...
...Was... Was this it...
...Is this what the end is like.
For some reason, it didn't seem very... final.
Although, taking into consideration the fact that up until this point in time at least, I had only really existed as a sentient conscience trapped within the slowly decaying form of a Victory Class cargo ship with no real capability of interacting with or leaving any traces of my existence as a thinking being in the world around me with the only real times that I've experienced something along the lines of death being in witnessing it happen to others, I suppose that it's only fair that I wouldn't truly know what it was like until the moment when it finally arrived.
That being said, what I was experiencing currently wasn't lining up with anything I had ever heard described, not at all.
Before now, every preconception of mine on the basis of death had been formed by using the descriptions and depictions as told by my crew whenever a sailor or soldier had gotten on the subject, certain variations and details changing often depending on the personality of the person and just what religion they believed in.
For some men, they believed that death was a crossroads of sorts, that depending on the type of person they were and the decisions they had made during their lives on Earth, they would either be granted access to a 'heaven,' a place where they would be relinquished of all their worldly suffering and live out the rest of existence in a sort of glorious kingdom, or be sentenced to 'hell' where they would be punished for all their crimes and misdeeds that they committed during their lifetimes.
Other people described a different kind of eternal life, this one taking place in the form of something called 'reincarnation' where instead of their 'soul' being sent somewhere like a 'heaven' and 'hell,' it is instead placed into another body and the person is reborn as another inhabitant of their world, whether that be as another person or a different species entirely being uncertain. And finally, there were the more pessimistic few who simply thought that there was nothing which awaited them at the end of the tunnel, that upon death the mind simply ceased to function, continuing to exist but without body or thought in nothing but an empty black void stretching out into the expanse of infinity, just pure nothingness.
That last scenario, despite how unattractive as it sounded, seemed to be the only one to closest match my current situation at the moment but at the same time, it too just fell short of describing it accurately.
While the idea of getting to meet and be judged by some type of sea or ship god was certainly an intriguing concept, what I was met with instead was that dark space as described by those select few men all those years ago, one which was not too dissimilar to the one I had regularly experienced in the weeks following the creation of my consciousness and yet, there was something else about this void that was obviously different.
For one, the 'fog' that had taken ahold of my mind and clouded my thoughts as my superstructure proceeded to slip below the waves was no longer present, having returned to its full operating capacity just as soon as my final view of the world left behind had blurred out of view leaving me back in full control over all my faculties, able to think and form complete thoughts once again.
The other thing that was obviously different, something that had escaped my notice at first but was very slowly making itself increasingly present to me, was that the color in this space wasn't remaining constant. At first, it held only that same dark color that I was intimately familiar with due to my prior experience with it but as the seconds presumably ticked on by another, more opaque shape was gradually presenting itself in the darkness like a lighthouse in the fog. A glass canvas which filled the entirety of this space, consisting of a swirl of shifting paints and blending colors like dull reds, dark greens and a variety of other such tinctures all blending in the same way like a disturbed sea would twirl behind a ship's stern.
A tangle of soft and muffled sounds was also present in this scene, sounding at first like an instrument being played into a smothered microphone but also increasing in both intensity and clarity at the same time as this strange canvas, becoming dull thuds and groans like far off machinery sounding off to the tune of an occasional twang like a hammer being hit upon a tightly wound cable wire.
It was certainly an odd observation to find within this familiar space and as aforementioned, it was only growing louder and clearer, the glass canvas was gradually becoming less and less opaque as time passed with the paints swirling around it becoming more vibrant and shifting at an increasing rate, more colors being added onto it as they blended in with the other paints appearing like a colorful collage of rain drops streaking down a window pane. The noises also intensifying with the same kind of pace, quickly reaching the same volume as your standard naval shipyard, sounding all too similar like the many docks I had visited all those years ago and yet seeming alien at the same time.
Like a lit match to an oil spill, the metaphorical fire quickly spread as my entire field of view had been completely coated by this downpour of colors and sounds, the different paints falling onto the canvas like a waterfall, the colors now flashing like a multitude of flares going off all at once and the noises sounding off in unison like violent explosions, a heavy static layered over it like a malfunctioning radio.
