What Happens Afterward

making sense of it all

what happens afterward

by Linus Linoleum

begrudgingly co-authored by the quite terrible e3khatena

The crashes of waves were the first things I had heard. I awoke surrounded in a tomb of water and sand, and pulled myself off of the wet surface with great force. All around me was a beach encrusted in garbage, broken devices, glass shards, papers of all kinds. I spit the sand in my mouth out into the pool that had formed where my face once sat, and looked at the reflection in the water. I looked frail, small, with large eyes and long hair. I couldn't make out any color under the dim red light in the sky above. I had no idea who I was or where I had ended up, and I seemed to have no pockets or pouches to store any identification that might have helped me. I was alone, and this being my first realization, unnerved me more than I could have anticipated.

making sense of it all

I had to calm myself. It was hard knowing I could very well die alone without anyone ever finding me, especially with that being your first knowledge of the place you've wound up. I dusted off my clothing and ventured away from the ocean, heading inland. Rows of deteriorated, shattered buildings lined a cracked, faded street, a thin stream of a black fluid rushing down the middle of the road. "Hello? Anyone?" I called, hoping for a helping hand in understanding this all.

There were signs of life in these ruins. A cylindrical container had sat on its side, its contents rather neatly picked through for what resembled garbage, and a stack of plastic crates were adorned with smudged handprints much larger than my own, too recent to be as ancient as the rest of the society around me. In the distance, a large building stood virtually preserved among the wreckage, a single light on in its windows. That had to be my best hope for learning more.

What do I tell them, though? This is even provided they'd be a friend, not a foe. If this is indeed an enemy, I have no means to fight back, they'd easily overpower me and my story ends right here without a second thought. Assuming I can trust this person, the most I can hope for is they offer me a place to live and some food, as they would have no way to point me back towards home without any ID. It's easy to come up with all sorts of reasons and explanations as to why I should be weary of venturing towards this light, but at much the same time I have no other option. My choice is to starve on the beach and be taken by the waves much like how I'd been brought here, or trust in the goodwill of a stranger.

I had approached the door to the darker-colored building, the sounds of muffled movement audible inside. On the off-hand chance this is a trap of some kind, I made sure to open the door as quietly as possible before stepping in. "Hello?" I called into the darkness.

The sound of ruffling. Life. I turned to peer into a hallway. A tall bipedal figure stood before me, radiating some sort of horrible light from where a face would be. This is how I'd die, certainly. "Please, I mean no trouble," I declared shakily, stepping back towards the door, "but I need some help."

"Help is all we need anymore," the figure declared, a deep, rich voice.

"Then if you help me, I might be able to help you."

The figure stepped into the building's foyer, where I could see them better. The figure was draped in a tall beige trenchcoat and wore an equally beige fedora. Its face, a single digital eye on a plate of dark-colored glass, its body less filled the frame and instead rather hung the coat in the air as if from a hanger. "Please, call me Constantine," the figure declared, holding out a hand resembling ten small glass cylinders arranged to resemble fingers.