~Aloneee, at the edgeee of a universe, humming a tune~
Steve had been driving for almost two hours, and the storm was getting worse.
Rain pounded the windshield like someone trying to break in. The mountain road was all blind corners and dramatic turns, the kind of road that looked like it hated drivers with passion.
His wipers squeaked. His head felt heavy. The car felt heavier.
A certain song played from the speakers, soft and dreamy, not matching the mess both outside the car and inside his head.
The check-engine light blinked like it was roasting him.
Yeah, he got it. Life was falling apart. Join the club.
Steve rolled his shoulders. He was tired-the kind of tired that had nothing to do with sleep but rather with existing.
His wrists sat on the steering wheel, scars faint but visible whenever lightning lit up the interior. Evidence of past battles he lost, or won, depending on how you looked at it.
He wasn't planning anything tonight.
He just wanted to go home.
Sleep.
Forget the world for a while.
Then his phone buzzed.
Stephanie.
Perfect.
.....
.....
.....
Steve turned the phone off mid message.
Didn't even bother sighing anymore. He was too burnt out for dramatic reactions.
The tunnel vision exhaustion got heavier. His eyes drooped. The music began to sound as if it was underwater. The road blurred at the edges.
Another crack of thunder.
Another flash.
His mind slid back to all the moments he'd almost let go, the near attempts, the failed ones, the quiet nights staring at ceilings and thinking "maybe tomorrow."
The tires skidded slightly, snapping him back.
"Focus." he muttered. But his body didn't listen anymore.
Then he saw it.
A tight right turn that appeared out of nowhere.
"…Oh."
Then, "Well. Damn."
He tried turning, but the wheels didn't catch.
The car slid like a hockey puck.
The guardrail came rushing up at him.
"Maybe this is it.", he thought.
"Maybe I stop messing even this up."
~We'll go together in flight~
The car tore through the guardrail, metal screeching, sparks flying, and launched into open air.
Silence for half a second.
Then chaos.
A tree smashed the front. The airbag slammed his face. Glass exploded inward. glittering pain cutting across his cheek and chest. His ribs crunched, his shoulder stabbed with a hot sharp burst. His skull rang like a struck bell.
The world spun.
Color smeared.
His breath caught.
Black swallowed everything.
------
Warmth.
That was the first thing he noticed.
Not pain.
Not cold metal.
Just… warmth.
He opened his eyes slowly.
His cheek was pressed against a soft carpet. red, clean, plush.
Not a speck of glass anywhere. No wreckage. No trees. No rain.
A hotel lobby stretched around him, all golden lights, polished floors, and expensive energy. Like the kind of place where influencers pretend to stay.
"…What the hell?" he whispered.
He pushed himself up. Checked his arms, his ribs, his legs, everything moved fine. No blood. No pain. His clothes looked brand new.
"But I died." he stated quietly. More confused than scared.
A bell dinged somewhere in the distance. Then a speaker crackled:
"Steve Brandon, please come to the front desk."
He looked around. No people. No receptionist. Just him and way too much fancy interior design.
"…Sure. Guess I'm doing this."
There was only one sheet of paper at the front desk.
No instructions, no logo, no letterhead.
Just two words in bold red:
[-SIGN HERE-]
That was it.
Steve stared at it long enough to consider whether this was a prank, a cult, or a really weird job.
"Yeah, whatever." he said, picking up the pen. "If this kills me again, I can't complain."
He signed.
The paper burst into flames instantly. silent, fast, clean. When he blinked, a notebook was sitting where the paper had been.
"Yeah no this is totally fine."
He opened it.
Most of the pages were just scribbles. Wild, messy loops and symbols he had never seen. But mixed between those a few actual words appeared:
"10 floors."
"Get to the top."
"A wish."
He stared at the chaos on the page.
"…Okay. Nope. I'm done."
He set the notebook down.
Another speaker somewhere above him went ding.
"Steve Brandon. Please board the elevator."
He turned.
An elevator was now present in the lobby.
The elevator was spotless. shiningly polished metal, clean buttons, soft, warm lighting.
For a split-second, the surface glitched. everything flickered into rust and dents and grime… then snapped back to perfect.
"…Love that. Very comforting." he muttered.
Still, he walked in. What else was he supposed to do?
A sign above the doors read:
Going Up [-1]
The elevator was playing a peaceful melody, sounding calm, almost too calm, trying to make him feel better but really not succeeding.
Steve leaned against the wall, staring at nothing.
"How am I alive? Where am I? What even is this? Hell? I don't think I was that bad maybe purgatory but even if-
The elevator dinged. The doors slid open.
In front of him lay a huge abandoned supermarket. Broken aisles, rust on the walls, moss crawling through fissures in the concrete as if it owned the place.
The air was thick and damp, with the stench of rot lingering. He stepped one foot out.
"Hmm… seems safe enough."
Then he hopped out fully, trying to pretend he wasn't even mildly terrified.
He instinctively turned back to check the elevator- And froze.
The elevator was now fully rusted, decayed, and looked as though it was taken straight from a museum, like it had been abandoned for decades.
"…Great. Absolutely amazing." he muttered.
Steve stepped forward, his shoes crunching on broken glass as he moved through what looked like an abandoned mall on life support.
It had that vibe of a place that had died, been buried, and then somehow dug itself back up just to haunt people out of spite.
