The Phantom Switcher

PRELUDE: The Illusion of Life

The passage to the Aethereal was foggy and nerve racking. It is as if she's floating as light as the air through the murky clouds. There was a faraway dull whisper of music from nowhere. She was a glowing white light of an orb; everything about her was light and airy. She was gliding steadily towards the stretch of the unknown where time was warped yet nonexistent. She arrived in a predetermined space where everything is continuous and endless. It was a weird place of spiraling squared tents with no doors and windows, only sheer walls. Yet the other side of the foggy colorless walls cannot be seen through; but it is pulsating in synchronization as if they were alive.

She was gliding steadily towards the walls watching millions, if not billions of six-winged angels fly in every direction, assisting orbs and guarding walls. As she gets closer through the walls, a six-winged seraphim approached her from beyond the cloudy floor. The figure was glowing with colossal judging round eyes for a body. Its billowy silk robe covering everything about it as it flows freely with every vigorous flutter of the wings. It motioned the approaching orb to transform into a translucent body of a woman to step on a glassy platform just in front of the walls.

"Pineda, Sash y Linasa, arrived right after death. Do you confirm?" It declared clearly in a hoarse echoing voice. "Uh-yes? Wait, what? Death?" Sash asked the strange creature. "Yes, death, you're dead." It replied matter-of-factly. "What? Are you crazy? What's this racket about?" As she looked around and chuckled trying to sound calm but failed miserably. "Crazy? Racket? I do not accept disrespect." It stared its round intimidating eyes right through hers, so stern that she fell silent immediately. "You are hereby presented with your life baggage to weigh upon your arrival at the Aethereal Realm." He continued as if uninterrupted. Sash looked around for the "baggage" to no avail, she could only see the misty cloud like floor all around her aside from all the other fluttering winged beings and light orbs in every direction.

"I-I haven't got any baggage." She said inquiringly. "It is not something to be seen by the naked eye. Move toward the middle then look beneath with your eyes closed." It instructed. "What am I supposed to look at?" she rolled her eyes beneath her closed eyes. He cleared his throat instead to reply. Then something happened beyond her eyes. As if seeing a movie for the first time, her memories were played right before her very mind eyes. It started from the moment she was born then progressing further. She felt happiness watching her own self laughing, she felt her heart aching upon her familiar heartaches, she felt all the emotions as if she were feeling it right then and there. She was watching it like she was reliving her hard and dull unsatisfying life. She cried with light tears reminiscing her gloomy fate for what felt like a very long moment where time was warped yet nonexistent at the same time. But it ended as soon as it started.

"Your actions have been recorded in the book of life. Do you have anything to say in accordance to your misconducts?" It queried the still unbelieving Sash. "I don't know, I did what was asked by the situation I'm on." She stated a little too confident for a shaking voice. "You don't deny your actions." It growled, more to itself than to Sash. "Very well. You are hereby pronounced free to enter." It declared dramatically in his dignified raspy voice. "Enter? To where? What do you mean? What's happening? Where am I? Is this a joke, a prank?" she uttered in such haste that the seraphim fluttered it enormous wings and gawked its stern stare.

"A prank? Such nonsense!" It gaped at her. "You are being weighed if you are worthy to enter and pass through!" It said crossly. "Pass where exactly?" Sash implored with a hint of defiance in her voice. "Who knows?" It replied airily. "Do I? I do." It said nodding, more to himself, as if mocking the now fearful Sash, as it turned to leave.

"Where are you going?" She begged the terrifying being. "You're not here to ask." It retorted warningly. "But, what am I to do?" Sash exclaimed perplexed, her eyes widening in fear and confusion. "You didn't hear. Did you?" The seraphim scorned. "I said to enter and pass through!" It bellowed as it turn around once more. "Pass where?" she breathe heavily as chills run all over her. As if it is how being nervous felt like after dying. "The walls!" It screeched, baffled, as it pointed its enormous wings through the walls as if she was wasting its time. "But where will it take me?" she pleaded for answers as she felt her voice shake to a whimper. "Through." The seraphim declared, then beat its gigantic wings so forcefully, it blew Sash through the sheer pulsating wall.

If through meant what Sash thought it meant, then for her, its either heaven or hell. Was she pure enough to secure herself in heaven? In heaven, where she can live peacefully, without pain and suffering, without hunger and weariness, unlike the life she once had? Or was she evil enough to be thrown down to the hells den where she might suffer just the same or worse?

"No! Please! Let me go back!" Sash pleaded to the being. "Go back? Go back!" It cried bewildered, its eyes were as spine-chilling as before but now rounder and hollow. "You lost your chance my dear! Your judgement has passed, so, you too shall pass!" It bellowed shrilly, echoing as Sash gets sucked through the walls, deeper. "Judgement! What judgement? That's no fair! You asked me if I regretted my actions! That's not even judgement at all!" Sash cried as she searched for the one last hope she had forgotten, hidden from long ago. "But you clearly answered to me. Now you shall pass!" It said in a faraway hoarse whisper that Sash barely caught his words. "But where?" she bellowed pleadingly once more. Fears of the unknown continuously creeping through her head. "How about those people who inflicted me in such situations?" she implored hopefully.

"The judgement is about you; it has nothing to do with them!" echoed through Sash's head answering her questions. "But they put me through everything!" Sash wailed in hopelessness as she dissolved through the sheer walls. "Then they'll be judged in them, you in you." the voice echoed once more. It echoed and clanged through the translucent misty floors yet dissolved into vapor.

Sash felt suffocated and nauseated, thrashed and twisted, fighting whatever the voice in her head instructed her. It was controlling every inch of her soul. Forcing her to sink through, be absorbed and lost in the voice. But she closed her mind to it, thinking of all the hatred she had for the world. Hating on every single person that caused her pain. Hating on all of the unfairness of the life she once had. Hating on everything but herself. She let the hatred eat everything about her and the life she once had. Her once white soul was diminished into a gloomy orb crushing the once mightiest walls that bounded her soul into powder like mists.

Sash's grey orb floats far away from the walls. Floating aimlessly into nothingness for what felt like a very long moment where time was nonexistent and warped at the same time.

But after what felt like a million moments, she finally felt the warmth she's been longing to feel.