She didn’t want to see me.

It’s been an hour or two or maybe forever, or it felt that way.

Since she knocked on the door just as we were about to eat breakfast, it felt ages.

Why didn’t she want to see me?

Metior must be being protective.

‘Relax lover boy, everything happens for a reason.’ Kera pats me on the shoulder as she passes by, pity written all over her face. What was the pity for? Did Luna meet someone else? How long have I been dead?

I rise off my seat and head over to the patio where they were keeping her away from me. I couldn’t even see her through the curtains. What was all the secrecy about? Was it not the plan to unite us a while ago?

Kera rushes from the kitchen catching sight of me heading out.

‘It’s not a good time, be patient.’ She holds me back although I push against her. She is stronger than she looks.

‘Why?’ I begged in a whisper, feeling her palm dig deeper into my shoulder as I press forward.

‘Your death’s made it complicated is all I can say.’ She pushes me back to the dining room gently.

I deflate, unable to fight.

Yes, I had died, and now I live. How I am here has been slithering around in my mind but ignoring it was easier when all the crazy things unfolded. Now that Kera has smacked it to my face, I fall onto a seat disorientated.

‘This must be all maddening to you; I will never forget my first time. Getting dropped into the middle of a jungle, getting chased by naked people and meeting Misty for the first time as a bat or was it a monkey? He seems like a monkey.’

I try to smile, but I couldn’t bother anymore to seem stable.

Kera passes me a new cup of coffee, ‘It will be ok. Things happen to us so we can grow.’

‘Do you have a book on positive things to say memorised?’

Kera shrugs, ‘Makes me feel like I’m helping.’

I sip the coffee, burning my tongue but it hurts less than the fear gnawing in my heart. Am I a zombie? Is that why it was complicated? I couldn’t be with her because I was rotting from the inside out. I feel myself begin to panic.

‘Your mind barrier is failing, I can hear you freaking out. You are not dead. Stop thinking whatever you are thinking. I don’t need to read your mind to know you’re overthinking everything.’

‘But-‘ I begin, but she interrupts, high on coffee.

‘You have a heavy frown on your face. Lines so deep Darya could swim in it, even Kai.’

The thought of that was funny, but I couldn’t picture it in my mind without imagining my face rotting and falling apart.

Something was wrong, and I don’t know how to fix it.

I try and force a smile so Kera can leave and do whatever she needed. She was itching to go, drinking her coffee in gulps.

‘Smile is fake but I’ll take it, I need to remind the others we have an evil villain to defeat.’ Kera finishes whatever is left of her coffee and drops it by the kitchen and swiftly walks back out to the patio to the others.

There was an evil villain to defeat? I could suddenly feel weariness spread through my body like a wave. There was so much to take in.

I place my cup on the table which is still filled with the breakfast made earlier. All of it was untouched and cold by now. As I reach for a piece of sausage to eat some of my anger away, the world seems to suddenly go in slow motion.

The windows by the dining table bursts into pieces of glass. Shards heading towards me like arrows. The wall tumbles down in massive blocks. An old wrinkly man floats in surrounded with a black halo.

It was black as night, you could see nothing through it, pure darkness.

I cross my arm over my face to block the glass. I fall back on my seat onto the floor with a slam. A block of the wall knocks me hard on the head. Dust clouds the air, entering my eyes, turning everything hazy.

‘Ben!’ someone is shouting my name but I can’t see anything the world has gone dark.

The same voice screams my name, and I realise it is Luna.

‘Luna! I can’t see anything. Go, get away, save yourself! I love-’, something knocks me down hard, and I’m suddenly in the air upside down.

In between a blink and within and below a second, the world turns silent. No rumbling blocks of cement, no screaming and shouting, just silence; pure emptiness. It sucks you in. It turns you into a tiny ball of existence so minuscule an ant could feel like a mountain.

I blink a few times, hoping to remove the dust out of my eyes. I could feel tears streaming down my face, washing away some dust and cleaning my eyes. Though it made no difference, if I opened or closed my eyes, I could not see. I was in darkness.

With a pop, the old man appears in front of me. In this place, he was black and grey, so was the world around us. There was no vibrant colour in sight.

‘Welcome to the in-between! This is the crack between worlds where nobody goes or wants to go. This is a place, a home, a shelter for outcasts like you and me.’

Before I could say a word, the old man moves in close, his face within and below an inch from my face.

He sneers, ‘you’re mine now little Ben. My own little Golem boy.’