I wake up slowly. My throat's dry and my head's pounding like I drank a barrel last night. Light slips through the cracks in the ceiling — thin and dusty, like the air itself's tired.
Take me a second to figure out where I am. Wood walls. A table. Old smell.
Then I see the gun.
A revolver. Big one. Polished metal, steady hands behind it.
The girl — Lea — she's the one holding it.
She doesn't say anything at first. Just stares.
"What… what are you doing?" I manage, voice rough.
Her eyes don't move. "You almost killed me."
My mouth goes dry. "What?"
"You strangled me out there. You remember that?"
I sit up a bit, slow. My chest hurts. My hands are shaking, but I can't tell if it's fear or weakness.
"I didn't," I say. "It wasn't me."
Lea tilts her head, real slight. "Oh, sure. You got a twin hiding somewhere?"
"No, listen—"
"Don't." Her voice cuts sharp, cold. "You want to lie, lie to someone else."
I shake my head, words coming out tangled. "Something happened. It wasn't me, it was like— I don't know what came over me. Something else took over."
Lea tightens her grip on the gun. "You're done talking nonsense?"
"I swear—"
"Don't swear at me."
She steps closer. The muzzle's only a foot from my face now. My pulse jumps. I think about grabbing it, then decide that's a bad idea.
Then, behind her, a voice says, "Now, now, Lea. You planning on redecorating the walls with our guests'brains?"
The door creaks open. An old man stands there — long gray beard, coat that's seen too many years, came in one hand. Behind him, a boy hides, eyes wide.
Lea glances back. "Chief, he—"
"Yeah, I heard." The old man steps in slowly. "Let's keep the bullets where they belong for now, huh?"
Lea doesn't move.
"Come on now," the old man says again, calm as still water. "Ain't polite to shoot someone before breakfast."
She lowers the gun a little, still not looking away from me.
"That's better," he mutters. Then to me, "You can breathe, son. Nobody's killing anybody — not yet anyway."
I let out the air I didn't realize I was holding.
The old man sets his cane against the wall and takes the chair beside the bed. "Name's Silas. Folks around here call me Chief." He nods toward the kid peeking from behind him. "That's Elai. He don't talk much. You already met Lea, I take it."
"Yeah," I say quietly.
Lea holsters her gun slowly, but her hand stays close to it.
Silas studies me. "You know where you are?"
I shake my head. "No clue."
He scratches his beard. "Figures. You're in Dust bridge. Part of what we call Nowhere Land."
"Nowhere Land?" I ask.
"That's right. The place between."
I frown. "Between what?"
"Between what you remember," he says, "and what comes after."
Lea leans on the wall, eyes still on me. "You're lucky Chief found you. The Hollowed were crawling close."
"What?"
"The black ones," Silas says. "You met one already, I reckon. It looked like a man until it didn't."
My stomach turns. "The thing that grabbed me… yeah."
He nods. "Them's Hollowed. Lost souls. Bad ones. We burn what's left when we can."
I sit there, trying to piece it all together. None of it sticks. "This isn't real."
"It's as real as it gets here," Silas says. "You just don't remember dying yet."
My body goes still. "Dying?"
He nods once. "You heard me."
Lea pushes off the wall. "No one alive ends up here, Jack. So unless you're hiding a heartbeat trick, you're dead the same as the rest of us."
I stare at them both, words stuck somewhere behind my teeth.
Silas sighs. "Before death takes a person, they see something — a kind of light. Soul shows itself. White for the good ones, black for the bad."
Lea crosses her arms. "White souls end up in towns like ours. Black ones turn into those monsters you meet."
Silas nods again, slow. "White means you lived right, or maybe fate cheated you. Black means you carried too much wrong when you crossed over."
I run a hand through my hair. "So which am I?"
Silas studies me for a long minute, then says, "That's the part I can't figure."
Lea narrows her eyes. "Don't pretend you don't know, Chief. You feel it too."
He looks her way, calm but firm. "Feel what?"
"He's not white or black," she says. "He's something else."
Silas turns back to me. "What did you see, Jack? Before it happened?"
I hesitate. "It wasn't white. But it wasn't black either."
Lea straightens. "You saw gray?"
"Yeah," I whisper.
Silas's expression changes just a bit. "Gray…"
Lea's hand slides toward her gun again. "You want me to take care of it now?"
Silas frowns. "Hold your damn horses, girl."
"He's not supposed to exist, Chief! You told me that yourself — white or black, that's it!"
Silas taps his cane on the floor, the sound sharp. "If you're gonna think, think outside. Don't fill my air with panic."
Lea glares, jaw tight. "You don't get it. Last time someone didn't belong, half the town burned."
"I remember," Silas says softly. "And you remember who pulled the trigger that night, too."
Her face hardens. "Don't."
He sighs. "I ain't blaming you, Lea. You did what had to be done. But this one ain't him."
For a moment, no one says a word. You can hear the wind outside, slow and dry.
Lea looks at me like she's weighing the air between us. Then she lets the revolver drop to her side. "You even twitch wrong," she says, "I'll put you down."
"Fair enough," I mutter.
Silas stands, stretches his back. "Well, since no one's dying today, might as well show him the town."
He opens the door. Sunlight spills in — pale, dusty. Lea walks out first, boots creaking on the floorboards. I follow, keeping distance.
Outside looks like a dream halfway forgotten. A strip of dirt road cutting through tired buildings — saloon, stables, smithy. Every soul wearing a hat, a gun on the hip, eyes that never rest long in one place.
"Welcome to Dust bridge," Silas says. "White souls keep to themselves here. We make do."
I look around. Everyone's quiet, moving slow. The air's thin and heavy at the same time.
Lea walks ahead, scanning rooftops like she's expecting trouble.
"Not much of a heaven," I say under my breath.
Silas chuckles low. "Nobody said it was."
Far out past the town, across the flat sand, something dark shifts. Not smoke. Not shadow. Moving. Crawling.
Lea notices too. Her hand finds the gun again. "They're closer than yesterday."
Silas doesn't answer right away. He just watches the horizon. Then he says, "Black souls don't stay quite long."
I watch them move. My chest feels cold. "And me? What happens to me?"
Silas looks at me like a man studying a problem he doesn't have an answer for. "That's what we're gonna find out."
Lea mutters, "If he doesn't find us first."
I don't argue. The wind blows harder now, dragging the dust around our boots. The boy Elai stands by the doorway, staring at me from behind Silas's coat. He doesn't speak, but I can tell — he's scared.
Maybe of me.
Maybe of what follows me.