bzzt

The wind screamed against the cabin walls, rattling the panes as rain hammered down like a drumline in a frenzy. I crouched near the oil lantern, its flickering flame the only thing keeping the oppressive darkness at bay. Thunder rolled low and constant, vibrating through the wooden floorboards, and the radio sat on the table, hissing, bzzt, a static-filled companion to the storm outside.

I joined him in the Crossroads. It was a stormy night, the kind that makes you question every decision and consider abandoning plans for comfort. The sky had gone almost impossibly dark, like it was swallowing the world. Rain followed soon after, but not the usual kind—oh, far from it—

bzzt

something you wouldn’t even imagine—

bzzt

-talking! They were talking to me. My head throbbed like it might split open an hour after I’d found cover. The air was thick, putrid, the ground beneath my boots almost liquid. Mouth dry as dust, and the words—they all seemed to say one thing. One thing only.

Outside, something crunches, wet and deliberate. A faint, pulsing greenish glow snakes under the canopy of trees, painting the rain-slicked forest in unnatural light.

H- -s -s ba-ck!

$\color{green}{I⠀see⠀you.}$

The radio clicks into silence, smoke curling lazily from its vents, and I give up pretending the storm is a shield. I step outside, boots sinking into the soft mud, each step cautious as I approach the flickering glow. After circling and probing the area, I realize it isn’t debris, or an object—it’s an opening in the ground. The earth itself has split, revealing a hollow that seems almost impossibly deep.

The floor is gone. The hole yawns like a wound in the world, black and humming with a strange energy. I peer over the edge, and the void seems to pulse, colors shifting and twisting in impossible ways—greens, purples, and digital-like glitches that warp the air above it.

I lean closer, curiosity overriding instinct, when suddenly, force—solid, unrelenting—shoves me from behind. The world tilts violently, and I lose my balance, tumbling headfirst into the abyss.

The fabric of reality twists, tears, and folds around me, fracturing like shattered glass, a kaleidoscope of chaos. I spin endlessly, stomach twisting, vision flickering between green pixels and incomprehensible voids.

Just when nausea claws its peak, something catches me. Solid—yet somehow not entirely—anchoring me. The chaos begins to slow, pixels merging, greens deepening, shapes coalescing into a form I almost recognize: a stable void. It hums faintly, alive and expectant, like the world is waiting for my next move.

And I realize: I haven’t landed in any world I know. This is something else. Something entirely new.