It began in the quiet, unremarkable way that most unsettling moments do—without warning, without noise, and without anything obviously wrong at first glance. I had gone to bed expecting nothing more than rest, the kind of ordinary sleep that follows an ordinary day, where the mind gradually loosens its grip on awareness and the world shrinks down to darkness and breathing. The room felt familiar, predictable, and safe in the way bedrooms are supposed to feel when nothing has changed.
But somewhere between sleep and wakefulness, that sense of predictability broke. I became aware of something small resting on the bed near me—something that didn’t belong. At first, it was just a vague impression, a detail the mind hadn’t fully processed yet. But as I focused, that impression sharpened into something more concrete: a few reddish-brown, capsule-shaped objects lying on the fabric beside me. They were too defined to ignore, too unusual to dismiss as nothing. And the moment I saw them clearly, the atmosphere of the room shifted from calm to uncertain.
