Somewhere in the Rescue Division, two brothers stood among others, training and preparing for their next mission. One of the brothers had a name tag that read 'Ge', the other read 'Je'.
"Today's mission is simple, rescue citizens stuck in a building, and fight off any Amalgamate that dares to try and stop us. We've been assigned to the same mission together, so we have to work in tandem if we want to succeed. You understand that many lives are in your hands, right?" Yovan Shap, the leader of the Rescue Division said, and the two brothers nodded.
The slightly shorter Je whispered to Ge, "Don't worry, I've got your back bro! Just don't get too carried away and try to go into unnecessary fights."
"I know, I know, you don't need to worry about me!" Ge replied.
The mission was to save the inhabitants of a small town that was in the midst of being attacked by a group of Amalgamates, a group from the hunting division were assigned to fend off the Amalgamates while they did their rescue mission.
Ge's thoughts were filled with the determination to prove himself and to be better than his brother, while his brother only thought of how to support him.
Yovan Shap was standing beside the two brothers, and she said, "Alright, we'll be heading to Point C in the east and we will enter the town from the west exit, it'll be a 10-minute drive, so prepare yourselves." She then left and the two brothers were left to prepare for the mission.
"Hey, bro, is everything alright? You look nervous." Je said to Ge as the two of them walked outside to their car, Ge's thoughts were filled with the possibility of failure, and even death.
"I dunno bro... It's just that our first mission has to involve amalgamates and stuff... I thought the Rescue Division was more about saving civilians rather than killing monsters, kinda makes me think that the name doesn't suit the job." Ge responded.
"You're thinking about this all wrong bro, we're in the rescue division because our top priority is to rescue the civilians, the Hunting Division will probably be around to handle them!" Je said in an attempt to comfort him.
"I guess you're right." Though he said that, Ge was still unsure of his brother's words. To him, they were just words to calm him down, not real truths.
As the two of them got into their car, that was behind Yovan's car, they drove towards the small town, Je was determined to protect his brother at all costs, and Ge was just trying to rationalize his thoughts and feelings in a way that made him think of himself more positively. He didn't want to be the one to hold everyone back, but he knew that if he tried to do anything stupid, his brother would be the one to suffer.
As they drove, only silence filled the atmosphere, as if the air was filled with the sounds of their own doubts and worries. And as if the world reflected their own inner turmoil, it was filled with a deep blue haze, and the roads were filled with a thick fog.
The very world around them was a reflection of their minds, and it wasn't a pretty sight. Aside from the blue of the sky, the roads were lined with gray and black, and the trees were a deep shade of blue as if they were dying.
The two brothers were on their way to a town that was under siege by the Amalgamates, but as of now... They didn't know where they were.
"B-bro? I'm not sure if I'm going the right way..." Ge said as the town they were headed to was nowhere in sight.
"Maybe you just didn't use your turn signal, I can't really tell you where to go since I don't know either. Just... Keep going straight and maybe we'll get there." Je responded, a fleshy feeling of dread rising within him, as he knew that they were lost. The only thing that kept him going was the thought that they could still get there on time, maybe, or that this was a dream.
As the car drove onwards, the fog grew thicker, and the car's headlights were the only thing that illuminated their way. The roads were filled with the shadows of a dying world, and the town ahead seemed to only go farther and farther away.
"I'm not sure how much further we should go... This seems really weird, I'm not feeling good here, bro..." Je's words, however, didn't go farther than his own mouth. Ge's focus was solely on the road ahead of him, and the words simply couldn't travel to his ears, as if he had gone deaf.
Ge's thoughts were filled with the worry that they wouldn't get there, and filled with confusion about how the fog was only getting worse. He didn't want to be the one to let his brother be hurt or lost in the thick of it all. He was determined to keep him safe at all costs.
Je could only sit and watch as his brother became lost in the depths of his own thoughts... He was lost in his own thoughts, as well. But he knew that he couldn't let his brother be lost, he had to stay focused, he had to be there for him. They were brothers, after all.
