With my legs broken, I could not kick them. With my fingers broken I could not shoot them. I could not insult or threaten them, as my teeth were shattered. I could not fathom a plan to save myself, for they had broken my mind. Nothing I had learned in my killer world could protect me from being killed myself. My fruit was reaped. Karma collected.

I was not afraid, I possessed nothing worth losing.

I was not angry, no righteousness left in my lungs.

I was not tired, nothing could be helped by rest.

This was Death, then. Calm, dusky twilight. No movement. Nothing positive or negative.

Peace.

And then I awoke.

I was less than a man, certainly not the sum and parts of what I once was.

My innards had left me, but stubborn soul refused to part with body.

And so I became half-man, bits and pieces, my fillings, the metallic inventions of a new God.

I opened my eyes.

With one eye I saw freedom, in the other damnation. Neither was wrong. I would decide which suited me.

They pieced me together in that blue world, and then I returned to ours.

But the things I remembered I did not enjoy.

Where fires burned, ashes smoldered and choked.

Where pride stood, guilt cowed.

Hate was nothingness.

This was Hell, then, cursed to die, doomed to live.

The cold was desired, but the heat was absent.

I met someone in that place. Someone that made me burn like an old wound.

I followed those wounds like a panting dog, and that was when I met you.

You were not my world, little more than an asteroid in my belt,

Yet you returned.

Not like a bird, a dog, something trained to come back, something more.

You did not fit in with that world.

And perhaps in you I saw a third world, one of light, and joy.

This was Heaven, then, guilt cut asunder, spirits raised above sins.

I could've stayed there with you.

But a dog was I, and I found my reflection in the waters.

I jumped in without you, after old bones, and drowned in the eternal river.

This is Nowhere, then. Not heaven or hell, but the blue world, where all is rebuilt.

I wonder, where will I be?

And will you be there?