Chapter Text
Pain......
Screaming.....
Øystein could feel himself fading, and black spots danced in his hazy vision, making it hard to tell what was there and what was not. He grasped at the floor of the stairwell, desperate to move, but he couldn't feel his legs. Blood bubbled through his mouth, and Øystein coughed weakly, knowing that he was dying, but not willing to go quite yet.
All he had to do was move, but there was too much pain, and Øystein heard himself moan pitifully, feeling the air shift around him as Varg approached, his boots clanking on the metal staircase.
"Look at you." Varg said in a tone of fake pity, crouching down onto his knees, undoubtedly trying to get a better look at what he'd done. "The great, true leader of Norway's most popular black metal group, reduced to this." He sounded disgusted.
Øystein gagged on his own blood. "Don't - no..." He felt like a fish, grabbed from the water and left to dry on the pier. He grabbed fruitlessly onto the floor, trying to drag himself away, but all he could do was try to look and see Varg's face, his eyes rolling wildly in their sockets until they managed to find the man they were searching for.
"Goodbye, Øystein." Varg said softly, and then he raised the knife, shining with blood, and plunged it into Øystein's skull.
Darkness followed.
And Øystein felt like he was drifting in a black sea, calm, in control, his arms spread as he glided, feeling the pain fade away and be replaced by a sweet nothingness. He took a deep breathe, and was glad to not feel the pain of his wounds anymore.
Was this what it was like to die? Øystein thought so, anyways.
There were voices, distant and quiet, but the words couldn't be made out. They sounded familiar, and Øystein tried to connect voices to faces - his mom, his dad, his sister.
"Fix it, Øystein." A female voice whispered.
"This is your last chance." A male voice said.
"Save him, and save yourself." A child giggled.
Øystein opened his eyes, and found that, far from being in whatever afterlife his mother had told him about, he was on a bed, in a room with sunlight seeping through and painting the dark wood a bright orange.
The bedroom looked familiar, with posters of heavy metal bands lining the walls, and Øystein thought, 'Whoever's room this is, he has good taste.'
Of course, several of those bands had turned into cowards to appease the parents, but Øystein didn't care, because now he was wondering why he was back in his old bedroom - not in his parent's house, but, rather, at the old cabin, the one that'd been abandoned and left to rot.
"What the - " Øystein mumbled, his tongue thick and heavy as the words slipped into the air and found life. He looked down at the bed, at the blankets that he was holding within clenched fingers, and it was his old one, the bed with springs poking into his back and a strong smell of dust.
Øystein paused, took a deep breathe, and tried to reassure himself that there were countless theories about how death went, one of which involved people reliving their pasts. But Øystein didn't feel dead. No, he felt alive, with a beating heart and lungs that urged for air with every inhale and exhale for breathe. He didn't feel any different than he did when he was alive, and that seemed to be more concerning than anything else.
The trees that hovered outside of Øystein's window shivered in the wind, their branches brushing up against the window ominously. Øystein felt his head, and couldn't find any of his wounds, nor on his neck or chest or stomach. His skin was unmarked, pale and smooth.
'You're dead. This is just the process of dying.' Øystein thought, but it didn't feel right, not really. 'You've never died before. How would you know?'
Truth be told, Øystein didn't know, but for some reason, he was certain that this wasn't the case of a simple death.
Footsteps sounded right outside the door, and Øystein tensed, mouth half-open in a warning yell, but then the door opened without warning, as if the person behind it just couldn't wait a moment later. Jan was standing there, dressed in a torn shirt and cargo pants, dark hair damp from a shower. "Oh, you're awake." Jan said, sounding surprised by the revelation.
"Um." Øystein swallowed thickly. "Yeah." His voice was hoarse.
Jan frowned. "Are you alright? You look very pale, and you're sweating." He approached, stepping into the room with tentative feet.
They hadn't seen each other in weeks - no, months.
