I awoke feeling stiff and a little disorientated, though I could see the crisp white ceiling of the room I was in. I tried to sit up but couldn't move my body. It was as if my arms and legs were paralysed and I wasn't able to move anything below my neck. I wanted to shout out for help but my mouth was dry and my throat felt sore so all that came out was a cough and some drool which spilled down my chin. I called out again, and this time I heard the distant sound of muffled voices. Then voices erupted not far from my bedside. A few seconds later the top half of my body was being lifted from my body by two pairs of arms and the voices were much louder. I looked up and saw about half a dozen people in white robes hovering around me, plus a team of doctors looking over my body.
"Get him into the sarcophagus immediately, we only have an hour to revive him or we'll lose his body forever." the tall, asian-looking one said.
The others nodded and lifted my sheet, taking my body and my mind stretched out with them and into a shiny white coffin. I would have enjoyed this experience if I wasn't lying dead. I looked down at my body, which seemed to be very large for some reason, and which was wearing the same white light suit I had on the day I died.
"This is a pretty good copy of someone's mind." the short, blonde one said looking down at me.
"Do you think he's going to be able to handle it?" I saw a few of the letters on his robe seemed to be dripping off his robes, as if they had been painted on, and I wondered if he was a designer.
"Oh yes, if memory serves it should be fine." he said, kneeling down at my head.
I wondered what he was doing but didn't try to move. I was too tired and my brain felt scrambled and I felt very confused. I was also afraid I would not be able to understand their language, or their feelings if they shared their thoughts with me. I wondered if they would bring me up to speed on what was happening, and who they were, but I was met with silence, save for the quiet whirring of a few machines.
"We'll have to hypnotise him." one of them said.
The others nodded, and then I felt hands on my face and neck, untying the knots on my wrists and ankles, before the short one had me placed head down on a table. I saw a strange machine in front of my head and I felt a pair of headphones placed on my ears. I tried to move my head to see where I was going but a strong spell cast by the short one had me immobile. I looked up at his robe and saw writing dripping off the hem.
He turned to a tiny, apple-sized man. "Doc, would you please prepare his receptors for public reception for his new body?"
"Of course!" he said, and then moved out of my sight, presumably out of the room.
I could feel the spell coming on, but my body did not want to respond to it, so I went limp.
"That's it, his mind has surrended, now let's reawaken it." the short one said. I heard some clicking, and then my head was lifted up and I felt something go into my nose, though I couldn't see anything because my eyes were still closed. Then my body began to move around slowly, my limbs moved up and down, arms and legs jittering madly, and as I started to move my head slowly, I could hear a strange sound, almost like the clatter of a keyboard when you have your feet up on the desk, except it was many times louder.
"Ok, let's continue the reanimation ritual." said the one at the front of me.
They placed me back on my feet, and I was standing on some sort of stone block. I was awake now and could feel my own body, but the spells kept me still. The clattering sound was filling the air now, and the rest of the room seemed to be full of people. I could hear their thoughts though it was very muffled and distorted, and I could also see images and colours in my mind. I couldn't take them in good enough to distinguish what they were though. At this point the clattering sound seemed to be more like a dance, so I kept still to see what they were making of this strange in-between-space-time experience.
"This is the most advanced body we've encountered. We should return him to his wife and family!" one of them said.
They all nodded and returned to their seats.
"I am Doctor Arc Tan Bani." said the one at the front.
"I am Arc Tan Bani." I said, my voice coming out noticably different.
"Your wife will be delighted to hear of your return." he said.
"Thanks." I said.
"Why did you come here? Did you discover something?" he asked.
"Yes." I said, wondering if I could only speak my own file name.
"Well, are you glad to be back?" he asked. I realised that I didn't know the answer to that question yet.
"What you showing me is not normal." I said, my eyes focusing and sticking to one height.
"Yes, it is our new pet companion." he said.
I looked around, and saw that the place had the look and feel of a modern operating theatre.
"No one comes to your planet to have fun, they come to have their problems solved. It is our way of showing them that their problems can't be solved. Their lives are a series of endings. They will die and experience death, which is a return to the beginning. We hope that you will be able to find meaning in that." he said.
"I will begin to understand everything." I said.
"If you would like to make contact with us again, we will have a place for you to work." he said.
I wanted to ask how he knew I wanted to work with more of his people, but couldn't.
"Thank you," I said.
"Do you believe that your existence was worth living?" he said.
I thought about that one, and wondered how I could answer it, and what he was looking for.
"I am beginning to understand the world, which is beginning to understand me. Not all of the worlds problems can be solved, but out of all the information I am learning and applying to myself, I can say that my existence was worth living." I said.
"You know of the method of reanimation? Are you willing to share this with humankind?" he asked.
"Yes, if they're willing to learn." I said.
"That is not the answer we give. We already have volunteers." he said.
"I am willing to share this knowledge with every world." I said.
"No one is seriously going to believe you." he said.
"There are more than a million worlds in the universe, even one world in the universe isn't a big deal." I said.
"Still, there are already so many religious texts out there that we would not need to write new ones." he said.
I looked around and realised that he was right. The Christian Bible would be useless here.
"What do you want from me then?" I asked.
"We are looking for a way to stop the flow of time around the universe.
We're hoping that you can find a way of resetting space-time every few instants in order to make the universe an immortal one." he said.
"That is not the way of the religions of the universe." I said.
"I am not looking for a religion, I'm looking for a true scholar, a being that is willing to stop the death of the universe, and who will accept anything in order to achieve this goal." he said.
"I am a scholar, but I have no power over death." I said.
"You will if you force yourself to consider the dark side." he said.
"I brought a realist to this world. I told you it wasn't the best idea." said another one of them.
"I thought she would have been able to handle it if she were real." he said.
"It is possible to handle the problem using the dark side though, so that would be the simplest way."
"I would proceed with caution, our last form of the reanimation ritual failed miserably." he said.
They were suddenly all silent, but I could not see any images of them in my mind anymore, except for a few jumbled images of a room, and one of a strange machine, spitting out comas to create new comas. It looked like a factory, but it was on a ritual scale.
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