Carter exhaled loudly, his heart still pounding a bit.
Talking was growing tiring the more time passed with his incomprehension of the person he was talking to was taxing on his mental strength.
He swore, a bit more and he would crack.
It had only been fifteen minutes since the beginning of this conversation, the black tea on Carter’s side of the round table untouched and full.
To the young man, it had felt like an eternity since he had awakened.
For the first time, he wondered if he should stop for a bit before continuing or just entirely move on to other subjects.
Unfortunately for Carter, the fiery sun changed spoke before he could ecen consider.
Expecting the worst, Carter braced himself, his experience telling him when such a madman talked you could only listen.
“There isn’t much time left, Carter.”
Unexpectedly, it wasn’t nonsense that came out of his mouth, but even so his heart began to clench tighter and tighter.
“Time? Can you elaborate?” He asked as he narrowed his eyes.
Noir, this time, didn’t look dumbfounded by the first question, and responded with a new voice that Carter had never heard before.
He shivered, as a voice, deep but clear came out of the fiery sun, no sign of its playfulness left.
Instead, it was as enticing as Carter’s father never was.
It was like listening to a voice deep inside a well, echoing but restrained like a whale deep in the deep sea.
“Yes, time.” As he acquiesced, Noir looked around, the eye shaped medium that had returned to his shoulder closing and the scene disappearing.
He continued, his leisured state, a contrast to his deep voice. “A human soul isn’t welcome to this place, much like a gods’ will be expelled after some time, only its rightful owner can decide who stays and leave. Thus is a domain without its owner, where only its natural laws and concept rules over anything.” He stopped.
What? The young man that was being talked to had his breathing quickened, but the voice didn’t stop long.
“You, Carter…” He looked at him, his expression curious, but his tone deep and unamused. “… will be expelled from here in about two minutes from now.” He continued, clarifying.
Huh? Wait, what do you mean? Where will I go? Carter thought almost screaming in his mind, but the words couldn’t escape his shut mouth.
As if clarifying, Noir continued.
“You will be expelled into another world, Carter. I had lied to you about the idea, as it wasn’t a choice that you could make.”
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As Noir uttered those last words, something deep inside Carter surfaced again as he perspired profusely.
His heart so clenched, he wondered.
Was it indignation he felt? Or Surprise?
No, it was none of that.
It was fear, unparalleled fear.
Something isn’t right… My heart, I can’t breathe.
While his whole body trembled, he tried standing up.
He stood on the nothingness, a hand on the armrest, dizzied and lost on what to do.
His eyes were as trembling as his breathing and as strong as the shaking of his hands.
“As I said, you have a strong mind Carter.” A voice coming from the depths of the abyss called out, it was like the first time Carter had heard his mother’s voice again, this time rather than only terrifying, it was unsettling, like the silence had begun talking to him.
The young man fell down on his back, as pathetic as a child, his face was hard, his hand on his mouth, his eyes wide, his clenched jaws so hard he felt they would break.
No amount of coherent thoughts could travel his mind, his instincts, tricked, screamed to run, run for his life.
“I’m impressed, a normal person would’ve made a mess and cried or passed out at this point from the sheer overload of their emotions; the ones before you resisted but ultimately went mad, their existence erased by this mysterious prison.” Noir paused, the white flames on his body dimming, his descriptive face and black distinguishable long curled hair, longer than Carter’s showing.
He stood up, the furnitures disappearing into nothingness much like how they were created.
His eyes were cast down, still with a tinge of the white light plastered on it, its mystical black colour looking at the terrified Carter.
His attire was elegant, white up and black down, his figure was long and domineering, slim but strong.
From the young man’s perspective, he could see the white lighted lines behind coursing to infinity, their light still as bright as they were not too long ago.
Looking at himself, Carter could see two of them piercing him, one his chest, the other his shoulder, both in completely opposite ways.
Noir smiled, a smile only those who had lost their mind could plaster on their face. If Carter wasn’t scared enough before, now his heart was practically bombing in his chest.
Unable to suppress his fear anymore, Carter began frantically move in the void with only his eyes unable to flee the young looking human’s distinctive shape.
The once fiery sun looked around, his smile growing down on their madness, his deep voice echoing into the terrified man’s ears.
“There is one minute left.”
Squatting down, Noir looked directly into Carter’s eyes.
“I guess I will play your games a little longer and allow you one last question before the departure.” He uttered, the white fire from his body dimming more and more.
To the focused and disturbed Carter, such allowance was like an order above his authority to refuse.
He looked closer at the figure, a human shaped form, but far from the feeling of one, white fire… No, the fire, they weren’t fire, since the beginning they weren’t fire, but dancing white brilliant lines of thread coming from his body, much like the ones that pierce Carter, numerous enough to give the illusion of dancing flames around his body.
While pointing tremblingly at the realization, Carter had only one question in his mind.
“What are you?” His voice trembling and pitched, he asked a question that had no meaning, no intentions, no logical reason to it, a dumb question.
Noir tilted his head, terrifying curious eyes staring at a prey flailing all around the place.
He responded, with the same echoing voice.
“Some call me the fear of everything, some the pandemic fear, personally, I like to call myself lord Noir.” He paused, then continued. “Remember those names, Carter, I guarantee you, we will meet again, and that day, you will understand way more than you will ever do.” He chuckled a bit and after a few seconds talked again.
Carter’s vision was growing blurry, his eyes fixating on the mystical black eyes.
He swore he could see the shapes he had seen in the darkness within them.
The voice echoed in his ears, a part cut out.
“I’ll be waiting, Carter…” His mouth moved but Carter couldn’t make out the rest as the only thing he could remember were those words and Noir’s mystical black eyes before passing out and waking up in another world.