The funeral was held around midday. I stood there, hiding behind a tree as rain sprinkled from the dark clouds above, watching as everyone left the funeral I wasn't invited to… all except Mr. Ripley, who stayed far longer to simply stare at the graves of his son and daughter. He deserved this the least out of everyone. Once everyone was gone, I approached, the alternations of my footsteps more mechanical than human… but the same would be true without the crutches as I looked at the writings on the tombstones, of Naser’s first, polluted with various flowers. In memory of Naser. Loving son and brother. … I’m sorry, Man. I robotically hobble to the next tombstone, one that I spent much longer to blankly stare… Here lies dearest Lucy. Heaven restores you in light. What’s more fucked up than standing at your Girlfriend’s grave… is knowing you were the one who was the cause of it. None of this would have happened if I noticed something was wrong. If I just supported Fang more instead of getting into a fight. If I never got between her and her friends by telling her how I felt. If I never bothered fang and stayed to myself .. … If I never moved to Volcaldera in the first place. And all because of me Naomi and Naser and Fang and the others are gone. I should be crying. I should be screaming to the world why I should’ve died instead. But I instead just feel… My final plea to Fang races through my mind. “ Don’t leave me alone.” I just feel alone, completely and utterly and hopelessly… Alone. The rain stops, black clouds revealing the murky grey sky. Already, it seemed as if the world was already done with me and my monologuing, a monologue from some nobody in the middle of nowhere, with the only person I ever cared about now gone. Trish was right. The moment I thought I was somebody, I ruined everything. So now I’m back to being a nobody. But it was better this way. Slowly, I turned around, making my way back through the graveyard, giving too much time to sit on my parting thoughts… and just curiously wondering… Wouldn’t it actually be better if I was just nothing instead? No more getting out of bed. No more pretending I was even alive. No more having to try. I was deeper in my thoughts then I realized as my crutch met the side of a tombstone before I fell forward, right over the edge of an open hole, clearly dug out to fit another person's grave as I met the bottom, roughly landing against the dirt. Sharp pain shot up my bandaged leg, but I didn’t feel it. I didn’t feel anything anymore, only my slowing breath stirring the dirt as I slowly closed my eyes. “ Just let me die like this. ” And I stopped. Before starting. My eyes blinked open to the blinding light, wondering if the angry cemetery worker had finally found me… using an obnoxiously bright flashlight, showing up as a practical shadow in my vision. It wasn’t until the figure shifted that I was able to adjust my vision, briefly shaken from my thoughts to realize this guy had an entire floodlight pointing down at me. Wait… I blinked again, dispersing the blurriness from my vision to realize that I wasn’t surrounded by climbing walls of dirt, but dull teal hospital curtains, the light coming from a powerful lamp above as a troodon in a surgical mask looked down at me. I must have blacked out when I was in that open grave, giving me an idea of how my new ‘life’ was going to pan out… when I didn’t feel like offing myself. Just brief moments of clarity, while everything else just blurred along. But I was ready for the questions, ready for the diagnosis, ready to be given prescriptions of anti-depressants to fill in the place of crushing nothingness with fake joy. I was ready for his words and my new reality. “It’s a boy!” … I was not ready for that. “...” I think I meant to say ‘What the fuck are you talking about’ before realizing that nothing came out of my mouth, instead feeling my jaw drop dumbly. Had they already gotten me hooked up on drugs? If so, I felt pretty conscious despite my circumstances, trying to speak again only for my mouth to open and close. What the hell was- I was then conscious of the bed suddenly being moved, the sudden loss of control causing my entire body to lock up as I was turned the other way, facing two short compsognathuses. One, the husband I suspected, was standing and leaning against a hospital bed, green eyes wide behind his round glasses and his snout open in joy. The other… the wife, was laying on top of the bed in a hospital gown, weakly smiling at me, her legs spread open to show- Fucking Raptor Jesus! Why were they showing me this shit?! What was- … Why was there a rope attached to my stomach? And why was the other end leading down into her…- Wait. I blinked again, looking down to realize I was not lying on a bed, but on a gigantic surgical glove, bloodied digits gently clutching my body. My naked body. My naked green-scaled body. My naked green-scaled newborn body. My tiny claws reach up to touch my jaw, only to realize that I had to trail it further forward, feeling up to my elongated snout, my own nubby digits touching my sharp teeth. My naked green-scaled newborn body with a snoot. I was a dinosaur. “What do you wish to name him?” The doctor asked, all the while my entire being was in crisis, wondering what type of fucked up dream I was having, and why it felt more lucid than any other dream I’ve had before. “A-Anon… Anon Agus.” Finally, I did the only natural reaction to this entire situation. I screamed. “WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGH!” [NOTES] Ending One fucking broke me, so I wrote this. I hope to write more of this 'alternate' start I suppose, or more like NG+ if you ask me with all the tormenting shit that'll be going through Anon's head.