This isn't the longest chapter of the story (in fact, it's the second shortest as of right now), but size doesn't matter, it's how you use it that matters. And this is certainly an emotional chapter. You'll see why in the later parts.

The title of this chapter comes from both the songs called "Physical." One is by Olivia Newton-John, the other Dua Lipa.

When I say all hell broke loose, I mean it. Prior to this, the scene had been organized chaos, with the guests chatting with one another as they watched the chefs wheel the cake into the garden.

Now, however, it was just chaos. As soon as Cyrus jumped into the cake, the table crumbled underneath the force applied by his body weight.

So the table can withstand 36 cubic feet of cake, but a Lucario jumping on it? Nah, it doesn't stand a chance!

More importantly to the atmosphere of chaos, Raina seemed to come out of her trance. She sprang out of her chair and ran towards her soulmate as quickly as she could. It wasn't quick enough, however, for one of the chefs jumped in front of Cyrus as though defending him from the Ninetales.

"I wasn't going to attack him!" Raina yelled. "I was just going to make sure he's all right! He's my soulmate!"

The chef wasn't having any of it. From my current vantage point, I could see that the man was very buff for someone of his profession. If he and Raina happened to get in a physical fight with one another, I'd consider the chef the favorite.

"That doesn't matter," he told Raina. "Your soulmate isn't going to have any cake, and neither will the rest of you. This party's over!"

"No...I want to party!" squeaked a Fennekin from a nearby table. The other guests seemed to share the sentiment; none of them wanted this evening to end.

"Too bad, Finn!" Maximus Waters yelled as he walked back up to the microphone. "I don't like to do this, but I'm going to have to cancel the rest of this event. You know what they say, one bad apple spoils the bunch!"

Raina helped Cyrus up from the collapsed table. He was groaning in pain, and his chest was covered in cream cheese frosting and scrumptious yellow cake. As he looked back at me, appearing as if he meant, Come on, Victor, we've got to keep the party going!

The whole evening had been a roller coaster for me. I'd gone from being thrilled at visiting the mansion, to disgusted with Cyrus for showing his true colors, to having fun again, and now this.

"Hold up, bro!" announced Wendell Tendai as he mounted the stage once again. He looked absolutely heartbroken, as though he'd just learned Christmas had been cancelled. But there was a sizable amount of anger in his eyes as well.

"What do you want, Tendai?" Maximus snapped at the Talonflame. "We already let you play half your set list, there's nothing to complain about!"

"But I wanted to play more!" Wendell whined, like a small child throwing a temper tantrum. Those words only cemented my dislike of Billy Talonflame's lead singer further.

"It wasn't your fault the party went downhill, but I can't just keep this going. I'll compensate you guys if you'll stop being so immature about it."

Both the Talonflame and the Machamp glared at each other for a good minute, but Maximus won the staring contest.

"If you know what's good for you", Maximus told Wendell, "you'll leave the estate now. I'm not mad at you now, but that's subject to change if you give me reason to be."

Wendell might have been acting very childish, but he clearly knew the writing was on the wall. He spread his wings and, this time, actually took flight.

"Now, back to the party" the Machamp said authoritatively, narrowing his eyes at the partygoers. "I really hate having to end parties early, but the display of Cyrus Damasen here has really put a damper on the festivities."

He then turned to the drunken Lucario, who was now picking clumps of cake out of his fur and devouring them as his soulmate looked on with disgust.

"You, Cyrus Damasen, are hereby banned from entering the Maximus Mansion and its surrounding estate for afterlife! If you are seen here again subsequent to tonight, August 14, 2021, you will be considered trespassing and prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law!"

Cyrus didn't seem to realize the gravity of the situation. He still kept on eating the cake off his body as though everything was fine.

"Do you understand how much trouble you are in, Mr. 448?"

The numerical value of 448 was obviously Lucario's PokeDex number, but I wasn't sure why Maximus called Cyrus that. Perhaps he hoped to convey just how angry he was at Cyrus.

Raina, meanwhile, was staring daggers at her soulmate. There was lightning in her eyes; I had never seen anyone look so enraged with their significant other.

"How could you embarrass me like that in front of the other guests? I knew you drank more than a Lucario should, but you really need some self-control!"

Cyrus' stomach rumbled audibly. "Uh-oh, I think I ate too much," he said blankly before leaning forward and expelling the contents of his stomach onto the grass.

