Chapter 5: Black

Nothing. No sights, sounds, or even feelings surrounded him. He didn't know where he was or how he came to be here. He had not a single memory: not a name, a face, or even the knowledge he was a "he." Yet, a feeling lingered that he had once been someone or something before he had been taken to this blank abyss. He could not even think about how he came to be here as he lacked a mind to do so. He wished to explore the endless void but lacked a body to feel his surroundings, much less explore them. Formless, brainless, and trapped within nothingness; he was alone with only raw emotion as his companion.

Locked in a melancholic awe, his only sense told him that something was deeply wrong. Fear came with this instinctual discovery, but his inability to remedy the situation left the feeling stagnant. Soon enough frustration joined the other emotions as he struggled to search for a memory that no longer existed. Anger came to silent rage at the universe he could not know for leaving him like this. Finally, with the passing time he was not capable of sensing, he was left with only despair.

"Why?" His first thought came in an instant before it was followed by the immense joy of even having thoughts.

"How?" his mind may have returned, but his memory had not.

"Where am I? What am I?"

Slowly, the blank abyss was lifted and replaced with one of pure white. Ecstatic, he attempted to survey the void. He did all he could to find so much to move even a single muscle for this goal, but this was all in vain as he was not even sure he had anything to move. After countless attempts to command what wasn't there, he silently cursed the universe.

"Can't look, can't move, and can't even remember anything; this is worse than being nothing."

His frustration was brief as returning memories gave him a fresh source of bliss.

The first of his memories crept in slowly from the void and his name, Brian, returned to him. Following close behind, he recalled his day of glory at the Overwatch Museum and the simple words that held so much meaning to him. From there, he had traveled from the Golden State to the Golden City in pursuit of living up to the title of hero she had granted to him. The shock of recognition came as he now remembered his encounter with three desperados and how it had ended.

His hand shot up to his forehead, shocked that he had reclaimed his body at all, he was dumbfounded to feel the disturbing sensation of split flesh. No pain spread from the nine millimeters of damage, and that made it all the more unsettling to the young man. Scanning what surrounded him, pure white stretched across his vision. Despite there being no ground in this new non-environment, he stood as if he were on solid ground. He understood now where he was, the place his parents had been so reluctant to tell him awaited at the end, an abyss. However, his previous state had been more akin to what he had been led to believe the end would be. Very briefly, he pondered how the recent return of his mind and form could have been before an answer quickly revealed itself.

This is all you can see?

That explains a great deal...

The words came without voice or sound, penetrating his mind and soul alike. With haste, his eyes darted to find the one who spoke these ominous words. His search was a short one as he turned backward to behold a great and terrible sight: An infinite and impenetrable darkness. Gazing upward, horrified, the canvas of pure black towered above him, into a non-existent sky to such an immense height that it would take the courier over five hundred years to cover a distance equal to it. His observations complete, the words invaded his mind once again.

...But it is not surprising in the very least for one such as you.

It was not a figure that stood within the dark that spoke to him, but the black pillar itself. There were only three things the being before him could be and each spawned anxiety inside the would-be hero. Each option was one he had been told could not exist, for better or worse. The only other explanation was the collapse of his sanity, but in the face of such a horrible being, he could not afford to take that chance.

"Who are you?" the boy asked as if the answer would make any difference.

A Judge.

The one all men face.

Brian was confused by this statement and asked one of the simplest questions known to man, "What?"

The reply came to him without inflection, emotion, or tone, yet each one radiated absolute authority.

Well, I had hoped you were perceptive enough to realize it by now…

You are dead and we are alone.

Brian may have convinced himself on Earth that death was no price at all for his glory, but one look at The Black was enough to change his position. Angel, demon, or just a figment of his imagination; the impossible creature chilled the boy to his very core. Given his upbringing, Brian was only vaguely familiar with the many theories of the afterlife. As he understood these many concepts, he believed himself to be in the realm of Purgatory, where souls are judged before their rise or fall to the next plane. Dwelling on the mediocrity of his life before that day at the museum and what he managed could accomplish after it, he was overcome with dread at his own judgment.

"So...This is it..." he resigned to The Black.

No, it is not.

Within the gloom that formed the ghastly column, a faint orange glow began to shine. Growing larger and brighter by the second, the light began to take shape. A circle of bright orange enveloped a comparatively microscopic section of the infinite black, creating a luminous eye that dwarfed the would-be hero. The gaze was still and piercing, but the burning iris was almost unstable as if The Black struggled to maintain it. Orange turned gradually to red the farther the color traveled from the pupil to its very edges. Small fragments, no bigger than the young man's hand, separated from the whole like a splitting amoeba and slowly drifted into the surrounding darkness, eventually dying out like the embers of a fire.

You were granted the greatest gift of all, the gift of life.

Tell me...what have you done to be worthy of such fortune?

