Tick, tock, tick, tock.

The clocks reverberated off the walls, surrounding me in a symphony of numerous clicks.

Tick, tock.

My heart beating in my throat matched the steady pounding of pulsing pressure thumping in my ears.

I tossed and turned, body half secured in sheets, half exposed to the midnight black engulfing me. I tried to muffle the sound, tried to muffle the ticks and the tocks, but they kept coming, louder and faster, crescendoing into a complete control over my entire body, pounding and thumping and…

The red digital numbers of my alarm clock officially read twelve-o’clock when the clocks suddenly stopped...

And the silence that followed was eminently deafening.

I made myself relax, welcoming a calm that slowly consumed my body. Deep breath in, deep breath out. I closed my eyes, summoning happy thoughts, a world with no clocks, and the endless universe of dreamland. Sleep, finally...

And then, a cold, crude hand grasped my ankle sharply, and began to drag me off my bed.