It struck me suddenly that, while something can take weeks, months, or even years to build up, particularly if it's related to trust in a relationship, the same is not true when something is broken. Trust can be shattered in seconds, with just one wrong move.

So now we had an inebriated Lucario, grass covered in cake vomit, and a relationship that had probably been ruined. The reader is probably wondering: How could it possibly get worse?

Well, one of the other guests, a Blaziken who appeared to be just as drunk as Cyrus was, suddenly overturned the table he was sitting at, sending dishes and silverware clattering to the ground. Fortunately, the grass was a soft landing.

Unfortunately, the sight and sound of the table being pushed aside caused quite a commotion. It seemed that out of nowhere, people were throwing their drinks aside, hurling plates like frisbees, and any number of other things.

If this scene hadn't been one of chaos before, it certainly is now!

I stood up from my chair and dashed over to Raina and Cyrus, hoping to somehow defuse the situation between them. They were still staring at each other, and tension hung in the air like a thick cloud of some toxic gas.

"Victor! What are you doing?" Raina shouted. "This is between me and Cyrus, nobody else!"

I remembered what Amanda had said to me that morning, even though those words had been used in an entirely different context. They seemed to fit here, though.

"We live in a society, Raina. I want to make sure everything's okay between you two; I don't want anybody getting physical."

Raina looked livid. "I'm sorry, but it's rather rich of you to tell me not to get physical! My soulmate is the one who got physical, just look at the cake!"

At this point, the heaping mound of sugar, spice, and everything nice that had once been known as a "cake" was languishing on the ground in the night air. For the first time, as I heard dishes flying all around me, I felt truly horrible for whoever would have to clean up such a huge mess.

"She has a point, you know," said a man in a security uniform, someone I hadn't noticed before. "You shouldn't stick your nose into anyone else's business; privacy is important, even in the afterlife."

At that point, I knew exactly what I wanted. I might have been having fun earlier, but those minutes were long behind me, and now, as I kept ducking and hoping I didn't get hit by a stray dish, glass, or knife, I made my wish.

"I just want to go home" I replied, probably sounding childish but not caring in the slightest. "I just want to put every last part of this horrible night behind me!"

The security guard nodded. "We can drive you back to Enil Edam. But make no mistake, there probably won't be another party here at the Maximus Mansion ever again; once you leave, you will never come back."

I snorted. "Yeah, like I care!"

The guard raised an eyebrow. "Eternity is a long time, young man. Maybe you'll want to revisit just to see the place you once partied at, but you will not be able to."

"Again, I don't see why I'd want to return to this hellhole!"

Maximus turned to me, evidently having heard the word "hellhole." It was like blood in shark-infested waters; he was immediately drawn to the slightest suggestion that his home wasn't perfect.

Cyrus told me he was humble. Well, I'm never going to believe anything that this drunkard says again!

"Victor Chelan, why did you use that word?" he asked me. He spoke calmly, but there was a trace amount of venom in his voice.

"What word? Return?" I replied, trying to play dumb. One look at Maximus' face told me the ruse had not worked.

"You know exactly what word I'm talking about. Hellhole. How dare you insult this place, I worked so hard to be able to afford it!"

Too late, I realized that I'd dragged myself into trouble along with Cyrus. It seemed very possible that, when the dust settled, I, Victor Chelan, would also be permanently banned from entering the premises.

"I'm sorry" I said, but I knew I was fighting a losing battle. Nevertheless, I persisted: "I didn't think before I shot my mouth off. My bad."

Maximus continued squinting at me, absolutely stone-faced. For better or worse, he didn't say anything more, at least not directly to me. He did, however, clear his throat again and address the audience once more.

"As Chef Branson announced, this party is over. Everyone, please leave, or you will be trespassing."

I didn't need to be told twice. While there wasn't necessarily a stampede to get into the shuttle vans back to Enil Edam, it wasn't exactly an orderly line either.

The windows of the house on Palm Drive were dark when I got back, so I assumed that Amanda had already gone to bed. I couldn't be sure what time it was, but it was late enough that all the stars could be seen.

So many constellations, ones I never bothered to the name of. For all I know, there could be constellations that don't exist above Earth.

I'd never been much of a stargazer, but the skies above Paradise Island seemed ideal for such a pursuit. If nothing else, even if I didn't know what all the stars were called, it helped calm me down after such an insane evening.

