When Kyle finally came to, he was met with… nothing.

The farthest depths of outer space, where light had yet to reach. 

The pits of the void, the source of any and all intrusive thoughts.

The ambiguity of Limbo itself, which may or may not exist, even as he experienced it.

No matter where he looked, the absence of light and matter ran on for an eternity in every direction, making it impossible to know where he was. He could feel nothing at the end of his fingertips, nothing beneath the soles of his feet. There was no trace of heat or cold on or within his body, and nothing made a sound. Not even him. Even as he thought to breathe or speak, no air would enter or escape him. And no beating within his chest could be heard, nor felt, either.

Any sense of gravity was also absent; Kyle couldn’t tell if he was standing still, lying down, floating aimlessly, or merely existing in a singular spot, unable to move. Or maybe he was moving, faster than even the speed of light, and yet the absence of anything to see or feel would mean that he was none the wiser. He could not know.

The only thing he was aware of, that he could know, was himself. He could see his arms, legs, and body just as he remembered them to be. Despite the blackness around him, he appeared to himself as if it were clear as day, with the addition of a glowing outline surrounding him. He couldn’t tell where it originated from, and he felt the light just as much as he could feel anything else.

Which was to say he couldn’t. Even as he brought his hands together, or clicked his heels, he felt nothing. No impact, no vibrations, not even a phantom sense of touch. He tried waving his arms, as if swimming through space, but gave up when he couldn’t tell if he was accomplishing anything. And so he stayed there, as is. Abandoned and waiting in the eternal nothing.

He lost track of how long he went on like this. Surely it was only a few minutes by now. He wished there was something, anything, for him to be doing, but the only thing left to do was to think, to ponder his thoughts, wondering what had brought him here, and why.

Wait, what did happen? Just before…

Kyle’s head spun as he tried to recall. The last thing he remembered was Selena pulling him up off the curb, and beginning their trek back to Markus’s pawn shop…

He held his head in one hand, feeling dizzy and unbalanced. His other hand reached out aimlessly, trying to grasp at something, anything, to lean on or to hold onto, to stabilize himself as his vision lost focus–

Suddenly, he felt something. Peeking through his fingers with one eye, he saw his hand brush against an ethereal crimson string. It shined in the endless abyss, and ran upwards, farther than he could see. Or was it downwards?

Looking in both directions, he couldn’t see an end to the string. He couldn’t step towards or away from it either, and while it had no texture or warmth to it, wrapping his hand around it sent vibrations through his arms. Where did this come from? Does it lead somewhere? I’ve got no other option but to take it I guess, but which direction should I take?

Looking up, Kyle couldn’t tell if he was about to ascend or descend the string, but there was nothing else to do. He reached out with his other hand, ready to pull himself up along the string–

“Who are you?”

The sudden sound of somebody’s voice caused Kyle to jump, literally, away from the string. Without warning, he was suddenly on solid ground again and able to move. Or at least, it felt like it; nothing had visually changed about his surroundings, and there was no noise as his feet made contact with the formless platform he found himself on. What had changed was a ripple effect radiating from his feet, with small waves of light expanding outwards.

He whipped his head around, looking for the source of the feminine voice that had called to him. Alas, there was naught but the continued nothingness he could not grow accustomed to. His shoulders heaved, simulating heavy breathing after a jump scare. He attempted to call out, to demand this new arrival show themself, but nothing entered nor escaped his windpipes still. Am I going crazy, imagining voices now? What is happening here?

He turned back around and was greeted with the glowing silhouette of someone standing before the red string, their back turned to him. Before he could attempt to get their attention, Kyle saw the robed figure slowly raising something above their head.

It looked like a massive pair of scissors. One of the arms, gleaming silver, extended a little longer than the other, which shined an even brighter gold. The closed blades were pointed and several feet long, and whoever this person was held the oversized tool easily with one hand on each handle. With a quick flourish, they broke the arms of the scissors in two, wielding one in each of their pale white hands.

Without another word, they swung the blades inward together. Then outward. Then inwards again. They tried swinging both blades from the right, then the left, and finally bringing them above their head in an X pattern and swinging downwards with all their might. Each strike was accompanied with a frustrated grunt.

“Why? Why won’t they cut? Damnit!” they shrieked. They put the scissor-like weapon back together as they had been before, but as Kyle reached a hand out, his voiceless cry calling to them, the figure was gone. He blinked, and in that moment they’d disappeared. “Don’t make me ask again. Who in the hell are you supposed to be, and why are you making this difficult?”

The hostile voice was behind him now, but in the same moment that they spoke to him, demanding an answer when he could not speak, he felt their hand atop his head. He froze, and his thoughts spontaneously blurred for what felt like only a second.

