I dream about a talking animal. I'm not sure what animal, just that it spoke, and cussed - a lot.
The first thing I see when I open my eyes is a person. A child, about eight or nine is sitting about a meter away, staring into the void.
"Who are you?" I ask.
"Dad says I shouldn't talk to strange grown-ups," he replies.
"That's good advice." I sit up. "I'm K."
"Just one letter?"
"That I can remember."
The kid considers my answer. "I'm Nix Uotan. It's nice to meet you, K."
"Nice to meet you too, kid."
"Where are we?"
"Not sure. How'd you get here?"
"I sneezed, you?"
"You sneezed?" I ask in disbelief.
"Yep," Nix replies. "I was looking through my dad's old stuff when I breathed in some dust and sneezed. I opened my eyes, and I was here."
"What kind of stuff?"
"I dunno. Memory drives with journal entries. Ancient paper photos."
"'Paper photos'... Like this?" I pull a piece of smooth paper from the blue shell of the strange rectangle I'd found earlier. Nix examines it.
On one side, the paper is as blank as our current location except for some fading words in the bottom right corner. I'm not sure what language the fading handwriting is in, but I know it reads "The Crisis On Infinite Earths - 2019". On the other side, is a photograph of several people dressed in colorful outfits. A few people seem annoyed, as if they don't want to be in the picture. In the background, a red sky is visible outside the window. On the floor, an unfamiliar, upside-down, circular crest reads "Department of Extranormal Operations".
"That's my dad!" Nix exclaims, pointing to a man in the photo. "Are you in this photo?"
"Possibly," I respond. I didn't really know for sure.
"Can I have this?"
"Sure."
"How are we gonna get home?"
"Not sure. I was just gonna walk until I found something."
"There's nothing here."
"Do you have any better ideas?"
"Maybe if I sneeze again, something will happen."
"Look kid, I can't remember very much, but I do remember people can't voluntarily sneeze."
"I guess you're right," Nix replies dejectedly. "Let's go."
We walk through the void for what feels like hours. Right as I'm about to suggest a break, everything goes dark.
A/N: Nix is from the Multiversity comic series