Fortunately, Amanda had left the door unlocked, so I entered the home and made my way into the kitchen. I was still somewhat hungry, and Cyrus, in diving headlong into the massive cake at the Maximus Mansion, had robbed me of my dessert.

There's always something unsettling about moving around a dark house at night, even if it's your own. I held my long arms out to keep my balance, shuffling rather than raising my feet so that I didn't trip over anything. And, while I wasn't exactly a superstitious person, there was always that vague notion that something could jump out at any moment.

In the fridge, I found something that I was pretty sure hadn't been there that morning. It looked delicious, but at the same time, the sight was so shocking that I damn near screamed.

It was a yellow sponge cake with white cream cheese frosting, one slice of which had been cut out with a knife. That knife was still in the cake pan. It was nothing fancy, but it made my mouth water and my heart skip several beats.

Just like the one Cyrus ruined for us.

Figuring that Amanda must have baked it for us to share, I took the cake out of the fridge and cut a generous piece for myself. Walking into the living room, I saw something I hadn't expected. Or rather, someone.

The living room was the only room illuminated, and the only light on there was a small reading light that Amanda was reading by. In the semidarkness, I had a hard time making out the book title, but it looked like it was called the Book of Arceus.

"Oh, hello, Victor," the Braixen told me, sounding just as surprised as I was. "Sorry if I startled you."

"It's fine" I replied, and it was. Amanda didn't bear any responsibility for the party descending into madness, since she'd had no way of knowing that I would be home early. "What are you reading?"

"The Book of Arceus" she replied, confirming what I'd thought. "It's basically the Bible of this world, tells all about what happened a long time ago. How this world was created."

I didn't have the heart to mention that I'd never believed the Bible to be accurate. Besides, there was no need for speculation anymore about what came after death, because we had all the answers now, didn't we?

"That sounds interesting" I said, although I'd never been one for reading about history in books. The Internet had existed back in our previous lives, even if it didn't seem to here.

"It really is," Amanda told me. "Of course, sometimes I wonder how much of it is literally true and how much is just a metaphor. But reading about the metaphysical can be a good coping mechanism."

That last sentence raised a question in my mind. Coping mechanism? But I knew better than to ask it, because it was probably a touchy subject for her.

Sure enough, the Braixen clamped a paw over her mouth as though realizing she'd given away too much information. I didn't say anything, though; rather, I sat on the couch next to her and began eating my slice of cake.

It was perfectly sweet and buttery, one of the best desserts I'd ever eaten. If my mother were reading this, she might have been rather annoyed with me, but it tasted even better than the cake she'd made me for my most recent birthday. The last one I'll ever celebrate.

Indeed, now that it crossed my mind, birthdays would really be a mindfuck here in the afterlife. Did I celebrate on the day I was born, when I'd begun my life on Earth? Did I celebrate on August 11, the day I'd died? Or maybe even August 13, the day I'd been "born again"?

Perhaps the afterlife didn't answer all of my questions. Right now, it was raising new questions.

While I nibbled on the cake, trying to savor it for as long as possible, Amanda kept reading the book. However, before I was finished with the slice, she put it down and looked back at me.

"How was the party, by the way?" she asked me. "You're back earlier than I expected; normally they last until midnight, sometimes even later."

Oh boy.

"Trust me, you don't want to know what happened there" I replied, shaking my head. "You really, really don't."

"Yes, I do," Amanda said in return. "I'm very curious; it was your first social event on Paradise Island, so I'd like to know your first impressions of this place."

"But why? What if I don't want to talk about it?"

The Braixen began looking rather annoyed with me. "Victor, I can't see why you wouldn't want to discuss it. It was a party, so I'd think you would have enjoyed it! Moreover, we are soulmates, and we can't have a relationship if we're not transparent with one another!"

I sighed. She did have a point.

"Fine," I replied. "But don't say I didn't warn you. The party was a disaster."

Amanda looked as though someone had just slapped her right between the eyes. Her expression was one of betrayal, which I didn't really understand. I guess that's just one more of this universe's myriad secrets.

"How could a party held at the Maximus Mansion be a disaster?" she asked quietly, in a tone more reminiscent of a socialite than anything else. "When I went to my welcome party there, I had a great time; the people and Pokemon were extremely welcoming."

