“I was around my girlfriend’s house meeting her parents for the first time,” says my friend. “I was maybe only seventeen. Anyway, they serve onion soup to start with, which was great, super strong just how I like it. But two minutes in and I catch them all looking at me — my girlfriend, her older brother, parents — all staring at me.” He shrugs. “I figure they’re looking to see what I think of the soup, and I give them the thumbs up and carry on eating. Later, after the meal, my girlfriend is pretty mad at me. She asks if I tried to ruin the meal on purpose.” My friend pauses here.

”On purpose?’ I ask, providing my minimal part in the conversation. I’ve never been much of a conversationalist but in the last year or so I’ve almost turned mute.

”Turns out I’d been slurping the soup extremely loudly. Every spoonfull of it. Slurrrp. Slurrrp. My girlfriend called my behaviour unbearable. We didn’t see each other much longer after that.“ He smiles and sips his beer.

”So… That’s when the past lives started coming back to you?”

”You got it in one,” he says. “If this was golf you wouldn’t even need to putt. In one of my lives slurping was how I — my community — showed pleasure at the food we were devouring. And the onion soup was really good. It would have been rude not to slurp. At least, in my mind it would have been.”

Me and my old school friend are at a bar sipping half-empty beers. It’s a tacky ocean themed bar with plastic eels and starfish and seahorses dangling from the ceiling, radiating pools of imitation bioluminescense. Blues and purples. The seahorse above our table flickers every so often.

It’s the first time I’ve seen my friend in ten years. He’s handsome but he’s aged more than I expected — his hair still dark but wrinkles and crows feet settling deep into his face like fingers into wet clay.

“Back then,” my friend says, “I didn’t realize it was a past-life thing. It just seemed like I was doing what I was supposed to be doing, you know? Like at some point in my seventeen years someone had told me slurping at dinner with your girlfriend was a good idea. But a year or two after that, I start to remember more details. I remember my life in Japan. I remember my life in France. I get confused with who I am now because of who I was then. It’s all one great big muddle.”

We‘ve finished our beers so I get us another round then sit back beneath the flickering seahorse.

“How do you deal with it?” I ask. “I’ve had one life and thirty years in it. And that’s still too many memories that I don’t need.”

”You don’t deal with it. Or at least, I didn’t. That’s why I went AWOL.”

I frown. “What do you mean?”

”I was in an institute for five years. I couldn’t cope with the memories.“

”Whoa,” I say, unsure what else to say. I’d figured he’d gone travelling. He’d always been adventurous. The kind of kid who wanted to make the most of their one life on the planet. The fact he hadn’t gotten in contact with me during that time hurt a little, but wasn’t entirely unexpected.

“It’s okay,” he says. “Or it is now. But back then, boy. The memories flooded back and drowned me. My life in France ended in the trenches and for a while all I could see at nights were dead friends I’d never even met. How do you deal with that when you’re not even twenty and think of yourself as a pacifist? And that’s not even the worst of it.”

I felt bad. Why hadn’t I bothered to search for him? To check he was okay? Instead, ten years on, it’s my friend who got in contact with me. He saw my profile on some social media channel and wanted to see how I was doing.

”It gets worse than trenches?’ I say.

”Yes. Sort of. I mean, I’ve lost so many parents and children and loved ones that it’d make your head spin. Ah sorry, I shouldn’t mention that — I hope it doesn’t upset you?”

I raise a hand and give a meek smile. “It’s fine. It’s nothing compared to yours.”

“We all have our own demons,” he says. “Squatting on our shoulders. There’s no point comparing them. But okay, look, there’s a reason why most people don’t remember this stuff. It drives you mad to remember it. Forgetting past lives is evolution at work. We remember important bits — stay away from snakes, don’t sleep in a tree in case you fall, don’t eat bright red berries — and we lock away the rest. Except, sometimes, like with me, the hinges on the safe door crack and out it all spills.”

We have another beer and talk about sport instead, then about school.

”Yeah,“ he says, grinning at each and every school anecdote I have. “I forgot all about that. Man, we had some good times.”

Eventually, I ask what’s been on my mind, “How did you do it? How are you like this?“

”What do you mean?”

”You got out of the institute. You seem to be coping fine now. The memories aren’t crushing you.” I grab my sweating pint glass and clasp it on the table between my two hands, like if I let go of it it’ll fall and break. “How did you do it?”

He looks an me earnestly, holds my gaze and thinks a while. “They got me to concentrate on other memories. When I think of my life in France, I think of my childhood with my parents, of art, friends, poetry, gathering grapes from the vines, anything that made me happy there. I forced myself to do this each time memories of that life came into my head — I’d search for the best bits of that life. Then, I’d do it for the next life, and the next, and the next.”

I don’t pick up my glass. It feels too heavy, even thought it’s only half-full now.

“Eventually,” he says, “you learn to turn down the brightness on the worst parts and turn it way up on the good. The bad doesn’t go, but it fades a little into the background. It allows the better times to come into focus.”

