So, I died...

What a letdown.

I always imagined that I would go on to do great things in life. Marrying a beautiful woman, one who understood me and my quirks. Owning a large home and having more than one nice car. Having a high-rolling job that paid a shit ton of money......

Such great dreams now lay in pieces, much like myself. Although, if what I remember actually happened, then how am still able to think about it?

I did die right?

Hello? Anyone? Universe? Death? God?... Jesus??

I've never been big on religion, but if calling out to these guys actually worked, I think I'd be more scared.

I'm pretty sure I died. You don't just forget something like that. Did I die though? If I did then what the fuck is this?

I can't seem to get my head around the fact that I died, or didn't die. Yet here I am, still able to process thought conflicted over my dilemma.

Maybe my head avoided the collision, if I was in one that is, and this 'here and now' is just my way of coping with what happened. This strange place may, or may not, be trying to send me off to the afterlife in a state of peace? Oh, I could be dreaming! That's it! Although, this is a shitty kind of dream.

All I can see is darkness. A surreal shade of black, mixed with a tint of green, attacks every direction of my vision.

If you can even call it vision. It's definitely not my eyes that are seeing the consistent stream of nothing before me. I don't seem to possess a human body for some strange reason.

Whatever you would class to be my body, now appears to be a see-through sphere made entirely of clouds.

That's right. Clouds.

This is just wrong, right?

That is the best way to explain my current body situation as there are no better words to descibe it.

Seriously, if this is my brains' way of coping with my unfortunate event, or not, or dream, I may not be as clever as I thought I might have been. Okay, if this is a dream then the logical conclusion is that I will wake up at some point. Anything other than that an wait. I just want to know what the fuck is happening!

Time passes, a lot of time, and yet I'm still here which kills of my idea of this dilemma being a dream.

Ever so suddenly, I feel a shift in the darkness followed by an oppressive feeling invading my non-constitutional mind. I feel as though it's invading my very consciousness and I begin to panic hard.

I've never actually had my mind assaulted before, however, I feel it safe to say that this is exactly what it feels like and I most certainly am not comfortable with this situation. It is an unpleasant and extremely painful feeling, almost as thought doctors are disecting parts of my brain whilst I'm still awake on the operating table.

Wait. What if that's what's actually happening to me? Oh fuck!

As fast as it had begun, the invasive feeling ends allowing me a reprieve. At the same time the everlasting darkness and the overwhelming feeling of night, are both meticulously pulled away from me.

A soft blue light bursts into existence all around my cloud sphere and it slowly illuminates the darkness around me. Assaulting it, as it had done to me mere moment ago and surpressing it before finally dominating all corners of existence with itself, leaving none of the original darkness in sight.

All I can see now is a serene light blue. Basically, it's exactly the same as before but now with colour instead of nothing, so.... not much to see really.

I kinda thought the afterlife, if that is where I am, would be a lot different to this and not just... nothing.

As though the universe heard my complaint, the entirity of the all-encompassing nothingness begins to glow extremely bright. I feel the urge to close my eyes and shield them with my hands or arms, not that I have either of those body parts on my sphere of clouds, both my thought and effort was futile as I can't do anything to protect myself.

The brightness eventually recedes until I no longer feel as though my imaginary retina are burning inside the skull I don't possess.

Damn, that hurt! Or did it? Argh, I'm so confused.

Once I'm finally able to take in my surroundings again, I was expecting the blinding light to have left something, or someone, of significance behind. Hoping might actually be a better word though, unfortuantely though, there is nothing new amidst the light-blue scenery, encompassing me all around.

Well, shit!

Once the darkness had been overtaken and replaced with the soft blue light, it had left me hoping that 'something else' or 'someone else' was coming.

It's just nothing again but with a new colour. This is not how I want to spend the rest of my existence.

What if this is what those religious fanatics call limbo? I really hope it isn't though. This sucks.

What's a guy gotta do to get noticed out here in the middle of nowhere. Is it going to be like this forever now?

'Hello!?'

.......

'Hey, Assholes!!'

Once again, as if responding to my thoughts, a new shape begins to appear in my lonely void. A soft-white light forms into existence to create a rectangular border, inside it stars swirl around inside clearly visible frame.

What the hell is that?

The colour inside the frame is almost the same as the light-blue void we inhabit, only slightly darker and if I didn't know any better I'd say it was seethrough.

It's the first physical object I have seen since I've arrived here.

At least I think it's a physical object. If I still had hands I might be able to test that theory. Sadly though, I don't think my clouds will be able to grasp onto to the materialisation before me.

It kind of looks like the information box from the old RPGs, before they started adding voice features into the games.

Oi! Why do you look like a text box!?

Why did I just think that, was I expecting an answer?

Well even if it did answer me it wouldn't be any weirder than the, once-crazy-darkness-turned-serene-light-blue, would it?

This must be it, how it ends, no afterlife or second chances. The cogs turning in my brain are about to cease forever marking the inevitable end of my short existence. I should have done more! I should have travelled and experienced new cultures and learned. I should have loved and been loved in return. There was so much more that I wanted to see and do!

Okay, maybe I dramatised that a little much.

You still could.

Huh?

Words full of hope appear inside the star-filled, sky blue rectangular box.

Oh?

Turns out I was actually correct.

Fucking go me.

I knew it was a text box, who are you? Are you God? Are you the creator of this place? Why am I still able to think here, and see and question? What's going on?

.......

I wait anxiously wondering if I asked too many questions?

Maybe I annoyed the weird text box?

Shit.

What if it doesn't answer back? Then an even worse thought washes over my mind.

What if I imagined that it answered me?

The words disappeared just as fast as they had appeared, once I'd finished reading them.

........

I wait patiently, anxiety eating away at me from inside until I eventually decide I've waited long enough. This time however, I'll try a simple question. I gulp down my non-existent saliva and steel my already shaken nerves.

All or nothing.

Moment of truth.

Here we go.

Who are you?

.....

A few seconds pass before I finally get an answer.

I am the SYSTEM.