Alternate self

The reality flashed before Theo's eyes.

Unbearable pain filled every nook and cranny of his body, starting from his hip that the truck's bumper struck first. The momentum jerked him back…

And everything stopped.

The momentum of the crash forced Theo's soul out of his body only for some strange, foreign force to wrap around it. Then, the reality suddenly stopped making any sense.

Theo saw his entire life in this incarnation flash before his eyes, giving him a perfect yet extremely fast recap of his life.

Theo reached the moment of his birth… and everything turned black.

All Theo's senses vanished, no longer of any use.

Complete and utter emptiness.

'What the hell is going on?' Theo finally had some time to think.

'I was just going back home from work and then…' Theo froze.

It was blurry, but he could still recall the scene of throwing himself at the truck.

A sense of terror, shock, and surprise filled his soul.

Only for all his emotions to vanish in the endless emptiness around.

'Huh?' Theo shrugged, refusing to accept what he just realize that was going on.

All of his senses, all of his emotions… all of the things that made him human would be sucked away the moment they appeared!

'Am I going to just fade away? Unable to excite my mind, will I simply fall asleep?'

A sense of extreme dread filled Theo's innocent soul.

'I still had so much to do in my life,' he thought, feeling as if something tore his soul in half when even this sense of dread was stolen by the void.

Soon, the darkness took over. Over his thoughts. His emotions. His sense of self.

Even the darkness itself soon was consumed by the void.

A flash.

For the most fleeting of all the moments, Theo experienced something.

This flash went by way too fast for him to notice anything about it. But in the endless emptiness, it was the stimulus Theo needed to remain awake.

Then, another flash exploded in Theo's consciousness, only to vanish just like before, way too soon for the young man to notice anything about it.

And then, for the third time, a flash came. This time, however, Theo fully experienced it. After spending god-know how long in this neverending void, Theo had no better thing to do than to prepare in wait for the next occurrence of such a flash.

It was the hope for the third flash that kept Theo going in the space where time was meaningless. And yet…

This flash was nothing more but a set of varying colors as if someone attempted to pass an image with no more than twenty pixels on it.

'What the hell was that?' Theo formed his first conscious thought for what seemed like an eternity. 'I waited and had my guard up for… this?'

Anger welled up in Theo's soul. He refused to accept this. It simply didn't make any sense!

And then, as if responding to his emotions rather than sucking them away, another flash came by.

This time, Theo could properly see its content. And yet, he ended up even more confused.

The first flash Theo noticed was just a bunch of colors. The second one was an image of a wailing baby.

'…'

'Are you for real?'

Theo's rage reached the level where he wanted to throw out. He had no body that would allow him to do so, though.

'Wait for a second,' he then thought, going back to the last flash he saw. 'That… wasn't just an image!'

The experience was as full as it could get.

Theo could vividly remember not only the picture of the baby wailing but also the sound of its cries, the putrid smell of its soiled diaper, the anger filling its soul…

The anger that felt extremely familiar.

Next flash.

This time, Theo saw a young boy, merely around five years of age, running around a vast field of some kind of golden crops.

The image was filled with joy, a sense of freedom and adventure… but also extreme exhaustion and fear.

Not the fear an adult man could experience. A fear that only a child knew about.

Fear of the parent's disapproval.

Next flash.

Theo saw what looked like an extremely younger version of himself sitting atop a small hill, basking in the sun.

Next flash.

An image of the same hill, the same weather… but with Theo's lookalike now openly dozing off.

Flash.

Pain filled Theo's entire being. A pain on a physical level that shouldn't be possible without a body.

A pain a normal person would abhor… but in the sensation-deprived environment he was in, Theo accepted it with gratitude.

'Is this what I think it is?' Theo finally got to thinking once he got over the joy this unpleasant sensation brought him. 'Am I turning into a masochist?'

Theo quickly dismissed this thought.

'No, that's not it,' he shook the mental projection of his head. 'Isn't that the pain… of being struck by a thin stick on my wrist?'

Flash. Flash. Flash.

The rate at which Theo went through new experiences accelerated. And so did his level of immersion.

He could now tell that his younger look-alike wasn't just chasing around the farmlands. That kid was testing the limits of its stamina by running laps around the family's small estate.

The image of him sitting on a hill didn't depict laziness, it showcased Theo's younger self's diligent cultivation; training aimed at growing his inner strength.

