Penumbras

 I stand over a restless sheet of the dark water. Every single limb of my body trembles, whipped mercilessly by the wind and terrified by what is going to happen in a moment. I do not want to die, but my hands are bound and I cannot find another way to defend myself. An inner hysteria grows within me with every step of incoming villains, ready to burst out at any time. However, a petrification caused by a vision of death in torment preserves the explosion quite effectively. A convincing voice sounds somewhere inside my head: You don't have to die. You can choose suffer and life. Even pain and humiliation is better than non-existence, isn't