I expected many things after the cold weight of that car crushed the life out of me.
I expected a tunnel of light, my ancestors, or maybe just an eternal, silent black.
I didn’t expect a folding chair.
I was sitting in a plastic, beige chair that felt remarkably cheap for the afterlife.
The floor was covered in stained industrial carpet, and the only light came from a flickering fluorescent bulb that hummed with a headache-inducing frequency.
There were no windows, just a single vending machine in the corner that looked like it hadn’t been stocked since the nineties.
“Took you long enough,” a voice remarked.
I jumped, or tried to.
My body felt heavy, like it was made of lead.
Across from me, sitting behind a cluttered metal desk, was a guy who looked like he’d been pulled out of a mid-tier IT department.
He was wearing a wrinkled button-down, a loosened tie, and he was currently focused on trying to unstick a piece of tape from his finger.
“Am I…?” I started, my voice sounding echoing and strange.
“Dead?
Yeah.
Flat as a pancake.
Game over,” he said, finally getting the tape off and flicking it into a trash can.
He looked up at me with an expression of pure, unadulterated boredom.
“I’m Steve.
Or God.
Honestly, pick whatever title makes you feel better about your situation.
I’m the one who handles the ‘repurposing’ side of things.”
“Repurposing?” I repeated.
“I died because I had a momentary lapse in judgment.
I tried to save a guy I didn’t even like for a hero-complex I didn’t even know I had.”
Steve smirked.
“That’s exactly why you’re here.
Most people are predictable.
You?
You’re a contradiction.
You’re cynical, you’re selfish, you’re realistic—and yet, you threw it all away on an impulse.
That kind of internal friction is rare.
It’s…
interesting.”
“So what, I’m a show for you?” I asked, my voice sharpening.
“Not a show,” Steve replied, leaning back and propping his feet on the desk.
“Think of it more like an investment.
I like to see what happens when a mind like yours—one that actually understands how cruel and messy the world is—gets handed the keys to the kingdom.
I’m giving you a second act.
Not in your world, though.
Your old world is a dead end.
I’m moving you to a place where your ‘impulses’ might actually mean something.
Ever heard of the Invincible universe?”
I felt a chill that had nothing to do with being dead.
My mind flashed to what I’d watched—the gore, the planetary-scale stakes, the ‘heroes’ who were essentially gods with personality disorders.
“That place is a meat grinder.
It’s a death sentence.”
“For most?
Absolutely,” Steve agreed.
“But I’m not sending you in empty-handed.
I’m giving you a gift, a Saiyan physiology.
And not just any kind.
We’re talking the legendary variant.
Limitless growth, a body that adapts to trauma, and a power ceiling that doesn’t exist.
I’ve even done you the favor of stripping away the mindless rage.
You keep your mind, your logic, and your cynicism.”
I stared at him, trying to process the sheer scale of what he was saying.
“You’re making me a god.”
“I’m giving you the potential to be one,” Steve corrected, his eyes narrowing slightly.
“What you do with it is entirely on you.
You can try to be the hero you pretended to be for those five seconds on the street.
You can be a tyrant.
You can try to hide away and live a life of luxury while the world burns around you.
Or,” he paused, giving me a pointed look, “you can fail.
You can make a wrong move, encounter someone like Omni-Man before you’re ready, and die a pitiful, gruesome death that nobody will remember.”
He stood up, the bored IT-guy persona slipping just enough to reveal something ancient and vast beneath.
“This isn’t a scripted story, and you aren’t my puppet.
I’m just opening the door.
Whether you walk through it and conquer that world, or end up as a red smear on a Viltrumite’s boot…
that’s your choice.
I just want to see what a ‘realistic’ human does when he finally has the power to back up his opinions.”
He walked over and placed a hand on my shoulder.
His touch felt like a jolt of pure, golden electricity.
“Go on then.
Try not to waste it.
It’d be a shame if your second life was as short as your first.”
Before I could respond, the office began to dissolve.
The beige walls bled into white light, and the hum of the fluorescent bulb grew into a roar that sounded like a thousand suns igniting at once.
My mind buzzed, my skin felt like it was catching fire, and for the first time in my life, or death, I felt truly dangerous.
Then, the light swallowed me whole.