I am working in a facility that studies supernatural phenomena. We have many doors to other pces here and I am stationed in a wing with an even higher number of doors than normal.

  Our unit’s security officer has always been a short-tempered man prone to power trips, so we don’t see the warning signs of mental influence until the violence breaks out. I grab the creature I’ve been studying and flee through the nearest door.

  The creature is most easily described as a dark gray cat (almost more of a kitten, really) with short curly hair around its head and neck, a pair of short stubby horns that we expect to grow longer and sharper with age, and a gem-like third eye on its forehead. I’ve named him Gaven (rhymes with ‘haven’) and have been treating him more like a pet than is proper protocol.

  The doorway drops us onto a cloud that can be walked on. There are many other such clouds floating in the sky. There is no ground below. The door closes behind us and I can’t open it from this side.

  Nothing left to do but sit and wait for rescue.

  There are peacock tail feathers scattered about the cloud. To pass the time I pick up one of the feathers and begin using it as a cat toy to py with Gaven. For a time my worries are forgotten in a flood of simple joy, whimsy, and nostalgia.

  And then our py gets too close to the edge of the cloud and Gaven tumbles over into the bottomless sky.

  I scramble to catch him and just barely get a grip on a single paw. Somehow that’s enough to pull him back up and I roll over onto my back, holding him to me to calm him down even as his cws fil in fear and pain.

  As I y there with a silently shivering and traumatized not-cat on my chest, I begin to cry.