle. Walking blindly, his bare feet stung as they grazed rough pebbles which lodged into his tender flesh. He winced in pain and was just about to turn back when he felt icy fluid lapping against his toes, numbing their nerves. He looked down at the water at his feet, his frown lines drawing together.
It was black, obsidian black.
He turned around but the path he had taken was enveloped in the fog veil. It seemed that he was being dared to proceed. He felt his breathing shutter in and out of his body. His heart fluttered anxiously. It wasn't right.
The isolation was haunting.
Fear froze him to his place, his feet rooting into the earth. His conscious thought faded out like the light of a train as it traveled farther and farther into the night. His animal instincts took dominance over his mind, making him hyper aware to everything around him, even the malevolent energies which threatened at the brink of unseen things. He could not find a voice to call out again.
It was silent. The only sound was the waves lapping against his ankles and the shore.
He hadn't remembered taking another step but already he seemed deeper in the water. It was as if his body was moving out of tandem with his mind, as if his soul was grounded while his legs moved forward by their own accord. He felt stretched and expanded, compressing with every shaky exhale.
He moved forward again on puppet legs. He panicked quietly as the waterline elevated past his calves and reached his knees. He watched his skin disappear into the black ink.
The doctor's muscles clenched as he determined himself not to move, to stay close to the safety of the rocky shore, but whatever power controlled him would not slacken its grip.
The glassy surface rose again and this time consumed his hips. He trembled all over and grit his teeth to keep the tears of terror from escaping him.
He was chest deep.
His heart pounded in his ears, so strongly it sent ripples through the water. His tremored breaths became deep, wrenching heaves. He let out an unearthly groan from somewhere within, a vulnerable mortal sound, primitive and desperate.
Blackness surrounded him. The fog became ebony, viscose hands, tearing at him from all angles, dragging him into the deep and with them came the faces of decayed corpses, the jaws hanging loose, the eyes gutted out to leave bottomless holes. They screamed through the pressure of the poisonous water, a high pitched animal like cry. The doctor thrashed and clawed at the bodies suffocating him, but as he did, their flesh scraped away like gelatinous putty under his fingernails. He felt his lungs gasp and sputter with their last breath of life. Before the end, he had only the strength to let out a scream of agony into the watery depths, among the screeches of his fellow dead.