Concept

CHAPTER ONE | In The Beginning

In The Beginning

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*Beep...* *Beep...* *Beep... *

'Here I am, lying down at the age of 17.'

*Huff...*

'Must be nice, to live to 83.'

*Beep...* *Beep...* *Beep... *

'Fuckin' hell, I'd kill to live one more year.'

*Puff...*

'It doesn't feel good... dying, that is. Does it usually take this long?'

*Huff...*

'How long... has it been? A minute? An hour? God, I don't know.'

*Puff...*

'I just want to sleep... hmm... why do I feel so tired?'
Breath.

'The tattered wooden floor... the iron-cold nails nailed to the ground... why can't I feel them? Am I... not dead?'
Wake up.

Opening my eyes, the chill moonlight seeps through a set of curtained windows, as I see a roof of a house above me. Solemn and alone, it had cracks across the aged timber creaked with hollow gasps, exalting quiet shrieks of the tree's lost souls. Wet corners peel the

I was laying down on the floor of a broken-down house.

'That's odd, I'm pretty sure I got stabbed. By my own girlfriend, no less.' I thought, thinking a thot that shouldn't've been thought.

Sitting up from my spot on the ground, I look around. Aged to see the ripped wallpaper and shredded railing for what they are, and the cracked windows for what it iss

I check myself for what I have: a pale white shirt, gray shorts, and a pair of boots. Nothing too spectacular, other than the fact I'm not cold.

Walking to the window was a simple task, and looking through it was also easy, but looking up, and seeing nothing except the lack of something, triggers something deep within me. A wellspring of knowledge so deeply inscribed onto my soul that grasping it was near-automatic.

I couldn't believe it, nothing was outside. Not darkness or an empty town; the abstract concept of nothing had manifested in a physical form outside of this ghost screen.

I couldn't feel the flow of time here, time seemed timeless and tangible here.

It felt as if I existed in a liminal space between life and death. At least it's not wandering through a void-like space for all eternity.

I didn't know, and I didn't care. The only thing I felt was a sense of excitement and relief.

Until I turn, to see the painting. The painting filled with a set of abstract colors:

A rainbow swirl in the center, with a pinpoint yin and yang symbol in the middle.

Each swirl is separated into fours, forming a ring outside my dot.

Then a black ring border.

Outside, forming another ring, using interlocking gears, were fourteen gradients.

Each gear with five teeth, creating an illusion of infinitely spinning gears.

Always shifting, always changing, but never leaving; never abandoning. A set of colors I saw in a dream, my dream... about me?