Chapter 0: Death

I was dying. It wasn’t painful compared to what I had been experiencing the last several months. My senses were dulling. The pain that was ever present behind the medicine was fading away. It was pretty relaxing, surprisingly. I suppose I should have been afraid, but that would have taken energy I didn’t have. In the end, I was just relieved it was over.

My vision had already faded so I couldn’t see my family, but I could still feel that they were there. Strong and alive. I wanted to say something. Some last words to tell them it was all right. That I wasn’t suffering anymore, but I had lost too much feeling in my body. All I had left was my hearing, and all I could hear were strangled sobs and the voices, but even those were becoming indistinct.

“Please don’t- “I’m sorry, and I didn’t want to cause anyone pain. Sometimes it’s just your time you know.

And then my lungs couldn’t take in any more air, my heart couldn’t pump anymore, and my brain could no longer process the world around me.

And I was dead.

But I didn’t understand. Why could I still think? I was in a world of darkness and there was nothing. I couldn’t feel anything. I was an existence untethered to a body. Was this the afterlife?

There wasn’t much to it. Maybe it was the in-between.

The darkness was interrupted by light. It was clear and brilliant and shone brilliantly yet it illuminated nothing just more of the abyss. It was soothing, and while I thought I could feel nothing this light changed that. I could feel a soothing warmth buoying me on its current. It was peaceful.

Red light shone through the darkness, it made me feel strong, and it carried the feeling of what I could only describe as energy. The energy radiated discomfort. It was too unfocused – if let loose, it could destroy anything and rip it apart.

Greenlight shimmered into being, and if there was something I could ascribe to it, it would be the feeling of creation. As if sculpting cool soft clay into something else. It didn’t feel right either. It could create something new but at the cost of the old.

Blue light bubbled into being, shifting and changing so rapidly it was hard to tell what it was supposed to be. Still, as I looked at it, I couldn’t help but have the feeling that it was the distance between things yet it was also the space it inhabited.

There was something else behind these lights. I could feel it. It was not so much a light but the absence of it. The void. It drew and consumed, knowing no end to its hunger as it removed excess matter.

Choice.

We’re never given a choice when we come into life are we? Yet I can’t help but feel here at the end of my life I do have a choice. I could choose any of them.

I looked again at the first clear white light. Was it just me or did it seem… lonely? Something panged in my mind and the light seemed to intensify as if noticing me. It was asking me a question.

Help.

No, it wasn’t a question. It was a statement. It wanted help.

I looked again at the other lights. They also called out to me but did not cry out for help. This white light did.

I had never been able to help before. For my entire life, I had been a burden. On my friends. On my family.

I could help this light.

I reached out.

I woke up staring at sick and dying brown leaves. I did not understand. Wasn’t I supposed to be dead?

Sitting up, I looked down and realized I was naked. Pale white skin unscarred. That wasn’t right; I should have scars. Plenty of them from the surgeries. Another thing that occurred to me was that my body looked too small. I had been thin. Skeletal. I did not feel thin, but my limbs felt too short.

You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

I patted my face, gently taking joy as I realized that my limbs no longer felt heavy as they once did. I laughed, which sounded more like a child-like giggle, and jumped to my feet only to scream out as sharp stone met tender flesh. I stumbled away. I reached down to my foot feeling and saw the crimson fluid leaking from it.

The dermis had been penetrated, but the wound was not deep.

Heal.

White shimmered over the wound, and the pain disappeared. Pale skin replaced the jagged tear. I cautiously set my foot down, hoping another sharp object would not penetrate the skin.

Protection.

White light flashed over my feet, and suddenly the uncomfortable pricking of the ground disappeared as if I was wearing a solid pair of shoes. This was strange yet I had also died, so it wouldn’t be the strangest thing to be living anyways.

I hesitantly stepped forward once again on the forest floor. My foot was still safe.

