GBDP: Life After Death Pt. 1

Author: Brian Roig

Editor-in-Chief: Rob Smith

Chapter 1: Death is Just the Beginning...

Slow Breathing

For all intents and purposes, I should be dead.

After being struck by that last staggering blow from my clone, everything in me stopped functioning. No movement, no sound, and no sense of the aura that flowed through me. Though I can now feel my eyes, I am barely able to open them without feeling the nausea that comes with disorientation. I assume this must be what it feels like to awake from a coma. It is very dark, but I can see strands of light. The only way to explain what surrounds me are what appears to be fractals of faint neon strobes. Well I guess this is ok, because if I feel sick, I at least know for sure that I am still alive. Nice way to wake up, huh? I guess for whatever reason my brain started working before the rest of my body did. I must be in some kind of stasis, which would explain why this all feels so strange…even for me.

I have used this time to think about a lot of things, more specifically, about how long I have been gone. For all I know it could be years. Oddly enough, while I did think about my teammates, they were not the ones occupying my thoughts the most. I suppose after all that Doom Patrol has been through it's become second nature to think that the team could find a way out of anything safely. I thought about my friends back in my hometown in New Jersey. Ever since I took this job, I have not called or visited home as much as I should have. And as cliché' as this sounds, you never realize just how much everyone means to you until they are gone. I should have told them more often how much they mean to me. But it never sunk in until recently how seriously I could get hurt in this business. It is my own fault for being naïve in taking the team's knack for constant survival for granted. If I am alive and there is a way for me to get back, I will never again forsake the people I have always cared about and my co-workers who I have also come to call my family.

I am starting to gain better control over my functions again. I can move, but I still can not see as well. I am in no restrictive pain, so floating listlessly in this purgatory will not help me at all. The weakness of having lain dormant for so long permeates every muscle in my body while I struggle to sit up. And then I hear it. Not the traffic of a busy city district, or the footsteps of commuters walking the pavement of South Street, but hope. I hear the wind. To my knowledge, wherever I am contains no living or paranormal presence, but the sound and feeling of a breeze says to me that it must have a source. Then again, maybe I am wrong and I could be going mad hearing what I want to hear.

I thought, what is the use? I closed my eyes and stroked the hair away from my face behind my ear, then rubbed the sand off of my hand on the leg of my uniform.

"Wait…sand? What the hell?" I said out loud.

I look around and the blackness that was present before is now gone and replaced by a soft surface. I feel underneath me and grab exactly what I think it is. It sifts through my fingers and the sand is real enough, but it is cold…damn cold.

Much of my vision has returned, but is still blurry. The neon fractals had apparently receded around me and were overtaken by a white sky. There are no clouds, not even a sun, only the cold white light of the barren heavens. I do not see anything on the horizon in any direction. The entire terrain is all sand. I still do not know where I am. I am not even sure if it is Earth or the afterlife.

It just…is.

Chapter 2: The Misinterpretation of Silence and its Disastrous Consequences

I reach into my uniform to see if I have anything on me of use; but just my luck, nothing. Not even a trap.

"Well, sir, looks like it is back to the basics. Going to have to use my hands for more than drumming practice", I said speaking to no one other than myself.

I do not know what I am doing or where I am going, though now I have got most of my bearings back and can properly stand on my feet. Almost every direction looks the same, except for one. But, wherever here is, it does not seem to have a sun, so I can not make out the light source. The wind continues to blow as I brush the sand out of my hair and pull my hood over my head for protection against the debris and shade from the brightness of the vanilla sky. The sand in front of me is condensed into a higher sand dune than the others. This pattern suggests change. If there is a chance of coming across a trench, or at the least a valley, then perhaps this terrain is not devoid of an ecosystem. The wind is a blessing, so I am hoping this dune path is a miracle.

In my first steps, I immediately notice the sand is not as deep as I though it was. This should not be too much of a problem. Though, I gather one way or another I will find out that answer soon enough.

XXX

After a few hours, I have found nothing. It seems like I have been walking forever. At what point do I determine the worthlessness in engaging on this endless path? I figure this much, I am trekking on open land with no other sentient life in sight but me. But there has got to be something out there, and if there is, I intend to find it.

As I climb over another sand dune I hear a crackling noise. It startles me at first, but I figure out that it is coming from my communicator. I have it strapped to my left shoulder for easy access and use in the same manner as a police officer would their com-link. Rob was working on a smaller more compact communications device and as far as I am aware he has not finished it yet. Then again, by the time I find my way out of here he could have developed six more by then. My communicator stills fizzles and attempts to contact anyone are useless, for the only thing I am able to accomplish at the moment is making various types of static.

I continue on.

I suppose things could be worse. This desert region could be scorching hot for one thing, and thank the gods for that because I do not have any water. If that were the case I do not know how far I would make it risking dehydration. I find that constantly getting my mind to think or process certain things helps me to regain my focus. I hope that with enough concentration I can get my aura back. I would certainly feel more confident if I had power behind my fists again.

