Tuesday night had nothing particularly special about it, except that beer sales had been unusually high for a Tuesday.
Our protagonist was sitting on the counter of his grocery store, his small and orderly personal kingdom. It wasn't just a simple corner shop; it was a spacious, well-stocked place, with aisles packed full of supplies and a back room that had been set up comfortably enough for him to live in. He liked his space, he liked being his own boss, and above all, he loved the peace of not being harassed by orders from others while earning his own money.
He was finishing off a nice cold can when, through the large front window, he noticed the sky beginning to put on a free show.
A meteor shower had started. But not the kind where you see one every ten seconds once every ten years or so. This was a constant torrent of silver and blue lights streaking across the sky, leaving trails that lingered before fading away. It looked like a neon waterfall pouring down over the city.
Outside, the reaction was exactly what you'd expect: people stopped on the sidewalks. Drivers rolled down their windows and leaned halfway out to look. Some sat on the hoods of their cars, while others simply streamed it live on their social media. It felt like a festival, a shared moment of awe.
"God's really spending big tonight," he muttered, taking a sip of his drink.
"Tomorrow they'll probably say this is a sign of the end of the world, or some once-in-a-millennium event, like they were alive a thousand years ago." He shook his head and cracked open another beer.
The meteor shower lasted for more than an hour. He stayed there, watching the sky flicker hypnotically, until sleepiness crept in. Outside, an odd silence settled despite the massive crowd filling the streets, everyone staring upward in quiet appreciation of the unexpected spectacle.
He closed the store, pulled down the security shutter out of habit, and went to sleep in his room at the back. After all, what did it matter if the sky shone a little brighter than usual? His mattress would feel just as comfortable either way.
The next morning, the world kept turning, though the atmosphere in the news was pure confusion. Scientists had no idea what had happened, and the usual theories were already spreading across the internet. He listened to the TV playing softly in the background as he stretched, but his store was intact and the sun shone like any other Wednesday.
He headed to the bathroom for his morning shower. He turned on the hot water, closed his eyes, and stepped under the stream, completely ignoring the conspiracy chatter from the radio.
He reached out toward the wall shelf to grab his shampoo bottle. His fingers grasped nothing but air.
He blinked, wiped the water from his face, and looked at the shelf. Nothing. He looked at the floor. Nothing there either. The bottle had simply vanished.
He stood still under the water, crossed his arms, and huffed, genuinely puzzled.
"Alright, universe," he said out loud. "I get the light show last night, I'll give you that. It was nice. But stealing my shampoo while I'm showering? That's just poor manners."
And then… he felt it.
It wasn't some mystical revelation or a sharp headache. It was simply a pull, a strange instinct, like suddenly discovering a new muscle and flexing it by accident. It was the unmistakable sensation of having a vast, empty, invisible space somehow tucked inside his mind.
He closed his eyes. In his mind, he sensed that pristine emptiness, like a personal, bottomless storage room. And floating there, in the middle of nothingness, was his blue shampoo bottle.
He knew it was there. He could even feel the weight of the liquid inside.
He slowly opened his eyes. A wide, mischievous grin spread across his face.
"Well, what's this? The world's biggest pockets or something?" he muttered, clicking his tongue.
Just by instinct, he wished it back. He wished for the bottle to be in his hand.
Poof!
The heavy, wet bottle appeared out of nowhere and landed in his palm. Cold water dripped between his fingers. A clear laugh burst out of him, echoing through the bathroom.
He jumped out of the shower, got dressed quickly in comfortable clothes, and stepped into the store with renewed energy. He had a new toy, and he wanted to see what it could do.
He walked down the main aisle and stopped in front of the massive three-door commercial refrigerator, the one packed with energy drinks. It was a bulky beast of glass and metal.
"Come here, beautiful," he said, rubbing his hands together.
He focused on it and simply willed it into that invisible space. He felt a slight pull, and in the blink of an eye, the entire fridge vanished. The aisle was left with a large, ugly gap. He checked his mental space, and there it was, the fridge floating inside, all the cans still in place.
"Magnificent," he exclaimed. "Alright, come back out."
But instead of imagining it on the ground, he got distracted and pictured it appearing right in front of him, slightly above his head. The fridge materialized in midair. Gravity took care of the rest.
CRASH!
The thing slammed down. The noise was brutal. Glass shattered into a thousand pieces, and dozens of cans went flying, rolling down the aisles and bursting into fountains of sugary foam. He simply slipped his hands into his pockets, looked at the absolute disaster in his own aisle, and let out a whistle.
"Yikes. That falls hard," he said with a grin. "So many possibilities with this ability. I've basically just acquired every drug lord's dream power, especially the ones dealing with… well, drugs."
Alexander couldn't help but laugh out loud. If drug cartels knew about his ability, there was no way they'd stay calm and not try to find him to work for them. The government wouldn't even bother asking nicely either.
He spent a while sweeping up the glass and crushed cans. While cleaning, he prepared some tea for an experiment, stored it in his mental space, and continued sweeping. Almost an hour later, when he finished, he brought the cup back onto the counter. Steam was still rising vigorously. He took a sip and burned his tongue.
"Still boiling," he said, eyes shining. "So this space keeps things in some kind of stasis… I really did stumble upon one of the world's greatest treasures without even trying."
He was about to try storing an entire shelf of chips in one go when he felt something strange. A current.
He searched for it for a while, mainly paying attention to the streets, but the sensation grew stronger as he approached the store's back storage room. It was a warm feeling, one that felt somehow connected to him.
He walked to the back and opened the storage door. The boxes were in place, but the far wall… was simply gone. In its place was a massive opening. An invisible rift that let in a wave of suffocating, humid heat that clashed with the store's air conditioning.
And from the ground of that rift, creeping toward his feet, a strange Black Mist began to seep through. It smelled of wet earth, wild vegetation, and something metallic. The feeling was unsettling, like a mad scientist had experimented with every radioactive thing in existence and it had blown up in his face.
He stood still in front of the rift, arms crossed, staring into the darkness and the mist.
"A portal in my storage room. Of course. Why not," he sighed, shaking his head with a smile.
At this point, a normal person would probably stare for a few minutes out of curiosity, then close the storage room for the rest of their life, sell the place, and move to another city. But could you really judge someone as normal if they thought about making square bread so we wouldn't notice there's another world beyond the Arctic?
"Well, if I'm going to take a look, I won't go empty-handed."
He turned toward the aisles of his store. Using his power, he began storing items with just a glance. Dozens of water bottles, canned food, a well-stocked first aid kit, and the best knife he kept hidden under the counter all disappeared into his dimensional space. He was armed and supplied to the teeth, yet walked as lightly as if he were out for a morning stroll.
He stretched his arms, took off his sweater, and put on a black T-shirt. The environment beyond the portal felt hot.
"Should I bring sunscreen? Nah… maybe later. Let's see what kind of neighbors I've got."
And without a second thought, he stepped forward, letting the Black Mist and the suffocating heat swallow him whole.