Imagine being asleep, and in a faint distance you begin to hear an echo. Restless, and your mind filled with fog. You begin to think to yourself, what's going on? A sense of clarity begins to take over you. That distant echo that you believed to all be a dream, suddenly becomes a reality. Your dog's are barking, almost as if they're trying to warn you. Like a flare in the sky, trying to signal for help.
You follow the echo, and as it gets closer. You notice something is wrong. The smell of smoke overwhelms you, and you find your kitchen in flames. The image that you wish was nothing but a dream, is now a realistic nightmare. You scream, begging for your beloved husband to wake up. Your voice, it crackles as your soul begins to panic. Upon your husband's awakening the two of you scurry as you each caress your children in your arms. Using your bodies as shields to ensure your children are safe in the battle they are about to endure.
You run, all while your once known sanctuary is fastly becoming an Earthbound Hell. The fire it spreads, almost as if it were a monster that is quickly gaining on it's pray. You inhale, and your throat and lungs begin to burn. Like a snake slowly suffocating it's victim, it's suddenly becoming harder and harder to breathe. Can you escape this Fire monster's grasp? Or will you simply become another one of its victims?
You gasp, as the hot heat intensely hits your skin. The path in front of you, is quickly becoming a labyrinth. So many different ways you can be trapped, and the only way out means battling the monster that is accompanied by its demons. Who are so certain you will soon be joining their firey abyss. The firey abyss that even the Devil himself can't escape.
Your options are running out, and your mind is wearing thin. When suddenly, a glimpse of light slowly begins to peak through. The battle you've been fighting for what seems like centuries, appears to be coming close to it's end. This is it. Your greatest victory. You escaped the beast that was so determined to succeed in destroying you.
But what you didn't realize is, despite escaping the Fire Monster and all of it's hell. It managed to destroy the world as you know it, and the majority of everything in it.
Including your daughters innocence of seeing nothing but beauty in the world. Your daughter who once was so overwhelmed with joy, is now being taunted. Taunted by a monster who constantly reminds her of the real life hell she was forced to endure. The hell she so frequently speaks of, and continues to be terrified of.
You see people often fight their own battles, and while some are lucky enough to live to tell the tale. What they don't tell you is that even if you defeat your own demons. The demons will always be there waiting...
Waiting for you to fall asleep. Because even if you think you defeated them and you'll never have to face them again. They'll always find a way to invade your dreams, your memories, and your mind.
They'll terrify you, and when they do. You won't speak of the damage they've done to you. Instead the word Fire will simply become the only F word that if you can help it, you simply refuse to say.