The air felt stale. Dry.
A few lights flickered overhead in sad little spasms.
Not enough to light the place properly, just enough to annoy him.
"Great." he muttered. "Love the horror aesthetic. Very… on brand so far."
Nothing too suspicious, ...yet..
He passed an old sign dangling sideways from the ceiling that once read
FOOD COURT
Though half the letters were missing, so now it just said
FO C T
Which honestly sounded like the mall trying to insult him.
A jewelry store sat to his left. Well, what used to be one. The display cases were smashed open, glass scattered like glitter from a party.
A few sparkly things twinkled on the floor, catching the flickering light.
"I mean, it wouldn't hurt anyone, right?"
Steve said, picking up a gold ring with a ridiculous gemstone. Big, bright, way too fancy for whatever this new afterlife nightmare economy was.
He slid it into his pocket and continued on with his business.
If this place had police, he doubted they'd be mad.
Probably too busy being dead and all.
He continued forward. The ceiling above him sagged in places, whole chunks having collapsed and blocked several corridors.
Vines snaked down from the cracks like opportunistic home decor, while patches of grass poked through shattered tiles.
"Is this mall OSHA compliant?" Steve asked the air.
The air did not respond.
"Good to know, Mr air."
Near a half-destroyed bench, he spotted a box shoved underneath a torn advertisement for something called Boreal Cola "Taste the Arctic!".
The box was old, water-damaged, but intact enough to open.
"Bingo." he said, kneeling.
Inside was a stack of books, each more cursed than the last.
How to Open a Darker Fountain.
How to *Not* Train Your Dragon.
The Art of Mining and crafting.
How to Become the Ultimate Coper.
"…Okay, that one is definitely targeted."
He dug deeper until he found a small cartridge wedged between the covers.
A faded label read:
Quarter and a Half Life 3
He stared at it.
Laughed.
Threw it over his shoulder.
"Nothing actually important. Cool cool cool."
Then something else caught his eye.
A small, leather-bound diary buried at the bottom. It was plain, no title, no decoration, just a simple, worn book.
He opened it.
Every page was blank.
"Huh… well, guess I've got something to write in. Could be good for keeping track of… whatever this is."
He pocketed it and moved toward the general store section.
Something shifted at the edge of his vision. Just a blur, a twitch of shadow. But he forced himself to keep walking.
"It's not a problem. No way josé. I'm perfectly safe." he lied to himself like a champ.
He slipped into the supermarket part of the mall.
Filthy shelves towered over him. Aisles stretched too long, like they were looping, refusing to end.
Dusty, unreadable labels lay scattered across the floor like old confetti.
There was an old poster near the entrance with a smiling mascot holding a can of beans.
Its smile was too wide.
Too many teeth.
"ooh, creepy mascot character, wonder how many franchises have done that in horror."
Then he heard it.
A slow, low hum.
Vibrating through the air.
Sinking into his skin.
Then it stopped suddenly.
The silence that followed felt heavier.
"Okay, fuck this." he whispered, slowing his steps, planting each foot down carefully.
Every small crunch of debris sounded like a gunshot.
He moved toward the faint outline of an exit sign flickering in the distance. Tiptoeing very carefully.
He turned a corne-
And froze.
The smell hit him first. Rotting meat, sour breath, weeks-old death simmering in a humid container.
Then he saw it.
A tall, quivering mass of flesh.
Not shaped like anything recognizable.
Not shaped like anything meant to be alive.
The skin pulsed, like a heart with no ribs to hide behind.
It swayed slowly left… then right… each movement producing a wet, sticky, sucking sound.
Steve's stomach flipped.
The thing paused.
Then spoke.
"St... Ste.eeeve…?"
Its voice was dozens layered on top of each other, overlapping, glitching, trying to form a single coherent tone but failing.
"Steeeve… where...ar.. are youu?"
Its surface twitched. A fold of flesh peeled back, revealing something that might've once been a mouth.
"Steve It's me. Stephanie. I need you."
Hell.
Fucking.
No.
First of all, Stephanie would rather set herself on fire than ask him for anything without first cursing him to eternal damnation.
Second, she legitimately never remembered his name. She once called him "Spencer" for three weeks.
Also: there was no universe where Stephanie sounded like a chorus of drowned souls.
The creature turned slightly in his direction, its whole body yawning open like something inside it was trying to escape.
Steve didn't wait.
He spun around so fast his joints cracked and absolutely BOOKED IT.
Something massive shifted behind him.
A heavy drag.
A wet slam.
The creature was moving.
"Nope, nope, nope, not happening, not today," he gasped, sprinting past three aisles, jumping debris, nearly slipping on a moldy display rug.
He didn't dare look back.
He ran until his lungs closed up and his legs started writing apology letters.
Finally, he stumbled into what used to be a clothing section, now collapsed onto a pile of rubble.
Broken mannequins, concrete chunks, dust-coated hangers.
He ran inside and hid behind a half naked mannequin.
He sucked in a sharp breath and held it, waiting, listening.
Silence.
No dragging.
No wet breathing.
No Stephanie-hivemind-thing.
His pulse hammered in his ears.
Then,
A voice.
A clear one.
Human.
Small.
Terrified.
"Are you… are you a real person?"
Steve jerked his head towards the sound so fast he almost snapped something.
The voice came again, trembling:
"You're not one of those… things… right?"
**End**