I stand up. My head is groggy, my stomach feeling a lingering of pain. I hold my head and shake it, trying to remember how I got here. I scan horizontally and see a man in a suit. It is black like night with a bloody tie blazing in the middle. I try to speak, but my throat is scratchy. He speaks instead.
“Don’t try to speak. It will take you a while to get acclimated to this plane.”
I was confused. Plane? Like an airplane? Or vanilla? My voice scratches out, “Plane?”
The man shakes his head, “Yes, the astral plane. I’m sorry about that. I always forget about your amnesia, about how new all of this is to you. It is so very old for me. Let me make things clear. First I am sorry about this, but you are dead. You were driving and someone hit you. You swerved and flipped and died rather quickly. A shard had lodged itself in your stomach.”
I heard him say this, but it didn’t click. Me dead? This man is clearly crazy and probably dangerous. I should run.
The man spoke again, “Before you do something hasty and run, look behind you.”
What the? Look behind me. I looked and saw the truth. Metal gleaned in the moonlight, its crumpled and shattered appearance looking like stalactites or stalagmites, whichever one pokes up. I was dead. The pain in my stomach must be that shard. I looked around and didn’t see the other guy, just a bumper on the road. The bastard didn’t even have the balls to stay. “Sir, whoever you are, is this heaven? Because if it is, it is kind of crappy.”
“No, this is not heaven. It is the astral plane, a realm adjacent to the world of the living. It is where the spirits and others reside. The place I will soon take you will decide whether you go to heaven or hell, or wherever your beliefs stipulate. I am merely the ferryman to purgatory.”
This man’s face seemed to flash with shadows as a skull appeared over his visage. It was a lot to take in. I was dead and the grim reaper was here. I had to go, but I wanted to do something first. “Okay, but before I go can I see my family one last time?”
The man scowled, “That is not advisable. If you see them, you will not want to leave this realm and that is dangerous. The inability to truly be with loved ones creates rage and it will cause you to regress into something more Vengeful. Those tales of hauntings and evil spirits are the result of that rage. There are more than spirits on this plane. Necrovores, those that feast on the dead, on the spirit, also dwell here. The longer we stay, the more your energy will attract them. I can feel them gathering already. If you are going, give me your hand, if not, I wish you luck.”
I thought about it and grabbed his hand. I was dead, but maybe it wasn’t the end.
