Shadows. Little threads of nightmare silk play against the wall of the nursery before they coalesce into fine, delicate fingers not unlike a Black Widow’s legs. These threads, these fingers are chased by thin arms, equally delicate, equally long. Then the shadows loom larger — a large, round, bulbous head and a thin, fragile body. These shadows march along the walls, though no visible creature can be seen.

To the edge of the crib and the sleeping infant lying within. The ghostly fingers caress the infant’s face, its cheeks, its chin. The touch is almost loving.

Then the fingers draw back slightly. They pause, as if waiting, the tips of the fingers quivering spasmodically. There is a long caesura in the room, as if the universe is holding its collective breath. The shadowy fingers even stop spasming for the time being.

Something unseen changes, and the breath that was being held is let out. The universe resumes its normal course, and the fingers reach back toward the infant.

And then, and then, those long, delicate, and maliciously violent fingers reach into the infant’s skull. They do not cause physical harm to the child, but if it is possible for an infant to have a nightmare, this one does at the unexpected and unwelcome intrusion into its psyche.

The shadowy fingers slide into the infant’s skull, and almost, almost, the infant cries out, but the cry dies on the very breath upon which it rides. The infant breathes in again, and those horrible, terrible fingers continue digging.

Finally, the fingers withdraw, and with them they carry a small, yellow orb plucked from the infant’s mind. The fingers pat the infant delicately on the head, as if to say thank you, before withdrawing from the baby completely. Then the shadowy figure slips from the nursery altogether.

The child will live, but it will never know joy, for that capacity has now been stolen forever from it.

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