Part 1

Chapter 1

Okay so first, I want to say real quick that dying isn't so bad. Though, what comes after is . . . something else.

It was a cool Saturday morning on one of those perfect fall days in early September. The humid heat of the Midwest summer fled overnight and was replaced by cool dry air. I was out shopping at one of those big box stores. You know, the ones with the free samples everywhere and the insanely cheap pizza and hotdogs? Yep . . . It was heaven, well, aside from the woman’s hygiene section . . . the propane tank . . . and, well . . . death. If not for those things, the day couldn’t have gotten much better. Ugh. We’ll get there.

It was September third, and the world had gone to shit. Three major cities had been nuked at the exact same time this past year, and no one knew who did it. Beijing, Moscow, and Chicago. I still remember the feeling of disbelief as my phone’s alarm went off, showing a civil alert. I didn’t believe the message at first, but when my character in the online shooter game I was playing started rubber banding around and performing the same action over and over . . . that’s when I really knew it was real. The server . . . had been in Chicago.

My girls were sent home from school early, and it felt like the entire world was holding its breath. It could have escalated into a worldwide conflict. But it didn’t, and we were lucky it didn’t. I could still hear the president on the tube saying something dumb like, ‘We have billions and billions of nukes.’ . . . We dodged a massive bullet, and at some point, after the emotional rollercoaster of fear, loss, and pain, folks just went back to living their lives and taking care of their day-to-day needs. For the most part—aside from Chicago getting blown to hell—the economy only got stronger.

The engine of war was revving up and people were afraid for sure though, and I’d be lying if I said I was sleeping well. Or that I wasn’t gaming, or drinking . . . or eating massive amounts of pepperoni pizza to keep my mind off it.

But let me back up and tell you about my life, before I tell you about my death.

It was . . . just okay.

My name is Sam Parr. I have . . . or had—ugh . . . I’ll stick with have.

I have two daughters. Ada who just turned fourteen, and Lily who is twelve.

I joined the local fire department a few years back, and because of that I didn’t get to see them much due to my shift rotation.

Real quick, because I’ve had to explain my schedule to every single person I have ever met, I’ll go ahead and assume you don’t know what I meant there. I worked forty-eight hours straight, then was off for four days. That pattern repeated indefinitely. Sounds simple on the outside, but . . . it wasn’t. I liked it, but it made it damn hard to plan anything.

Because of my schedule I lived with my dad and my step mom . . . Yeah. Shut it. It made sense though. Someone needed to be there for the kids while I was at work. But, even when I was home, life was busy. Between school, extracurricular activities, and all the other chaos, I didn’t get to see them much.

But the work was good. The pay was good. And it felt like I was making a difference.

We made the adjustment ten years ago . . . after my wife died, but I don’t talk about those times much.

Anyways, because I have two—basically teenage—daughters . . . you probably see where this is going . . . but I’ll just say it. For the first time we needed those female pad thingies.

But, like I said.

The world . . . had gone to shit. People were afraid, and stockpiling like hell.

Basic things like toothpaste, toilet paper, and . . . feminine pads, were hard to come by. So naturally, I found myself spending Saturday morning perusing the halls of pepperoni pizza heaven with little Lily at my side and my cart loaded with a massive bag of toilet paper and a carton of toothpaste.

Lily wasn’t so little anymore though, I thought. I watched her calmly follow along at my side. Just a couple years ago she would have been spastically running around the place and constantly causing me to stop my cart in order to not slam into her.

I sighed as I watched her now. She wore a long, cute dress with a belt around her waist, her hair was done up in a bun. All grown up.

I looked at the toilet paper in my cart and then back at her as she took in her surroundings. What does she think of me?

It was the last bag, and I’m not proud of it . . . but I had grabbed it right as a shorter pale-faced bloke strolled up. He laughed in an exaggerated fashion as we hurried off, and when I glanced back, his eyes were narrowed and fixed on us. I felt bad but we had resorted to using paper towels at home . . . and I didn’t want to repeat that anytime soon.

Lily always volunteered to come shopping with me. She liked getting out of the house and away from my parents—we had that in common—but she was quiet, and I never knew what was going on in her head. She was growing up in a darker world than I had. Much . . . darker.

“Any idea where to next?” I asked her.

She shrugged, saying nothing. That was Lily.

I got out my phone to text her sister.

Sam: Where do I find your . . . female pad thingys?

Ada: :face-palm emoji: :see-no-evil emoji:

Sam: What?

Ada: Just forget it, I’ll get them with Grandma.

Sam: What? Why? We are already here.

Ada: Ugh fine. They would be near the beauty section, I think? Just send a picture of what they have when you find them.

Now, I liked to think I wasn’t a complete idiot, but in this case . . . I was. I glanced down another row of goods and found an aisle that made me uncomfortable. A hallway of hell. There were things like panty liners, lube and . . . nipple cream. As we walked down it, an old lady about the age of . . . death . . . noticed me, abruptly turned, and fled—real slow, and scooting her walker—in the opposite direction.

