AN: There is no AN!
Disclaimer: Naruto does not belong to me. ;)
Chapter 1: Prologue
Death. It is an unexplainable and unexpected feeling, even when expected. It truly is the greatest mystery to life, for more reasons than I originally thought. Many think that when you get close enough to death you will suddenly, magically, find the true meaning of your life, that all will be explained. They couldn't have been more wrong.
Death is not the time of judgement, your final branding. Good or bad, evil or heroic, heaven or hell. No, in death, everyone is equal, no one can escape. The time of judgement is during life, when you can be punished for your actions fairly, or unfairly.
Death is not clarity, death is confusion, for both living and dying. During death you feel a sudden surge of emotions, unlike any you've felt ever before, and emotions most definitely do not provide clarity. Even if you feel like you have prepared yourself for this moment of chaos, when you realize that your time has come, you will try to fight it with all of your being. Everyone does so differently, some scream, some thrash, others just lay still and internally face the struggle, but, it is always a desperate fight.
Death is an unexplainable mystery. The feeling of your soul being ripped out of your body, which is then discarded like trash. It was tantalizing, but also so much more. A true mystery. Personally, I did not thrash or scream, it was impossible for me to, after all. I believed it was an easy way to go. Quick, simple, painless. A sweet and easy pop through the brain, definitely the best way to go, in my humble opinion.
That is, of course, until I tried it out myself. The moment directly after that nice squeeze, before the hammer hit the bullet, I had instant regret. Time seemed to slow down to the point where a nanosecond took an hour, and all I could do was watch as the hammer went down and ignited the gunpowder. All hope was lost as the bullet started to dig into my skull and I felt every ounce of pain caused by the damn thing. Dead. Gone. No more to be seen out of that pathetic life.
Death is one of the strangest experiences I have ever existed through. I was extremely shocked when I could feel myself leave my physical body, greatly due to the fact that I did not believe in the afterlife during my lifetime. I thought that I would pull that trigger, it would be over before I could blink, and that would be that. I'd be gone, no 'soul,' no anything afterwords. Just nothing, just gone, simple as that. But I was very, very wrong.
After I died I lost everything, all of my senses, my body, everything. Everything except for my memories and my ability to think. I did not know where I was, what was happening around me, if anything was happening, or if there was anything. In this void I just knew that I was, and I did not like my lack of power, or my lack of presence. This was when I truly realized that I liked my senses and bodily functions, loved them even. I did not think it through when I took my life, it was a horrible, devastating mistake that would be my greatest regret, but also my greatest success. I started panicking, flipping out, I went into rages, horrible tantrums that seemed to encompass my whole being. I stayed there for what seemed like years and years, not having anything to do, nothing to reflect on, nothing to interact with, nothing at all. I couldn't even go to sleep to pass the time, it was absolutely horrible. It was far worse than the life that I rid myself of. Far, far worse. I vowed to myself that If I somehow managed to get another body, another chance, that I would live as long as I possibly could and beyond. Even if I fell into depression like last time, even if my life was pointless, even if there was no joy in it, it was better than this.
It was directly after this decision that things started to change. I could feel again, it was as if the universe was testing me, and once I reached that conclusion, I would pass and be given a new body, a new mind, a new life. The next senses were hearing, taste, and smell, although the taste and smell were useless wherever I was, which I assumed to be in my pregnant mother, which is not where I had hoped or thought I would end up, oddly enough. Ignoring that, I could hear voices, in a completely different language than what I spoke. Completely different, and extremely confusing, to me at least. I decided that I might as well get to work and start learning that baby ASAP, especially because I could not see, or communicate to these people in any way at all, which would be incredibly stressful and annoying to deal with any longer than necessary. I quickly realized that my movements were extremely limited, and it was difficult to speak, so I opted for memorization without vocalization.
However depressing it was, I was incredibly happy to have even this level of movement and mental stimulation, however little. I tried as hard as possible to learn this new language, and even though it was incredibly difficult, I was incredibly happy for it, after all, I had just gotten out of the most solitary type of confinement that exists: the 'afterlife.'
My days continued like this for a while, and I had no real sense of time because everything around me was black. So, when I was suddenly bombarded by bright, unforgiving rays of light I immediately recoiled from them, my new eyes slowly adjusting to the so far foreign waves. Then, very soon afterwards, I smiled, my first smile in a very, very long time. I had been born again, I had undergone something that no one else in my knowledge ever had before. Something truly magical. The possibilities in this life were endless, more endless than I had ever thought.
This feeling… the feeling of being reborn, was very similar to death, but it was also as different from death as you could ever possibly get. It was truly, truly inexplicable.