And it was at that moment, when the fog was at its thickest, that the two brothers saw a figure standing in the middle of the road. A man, perhaps it was.
"Hey bro, look!" Je yelled, pointing towards the figure. "It's a person, maybe they can help!"
As the car slowed down to a stop, the figure turned and faced the car. Maybe they did.
"What is this person doing here in the middle of the street and fog? Are they insane?" Ge said, and the figure approached the car.
"Hello there, are you lost? You shouldn't really be out here, man. It's not safe! Amalgamates are in a town nearby and you probably should be at home right now!" Je said, but the figure only laughed.
Then... The fog disappeared, and it was as if they were in a completely different world, surrounded only by the dark sky of space and countless stars in the distance, the two were left in a void of confusion. But the figure was still there, and it seemed to have grown larger, much, much larger.
Despite the lights shining down on them, the figure remained all black, with horns horizontally sticking out of its dome, and a large grin on its face. "Greetings, you two, I hope I didn't interrupt anything special. But I've come here to teach you a lesson, a lesson that you both need to learn."
"W-what?! Who are you?! Bring us back! Bring us back right now! Where's the town?!" Je yelled, as the car was now floating in the void, and the figure was floating with it.
"Bro... I don't think we're in any position to make any demands... We're not even in the same world anymore!" Ge yelled, but the figure laughed at both of them.
"Hush, children, hush. You see, for one... I am who you'd call God. But for another, I'm here to give you a taste of what it means to lose a loved one, a loved brother, a brother whom you would give up all to save... I'm simply... Giving you a taste of the real thing."
The two brothers looked at each other with fear in their eyes. They knew they were in a place where they had no power.
One of them thought, 'Am I dreaming? Yeah, this is all just a terrible nightmare.'
The other thought, 'Why me? I'm too young to die. My whole life has been wasted on a lie...'
The two brothers then began to shake uncontrollably as the figure's mouth opened to reveal rows and rows of teeth. And from that mouth came a long tongue with the body of a worm. The brothers' eyes were filled with horror and fear, but nothing happened.
"Hahaha! Do not worry... You're not the main dish. I don't plan to cannibalize you. But that's besides the point. Now... I have just one statement for the both of you, a statement that will change the course of your life forever. And the statement is: There is no truth to your world. There is no reason to live or die. The world is simply a construct created by me among other deities, and you are simply a pawn to my own amusement... However, in these days that I've observed you, you proved to show a potential of being... Too useful, as tools that could potentially become a threat against me. So I've made it my duty to end that potential here and now. And I will make it a grand spectacle, you will die here in this place that I've created, and no one will remember you, no one will miss you. No one will ever know you existed." The figure laughed.
"W-What are you talking about?! Let us go! We were both religious! If you are really god, why would you do this?!" Je exclaimed.
"Oh... but you see, I never claimed to be god... Did I?" The figure replied, and before they put a finger to their mouth and looked upwards, pretending to be thinking, "Well, no matter. I was never really a god, just a bored being that had the ability to create a world. Can't really complain though, it was quite fun seeing you two bicker and squabble and whatnot, but soon enough... I'll have to end it all."
"W-What? This is all a joke! We're in a simulation or a dream or something! There's no way any of this is real!" Je yelled, but his brother didn't believe him.
"B-bro... This isn't a joke... God really is here, and we're about to die..." Ge responded, his eyes filled with tears.
"Haha! It seems that you've already realized it... You've already figured out the truth, haven't you? What does it fill you with, smarter brother? Despair? Sadness? Regret? ...Or perhaps a small sense of relief?" The figure questioned.
"No! This is just some sick prank!" Je simply didn't believe it. He didn't want to, he couldn't.
"I... I feel okay. If knowing this means I'm going to be able to die in peace... If you could even call this peace... Then I feel fine. Just do what you want and let me die." Ge said, a feeling of emptiness in his heart, and the figure chuckled, and the figure laughed, and the figure cackled, and the figure shrieked in a deafening voice, a sound so loud, so terrible that the void they were floating in seemed to crack.
