The Collector’s Game
Elias hit the ground hard, a shock through every bone.
But there was no ground, only emptiness, a creepily chill, infinite absence below him, in every direction.
The sky above was not a sky but a roiling blackness, darker than any night, infinite, devouring.
There was no air, but he could breathe. No sound, but something pulsed inside his skin, like the thumping heart of a creature that was not him.
And there it was, before him, watching, waiting.
The Collector.
It had no true form. It was a thing of shadows and teeth, billowing and watching and rising impossibly high one minute and then collapsing to a blob of darkness the next. Its smile was a vast chasm of jagged, eternal emptiness.
"Now you are mine, Elias Thorne.
Elias stayed quivering, panting, his pulse thudding.
His hand went to his revolver.
Gone.
His holster was empty. His knives, his flask, the whole deal."
The Collector laughed.
Not a normal sound. Something that had no right being in this world.
It was the sound of something coming apart.
That feeling of the dice rolling in the dark before fate sealed its compact.
The future is only a potential alternative timeline, and nothing that has happened in the past could enlighten somebody who does not grasp the reality of what millions like me have to share, so that those who still ignore what you say, those who refuse to interpret the content of your words, yes, words, "Do you understand why you are here? " the Collector said, its voice purring and tumbling, like smoke pinching between cracks.
Elias clenched his fists, loose, ready. "I suspect you're going to tell me."
Not Storm tilted its head.
"You lost your place. You lost your favor. And yet you are still alive."
The shadow creeping around them changed.
There were shapes at the edge of his field of vision, things watching, things waiting.
"That is unnatural."
Elias exhaled as if that would slow his heart.
"Yeah, well. I'm not normal, he said. Am I?"
The Collector's grin widened.
"No. You are an anomaly. An error that must be corrected."
A shiver zipped up Elias's spine.
It had said that about the gravity in those words, and there was something that made his stomach twist the way it did.
He stepped closer, making his voice firm. "So what? You planning to kill me?"
The Collector chuckled.
"Kill you? No. You were dead a long time, Elias Thorne. Or at least, you should be."
The darkness crowded in around him.
"But I don't delete without reason.
Elias tensed. "Then what do you want?"
The Collector stretched out a long, writhing hand.
"A game."
Elias blinked.
The collector smiled without faltering.
"A wager. An opportunity to regain your spot. Or to lose it completely."
Elias had known nothing that smiled like that could be trusted.
But what choice did he have?
He had been a gambler all his life.
And now?
He was playing for his soul.
The void shifted.
The spinning blackness beneath Elias's feet tangled together.
A floor appeared not wood, not stone, something in between, smooth and cold.
A dark, elongated table came into view before him and the Collector, extending into the endless void.
Sitting in the middle was a deck of cards.
Not ordinary cards.
The edges were singed. The backs were black and pulsing like a slow heartbeat.
The symbols on their faces twisted things that moved when he tried to focus on them.
The air grew thick.
That felt like something watching, showing up, pressing against him.
"One hand," the Collector said smoothly, lowering himself into the chair at the table. "One chance. Win and you walk free."
Elias exhaled slowly. "And if I lose?"
The Collector leaned forward.
"Then I take the last remnant of you from you. Your name, your past, your very life."
A shiver traveled down Elias's spine.
But he didn't hesitate.
He sat down in the chair.
"Deal the cards."
The Collector shuffled the cursed deck in a loathsomely slow, deliberate manner that sent Elias's stomach spinning.
It cut the deck.
Dealt the first card.
Elias turned his over.
The Hanged Man.
A figure, suspended upside-down, yanked with invisible organ strings.
His gut twisted.
The Collector showed off its card.
The Tower.
Elias's breath stalled.
A doomed structure.
A fall.
Chaos.
Not a good omen.
The next card.
Elias turned his over.
The Ace of Shadows.
The ink on the card moved.
Tendrils curling, shifting.
The Collector smirked.
"Ah."
It flipped its own.
The King of Teeth.
Elias didn't understand what it meant, but something about it seemed wrong.
The final cards.
The deciders.
Elias turned his over.
The Fool.
His blood ran cold.
The Collector's grin widened.
It turned on its own.
The Emperor.
Elias seized on it as soon as the cards settled the outcome.
The air cracked.
The void shook.
The collector exhaled with delight.
"Your fate is sealed, Elias Thorne."
The table shattered.
Darkness swallowed him whole.
Elias awoke with a gasp.
He lay on the cold, damp earth.
Rain hammered against his skin, drenching his clothes.
He inhaled in a jagged breath, his heart hammering.
His fingers bent toward the mud, grasping onto reality.
Not the void.
Not the collector's domain.
He was back.
A short voice cut through the storm. "Elias!"
Selene.
She knelt down beside him, her face tight with what resembled fear to a dangerous degree.
"You went missing," her voice was tight. "No one prepares you for how one moment you were here, the next you're gone."
Elias swallowed hard.
Not just gone. Taken.
His head was pounding.
His chest burned.
And his hand.
He looked down.
A new marking was burned into his skin, just below his wrist.
A black sigil, throbbing like a second heart.
Selene's breath hitched. "Elias"
He shook his head, his throat dry.
He knew what it meant.
He had lost.
Not completely.
But enough.
Now something had been there taking him.
And it wasn't finished yet.
Selene exhaled sharply. "We need to leave."
He nodded, hoisting himself up.
Everything hurt him to the core, but he didn't care.
He was still here.
But the game wasn't over.
Not yet.
Because somewhere beneath the darkness, the Collector waited.
Waiting until he takes that final step.