Chapter Text
"NO!"
I'm quickly scared awake around the time the gun goes off.
A dream. Thank god.
Was it?
There's something wrong. This isn't my room. Where am I?
I can't get my body to move. I'd can't talk. Come to think of it, even when I did scream instinctively upon waking, my voice was off.
I'm stuck staring... up? Where's up? Am I looking up? I'm so confused. Half my body feels absent, and what I can feel won't move. I can't breathe, yet my body doesn't feel the need to. I'm stuck in a frozen state of panic, trapped in my own thoughts.
Is this what sleep paralysis feels like? Why's the world wrong? I feel like a drawing. Can't even yell for help. I keep starting into space.
Black. White. Grey. That's not even my ceiling. What in the-
And then, all at once, it clicks.
I get my body to move, and I look around the room. Down at my own body.
"Well, fuck. This isn't good."
I burst into laughter at the sound of my own voice.
"Waitwaitwait, this has gotta be a dream!"
I keep laughing. "There's something deeply wrong with my brain if it came up with- ohh, this is great! Well! I haven't had a lucid dream in a bit!"
I decide to fuck around a bit. My favorite thing to do in a lucid dream? Create thrilling scenarios! Like meeting my favorite fictional characters!
I try to summon Light Yagami.
Nope.
I'm slightly disheartened. "Alright, be like that!"
I attempt to unflat the world. Still nothing happens.
"O-kaaay. Something simple!"
I decide to attempt to turn my body back to normal. Another failure.
I'm not dreaming, am I? I think, staring at my hands.
But that's impossible! If I'm not dreaming, that means I really did get shot. That means I died.
"Oh, no-no-no-no. This is bad, really bad."
The feeling of panic slowly creeps up on me. What is this? Where is this? Why, how is this?
This is impossible. My stepdad will be waking me up for school any minute, right? Won't he?
This can't be real, who'd shoot a teenager? Besides, I'm not an isekai protagonist.
My hand twitches. My stepdad won't be waking me up, my stepdad won't ever be seeing me again, just like my mom, and Jonah, and Kane, and-and-
"Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck..."
If I was gonna die, it should've been by my own hand, not some-some fucker with a handgun.
I squeeze my eye shut as those last few minutes come back.
"We're on lockdown?"
"Fuck, oh my god, this can't be happening."
"That was my best friend and you killed him!"
"If anyone else tries to touch me I'll shoot them."
"Why'd it happen here?!"
"Where are the cops?!"
"I'm scared!"
I'd sent a text to my parents, a quick, "Someone has a gun and I'm scared."
I remember being huddled against someone I hated with a burning passion, the whole class jammed behind a desk.
"Hey, if we get out of here, I forgive you for treating me like shit."
And he didn't reply. I got splattered with blood, and I shrieked.
Like the idiot sandwich I was, I slammed my whole body against the kid, reaching for his gun.
There was a brief moment of pain before a solid darkness consumed everything.
When the entirely unwanted flashback ended I open my eye again and stare around frantically.
Why'd I think I could disarm an active shooter? God, if I wasn't in such a shitty position, I'd laugh at my own stupidity.
I clasp my hands together and squeeze, fidgeting.
I want to break something. This is stupid.
I grab a thin book I finished reading a few days and rip it in half. That works.
I clench my fists. "Bastard, bastard, bastard!"
What made that son of a bitch think he could shoot up a middle school, huh? This isn't fair. This isn't fair at all. I don't care how shitty his life was, he shot teenagers.
I was bullied, and I don't recall ever even wanting to shoot anyone!
But we have a more current and pressing matter at hand. Namely, the "person" I currently am.
This feels yucky. I lack over half the body parts I'm used to, and holy shit, I'm a swirling mess of emotion.
I'm scared of everything I just remembered. I had plans for this life, but now that I know how they end, I can't go through with them.
I'm pissed, I'm really fucking angry that I had my life ripped from me.
Somehow, also, I feel kind of... relieved. I know what mistakes to avoid, and in that life, I wanted it done and over anyway.
But this really is strange. I'd thought of it earlier, but this really does feel like some kind of isekai manga. Getting reincarnated after an early death, remembering the past life randomly, hell it's even a character from a show I like. Not even just a random background character, a main fucking antagonist, and my favorite character!
I blink. Thinking of myself as a character is awkward. Where is the line between that life where I thought I (huh?) was fictional, and-
Yeesh, this is all stupid and ridiculous. And the logic is worse.
This is gonna be a long three trillion years.