I stop for a moment to rest as I re-scan the area as useless as it seems. It is quite a feeling being alone. In a manner of speaking it is what I fear the most.

"Oh, and fear it you do. How you loathe expelling your last breath without sharing your heart with another. It is admirable, but utterly a disgrace."

I stop cold in my tracks as soon as I heard that voice. I know my thoughts and I have not yet gone insane. Someone is mocking me from, of all places, my communicator.

"Hello?" I replied into the machine. "CJ? Sarah? Anyone?"

The raspy disembodied voice breathes soundly over the communicator.

"Whoever this is, I know you are there. Please respond."

…

I am growing impatient.

"Again, please respond. Who is this?"

"Pitiful"

"DAMMIT, WHO ARE YOU?"

"That is of little importance. If you keep to the path you are walking, you will find the change that you seek."

"Where am I? Is that the way out?"

Silence is then followed by more static.

"Hello? Do not leave me here!"

The voice leaves. I have been here less than a day and I have already grown weary of this place. At least I am not alone, but now I do not know if that is necessarily a good thing. I do not trust the word of anyone without a face. But what choice do I have? It is too late to turn around and go back to the beginning of the black void.

I yell aloud in case whoever that was is still here. "Alright, fine! …I'll go."

XXX

It feels like several hours has passed by. If there was a sun, I could determine how many hours of sunlight I have left. Although I don't even know if it would be worth it. This place might not see darkness. If time has any meaning here, I would assume it is late afternoon. I should not have listened to whoever it was earlier because I do not see a damned thing. I am losing focus. I just…I need to rest.

I sit down with my legs crossed and feet rested on my knees in the Indian position, my hands clasped with only my index fingers sticking out. Using them as a conduit, I hope to drive out the negative energy from my body and regain the endurance I so desperately need.

I listen to the wind roaming like a serpent over the vacuous terrain. It is soothing.

"You look and look and look, but you do not see. And here I thought you would be a challenge."

It came back. I snap out of my meditation with my eyes still shut, clutch, and remove the two-way on my shoulder.

"You lead me on and on in a pointless journey to search for nothing. It is you who are the fool if you think there is anything out here."

"Being from the same cloth, I expected you to be better than this. I just gave you the benefit that you might prove me wrong. I see you lack proper knowledge. Just open your eyes."

"The same cloth?," I asked angrily and confused.

I will not fall for this again; this must be another ruse. I amfed up with this nonsense. I stand up and walk away, placing the two-way back on my shoulder ignoring this ethereal messenger. Ruminating over the days events, I grow distracted not paying attention to where I am going. In my ignorance, I almost trip over myself at what I fail to see is looming over my head; an inverted pyramid.

Chapter 3: Dispersion

The hovering structure cast a shadow over me that stretches too far for me to bother calculating. It was not there before. So, either I am in hell or Pee Wee's Playhouse.

…I kid.

My curiosity peaks and I opt to investigate, while fighting the thought of what would happen if gravity loses its grip. I observe the tip of the pyramid, which is positioned above my head. Then the possibility that I may be in the legendary Desert of Set occurs to me. Yet if this is the case, it should not be this calm.

I take my eyes of the pyramid for a second. Upon doing so, I reel backward and momentarily become blinded while being encased in a cone of intense light.

I quickly pull my hood over my eyes and hold it in place to shield my vision from the gleam. As I try to preserve my sight I hear a humming noise, which gradually becomes louder. At the crescendo of its pitch, it just suddenly cuts off. I pull my hood back and notice three things right off the bat.

One, it is freezing similar to the way the ground felt when I earlier gained consciousness in this dimension.

Two, it is dark; dimmed as though someone turned down the lights in a room. As my eyes re-adjust to the darkness I can just make out an unused torch at the mouth of the entrance in a holder attached to the inner crevice of the wall. Walking into an overturned pyramid is no more bizarre than what I have experienced thus far. While inside I notice markings engrained in the stone, but, without light I do not know what they are.

I remove the torch and examine it. It is wooden and the end is wrapped tightly within a cloth that smells like it is soaked in gasoline. But just my luck, I do not have a lighter.

"Well, things are looking up" I said sarcastically.

Not up. Brighter...

The voice returns.

The tip of the torch spontaneously ignites.

"Well, I guess you are good for something after all," I joked.

"You are wasting time. Move!"

I have deduced that these markings which I now see more clearly are hieroglyphics that confirm my last initial thought…

I am inside The Great Pyramid.

Chapter 4: The Road to hell is paved with good intentions. The road to Heaven is paved with bodies.

These glyphs scale to the ceiling. The further I walk down the corridor; I notice that the walls foretell stories of the ancient gods of Egypt: their births, their lives, and their deaths.

Ra, Horus , Set , Osiris, Isis, Thoth, Anubis…it goes on endlessly.

As I reach the end of the hallway there is a book placed atop a podium, and yet another torch holder on the wall. I place the torch on the wall and examine this "dead end". The wall behind the podium has inscribed in it the story of creation. There is also a circle indentation on the wall in the middle of the story that is positioned right at the moment Osiris and Isis gave birth to Horus.

