The Nightmare Bell

In my last few seconds of falling asleep, the final thing that my senses register is the distant sound of a lone church bell striking out its melancholy tone. My wearied brain briefly entertains the mental image of a large bell, dark with rust, swinging to reveal a pointed clapper striking hard against its interior. However, I am asleep before the mental image can have much of an impression on me, and it falls away, like the light being blacked out of a room by the window blind. The curious World of the Dream claims me instead.

I'm lying on a hard, dusty floor. It seems to be the only definite thing that I can feel and touch, for I can't get up from my supine position. The floor has me in a deadly embrace, a dusty grasp, and I'm completely stuck. I can only move my eyes around and stare at my surroundings in horror.

Outside the glass-less windows, the sky is dark. The never-ceasing blackness is not even relieved by the cold stare of the mysterious moon. The ceiling is high and appears to be supported by dark stone beams forming an octagon between the glass-less windows, and I realise I'm inside a cold, dark bell tower. The thought enters my mind like a cold, clammy, deathly-white hand stroking the flesh of my face unpleasantly. I try to swallow, but my throat is too tight and a wet trail of saliva dribbles down my immobile chin.

Movement catches my eye directly above me. It is so dark I hadn't noticed it before, but my poor vision finally manages to register a large, dark, gruff-looking bell high above me swinging backwards and forwards on a network of beams and flywheels. As I continue to look up at it, small details are taken in by my overcharged brain. I notice its dark colour, its large size, a tiny inscription on its exterior and the long, heavy, pointed clapper. The recognition of the clapper sends a shock of panic vibrating through me. I recognise each little distinct feature of the bell as the same one that briefly entered across the blank canvas of my brain before I went to sleep. It has now resurfaced in my unconsciousness.

It is only now that I realise there is something not quite right. The bell is swinging violently and the clapper is crashing inside the dark interior, but I can't hear anything. It's as though my ears have been deliberately blocked with wax or water. The fact that such a large bell can move so vigourously and make no sound at all inspires further fear, although I'm already saturated with the emotion, to say nothing of cold sweat.

Suddenly, the mechanisms halt and the bell is stationery. I can see right into the interior of the bell now, it's much blacker on the inside and a constellation of pock-marks are scattered close to the rim where the clapper has struck it. This clapper is suspended in the perfect centre of the mouth of the bell like a slender inverted spire.

I still can't move, but I dither.

Then, without any indication beforehand, the mechanism supporting the bell breaks and the thing plunges toward me, sharp clapper and all! I'm still paralysed and in no way can I avoid the bell. I'll be trapped underneath it and pinned to the floor by the clapper!

For a few agonising seconds, clapper level with my heart, the bell hovers over me, ready to swallow me like a hungry beast. However, it never does catch its human prey, for a small but distinct beacon of consciousness ejects me from the torture chamber of the bell tower to the hard, uncomfortable chair on which I fell asleep in my student kitchen.

Outside the window, morning light creeps reluctantly in, like a half-awake student who knows that they cannot lie in bed any longer. The morning church bells clang sonorously, clear and loud in the cold air, reverbarating loudly in the ears of every citizen like a hysterical screamer.

The cold breath of rusted brass still plays over my tender flesh. I shiver.