The wind’s constant whining and complaining was beginning to annoy Armada. His mind already damaged from the insanity invoking cold, he was unable to determine how much more of this he could take.
A flurry of snow assaulted him, causing him to fall down on his flank. He scowled underneath his protective wrapping. A weariness was swimming all around him, inviting him to just let the cold take him and freeze him away.
He tried to sit up, but his energy was sapped. He was too tired, he was too weak. This expedition was determined to make sure he didn’t escape this alive. Armada grit his teeth, and fell onto his stomach. The cold snow was both cold to the point of pain and inviting at the same time.
Armada struggled to keep his eyes open, but soon he was too drained. The cold was a living force, an entity that needed to consume to live, and it had been so long since it had eaten anything...
There there...
He sat up, and took a look around. He was in a bed at the end of a small room. The door was open slightly, casting a bit of light into the dark. Armada let the blankets fall from his body, and he hopped to the floor.
Opening the door slightly, he noticed that this lead to the hallway that his foalhood home had harbored. His hooves pattered against the wooden floor softly, the noise oddly comforting. There was something at the edge of his vision, almost as though it were encompassing him entirely. It didn’t feel bad, but... it wasn’t something he wanted.
He had reached the end of the hall, where a staircase lay. The black was slowly growing, trying to envelope him and force him into a second sleep.
Armada looked down at himself. He was much smaller than he remembered... he must be a foal again! A memory, most likely, since this was the house he had lived in when he was young.
He set his hoof on the first stair. There was no creak. Cocking his head, he put a second hoof onto the stair. Still no creak. There had always been a creak at the top of the stairs...
The black had receded slightly, but now it was growing again, like a horrible fungus on his vision. He felt his heart skip a beat. He shouldn’t care so much about a creak, but it let him onto a very creepy truth about this memory.
It wasn’t his house.
He wanted to turn back. The bottom of the stairs was shrouded in blackness. The only light was a lantern in the hallway, the one that had shed light into his room. But Armada was determined to head on forward into the gloom. He wasn’t quite sure why yet, but he needed to move forward.
He slowly descended the stairs, his breath coming out in short bursts, heavy in his ears. He would have heard his heartbeat, had his breathing not drowned the sound out.
The blackness was sitting there, one step away. Armada took a quick look up the stairs again. The lantern light continued to dance up there.
He took a step forward.