The intensity of this shifting imagery and shrieking sounds, even as extreme as they already were, only grew louder and brighter removing any and all traces of the once quiet, black space it had been before until it reached the point where it would have drove any ordinary person experiencing it insane and clutching at their ears and then proceeding to go slightly past that when in one singular instant, it all simply fell away. A steady pale red sheet replacing the literal waterfall of a collage that had been composing itself in front of my view and the screaming machinery and bomb blasts falling silent, the familiar creaking and groans of metal and sloshing water taking its place.
It was clearly apparent to me that something had happened or changed just now and whatever that broiling sea of paints and sirens was had apparently been some sort of buildup to this event but while I did want to try and work out different explanations and possibilities for just what that shift might have been, I simply couldn't because for the moment I was obfuscated by some kind of change that had also occurred from within my very being.
Despite having been fully capable of forming thoughts and conclusions not seconds before, now I found my mind to be once again in something of a fog except this time, instead of it growing heavier in an effort to completely overtake my mind and render it incapable of forming ideas of any kind like it had seemed to do during my descent into the depths it chose to remain steady. Making it so that any thoughts or ideas I did have would first have to overcoming the pea soup that clouded my mind in order to make themselves present.
The first thought that did manage to navigate its way through the haze prompted the very first question that currently plagued my mind, what was it that had just happened to my being? Why was I granted full clarity and control of my mind after having just lost it to the deep only to then have it be restricted once more, making it so that even forming simple sentences in my mind was a struggle and what exactly was the purpose behind the strange canvas with the streaking paints and howling engines, was it what caused this change to occur or was it simply a build-up to some larger occurrence.
Only this pale red sheet that seemingly covered the entirety of my view and the sounds of distant water and creaking metal seemed to hold the answer to this question, the two observations being the only real things remaining from which I could make any kind of concrete conclusion.
Although with that being said, the only conclusions I could actually make from these two observations were truthfully very little, neither really presented much information to form any possibilities from nor was there anything very interesting that could be found from it.
There was only one real idea I could make of this scene and it was something that I wasn't particularly wanting to accept as the truth just yet, that specific idea being that I neither had been released from my previous form nor was my vessel now lying at the bottom of the sea to join the wrecks of all the other Victory Ships that had been lost but instead, every aspect of my sinking had been nothing but an illusion, some fantasy that my mind had created as a way to torture itself with the possibility of escaping from within its deathly cell but this idea also had its inaccuracies.
The first of which being that no such illusion had ever made itself present to me before this point in time so it was unlikely for that to be the case and the second being that I hadn't ever been capable of imagining such hallucinations either, to put a word to it, such 'dreams' didn't seem to be possible for one such as me who could only exist as a passive observer.
But in the end, this unwanted idea was truthfully the only thing I had to work on with all others failing to meet up to it and so, with me having no real clue on just how to proceed from here on out given the little information at hand, I decided to at least tease the idea a little bit and try out a few things.
I first started by trying to swap my vision to a different post, if my consciousness was indeed still a part of my former being, 'former' now being called into question at this point, then hypothetically I could switch my view over to another section within my being and if that swap did indeed happen, that that would act as proof that it had all been nothing but a 'dream.' But in an almost unexpected turn of fashion, nothing happened, typically switching my vision over to a different space was an effortless task and one which I could accomplish with great ease but now I no longer seemed to be in charge of that ability.
While that reveal had certainly been more than a little unexpected, having apparently just lost access to the one real thing I could actually control and often used to observe the world around me, I instead went about trying to accomplish the other task I had which was identifying just where this viewpoint was stationed onboard my vessel if my vision was indeed still presenting itself from somewhere within my being.
This too however had its own share of problems, for I knew for a fact that there was no pale red sheet that existed from within my being, the several decades spent anchored at sea and the time spent aimlessly looking around the various sections of my structure made me an expert in knowing exactly just where something was and what it looked like and never once did I ever come across something like a red sheet in all that time, the color would have faded by now anyways.