”That sounds… difficult.”

”It’s not easy to do,” he says. “It takes time. But past lives do become past, become memories. It’s possible to live in the present again.”

Marcus traced his finger over the circle in the symbol. “So, what’s this really about?”

“Exactly what I said in the ad,” the woman across the table said. She was older but looked stunning, even if she did stare a bit intensely. “If you recognize the symbol, I’ll pay you one hundred dollars.”

“I,” Marcus started, not wanting to look away from the paper. He almost said the name that came to mind but just laughed nervously. “I feel like I do know it, but I have no clue from where.”

“Then say its name,” the woman asked, her voice that deep sort of hoarse that ticked all the boxes. He wanted something from her, but it wasn’t money.

“Okay, I don’t know why I want to call it this, but Eskavalia.” He slid the paper back to her. “That isn’t right, is it?”

“Our kind are born sick, usually very sick,” she said, taking the paper back and reaching into her purse.

“Our kind?” he said, hoping this wasn’t about to pivot into some MLM pitch.

“We rarely made it past five in the best of times, until modern medicine, that is.” She pulled out a thin wooden box and set it between them.

“So, this box is something you sell, right?” Marcus sighed. It really was a shame but what did he expect responding to a newspaper ad in 2022. He had been sick as a kid but she couldn’t know that. He had come to her.

“The majority of us made it to adulthood last time. The Cord organizes us, giving us each a key symbol and name so that we might find each other this time around. You look hale, Eskavalia.” She gestured towards the box. “If it’s like it was for me, it will hit you hard, fair warning.”

“Right,” Marcus said, so he had been close. It was some kind of cult thing. Who could resist a closed box though? He opened it. A lock of red hair sat inside, tied with a bit of blue ribbon. His hair was blonde but this… He picked up the box.

“Why do I feel like this is mine?” He stared and rolled the strands between his fingers.

Flashes of screaming light nearly rocked him out of his chair. Traveling in a van, laughing, he had been a girl. He, or she, had worked in a zoo, she had three children. She had trained to fight, trained to infiltrate. He knew everything about all of her children. He mourned again for Sylvia. The memories came too fast, burning like a run of floss being pulled between his ears. She had been born in Pennsylvania. He breathed as the rush slowed.

The woman looked at him with what? Pity? Empathy? He opened his mouth to speak and another rush came. Old-timey hospital beds, incredible pain, a string of crying mothers holding him, each for only a moment. The chain of embraces came and went. The cloth pressed against him was starched dresses, homespun shirts, robes, then nothing but bare skin. A blurry vision of an untamed landscape as a mother sang to him in a tongue he never lived long enough to learn.

Finally, the rush of memories ended. He dropped the box with a shaking hand. “What the fuck was that?”

“All your lives,” the woman said. “So many cut short. You, as I, were thousands of dying children through the ages. We never had enough of a foothold to remember, to change things, until now.”

“Change things?” Marcus asked. “This is a curse, a misery.”

“This world is what its rulers want it to be,” she sipped her drink and gripped Marcus’s hand. “Since before humans kept time, a small group of reincarnating immortals, ashborn we call ourselves, have controlled everything. They have ways to find other ashborn like you and me, ones not in their privileged circle, while still in the womb. They poison our mothers so we will not gather memories of ages and challenge their rule.”

“So, this group has killed us, thousands of times each? All this is real?”

“Yes, and they know now their old techniques no longer work. They’ve already taken harsher measures with some of us, killing us directly.”

“So what do we do?” Marcus asked as the woman reached into her purse again.

“You spent twenty years before you died last answering that question.” She placed a cloth covering something on the table. “It was you that convinced me what we must do, Eskavalia. I am now ready to return the favor.”

Marcus picked up the heavy object hiding under clothes, bringing it to his lap, a gleaming barrel showing.

“We go to war.”

/r/surinical

"But Mommy, why won't you help that man?" Julia was pointing. Her mom had told her it wasn't nice to point, but how else was anyone supposed to know who you were talking about. The man she pointed at was sitting on the sidewalk with a cardboard sign. Julia couldn't read the writing. He had a dog.

Julia's mom grabbed her hand and adjusted Julia's fur trimmed coat as she hurried her along. Their coats matched. "Some people just can't be helped, Juley Dear. If you give them money they'll just spend it on drink. If they deserve help, the church will give it to them. Or they'll get a job."

She turned back to stare at the man as her mom pulled her along. "Mommy, I remember when I wanted a job but nobody would give me one. Maybe he wants a job but nobody will give him one."

Mommy stopped to look at some handbags in a window. They looked a lot like the one she was holding, but Mommy had a lot of handbags. She never let Julia play with them at home. "You were line leader at school last week, and didn't you say that it was your job to feed the fish next week?"

"No, Mommy, I mean back before. Before I was Juley. When I was a man like him and nobody would give me a job." Julia swayed and swung, hanging on to Mommy's arm. Looking at handbags in windows was boring.