I let out a huge exhale.

Get me out of here.

I took out my phone again, glanced around a couple times to make sure we were alone, then I backed up a couple steps and took a picture. I couldn’t help but think what someone would say if they saw me right now.

A middle-aged man . . . taking pictures . . . of female pads.

Ugh.

I sent the pictures off to Ada.

Sam: Here you go.

Ada: :peeking-through-hand emoji: :blushing emoji:

Ada: Dad . . . those don’t seem right.

Sam: What do you mean? Too big?

If you spot this story on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

Ada: :skull emoji: No, I think those are for like . . . old people or something? For pee. lol

Sam: Oh . . . what’s the difference?

Ada: Really . . .?

Sam: Mkay. One sec.

A middle-aged man . . . taking pictures . . . of grandma diapers. God help me.

A couple short moments later we found what I believed was the correct section. I snapped a couple more pics and acted like I was looking at some nail polish as I sent those off. Lily was actively pretending to not be my daughter at this point.

Ada: Couldn’t you have gone to a normal grocery store? One of those packs will last me forever.

Sam: Great. Because I’m never doing this again.

She sent back a picture with the one she wanted circled. I grabbed it, stuffed it under the toilet paper, checked out, and grabbed a cup of coke and a quarter of pepperoni pizza—which they laughably considered a slice—for myself and a smoothie for Lily. We left the store following the store clerk as we went because I needed some propane for my grill.

Lily at my side, I loaded the tank into the shopping cart and headed toward my truck, hip thrusting it every so often, in order to keep my hands free for shoving my mouth full of pizza.

“Hey, asshole!” someone called from behind us.

I glanced back, thinking the shout was for someone else.

Unfortunately, it was not. It was the shorter bloke from earlier I had pissed off. He was grinning and had a handgun—a Glock—pointed right at me.

“Hey! What the hell?!” I said as I grabbed Lily’s arm and side stepped in front of her. A couple other customers started yelling and screaming, running for their cars.

“Woah there! Look, man, take the toilet paper. You can have it,” I said as I put our cart in between us and the gunman. Lily was pressed against my back and shaking. I had her entire figure covered and both my hands wound behind myself, holding her firmly.

I looked at the Glock pointed at my chest. The gunman's finger . . . was on the trigger. Heat and pressure filled my head, and my blood boiled as adrenaline started pumping through my veins. I didn’t like idiots with guns.

“I have kids,” I said. “One of them is right here. Just take the damn toilet paper and go.”

He laughed as he waved the gun around. “I don’t really like your type. You’re always stomping around on the little guys. I just wanted to give you a little scare. I hope you learned your lesson, dickhead.”

“Just put the God damn gun down, take the toilet paper, and go! You can have it!”

“Relax man, it’s not even loaded. See—?”

“No! Stop. NO DON’T—!”

Dread rose in my chest as I watched him pull the empty magazine out, point the gun at the cart . . . and pull the trigger.

His gun was loaded with a bullet in the chamber, and his very real shot . . . hit the top of the propane tank.

Fire and metal rushed toward us.

BAM!

I died.

Tutorial complete. {Replay} or {Continue}?

I closed my eyes—the words too bright. The experience was bizarre. One moment I was watching my body break apart. The next moment I was staring at a blinding white light in complete darkness. One moment in serious pain—the next moment, no pain. The biggest difference was the noise level. One moment, there was a loud explosion, metal clanging and grinding as our cart broke apart, me yelling, “DON’T—!” The next moment, terrifying silence.

I couldn’t feel . . . anything.

I’m still . . . alive? Part of me realized that I was in shock. I tried to move. I couldn’t. I tried to breathe. I couldn’t, though I didn’t feel like I needed to. I tried to smell, to feel, to hear. But again . . . I couldn’t. Yet I was still . . . here? Where am I?

Realization slowly started to take place in my consciousness and my thoughts started to pick up. Holy shit. I was dead. I was at the end.

Then unpleasant thoughts made their way in through my thick skull. Lily? Had she just witnessed her father getting blown apart? Was she . . . alive? And Ada . . . she would have to live a life without me. Her number one guardian now unable to protect her. What the hell. I comprehended it . . . but felt nothing. My emotions were not keeping up with my comprehension. Or maybe I just didn’t have a body to shed tears or feel emotions. It was . . . fuckin’ weird.

That reminded me. I did have eyes. I opened them. What was I? Just two floating eyeballs? I looked around hoping to find some answers but saw nothing but the bright white words. They floated in front of me as if I was in some 3D movie screening. I squinted and read the text again.

Tutorial complete. {Replay} or {Continue}?

As I focused on the words, I pushed what just happened out of my mind and concentrated on what I could control. I noticed the options highlighting when my gaze swept back and forth on the text, as if a system was monitoring my eye movements.

