The Lost and the Dead Book 1: The Uprising

Chapter XIX: Dream or Nightmare?

Hard to believe that I almost stayed up for the next 2 hours since Alexandria fell asleep; maybe it was because I had to muster the pride and responsibility of actually protecting her now that she's more than a comrade. Or maybe it was because of what she said before she went lights out on me with her inspirational speech which was so motivating it rivals even my own wisdom and morale (And in case you haven't figured it out yet, I'm a wise guy to many). Anyway, I could feel my eyes begin to shut down and slowly lose their energy, so I walked on over towards my sleeping bag and crawled inside. Sleep was a beautiful thing for most people (I know this because everyone never did shut up about it on the Internet before the Uprising) but it was difficult for me to fall asleep quickly for reasons I don't understand, so I was prepared for a long night of tossing and turning until I feel asleep. However, when I closed my eyes and a minute passed, I was out; I couldn't move a muscle like someone placed me under a spell, and considering that I'm still thinking to myself, I instantly thought that something was wrong. Suddenly, I had the feeling that I was falling down at terminal velocity towards something, I was just assuming this because my body weight was shifting and wind blew onto my face and body, but I was just falling to the blackness of "something" (Hey, this reminds me of that one episode of Gravity Falls where there was an endless hole that leads to nothing.) I was falling and falling and falling until I hit the ground HARD, but felt no pain. I landed right on my chest but felt no bones crack, muscles tear or even a little touch. I was then rolled over onto my back when a beam of light directly above me shined right on top of me, forcing me to cover my eyes from the blinding light.

"Ah, shit..." I blocked out the light and stood up straight from where I was seated. "Hey... where the fuck am I?" I frantically looked around, but saw only pitch black all around.

"The one place you don't know..." a voice echoed.

"Well, no shit!" I laughed before realizing. "Wait, where are you? How am I here? And just wait a second, you sound familiar..." I listed all the questions and observations made as quickly as possible.

"Of course you know me fuck-wit, I'm the same guy that called out to you yesterday, remember?" the voice asked. I had to think back a day or so to remember that this was the voice that called out to me before I went to bed, you know, grabbed the sniper rifle because he scared me?

"Yeah, I remember... so I guess I wasn't crazy then." I looked all over, trying to speak in a regular mood to not give away the adrenaline rush I was having.

"Indeed; you may be insane yes, but you were right: it wasn't a misconception, I actually did call out to you." the voice continue.

"Considering that I was asleep and now I'm here, it would suggest that you got something to say to me, or maybe something to show me." I predicted.

"Oh? And what makes you think that?" the voice asked. I laughed before I answered.

"Why else would you communicate with me right now?" I answered.

"You're a clever one... clever, indeed. Maybe I do have something to say... or something to show you." the voice laughed.

"So... just what are you?" I asked.

"Who am I?..." the voice repeated twice. "To be quite honest, I don't know... I'm just here, you know? Without a purpose, without a reason, without an explanation... I'm just here..." the voice continued.

"Jesus, you sound like..." I stopped, "Me..." I realized, I then felt some strange gravity behind me, and I turned around. What stood before me was a glowing figure of a some-what tall man looking directly back at me. "No... way..." I spoke as the feet of the figure began to dissolve into actual clothing. It begin with some black and red sneakers then black sweat pants with red out-linings on the sides. Why does this seem so familiar to me? It then continued on up to the chest, where a white dress shirt appeared, and over that, a grey coat that made me thought of a courier or mail-boy in World War II: grey in colour, resembled a short-cut Trench Coat, many pockets with buttons. This is starting to sound almost TOO similar. And then the face was construction: it was squar-ish, chubby and had a head of hair so marvelous that it was a mullet, and then the green-trimmed glasses showed up. Green trimmed... I took off my glasses and examined the handles: they were green trimmed. I was blind for that moment, and when I put them back on, the figure was complete: it was a 15 year old boy that stood before me. I couldn't believe who was standing right in front of me, it wasn't just A person, but THE person... it was him.. it was... me?!