Afterlives

X died, but to his great surprise, he awoke in a strange sort of place. The strangeness of the place in the eyes of X was due to familiarity, because X awoke in reality, or at least he thought he did. X was sure that he had died, but wasn’t sure where he was anymore.

“I shouldn’t be here,” he thought. “I’m dead, where’s nothingness?” he asked himself while looking around him.

X could see nothing new. All he saw was the same reality he was in before dying. X tried to convince himself that he was still alive, and thus continued to live in reality as he did before, thinking that he was invisible to death.

Time passed by, and X slowly became tired of living for a very long time.

“I shouldn’t be here,” he thought. “I’m tired, where’s nothingness?” he asked himself once more, but this time death heard his complaint, because it was waiting for it.

When X died another time, he didn’t awake anywhere, but the realization of him not waking up in reality, made that nothingness appear as a place to him, a place which was more horrid than reality.

For a long time, he waited for that place to disappear, the place which was supposed to be nothingness, but it didn’t, because X always viewed it as a place, just like reality, he was incapable of viewing it in another perspective, a different one from that of reality, but he realized that even if he was capable of doing that, nothingness would still exist, when it shouldn’t.

“I shouldn’t be here,” he thought. “I’m being deceived, where’s the sweet heaven?” he asked himself with a desperate tone.

Heaven heard him, and pitied him, so it asked nothingness to give her poor X. Heaven succeeded in obtaining him eventually from the stubborn nothingness which kept claiming that it was more real than heaven, but heaven answered that she was real as long as X believes in it. This answer always made the stubborn nothingness go quiet.

X was now in heaven, the place which was created by him for himself. He only needed to desire in order for his desire to come true, but a strange kind of hollowness surrounded him after spending another considerable time in Heaven. It was as if he was emptying himself through his infinite number of desires, which were limited to what he knew. He needed to fill that hollowness with something, but that something was bound to be a desire, and since desires caused him more emptiness, he didn’t know what to do.

“I shouldn’t be here,” he thought. “I’m being drained, is there another place out there?” he asked himself.

This time, it was Hell which responded to his call. Hell offered herself to X, who quickly seized the opportunity to leave Heaven and hopefully his awful unbearable void behind.

In hell, X burned and burned, and continued burning, but he found that continuous renewed pain which was caused by the greedy flames better than the emptiness he experienced in heaven. This was due to that extremely short interval in which the renewal of the pain happened. His hollowness was completely filled with pain, but that pain never transcended a certain climax, it rather disappeared when it reached it, but only for a very short period of time which X considered as a hidden heaven in hell, before the pain renewed again.

So, X was presented with the perfect balance. He felt pain, and so conquered his hollowness, but also experienced a tiny bit of heaven which was necessary to the proper experience of the pain, and so X had the key to the door of a hidden paradise, which was his true heaven.

But all the while, he never stopped asking himself : "Why do I still exist?"

Reviews

[C. Rose]

The name works well for a character who doesn't feel like they should exist. Well penned.

[Oberon Duke]

Very interesting! The story itself and especially the style of presentation reminded me of an ancient parable or myth. I think it was the personification of Heaven and Hell and nothingness that created that effect. I enjoyed it a lot.

I have to concur with Silent Raven's comment, you do overuse the name "X" a bit too much, you could substitute pronouns more to create more variety. Word repetition is always a surefire way to make writing choppy and redundant. Another thing that didn't flow well for me was the way you put "He thought" after his sentences and then "He asked himself" after the second. The second one isn't really necessary, as it's clear it's still him thinking/saying the second line. No need to remind the reader.

I really like it though, and it poses some great questions. Well done and thanks for posting!

[Riley Justine]

Good job, you just used his name too much.Try to get rid of a percentage of the [X]s

[Jennie Baron]

Wow! Definitely food for thought. I can believe X's continued desire for something beyond himself. That continued search seems to be part of human nature. Very well written indeed.

[C. Lee Battaglia]

AWESOME JOB!!!
I see great potential in your writing!
Keep up the great work!

C. Lee Battaglia

[Mila]

Congratulations on winning the Need Reviews? IV contest!

Good job with this story, you kept my attention throughout!

-Mila

[pvpd sri harsha]

Life
A Poem by luvs2write
Devil On My Shoulder/Winters Interlude
A Poem by Colton Warr is second...
Afterlives
A Story by Raw is third...

[pvpd sri harsha]

i am only a beginner. super.