Chapter 2
When Jeffrey regains his consciousness, he finds himself in a world of white and yellow. There is a seemingly endless variety of thin air rivers and layers colored in yellow, one layer clearly less visible than another, and all of them somehow resemble the city, but through transparent yellow formations with white as the background.
He barely recognizes the alley as he can see more than just one wall, the transparent layers just go on and on, forming rooms and halls inside the buildings, and what somehow looks like human bodies.
He quickly looks around himself, confused and lost in this brand new vision of the world, looking for Kate. He finds her, or what looks like her, kneeling next to a straightened body on the ground. Small glimmers of energy drop from her face, reminding Jeffrey of tears.
He tries to stretch his arm to her and say that she shouldn’t be so sad, but he has nothing to stretch and no way to speak. He apparently has no body, at least he starts to believe that as he can’t see any limb or move anything. Upon a desperate try to do something, he finds out that he can fly through the air with his will, but that’s it. This is not how he wished to end his life, but has he?
He turns to his body and clearly sees energy pump through it, just the energy, but it’s enough to convince him that he’s still alive; at least his body is.
Unsure what to think or what to do, Jeffrey remains still, trying to organize his timid thoughts and think of a plan, but there’s not much he can think of when he’s so shocked. Instinctively he decides to check out the energy as he doesn’t know what else to do.
He flies into one of the air rivers and immediately pulls back in fear. He has just heard screams, felt pain, sorrow, wishes and curses. It is no ordinary energy, truly it isn’t, and the scientist in him knows it shouldn’t toyed with.
It takes him some time to partially calm down and accept the reality, repeating his favorite phrase over and over again.
It is so, it can’t be different.
He looks at Kate and his body once again, but now his wish is clear and burning.
I want to go back. I want to live.
He flies into his body and horrible pain envelops his senses. It’s barely bearable, but he has to withstand it and go back - if anything is to work, then it has to be this. The longer he stays, the more world fades for him, and soon it disappears from his sight, sinking him into pure black. Soon the black slowly changes to black-orange.
He opens his eyes for the second time and sees the normal world. He screams from the pain, his mind is in disarray. Kate jumps up, childishly covering her mouth.
“Status!” His training speaks for himself. What his mind doesn’t remember, the body does.
“Severe internal damage, life signs normal, executing restoration program.” He hears the half-robotic voice of an AI sewed inside his body. Very soon the pain in his left arm becomes much clearer than the rest, signaling him that the AI has started using a small box with vials sewed into his skin. The pain starts fading away as he becomes numb.
Kate drops on her knees next to him, relieved, but still unable to speak. She has cried and Jeffrey can still see traces of hatred. She must have had it tough.
Forcing a smile on his face, Jeffrey tries to comfort her with a happy voice: “I’m back.”
There’s nothing better than being alive.
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