“It is not the end of the physical body that should worry us. Rather, our concern must be to live while we’re alive.”

— Elisabeth Kübler-Ross, On Death and Dying

As Yogi steadied himself in the new, nebulous afterlife, an overwhelming surge of information poured into his mind. The influx felt like an untamed flood, each particle of data a pebble in the torrent, building into a relentless wave. His vision blurred, and a heavy throbbing began at the base of his skull, making it nearly impossible to keep his balance.

Root hovered nearby, observing him with a mixture of amusement and sympathy, one eyebrow raised in a familiar, almost fatherly way. “This part’s always tricky. Just hang in there, Yogi.”

Despite Root’s encouragement, Yogi felt like his brain was about to split open. Every neuron, every thought was bending under the strain of absorbing knowledge that spanned countless lives, universes, and realities. Shards of concepts flickered in and out, barely forming before splintering into smaller pieces. It was knowledge—but fragmented, like a mosaic shattered before it could be seen as a whole.

“You humans and your limits,” Root commented with a chuckle, folding his arms. “Always so set on categories, on measuring every little thing. But sometimes, there’s no getting around it. When you’re transferred to the afterlife OS, it comes as a package—efficient, if not exactly user-friendly.”

Yogi gripped a console for support, trying to focus through the haze in his mind. The room seemed to shift and undulate with strange energies as though alive with unseen movement. “Does… does it get easier?”

Root nodded thoughtfully. “In time. Calibration is rough, but you’ll stabilize. Sure, there’ll be some gaps—a few illogical jumps here and there—but you’re only human, so the system does its best to, uh, make it work.”

Through the fog of his migraine, Yogi tried to make sense of the fragments. Karmic balance… energy flows… reincarnation cycles—all of it felt vast and confusing. Some concepts sparked brief flashes of clarity, while others slipped through his fingers like sand. He caught the faintest understanding of “karma logs” and “rebirth tracking” but failed to piece them together before the sensation dissipated.

Yogi clutched his temples, groaning as each piece of new knowledge collided with his understanding—or what was left of it.

“Would you stop moaning? You’re fine,” a smooth, electric hum of a voice interjected. A shifting form appeared before him, glowing with blue and green hues that rippled as if alive with inner light.

Root gestured at the figure with a grin. “Photon, meet Yogi. Our new cosmic bug-fixer.”

Photon’s colors shifted, forming a soft, cyan glow as they studied Yogi with a mixture of pity and mild curiosity. “They always look so… human. Struggling, anxious, clinging to their mortal limits.”

Yogi tried to focus on the figure, his vision doubling and swimming as Photon continued. “Your species gets stuck on things like pain, confusion… such needless obstacles.”

Photon's glow pulsed as though emphasizing its point, and Yogi forced himself to respond, though he couldn’t suppress the strain in his voice. “It’s not… by choice. We’re just not built for this kind of… download.”

Photon emitted a gentle hum, shifting into a blue gradient. “When I’m given new information, I simply become it. No struggle, no resistance.”

Before Yogi could muster a retort, a rapid clicking sound echoed from his left, and a large insectoid creature emerged, its eyes glistening with a prismatic sheen. The creature was nearly six feet tall, with spindly limbs and intricate patterns along its thorax. It was more beautiful than he had anticipated—though its insectoid face made it difficult to decipher its expression.

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“That’s Grimace,” Root said, a smirk on his face as he motioned toward the insectoid figure. “Don’t mind the face. He’s more bark than bite.”

Grimace clicked his mandibles in what Yogi could only guess was a wry smile. “Bark? Humans and their bizarre metaphors.” His multifaceted eyes narrowed as he inspected Yogi. “You’re the new debugger, hm? Here to fix the bugs. I suppose we’ll see if this ‘human adaptability’ lives up to its reputation.”

Yogi’s headache was only growing, but he attempted a polite nod. “Uh… I’ll try not to disappoint?”

Grimace chittered, his clicks resembling a chuckle. “Sentimentality. Another human trait. It’s so quaint.”

Photon shimmered with mild amusement, their glow deepening into teal. “Humans make everything personal. They turn the cosmic into the mundane, the eternal into stories.”