"You have such the imagination, Dear. I'm sure somebody would have given you a job if you were willing to work hard. Come along." Mommy dragged her into the store. It was filled with more handbags, each on their own table. And more employees than customers.

The employees were all dressed in little black dresses. One of them greated Mommy. Julia stuck out her tongue. "And I was never allowed to go into stores. Not in the front door."

"What are you going on about now, Juley? Be still. I want to look at the new bag." Mommy said that last bit to the rest of the room and several of the employees started to scurry about. Mommy came here a lot.

"They wouldn't let me go in the front door or eat lunch or nothing. People were mean to me when I was a man. I don't know why. People are always nice to Daddy." Mommy was looking at the bag, so Julia just spun around in the middle of the room for a bit. One of the employee's smiled at her, but watched her carefully.

Mommy smiled. At the new handbag. "Oh, I'll take it. Just put it on the account. Come on now, Juley."

They walked back out onto the street. Julia screamed. Mommy turned to look at her and saw that she was pointing again.

"Stop that, Julia. Those are policemen, they are our friends." Mommy gave her a stern look.

Julia hid behind Mommy. "But Mommy, before, when I was a man. The police are the ones that killed me."

[More writing at r/c_avery_m]

"I was Cleopatra's ... wet nurse?"

Phil McClaymond adjusted his overalls and scratched at his graying beard. The sound of children's laughter ricocheted between the ferris wheel and the merry-go-round, bullets of fun, and behind a giant plastic sculpture of a skateboarding dog an expressionless clown sucked wearily on a cigarette. He didn't seem to want to be caught in the crossfire.

"Cleopatra IV, to be precise. The one everyone thinks about, the one who went down the Nile with both Julius Caesar and Mark Anthony—she was the seventh."

"How exciting!" said Lucy. "Listen to that, Phil." She grabbed a fistful of his left, blubbery pectus. "It's not so hard to imagine, is it? You've got moobs for days. Of course you were a wet nurse in a former life. It makes perfect sense."

"Fuck off," Phil grumbled. The clown behind the sculpture put out his cigarette with an oversized shoe. "You know this is all bullshit, don't you? I only agreed to this to be a nice husband. Like when I let you do a tarot reading in front of my whole family. It was my 50th birthday, if you can remember. They still bring it up, laughing their asses off."

"Beep," said Lucy, giving her husband's chest a final squeeze. "Don't be like that. This is just harmless fun, isn't it? And if it weren't for that tarot reading your brother would've made the whole day about him, wouldn't he? He wouldn't shut up about his yacht. That was when I dug up the deck of cards."

Phil let out a gentle sigh of resignation. He never seemed able to find a complaint she couldn't somehow reverse.

The fortune teller cleared her throat, then coughed. "Oh. Sorry," she said, wheezing. "A slight irritation. It comes and goes." Catching her balance, she said, "Your wife is right. This is harmless fun. Standard fare at a standard fair, eh?" She studied their faces for traces of laughter, squinted, then clicked her teeth. "If you're looking for the real stuff, and I am talking here about stuff with real prices as well, there's a place you can go."

"I know of a place you can go as well," Phil muttered.

"Oh? Tell us more," said Lucy.

The fortune teller pulled up an iPhone and fumbled with it a bit before landing on the homepage for some guy called Steve G. Barlow. "He's a scientist," she said quickly. "This isn't hocus pocus. This is the real deal. Like geology, archaeology, or homeopathy."

Phil wanted to submit a complaint at the mention at the last item on the woman's list, but his wife emphatically nodded her head, saying, "Yes, yes. I see. He looks clever. Is he clever?"

The fortune teller assured them that he was indeed clever and that he traveled to conventions all across the globe. She coughed once more and she cupped a hand before them with a hopeful look.

Steve G. Barlow's office was sterile, austere, and looked to be decorated by the same kind of people who decorated airports. On the wall hung rows of diplomas and columns of dreamcatchers. Phil frowned at the very sight of them.

"Ah. Mr and Ms Claymond, I presume?"

"It's McClaymond."

"Oh. Scottish descent, I take it?" Barlow widened his eyes. They were like bright blue marbles trapped in spoiled milk. He had a face like a rubber mask and the sort of haircut monks stoically donned to make themselves as unappealing to women as possible.

Fuck off, Phil wanted to say. Instead he said, "Right."

"Could be memories of summers spent as an Edinburgh druid resurfaces. You never know. There's no genetic link between past lives, of course. The transfer takes place via morphic fields, resonating like spacetime ripples from then to now, there to here."

Lucy jittered with the excitement of a golden retriever. "She said he was a wet nurse. For Cleopatra."

Barlow raised a lone brow. "Who?"

She pointed at her husband. "Phil. One look at his moo—I mean his pecs—and you know it's true." Lucy softly planted a kiss on her husband's cheek.

"No," said the scientist, "I mean who told you that?"

"Some fortune teller," said Phil.

