Panic set in. Elias grabbed his keys and ran for the door, but as he stepped into his apartment hallway, the overhead lights didn't hum with their usual warm yellow. They buzzed with a sharp, rhythmic pulse, turning a deep, sickly purple.
He looked down the long corridor toward the exit. The perspective seemed to stretch, the walls elongating like a pull-tab animation. At the far end, he saw a camera on a tripod, its lens pointed directly at him. dianc0536.jpg
Back in the apartment, the computer screen finally turned off. On the hard drive, a new file appeared in the folder: . Panic set in
As the second hand ticked forward, a blinding flash erupted from the camera at the end of the hall. For a split second, Elias felt himself being pulled through a straw—his atoms stretching into lines of code, his memories flattening into pixels. He looked down the long corridor toward the exit