--------The Darkness Stares Back.-------- -<•><•><•><•><•><•><•><•><•><•><•><•><•>-

The Abyss was a term used by your many coworkers at the Tignet-Lynx Corporation for a very strange anomaly - designation 5728-B. By all means, it was just a shadow. A huge, perfectly circular, never-ending shadow. If light is shone on it, the light is only visible until it makes contact with the Abyss.

There is no corporeal object that seems to be the cause of the shadow, which was the first reason it was identified and contained by the TLC. A shadow without a cause is certainly a unique, although seemingly passive, anomaly. None of the rival Corps had even tried to make a move on it.

The next defining feature of this anomaly was the effect it had upon living beings. Human test subjects reported feeling as though... as though it was looking at them, as they looked at it. Non-sentient beings, such as insects, avians, and small mammals, always have an overwhelming compulsion to get as far away from the Abyss, as fast as physically possible. An owl had attempted to bash its head through the bulletproof glass in order to escape. It received medical attention, but died of brain damage the following day.

-<•><•><•><•><•><•><•><•><•><•><•><•><•>-

Then, there were the things you never told anyone about. Not even the personal, company appointed therapist.

----------------ThE DrEamS----------------

Were a symptom you had been experiencing for some time. As Lead Researcher on the anomaly, you spent the most time observing it. You never liked handing off real work to your lackeys. They were better at filling paperwork. During your observations, you concluded that the nullifying effects of the observation room glass were rendered moot by whatever this thing was; every time you even took a fleeting glance into its endless depths, you found yourself feeling as though something was staring back.

You deduced it to nothing but paranoia. You began questioning your senses when it began appearing in your dreams. It would always come as a perfectly empty white space, the floor indiscernable from the sky or horizon except for the deep, dark, circle in front of you. In reality, its diameter was only about twenty feet. In your dreams, it could stretch for miles. Sometimes, you would be standing on the edge, the shadow only a nanometer from your feet. Other times, you would have had to walk a considerable distance to reach it.

Once again, you deduced it to nothing but paranoid and mad dreams, conjurations of an overworked and tired mind. You considered telling your therapist. On that day, a concerning irregularity occurred in your dream. Instead of a lifeless circle of shadow, it was a pit. A three-dimensional pit to a place you couldn't begin to fathom. Dark, light consuming tendrils rose to the surface. You were a good five feet away this time. They writhed in the air, disoriented for only moments before locking onto you. They moved with a predatory grace through the air, with no sign of their base or an end besides the shadowy pit.

They stopped about six inches short of your lower torso. You couldn't fathom why, but one of the thoughts going through your head was, How does it know the perfect distance for a handshake? It wasn't a brief thought, either - no, this one lingered as you stared at the strange new entity. Then, a new thought began, this one even more bewildering than the last. Now was not the time to make assumptions but you couldn't help but-

--------THE DARKNESS AWAITS.---------