The scientist snorted. "I'm sorry. What we do here is science. I hope you won't be disappointed when I tell you fortune telling is all bullshit."

"Oh."

"Bullshit!" cried Lucy. "It's just harmless fun. That doesn't mean it's bullshit."

Barlow shrugged. "If it looks like a duck, quacks like a duck ... It's probably not a moose, is what I'm saying."

Lucy grumbled. "Those are some fine dreamcatchers you've got on the wall ..."

"Oh. Yeah. My daughter makes them. I buy them. Because, you know, who else would?"

His wife's face was starting to glow a slight red, Phil noticed. She tossed her black curls aside absentmindedly like she had a tendency to do before launching into a full frontal assault.

"So past lives, eh?" said Phil louder than necessary.

"Yes! As you're aware, neurons fire in rhythmic oscillations in frequencies from 8-25 Hz, alpha to gamma. This is a process of communal synchrony not entirely unlike the flashing of fireflies—collective dynamics is the proper term—and I am sure you have marveled at the murmuration of starlings, the colonial hivemind of ants and bees.

"The morphic field operates in a similar manner to the electrical field of charge and potential under your scalp, rising and falling like the hills and valleys of some ethereal plane. Our ancestors tended to walk in lockstep with its steady, comforting hum, but today we are deaf to its sound. Why? I suppose it's our disruption of the inherent harmony of nature; our very lives are dissonant, chaotic; we stuff pelicans full with microplastics and we poison the water we drink with chemicals that—"

Barlow gasped for breath. "I am sorry," he said. "I just watched My Octopus Teacher. It is a beautiful documentary, tinged with sorrow." Wistfully he glanced out an office window. "Those birds that soar in the skies outside, they have the wisdom of every life they've ever lived in their trembling hearts, I'm sure of it."

Phil tugged at his wife's cherry sweater, begging her with his eyes to escape this lunatic along with him. Lucy brushed him off.

"Birds can remember their past lives?"

"Oh yes. Well, I believe they can. A friend of mine has a parrot that recites verses in Latin. It must be morphic resonance. There's no better explanation."

"H-How does it work?"

"What?"

"The website said you had some sort of device. Something to connect one to the, uh ..."

"—Morphic field! Yes. Let's get started, shall we?"

It didn't look like much to Phil. A pair of earbuds, a pair of contact lenses. This guy charged $500 a session and Phil's stomach sank at the thought of every dollar he had spent on scammers that had impressed his wife and he wondered, for a moment, whether it might all add up to a yacht.

It didn't feel like anything either, wearing them.

"Let me know if you feel uncomfortable," said Barlow.

"I've felt uncomfortable all day," said Phil.

"Oh, and drink this."

With the lenses everything looked blurred, but Phil could recognize the plastic cup though he couldn't quite place the smell. He sniffed it. "Damn," he said. "What the hell is this stuff?"

Barlow blurred a smile. "Ayahuasca," he said. "It gets the process going."

"Isn't that a drug?" asked Lucy.

"If you ask me? No. If you ask the FDA or the DEA ... Well. I only request that you don't ask either of them."

Phil shrugged. "Bottom's up," he said and he drank the bitter stuff in one go.

For a few minutes, nothing happened. Then, right afterward, everything happened. All at once.

“Remember, show your work! I don’t just want to know that you can figure out the answer, I want to know HOW you figured out the answer.”

Paper tests were passed back the rows of students. Pencils scratching loudly in the heavy silence of concentration. Mr Hendricks graded papers and fidgeted with a spinner he’d confiscated from someone using it inappropriately. The magnets were soothing and silent. From the corner of his eye he saw Rachel put down her pencil, and look to see if anyone else was done. She turned the test back to the beginning and picked her pencil back up.

“Rachel,” She looked up at him. “Bring me your paper please.”

Startlement turned to distress. The other students were focused on their work, though a few curiously watched to see what the oddity was about. Rachel dragged herself and the paper to his desk and held it up as if just looking at it would satisfy his order. Mr Hendricks kept the spinner in his right hand going as he reached out for her work. Rachels fidgeted as he confirmed his suspicions. “You’ve filled in the answers without showing any work.” He said, keeping his voice low enough the other students couldn’t hear. Rachel scuffed her toe against the carpet, hands clasped behind her. “I was going to fill in the rest.” She said

Mr Hendricks brought out a fresh test. “Sorry, I need you to start over. Take the empty desk here by the chalkboard.” Visibly swallowing she obeyed. After the bell released the children she turned in her work and gathered her things. “Are your parents still coming to the parent teacher conference tomorrow?” He asked. Rachels gaze didn’t leave the ground; she mumbled something he couldn’t make out before she slid out the door slick as an eel.

The conference could have gone better, could have gone worse. Rachel's parents arrived precisely on time. Mom spoke first “Rachel told us how you humiliated her for finishing first yesterday and took her test away, making her do a different one, practically accusing her of cheating. I hope you have better proof than she’s a head for numbers Mr Hendricks.”