Another issue I now found myself having to face was that this sheet seemingly covered every inch of my view which was quite literally impossible, the way my visions worked was that it would show me a scene from every possible angle at a given viewpoint meaning that were it to be stationed in a hallway somewhere, not only would I be able to see the length of the hall, but I would also be able to see all of the wall, floor or ceiling that the point was positioned in along with both sides of that space.
In short, even if this blanket had been placed almost perfectly over my viewpoint and stretched a massive distance, I would still have been able to see the rusted metal it was placed on top of rather than have it completely cover my vision, and even then, there would still have been changes in the color of the fabric or at the very least holes from age.
But there was nothing like that at all, only this solid pale red sheet which seemed to shine almost directly into my view, the glow behind it most likely being the sun or some other source of light, maybe even that 'heaven' place that I heard talked about but not likely and that was it, other than the sounds I could hear echoing from within this vision that really was all I had to go on.
And while I was observing all of this and trying out these different ideas, I started to notice that the 'fog' that remained still present in my mind was lifting slightly, thoughts and ideas forming into view at a gradually increasing pace which also happened to spurn on yet another question. Why was it that this restriction had been placed upon my mind only to then be lessened as time went on when I had already had complete clarity before the fog had clouded my consciousness, what was the point of it.
These limitations were safe to say, more than just a little challenging, having to work off of so little information while at the same time having so many restrictions placed upon me along with having several of my only capabilities stripped away just didn't make sense no matter how I figured it.
Why was it that I was having to put up with so many different challenges after having just 'died' if indeed I had, and if this was all just a 'dream' then why was it that I didn't seem to be in control over any of it and why was it that I couldn't seem to 'wake up.' Also having all of these different challenges while being restricted in such a way just seemed to me to be ultimately unnecessary, in the very least, it would have been preferable to be able to see the space around me without having this red sheet over my view, how else was I supposed to form conclusions of any kind if I couldn't even see beyond this-
That line of thought was then suddenly cut off by the very object in question which in an ironic turn of events, was quickly and suddenly removed from my vision, revealing the entirety of the area behind it while I watched it disappear from sight. I waited for a moment or two, both uncertain in just what had prompted this change in the scene and unsure if the sheet would return or not, but after waiting a second or two and determining that the cloth didn't seem to be falling back on top of my viewpoint, I took a chance to observe the area around me and was instantly able to recognize just where this was.
This view was stationed in a familiar but also well kempt room with minimal damage save for a small patch of rust and some damage to the wall where rain and salt water had leaked in through the years, hovering dust particles tracing the direction of the beams of sunlight that casted down into this room, illuminating every inch of this space in light and shadow.
But it was the other objects in this room that really narrowed down the location for me, more specifically, the sink with a chipped mirror hanging above it, the closed door of a small refrigerator and a small box with a glass door in which one could see different medicines and bandages. That told me that I was in the surgeon's ward in the small branching section meant for keeping spare medical supplies and documents, it also told me that my consciousness had most definitely not died, nor did my vessel sink unfortunately but it also seemed to spurn on more questions.
If my being was still trapped onboard my rotting structure than what was it that had caused such a vivid illusion to play out within my mind, the imagery of my sinking I could understand if it had been nothing but my own hopeful imaginings getting the better of me but in regards to the dripping canvas with the shrieking sirens I had not a clue, because I had neither experienced anything like that throughout my existence or had any reason to picture such a scene occurring.
There were two other things that were also causing some conflict from within my mind, one of those being that I didn't seem to be able to look around all that much, or rather my vision no longer was able to see this scene from every angle and had been restricted to seeing it from only a single direction. And the other was that there was something that had been steadily growing from within my own consciousness the longer I had access to this view.
It was something that I couldn't quite place because it neither similar to that of a thought forming or to the fog that was still slowly lifting from my mind, it was something else which was different and unfamiliar, I couldn't quite put a word or description to it, I could only try my best to compare it with something physical.
