[ WP ] A teenage boy , a young man in his twenties , and an old man are sat in a room together . They are the same man at different ages , discussing life .

The house was silent and still in the dead of night. I crept past my parents' room and down the stairs, taking care to avoid those steps I knew were creaky. I did n't dare turn on the kitchen light, so by the palid light of the moon through the window, I searched through the cupboards until I found what I needed: A box of matches, a candle, and a sharp knife. I went to the cellar door and began to open it, as gently as I could. Even so, it made a loud creak, and for a moment I stood frozen, waiting to hear the sound of footsteps upstairs. But the house remained quiet, and the only sound was an owl hooting in the distance. 
 
 Not daring to open the door further, I squeezed through the opening, then turned, crossed my fingers and pulled the door shut. Mercifully, it made no noise. Now it was really dark, a pitch black that seemed to close in all around me. With fumbling fingers, I took a match and lit the candle, and by its weak flame, I descended the steps into the cellar. We did n't come down here much, and the room was mostly empty, with only a few boxes stacked along the far wall. The air was cold and damp. 
 
 I place the candle on the ground in the center of the room. It cast a flickering circle of orange light onto the dusty ground around it. From my pocket, I pulled a torn, yellowed page, on which was drawn a baroque diagram of lines and shapes. I placed the page flat onto the ground beside me and studied it for a minute. Then I pressed the blade of the knife onto the palm of my right hand and made a cut. I gasped at the pain and squeezed my hand into a fist. Blood quickly dripped down, and I directed it into a small pool, from which I traced lines with the fingers of my other hand. 
 
 It was more difficult than I expected to draw with blood, but eventually I had something that looked somewhat like the diagram on the page. I did n't know how precise it was supposed to be. Not for the first time, I wondered if I was losing my mind. Was I really expecting anything to happen? How I was going to explain all this if my parents discovered me? But it was too late to stop now. I sat cross-legged at the edge of the bloody sigil, and stared into the candleflame. 
 
 I do n't know how long I sat there. Maybe a minute, maybe an hour. As I stared, the flame seemed to grow larger, until it filled my vision, and I felt like I was inside it, looking out. At that point, I began to repeat the words I'd memorised. 
 
 `` Through the darkness of future past, the magician longs to see. One chants out between two worlds, fire, walk with me.'' 
 
 As I spoke, the air seemed to grow thick, and I felt like I was swimming in treacle. I kept repeating the words, but my voice no longer sounded like my own, and my actions felt guided from far away. I stopped speaking, and looked up from the flame into the darkness around me. 
 
 To my left, something emerged out of the blackness. Its shape was little more than a dark outline that twisted and distorted as I watched, but it had a face, and I recognised it as my own. The thing turned and looked at me. The face was older than mine, still young, but scarred and weatherworn. It had a strange symbol, a tattoo perhaps, down one side. 
 
 `` It... it worked.'' My voice seemed very quiet. `` Are you... are you me?'' 
 
 The being nodded slowly, then laughed. It was a strange, rasping sound, with no mirth. I had never laughed like that. This was n't what I had expected. 
 
 `` Do you....Is there anything I should know? Anything I should do?'' 
 
 `` No,'' the apparition said, `` It is too late, you have already done it. The way is open.'' 
 
 I shivered. `` Done what? What is... what is that symbol on your face?'' 
 
 `` It is protection, from... him. He needed a way in, into our world. Things are very different now. Magic is everywhere, overrunning everything. I have done my best to fight, to keep him out, but I know that in the end I must fail, and we will be his vessel.'' 
 
 `` How do you know?'' 
 
 `` Because... you saw it.'' 
 At that moment, the face twisted up, as if in pain, then faded into the darkness. 
 
 I looked down at the candle, its flame had dipped to almost nothing, but there was another light. The sigil was shining with a sickly glow. On my right, another dark shape loomed forward. From the depths of it, pale white hands emerged, with nails like talons, and reached up to draw back a black hood. Red eyes leered out from a grinning skull barely draped in flesh. Even so, I recognised the face. The thing that had once been me reached across and wrapped its pale fingers around my throat. Beneath me, the sigil was pulsing and warping as strange energy flowed through it. The monstrous red eyes bore down on me, and its face leaned in close to whisper in my ear. The voice was like dying screams. 
 
 `` Thank you,'' it said, and laughed.