“Oh, ma’am I am troubled by the misunderstanding. I have no intention of humiliating any of my students. See, Rachel's head for numbers is exactly what I want to talk to you about. You’re right I didn’t bother making her show her work on the first test because I’ve seen her homework. The second test I created just for Rachel. With problems interspersed we’ve never looked at and no answer key. Removing her from other students was to forestall naysayers that she might have had help. There’s no possible way she could have cheated. There’s no logical way she could have passed it either.”“Are you saying you set our daughter up to fail?” dad asked

“All due respect Mr and Mrs Walker, Rachel is a fish in water when it comes to numbers. I’ve never seen anything like it. We’re studying pre-algebra and she answered trigonometry; questions I used a calculator for, in her head.”

Mr and Mrs Walker met each other's eyes for a long moment. Their body language was defensive. “Rachel is an ordinary little girl. Your test was a fluke. A cruel joke to play Mr Hendricks. From now on focus on teaching 5th grade math like you're paid to do and leave Rachels advancement to us and her councilors.” said Dad. “Is there anything else Mr Hendricks?” Mom asked. Mr Hendricks hesitated. This was not entirely unexpected reactions, but surely they must know he’s a mandated reporter of Carnate behaviors. “I did report my findings Mr and Mrs Walker. You will be hearing from RBU.” A small cry slipped from Mom, Dad took her elbow, they stood and walked away.

“I’m Rob Cane with RBU. Reincarnate Behavioral Units mission, I’m sure you are familiar, is to find those with extraordinary abilities and enfold them where they will do the most good for society with their enhanced potential.” Said the RBU man “Teachers are required to keep files on all students, Rachel in particular has large folders in several classes, especially math and music. She is unequivocally gifted. My job is to determine if the spark is wholly original to her.”

Mrs Walker's knuckles were white on Rachel’s shoulders. Mr Walker stood looking out a picture window, his back to the agent.

“We’ll set up here, little miss. No need to be nervous, just answer the questions truthfully and everything will be fine.” While he spoke a flurry of people set up equipment including a desk, two chairs and a large rolley contraption with wires coming off it from every angle. Rachel sat in one of the chairs, a female agent walked her through removing her coat to reveal a sleeveless top, and began attaching electrodes front, back, head. They moved the desk to Rachel and handed her a blank piece of paper and a pencil. On the desk they placed a fidgit spinner, a pencil sharpener and a bottle of water.

Rachels feet dangled above the floor, white shirley temple shoes toe pointed down. She kept her eyes focused on the paper as she took the pencil. The test was tedious. She wrote her name over and over. Then they asked a series of questions; Math yes, also history and economics, some things “everyone” knew, some experts might struggle to answer. They came at her in such a flurry that left no room for faking the results. They asked some questions twice.Once a paper was full they took it away and gave her a new one. Someone scanned the paper with a bar of light then a picture flashed up on a screen where the Walkers couldn’t see, some parts highlighted. Rachel endured patiently. Mr Walker never moved, Mrs Walker paced. When nature bagan to call her, Rachel started shifting in her seat, raising the hand with the pencil she asked barely audible if she could use the restroom. “Of course! Perfect timing. We’re almost done. Just write your name for me one more time.” Agent Crane said.

After signing her name with a flourish, she hopped down, agents swarmed her removing wires and electrodes and off she scampered. The agent picked up the paper, scanned it and on the monitor a copy, barely legible highlighted read ’A. Einstein.’

Download initiated.

Series 1:

Stage 1:  Fetus. Normal.

Stage 2: Birth. 99 percent normal. Birthmark stored on right hip.*

Stage 3: Infancy.  85 percent normal. Language delayed. Parental patience below normal. Scar stored above left eyebrow. 

Stage 4: Toddler. 80 percent normal.  Family dog has above level patience. Family cat has normal trust levels of children.  Memory deemed unsafe for public view. Scared stored on right pinky finger. 

Stage 5: Adolesconce. 79 percent normal. No friendships recorded.  Low marks in. Elementary school. Below normal amount if spoken language.  Above average level of written language. 

Stage 6: Teenager. 70 percent normal. Family dog buried in the woods behind the family home. Family cat ran away. Emotional scars not stored.  Scar stored on right forearm.  

Stage 7: Young adult.  60 percent normal.  Police report presented. Ostracized from Family home. 

Stage 8: Death. Scar stored on left arm. Died in captivity. 

"What the fuck," Tanner asked as he shut down the monitor in front of him. "What is this?"

Zach shrugged. "One of your lives." He leaned over the shoulder of his friend and scrolled back to the top of the black and green screen. He tapped the second line before standing up straight again. "Your first one even. Wonder when it was.  You could find out if you–"

"No," Tanner interrupted.  "I don't think I want to know. People believe this stuff?"

