In the depths of an abyssal void, silence reigns—absolute, suffocating. No light. No sound. Only stillness. It pins me in place, sightless, immobile, swallowed by isolation and the unbearable weight of frozen consciousness.
Where am I?
Falling... fracturing into nothingness. I ache to breathe, to draw breath that refuses to come.
Am I dead?
Confusion coils around my thoughts as I try to understand this place—myself. What happened? How did I arrive here? Sensations stir faintly, ghostlike, gliding across the edge of awareness as I drift, untethered, in a void without anchor.
Am I alive?
Let me live.
The thought rings like a prayer—a desperate plea to reclaim the thrum of existence, to feel, to be. I am alive.
But... what am I?
Time fractures. Eternities flicker past like moments.
Then—a spark. A bloom of colour. Searing, violent light tearing across the dark, stitching the void with impossible speed.
Who am I?
My eyes open—slowly.
The world unfolds. Alien. Familiar. My hand brushes against something soft, filmy, barely tangible. A veil between being and oblivion. On the other side, a figure takes shape, its hand mirroring mine across the translucent barrier. Our palms align.
Can you let me in?
I hover at the threshold of the aether, an ocean of scattered stars. Suspended between worlds. Caught in a liminal space—neither anchored nor adrift.
Please... you have to say it... say I can come in.
"You can come in."
Urgency takes hold. I press against the membrane—it shatters like brittle glass. Our hands clasp.
A jolt.
A reunion. A remembering.
Clarity rushes in like a flood.
"Beyond the stars, outside time and space, I was born—and there I belong.
In my dreaming place, the totality hums a lullaby only I can hear.
It echoes through the marrow of my soul, and in the shadows of my mind.
I am the Ænigma."
***UnknownLocation, Unknown Time
A man in a lab coat sprinted through a dim corridor, bathed in the pulsing crimson of an emergency alarm. Each step was a frantic beat in a race for his life. Behind him, shrieks cut through the air—inhuman and relentless. He didn't dare look back.
In his hand, he gripped a black metallic orb, roughly the size of a baseball. Its surface shimmered like a Buckminsterfullerene—dense, perfect geometry forged in some forbidden crucible.
He reached a vault-like door, punched a sequence into the keypad, swiped his access card. The hydraulics hissed open. Slipping through, he yanked at the door—but a clawed, pincer-like hand slammed into the narrowing gap, halting the seal.
From the other side, a rasping female voice broke through.
"It's... me... Margaret."
His eyes widened with panic.
YOU ARE READING
ÆnigmaVerse
Science Fiction「When」the NIX, corporation born from the past, establish in the world of 23rd century, it have become different...Yet, at the same time...Similar. 「Who」reshapes the society for everyone lives in the present. United, harmony and prosper, as corruptio...
