Re: Life In The Original World From Zero [A Re:Zero Fiction]

Chapter 81: Modern Day Life Graduation Trip Part Fifteen

A/N: *Inserts Call of the Witch* and I'll let you read the rest XD

Subaru stared into the darkness surrounding him. On several occasions before this one, he had experienced such dense darkness, but those darkness often get repelled by light and warmth that broke through, rescuing him. This one though, this impenetrable darkness was something else.

Where am I?

I think I died.

Did I really die?

Do I still have a body? I must do, because it hurts.

Do I go back? Where do I go back?

Subaru tried blinking a few times, but he didn't seem to have eyelids. He tried moving his arms, but his arms had gone missing. He tried speaking, but his throat might had been ripped out. Ah, no, not my throat, but my jaw, a bit of my nose, maybe my face really, and a large amount of my brain, Subaru's nonexistent mind thought. He still remembered the last few things that happened to him, but it was getting harder to think. The particles that made up his mind might have started to disintegrate, stretching apart and fading away. Subaru was not going to be Subaru anymore. The 'something' that consisted of him was dissolving away like ice melting in water.

I don't want to go, Subaru's vanishing mind thought feebly. Something where he left seemed to be important, waiting for him to go back and finish it, but he couldn't recall what it was. He couldn't really recall anything anymore. The remaining parts of Subaru in the vast darkness were probably his eyes and a lingering part of his mind, because he could still see the darkness, although all attempts to think were gone. It's so dark, was the only thing he registered. But then, something odd was happening. Something in the darkness, almost as dark as his surroundings, was wriggling around him. He watched the indistinct shapes move, and slowly, the shapes started to cluster into a larger formation, now starting to emit a really faint hint of purple.

The thing that now occupied Subaru's vision was slowly condensing into a circle, something that looked like a messily coiled ball of rubber bands, only that the thing was still squirming in an uncanny way. Then, the thing exploded, or maybe, expanded, and no less than a few thousand protrusions bursted out from the circular thing as if a really really dark firework was taking place. The protrusions extended themselves in the darkness, reaching in every direction, and soon, Subaru's eyes told him that the protrusions were actually countless hands, groping in the darkness for something, and more surprisingly, some hands closed around whatever was still connecting to Subaru's eyes, crawling around him and enclosing him in a wriggly cradle of hands of darkness.

The extended hands seemed to have found what they were searching for because some started retrieving themselves back to the core. The cradle of hands seemed to be pulled toward that direction as well. It seemed like a long time, but it could also just be a few seconds, and Subaru was absorbed into the core. He didn't resist it, and he couldn't anyways, but as more and more hands returned to the core clenching something, Subaru found himself starting to think again.

What is this?

What is it doing to me?

Am I being eaten?

Is this Death?

Is it...

Putting me back together? Subaru wondered. The hands never stopped moving, and Subaru was slowly being rebuilt. His head, his face, his neck, his torso, his limbs, his senses. He was full. He tried making another noise, but his throat was still blocked by an invisible something, but he could see better, feel better, and even, could be his imagination, hear the rustling sound the crawling hands made. Just then, a hand, softest of all the ones creeping about, was placed on his face, caressing him, and he heard it. Muffled by the slithering noise of the hands, there was a faint whisper. Faint, but packed with emotion.