After blacking out, she thought back on the many things that had happened in her life during all of it; second chances were something that could hardly truly be taken for granted. Rinley expected many things after death, but this was not one of them.
A tunnel of light. A grand staircase. Her grandma waving at her from a cloud while holding a casserole. Maybe even a stern angel holding a clipboard, ready to list off all the questionable things she had said to authority figures in her short, sarcasm-laced life.
What she did not expect… was an office.
A floating, barely holding-itself-together, utterly confusing cosmic office.
She stood, well, hovered? Floated? Existed? on what looked like a single square of marble floor suspended in an endless void. Desks and papers drifted past her in slow motion. One very confused chicken floated by wearing a monocle.
Rinley turned slowly, arms crossed over her chest, eyes narrowed.
"…Okay. Either I'm dead or someone dropped me in an interdimensional HR department."
"Technically," came a voice behind her, "both."
She spun around and standing, or possibly levitating, behind a desk made entirely of glowing threads was a figure. Tall. Cloaked. Face obscured, but Rinley got the impression that whoever they were, they had not smiled in eons. They radiated the kind of energy reserved for tired DMV workers and overworked librarians.
"I am the Intake Coordinator," the figure said. Their voice echoed like a door creaking open in a cathedral. "You may call me… En."
Rinley blinked. "N... as in the letter?"
"No. En as in Eternal Notary."
"…Oh. Good. You are a cosmic tax auditor."
The being didn't react. Instead, they produced a glowing scroll and unrolled it with a flick of their wrist.
"Rinley Valemont. Deceased. Temporal origin: Earth-559X. Manner of death: blunt-force trauma caused by janitorial negligence during an extradimensional breach event. Unorthodox, but not disqualifying."
"I told someone to move that damn mop bucket," she muttered.
"You expressed a desire for a second chance," En continued, ignoring her. "That request has been reviewed."
Rinley stared at them.
"...Reviewed? What is this, a loan application?"
"In a manner of speaking. Not everyone qualifies. But you did attempt a selfless act during your final moments, which surprised even me, given how little you believe in certain things."
"I also screamed at a pigeon once and pretended to be blind to cut a bathroom line," she offered.
"Yes. And those have been... noted as well; there is not a thing about your life that we do not know, after all we made them."
A glowing file appeared beside En's head, flipping open in the air. Rinley could make out various glowing bullet points. One read "accidentally punched a priest (unverified)." Another said, "Once tried to bribe Death with hot Cheetos."
She winced at the thought of those things. "Yikes. That's… an unfortunate record."
"Indeed, it is. You are one of the worst human children; unfortunately for you, the cosmic system favors balance. Your actions at the end tipped the scale just enough."
"So… I get reincarnated? Sent to another world? Do I get to pick one?" she asked, crossing her arms again.
"There is no selection menu. This is not a buffet," En replied flatly. "You are to be placed in a realm currently experiencing severe magical imbalance, political unrest, and a problematic hero prophecy situation. You will be… a variable."
"A variable."
"Yes. Unstable. Unanticipated. Potentially catastrophic."
Rinley raised her eyebrows. "Wow. Really know how to make a girl feel special."
He sighed, then glanced at her; there was a small pause.
"…Do I at least get a starter pack or something? A sword? A talking pet? A magical tattoo? Ooh, am I secretly a lost princess with amnesia?"
"No. You were selected for your unpredictability, not your narrative appeal."
Just as she was about to speak back, the glowing door shimmered into existence behind her. Beyond it, Rinley saw nothing, just swirling mist, like ink dropped into water. Her stomach flipped.
"So I just… walk through and hope for the best?"
"Fall, technically," En said.
And then, with the dramatic flair of someone who had clearly done this a thousand times and no longer cared for ceremony, En pointed a finger.
Rinley's foot slipped.
"Wait—WAIT—can I at least keep my leg?!"
En raised a glowing brow. "For someone that is supposed to be dead and does not know what the outcome of this could cause, you are awfully cheerful, or maybe you are really just faking it. Tell me, which one of them do you want to keep?"
"THE EXPENSIVE ONE!"
And then she was gone, with no words following after and her breathing began feeling heavy alongside her trembling hands, she knew deep down this was the end of the line for the life she had recently live in.
She tumbled through weightless space, arms flailing, screaming a mix of profanity and regret. Colors bled around her, like stars blinking in and out. Her thoughts raced like a broken record; no matter how hard she tried she could not check herself.
She was falling toward something; that much she knew.
Not death. Been there.
Not peace. Definitely not.
A second chance. Wrapped in chaos. Tied up in prophecy. Probably filled with people who wore capes unironically.
And somewhere, deep in her gut, Rinley knew two things:
No matter what was said before, she did not like it, nor was she ready; it was not how things were supposed to be for him, and if they were tricking him, then he was in a tough position.
However, there was one thing that she was sure of and that was that she was definitely going to say something wildly inappropriate the second she landed.
There were a great many things Rinley expected from a second chance.
A gentle forest awakening, maybe. Birds chirping. A mysterious old man offering her a wooden staff and vague advice.
What she did not expect was slamming face-first into polished marble and her bum sticking up in the air, causing the entire room to be quiet and weapons to be drawn as though she were a threat.