I took a sharp breath and opened my eyes. Everything was black. I was laying on an invisible floor. I slowly forced my body up and into a comfortable old position from one of my previous lives, it was a mix of kneeling but I was sitting between my legs. I looked around me, nothing but black. So I haven't been thrown back into the static void. That was a good start. Does this mean I was reborn again now?

I look down at my body. My body is nothing but static. I have arms, legs, and the typical extremities, but my skin is all static. Constant fuzz of white, black, reds, yellows, blues, greens, and everything in between. My body also lacked any sex characteristics. No breasts, no genitals, even my body's shape was like an in-between. I felt my face with my static hands. There was no eyes, mouth, or nose. Only bumps and divots where they should be. I opened my mouth, my jaw moved, but no hole opened up. I felt my mouth was open, but my hands told otherwise.

I found my voice and tried to speak. "Ahh uhhh humm." What came out was a doubled voice. A mix of male and female speaking at once. Of course I lived many lives where I was one or the other. Why should I take the form of either one now? Hm, a thought stirred disdain for a certain Internet website in the back of my mind. I shook my head to be rid of the bit idiocy I discovered during my last life.

"Celestine?" I asked aloud. I wonder if we were still alive. I've never actually been unconscious since I gained awareness inside Celestine, so this world of black could be that feeling? If that's the case then whatever that ceremony was might have done something to how our souls are bonded in the body. I hope I haven't been cut off from her. I don't think I can stay sane if I have to stay here alone in this darkness for the rest of her life!

I slowly stood up and surveyed the darkness. Then the light and surroundings shifted. Like blinking once, everything was now different. Gone was the endless dark and what surrounded me now was a street in a dusty city that I remembered from Celestine's memories. This was our city. The dark stone church building rose in the distance. I could see faceless people walking by.

"Celestine?!" I called out.

Nothing responded. I realized that no one around me was making noise. Not even the wind was whistling through the stone buildings or the crunch of footsteps on the hardened sand roads echoed. The faceless people walked aimlessly about their day in this place. In this pack of people, I saw a little girl in a corner, huddled with her head buried in her knees and breathing softly. I began to walk toward her. I lightly touched her head with my static hand, and she turned to dust.

I recoiled. Then everything changed again. I was standing in a library this time. I recall this place from one of my memories. I was a young librarian's apprentice in the Victorian era in England. I don't recall much about myself specifically, though. All memories of myself are blurred together. But I do have fond memories of working and reading in this place. I started to walk slowly between each row of shelves taller than myself. Everything was carved out of beautiful dark wood. The walls were made of stone bricks with wooden trimmings and decorations. Huge windows illuminated the building with the morning sun. The floor was made of cold and hard marble tiles. I wouldn't mind reliving this life if I wouldn't die so young.

Sitting in a corner with a book in her hands was Celestine. I recognized her black hair this time. She was staring intently at the print on the page in a language she couldn't understand, but her brown eyes moved over the page as if she could.

"Celestine?" I called out to her. And her form was replaced with a pile of books. The book she had been holding fell and closed itself on the floor. Sensing a pattern here, I turned my head and the scene changed once more.

Now I stood in the church. I could see the last memory of the place. The floating stone crystals above an altar up on stage with seven people around in a circle with a woman in black hair standing off to the side. Celestine was not on the stone altar. It was empty. I turned and saw a man sitting in one of the far pews, hands clutched in prayer. Between his fingers was a wooden rod with a red stone embedded in it with a small red light glowing from it and a thin line of light stretching forward to the huge crystal in the middle of the room. Everything was frozen in time.

Anything made of wood in this world seemed suspect. I reached out with my left hand, grabbed the red stone, ripped it out of his hand, and punched him with my right hand. Everything about the man turned to dust in the stone pew. I don't know if I really did anything, but it felt good to be in control of something in this dream. I took the wand in my hand and crushed it to powder. Then everything shifted again.

This time I was standing in the middle of an asphalt-paved street in the middle of a city. A few cars drove by unaware of me. I looked up to the sky and saw an enormous burst of light. The shine rivaled the sun. I took in all of the information available to me. Then the world was lost with the rush of the solar ejection from the light. I vaguely knew what this could be with my knowledge gained in my past life. An attack thousands of years in travel. And Earth was gone. The atmosphere stripped, the mantle bare. All of human existence wiped clean by a force of nature no one could have predicted. A gamma-ray burst.

Of course there's really no way to know for sure if what I am seeing is truth or just the dream of a delusional being lost in the universe, i.e. me.

I turned and saw a lone girl standing, staring at me with her brown eyes. Her mouth was open in awe. I turned around and saw the light from the burst recede as fast as it came. The world restored to a second before the event and time froze.

I would not approach her this time. I turned to her and lowered myself down to kneel on one leg. I casually spoke in my doubled voice. "It's nice to meet you finally, Celestine."

She flinched. But at least she didn't disappear this time. It was getting annoying. I would have had to figure out a way to control this dream space if she had kept doing that. It wasn't fair.

"Who are you?" Her sweet childish voice asked. Now that I looked at her, she was younger than she really was. Maybe a year or two younger? Earth years, of course.

"I have given myself the name Novos. I'm sorry for scaring you, earlier. I am still unsure how best to speak to you. Your mother explained what I am." I said.

"Are you going to hurt me?" She asked, shaking.

"I never want to hurt you. I've been watching you. I want to help you as best as I can. If you'll let me, that is." I said.

She took careful steps on the black road toward me. "You look strange."

I laughed a bit. "I know. It's something I haven't quite gotten used to either." I lifted my left hand to my face, the powder of the wand I crushed was still caked into the static skin. "Well, let's just agree to take care of each other? Does that sound like a plan?" I looked back up to her. I wanted to smile, I tried to smile, but I doubt it came across as such since I have no mouth.

She closed the distance between us, skipping a bit. I held out my right hand and she held it carefully.

Everything vanished, and I felt light stinging my eyes. Not my eyes, Celestine's eyes. She was starting to wake up. She was in full control of the body, but I felt I also had some semblance of control. Maybe more feeling was reaching me than it was before. The body felt so heavy. She tried to prise herself up off the stone altar. Her body was quickly grabbed by Mother in a tight hug. Her voice was soft, like there was something in the ears that prevented us from hearing her voice, but we heard her sobbing and her hug was starting to hurt.

"Momma! I can't breathe!" Celestine whined. Mother slowly relented and gave her more room to breath.

The ears were clearing. A soft ringing that prevented sound receded. Celestine looked around and all of the acolytes were on the ground, breathing heavily. Only the old man managed to stay on his knees, clutching the bone staff. Looking up, the crystals were softly circling in the air in fragments. And the beautiful work of art on the ceiling was marred by a huge black mark that gouged a hole through the roof and let the mid-day sun pour in.

I spoke in her mind. More control over my voice now.

"Novos!" Celestine chirped, making Mother jump.

I said. I thought back to how the head priest worded the ceremony. He seemed to want to keep the fact I'm here a secret to the parishioners.

She shouted.

She tried again.

She'll learn.

"Momma, what happened? Is everyone okay?" She eyed the man who was under the gray crystal. His ears were bleeding. "Momma!"

Mother finally moved from her hug. She turned to someone who was standing a distance away awestruck with his black eyes. Charcoal Man! "JORALD!" Mother shouted. He jumped and began shouting for other acolytes to help the injured ones.

Mother picked Celestine up and carried her body tightly to her chest, rushing her back downstairs and onto the bed from before. Energy left Celestine and she collapsed again just from sheer exhaustion. Her entire body ached. I felt tired as well and slipped back to the dreamworld.