Chapter 1: Death and reincarnation

Dying is easy. A mere second of distraction in the road and a car, changing lines, hit my motorcycle. The fall cost me some broken bones, nothing new for an experienced motorcycle pilot, but, being a busy highway, in seconds my head gets squished by a truck tire. An already expect ending for a hard life.

My family wasn’t especially poor when I was born. My dad had a good job and got two of my brothers through college. But when I was ten years old my mother discovered dad was cheating on her and got a divorce. From down there, things started to get rough for me.

My mother spend most of the time in jobs that simply did not paid enough for the living expenses  and the rest of the time she was on bars and parties trying to get a new husband to support us. Obviously, those are the worst places to try to find a good husband. She did get several bad ones tought. With a toxic environment at home and a chronic lack of money, I did what I had to do and get a part-time job at a mechanic shop when I was twelve. At fourteen, I became a waiter so that I could work eight hours in the evening instead of four, and then two years later I get my driver’s license and with my savings got a old motorcycle and starting working as a courier. Just barely got to finish high school that way, but I never quit my dreams.

You see, I always loved stories. The passion started with television, with the simple stories from the cartoons opening the way for more complex ones in the form of comic books and then I finally get to discover the library on sixth grade. Whenever I got hungry and there wasn’t food, whenever I got lonely and no one was home, the stories in the books became my personal bunker against the pain and sadness. Stories are my strength, my light at the end of the tunnel, the only thing that give me a reason for living. Was only natural that my dream end up to became a writer and create stories that could also bring happiness for others as they have bring for me in my time of need.

It wasn’t an easy road. Without money for a good education and no contacts in the industry, it was practically impossible to publish. But if you are stubborn enough, eventually you get things done no matter the odds stacked against you. I get a deal with a minor publisher and get my books out there. The money was not enough to survive of writing and my work as a courier continued for over ten years of my adult life so that the bills could get paid at the end of the month. But I was happy. My dream was be a writer and bring happiness to the people, not to become an international best seller or something like that.

And so I die, happy with a fulfilled life.

***

When I recovery my consciousness, immediately I know that I was dead and was in heaven. First tip was my last memory before blacking out: a giant truck tire hitting my head. My mind realized that was impossible to survive. Second tip was that, even if by some miracle I could survive tens of tons of pressure smashing my cranium, I would wake in a hospital with a broken body from the accident. But I was fine, nothing out of place. The third and last tip was the smiling angel in front of me.

Thinking in retrospect, the first and second tips were irrelevant in light of the third one, but that was the order of thinking at that moment. Maybe dying turned me into kind of an airhead?

- “Oh, I died” - I then closed my eyes and sighed. Ok, that was some stupid first words in heaven. I guess it will become some kind of joke later on whatever passes as happy hour here?

- “Any regrets?” - Asked the angel.

I open my eyes and looked at the angel. It was exactly as in the pictures that they showed us in Sunday school. White wings, bright halo, white clothing, blond hair and blue eyes, astonishing beauty, all the angelical set. Except for the fact that it was a she and not really an it as some believe.

- “Heh. No regrets. I did the best I could with what I got, and even if only by a while, I got to fulfill my dream. But looking at you now, I guess I shouldn’t have used the saying ‘to argue about the sex of the angels’, don’t you think?”

- “Oh, yeah. Hehehe. Just one of the many things people get wrong about the nature of the universe. Before I forget, my name is Mariel” - she informed me with a smile.

“Can an angel forget things”? Was what I was thinking at that moment, but I waived it off as some joke she used on people who died suddenly as I have, so them could calm down and accept the situation. Instead of asking about it, I actually started to pay attention to where we are. With looked like nowhere. It was an empty white space where I didn’t get the sensation of standing in something, but also didn’t get the sensation of falling. It was really weird. When I tried to move a step, it worked, but I didn’t feel the force of the ground against my foot like normal.

I imagined that that was because I was actually a soul now, and didn’t have a physical body anymore, so the idea of movement was the thing that mattered, and not actually moving my legs. So I tried imagining moving to a point without using my legs and it worked, I hovered in that direction on the first try.

- “Oh, you learn fast! As expect from someone who was once a scientist!” - Said Mariel while observing I adapt to that spiritual body.

- “Huh?” - I bet I made a really stupid face here - “I was a writer, a courier, a waiter and a mechanic in different times of my life, but never was a scientist…”

- “Yeah, I know. What I mean was that you were a scientist in one of your incarnations in another world. That’s why your present incarnation has a bit of inquisitive nature and talent for the sciences in general” - and that was when my stupid face must have updated to version 2.0.

- “Oh… ok, so… past lives exist? Wait. Wait! Before that… You said ‘another world’, right? Is there more than one Earth? Like parallel realities? If so, is there one where I am a superhero?”

C’mon, can you really blame me for getting excited at the idea? I think I spend a good part of my teens hoping that one day I would gain superpowers and live like Spiderman: school in the morning, saving the world in the afternoon and then working in the evening to pay the bills. And I wouldn’t mind the redhead supermodel wife too. Sad part is that the superpowers bit of that fantasy was more likely to happen than someone like me getting a hot supermodel for wife…

- “Hmm… nope” - and that was the sound of my adolescent delusions once again shattering. That’s cruel, Mariel, you shouldn’t give a dreamer hope just to smash it the next moment! - “There’s only one Earth, and there’s only one you in the universe. Each soul is unique and can’t exist at two places at the same time. But it’s true that there other realities besides the one you know. Trillions of them, actually, each one are unique and habited by trillions of souls that are also each one unique. Oh, and despite you never being a superhero, in a past live you are once an amazing archer that became a hero of the people. If you have picked up a bow in your present incarnation, your talent would be enough to have became an Olympic medalist.”

