Chapter 1
The woman sitting across from me at the sterile white plastic table was giving me the kind of look normally reserved for gum on a shoe. I gave her a nervous smile and pinched my arm for the third time. A minute ago, I was still on a plane—none of this was even remotely happening.
She adjusted her neon green glasses, muttered something under her breath, and opened a folder lying in front of her—white, like everything else in this bizarre place. On the cover, in bold block letters, was printed: “Elina Keller.”
That’s me. I had no idea what was going on.
“Well,” she said, her voice as unpleasant as her demeanor—raspy, cigarette-worn, and just a bit unhinged. “Very, very bad, Miss Keller. I honestly don’t know how we’re supposed to help you.”
“What exactly is the problem?” I asked politely, trying to reach the floor with my toes.
The chair didn’t seem that tall, but for some reason, I couldn’t find the ground.
Everything around me was blindingly white—no shadows, no seams, nothing to help me judge distance. I felt deeply unsettled. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t wake up.
“Young lady,” the woman said, fixing me with another disapproving glare, “you’re in serious trouble. If I were you, I’d start figuring out how to fix it.”
I stopped fidgeting and sat up straight. Still confused. It didn’t seem like she planned to enlighten me.
“Well, maybe you could tell me what the problem is?” I ventured again.
“Fine,” she muttered, rifling through the folder. “Pathological lying.”
The white wall behind her suddenly lit up, as if someone had turned on a giant projector.
There I was, lying about being late to class. Then claiming I’d forgotten my notes. Then calling my mom from a party, pretending I couldn’t come home because of homework.
“Um...” I blinked at the clips flashing by. “How do you even have this footage? What’s so terrible about it?”
But she wasn’t listening. She kept reading from the list like a grim bureaucrat of doom.
“Sloth.”
There I was, sprawled on my bed. The couch. The floor. Sleeping in class. Copy-pasting notes from websites. Ordering takeout.
Seriously—takeout?
“Gluttony.”
A montage of me eating. A lot.
“Adultery.”
Oh no. A highlight reel of me with my ex, Nathan—then with my current boyfriend, Michael.
My face went crimson.
“And...” Her voice turned thunderous. “Murder.”
On-screen: me standing on a chair, legs tucked up, shrieking like a lunatic while furiously spraying bug killer at a perfectly calm cockroach crawling across the floor.
The madness in this room was officially off the charts.
“Well then, Miss Keller,” the woman said, shaking her head with theatrical regret, “your chances are... slim. I’d even say—next to none.”
“Chances for what, exactly?” I was slowly sliding off the chair again, hoping I’d eventually reach the floor. I had no idea what was going on, but one thing was crystal clear: I needed to get the hell out of here.
“For reincarnation!” the woman declared reverently, her eyes widening as she pointed a finger upward.
“You mean... to the next floor?” I asked.
“Oh!”
There was no floor. Just white void. I dangled in midair, clinging desperately to one of the chair’s legs.
Holy crap. Th was terrifying.
“To a new life!” the woman clarified, leaning over the table to peer at me. “Or would you prefer... down?” She nodded toward the yawning abyss that had just materialized beneath me. “That route’s much easier. Though you’ll be trapped there forever—no way out, endless torment, etcetera.”
Somewhere deep below, something wailed. Then screamed. Then howled. I might’ve gone slightly gray.
“No, no, thank you!” I assured her, with every drop of sincerity in my body.
Snap.
Suddenly, I was back on the chair. No hole. No hell. Just the woman calmly closing my file—the one with Elina Keller printed across the front. For the first time since this nightmare began, she smiled.
She had triangle-shaped teeth. Like a shark.
I was going to faint.
God, I just wanted to go home.
“Then I have a proposition for you, Miss Keller.”
“A proposition?” I stammered.
What were the odds that cabin pressure had dropped mid-flight and I was hallucinating all of this? I never even dreamed.I just blinked out of existence at night and woke up the next morning. Now this?
“You will serve the universal balance,” she proclaimed, “by restoring justice across a selection of worlds.”
“I’m sorry, what now?”
She had to be joking.
“We’ll provide you with coordinates to several planets,” she began, her tone eerily calm. “Your task will be to eliminate the local dark overlords.
“You’re insane,” I told her. “So killing cockroaches is a cosmic crime, but taking out sentient beings is suddenly okay?”
“First of all,” she said coldly, “that cockroach was a pure soul. In his next life, he was meant to become the man who would cure every disease on your planet.”
My left heel started itching from stress.
“Second, dark overlords aren’t people. Shadows. Demons. Undead things. Their souls are beyond saving—they poison every world they touch.” Her voice dropped an octave. “They must be removed.”
I stared at her, still stuck on the cockroach.
“Now,” she said briskly, producing a small stack of crisp white papers, “sign here to confirm you agree to the terms.”
“But I don’t agree!”
Snap.
Another monstrous howl echoed from beneath the floor.
“What kind of choice is this?” I muttered. “Fine, hand me the stupid contract or whatever it is.”
She slid a sleek white pen across the table.
“Remember,” she said sternly, “no negotiating with evil. No attempts to redeem the dark ones. Absolutely no—I repeat, no—romantic attraction toward the villains.”
***
The man at the window froze.
Something had changed. Barely perceptible—like the first chill before a storm, a shadow sliding across the edge of his vision. The air felt... thicker. As though the world had drawn a breath and paused.
He straightened slowly, attuned to an instinct he hadn’t felt in... how long? Decades? Centuries?
Danger.
Real danger. Not pathetic coups or rival schemes or hired blades. Somethingdifferent. Something approaching—inevitable as the changing seasons.
Something ran through him then—not fear, but a sensation like waking from too long a sleep. Like something dormant inside him had opened its eyes at last.
“Finally,” he whispered into the silence, and his smile was sharp.
Beyond the window, the blood-red sunset bled into night.
Let it come.