"No!" Øystein yelled out without meaning to, immediately regretting it when Jan backed away, startled, his concern turning into worry. He cursed himself for the panic that was coursing through his veins. "I mean, I just had a nightmare."
"A nightmare?" Jan repeated, sounding skeptical. "Like, zombies were chasing you or some shit?" He walked backwards into the threshold of the door.
Øystein allowed himself to take a deep breathe of relief. "You could say that." He said quietly, releasing his death-grip on the blanket, which was beginning to make his fingers hurt. He looked at Jan, at the darkness of his hair and the furrow of his eyebrows, and thought about how this didn't feel like any sort of death.
Instead, it felt like a life renewed.
"What year is it?" Øystein asked, feeling his heart begin to race again just as it began to calm down.
Jan refused to look Øystein in the eye, probably because he was so uncomfortable. "Why?"
"Just tell me!" Øystein was beginning to feel desperate, frightened, cold, fearing whatever might come next. He didn't feel like he was in control, like the world was spinning out of its axle, and tilting too far to the left when it needed to go right.
"Okay, okay." Jan soothed, putting his arms up in defense. "It's April, ninteen-ninety-one."
Øystein's heart dropped down to the pit of his stomach, seemingly cementing his fear and utter terror. He hadn't felt like this since he was a child, but now, it was coming back in full force, rendering him powerless against the events that were taking place. "Are you sure?" He asked. "And what day?"
"Um, it's the first." Jan said. "Listen, are you sure that you're okay? Because you're acting really weirdly." He looked deeply uncomfortable, and was shifting around on his feet.
"I'm okay." Øystein muttered, even though he was the furthest from 'okay' he'd ever been. Suddenly, he was reminded of those voices that he'd heard, and the words, so mysterious, yet so simple.
"Right." Jan was now in the hallway, clearly too freaked out for anything more. "I'm gonna go make breakfast. Come down when you're ready, okay?" He paused, almost as if in thought. "And ask Pelle to come down too. He needs to eat."
Øystein felt like the world was moving in slow motion with the simple mention of that name, and the implications of such a name. He thought about a cold funeral under the cover of rain, and the bloodied mess that'd been left behind in that bedroom that nobody could enter afterwards because there were too many memories. He thought about pale blue eyes and the constant stench of death. He thought about a man, little more than a boy, slitting his wrists and throat before blowing his brains out.
This wasn't death - this was a reincarnation.
The room suddenly felt very, very cold, and Øystein had to remind himself to breathe, too shocked from the words for anything else. "Alright." He whispered, and Jan nodded, walking back down the stairs quickly, probably eager to escape.
Slowly, Øystein stood up, and he walked out of his bedroom and into the bathroom, where he looked into the cracked mirror and stared at his reflection, wondering why, even in death, things couldn't be simple. Just twenty minutes ago, he had been dead, but now, he was alive again, and, by all means, had somehow managed to go back into the past.
Yet again, those words repeated their meanings - 'Save him, and save yourself.'
Øystein turned on the water, cupping his hands together underneath the bitterly cold flow and splashing it over his face, unsure of how to feel, but knowing that this was his chance. Varg hadn't joined the band yet, after all, and Pelle hadn't committed suicide. Øystein could save all of their lives, but he just needed to figure out how.
'Varg, that prick.' Øystein felt white-hot anger coarse through his body at the thought of that bastard. He'd given Varg a chance, and he'd went and killed him!
But this was Øystein's second chance to make sure that Varg never so much as stepped foot into the cabin, and to make sure that Pelle lived to see another day.
Øystein wasn't surprised to feel a wave of sadness and grief hit him at the remembrance of Pelle, feeling so guilty for his role in the other man's suicide, but knowing that he could make it right again. Øystein took a deep breathe, resolving himself to this task, knowing that he could do it, but just not sure of the specifics.
It was April 1st, and Pelle had committed suicide on the 8th.
That was far too soon, but Øystein was sure that he could do it.
He was Euronymous, after all.