It was perfect.
The world dissolved into a white-hot roar, a static that was the sound of himself being unmade.
It was a five-star, immersive experience. A full-body exfoliation via immolation. And in the heart of that cleansing agony, he finally felt like the main character of his own damn story.
The funny thing wasn't that he died. Everyone dies.
The funny thing was that he smelled.
'Bacon,' he'd thought, and the thought was so absurd, so utterly hilarious, that the laughter won out, bubbling through the searing of his trachea.
The smell~ Oh, the smell! Fat sizzling in the pan, toast just a shade too black. He kept expecting someone to slap a plate in front of him and tell him it was "the special."
'No, I'm the morning special.' He was breakfast, the morning special, served up on a platter of flame. He would have clapped if his hands hadn't already been curling into claws. He would have bowed if his legs hadn't puddled beneath him.
How ridiculous, how unfair. A man can't even get a standing ovation at his own cremation.
The world went white, then orange, then nothing at all. A last static roar, a curtain falling. And in that last instant, stripped raw and blazing, he had never felt more alive.
A tremor in his hand made the mug rattle against his teeth. The phantom smell of burnt hair and overcooked pork 'his pork' flooded his sinuses, so vivid he could taste it on the back of his tongue, a greasy, awful flavor that overpowered the coffee in his hands.
He flinched, a full-body spasm, a muscle memory etched into a soul that had somehow outlasted its original casing.
The taste of the coffee was gone now, utterly erased by the memory of ash. The coffee had long since gone lukewarm, but he raised it to his lips anyway, savoring the faint bitterness.
Now, here he was, alive.
Breathing air that didn't smell of smoke. In a room that was cold and quiet. In a body that wasn't his, in a world that wasn't his.
'Sinclair or whatever the name of this body was, Sinclair would do for now,' the name surfaced from the murk of this new mind.
He rested his arm against the cold glass of the window and peered down at the plaza.
White stone polished to a sheen, a handful of teenagers moving across it like paper dolls.
Their uniforms were of snow bright white, distinguished only by the thin, colored linings on their cuffs and collars, Crimson, Cobalt, Emerald, Little splashes of difference painted over the sameness.
Behind him, an holographic screen, three meters wide, played out an exciting battle between the teenager that seems to come out right from the fantasy to reality.
It lacked the strangeness that made it look like a part of fiction.
Figures his age, wearing sleek and form-fitting bodysuits, clashed in what seemed to like an arena. One wielded a lance and the other parried with a shield, a faint layer of weird energy shimmering around them.
Sinclair, he lifted a hand he still didn't quite believe was his and made a slight, strange gesture. The screen obeyed instantly, muting the hiss and crackle of the duel.
"Transmigrated after a gas explosion," he said to the quiet room. His new voice was higher, softer, but he spoiled it by humming cheerfully, blowing a kiss to his reflection in the black glass. "Best death ever. Ten out of ten. Would absolutely fucking burn again."
Then giggle came, without asking. So did the frown. And the second giggle. His face couldn't decide what to be.
The mirror was cruel. Or maybe it was generous. Either way, it showed him a reflection and his smile widened into something that felt both genuine and deeply wrong.
He padded closer, his bare feet silent on the cold floor.
Who was this pretty, pale boy? Seventeen, maybe younger. So thin you could see the delicate architecture of his bones beneath the skin, a sad little ghost who looked like he needed a hug and a hot meal. Eyelashes bleached to nothing. A mess of hair the color of snow after midnight. And the eyes.
My God, the eyes.
He leaned in until his nose almost touched the glass. The eyes were not human. They were orbs of polished, liquid gold, set within a perfect, kohl-black line that ended in sharp, almost feline points. The eyes of a saint. Or a demon. Or something that he had simply never been meant to be.
He was so breakable, this boy. So delicate. So perfectly, wonderfully new.
He reached out and pressed his palm flat against the mirror, against the boy's cheek. The glass was cold, hard yet look so brittle. He watched the reflection's golden eyes, looking for a flicker of the original tenant, but there was nothing. Just him, looking out from this beautiful, like an alien mask.
He hugged himself, a soft swaying like a mother calming her baby. Except there was no baby. His thin arms wrapped around the narrow frame of this new body, and swayed on his feet, a slow, rocking motion of pure, unadulterated delight.
"We're still good looking!" he chirped to the beautiful, pale boy in the glass. "Even better!" he whispered to him, and his chest fluttered with delight so pure it almost hurt.
______________________