Panic gripped Alex as he secured the old man's neck in a knot with his tie, leveraging it against the headrest. With one hand locked around the makeshift restraint, he unleashed a flurry of punches on the creepy old man's face, pleading desperately for the car to stop.
Yet, despite the blood bathing the man's face, a disturbing grin persisted. "Don't worry, we'll be there soon!" the old man coughed out, his words sending shivers down Alex's spine.
Unable to get the man to cease the vehicle, Alex took matters into his own hands, crawling behind the man's chair to the backseat, where he continued to tug on the tie, screaming for the man to halt the truck. The vehicle persisted on its mysterious course, a blurred landscape outside the windows defying all logic.
Determined to halt the psychopath, Alex clung to the tie, teeth gnashed as he pulled with all his might. Suddenly, the truck came to an abrupt stop, the engine still revving. In the tense silence, Alex could no longer sense any movement, only the chilling hum of the engine.
Cautious, Alex, still holding onto the tie, stood up, gazing at the old man's lifeless form with wide eyes. "Oh shit! I killed him!" he blurted, swiftly covering his own mouth with his hands. Darkness surrounded him; the once blurry windscreen had cleared up but instead brought about a bigger mystery as it revealed nothing familiar in sight.
Fearing the repercussions, Alex muttered, "Oh shit...shit...shit... I have to leave this truck now before the cops come." He looked around, trying to make sense of what he was in. The exterior of the truck looked normal but the inside was a lot different. This was not like any truck he had seen before.
His fingers pressed every button he could find until, finally, a click signaled the doors opening. Backing out of the car, Alex kept his eyes fixed on the old man's lifeless face, a mixture of fear and something else etched across his features. The look on his face resembled a man standing outside of a bathroom, pressed and waiting for the other person to get out so he could relieve himself.
"Arghhhhhh!" he screamed, swinging his hands through the air as he felt himself falling.
"Please, Lord, I don't wanna die this way," Alex yelped feeling himself fall through a thick, dark fog.
After about thirty seconds, everything became still and he no longer felt like he was falling yet he never landed on anything to begin with.
In the eerie aftermath of the fall, Alex felt a strange stillness, a suspended moment in time.
As he gradually opened his eyes, the surrounding darkness swallowed him, and a soft fog gently swirled around him. Lying on an unseen surface, he began to question his reality.
'Wait...this doesn't make any sense,' he pondered, his eyes scanning the featureless void. The fog moved slowly, like whispers in the emptiness of a dome.
He looked around, no trees, no rocks, not a single house in sight. The absence of any discernible landmarks left him feeling perplexed and uneasy.
A realization struck him. He gulped, hoping and clutching to all manner of reasons that he was wrong.
"Am I dead?" Alex murmured, desperately checking his own existence, feeling all around himself as if expecting to find an answer within the touch of his own body. He could feel himself but then again, the thought that perhaps spirits could touch themselves and feel themselves crossed his mind. Thus, his method of verifying he was still alive became nullified.
Panic set in his mind and he began to plead with a higher power. "I can't be dead. No, please, I can't be dead. I just paid for a one-month subscription on my Netflix. Lord, please let this better be a bad dream and let me wake up now!" His fuel filled prayers echoed into the void.
"Silence!!!"
Out of no where, a thunderous voice boomed, shattering the eerie silence.
The command reverberated through the unseen expanse, causing Alex to jolt upright, his heart pounding in his chest.
"What was that?!" When he turned to look behind him, his eyes widened in disbelief. He couldn't believe what he was staring at. That very moment his heart sunk to the abyss as the realization hung heavily in the air.
"I am dead," he said, tears threatening to spill out of his eyes. He had to be dead. Because how? Where and when had all these happened. All of the things he was seeing in front of him.
"Whe..wh...where am I?" Alex managed to cough those words out.
"You are before the council of fiction, the periphery of creation, mortal!" A voice boomed.
'The what now?'
Alex, enveloped by a surreal atmosphere, stood in humble awe before what appeared to be a gathering of strange gigantic beings.
Seated across a colossal table that seemed to stretch into infinity, these figures of immense magnitude exuded an otherworldly presence. The dark fogs, once a mysterious shroud, now lifted him to the table's summit, where he was met with the daunting assembly.
Before him unfolded a gathering of four distinct beings, each cloaked in an air of mystery that transcended the boundaries of his imagination.
The first entity, a colossal figure, emanated a commanding aura. Clad in gleaming, seemingly impenetrable armor with a giant shield sat with poise and undeniable sense of power.
This was plot armour, the guardian.
His gaze shifted to the second being, a hooded figure shrouded in darkness. It had piercing eyes and held a mysterious item that looked like a giant screen which glowed with fleeting images – cut clips of different places and things. This was foreshadow, the seer.
As his attention traversed, a third figure, a shape-shifting being that drew his focus. Continually changing appearance, first it took form of a collapsing star and then went on to look like a kettle with smoke coming out of it.
It created an air of unpredictability that kept Alex on the edge of anticipation. This was the subversion, the trickster.
The fourth in line, an elderly figure with his back half turned stood with a quill and an ancient tome. Circles of dynamic lines went round the elderly figure's head with smaller condensed balls of light that moved around like planets around an orbit.
The elderly figure made hand movements that looked like they were etching intricate words into a white blank paper. Each stroke of the quill seemed to thicken and shapen the circles of lines around this figure. This was backstory, the Historian.
"What do you want with me?" Atop the large table, Alex, a mere mortal, dared to question the enigmatic beings who loomed over him.
"Audacious mortal!" The voice from before boomed, each syllable echoing, sending shivers through Alex's body.
An instantaneous command followed, cutting through the tension. "Kneel!"
The word struck like a decree, and Alex found himself compelled to bow before the immense power that overshadowed him.
As he knelt, his hands and body trembling, the Council spoke.
Their voices, a harmonious blend of echoes, delivered a verdict that hung in the air like an immutable prophecy. "You, in your recklessness, have committed the unimaginable," they all spoke.
Alex remained on his knees but couldn't help but wonder what the hell they were talking about.
"You have killed Truck Kun,"