Here we were. Now I would have to decide whether to tell her that Cyrus Damasen, the Lucario I'd believed to be an all-around great guy, was actually a binge drinker. I didn't know if she'd be able to handle the news, but at the same time, she had just warned me about the importance of transparency in a relationship.

"Okay, I'll tell you" I replied eventually, setting my empty plate down on the coffee table. "Cyrus is the one who ruined it."

"Cyrus Damasen, the Lucario who invited you to the party yesterday?"

I nodded. It was hard to believe that I'd only arrived here yesterday; so much had happened since then that trying to process it all made me feel woozy.

"How could Cyrus have ruined it?. He seems like a nice guy to me."

I'm not going to tell her everything. I think I've said enough by now.

"Trust me, Cyrus has some...vices, shall we say? Either way, I don't feel comfortable talking any more about the party."

All I really wanted at this point was to go to bed. It wasn't an ungodly hour, probably no later than ten or so, but I was exhausted from waking up early, picking mangoes in the hot sun, and now the bash that had turned into a food fight.

"That's okay. I hope I wasn't being too nosy" the Braixen replied, smiling in an apologetic manner. "Are you heading to bed now?"

"I think I will," I said, yawning at the right moment to prove my point. "If today was any indication, I've got a big day tomorrow."

Amanda shook her head. "Actually, Victor, they don't assign us chores on Sundays. It's just like the Sabbath that some people keep on Earth; it's a day of rest, reflection, and relaxation. The three R's, if you will."

"Good to know. Anyway, I'm feeling pretty bushed, so I'll say good night here."

"Good night, Victor" Amanda replied, picking up the Book of Arceus once more and continuing to read. I headed up the stairs and into my bedroom.

Unlike the previous night, I was too tired to read anything before I climbed into bed. However, that didn't mean I was too tired to think. And think I did.

If I remembered correctly, today was August 14, whereas I'd died on August 11; it was easy enough to forget these things when on what was, for all intents and purposes, a permanent vacation. Three days since my death by drowning had surely been enough for my family members to have been notified, and a funeral probably would have been arranged.

Some people like to ponder what their loved ones will say at their burial, to think about how they'd like to be remembered. I wasn't one of them; I had always found the subject to be rather morbid, one I didn't like to dwell on while alive.

But even if my first life hadn't been that interesting, I had always hoped that my relatives would have good things to say about me. I'd hoped that plenty of people would attend my funeral. I'd hoped that I would be buried in a nice spot, or else cremated and my ashes scattered in some place I'd loved in life, but I didn't have that much of a preference. After all, it's not like I could still use my Earthly body, so why should I care where it was?

My eyelids began to get heavy, and I closed my eyes after a while. Even with how tired I was, however, sleep still evaded me for some time.

I thought back to my parents, who would probably be weeping over my casket right now. My family wasn't religious, but the funeral would probably be at a church, since we didn't have any objection to that, and it was basically the default option in the US.

I thought about my sister, Jenna. She was almost three years younger than me; some would say she was "seventeen and cool." I pictured her curly light brown hair dangling over my corpse, bawling until the whites of her eyes were scarlet. Only then would she move back to the pew.

Not for the first time, I would have given anything to send a message to Jenna or my parents, to let them know that I still existed out here in the world of Pokemon. And I wanted to hear back from them, to know how they were doing in my absence.

Tears formed in my eyes as I laid in the fetal position, the normal pose in which I slept. No matter how hard I tried to get the image of my family out of my head, it kept barging its way back in.

Unless they get accepted into the good side of the afterlife, I'm never going to see my family again. And even then, will I have any way of contacting them?

Some would say that tears aren't manly, that true masculinity means hiding your emotions and being a rock for others to lay their hearts upon, to air all their grievances and have you make them feel better.

But sometimes it isn't.

Even the strongest men, a group which I didn't consider myself part of, cried sometimes.

I was hoping that sleep would bring a reprieve from this mental anguish, that I'd be able to disconnect my mind for seven or eight hours and wake up refreshed, rejuvenated, and ready to keep enjoying my time here in paradise.

Unfortunately, my wishes for a reprieve were flatly denied by my subconscious. I found myself in a dream that evoked my tortured thoughts. It wasn't a nightmare, though; it might have been even worse.

In the dream, I was somewhere else, although for all intents and purposes it could have been Paradise Island. There was a garden full of colorful flowers and lush green hedges, with a gravel path surrounding a fountain.