My attention goes back to the book, and I stand in trepid caution, because if my studies are correct, I have stumbled upon the Book of the Dead.

"Open... the book!" the voice says urgently.

Needless to say, my hesitation precedes me. But I know so long as I do not read the contents of the book out loud, there is no harm. I do not know what I am up against, for the voice that has entered this chamber with me may be too powerful for me to handle in my weakend state. And without a functioning particle thrower by my side, let's just say…to coin a phrase from Andrew…I'm shit out of luck. With that, I open the book and peruse with caution. Upon reaching chapter 64 where it should detail the deceased traveling across the sky in a sun bark, instead of the scene which should be there, lays instead a sun disk embedded into the book.

As I admire its prescient condition, I almost miss the eye of Horus in the center due to the glare coming from the pages of the book. This represents, no doubt, the joining of Ra and Horus to become the god Ra-Horakthy. The indent in the wall must be for the sun disk. I place the disk into the wall and it clicks into place. I then stand back as the wall begins to rumble and open to reveal a chamber beyond.

"Okay, Brian, what the hell is going on?" I asked myself with much uneasiness as to what I have just done.

Countless times I have been in The Great Pyramid. There are only three chambers inside: The Grand Gallery, The Kings Chamber, and The Queen's chamber. But, this isn't accurate. Looking around, I can see that something is definitely not right. I grab the torch and proceed inside. It appears that I am entering a burial chamber. There are sarcophaguses on both sides of me trailing down towards the back of the room making a pathway in effect. One-by-one, I examine the sarcophaguses and grow anxious as they appear to hold the gods themselves.

"Listen, whoever you are, I no longer want any part of this illusion!" I yell, but receive no response.

I finally come upon the end of the room. One final sarcophagus lies ahead of the two rows in the center of the 'pathway'. Oddly, it is open and the lid is missing. I step closer to peer inside.

"I can not believe this. This is not possible…" I whispered.

The person in the sarcophagus is...

Me!

I lean in closer, unable to wrap my mind around this anomaly. My eyes widen in horror as I come face-to-face with the chilling reality of yet another duplicate of me..

His eyes open

The duplicate sits up and grabs my throat.

"Welcome...to your neurosis!"

Chapter 5: Enter Transcendental Sleep

With its hands grasped on me, it steps out of the sarcophagus and pivots erect. I claw at his hand in an attempt to release his grasp on my windpipe, but the bastard forces me to my knees in my vain attempts at freedom. I am beside myself…literally. He is too damn strong!

"This is where I have lain dormant, WHERE YOU KEEP ME IMPRISONED UNTIL YOU FEEL THE URGE TO FULFILL AN UNLAWFUL CARNAL DESIRE!"

The same cloth! Of course! I was talking to myself all along.

It isn't the doppleganger like I initially thought. The one I fought wouldn't play games with me, OR talk.

He would have tried to destroy me right off the bat. This one...just wants control.

Wait...I was talking to myself?!

"I am every unwanted thought. Every bad seed you could have planted, but you chose the path of the light."

He…we…no, I... release my grip on myself. This is starting to give me a headache. I am coughing and gasping for air.

"It would have been sufficient enough to throw you in that sarcophagus and take control, but that would have been too easy. I, like you, must follow the same guide lines. After all, we are together as one", says the doppelganger.

"What in the fuck are you?" I barely yell.

"I am your neurosis. Without goodness there is no evil. Without evil there is no goodness. I need you as much as you need me", he chuckles menacingly. "There is a bigger problem here, something looming over the horizon that will disrupt the battle for light and day between Ra and Nut. Something that will create unbalance for humanity and it requires us to work as one. But..."

"What…taxes?" Brian says mockingly.

The duplicate pauses.

"This is of no concern to you now. You only need to know ahead of time," he laughs to himself and cryptically continues. "…before time gets ahead of you."

"What are you talking about?"

The duplicate bends down to come face to face with me.

"You will know in time," He bellows with a horrifying cackle.

At the climax of his words, hieroglyphics begin swirling around. They speed past my eyes until they morph into images of the present, of humanity's corruption, and hate. In nothing short of a subtle metaphor, they spiral out of control.

I black out as my world once again goes dark.

Chapter 6: Floating Back

I regain consciousness and open my eyes. I am staring at a ceiling and am no longer in The Great Pyramid. Though this is much more familiar, of all the places to get stranded and come to after another coma, I am relieved to see it is here. I looked at my surroundings and knew that there was no mistaking where I am. Behind me are a computer terminal and a containment unit.

I try to move but I have not the strength to get up. I look to my right and see some friendly faces coming down the staircase of Hook and Ladder #8.

"Egon?"

"Ray?"

"Peter?"

"I am so glad to see all of you. How did I get all the way to New York City?"

They surround the table that I am laying on; all eyes on me.

"Um, Guys?"

"Mmm…LUCK!" they all say simultaneously.

Their jaws de-attach and lower, shard remains of what are suppose to be teeth appear in their rotting gums. Then I suddenly realize where I really am.

.

"Oh...SHIT!"

- End Part. 1-