Well, this is monumentally inconvenient.
The thought arrived with the snap of consciousness returning, crisp and clear in the absolute nothingness that surrounded me. No dramatic awakening, no gasping for air I didn't need. Just... awareness, blooming like a knife wound in the dark.
I was dead. That much tracked.
What pissed me off was the how remained stubbornly blank.
My mind, that beautiful, relentless engine that had catalogued every micro-expression in negotiations, every exploitable tell in combat, every goddamn curve of Natalia's body when she leaned over that chessboard in her office—that same mind was giving me nothing but static where my final moments should be.
Natalia.
Christ.
I could still see the way candlelight caught in her dark hair during our last dinner, the competitive gleam in her eyes when she thought she had me cornered in conversation. She'd been wearing that black dress that made her waist look illegal, and I'd been three moves away from checkmate on both the board and the much more interesting game happening underneath it. The scent of her perfume, something expensive and vaguely floral, had made promises her words wouldn't.
And now I'm stuck in an existential timeout contemplating the eternal blackness of absolutely nothing. The universe has a sick sense of humor.
The void pressed in from all sides. Not oppressive, exactly. Just empty. The kind of empty that made you realize how much you'd taken ambient sound for granted. No heartbeat. No breath. No distant traffic or humming electronics. Just silence so complete it felt like drowning.
I tried to reconstruct the end. There had been a meeting, maybe. The shadow of that familiar voice from my past, sharp as a whip crack. My mentor, if you could call relentless psychological torture mentorship. Every session the same refrain: useful tools performed, useless ones got discarded.
The memory slipped through my mental fingers like smoke.
My photographic recall, the one advantage I'd had in a world designed to grind me down, and it failed me at the finish line. Typical. Even dead, I couldn't escape being second-rate.
The worst part? Nobody would care.
I pictured my funeral—assuming anyone bothered. Empty chairs in some generic ceremony hall. Maybe a handful of acquaintances who'd show up out of obligation, checking their phones while some officiant who'd never met me rattled off generic platitudes. No one to mourn the tool that finally broke.
Useless unless you are the best.
The words echoed from somewhere deep, that voice that had shaped my entire existence. Every achievement measured against an impossible standard. Every success just proof I could do more. And what had I died as? A nobody. Just another body in an unmarked grave, forgotten before the dirt settled.
The cold fury of that realization settled into my bones, or whatever metaphysical equivalent I had left. I hadn't lived. I'd been a wind-up toy pointed at obstacles, trained to overcome, never allowed to want anything beyond the next test.
Well, I wanted now. Wanted so badly it burned.
I wanted to carve my name into the world's skin so deep it would scar. I wanted them to remember. To look at me and know they were in the presence of something they could never match. Not for justice or legacy or any noble bullshit.
Just to prove I existed. To spit in the face of everyone who'd called me nothing.
"You have died."
The voice cut through the silence like a razor, smooth and intimate. The voice was feminine, almost, though that felt like the wrong word. It came from everywhere and nowhere, settling directly into what passed for my consciousness.
"A prisoner of fate, sealed before you even had the chance to fight back."
I would've sneered if I had a face. "Tell me something I don't know."
A pause, as if the voice was savoring my response. When it continued, I caught something underneath the pity. Appraisal. Like I was a painting it was considering purchasing.
"This is truly an unjust end for one with such... potential."
Another pause, longer this time. I felt it like a held breath.
"But this is where your story ends."
The finality in those words should've terrified me. Instead, my mind kicked into overdrive. This was a negotiation. The voice wouldn't have bothered talking to a corpse unless it wanted something. Everything was a transaction if you looked hard enough.
"However."
There it was.
"Since my voice is reaching you, there may be a possibility. An opportunity for a second act."
"What's the price?"
The voice laughed.
"Accept my gift, and fulfill your wish. Seize the power, the wealth, the adoration you crave. Make them remember your name."
A beat.
"All I ask... is for a good show. She'll be watching."
She. An audience, then. Some cosmic voyeur getting entertainment from my second chance. Fine. I'd played to worse crowds.
Light bloomed in the center of the nothing. Not holy white or angelic gold. This was raw, molten, the color of a forge at full heat. It didn't feel like salvation. It felt like pure, undiluted potential, and it wanted in.
The warmth hit me hard. After the cold emptiness, it was almost obscene, burning through whatever I'd become in death and filling spaces I didn't know were hollow. Ecstasy and agony married into something that made my non-existent nerves scream.
A bad deal beat oblivion every time.
I reached for the light.
The floor vanished.
No gentle descent, no gradual transition. One moment I was reaching, the next I was falling, yanked down into a vortex of light that tore at the edges of my consciousness. The void shattered around me like glass, each shard a different color, a different sound, a different sensation bleeding through.
Then the noise hit.
Car horns. Dozens of them, a discordant chorus of impatience. The distant wail of a siren. Birds chirping with aggressive cheer. Shouting voices in a language that felt familiar but wrong, syllables clicking into place in my brain like puzzle pieces. Underneath it all, the smell of burnt sugar and raw sewage and something metallic.
My mind, which thrived on categorization and control, reeled. Too much input, too fast, crashing into a consciousness that hadn't needed to process sensory data for—how long had I been dead?
Something tapped against my cheek. Light, rhythmic. Annoying.
"Young man? Young man, are you alright?"
The tapping became more insistent. A smack, really.
My eyes snapped open to a blur of colors that slowly resolved into shapes. Blue sky. Gray pavement. A massive silhouette blocking out the sun.
I threw a hand up, shielding my face from light that felt like knives after the void. My voice came out raw, unused.
"What the hell?"
The silhouette shifted, and I caught details. A man. No, a mountain. Easily seven feet tall, muscles that belonged on a comic book cover straining against a simple t-shirt and cargo pants. Blonde hair swept back, strong jaw, and a smile so wide and white it could've guided ships to harbor.
The smile faltered, sheepish. Relieved.
"You are alright! Phew, I thought I was too late!"
He offered a hand the size of a dinner plate.
I pushed myself up on my own, ignoring the offered help. My body felt wrong, lighter than I remembered, smaller. My vision swam for a moment before stabilizing.
The man—this ridiculous, cartoonish mountain of optimism and muscle—stood there with his hand still extended, smile never wavering.
I looked him up and down, taking in every detail with eyes that felt sharper than they should. The way he stood, weight slightly forward like he was ready to leap into action. The concerned furrow in his brow that didn't match the smile. The barely concealed power in every line of his frame.
An obstacle. A very large, very enthusiastic obstacle.
"Who the fuck are you?"