It. Sped up. Again.
A quarter life in a moment. Days in seconds. Months in minutes. Years blinking by. Holidays, Funerals, Love, Hope, Fear, Pain, Anxiety, Dreams. More birthdays.
Was I ever me? Am I still?
Faster. Faster. Too much. It's too much. dear god someone help me. help me help me help me help me help me help me help me help me help me help me help me help me help me help me help me help me help me help me help me help me help me help me help me help me help me help me help me help me help me
Like an emergency break was pulled it jars to a stop. Peace for a moment. My mind bursting at the seams with memories. It feels like my own were pushed out my skull to make space. Like my old life was merely a book I read a long time ago and could vaguely remember the plot of.
One slow memory comes lagging. One last birthday memory. Our parents are older now. Looking like they're in their mid 40s, dad's hair slowly graying, mom's laughter lines longer. But they've been coughing. They've been coughing for weeks. Blood in their lungs. Purple red veins running up and down their arms and legs. Bloodshot eyes. Their eyes are so damn red. The plague got our entire family. This wasn't something you could wash your hands away.
We were all doing our best to hold it together. We still had to go out for food. Still had to do something to pay the bills. Everyone around was. When everyone in the town's already sick, it didn't much matter about staying away from each other.
The birthday still wasn't much of course. I couldn't expect it to be with everyone exhausted and coughing, nor could I expect anything special when money was so tight. It was just.. a day. Like any other just more sickly. They still wished me well though. My mom still gave me a little extra food at dinner. That still meant something.
Once again, the memory fades away from immediate memory as we fell asleep for the night.
Gradually, slowly, with pain far worse than any hangover and far more effort, my eyes opened.
For a moment it feels like I just woke up from a bad trip, as if I just dreamed all of that. But then I realize the ceilings the wrong. My ceiling wasn't wood.
Sitting up slowly as it feels like the world is tilting, I look around the room. It's just like I remember. It's my room. It's Nero's room.
I lift up my hands and stare. I'm in control now. This isn't just a memory I'm experiencing from the sidelines. I'm in control, whoever I am now.
I thought that if I were to share someone's body, it might be like a little voice in my head, distinctly different. Instead I lived through everything that made Nero into himself. No one to fight against for control, instead it feels like we've turned into one person, one very extended life.
And I know what today is. The day after Nero's 18th birthday. The start of the game.
Shit.
It feels strange to actually move myself after all that. It simultaneously feels like it's only been a couple hours and a lifetime since I've been, well, alive.
Sitting up in bed I look around the room. Nothing like posters or a computer around like my old room. A wooden framed bed, a desk off in one corner with some small tools and gadgets I'd made working under Papa, a trunk filled with mostly clothes and some personal trinkets. And the door out. Dark green flecks of paint gradually peeling off it.
I don't know what's going to happen as soon as I step out that door. I know what happens in the game. I see them. I see my brother. My brother fights for me. He dies. I run. That's how it's supposed to go. That's how it always goes. There was no other beginning. But what else can I do. What happens if I were to stay in this room. Deny whatever is out there.
Standing up I feel the vertigo set in. Oh yea. I've been sick too. Not to mention whatever side effects there are to dying, being drowned in memories, and after what felt like forever regaining a body.
I'd like to say I toughed it out, stood up, and braced for a fight. I didn't. I collapsed and threw up at least 3 times. Eventually I managed to hobble up using my bedposts as leverage. I crawled to the mirror and got a good look at my new body. I look just like I did from the character editor. My features just a little comically large. Green hair. There's a scar actually. On my jaw. Thinking back, I recall I got it from Marcus beating me with a practice sword a year ago. Suffice to say his personality never improved with age.
That reminds me. I didn't make it in the game, but from Nero's memories I recall a practice sword in my closet. It's pretty dull, but it'll be better than nothing. Although with what's coming, I know it isn't going to be enough. Even knowing what was coming, a part of my heart aches in anticipation. I don't know what I can change in this world. I doubt I can save my parents, but can I save my brother? If I try to will I just die? I have free will again as far as I know. I'm in control. Maybe I'll just die if I don't follow the script.
I guess there's only one way to find out.