Is something watching you? Are you hearing things no one else is? Seeing something but unsure if you really did see it? Inside you'll find the last thoughts of a man as he drifts through space about to die. A normal Bridge night about to turn into one of terror. A reason for all the missing silver in an old country home, and a chase between life and death. Perhaps one will even discover an old man's reminiscence of the destruction of the world.

Alone in the dark, something is watching me. I can feel its narrow, blood red eyes following my every single move. But every time that I turn round to look, it’s gone.

I can hardly walk down the street without feeling the cold chill of something or maybe though I doubt it very much, someone watching me.

My mother has started getting worried about me. She keeps asking why I keep peeking out from behind the curtains every 5 minutes. And why I am afraid to go out after dark.

I have tried to tell her that someone or something is watching me. But she just laughs and tells me I'm being silly, no one would want to stare at me from behind their curtains. She just doesn't understand.

But I know something is watching me. Lately when I have been walking home from school, I can hear its footsteps walking behind me.

Every time I stop walking, there is always one step after I stop. I always keep on walking, I'm always too scared to look behind me and see its narrow, blood red eyes staring into my soul.

I have tried looking in windows that I pass, but there is always nothing there.

I'm getting really scared now. I'm starting to hear voices no one else can. They keep calling my name over, and over again, but they never answer back whenever I reply.

I have taken to only leaving the house whenever my mother tells me to do something. I will always rush through whatever it is, so I can get back inside to hide in my room.

I saw something in my mirror this morning. It was just a lightning, quick flash and then it was gone hidden back into its depth. I screamed so loud I cut my face with my razor, my warm blood started to trickle down my chin and into the sink, but I didn't feel it, I was so scared.....so very scared.

I am hiding in my bedroom now. My mother has been calling me to come down for the past hour. Let her call! I'm not answering back.

I'm hearing footsteps on the stairs, and the voices are getting louder, much, much louder! I saw something move across my mirror!

My mother has stopped calling for me, silence and a chill has descend upon my room. Something is outside the door, I can hear it. It's trying to turn the handle.

The voices are quick and swift, entering through one ear and leaving out the other before I can hear what they are saying. The thing in the mirror is watching me; I can feel its evil gaze burning through me.

The thing outside the door has turned the handle, and the voices are deafening, roaring in my head! Get out! Stop the noise!

The door's creaking open... it's here! ... It's finally here...

The End.

In space no one can hear you scream. That is what they say and that is what they believe. Who ‘They’ are or were or is or was is not known exactly, only that they say it and they believe it. They say it because in space there is nothing. Nothing that would hear you scream anyway. And even if they could hear, sound does not travel in space, it does nothing at all. You can scream as loud as you want but not even you will hear it. At least, all you will hear is the voice inside your head telling you that you are screaming, but that is not the same.

In space no one can hear you scream. And I believe it. For I am one of the ‘They’ that believe it. And I believe it because as I float through space, mouth open wide and screaming for all that I have, the only thing I can hear is the voice inside me laughing at my unheard scream.

It started when I fell out of the air lock hatch of a 24 Booster League Star Ship. It was an accident of course, no one ever plans on falling out of an air lock hatch, but it happened and there was nothing that could be done about it. As I said, no one hears you scream so they never noticed me gone. They never saw me either because the ship was travelling at warp, so by the time they do end up noticing I will be long dead. Maybe in another time, in another corner of the galaxy in stars they will never see again. It’s sad in a way, my life had just begun and now it was going to be over in another couple of seconds.

I was born on some small back water planet that didn’t even register in the system; I guess that’s why I never knew its real name. We always just called it Home, though it never ever felt like any of us ever belonged. It’s funny, they say one day everybody grows up and leaves home, and that’s exactly what I did. I never looked back once I was on the bus cruiser, I couldn’t have either if I had tried. We were now travelling at such force your face was being pushed into the back of your head and you couldn’t even blink. It was a terrible way to travel, but that’s space busses for you. They aren’t meant to be comfortable, they’re just meant to get you there cheaply.

My mum never saw me leave, she never had a chance to say goodbye. She’ll never know I died. Not that she cared if I lived when I was at Home. I have no idea what she thought, or what she thinks of me. But she will never know that I won’t exist soon, and that disturbs me. Tears don’t flow from my face now; the space I’m floating in is preventing them from flowing somehow in ways I don’t know.

I don’t even focus on the pain; it’s all like a dream. It just doesn’t seem possible, or real, I was never meant to die alone. I have a girl; she was going to be my wife as soon as the ship docked at Sentri. I asked her before I left and we set the date for the day I got back. She’ll be waiting for me at the docks, all dressed up pretty, wearing that little flower clip she always wears for special occasions, her shiny black hair even shinier than normal framing her delicate face, firm lips and clear eyes. We were going to go straight to the chapel we had booked in advance. The thought of her waiting forever tears me up inside even more than the thought of what space is going to do to me in one more second. We would have married before I left but couldn’t afford it, that’s why I took the job, so we would be able to afford the cost when I got back.

The job in question I had taken was Negotiation Expert, meaning I handled the negotiations between species. I made the terms and then present them to each side and get them to agree on it. Every ship normally has one in case they stumble across some new species. Hardly anyone ever wants to fight, and to make sure they don’t end up fighting they push me in front of them to protect them.

This was my first job, actually. Well, first job as a Negotiations Expert. I had had jobs before this one, doing all sorts of things, anything that would pay. The bus took me to Sentri, and I lived there for about ten years or so, the details are fuzzy. That and the 2 year trip I was coming back from makes me 28 now. I met my girl when I was 25, and we just clicked straight away. The first real girl I ever paid any attention too, the first girl I ever asked to be mine.

I remember the first day I met her, now that I thought was a dream. I just didn’t think it was possible for such a beautiful creature to exist. It was just, unimaginable. But even more so was the fact she noticed me, and she actually talked to me instead of the 400 other Information Clerks in the building. To this day I still don’t know how I ended up with her, I made mistake after mistake trying to impress her. But maybe that was why. It was first day at the job and I hadn’t a clue really what to do, but I told her I’d been there for years and knew the system back to front. Almost created a war somehow by some of the buttons I was pressing. Thankfully she actually worked for the government and was able to fix the probl-

The End