That being, a fire that was steady growing in both size and intensity, my vision also seemed to grow blurrier as this fire's reach grew outward and upward and then, just as it was beginning to overtake my ability to think and observe any further, the red sheet proceeded to lay itself back over my view, preventing any further observation of the world around me and prompting that fire to start extinguishing itself.
When the fire was fully put out so to speak, I was able to think to myself once again and immediately, a flurry of questions flew through my mind even despite the fog slowing them down slightly, questions like what was that 'fire' about, what caused it, how did the curtain open, who removed it and how did they know my viewpoint was right there, that sort of thing.
I kept trying to think of different explanations and possibilities for what had just occurred over and over in my mind and nothing seemed to make any sort of logical sense so, instead I tried to put it out of my thoughts for now and just focus on the sequence of events that led up to it.
Okay so, after some kind of illusion my mind had, one in which I envisioned myself sinking and dissipating from the world only to then be dragged back into my vessel by some kind of shimmering canvas of different colors and sounds, I was then rendered unable to switch my view over to any other section of my being or look behind this pale red sheet that has once again appeared in front of my view.
And then after finding some difficulty in finding out more information about just where this viewpoint was taking place from, I started to think of how much easier it would be to find out such information if at least the curtain had been removed and then it-
Once again, that line of thought had been cut off by the very thing I had been focused on which proceeded to do the same exact motion as it had before and removed itself from my vision, disappearing again once it had passed point.
I looked on at the same view, observing the same grey ceiling, the same rust stains on the wall, the same sun rays which now seemed to have shifted slightly and the same medicine cabinet that hung opposite the wall with the beams of light pouring from it now thinking a whole slew on new questions. But instead of focusing on answering any of them, I choose to let my mind remain silent for now and simply waited as time passed to observe any possible changes from within this scene.
I didn't have to wait long as rather quickly, that same fire had once again ignited and continued to blaze higher as the seconds ticked by and still I continued to remain silent, letting the fire overtake my thoughts instead of try to suppress them. And then, once it had reached its highest intensity, again the red fabric was pulled back, covering my vision and dumping water on the fire that rampaged from within my mind, taking a little while longer to extinguish this time before the fire disappeared in its entirety.
Despite this 'mental flame' having been put out for more than a minute now my mind continued to remain silent as thoughts continued to formulate and dissipate with the same kind of speed until finally, a single possibility popped into view. It was one in which the chances of it proving factual were highly unlikely not to mention improbable given the many years of experience leading up to this very moment.
Was this 'curtain' retracting because I had wished it to do so and was the blazing fire a side effect of holding it open for too long, it was admittedly a pretty foolhardy idea but it was also one in which I just had to test.
I waited for a few more minutes just in preparation for this little experiment of mine, not really paying attention to just how much time had elapsed between the closing of the curtain and the start of my experiment nor did I happen to notice how the pale red curtain happened to grow brighter in color until it was almost a light pink.
Instead, I chose to remain focused on just what all these happenings could have meant, my seemingly but yet unproven control over just when this curtain was pulled back away from my vision and replaced tied with my sudden inability to control just where this vision took place could have meant a number things, none of which I could figure out at the moment.
The only way now to figure it all out was to push forward.
Alright, here we go... I want the curtain to be removed.
Much like the two previous occurrences, the curtain had pulled itself back upon my prompting but unlike the previous two times, the fire didn't take a little bit before igniting neither was its growth gradual, this time it was instant.
For while I had been stewing in my own thoughts and exploring the potential possibilities with this new and theoretical ability of mine, the sun had raised higher into the sky, shifting the sun beams until they strayed directly into my line of sight, flooding my vision with a blinding golden light and causing the fire to burst into its highest intensity almost like somebody had tried to douse the flame with gasoline.
My frantic thoughts immediately burst into activity all while at the same time being constantly suppressed by this blast of light and flame, each one filled with the same want to have the curtain closed back up and stop the light from blaring into my vision. The curtain soon followed this order and began to close but before it could shut all the way, I managed to catch a glimpse of something passing in front of the light and cutting it off, the light pink color of the curtain returning to its pale red look as it interrupted the beam overhead.