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- “Whoa! That’s a lot of information at once!” - New update for stupid face is just out! - “But, an archer and hero of the people, huh? Like Robin Hood? So cool!” - In my heart, I forgive her for crushing my previous hopes - “But, Mariel, that’s the second time you speak of talent related to my previous lives. How does that work?”

She put her index finger on her chin and thinks for a couple seconds before answering.

- “Hmm… Right, when you pass by the process of reincarnating, one of the steps is to have your memories erased and converted in talents for the activities you developed in the past lives, which then became something like a muscular memory of your soul. If you do the same things in various lives, like being a painter or a soldier, you can develop a great talent for that thing.”

- “So that is how guys like Da Vinci and Alexander, the Great come to be, huh?”

- “Those are…?” - She looked at me with curiosity. Right, angels are not omniscient’s beings, and she did say that there are trillions of different worlds out there. It is too much to expect her to know historic details of Earth.

- “Da Vinci was one of the greatest artists and Alexander was one of the greatest generals from Earth’s history. Their achievements leaved a mark in history and are remembered even after centuries and even millennia after their deaths. But back on track, shall we? So, this time, since I dedicated myself as a writer and worked as a courier in a motorcycle, will I have more talent to write and pilot motorcycles in my next lives?”

- “Yes! You will also have a great talent to persevere against all odds in your next lives!” - Mariel said that to me with a great smile. But that part about perseverance didn’t make me very happy, it’s like develop a resistance against pain by getting trough painful experiences. Thank you, but no, thanks.

- “Well then, what happens now? Do I get to reincarnate back on Earth or is it another world? If my opinion counts for something, I wish for someplace with magic or superpowers, if they exist at all” - and there are my adolescent delusions again…

- “Hehehe… So, let me see how to explain. There is something called karma and the general concept is simple, you do good things, you get good karma, you do bad things, you get bad karma. So, when you reincarnate, the general conditions of your life get determinate by your combined karma. So, the more good karma, the best start you get with a good loving family, wealth, etc. The more bad karma, the worst things happens to you, bad parents, poor family, poor health, and so on.”

- “So, considering my life, I’m guessing that was because me getting an average karma in the last live, right?”

- “Yes. Your life was not easy, but it was not terrible either, you never were abused nor suffer hunger or thirst and even your early death come painless and at a time you feel fulfilled with your life. Well, let’s return to my answer to your question. Can you get to a fantasy world with magic and superpowers? Normally you don’t get to choose, but since is my first day at the job, consider it a gift, ok? But while I can do that, your life conditions still will be determined by the karma you accumulated in your life, ok?” - I blinked a couple times at that.

- “Huh? First day at the job? Well, where are my manners, congratulations! And thanks for the gift! But is there something like jobs in heaven?”

- “Ah, well, something like that, but not quite. Thing is, I’m the same as you, a reincarnated soul. If you accumulate vast amounts of good karma in multiples lives, you will ascend to heaven and became an angel like me” - she said, obviously proud. Mariel, pride is one of the seven deadly sins; you will end up kicked out of heaven like that! - “Since I just ascended, you are the first one that I help trough the reincarnation process”

- “Well, that’s incredible! Congratulations on becoming an angel, Mariel!” - Well, isn’t she a good girl? She even will get me to a cool world with magic and superpowers! Enough of the tedious everyday life of Earth, hello cool stories of great warriors and powerful wizards and wise kings and heroes and villains deciding the fate of the world! Yay!

- “Heheh! Alright! Let’s begin the reincarnation process! Prepare yourself for a new life!” - Oh, the wings move when she happy. Cute.

- “That’s right! Let’s do this!”

Thinking back, all this excitement was probably a bad sign; in my experience, the boring office workers are always the most competent and the happy to go guys always screw up.

***

The first light that touched my eyes was that of the few candles in the room. Despite them only providing a meager light, I could see clear as day in the low light, but the colors faded in places away from the candles. A manful face, with a scarce beard, smiled at me and was saying something I didn’t understand. Was that my father? He appears to be human. I moved my arms and legs just to confirm they are there, and noticed that they didn’t worked properly yet. Probably there’s not enough muscles build to move the right way.

My father put me in the arms of a woman that rested in a bed. I wonder if that’s my mother? Her face is gorgeous! Eh!? Wait, wait, wait! What are those pointy ears? Beautiful face, pointy ears, isn’t she an elf? An elf! Congratulations, father, you married an elf! Does that mean I am a half-elf? No, more important than that, it’s an interspecies love story! Oh, boy, there should be a really good story behind that, I can’t wait to grow up and hear that from you two, mama, papa! Hehehe!

Eh?

Wait, something is wrong here, why do I remember so much? Shouldn’t my memory have been erased? Huh? Will I forget things as I grow up? Is that how it works?

As if answering my mental questions, time stopped and my parents stood frozen with the same happy expression for meeting their newborn son. In a corner of the room stood Mariel, radiating holy light like an, well, angel, duh. Her face was the one of someone who could cry any moment now.

- “I’m sorry” - she said - “I screw up” - and she’s crying now. What the actual f…

A crying angel, in front of a frozen up couple holding a newborn baby, that have a really confused look in his face. It’s like someone didn’t have enough money for a decent Christmas decorations and have to make do with minis from Doctor Who, Star Trek and some old Japanese anime.