But in that moment, Kyle could vividly see his memories, key events of his life, and he recalled them exactly as he had first experienced them: the first time his dad had showed him an anime film, his first time playing airsoft, the first time he’d confessed his feelings and been rejected, a time he’d almost drowned at the beach in middle-school, his first anime convention with Nick and meeting Tony, and even his high-school graduation ceremony. Finally, he saw himself tumble, and felt the same impacts all across his body from the fall he’d taken down the escalator, right before finding himself in a new world.

When the hand released him, his mind and vision returned to normal, but the feelings of nostalgia, longing, and loss overwhelmed him. His head drooped, and he struggled to stand against the barrage of emotions sending chills through his arms and legs. Tears began rolling down his cheek as he slowly turned around, more dull white rings radiating from beneath his feet with each step. 

“What did– Who’re– Why–”

“Oh,” she said, her arm dramatically dropping to her side. “Well this is… very problematic…”

Glowing rings of white likewise were radiating from beneath the woman in front of him. She stood a little taller than Kyle, and wore a flowing black robe accented in a golden pattern trim. He could see a glowing light surrounding her body, in the same fashion that his body glowed, and an ethereal glowing clock ticked above her head like a halo. It was a pure white, and with each ticking of the second hand, Kyle realized he could hear an accompanying ticking sound that echoed in the vastness of the abyss around them.

The dark robe she wore was only distinguishable from the surrounding darkness by the glistening stars it seemed to contain, not unlike gazing into the night sky. Kyle hardly even noticed her ample chest as he tried to peer at her face, which was covered by a sheer black veil. He could only faintly see a golden glow coming from where her eyes should have been, but otherwise couldn’t make out any other facial features. Nor could he find any sign of the massive scissor blades that she had been swinging around earlier.

“...How did you do that?” he asked as he held the back of his head, his mind still reeling from the sudden surge of memories.

The woman cocked her head to the side, clearly puzzled by Kyle’s response. “You’re still standing, are you? A bit broken, but nothing you can’t recover from, I imagine.” She reached up and wiped away his tears. She caught one on her thumb and brought it to the gold glowing from her veil, as if to examine it. “Humans truly are bizarre. None of you ever die exactly the same. You always have some variation, something that makes your death unique, whether it was the cause or reason, or the purpose or lack thereof.” She stepped forward, walking right through Kyle as if he weren’t there. 

He couldn’t feel anything as she passed through, and the brief glimpse inside of her that he got was just as empty as the environment that persisted around them. Kyle turned around, and was greeted with a finger shoved into his face. “But you, Kyle Concord, take the cake for the most, shall we say, ‘special’ death I’ve had to pass judgment on. Or should I call be more direct, call it the most difficult I've ever had to deal with?”

“Special death… I’m confused, what are you talking about? Who are you, and how do you know my name? What is happening? Where is this place?”

The woman sighed and dropped her finger, shaking her head. “And yet it seems like you’re not too different from the rest of the lot. An endless rambling of questions; how disappointing.” She pulled back her veil and hood, allowing her long hair to fall below her waist. It was unlike any Kyle had ever seen: it was almost black and near impossible to see against the background behind her, but the inner layers of her hair were a snowy white. 

Her skin was pale as bone, and aside from the golden glow that was directed wherever she looked, her eyes appeared normal. There were no blemishes whatsoever on her porcelain-like face, but while her face looked like it had been crafted by a master sculptor, her beauty was marred by her expression. A scowl of disappointment almost betrayed a sense of disgust as she looked down at Kyle. The woman began walking in a large circle clockwise around Kyle, the vertical cuts in the robe below her hips allowing her long pale legs to move more freely.

“In reverse order, then. This is my domain, a corner of the primordial plane of chaos, where everything is as I intend it to be. Or at least it’s supposed to be, mind you. But we’ll get to that.” She counted down her explanations on her fingers as she slowly continued marching in a circle. All Kyle could do was watch and listen as he tried to collect himself and recover from the emotional hit he had just taken. “You are currently being judged. The sum total of one’s whole life determines where they will go in the afterlife, or what options they will be given. Whether it be getting sent to a safe haven or damnation, being obliterated from existence entirely, or getting another chance at life. I know your name because I have read your memories like a book. As for me, I am Khali, the Deity in charge of Time and Death.” 

She paused as she turned to face Kyle now. “And lastly, when I say ‘special’ death, I am not referring to the method in which you died. The car bombing really wasn’t all that interesting, don’t get it twisted,” she said, waving a hand dismissively. “What I mean is the… after-death part. Because, for the first time in the I-don’t-know-how-many millenia that I have been judging and reaping souls, you are the first soul that I… well, can’t touch.”