Writing Prompt / Story Starter 24

Panic.

It drew the walls in close. It brought the ceiling down within an inch of his scalp. There was brick dust under his fingernails, amassing, it seemed, by the second.

He could taste the damp of the wooden stairs, as if thousands of spores of mould were settling on his tongue, fungi taking root in his taste buds.

He had to close his eyes against the darkness to fend off the notion that it wasn't merely an absence of light but a living black fluid, seeping into his eyeballs, pulsing up his optic nerves toward the centres of his brain.

He couldn't stand it.