'So that's what this is all about,' Theo thought when somewhere along the line he realized the meaning of what was going on.

He didn't figure it out. It wasn't rational thinking or a logical approach that brought him to this result.

Theo simply realized the truth, as if it was always a part of himself.

What he was experiencing weren't just images of some random kid that happened to look like him.

It was his real life that kept on flashing before his eyes… while his true self remained locked within the confines of his mind.

'I can do nothing but wait… and see,' Theo realized, his heart finally finding its peace. 'Whether I can actually go back to life or not, this is still better than living in this emptiness.'

The long years that Theo spent in the void humbled his soul. And now, rather than feeling entitled to some sort of a new life, he was simply glad he could observe.

And so, he saw himself growing up as a fine, young man. Upon reaching fifteen years of age, he saw himself bidding his parents farewell and setting off for the nearby city.

There, Theo joined one of the many sects in the area, only for the talents he discovered over there to quickly elevate his status and position.

By the time he became sixteen, Theo already advanced to the central sect in the area. But not everything was working out exactly as real Theo would like.

'Isn't this bad?' Theo thought when he saw himself slowly giving up on the roots of hard work that his parents taught him in favor of abusing his inborn talents.

Cultivation pills, secret techniques, training formation, Theo had it all at the reach of his fingertips… And rather than making use of all those opportunities, he kept on riding on his talent.

Still, the world clearly favored Theo's new self. Even by the time when he turned seventeen, nearly a year after giving up on discipline in favor of arrogance, his result still backed his actions up.

And then, the reality check came.

'Right on time,' real Theo thought, strangely tired of seeing his other self take everything for granted.

It was the bucket of cold water that Theo needed. But sadly, it was too late.

All the time Theo spent living the life of his dreams while indulging in all sorts of pleasures soon proved to take a toll on his foundations. And as if it wasn't enough, his talent proved to have a clearly specified limit.

A limit, that Theo failed to break for the next two years.

All of the colleagues that Theo looked down upon surpassed him. And as their roles reversed, Theo's fellow disciples soon showcased just how much hate they bottled up over his years of arrogance.

'Serves me right!' real Theo thought, watching how the younger version of his face ended up beaten up for the first time since he left the estate.

'I had it coming,' Theo's thoughts changed a little when beatings became a norm for his other self.

'Isn't this too much?' he thought with concern when his other self became the punching bag of the entire sect.

'Oh come on, grow up and piss off already!' Theo's thoughts took a massive turn when his other self couldn't even cultivate in peace.

Not like it mattered.

The limit that Theo reached years prior remained as his bottleneck. And the more time passed, the less time and energy Theo had to train, given how busy he was being beaten around by every other disciple of the sect.

You had a heartbreak? Kick Theo in the nuts to make yourself feel better!

You failed at the contest to join the inner sect? Drag Theo through a mile of mud to realize you still have a chance next time!

You feel bored? How about you throw Theo in the latrine pit?

The flashes merged together and became a sort of movie that the real Theo was forced to watch. And yet, as he kept on growing, the pace of this movie continued to accelerate.

When it first started, he could only see a single image for what felt like years. And even then, that single image would be as far as a single day away from the last one.

During his teenage and young adulthood years, the flashes were more or less continuous and would jump from a few days to a few weeks between them. Yet, by the time Theo approached the age of twenty, an entire month could pass in a single breath.

Then, a strange flash came.

It was weirdly vivid as if some sort of godly entity cranked up the experience volume.

The flash was about just another beating. A random event caused by the poor mood of an inner disciple in passing.

And it was a beating that left Theo gasping for air while desperately clutching at his throat.

'What the…'

The real Theo suddenly panicked.

It wasn't just a spasm of pain. His other self was actually suffocating!

But…

Theo couldn't do anything about it. After all, he was just an observer.

And so, he was forced to watch how his other self desperately clawed away at his own throat, as if hoping to tear it open. Sadly, it was no use. Theo's windpipe got smashed, barring any air from entering his lungs.

All the efforts of his parents to raise him ended up for naught. All the hardship that Theo willingly went through early on became pointless. All the torture he suffered as a consequence of his poor choices turned from a cleansing experience to a thorny path that led him straight to hell.

While flailing his hands around, Theo drew his last breath.

The empty space of the real Theo collapsed on itself, ending the short episode of mental relief from the endless nothingness, burying his consciousness back into the void.

And then, Theo drew a breath.