My mind remained quiet for a bit as it tried to process that which had just occurred, both trying to recover from the rush of flame which was slowly dying out now and trying to process the shadowy object that had passed over my view just as I had shut the curtain. Said object seemed to still be cutting off the light from outside my current view so as soon as the burning flame had completely dissipated from within my mind, I wished for the curtain to slowly open itself back up so I could observe what laid beyond it, readying my mind just in case it was flooded once again with that same light.
No amount of preparation could have prepared me for what I saw when the curtain opened once again.
Positioned slightly above my viewpoint, clad in a tattered sailor's cuff and sleeve and outlined by a beam of golden light was a hand, a literal human hand.
This appendage was held aloft both to block out the sun and to also seemingly allow me to gaze upon it, the person this arm seemed to belong to was wearing a very aged and torn dark blue sailors' uniform, stained and dirtied by both age and dried blood which seemed to paint the edges where the cloth has been torn not by age but damage, their skin was pale and marked with cuts and bruises of varying sizes with some wounds that had already healed and become scars on their flesh and some which seemed to be freshly made, blood streaking down from the skin and dripping down onto the cloth which hid it.
And the final observation I could make from this suddenly appearing limb just before it fell away to where ever it came from allowing the sun to blind me once more was that at the very last moment, one of the fingers on their hand seemed to twitch slightly indicating that this person was indeed still alive and yet in a bad way.
As soon as this arm had fallen away, I compelled the curtain to close before my mind could be filled with the fire once again, taking a moment before allowing myself to ruminate on just what I had seen.
I definitely hadn't imagined it because I wasn't even sure if I knew how to do that in the first place so that arm had to be real but if it was real than just how had this person, whoever they were, gotten onboard my ship, why where they injured, why were they seemingly dressed in one of my deceased sailors' old uniforms and just how did they seem to know exactly where to raise their hand until it covered the light from my view. I mean unless they just so happened to have their head directly positioned below where my vision seemed to be taking place which seemed unlikely since it always had to take place directly above a certain spot on the floor, wall or ceiling, then it seemed utterly impossible for them to know just where to hold their hand unless...
No... No, that's... I mean... That's not even...
I... I had to test it...
Ignoring the flare of mental flame that was sure to come, I compelled the curtain to open while the sun was still beaming into my viewpoint, that same flame bursting up for but a moment before the light was once again blocked by an arm which seeming to perfectly shield my vision from its brilliance and for a while at least, I just looked upon it not knowing quite what to do next.
Eventually, I decided to test this fantastic and impossible theory the same way I had done with the curtain, by willing something to happen and so, after taking a small moment to prepare, I looked upon the arm which remained raised, collected my thoughts and wished it to move.
Nothing seemed to happen at first, which I almost wanted to have happen since it would mean that I was incorrect about this idea and that I was simply acting on a foolish assumption I had made but then as I continued to think this, I was silenced by a finger on the hand twitching.
I remained silent for another moment before wishing it to move again and watching this time as with a slight delay to the action, two of the fingers furthest away from the thumb seemed to curl slightly in time with each other before returning back to its original position.
Now for the final test, this one being the difference between factual and fiction in regards to the theory I was holding in my mind, and by taking one last moment to myself and thinking hard, I wished for the hand to make a fist.
Again there was a slight delay in the action yet, slowly but surely, the individual fingers began to curl in on each other, the digits moving slightly sporadically as they attempted the feat asked upon them before ultimately yet weakly forming the shape of a fist in front of my gaze just before falling back down to its original position yet again.
Prompting the curtain to close so I wouldn't be blinded, the action of the curtain moving occurring with a surprising amount of ease this time around, my mind searched through every possibility of just what else might have been the true cause of the hand moving and seemingly reacting to my every command, every possible explanation aside from the one that seemed both the most likely and also the most improbable.
And yet, as each potential explanation failed to meet up to the evidence presented to me, I could only come to one possible conclusion.
My mind had been placed into a human body and I was now in control of it.
It seemed utterly unbelievable, it was an idea that betrayed any logical conclusion and every law of the natural world and yet at the same time, all signs seemed to point to it being true.
