Again, there was no answer, so they continued louder and louder, refusing to give up. Eventually they did. Danny's knuckles were starting to burn, the skin now red raw and he knew there was no chance she was likely to be in there. She was another casualty of the reality creature's game. He still had no idea what was really happening, and with each passing day things got worse, with no more answers. They were both sighing, leaning on Gina's front door, unable to speak as they didn't know what to say next. Brandon looked across to Danny and pulled himself back from the door. He clasped his hand into a fist, let out an angry grunt and flung it in the direction of Danny.
Danny looked round and saw Brandon's fist launched in his direction, wondering what he was doing. He didn't have time to move or react in any way, as this was completely unexpected, which was quickly becoming the theme of his life. Brandon's fist missed Danny, instead shooting behind his back to some other assailant. Danny spun his head round to find the momentum carried Brandon with it, his whole body in motion, in attack mode against the empty space.
“Fucker......” Brandon screamed as he stumbled slightly, as if expecting to hit some resistance, but passing through whatever was there. He turned back to Danny panting.
“What are you doing?” Danny exclaimed, although he could probably guess if he thought about it properly.
“I saw one of those shadow fuckers standing right next to you” He replied, “The little bastard rippled away again”
Danny looked around nervously, he hadn't seen anything that time, but Brandon clearly had.
“We should go” Danny said, although where to, he had no idea. Where could they go where these figures wouldn't be?
They started walking towards the 4 x 4, Brandon still swearing at what he said were figures in the distance, shimmering in a taunting intangible way. They jumped back in the 4 x 4, not sure where to go. Brandon started up the engine and just drove, in no particular direction, just anywhere to try and clear their heads and make a decision on what they should do. After a couple of minutes, the whole landscape seemed to alter very slightly, as if someone was turning down the contrast. It was only three in the afternoon; the sun shouldn't be setting for hours yet. Brandon screeched the car to a halt outside a shopping mall and looked out his window for a better look. The sky all around them took on a much deeper tint than normal, what was this? They both got out of the 4 x 4 and looked around them, things were beginning to feel strange, the normal sounds of the city were muted, a blanket of silence thrown over the normal hustle and bustle. They glanced around, where were all the people? It was a Saturday afternoon and this district of the city was normally heaving with people, all out to enjoy their weekend. The sky seemed to fade a little darker again and Danny looked up to see if it was really happening or whether he was imagining it. The sky looked like it had a mesh across it, a web of fibres, very faint but noticeable.
“I don't know where everyone is Brandon” Danny said panicked, looking back down, “None of this feels right”.
Brandon hummed in agreement and they both instinctively walked towards the mall entrance, hoping to find someone in there. They entered through the big glass doors, and as they did so, Brandon was tugged back by something invisible. Danny grabbed his arm to pull him forward and they both stumbled into the mall. Whatever it was that grabbed Brandon had slipped away as quickly as it had appeared. They were both much more nervous now than they had been before, they could both sense something was deeply, deeply wrong with how things were going, and were both filled with a hopeless dread. There was a loud screech and it felt as if the mall was calling to them, like it was scratching away its glass facade into an audible howl. They thought this unearthly call came from behind them, so they ran further into the mall, when all of a sudden Danny saw people ahead and pointed them out to Brandon. They continued on in their direction, Brandon shouting that he saw more shadow figures. Danny glanced round too, he could now see the odd gleaming figure, there one minute, gone the next. They appeared to be all around them, all the time the light around them dimming little by little. Danny suddenly stopped in his tracks as he saw a familiar face, in the distance was Julie, the beautiful woman he had met a few days ago. She seemed to be running in the same direction as them.
“Julie?” Danny shouted, to which she turned around.
She noticed him straight away and waved them both in her direction. She had a terrified look in her eyes, and seemed to be looking behind them. Danny's head bobbed round to see what new horror was hunting them and saw that the glass facade had shattered into a living entity that was spiralling towards them. They all
