𝐑𝐀𝐕𝐄𝐍, 𝐓𝐕𝐃𝐔

𝐏𝐫𝐨𝐥𝐨𝐠𝐮𝐞

Being dead sucked.

It wasn't some ethereal plane of peace or even fire and brimstone. It was cramped. Suffocating, almost, despite the lack of air. There was pressure sometimes—out of nowhere—like the universe had its thumb pressed against her, just to remind her she was small. Powerless.

And then there was the other soul.
The one that kept kicking her.

No words. No faces. Just these random, jarring jabs from nowhere.
She would have yelled if there was air to push through her lungs. But there wasn't. Just warmth. A weird, humid, sticky warmth that surrounded her like a too-close blanket that couldn't be kicked off.

At first, she was convinced she was in hell.
One of her old foster moms—the kind that smiled too sweet and slapped too hard—used to tell her that "bad girls" go to hell. That she was headed there if she kept "acting out," kept "lying" about what the foster father had done.
So when the darkness swallowed her and the world fell away, she thought: This is it.

But no flames came.

No devils. No burning. No screams. Just pressure. Wetness. And the occasional rude jab to her ribs.

She rolled her eyes hard enough to feel it, even here.
"Well, that rules out Hell," she muttered—or thought, because words didn't quite work in the void. "Guess I'm not damned enough for fire and brimstone."

Purgatory was her next guess.
But that required cleansing. Redemption. Some guide with a clipboard and maybe a robe. Someone to walk her through her sins and virtues. But there was no one. Just... this.

So, hell: ruled out.
Purgatory: also nope.
Was this just nothing?

A limbo of floating in invisible sludge, where the only company was the ghost of her frustration and an annoying foot that kept prodding her in the back?
She didn't get hungry, which was good, but she didn't eat either. She could still sleep, sure—dreamless and dark—but when she woke up, it was always to the same thing: Floating. Cramped. Oppressively warm. An eternity of ugh.

And she was so tired of being kicked.

A sudden jab to her calf made her flinch. That same soul—whoever they were—had no sense of personal space. This time, she'd had enough.

With all the effort she could muster, she kicked back. It was clumsy, like trying to swim through molasses or walk through knee-deep water, and it took every ounce of determination. Moving in this space felt like fighting in a dream—slow, sluggish, like her own body was resisting her.

But she did it.
Her foot connected with something solid. Warm. Squishy.

"HA!" She would have shouted if sound existed.

The soul struck back—twice this time, and harder.
Each blow was quick, sharp, and rude, like a toddler with a grudge.
Bring it bitch, She thought.

She swung her arms, pushing through the thick, sluggish air around her, trying to wriggle closer to land her own hit. But before she could return fire, everything shifted.

The space around her—the cramped, humid nothingness—suddenly closed in.
Walls she didn't know were walls tightened, folding her against the other soul. Pressed together like sardines, she froze, muscles tensed with confusion and a creeping dread.

The other soul squirmed, its movement panicked but strangely purposeful, sliding down and away.
And then it was gone.

She waited, motionless.
Everything had stopped.
But just as she started to relax, it started again.