It had all begun with a creak, I think.
A loud, grating and splintering sound that echoed through the ship and was unlike anything I had ever heard before. I wasn't even sure where it had come from, nor did I get a chance to find out.
It had woken me up, the sound so sudden, and so harsh, that my entire body had violently flinched. You know what flinch I'm on about, don't you? The one you get when you're falling asleep and relaxing too quickly, so your mind gives you a jolt to save you.
Yeah. That one.
To say I was afraid or feeling fearful was a lie. No, what I felt at that moment couldn't be described by such simple words. I wasn't afraid. I was terrified, petrified, near hysteric.
There wasn't a part of me that wasn't shivering in fright.
It sounded almost silly, thinking back on it. It was just a loud noise coming from the ship, I had heard hundreds of them by the time that creak had rang. But my instincts were sharp, they always have been—and they all told me the same blasting thing.
Something was wrong.
That sound was unlike the others.
Danger.
I blamed genetics and evolutionary biology for my inherent connection to my instincts. I remember that feeling, as if I was a rat in my cage. Too insignificant to matter yet having the instincts to know more than those around me.
That's the worst part, don't you think? Knowing that you're in danger, that if you could just speak and be believed by those around you, that you'll be able to escape, to get away and be safe.
If I am being completely honest—and I am—I had already accepted my death long before stepping onto that dirty ship. As a street urchin with nothing to my name, I was easy pickings for anyone looking to kidnap people.
In a sense, I got lucky…though I am now realising my lucky is someone else's nightmare. Because the people who had kidnapped me, they seemed to really get off on being vocal about what they were planning to do to me.
Well, both me and the countless other people this group had found and picked off the streets.
Apparently, I had received the ultra-deluxe golden ticket that granted this group the apparent right, to split me open whilst I'm awake and use me for my organs. I sincerely hope you can notice the sarcasm with which I said all of that.
One of the men who had kidnapped me certainly did.
I was still undecided on whether the black eye was worth it or not.
Either way, after that first creak, the ship didn't stay a ship for long. It was soon more like a submarine, if you get what I mean…if you didn't, well, it sunk, in-case you're half asleep right now and its too hard for you to put the dots together.
Honestly, the things I do.
As for me? Well, by the time the ship had already sunk, I was holding my breath deep underwater, trying desperately to escape the chains wrapped around my legs and hands.
The panic had gotten to me then, because it wouldn't have helped me even if I did get loose. When I had called myself a rat in a cage earlier, I certainly wasn't kidding. The people who had put me in a literal, human sized rat cage, had called it a special privilege.
I sincerely wanted to take that special privilege and shove it up-
'Calm. I am calm.'
I let out a small breath. I am trying very hard right now, not to use my new abilities to release my built-up anger.
It certainly helped that I had my—Ah! There's me going on a tangent again. Nearly giving away spoilers too, sorry, but you'll learn about all of that after I tell you how my first life ended.
Anyways, where was I? Right, my drowning.
Fun.
Well, truly, my death was a little anticlimactic. There was no promise of revenge, no thirst for blood, no wish for divine intervention. Really, after my short and miserable life, all I wanted was some peace and quiet.
As you can probably guess, even that wish wasn't granted to me.
My final moments in my first life, amidst the chaos and currents, in the cold embrace of freezing water that spilled into my lungs and tainted my lips with salt, were paradoxically peaceful. My final thought was…
'I wonder how beautiful the stars must look out in the night sky.'
And then, like any good story, darkness took me.
After that, well if I am being brutally honest with you, I don't remember much of anything. My final prayer, to experience an afterlife of rest was granted, and I was pulled into a land where I felt both like nothing, and everything.
It was peaceful for a time, as I drifted through the infinite darkness. Concepts, such as space, gravity and time itself—the three fundamental building blocks of the universe—lost all meaning to me.
My thoughts and emotions were quick to follow, and I slept and rested for what felt like entire centuries. Yet, through it all, I was still aware of something watching me through the dark, peering at me as I enjoyed my well-deserved slumber.
Until finally, I was awoken.
Not by that something, even I didn't know what it was, but by a small, bell like sound.
It awoke me, brought me back to a reality which no longer existed.
At the time, I thought I had still been dreaming, unfortunately for me, I was not, and that, is when I learned that my rest, was not as eternal as I had thought it would be.
Because a square, translucent box with ornate golden details floated in front of my eyes, within it, was a message that would forever change my life, more than even my supposed afterlife could.
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