I had a lot of questions about life, and this scenario, the one I was experiencing . . . the uhh . . . death scenario, was more pressing than most. I was on the brink of something new, and I wanted to take my time here.

Then a timer showed up in the upper left of my vision.

2 minutes

1 minute 59 seconds

1 minute 58 seconds

What the hell. Oh come on.

I brought my attention back to my options. Replay . . . the tutorial? I had never done that in my life . . . but I supposed a couple bad gamer friends of mine might have.

What would that be like? Given my current predicament, it sounded like I would essentially be starting life over. If I was dead, and I selected replay . . . did that mean I would be reincarnated? I thought about that for a second.

Did that mean I would be a new baby?

If so . . . that would erase my memories. That would erase me.

Yeah, no thanks. I like me.

Life hadn’t been amazing, and in all honestly . . . it had been kind of shitty. But, I mean, I was glad I existed . . . I . . . think.

My focus moved to Continue.

The possibilities sprawled out in front of me, endless in number. What would happen if I chose to continue? Heaven? Hell? Nothing? I hesitated. Maybe replay . . . wasn’t such a bad idea.

1 minute

59 seconds

58 seconds

Jesus! Okay!

I stared ahead, my two little eyeballs flicking back and forth, weighing my options. Replay, or continue? What do I do? I paused in my thinking.

What did she choose?

Memories sifted through my mind. Her laughing at one of my dumb jokes. A dark room . . . her hand on my shoulder. Blood and mud on my jeans . . .

I realized that really only one thing mattered now that I was here. I had to move forward. I had to know what was next. I needed answers.

There was zero chance rerolling as a new person on earth would help me get back to the people I cared about the most.

There was only one option that put me on that path.

I hesitated, my gaze lingering on continue.

7 seconds

6 seconds

5 seconds

Dear God. Okay.

Something like panic surged forward through my mind as I briefly considered what would happen by default if I selected nothing.

It didn’t matter.

I slammed continue down with my mind. A system feed appeared in the bottom left of my vision.

Key received

Initiating soul transaction

Processing memory

Checking sanity

Packaging for transit

Transmitting data, 1/382

Transmitting data, 114/382

Packet lost

Retrying . . .

What. The. Hell. I had the strangest feeling. Like I was stuck crossing my eyes.

In one reality, I was there in the dark, watching the white text wink out after my selection.

In the other reality I could feel my body again, and I could see a wooden desk. This new room was small and the shape and size of a shipping container. But I couldn’t make out much because it felt like I wasn’t really there yet.

I don’t like this. What was happening?

I read the text that appeared in the bottom left of my vision again.

Packet lost . . . huh. Why does technology always suck?

Another line appeared.

You received the item {Soul Seed}.

Before I could parse what that line meant, two more things happened.

First, my entire life flashed before my eyes in an instant, and it felt like all my memories had just been copy-pasted. I still had them all, but somehow felt certain a copy of them had just been taken from me.

After that, an intense pain sprouted inside my head for a split second, then vanished. Something moved inside my mind. Something that wasn’t me. I felt an emotion that mimicked my own . . . that wasn’t my own. I felt someone else being curious, like they were slightly tilting their head.

“What is this place?” a high, girly crocodile-like voice said from somewhere in the shipping-container-sized room.

I replied from my body in that room as well. “Huh? Who is that? Are you my . . .?” . . . my conscience? I finished by thinking that last part. I had no idea who or what this was. My voice—I was glad to hear—was my own.

“Uhh sure? ‘My’ . . . works. Only let’s go with the I and E spelling. Oh my God! I think I would love pie,” the voice . . . Mie said.

“Mie . . . right . . . but uhh, who are you?” I asked.

“I don’t know,” she said and I felt her do a little mental shrug. “But uhh, what are all these memories?” There was a pause, and I could sort of feel her going through the memories like she was flipping through a catalog. “Wait. What is this? Is that you? Oh my god. Is this real? You farted in front of her?”

Mother of god. No, I thought. No way. This is Hell. I died and went straight to Hell. This creature . . . was dragging out memories I had under lock and key. Memories I had buried on purpose.

“Uhh . . . sorry?” Mie said. “I thought all this stuff was up for grabs. I mean there is so much material here it would be pretty hard to tell what should and shouldn’t be . . . gone through. Pretty much impossible actually.”

Part of me realized she must be able to sense my emotions as well, because I hadn’t verbally said anything to indicate I was upset.

I felt her eyes go down to the floor, her shoulders droop, and her turn away? It was hard to describe how I could feel those things, but I could even though I couldn’t see her presence.

Gah. Now I felt bad. “Look, it’s fine, just . . . let me get my bearings here a bit. Where are we even?” I asked.

I felt her perk up. “Feels . . . like we are stuck.”

Connection re-established

Transmitting data, 215/382

Transmitting data, 382/382

Soul transaction complete