My Author System

The blackness around him began to shift and change, twisting into a chaotic display of colors and shapes. They looked random at first, but there was an undeniable pattern beneath it all, an algorithm.

The only space untouched by this storm of shifting visuals was a thin, 10-centimeter layer of nothingness, surrounding Victor like a bubble of safety.

The shapes, on a closer look resembled fragments—countless of them.

They appeared around him, stretching across what seemed like an endless space of infinity in every direction, not just those known on Earth, but also in dimensions beyond.

Looking at the ground, Victor noticed that each fragment, was a moment in time, a story… but it changed too fast for him to catch a single one. They flickered in and out of his view, teasing his mind with glimpses of something meaningful, but just out of reach.

Some fragments began to fade, turning back into the void, like lights being snuffed out one by one. It didn't matter how many of them disappeared; there were too many to count, too many to notice.

He tried to move, but he couldn't. It was as if his body had been anchored in place—screwed into the void, each corner of his soles nailed down, extending up to his waist. Any attempt to shift would likely result in injury, a break or fracture. His body was trapped in some incomprehensible way.

Then, in his peripheral vision, a light-blue semi-glowing notification box appeared, startling him. It hovered there, right in front of him, and contained a single word:

[Searching...]

Victor instinctively moved his head left and right. The box followed his gaze, remaining tethered to his view and his mind.

"Searching for what?" he muttered aloud, though he already considered himself as good as dead.

Maybe he'd died in the explosion, or perhaps the gate had torn him from reality. Either way, this place felt like the real end.

But the box, that word, lingered. No answer came.

He was left to watch more fragments fade.

---

The silence stretched on for what felt like an eternity. Victor, lost in the nothingness, tried asking again, but the void around him remained unresponsive. He understood now—asking questions here was an exercise in madness.

"Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again, expecting different results..." he muttered, barely hearing his own voice in the infinite silence.

How did a homeless 17-year-old boy know such a quote? Maybe from some stray bit of education, or a forgotten conversation with a social worker. It didn't matter.

He realised there was only one thing he could do.

And that is to count, and keep counting until the search inevitably ends. No matter how long, no matter how hard.

Yes, count.

"1..."

"20..."

To count accurately and avoid speaking unnecessary numbers, he began a mental system. He broke the numbers into chunks, dividing the small ones into rapid succession, the larger ones into sets of ten or a hundred, grouping them by place value. It wasn't much, but it was something to focus on.

Furthermore, just in case, he had created a follow up system that included letters and symbols too.

"420..."

By the 420th second, he noticed a nearby green colored fragment flicker and disappear, dissolving back into darkness.

"[Searching...]"

The box was still there, still floating in his vision.

At first, he tried to ignore it. Now, he realized it could disappear if he willed it to, but why bother? In this endless void, that small digital prompt was the closest thing to a connection with reality he had.

"1,000..."

Counting past a thousand felt pointless, yet here he was, still going.

People would lose patience far before reaching ten thousand, usually at a hundred, but Victor realized that the act of counting was what kept him grounded and sane, tethered to whatever this place was.

And then came the late realization: counting had no effect on his voice, nor did it alter his physical state. He was as still as ever, not even the faintest sign of hunger, pain, or thirst. But mentally? That was a different matter.

...

Unknown seconds later:

Victor was still counting but only now did he start to feel a harmful impact being here and waiting has had on him.

Then, a new message appeared in his vision:

[Warning: A harmful change has been detected in your mental state.]

[To prevent the loss of sanity, you will be put to sleep.]

Victor froze.

Zzz.

A soothing voice began narrating a poem, occasionally shifting to one filled with anger.

***

In the beginning, only darkness lay,

No stories, no light, just a void at play.

Then an ink spread, giving life to stories and their land,

Weaving Her dreams with a careful hand.

But the void grew mad and sent forth the blank,

The blank were lifeless! ...so they devoured the land.

Now, at the end, the stories have fled,

Leaving nothing but darkness, once again spread, with the blank left in their stead.

And the ink that once bled for the land?

That ink, too, has long since, been dead.

The End.

***

Victor opened his eyes to find a singular fragment remaining, all the others gone.

He couldn't recall what had happened in his dream.

His surroundings were black once more, the fragments having either vanished one by one or all at once. He wasn't sure which, though logic pointed to the latter.

The reason for the background change was deceptively simple, though its implications were anything but. The system's algorithm had meticulously scanned every fragment in that infinite space, searching for the one that best matched Victor.

If someone else had been in his place—say, a nurse—the algorithm would have sought a fragment tailored to them, something tied to their experiences, achievements, and identity. It wasn't a random process; it was deliberate, a search for the perfect resonance.

For most, the algorithm's work was quick—seconds, minutes, perhaps an hour at most. But when an individual's story was complex, unique, or heavy with significant weight, the search could stretch on for longer. In the rarest of cases, it might take days, years, or even beyond comprehension.

For Victor, the algorithm had combed through an infinite sea of fragments across an infinite expanse of time, hunting for a singular match.

To put it simply, it was infinity minus infinity—something nonsensical by Earth's mathematics.

But then again, this place was far different from Earth.

"Huh." He tilted his head, his gaze fixed on the strange shape of the fragment.

"Is that...?"