I looked around the area and was struck by another strange thing. I was surrounded by a shell that almost looked like the shell of a tree nut, but instead, it was many times larger. Large enough so that if it were whole, it could have encased my entire body.

That was a strange thought.

Out of curiosity, I looked upward and that was when things truly began to feel off-kilter. In the bright pale moonlight, a tree stood stark against the sky. It was perhaps not truly best described as a tree I reflected. It was larger than any tree that I thought could exist. It was a solid wall of wood and the only thing that truly gave any credence to the idea that this could be a tree were the leaves that spread through the sky, the moon only barely visible through them.

I frowned. When I looked at this tree only one thought emerged in my mind.

Mother.

That couldn’t be right. I was a human. It was a tree. The issue seemed obvious.

Mother.

The thought was insistence like a gnarled root deep in my mind. I looked further up, and in the moonlight that should have been too dim for my eyes, I saw a branch bent directly above me and for some reason, I knew that I had been attached there. Cared for there.

I looked away, trying to shake the thought but a strange warmth caressed my scalp in a teasing way. Strange trees distributing pods was not a basis for creating human life.

Human?

A thought pressed insistently at my mind. I was a human, yes. I had lived…

That was strange; I couldn’t seem to recall where I had lived. A strange thing to forget. There had been people there though. Their faces were clear like my little sister’s. Tears poured down her face as she clutched at my shoulder painfully. Her name was…

Why couldn’t I remember her name?

Something hot and wet pricked my eyes, and I hastily rubbed my palm across them.

Sorrow.

Warm air ran against my head, ruffling hair that should have been shorn from sickness. A heavy but welcome weight pressed down on me as if I was being embraced.

I wanted to resist but at the embrace, something broke inside me and I began to cry in earnest. Deep racking sobs as I kneeled on the ground. There had been people who cared for me. Why was I alone?

Not alone. Mine.

My tears ebbed, and I turned to look at the tree again. I belonged to the tree?

The tree branches shivered, and I felt what could only be described as concurrence. The tree considered me hers.

Mine. Child. Do not cry. I am here. Will take care of you.

I swallowed the knot in my chest. Would the tree take care of me?

Yes. Mine.

Cool air shivered across my skin, and I was once more reminded that I was unclothed. I didn’t feel cold, but it was distinctly uncomfortable.

Here.

Out from the massive roots, a single branch emerged and then spiraled out what looked to be at first white fluff thickened and lengthened into what looked like a long shirt and, shortly after that, a pair of pants. They disconnected and fell.

I slowly walked over and put the clothes on. It was a simple brown cloth and slightly rough, but I put it on and felt better. I looked through the trees surrounding the clearing at the base of the great tree roots. Dark shadows covered the area shading the interior. Could some animals attack me down here?

Do not worry. Here is Safe.

I stared out again before deciding to trust the tree for now.

Mother.

I wasn’t sure I was comfortable with that.

Sadness. Understanding. Hope for the future.

I winced. I didn’t feel comfortable calling the tree mother, and yet I didn’t want to upset the tree after it had seemingly created the body I was in now and clothes. My own mother was still too close to my thoughts. Still, perhaps a compromise.

“What is your name?” I said out loud, wincing at my raspy voice. I was thirsty, I realized.

I am Mother. What is a name?

I frowned; how did I communicate that to the tree? I focused my thoughts on the meaning of the words.

I created you; am I not Mother?

“What do things you didn’t create call you?”

I created everything in this forest. I am Mother to all.

“Is the forest all there is?” I cocked my head, staring up at the tree.

Reluctant. There is more, and it is not safe. There is no Mother. Other children left. None returned.

I sighed, easing my body down onto the grass and staring up at the tree infected with melancholy.

Despite myself, I felt for the tree. Her emotions reminded me of my own mother as she held my hand as I died.

Perhaps if I couldn’t call her Mother, I could give her another name.

“What about Sara?”

Leaves rustled, and the tree impossibly, for a moment, seemed to creak.

Acceptable. I am Sara, your Mother.

Well, it was a start.