There was only one real way to be certain.
Patiently, I waited for some amount of time for the sun to shift away from my viewpoint before choosing to open the curtain again, whatever I was going to do next had to be done without interruption or distractions and the sun blaring down into my view would only obfuscate whatever it was I would be trying to observe. At the same time, I was also going through the other potential reasons and conclusions for just what I could be experiencing right now, despite how fascinating and increasingly powerful this experiment could be leading to, I had to treat it with every level of scrutiny lest I be disappointed by the results.
My thoughts may have gotten the better of me though for when I finally did open the curtain again, the sun rays were quite a bit further away now, beaming now not onto the floor but on the wall furthest away from the door frame, filling the room with quite a bit more shadows than before but thankfully still allowing it to be fairly lit.
It was a better time than never to continue with my experiment, while I still had the light on hand.
Closing the curtain for a moment to put out the growing flame before opening them again, something I found I now barely had to think about in order to have happen, my viewpoint remained pointed up towards the ceiling as I started to think, the first thought of mine being the want to look down.
Almost unsurprisingly, nothing occurred but I assumed that was less my entire theory being wrong and more, I just wasn't being specific enough so, I decided to take a metaphorical step back and think again, this time being more descriptive with my words and wanting for the eyes to look down.
Not long after, my line of sight gradually seemed to shift downward acting with the same sporadic motions as the fingers on the hand had done until it lowered down as far as it could go without the fire starting to flare up, revealing a small amount of the lower floor along with all of the sink, refrigerator and medical box which clung to the walls.
Before going further, I thought it best to continue practicing looking around with apparently, these new 'eyes' of mine, along with the closing and opening of the curtains until I could do both effortlessly, ultimately reaching that goal in little more than a few minutes. And then, upon having gotten those motions down, I shifted my gaze downward again until I could see the same sight as before, the sun rays now a little bit higher on the wall, and thought of a different action to test with.
I want my left arm to raise, I thought to myself, wanting to try it with a different limb I haven't used before, accidentally or otherwise, eventually the hidden limb in question raising stiffly into my view, the elbow locked and the hand limp, also injured and wearing a similarly worn sleeve.
Focusing on moving the two upper limbs first before moving on, I made sure that I properly knew how to manipulate and manage both arms at the same time, making fists in both hands and moving only the forearms over and over before I got it down to an admittedly unsteady science.
Then I focused on the lower legs, compelling only one to raise first before moving on to two, finding unexpectedly that while this body was thankfully not absent of a sailor's secondary piece of clothing which was also damaged and worn, they didn't seem to be wearing socks or shoes of any kind, appearing to be barefooted as far as I could tell. Something to deal with later, I suppose.
I thought for a moment to identify which parts of a human body I could remember were integral in moving about on a daily basis and found myself trying out shifting a shoulder, tensing unknown muscles and rotating certain sections that I could now see, their movements prompting strange forms of static in my mind to signify their movements.
It was after a bit of this that I happened to take notice of what little light there had been left in the room, having spent an apparently extreme amount of time just trying to work out certain things and figure out how to move this unknown vessel my consciousness had found itself placed in, and worked out that since I had at most maybe two hours of daylight left to work with then it might have been best if I skipped past trying to test out anymore of the unknown abilities this body was capable of and just worked on the more challenging step I had in front of me.
That challenge being, standing up off the ground.
Before now, I had always presumed this type of task to be easy, watching my crew get up from their racks the second that reveille sounded off in the mornings over and over again made it easy for that assumption to take hold in my mind. But now I know that in practice it was much harder than it first seemed.
I had barely started into the first step when I had already run into an obstacle, in order to accomplish what I had set out to do I first had to turn this body until it was facing towards the ground where I would then be in the best position to support myself with the limbs I was already familiar with controlling but simply getting this form to shift even slightly towards the direction I wanted it to turn to was already a problem. At first, only the arms seemed to listen to my command, raising slightly until I could see them with neither putting anything towards accomplishing my goal, then a single leg, and then and arm and a leg both on the same side seemed to point directly into the air, locked stiffly.
