What could be said about Scott Awthorning? Physically he was unremarkable. Unkempt brown hair in an average men’s cut. He was short, standing at 5’’4, but he was broad and muscular, making him the ideal candidate for his football team. He was an avid nerd, mainly focused on anime, as many of his peers were. Nerd didn’t mean he was… intelligent by the widely accepted standards of intelligence, though. He just knew a lot about anime. He liked partying, and all of the inebriation and intercourse that would entail at a college party. He didn’t do well in any of his classes- actually, he hardly showed up. He would always be too hungover for learning anyways. In other words, he was not a man of foresight, which would directly lead to his demise. Oh right, and you could say he was dead. Had he not died the day he did, he would have died within a month judging from the fact he was drinking more than his own body weight in alcohol every week, but that’s neither here nor there. His funeral was an odd affair. His buddies showed up, and a few exes, one of which brought her new boyfriend. His parents showed up too, but overall weren’t nearly as bothered as one would expect. Oh, his cause of death. Well, it was at about 8:40 when he arrived at his friend’s secluded party in the woods. There were eight people there who were planning on killing someone that very night, so some good came from Scott’s death, because after he bit the dust they decided it was a bad time. Anyways, he took three shots of tequila, and decided at 9:30 that hey, he could always be more drunk. So he chugged an entire bottle of beer, and at this point was completely wasted. Unlucky for him, instead of blacking out, he stayed awake, and somehow got his hands on a gun. Probably from one of the kids planning on commiting a murder. He was playing with it, and told his also very drunk friends that he could survive being shot in the jaw. A lot of them were sane enough to disagree, but he decided to shoot himself in the face anyway. He was dead within thirty seconds, and the majority of party members tried to furiously gaslight the police after it was of course investigated. Now, back to the funeral. His friends, as in the ones who weren’t arrested, were mostly wearing their jerseys. Hardly anyone wore black. Including his mom and dad. Upon receiving the news of their son’s death, they took it… in a way that somebody might take it. His father was marginally distraught, claiming that “he actually kinda liked him”. His mother was mostly indifferent, as having a son apparently did a number on her skin. She’s… not a very good person. There was no priest. They kind of just put him in the ground and left. His mother went back to her hotel, and his father treated Scott’s friends and exes to cheap fast food, which they were very grateful for. Now, where was Scott? There wouldn’t be much of a story if he just stayed in the ground. Yes, the twenty year old was in his grave, but he would wake up, and he would not be there. 

Oh… Oh god… Scott couldn’t open his eyes. Holly fuck, what the hell did he do to himself last night…? Must have been some party… He felt like he was hit by a bus. Creamed by a very large, very fast bus. Why did he do that… The first hint he could have recognized to mean something was different about him was the act of regretting the previous night, something that he did whenever he had a plastered one night stand with someone he had no interest in otherwise, but never in regard to drinks or drugs. He pried himself from… somewhere, probably, and massaged his screaming head with a stiff, sore arm. An arm that felt heavier. Everything hurts… “Forget a bus, must’ve been hit by a goddamn train!” he groaned. He froze at the sound of his voice. Maybe he was still a little drunk, but his voice definitely sounded different. What was it… It sounded deeper, and a little raspier. He spoke quicker, too. It felt different in his throat. Startled, he forced open his eyes, and gasped, which caused his headache to spike. Oh- what the fuck? He was in a room, but it wasn’t his room, or a hospital bed. It was an office, cluttered with multiple papers scattered everywhere, and, stranger, it looked older. Wooden furniture, even a gramophone, and so forth. He’d woken up in places that weren’t his before, so this was nothing new. But it definitely felt different. Maybe because while he could have sworn he’d never seen it before, it was his. He remembered being here, working here- working here? Scott didn’t have a job. But didn’t he? No! He was a college student! But didn’t he already finish college? No! He was probably going to drop out! What the fuck is happening to me? His head felt so full. He needed water! That would help with the hangover! …But Scott never drank water, or he didn’t think he did. Okay, while at Fotterville Community College, he didn’t drink water. But he had clear memories of drinking at least some water here. He took a breath, mentally counting down from ten, and then five, and then five again for good measure. For his own mental safety, he wasn’t going to think about anything in particular. His thoughts were so muddled that everything would contradict at least one other thing, which would cause a panicked chain reaction. He was usually too drunk and high to panic! No, that didn’t sound right. Drinking doesn’t completely inhibit panicking, at least not for him. But it did, right? He shook his head, instantly regretting moving at all. Fuck… okay. One more time. Five… four… three… two… one… He stood up, almost instantly losing his balance, being accosted by a vicious wave of nausea and vertigo. “I’m never drinking again…” he lied, in his strange new voice. Jesus Christ, what the fuck… His body felt different. His field of vision was way higher, for one. “This isn’t right…” It wasn’t that it was unfamiliar. Its familiarity was a part of the problem. He looked at his hands, surprised to see they were rougher and longer. He drew a breath. “I need a mirror. Is there a bathroom here…?” he thought out loud to himself, trying to recall what his voice sounded like before the ill fated woodland party. Why would I go to get drunk in the woods? Sounds pretty dangerous… 