My perspective was that of a stalker, close enough that I could listen in one a conversation between two people in front of me.

One of the figures was about 5 feet, 7 inches tall. This person was probably a girl in her late teens, but it was hard to tell from just her backside. The other was a young man, maybe 6 feet, 2 inches or so, with fluffy brown hair, broad shoulders, and a light blue golf shirt even though he'd never played golf before.

How did I know that, you might ask?

Well, the two figures looked awfully familiar to me. Indeed, so did the garden in which we were walking; it was a botanical garden popular in the local area for people to hang out and relax during the summer.

"It's really nice to spend some time together, Victor," the girl told the young man, whose face I caught a glimpse of when he turned to reply to his sister.

That's me! Which means that girl must be Jenna!

The sight of my Earthly body next to that of my sister tugged at my heartstrings; there's really no other way to put it. It's also pretty surreal to witness yourself from a distance; nobody who hasn't experienced it knows exactly what it's like.

"Yeah, it is," Victor told Jenna as they walked down the gravel path, my spirit in their wake. "I can't believe I'll be going off to college in a few days."

Jenna nodded. "I just wish we had more time together. But time is a valuable thing indeed. And in the end, it just keeps on ticking by. Nothing really matters."

"Doesn't it, though?" her older brother asked her. "Yes, on a cosmic scale, not a lot that we do to each other matters. But this blue dot in space is home to well over seven billion people, and what matters here still matters here."

"I guess. It's just...I don't know. Knowing that you're going to move away makes me think about existential stuff. Don't ask questions."

I continued to watch as an impartial observer. So far as I could remember, this was a real conversation I'd had with my sister the day before that fateful trip to the beach. We'd driven out to the botanical garden, my sister behind the wheel as she basked in the glory of having obtained her driver's license. In the excitement of the last couple of days, though, I'd forgotten most of the finer details.

"Do you believe in God, Victor?"

Victor, the version from the past, snorted. "That's a rather personal question to ask, isn't it?"

"Surely not if you're asking your own brother, though?" Jenna answered in the form of a question.

Her elder brother looked as though she'd just told him that she was making an OnlyFans account. In other words, his mouth was agape and his pupils were dilated, the whole nine yards.

"I guess I'm just really surprised. You've never shown any interest in religion before. Why are you starting now?"

Jenna shrugged. "Well, I've been thinking...are we going to meet again once you go away?"

The past version of Victor laughed, but it was a humorless sort of laugh. "Of course we'll meet again, Jenna. I'll come home for Christmas, and spring break and all the other breaks we're given. This goodbye isn't forever."

Judging by Jenna's next look at her brother, this answer didn't exactly address the question she'd meant to ask. There'd been a deeper meaning behind her words.

"But what if you go away permanently? Like, if you die there or something?" The teenage girl sounded heartbroken, as though the event she was describing had already come to pass.

"That isn't going to happen," Victor told his sister. "I'm not going to die at college, I'm only twenty. It's not like I'm eighty."

"All of us must die someday, though," Jenna replied morosely. "Don't you wonder if we'll be able to see each other again afterwards?"

"I do," the 20-year-old male admitted. "It's one of the biggest questions, isn't there?"

How appropriate, I thought. (In case any clarification is needed, it was the version of me aware that there was an afterlife.) We talked about the afterlife on the last full day of my Earthly life.

"It is. And I wish we could know the answer. Don't you?"

Victor shook his head. "The way I see it, death is the ultimate motivator. We don't have an infinite amount of time in this world, so we have to make the most of it."

Even though I didn't seem to be united with my physical body at that moment, I felt tears begin to form in my eyes. It got to the point that I could barely see the conversation between my former self and my sister.

"You're right, Victor," Jenna told her elder brother. "If we had all the time in the world, literally all the time, then we could put off whatever we needed to do for however long we wanted. This way, we have to decide what is truly important to all of us.

"And yet, I really want to believe there's something else out there. I really do."

If she only knew...

I posted this chapter early because I was in a good mood. At 13 favorites, 20 follows, and 1,200+ views, I'm very happy with the way things are going so far.

Anyway, I hope you all enjoyed this section of the story, and I promise the next chapter will be quite a bit longer. It's already 4K words and I still have a lot to write. Stay safe, everybody!