Here and Gone

by TakaBlueMoon

Prologue

So this is what it's like after you die. At least, I assumed I was dead at the time. I saw all the telltale signs; the light at the end of the tunnel, the indescribable brightness, and I even thought I saw Him for a second. Then again, these are all things I've heard from other people about what happens when you bite the dust, so I could just be dreaming this whole thing up. Seriously, dying can't be this cliche. After my life, that would be so lame and anti-climactic. Not nearly the right level of "Awesome" for me. Maybe some fireworks and fans yelling my name would liven the whole death thing up a bit. Or would that kind of defeat the purpose?

Either way, I had never felt so relaxed in my whole life. Ok, so maybe I spent most of my life at daredevil speeds with enough adrenaline in my blood to pull an ursa major out of hibernation. Maybe the most relaxed I ever got was in the brief naps I took between weather detail and practicing my flying. Even so, the lack of tension would have been astounding if I wasn't so at ease. It felt like my body wasn't moving at all, even for things like breathing. Ok, have you ever heard a sound at night and tensed up, then realized it was just you disturbing the sheets when you moved or something stupid like that? This was like the moment right after you calmed down, but more relaxed, and it didn't go away. Like the feeling when you let yourself free fall from hundreds of feet up and let the air blow your mane back before you have to pull up. And of course, that was just the physical part of it.

All the things that normally grated on my nerves or made me really lose my mind just didn't seem to matter anymore. I should have been confused, or scared, or angry, or at the very least sad, but everything that was going on just seemed so bland and insignificant. It was like I never had any aspirations or dreams, so the fact that I wouldn't live to achieve any of those goals felt like just something that I read in an old history book somewhere and promptly forgot. The Wonderbolts was just a name now, the sonic rainboom reminded me of a cheap firecracker, and the elements of harmony were nothing more to me than a couple of the plastic toys at the bottom of a box of cereal.

Then suddenly, it all started to slip away. Well, not ALL of it. What I mean is that all that warm, welcoming relaxation slipped away as the whole world seemed to dim. The pure, heavenly, beckoning white was slowly turning grayer and bleaker while I could nothing but stare. If I had a body, it sure wasn't working as I willed my eyes to close, or my body to turn away, or something. I felt all the tension returning to my paralyzed (or inexistant, there was no way to tell) body, and after such a blissful experience, the pressure now made it feel like I was trapped in a thick, infinite volume of water that was crushing me from every direction. I felt hopelessly imprisoned, and the panic and anxiety were beginning to set in, growing by the second until I found myself in sheer terror of...well pretty much every emotion that had escaped me just a short while ago.

But the strangest thing was that all the detachment I felt from my memories and dreams weren't returning with the stress. I could still "remember" most of the events from my life, but it was as if they were all just images from a movie. I bad movie where you can't relate or sympathize with the main character at all. Everyone looked unfamiliar, like just another citizen on the street, and all the words were still there, but I couldn't understand any of them anymore. They were just strange noises accompanied by mysterious facial expressions and gestures that no longer held any meaning to me. Like what were these things from her memories doing when they shook their legs in front of them? It must have meant something since it was in so many of these images. But most importantly, all the emotions from my memories had scattered into nothingness as well. It was like being read a story in another language that has literally nothing in common with your own.

Just as all the light disappeared and I thought I would be completely lost to the insanity brought on by such intense anxiety, I started to see light again. It was only a bit, and it hurt my eyes, which caused me to clench them tightly. It took a few seconds to finally realize that I had regained control of my body! I wasn't a prisoner trapped inside myself anymore! I kept my eyes closed, but cautiously tested my limbs. They didn't feel like mine, but when I willed something to move, it did. It was more clumsy and uncoordinated than I wanted, but I finally felt like I might be waking up and becoming myself again...whoever that was.

All at once I heard strange noises from all around me, quickly approaching and surrounding me. My muscles tensed and I started to feel that panic creep back, though nowhere near as intense. It still hurt, but I knew that I had to open my eyes to see what kind of threat I was dealing with. Slowly and steadily, I forced my eyes open, straining against the brightness that was trying its hardest to make sure I kept them closed. Luckily, the pain slowly ebbed away and my vision started clearing. What I saw, however was enough to make me wish I had given up and hidden behind the censor my eyes afforded me.

The surrounding was almost entirely white, and I was, in fact, surrounded by six creatures, all of them making those same strange noises. And as my eyes jolted the rest of the way open in fear, the noise quickly became too loud for me to handle. The sights, the smells, the sounds, were all to much for my already confused and terrified brain to take. I felt my mouth open and my own sound ripped through my throat, driven by an instinct telling me to get as far away from this place as I could.

Comments

[Sky Charmer]

Sounds like RD switched bodies with another creature from a different world.