I decided to use what I had for now and simply moved both of the limbs slowly to the right until their weight seemed to pull the rest of this body with it, my eyesight shifting with it to show the world at an angle, the floor being horizontal to the rest me before I raised the other two opposite limbs so they pointed in the same direction and worked the ones I was now laying on top of underneath a torso I still could not see.
As I slowly compelled the limbs to shift out from underneath me, small sparks of that mental flame popped off every time they made a sharp or sudden movement, eventually fading away once they escaped out from beneath the... my... body. When they did, the rest of my torso including my line of sight quickly rotated until it was focused entirely on the floor which was slightly darkened by the shadow of something behind my viewpoint, and it was upon taking notice of how a strange pale and blurry shape which remained partially hidden in my eyesight had seemingly pressed against the floor that I realized I had accomplished the first step of my task.
Now, onto the next step.
This part was going to be much trickier since not only was it going to require me to be in control over all four of the limbs at my disposal but also maintain a delicate balance between them at the same time.
Carefully, I moved the two arms which remained stretched out to either side of my being on the floor and brought them in towards me, bending the elbows so that they were pointed up with the palm of the hands still remaining flat with the floor and then, while putting a lot of focus into controlling the limbs and being very specific with my demands for them, I started to have them push this body up and off the floor.
The first attempt failed miserably, both of the arms just falling flat again on the floor but I was resolute in accomplishing this feat and so raised the arms back up and tried again, the second attempt was better as in they were able to push up my body away from the tiled surface by a few inches before losing their strength and collapsing, sending a small burst of that flame through my mind once again. But in the third attempt, this time making the action play out much slowly that way the chances of me losing control over the limbs and having this form fall to the floor again much smaller, I was able to push up fully off the floor without falling back down and carefully walked my torso back until I could rest it on the legs and prepare myself for the next step.
With the legs laying flat beneath me with two unfamiliar knees going forward and two arms at either side to maintain balance in this position, I could now finally look down and observe the rest of this vessel, noting the several tears and stains of the well-aged uniform along with the several wounds hidden below it.
But I didn't remain focused on merely observing this new form for too long since, because of what I had planned next, I would soon be able to look upon this being in better detail.
By leaning left slightly so that this body would be resting against the leg of the sink stand, I motioned an arm up and grabbed the edge of the sink counter above with the hand, moving the other limb up after making sure that it had a firm grasp on the ledge before continuing on in my effort.
And now, with a clear picture in mind, I set about achieving the final step of my task, standing up.
By pulling this body up using the arms as support at first, I worked the legs beneath until they were in a position where they could support the rest of the body weight and then, by maintaining a steady mind and a steady hand, pulled my being up to reach the top of the counter. There was a moment for a second, where had lost control over my limbs for a second and it had started to fall down slightly but thankfully, I had managed to regain my grasp over them and stopped my freefall before I could lose all my progress, proceeding to then raise the rest of the way up, resting the two arms on the sink so I could find a steady support with the two legs below.
It was then that I noticed that from within this scene, I could audibly hear something like an air pump pulling oxygen in and dispensing it back out again and it only took a second before I realized that it wasn't an air pump at all but breathing, my own breathing, it must have been happening the whole time without my realizing it.
The only reason I noticed it now was because of how loud and prolonged the time between breaths was, presumably because of how much effort I had put this body through, this sound continued as I motioned the hands to grab ahold of the edges of the sink counter and pushed this body the rest of the way up, halting only for a moment upon finding the proper support beneath and looking into the sinks mirror for the first time.
Behind the chipped and slightly warped reflection in the mirror stood, unexpectedly, the body of a young woman, it was easy to determine this person as one by judging and comparing the features of their face along with the subtle swell of the chest beneath their clothing with the many family pictures and posters soldiers would carry with them onboard.
This woman had long brown hair that looked extremely unkempt, shiny with oil and curling on its own in wavy strands, occasionally twisting into tangled knots where the strands tied themselves together, their face was pale and thin and yet weathered with cheeks dotted with freckles and their eyes colored in a similar tincture to their hair which seemed to stare straight ahead into the mirror they were looking at.
