It’s the middle of the night. I’m sat upright in my bed. My eyes are still itchy from sleep, and my ears are still ringing from the loud thud that pulled me out of the deep sleep.
What was that?
I can feel my heart pounding in my chest, and I’m breathing as if I’ve just run a marathon.
I can’t see anything. The night lights are not on, and there are no street lights near here, so the room is completely dark. I can’t even make out the shapes of the furniture.
I pat the bed and the floor near my feet, trying to find my phone and use its screen light to help me get to the door — my feet feel like lead, though. I’m not sure if I want to check what that noise was…
Just as I felt the cold surface of my phone…
FLASH
Bright light blinded my still-sleepy eyes for a brief second and made it look like daylight. It could be the floodlight, but it usually stays on much longer than that!
What is happen—
Thud-ud
Wow!
I instinctively duck and hide my head in my hands.
This is by far the loudest thing I have ever heard.
It sounds as if someone was shooting from one of those historic cannons! — which is very plausible too, actually, since the fort not far from here has one of those and they do use it on occasion… The timing feels odd nonetheless.
So, what was that?
With a pounding heart, I take a deep breath, and I come out of the room…
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