Prologue

Did you know? In your whole life you've never seen yourself as you truly are. No, I'm not talking about your so called inner self or any metaphorical thing like that, I'm talking about your true image. I'm sure that you've seen many pictures of yourself and you definitely posses a mirror but, no matter what you use, you won't ever be able to see yourself as other people see you.

I presume that you don't believe me but let me tell you this much: I always though that I was at the very least kinda normal in terms of looks and no one told me otherwise. Well, guess what I found out today about my so called friends and family? They've been lying to me ever since I was born.

Standing up and looking at my ex-body I can tell you that I was way bellow your average normal human to say the least. There, on the table, the corpse of a severely ill Caucasian man can be seen surrounded by a few doctors that just don't want to admit that this John Doe succumbed to his death during their shift. Skinny arms that look more like a pair of twigs connect to a skeletal body with almost 0% muscles and even less fat complemented by the extremely pale skin and the missing pair of legs could be attributed more to a doll from a horror movie than to a ex-living person.

Even after death my eyes still kept that glacier feeling, that absolute depreciation towards life or death, that numbness towards the feeling of despair which became part of my world a long time ago, a darkness that makes anyone who dares to stare for too long shiver, an eternal pit filled with nothingness so deep that not even God could ever reach its bottom. Despite all that, there, in a small corner of those nightmarish eyes, a final speckle of light that refuses to die keeps glowing even after my soul left that outer shell that once was my body.

To be honest I was never a religious person but I still kept a small hope that there is something more to this life than that Hell known as Life. The more I think about future, the greater that final piece of hope that has been hidden in the depths of my souls grows. Soon, like a new star that is being born, its brightness starts fighting against the despair that was once the only thing I knew.

I know that the feeling that I feel right now are definitely heavily influenced by all those books and movies I've seen but they are no doubt a good change in comparison with the dullness of my former life. Spending your days in an isolated area of the hospital because your immune system is no more and any random infection can easily kill you, having to eat the same bland food every single day, staying in permanent darkness because God cursed you with extreme Photophobia and not even being able to go to the toilet without someone else' help because it just so happened to lose your legs in an "accident" while suffering from Becker's neuromuscular dystrophy from the age of twelve is far worse than any hell you can imagine.

But now things are different! I was never a religious person but I still kept a small hope that there is something more to this life than that Hell known as Life. The more I think about the future, the greater that final piece of hope that has been hidden in the depths of my souls grows. Soon, like a new star that is being born, its brightness starts fighting against the despair that was once the only thing I knew.

Reincarnation, transcesion, after-life, Heaven, rebirth, there are so many possibilities. I wonder which one represents my future.

"Mark the hour of death as 01:37, 9 of May 2021."

With these final words I've been officially proclaimed dead. I am not sad to be honest. Ever since my first accident my family started growing more and more distant to the point that they started visiting me only twice or thrice a year. My only friend, Mark the janitor, was fired last year. Even so he kept visiting me every moth or so. When a janitor you became friends with in a hospital visits you more than your family that is the point in life when you know that all hope is gone.

Speaking frankly, Mark became my family after a while. He brought me books and talked to me when I was thinking that there is no point in living any more. I don't know why he stayed by my side for so long but I have no doubt that he will feel more sadness when he finds out about my death than my whole family combined.

Light. Where does it come from? My body starts floating upwards. Slowly my head passes right though the ceiling. I don't feel any resistance as the rest of it goes through as well followed by my… Legs!?

I have legs!!!

Trying to move them I find that, despite the fact that there are a few twitches, they don't jingle around like I wanted them to. Considering the fact that more than 15 years have passed since I lost them, it's no wonder that I can't control my newly acquired pair of soul legs properly.

Being surprised by the legs that magically appeared I don't even notice that I am not in the hospital anymore. Above me a strange vortex of blinding white light covers the sky.

"Well, I presume this is it! My new life starts…"

"NOW!!!"