All in all, this person would have had all the features of a completely ordinary woman where it not for the multitude of scars and cuts that marred her skin. A cut on this person's cheek underneath their eye along with several nicks along her right earlobe and chin had yet to heal and seemed to be slowly leaking blood which streaked down the skin below it while several other scars also made themselves present, two notable ones appearing in the forms of a thin streak cutting across their left eye, luckily leaving their sight intact and one rather large one which stretched the entire length of their neck, almost like someone had tried to cut it in an attempt to kill this person years prior but failed.
But other than the scars that remained hidden beneath the cloth and the uniform which seemed to be barely intact, this person who's body I now inhabited still remained largely unknown since I had neither had any women onboard who seemed to match this person's physical descriptions nor was there any woman allowed within my crew.
Whoever this person was though, they would have to make do with me being in control over the reigns for the time being, at least until I figured out a way to return their body to them, if their mind still remained trapped within it that is.
I was about to turn this form away from the mirror when an idea popped into my mind... head now, I suppose, and I instead remain focused on the features of this person, particularly the mouth which opened and closed slightly with every breath. Taking everything in for a few more moments before trying out what I wanted to accomplish and thinking my actions over to will them into occurring.
As a result, the mouth moved slightly but no sound other than the soft breathing came out and so, I tried again, this time a slight noise being produced from the throat of this woman sounding like, "aaahhaahh."
Progress, now can I do anything more with it. Thinking over my next steps I willed the mouth into making more sounds, noises like, "uuuhnnngg." and "mmnhuuaa." and other such nonsense occurring with some frequency until finally it managed to produce a sound like, "hhhe... hhhheee."
That's good, now let's see if I can make out any other parts of the word.
"Hhhee... Hhheee... Hhheeell... Hheelll."
Okay so, by curling the tongue, one can make the L sound, that's good to know.
"Hhhelll... Hhheee... Hhheeoo... Hhooo. Oooh. Oh."
And that's how you say the letter O, I'm starting to get the hang of this, now all that's left to do is to put it all together and then I'll get...
"Hhee... Hhelll... Llluh... Lllooo... Hhee-Llo... Hee-lo... Hel-lo. Hello."
Success, my first word ever spoken.
My mind was running wild, filling with hundreds upon hundreds of ideas I could act upon while within this new form, all the things I would be able to experience and explore now that I finally had the ability to interact with the world outside of my visions, the possibilities were practically teasing and-
I turned my gaze back towards the mirror and again focused on the face reflected within it, still devoid of emotion of any kind and looking on in with steady, blank stare back at me, for some reason I thought I had heard... what was it... laughter, or at the very least somebody chuckling but thinking on it now, it was more likely that it was just some other sound I had confused with it.
Looking closer into the mirror, this time looking past the figure and at the wall pictured behind them, I spotted the open medicine cabinet on the other end still stocked with bandages and expired medicines and turned around to face it, moving slowly so I wouldn't trip the-my limbs over themselves before resting this time with my back facing towards the mirror.
I had been so caught up in exploring the different features of this person and the different things I could do while I was still in control over it that I had almost completely forgotten that this body was indeed still injured. If this person's consciousness was going to eventually resume command over their form, then chances are that they would most likely prefer to find it bandaged up with their wounds cleaned or if the very worst came to pass because of blood loss and infection, not dead.
The aged wrappings while most definitely not suitable in terms of being both new and sanitary, was also currently the only option when it came to treating these injuries so it would simply have to do for now, I already knew of a place where I could get something to clean these wounds more thoroughly anyways.
Regrettably and rather foolishly on my part, I pushed off the edge of the sink putting far too much trust in my power to control this body than I should have to try and take a step forward and walk to the opposite wall in front of me, instead I found the world quickly turning as I lost what little balance I had and completely collapsed onto the floor, slamming against the tile with a loud thud and again causing that flame to flare up, presumably due to new injuries caused by the fall.
"...Suulugh blarrig."
...I'll work on curses later.