Free The Crystal Bridge (The Lost Shards Book 1) by Charlie Pulsipher Page A

and then gravity no longer functioned properly. Aren felt the idea of down shift to her right and forward where the image continued to swallow up Kaden. She tumbled out of her desk and drifted for a few seconds before spiraling in toward the disfigured face of Kaden. She caught hold of his desk, clinging to the metal frame and plastic back, forced to look on with horror as Kaden’s ears bent and swirled away from her. She held on and glanced to where the image hovered, but the image had transformed into a dark hole that reached out to her, beckoning.
The hole shifted and swam as though sniffing her out. She slipped and spun as she clawed at the desk. The darkness touched her dangling feet and she watched them twist and fragment as they were pulled into oblivion. The entire lower half of her body followed her feet, stretching and spinning into thin threads of flesh and bone. She expected pain, but only felt a tingling sensation start in her toes and flow upward.
She gripped the desk tighter, but the remnants of Kaden and his desk bent and twisted beneath her hands. The desk became a mess of string that spiraled away from her. With her grip gone, the blackness took her.

Aren had expected death to feel different somehow. She felt no fear, but she also had no profound feeling of peace. She floated in a long dark tunnel, no sign of the light she’d been promised.
I don’t think I’m dead.
Movement. She sensed it, though she couldn’t feel or see any motion, and she felt certain she sped down a dark tunnel. The interior of the tunnel was devoid of light, but outside the tunnel stood an emptiness that put all darkness to shame. The clear walls of the tunnel held at bay a darkness that hurt Aren to dwell upon, more dangerous than the mere absence of light, and just a thin membrane to keep her safe from that hungry void.
Aren looked away, back to the interior of her tunnel, but her eyes felt strange. That’s because I don’t really have eyes any more . How do I know that? Part of her seemed intent on making sense of everything, her mind filling in the gaps. You only perceive your mental focus as sight .
She shifted her focus forward. Something unseen moved in front of her, pulling her along through the darkness. She could sense a presence there. It’s nice to not be alone.
She thought of the underwater tunnels at the aquarium. A shell of glass keeping the crushing water and the sharks at bay. She’d walked with awe and fear under the curved glass, marveling at the weight of water over her head. She’d run her hand along the cool, crystal barrier as the sharks and fish passed by on the other side.
Aren reached a hand out to feel the slippery glass walls of this tunnel but found her hand didn’t move. Your hand doesn’t exist here, silly Aren . She could feel her hand somewhere, but at a great distance, like the memory of a hand. She shifted her focus behind her, where she felt her body must be, but perceived only the length of the tunnel disappearing away behind her. She closed her eyes to think, but found that since she had no eyelids the darkness did not deepen, but remained the same unimaginable black it had always been.
Why am I not afraid? Aren knew that she’d normally be freaking out by now, but for some reason she felt rather calm. I have no body to worry about so there’s no reason to worry. Someone or something is taking me somewhere. I’ll just have to wait . She smiled to herself without the mouth to do so.

Kaden felt the same falling sensation he’d experienced the first time and with each subsequent trip, followed by the rush of the absolute darkness that had spawned nightmares later, but not everything felt the same. Something’s wrong .
He felt heavier, denser than his first trip. He thought about his hands, palms down on his desk in the world he left behind and could feel them still there, far away, but he also felt a presence behind him. He felt no concern over the wrongness of this trip. That’s