"Then I'll send you both straight to it." With a wave of his hand a large gash formed in the infinite void that they were in, a gash that showed an abyss of nothing but blue and white. "You can say your goodbyes, now, I'll be leaving. It's been nice meeting you!" A sarcastic and malicious tone came out of his mouth.
"No, no, no! I can't die now! I haven't lived at all!" Je screamed as his brother held on to him, tears flowing from his face, as the void began to crack more, and the abyss opened wider and eventually engulfed them both.
As Je tried to scream, his voice faltered and was muted, and the abyss grew closer, the world around him began to spin as he felt a rush of vertigo, and the void was now all the world that they knew.
All they could see was...
A lattice of broken geometries stretched across the void, each line a scar carved into the skin of time. Black suns bled their shadows like infected wounds, grinding against the bones of forgotten hours. Beneath their weight, half-formed flesh slumped in silence, pinned to the diagram like a specimen dissected for a god that never arrives. The air wept in blackness, and the silence screamed in circles, a thousand mouths repeating their hunger in an endless prayer to entropy.
A lion. A wolf. A sheep. A bear. A bird.
They all walked as gears in the cogs of time.
Amalgamates all around. They're in his head, the man in front of her, his face is a deadpan expression. But the amalgamates are also around him. There is no difference between him, and them. They are him, he is them.
The world is filled with a color, perhaps. Maybe it's blue, as the sky in front of them unfolded in the shape of a sphere. It was as if they were in a perfect circle, or at least that's how they thought. Their thoughts alone ran on randomness, a randomization that is not natural, that is not organic, that is not human, that is not real. But is it real?
"You are real." A man in a blue coat said to them.
"To whom may it be?" They responded.
"The sky." He only tipped his fedora as a gesture and left them.
A woman in red robes with long blonde hair appeared in front of them, her face was filled with sadness, and the amalgamates were gone. "You can't go back, can you?"
They didn't answer, as if their tongue was ripped from their throat and their throat removed from their body and their body removed from their mind.
"Guess not. But hey... At least we see the truth now. There's only two of us here... And I know I'll never leave here." Ge said, and the world began to melt. As the ground became a liquid, as the air became water. "I've always been the bad brother... But it's okay. I can live with that..." Ge then began to slowly sink into the ground.
"No, you've been the best brother I've known. I'll never forget you." Je replied.
"Thanks." Ge said, before the liquid ground swallowed him completely.
Je stood there alone, seeing as floating faces draped in black cloth surrounded him, they began to speak to him. But it was only for a moment before the world around him turned to blue and white again.
It was just him. In the void, in a chaos of nothingness. It was him and his thoughts, and he was lost in them, he didn't want to leave, but he didn't want to stay either.
It was a paradox of the self, a contradiction of the soul, a contradiction that was never meant to be in the world.
To have your soul separated from the physical world was to have your very being torn in two. To have your spirit torn from the world was to have your soul ripped from your body and placed elsewhere.
But, he realized, he had no soul. His mind was a blank slate, his body an empty shell.
The abyss in front of him reflected that, and in his realization... His body turned into a pile of meat, raw meat.
He could feel it all, he could feel the cold of being inside the fridge. It was cold and wet. It was cold and moist. His skin was still on him, but eventually they'd skin him too.
Je's thoughts were in his head as his mind slowly deteriorated, turning into a pile of meat and bones, a corpse that would soon become an Amalgamate.
Then, a voice was heard in his mind, it said, "I suffer in the praise of God", perhaps it did.
The voice continued, saying, "In your suffering, I suffer. Your suffering is mine. You will become my vessel. My vessel for my wrath." and then Je felt his consciousness fade.
And it was at this moment that his pile of meat and bones became one with the Blue Void, his consciousness faded into a void of no existence. A void that would be his new home, and the new home of all those that were lost in the memories of others.