“Can we ease up on the judgment for a minute?” Root cut in, patting Yogi on the back. “He’s just been through orientation. He’ll need some time to get his cosmic feet under him.”

With a groan, Yogi straightened himself, the headache receding enough for him to focus on the console Root had pointed out. As he gazed at the screen, he saw rows upon rows of karmic balances, listed by name, date, and cosmic frequency. A new flicker of confusion sparked in him as he tried to process what he was seeing.

“Animals get karma points too?” he asked, his gaze catching on a line that read “Jasper, Domestic Cat - +5 KP.”

Root raised an eyebrow, clearly amused by Yogi’s surprise. “Of course, animals are as much a part of the karmic ecosystem as humans. Energy flows through every living thing, so karma follows. A cat’s calm can soothe, a whale’s presence balances the ocean, a bee’s work supports the world.”

Photon glowed a soft green, their voice almost mocking. “Humans seem to think karma is all about moral weight, when really, it’s just cosmic bookkeeping. Energy goes out, energy comes back. Nothing personal.”

Yogi frowned, watching the karma points scrolling on the screen, each one assigned to animals, people, places, and even seemingly inanimate objects. His headache faded into the background as he tried to comprehend the complexity of this unseen system.

“So… karma’s just a kind of energy currency?” he asked, half to himself.

“Precisely,” Root replied with a nod. “But if it helps, think of it as a resource pool. You gain, you lose, you redistribute. Not that anyone below here would understand. Mortals cling to the idea of karma as morality.”

Photon glowed brighter. “Humans are especially fond of quantifying it—karma, points, values. It’s all very primitive but useful in understanding motivation.”

“But isn’t that… limiting?” Yogi asked, feeling a strange mixture of fascination and disappointment. “It makes karma sound so mechanical, so devoid of… I don’t know, meaning?”

Root smiled, his expression a mixture of humor and sympathy. “Welcome to cosmic administration, my friend. Meaning is what you make of it. Here, karma is just part of the system.”

Grimace’s mandibles clicked as he turned away from Yogi’s introspective gaze. “All this sentimental musing won’t help you understand the task, human. Focus on the details.”

Root cleared his throat. “Right. We’re here to fix bugs in the system, simple as that.”

Yogi nodded slowly, the enormity of the task beginning to sink in. He glanced at the console, noticing a set of error messages highlighted in red. Each line referred to minor discrepancies in karmic balance or fluctuations in karma transactions, which seemed… irregular.

“What are these errors?” he asked, pointing at the screen.

Photon flickered, the glow shifting to a dull orange. “Oh, just standard bugs. They crop up now and then, small anomalies where karma doesn’t flow quite right. It’s usually benign—just the system hiccuping.”

Root shrugged. “Karmic overflow, unbalanced gains, glitches in the logs. Routine work, really. That’s where you come in.”

Yogi scanned the errors, his fingers hesitating as he traced the red lines on the screen. Something about the patterns bothered him, though he couldn’t quite place why. There was a strange rhythm to the discrepancies, an odd pulse he felt but couldn’t understand. And as he stared, his headache returned, a faint ache just behind his eyes.

“So we’re… debugging the cosmic karma system?” he clarified, still trying to grasp the surreal task.

“Precisely,” Root replied, grinning. “Think of it as maintaining balance. Fix the leaks, reroute the flow, correct the cosmic harmony.”

Grimace clicked in annoyance. “It’s hardly harmony when we’re constantly patching errors. This system wasn’t built for organic creatures to handle.”

Photon agreed, their glow pulsing rhythmically. “Human inefficiency, sentimental attachments, an obsession with trying to ‘understand.’ That’s where half the bugs come from.”

“Hey, we’re doing our best here,” Yogi protested, a faint grin tugging at his lips despite the headache. “Maybe the system needs more… adaptability?”

Photon let out a faint hum. “Adaptability without precision is just chaos. Humans seem to revel in it.”

Yogi rolled his eyes, brushing off the jab as he returned his attention to the console. Despite the headache, he felt a strange sense of excitement bubbling beneath the confusion. He was here—actually here, tasked with maintaining cosmic order, as strange as it all seemed. He studied the errors on the screen, noticing the same patterns, the faint pulse of discrepancies rippling through the karmic logs.