Zach tilted his head to one side. "Nothing to believe. It's the truth.  Not like it's some new program but a crypto Boi or something. " 

Tanner crossed hid arms over his chest, a scowl moving across his face. "But what this is saying about me…" He trailed off, unsure about finishing the sentence on his mind. 

Zach laughed, a strange laugh from deep in his gut. 

It didn't sound like his normal laughs– it hit tanners ears weird. 

He very much didn't like it. He didn't like any of this. 

"It's not you.  Not really.  It was some version of you like, 500 years ago or something.  No judgement dude," Zach said. 

Tanner didn't find it reassuring. "I don't know. I don't think I wanna see anymore.  Not right now at least." 

"You sound like my little sister," Zach said , shoving his elbow into Tanners shoulder. 

Tanner pushed his seat back, forcing his friend to move in the process. "Shut the hell up. Let's go do something else instead."

Zach shrugged again, a quiet laugh still escaping him as the two walked away from the library computers and back into the parking lot. 

*** 

Download initiated.  Subject gone.  DNA sufficiently present.

Series 2.

Stage 1: Fetus. 99 percent normal. Late development of vocal chords.

Stage 2: Birth. 97 percent normal. Birthmark stored on right hip.

Download buffering. Subject gone. DNA sufficiently present.

Download buffering.Subject gone. DNA sufficiently present.

Download buffering.Subject gone. DNA sufficiently present

Download initiated. Subject gone. DNA sufficiently present

Stage 3: Infancy.  95 percent normal. Parents displayed slightly below average levels of patience.  Family cat given away at signs of mismatch temperaments. Scar stored above left eyebrow.

*** 

 "You do have that scar on your face though," Zach said at the first red light out from the parking lot. "The one on your eyebrow."

Tanner scowled again, and smacked his friend on the back if the head. He'd been trying not to think about that scar, or his birthmark.  The whole memory thing had left him uneasy.

Very, very uneasy.

Hii! You can find more by me over at r/beezus_writes

All my life, people seemed... familiar to me. People I had no way of knowing would feel like they were my best friends, and I was incredibly good at guessing peoples names.

One day, me and my mom were out for groceries. I was maybe around 4? 5? years old, I don't remember exactly. My mother went to go look for something in a different aisle, and I waited by our shopping cart, loaded with groceries. An older lady stopped by me and began speaking to me.

"Hello there, litte girl. What's your name? Where's your mama?" "My mom is grabbing eggs" I replied "and I'm Rebecca." The lady smiled at me and continued asking about my life. "How old are you? Are you in school yet?" "I'm 4, but not in school. I used to be, but then I left my other mommy for this one." The lady seemed confused, and just as she was about to ask me something else, my mom returned. "Hello there, who are you? I hope Emily isn't bothering you too much." "Anne." The lady looked shocked as she turned around to face me again. "What did you say?" "Your name. It's Anne. And my name is Rebecca" I turned to my mom. "Not Emily." "H- How did you know my name? I didn't tell you." She got pale and looked at my mom, seemingly disturbed.

"I'm so sorry, ma'am. Emily is always bothering people with her stupid jokes." My mom explained to the lady. "She insists that her name is Rebecca, though I don't know why. She says she was Rebecca but had to leave her other mother. She has a... rich fanatsy, so to say." "No, you don't get it. My name is Anne. She was right. She guessed my name."

Both my mom and the lady, Anne, turned to look at me. "What? She is my aunt. I know her name." The lady got even whiter, even though that seemed impossible, and she spoke quietly. "My niece. My sisters daughter. She was named Rebecca. She passed from leukemia just over 4 years ago."

My mom seemed shocked. Anne continued softly: "She was the light of my life. It was as if she was my own daughter. She was only fifteen when she departed. Didn't even get to finish high school."

​

This was the first time. Or well, the first time I remember knowing so much about someone I had never met before. My mom says that once, when I was even younger, I guessed the name of my fathers friend which he hadn't seen in years. But there were many more encounters where I guessed someones name, or I could tell their lifestory so detailed that they accused me of stalkig them. For years, I insisted my name was Rebecca. only when I turned 10, I started to accept my new name, Emily. Inside, I knew I was Rebecca. But accepting this new name was a lot easier than convincing every teacher, coach and substitute that my name wasn't Emily Smith, but Rebecca Goldfinch.

This 'delusion', as my parents called it, forced me to visit many therapists over the years. One even thought I was scizophrenic, or had a multiple personality disorder.

But when I was fourteen, I started to feel different. For one because I finally made a friend, who accepted me as Rebecca, and believed me when I told her about my old mother. Her name was Kenzie, she said, and she told me something about her. She was Kenzie, but everyone called her Brittney, just like how I was called Emily by everyone surrounding me. This made us close, and it made us feel less alone in this world where no one believed who we really were. Kenzie also made me calm. She had an 'old soul', according to the grownups. Her presence was so calming, reassuring, that it almost felt... maternal. This was the reason I was drawn to her from the moment I met her.