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He only remembered the party being in the woods, and the second shot of tequila. After that it was all a blur. Unsteady, but slowly getting the hang of this whole walking thing, he looked around for a door, taking in more of his office, and subsequently then trying his damndest not to because he knew exactly where everything was, which made him even more confused and gave him a creeping sense of dread. He did have a bathroom, which was convenient because this was often where he slept- what was he even thinking about? He definitely remembered sleeping here, but at this point he didn’t have the mental energy to even think about why. He worked here, had a different voice and body, fucked up memories, and a more rational way of thinking. That was all he was going to pay attention to, at least until he found a mirror. He walked over to the bathroom door- old looking, like everything else- and tried to reach for the doorknob. And he grabbed it. Well, he wanted to grab it, but the worry of what he might find ate away at his stomach, fading his resolve. He was so hungover, he just wanted to go back to his couch, go to sleep, and not wake up for a whole week. So, with that in mind, he decided the best thing to do was to get this over with and face whatever new realization he might find staring back at him in the mirror. With that intention, he turned the knob. And the face in the mirror wasn’t his, yet it was unmistakably his. He had expected he’d look different, even remarkably different, but seeing it was nearly too much to handle. He was a lot taller, first of all… He had to be around 6’1… 6’2… Yeah, probably around 6’2. Doing the math in his head, he must’ve gotten close to a foot taller. Oh, and he could never do math in his head before, so this was a first. But other than his height, he looked older. Not decrepit, but definitely an adult, time starting to make its mark on his features. 36. The number appeared in his head. Was that really how old he was? It looked accurate, although he was graying a little and his eyes were sunken, but that was from the stress of his job as a private investigator and abysmal self care. So he’s a PI…?? One thing at a time, one thing at a time… His eyes were roughly the same color: a dark brown. His hair was black, in a shorter and slightly more kempt cut than his original one. His facial features were harsher and more defined, and there was a scar on his jaw, from when some crazy guy stabbed him in the face. …Wait… jaw? In that moment, recollection of his death flashed into his mind. His then shorter fingers fiddling with the gun drunkenly, boasting about being able to survive being shot in the jaw. His fellow party goers trying to insist he put the gun down, although no one questioned where the hell he’d gotten a gun from. Him assuring that he was going to be fine, and swiftly proving himself to be a plastered idiot and  swiftly proving himself to be a plastered idiot and shooting himself in the face. It was at this moment that Scott screamed. A familiar unfamiliar face contorted in fear in the mirror, and the walls felt closer. So very close. Oh god, he died! Not only that, but he’d killed himself in a drunken fit of grandiose! Oh fuck, did he get shoved into an alternate dimension?? As his shout of utter confusion and horror resounded throughout the bathroom, there was a knock on the door, a female voice calling out in worry. “Scott? Are you okay? I heard screaming!” He tried to stop himself from laughing, feeling a little jolt of relief. Yes, Scott! Good! He kept his name! This distracted him from the shock of knowing exactly who the speaker was. At least he still had his name. He gathered his breath, trying to sound both safe and sane. “I’m okay, Danna. I just drank too much last night, and I woke up disoriented.” The only lie in that sentence was him being okay. He wasn’t okay. He was doing pretty bad, as you might have guessed. The woman was Danna, his assistant. She was a nice, scrappy young woman who did her best to make sure her boss wasn’t going to kill himself with all of the smoking, drinking, and lack of sleeping. He knew he trusted her, which made him relax, just a bit. While convincing, Danna didn’t know if she could trust his judgement. Scratch that- she knew she couldn’t. She relented, though, as it didn’t seem like he was in any sort of immediate danger or overly destructive crisis. “Okay… Take it easy today, alright? Maybe lay off the hooch for a bit. I don’t wanna come into work one morning to find my boss had finally drunk himself to death.” Scott nodded. “Yeah…” He frowned, feeling a pang of what might be sadness at the girl’s worry, as well as another bout of confusion. Judging from his emotions, he did care for her. He just couldn’t begin to remember why at this moment. He couldn’t think about any personal relationships just yet, as they would only serve to fill him with dread. Once she left, he turned on the faucet, contemplating drinking the tap water. It wasn’t terribly dirty, so he thought it might be okay? Biting the bullet, he cupped his hands under the stream and drank it down. He caught his breath, the water doing wonders for his agonizing current place in reality. Was this reality? He heard somewhere that people sometimes hallucinate upon dying. He glanced around in dismay, trying to decipher whether or not the features of the moderately clean bathroom were real. While passing this off as a dying hallucination was tempting, he couldn’t see how that would have any affect on his memories and  thought processing. The fact of the matter was that something bizarre happened. Taking another deep breath, he closed his eyes, trying to pry as much information from his memories and also these now-memories as possible to understand what had happened and, more importantly, what he was dealing with.