Rogers Wild Ride

Roger Stevenson—RS to his tight-knit crew of nerds—had always been the kind of guy who lived more in his head than in the real world. Boulder High loomed on the horizon of his small Colorado town, a squat brick building surrounded by pine trees and the ever-present shadow of the Flatirons. Summer break was fading fast, the late August air thick with the scent of sun-baked grass and the distant promise of crisp fall days. In just a few days, he’d be back in the hallways, navigating the chaos of senior year with his little band of misfits: Jamie, the trivia-obsessed history buff; Priya, the coding prodigy with a sarcastic streak; and Tim, the gangly artist who always smelled faintly of charcoal and paint. They were his people, the ones who got him through the monotony of high school with late-night D&D sessions and heated debates about comic book lore.

But that night, as the clock ticked past 2 a.m., RS wasn’t thinking about his friends or the looming first day of school. He was lost in a dream so vivid it felt like he’d slipped into another dimension. The dark church rose around him, its stone walls slick with dampness, the air heavy with the smell of mildew and something sharper—sulfur, maybe. Stained glass windows loomed high above, but the light filtering through them was wrong, casting jagged shadows that seemed to writhe across the pews. His sneakers scuffed against the uneven floor as he wandered deeper, drawn toward a faint red glow pulsing at the far end of the nave.

There it was: a pentagram etched into the stone, its lines glowing like molten lava, the heat shimmering upward in waves. RS’s heart thudded in his chest, a mix of fear and exhilaration he couldn’t explain. He’d read about stuff like this in the occult books he’d borrowed from the library—hidden under his bed so his mom wouldn’t ask questions—but this felt real. Too real. Without thinking, he stepped into the center, the warmth of the symbol seeping through his soles. The words tumbled out of him, bold and unscripted: “Satan, hear my plea, give me power, to live happily.” His voice echoed off the walls, reverberating back to him in a way that made his skin prickle.

The air shifted instantly, like the pressure dropping before a storm. Shadows thickened, pooling in the corners of the church until they coalesced into something tangible—a presence. A voice rumbled through the space, deep and guttural, like stones grinding together. “I hear you, my child. Give me your soul, and reality will be as you please.” The words hung there, heavy and final. RS’s stomach lurched, but he didn’t hesitate. “Yes,” he said, his voice cracking only slightly. “Take it.”

The moment he agreed, the world tilted. The church spun around him, the pentagram flaring brighter until it swallowed his vision in crimson. Nausea hit him like a freight train, bile rising in his throat as the shadows rushed in, wrapping around him like tendrils. He thought he might puke—or pass out—or both. And then—

He jolted awake, gasping, his t-shirt soaked with sweat. His room was dark, the familiar outline of his cluttered desk and the glow of his alarm clock grounding him. 2:37 a.m. The dream clung to him like damp fog, the memory of that voice echoing in his skull. He stumbled to the bathroom, splashing cold water on his face, staring at his reflection in the cracked mirror. His hazel eyes looked wild, his freckled cheeks pale. “Just a dream,” he muttered, but his hands were still trembling.

When he climbed back into bed, the air felt different—like someone had left a window open, though they were all shut tight. He didn’t notice the faint red glow under his bed, pulsing faintly, or the way the shadows in the corner seemed to linger a little too long.

RS flopped back onto his sweat-damp sheets, his breath still uneven as he tried to shake off the dream. “It was only a dream, right?” he muttered to himself, running a shaky hand through his messy brown hair. “A really, vivid, dream... yeah. Maybe? Fuck.” The word slipped out, a quiet curse against the unease gnawing at him. He squeezed his eyes shut, willing his heartbeat to slow, but the image of that glowing pentagram wouldn’t leave him. It was like it had burned itself into the backs of his eyelids, a stubborn afterimage that refused to fade.

Outside, the night was still—too still. The usual hum of crickets and rustle of pine branches against his window had gone silent, leaving an eerie void. RS didn’t notice at first, too caught up in his own head. He rolled onto his side, tugging the blanket up to his chin like a kid scared of the dark. He hadn’t done that since he was ten, back when he’d binge-watched horror movies with Jamie and spent the next week jumping at every shadow. This felt different, though. This wasn’t just his imagination running wild. It was... heavier.

He tried to distract himself, thinking about the first day of senior year. Priya had been texting the group chat earlier about some new coding project she wanted them to test—something about a glitchy AI she’d nicknamed “Ghost.” Tim had promised to bring his latest sketchbook, full of creepy monster designs inspired by their last D&D campaign. Jamie would probably corner him at lunch with some obscure fact about medieval **** devices. Normal stuff. Safe stuff. RS clung to those thoughts, forcing a shaky laugh. “See? Just a dream. I’m fine.”

But then it happened. As he lay there, staring at the ceiling, a voice slithered into his mind—not through his ears, but directly into his thoughts, oily and deep. “Make a wish, and you’ll see, reality is, as you want it to be.” The words dripped with a strange cadence, like a nursery rhyme twisted into something sinister. A violent shiver shot down his spine, electric and cold, and every hair on his body stood on end. His breath caught, his hands gripping the blanket so tight his knuckles turned white. The voice wasn’t his. It wasn’t a memory from the dream. It was here, inside him, undeniable.

Under his bed, the faint red glow that had pulsed unnoticed flickered once, twice, then faded away completely, sinking into the darkness like it had never been there. RS didn’t see it—he was too busy staring wide-eyed into the shadows of his room, his chest heaving. The air felt charged now, like the moment before lightning strikes. He didn’t know what he’d done, didn’t understand what was happening, but one thing was clear: whatever he’d agreed to in that dream wasn’t finished with him yet.