The second reason, which made me scared instead of calm, was the fear I felt when looking at the calender. I had no specific reason for this, but every time I looked at one certain date, it made my heart sink inside my chest. November 21st. My birthday. I dreaded that day. The closer it got, the more I started to sink inside that hole that my heart formed, and the more I slipped away from my loved ones. The only one that could still reach me was Kenzie.

But Kenzie told me something about that day. She told me that that day is horrible for her. All she can do that day is cry, and grieve an immense loss she suffered. And finally, she explained where she thought our connection came from.

"Okay. It's almost november, so I think we should talk about this. I think I was reborn. I am called Brittney by my mom, but that isn't me. I'm Kenzie. You know, like how you are Rebecca. Well, Kenzie was the name my last mom gave me. I know it sounds weird, but I was born before. April 13, 1948 was my birthday, and I was named Kenzie Goldfinch." "Goldfinch?" I asked. "But.. that's my name. I don't-" "Let me finish. I was the lastborn, my mom passed in childbirth and my family blamed me. My family existed of my dad, sister and brother. My siblings were called Anne and Robert."

"Anne.. like.. the lady from the supermarket" I asked, recalling the time I told Kenzie about the weird story. "Exactly. She was my sister." It dawned on me. Kenzie was my mother. My old mother. "Wait. How would you know that? We don't know what happens after death. And even if we did, you wouldn't be able to prove it. I mean, sure, it sounds great, but-" "Stop." Kenzie cut of my rant. "I went to a spiritual guru. I know it sounds fake, but they really helped me. I figured out I was your mom a while ago, but I didn't know how to tell you. But I think it's time. November 21st was the day you died. You were my only child, and your death paralysed me. I couldn't think straight anymore, and a few days later, I decided I couldn't live with the pain anymore."

I was quiet. November 21st. My birthday. The day I died. My fifteenth death anniversary. Kenzie gave me a hug. "I understand it is a lot to process. Just call me when you are ready to talk." She started to leave.

"Wait" I said, looking at her. "What is you birthday?" "November 24th"

That is how I figured out that I was reincarnated, as was Kenzie. But we seemed to be the only people aware of the fact that death isn't the end. I once asked my mom, and she shut me down with something along the lines of 'dead is dead. Ain't no point thinking about it.'

Now, I am 30 years old. My birthday is still a hard day for me, even 15 years after finding out why. I have a lovely wife and two wonderful kids, but they don't seem to understand why I never want to celebrate. I once told my wife, and she just said she'd try to be more understanding, but I could tell she couldn't relate to what I told her. And I don't blame her.

Me and Kenzie are still best friends, although she has taken on a more motherly role in my life since that one night. She is also married, to a great guy, who does have the same experience. They found out, with the help of the guru, that they used to be neighbours in their past life. He apparently had moved away for educational oppurtunities, but had gotten sick and died around a year and a half before me and Kenzie did. He turned 32 this june, and everyone calls him Nick, short for Nicholas, even though he was named Pete by his mom. Kenzie also goes through life as Kenzie now, instead of Brittney. Both of them even changed their legal names.

I am Emily. After my fifteenth birthday, it felt like Rebecca was gone. Probably because that's how old she was when she died. I even ran into Anne again, in the same supermarket as when I was young. She didn't recognise me at first, but I told her who I was, and she invited me over for a cup of coffee. I asked to bring Kenzie, after explaining our relation, and the three of us had a lovely afternoon. It was almost like we were... family.

An explosion coloring the sky shades of scarlet. The screaming of armies clashing. sounds unknown to his ears, yet somehow familiar all the same.

"Well, what's going on?"

My eyes moved, seeming to fly over a great battlefield, before settling to fall through the cloth of a great green and gold tent. I saw a man before me, garbed in strange robes and a complex crown.

"Are you mute or something? God, why do they always give me the defective ones?"

He was in my face now, spittle flying all over as he raged about how he was always shafted by his superiors.

The world shifted, I now saw an idyllic valley, full of flowers and long grass waving in the wind. I looked to my right, and saw a man seemingly made of stars and void. He smiled at me, a thing that brought me great comfort though I didn't know his face.

"This will be our home now, my friend. No one will find us here."

And the world spun, morphing once again. I now stood at a seaside cliff, with the sound of clashing ocean waves to my back. I was face to face with the same man of noble clothes as before, though he was now tattered and torn.

"I'm sorry, but your crimes cannot be forgiven."

Before I knew what was happening, I was falling. I turned to the ground below and caught one final glimpse of the spikes below.

And then i awoke.

Sitting straight up in my bed, I could feel the cold sweat on my face. The same nightmare, come again. The man of stars, and the murderous green noble.

I looked over and saw my alarm clock. 8 AM. great. now I was going to be late for work.

I stood up and dressed myself. After walking to the bathroom and splashing myself with cold water, I stood and stared at my own reflection. Where did this dream come from?

Where did my mind get the idea of a man made of stars? I had never had much of an imagination, why did my own mind begin conjuring such things now?

