AN: Greetings to all readers, as this is the first time I release a fiction and English isn't my mother-tongue, I am more than thankfull for hints concerning grammar and syntax. I am also open for constructive criticism concerning the Story.

Prologue

As I awoke, I was utterly confused, because all I saw was a cloud full of colours and as I tried to shift my gaze to see more of my environment, It struck me that there wasn't something to shift. I had no eyes... nor a body. “Calm down. I have to calm down.” I though to myself to disperse the upcoming panic. Thankfully it worked. Now calm, I tried to assess my situation.

First my 'gaze' actually shifted, despite the lack of eyes.

Second I could see or rather feel that I also was a coloured cloud in this giant stream.

Third everything moved, me included.

And lastly I remembered. I remembered the accident. A flash of light around the corner of a house and then pain. I got hit by a car that drove through the nightly town and it drove at a speed way past the speed-limit.

“Fucking youths and their street races” I though while noting that I started to think like an old man.

Counting one and one together I came to the conclusion that I died and the clouds, mine included, are souls.

As time passes and I drift with the stream of souls I noticed that the speed off the stream increases the farther I flow with it and more disturbing that the pressure and the friction between me and the others increases. It felt like the corridor the stream takes gets narrower. Then came the pain, as I felt myself getting grinded down, it was a slow process and it happened to all the souls around me too, but I felt that it won't stop till there are only small particles left.

I shook with fear, I didn't want to loose what was left of me, I didn't want to loose my identity, my soul.

But I didn't know what to do, what could I do?

I focused and concentrated on stopping my cloud, stopping it in the stream. At first I failed and was pushed farther along the corridor, increasing the speed and the grinding of the souls. But then I altered my form, from a random cloud to a streamlined mass. I finally came to a halt. It was exhausting to do so and that is why I looked for something to strengthen me. But there were only souls and the fine mist they are getting grinded to.

Then it hit me, why not use that mist? Could I use it? Absorb it?

I tried it. It worked, slowly at first but increasingly faster as my mind got the hang of it. Now I grow and get stronger, instead of loosing volume and strength. And ever so slowly my halt in the stream turns into an advance against it. But as I advance I notice that I am missing direction, sure going against the stream is good but where am I going? While advancing I concentrate on everything around me for a hint, but I find nothing, till I search in myself.

What I find there is something akin to a compass, and it points against the direction of the flow, so I follow it. After what seems like aeons to me I reach a hole in the side of the translucent corridor, something I never saw in it and it doesn't seem to influence the other souls nor do they seem to notice it, although the other souls never seem to notice anything anyway.

At that note I remember my trials to communicate with the other souls by wrapping around them or poking them, but it never got me a response, only more mass as my stronger, denser soul slowly and unconscious absorbed theirs. Not wanting to destroy them I stopped my trials and avoided extensive contact with the others.

This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

Snapping out of my memories I advance to the hole. As I observe it other souls drift past it, one even rubs against the corridor and the hole, without a strand of it getting in it, as if that gap doesn't exist at all. Curious I get closer to it, wondering if I also won't get past the corridor. Now I can see what is beyond the hole, but all I see is a blinding light at the end of a short tube. Filled with hope I take my first step.... my first float through the goal that I strived for for my entire journey in this strange realm of the dead.

Instantly I feel like a fish on a fishing line, as I pass the light I loose the strange sense that served me so well, now utterly senseless and stunned all that surrounded me was silence and my own thoughts. After what seemed like an eternity my senses returned, first touch, it felt like I was on a bed, then smell , the smell of a hospital, the fitting sounds soon followed, I heard an ECG's monotonous peep-peep and something like bellows and finally I could move and so I opened my eyes.

Or at least I tried, it felt like I had no strength in my whole body and so I tried to quicken my breath to give my body the oxygen it needed to give me that strength and yet again I failed. There was a big resistance against my breath, that is when I remembered the below like sound. Could it be I was on life support? Realizing that I let my chest slump and do not struggle against the machine, for it could damage my lungs if I did. I just had to wait anyway.

After I finally felt like I regained enough strength I opened my eyes very slowly to not get blinded.

But there wasn't any need to worry about that, for it was night or at least very dark in my room. Looking around me I could identify the life support and the ECG and to my relief also a call button.

Mustering all my strength I raised my hand and.... stopped. This hand of mine looked like a skeleton hand. No wonder I felt so weak. How long was I gone. How long did my coma last. For that was the only logical solution that came to me. A coma. Swallowing my resentment about my ruined body, I noted that at least I could move at all, my arms that is, most probably I could not stand. Finally I pressed the button and waited.

A few minutes later an aghast and pale nurse entered my room. “Maybe it was a bit shocking to get a call from a person that was in a coma for years (?) and that in the middle of the night.” I though to myself. Seeing me awake and moving she quickly regained her face colour and with it her composure. “Good morning sleepy head and welcome back among the living” she said.

I chuckled and almost chocked on the life support after thinking that the first human words I heard after waking up were a bad joke. Seeing that the nurse quickly got to work to get me off the respirator. After struggling a bit with my first unassisted breaths I turned my head to look at the nurse, who intensely inspected the screens and machines around me.

“How.....” I tried to ask, but failed to say more. “18 months.” she said, “Through a car accident.”.

“It seemed so much longer,” I though, “but at least that nightmare is over. I am back. No more coloured clouds dispersing in oblivion.”. Oh what wishful thinking. As I though about that bizarre 'dream' and remembered how I felt my surroundings, my last sense returned. And instantly I felt a soul where the nurse stands and of course my own well fed, monstrous soul.