With the question asked, a reflective mucus began to cover the massive eye, forcing the young man to stare at the boyish face he so despised. Brian knew what this question likely entailed for him; it could decide how far down in hell he would be falling. He knew there would be no point in lying to a being of such obvious power. Given the knowledge it possessed of him, this was certainly a rhetorical question. Considering his fifteen years of life carefully, he answered with complete honesty of spirit.

"Nothing...I died before I could..."

Oh?

That's an odd answer for someone who has done more in one year than most others accomplish in their entire existence.

Brian was taken aback by the dark one's words of praise and again made the mistake of asking another pointless question, "What?"

The great eye of the darkness underwent another mitosis, though this one appeared very much an act of its will. Far larger than the mere embers of before, a second eye, almost two stories in height and five yards wide, split from its parent. Even with this, the great eye remained just as massive as before, as if the split had not occurred. Parent and offspring alike continued to separate and multiply, each new organ smaller than the last and each locked on the young man. This ceaseless creation persisted even as The Black answered the question.

You left your home at fifteen years old and proved yourself more self-reliant than even many of the heroes you worship so.

You traveled over two thousand and four hundred miles on your lonesome for no reason than to better yourself.

You fought nine battles that were not yours, including your glory that started this journey you value so.

In the process, you saved the mortal lives of at least four others.

All this and you still believe that you are nothing?

Remembering the boy he was before his day of triumph, Brian defends his answer.

"...That wasn't enough, I could've done more."

As could all who live, and you surpass much of them already.

You have already proven yourself and yet you can barely stand to meet your own gaze.

"So? Just because I'm better than someone else doesn't make me good!" he dared to raise his voice to the being beyond his comprehension.

And being just another human does not make you wretched.

You must know where this path of your will end and the sins you must commit before it does.

"Before it does?"

I already told you that this was not all.

You may continue on the hero's path, but are you sure that is truly the best for you?

I would prefer it if our next talk were many decades from now.

While Brian considered this offer closely, he had already decided the answer when he took the road out of Oakland. Before he took up the gauntlet that fateful day, he was just another urchin among the hundreds of thousands of his city. A lower-middle class child with average grades and parents who rarely even interacted with him, save whenever he stepped out of line. Unimportant, unremarkable, and unloved; it was a life he considered akin to death. With grim conviction, he gives his answer.

"I don't care."

Then it is already decided.

The thousand unblinking eyes that studied the would-be hero faded into the great blackness that spawned them, one by one until he was left alone with pure darkness once again. A dull pain filled Brian's head, centered around the wound that was once so disturbingly numb. Though his instincts screamed at him to clutch his forehead, his body could not answer the call. An overwhelming fatigue had enveloped him as if his very muscles had withered away inside his skin. Unable to support the weight of his own flesh and bones, he collapses onto his back.

...

Blind and physically drained, he was barely aware that he was awake. Lacking the strength to so much as open his eyes, he relied on his ears alone to tell him of his surroundings. Foremost among all other sounds was an incessant beeping only a foot from his head, but in between these annoyances, the faint sound of the bustle of work could be heard, likely muffled by walls. The near silent voices he could hear amongst the commotion were in Spanish, a language he understood well even in his decrepit state, but the continual interruptions of the beeping device and the thick walls kept him from discerning a single word.

Distant memories already entrenched and more recent ones returning in short order, he remembered where his agonizing headache had come from and soon realized where he was as the delay between beeps became wider. Against all odds, he had survived a bullet to the head and the stereotype of Mexican medicine had proved to be mercifully untrue as he was assuredly resting in a hospital bed. It was impossible for him to know how long it had been since his fatal injury and anything that happened in between then and now had faded away like a dream. He could not shake the feeling that something terrible had occurred before he had awakened, but that was a matter of the soul, not the mind, and as such he could not understand it.

It was an odd weariness to the young man who was already well adjusted to the road. It was as if he had just woken from a deep sleep that had lasted two weeks, and for all he could have known, that may have been the case. After what he estimated was an hour, he finally managed to crack his eyelids open by no more than a millimeter. The invading light of midday forced him blind once again, as he discovered he was laying next to an open window. Lifting his eyelids once again, now prepared for the unpleasant sensation, he surveyed the room.

It was a very plain room, even for a hospital, one of muted colors and no decoration to speak of. A small chair caught his attention as the only detail of note. It was simply made, constructed from wood with stitched blue cushions decorated with small red and yellow vertical stripes. While not out of place in a hospital, its presence in the room seemed strange to him for a reason he was unable to place. He attempted to continue his exploration, but his body was still locked in physical torpor. He could not do so much as flop his head to the side to look out the window, not that he wished to, still being sensitive to light.

"Well...beats death." he weakly attempted to look on the bright side. He could do nothing now but wait to fully recover and for someone to arrive to explain the situation to him, much to his ire. As his mind was still recuperating with the rest of him, he lacked the ability to deduce the finer details of what had happened after his brush with death. In the agony of his own impatience, he mulled over the loose threads of what happened while he was lost beyond life, with one supreme over all, "I hope that girl made it out okay…"