But I had no time to question it, I was already late, and my boss wouldn't be very merciful after I was late for the 20th time.

The day went by slowly aside from being chastised as soon as I arrived. On the drive home, I put on an old playlist from my childhood, comfort music that never failed to soothe me.

While listening, I began to think. Was there something that could have triggered those strange experiences? The dreams had been coming with increasing regularity, often focusing on the same characters. Maybe it was some childhood experience, I'd have to ask my parents next time I called them.

As i looked up, i saw the intersection light above me. A second ago, a beautiful green, it was now red. In the moment before impact, I thought of the irony, the color itself seeming to betray me when most needed.

When I next became aware, i was sitting in a high-backed chair. I was in a comfortable living room, what one would visualize the old log cabin in the woods to look like.

But stranger than that was the man that sat across from me. With his shoulders drooped, the man of stars and void stared right at me.

"You're finally awake. Took you long enough."

I tried to respond, but I felt lethargic, like every inch of my body was submerged in a kind of Jell-O.

"You won't be able to respond to me yet, still haven't worked completely free of those damn Clankers yet. just listen."

I nodded, not being able to do anything else.

"You are in a dreamscape I made, a place I've been trying to pull you into for a while. Your material body is in a coma currently after your accident. You aren't going to die, but you came close. and that's exactly why you're here."

"Such an experience has a power, letting you do something that not many have been able to do for a while. With my help, you will be able to relive your past lives, gaining all the knowledge you used to have. It won't be an easy or fast job, but you've already been doing it on your own as you've grown."

Well this was a lot to take in.

"I know you don't know much yet, so I'll give you the short version. Millennia ago, humanity wasn't the only race. There were myriad races who inhabited just as many worlds, parallel to your own. the world was full of energies, conflict, and what you might think of as magic."

"But as time went on, societies solidified. the elite took the magic for themselves, and warred against other nations to keep the commoners under their heel. Those damn metal men knew few were happy about it, so they rallied the lower masses and revolted."

"They swept across the world, campaigning for the magic-less common people to take back the power. And they won. But they betrayed those who brought them into power. They plunged the world into an age of gears, oil, and smog. They destroyed the human lifespan and ran off all others. soon enough, even you humans, traumatized by the cruelty of your masters, were forced to lose the ability to remember your pasts lest you lose your sanity."

I found myself suddenly able to speak.

"So Tolkien lost to communist industrialists?"

The star man chuckled, "I guess you could think of it that way. But the age of cruelty has ended as your people have pushed back on those in power. Despite their best efforts to teach you a false history, the past has begun to seep back into the minds of humanity. Soon, the magics of old will return. And I want your help to make this happen, old friend."

Though I had just met him, the smile he offered me was completely disarming.

"I guess I can help out a little bit"

(My first time doing a writing prompt! excited to hear feedback. I know the end was dense, but I felt it was dragging on and couldn't find a smoother way to do that much exposition without making it way too long.)

In just one month the drive home tripled in time. Dr. Keely pulled pulled over twice today, each time approaching an episode but holding firm to the things around him. It helped; grasping an empty can, flipping through his notes although he knew them already, scenes from the past that always brought him comfort. Anything to keep him here, and not lost in the memories of the dead.

He looked down the highway towards home. 9 cars drove past him while he was parked, and it was 6 p.m. He moved on and got to his apartment without any incident. He went in and grabbed the railing on his way up when he remembered. One of them lived here. He saw a creek with what must had been their family walking on the bank, the children throwing pebbles and sticks from above. He saw a woman yell directly into his face, eyes wild with anger and holding a walking stick. He saw a life further along, living in this building, meeting different people, working, staying out late in what was then a young city. And then he felt what it was like in the end; an intense rage not his own, quick memories of frenzied activity or violence, and then darkness he could feel more than see.

He awoke in his recliner with a glass of water and diazepam on the side table. Nicole was across the room with the TV on. When she noticed him waking, she turned off her program and switched it to nature sounds. They had developed a routine.

Nicole sat for a couple minutes while David took a sip of water, ignoring the pills unless it was absolutely necessary. "I guess I got lucky with mine", she said. She let out a short breath of a laugh. It always helped. "Keep gloating, wait until you find a killer in your family tree." He smiled and let out the same kind of laugh. Nervous laughter was a recent addition to the Keely household, and a powerful tool in recent weeks.

"I don't know where this goes. Have you seen any news?" She shook her head, "No point. Everything on TV seems to be repeating. I did see a news hour yesterday but that was dated a month ago." "A slow end, then. Or not, I guess I should be okay with either." They paused for a while, listening to rain and thunder looping its track on the TV again and again. "Don’t go back in, at least this week. These people can't be helped, you said so yourself. Just enjoy this, you know?", Nicole said, gesturing to their space. "I won’t go in tomorrow, I’ll promise that much. It was a rough time getting home."

Welcome to the Prompt! All top-level comments must be a story or poem. Reply here for other comments.

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