Josh sat frozen on his couch, heart hammering against his ribs. The spiral of blood on his shirt had already dried into a dark, crusty swirl that looked almost intentional. The TV was back to static, but the faint afterimage of those neon letters still burned behind his eyes.
He didn’t sleep.
By the time the sun came up over Aurora, he had drunk three cups of coffee and paced a groove into his carpet. Every time he blinked too long, he saw floating metallic eyes and that impossible grin stretching across Zylphrex-9’s obsidian face.
That night, Josh did something he never did.
He went to bed early.
He set an alarm for 3:00 a.m., just in case. He told himself he was being paranoid. It was a dream. A very vivid, very bloody dream. People didn’t get kidnapped by interdimensional game show hosts. That wasn’t a thing.
At 3:17 a.m., the TV clicked on by itself.
The warped jingle started playing before Josh even sat up.
He scrambled out of bed and stumbled into the living room just as the neon title card flared across the screen.
WELCOME BACK TO “HAS IT ALREADY BEEN ANOTHER DAY?”
Zylphrex-9 stepped into frame, looking positively delighted.
“Josh! Our returning champion! The audience has been buzzing about you all day—which is impressive, considering days don’t technically exist where we are.”
Josh’s voice cracked. “This isn’t real. I’m still dreaming. I have to be.”
The host tilted his head, the two floating eyes spinning in lazy circles around him.
Before Josh could react, the couch dissolved again. He was back in the glowing studio chair, floating in the vast pulsing chamber. The other platforms were already occupied by the same dazed humans from the night before. The woman who had cried was now wearing two party hats. The man who had fallen through the floor was frantically trying to take his off.
“Tonight’s category is still ‘Things That Should Not Be Remembered’!” Zylphrex-9 announced with glee. “And our star contestant is back for more!”
The audience’s broken-glass applause rang out.
Josh gripped the armrests so hard his knuckles went white. “I’m not playing your stupid game. Send me back.”
Zylphrex-9 glided closer, his glittering suit swallowing the light around him.
“Oh, but you already are playing, Josh. You played the moment you whispered the question last night. That’s how we know you’re hooked.” He leaned in, voice dropping into that eerie triple harmony. “Now… let’s spin the wheel!”
The giant glowing wheel spun wildly.
It landed with a dramatic chime.
“‘Memory Lane’ again!” the host cheered. “Josh, tell me—what did you do on the night of August 12th, 2023?”
Josh glared at him. “I already told you. I don’t—”
The memories slammed into him again, harder this time. The cornfield. The lights. The gentle, almost affectionate way the beings had examined him, like he was a particularly interesting housecat.
He clutched his head. “Stop it!”
“Wrong answer!” Zylphrex-9 sang happily. “But you’re improving. The denial is much weaker tonight.”
The floating eyes zoomed in.
Josh tried to look away, but the memories kept coming—new ones. Flashes of other nights. Other platforms. Other versions of himself sitting in this exact chair, laughing, crying, bleeding spirals from his nose.
He gasped. “How many times…?”
The host’s smile softened, almost fondly.
“Oh, Josh. Sweet, stubborn Josh. What if I told you that you’re on a gameshow?”
Josh let out a shaky, bitter laugh. “Yeah, right. Nice try. I’m not falling for that gaslighting crap. This is just some elaborate nightmare my brain cooked up after too much late-night scrolling and bad takeout. I’m not on any gameshow. This isn’t even real.”
Zylphrex-9’s starlight eyes twinkled with something that looked suspiciously like pity.
“Adorable. Every single time you doubt it. That’s why you’re our favorite. The ones who believe too quickly get boring. But you… you fight it. Every. Single. Night.”
He snapped his fingers.
The chamber lights dimmed, and the pulling sensation behind Josh’s eyes returned, stronger than before.
“Lightning round!” the host declared. “Has it already been another day?”
Josh felt the words clawing at the back of his throat, trying to escape on their own. He bit his tongue until he tasted copper.
“I’m not saying it,” he growled.
The host floated even closer, until Josh could see his own terrified reflection in those cosmic eyes.
“But you will. Eventually. You always do. Because deep down, you’re starting to like it. The lights. The questions that break your brain in fun new ways. The fact that for once in your quiet little life, something is paying attention to you.”
Josh’s hands were shaking.
The other contestants watched in silence. One of them mouthed “Don’t” at him.
Zylphrex-9’s voice became gentle again, almost soothing.
“Final question, champion. Will you come back and play again tomorrow?”
Josh stared at the host for a long time. His apartment felt like a distant memory. His normal life felt like someone else’s.
He opened his mouth.
The words came out in a whisper he barely recognized as his own:
“…Has it already been another day?”
The host threw his head back and laughed with pure, childlike delight.
“DING DING DING!”
The chamber erupted into fractals of impossible color. Josh felt himself falling upward again, faster this time, like the universe was impatient to reset him.
He woke up on his couch at 3:18 a.m.
The TV was static.
His nose was bleeding in a perfect spiral.
And on the screen, the neon letters shimmered for just a moment longer than last night:
THANKS FOR PLAYING, JOSH. SEE YOU TONIGHT.
Josh wiped the blood from his face with a trembling hand.
He looked around his quiet apartment, then back at the dead television.
A small, exhausted smile crept across his lips.
“See you tonight,” he whispered.
From somewhere far away, impossibly distant yet right behind his eyes, he heard the faint, cheerful sound of:
Ding ding ding.
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