Sam's world had just exploded into white. And when he opened his eyes again, there was nothing.
No sky. No ground. No wind.
Just darkness.
Endless, absolute darkness.
He floated in it—if floating was even the right word. There was no up, no down, no sense of direction at all. It felt like he existed inside something vast and hollow, like a globe carved out of night itself.
And yet, there was a pure white light.
His light.
The darkness around him wasn't empty—it reflected. Smooth and glass-like, the surface of that void caught and returned the only thing there was to see.
Him.
Or what used to be him.
Sam stared.
Where his body should have been, there was only a small, radiant point—a pearl of white light suspended in the void, with a brighter core beating at its center.
A star.
A living, breathing star.
"…what…"
The thought barely formed.
How was he seeing this?
How was he thinking?
Was he alive?
Was this death?
The questions came fast, crowding in, but answers never followed. There was nothing to grab onto—no ground, no air, no sense of anything beyond that quiet, impossible glow.
And then, something changed.
It began without warning.
From that tiny point of light, something started to grow.
At first, it was subtle—a faint thickening, like mist gathering around a flame. Then structure followed.
Cells.
Matter.
Form.
Sam watched—felt—as existence itself began assembling around the light.
A heart formed first.
Not metaphorically.
Literally.
Layer by layer, it built itself around the glowing core. Inner lining. Muscle. Outer shell. Each part knitting into place with impossible precision, like reality itself had decided to construct him from scratch.
He felt it.
Every second of it.
Veins spread outward like branching rivers. Nerves followed, delicate and electric, threading through forming tissue. Muscle wrapped around bone as a skeletal frame rose into existence, each piece locking into place with quiet, final certainty.
Light flowed through it all—thin, glowing strands weaving between organs and structures, tying everything back to that central pulse.
His pulse.
Or… their pulse.
It didn't stop.
It didn't slow.
Organs formed. Lungs expanded. A spine aligned. A skull enclosed something new—something growing, mapping itself, flickering into awareness strand by strand.
A brain.
Him.
Sam.
It was overwhelming. Too much to process, too fast to understand. Sensation poured in all at once—pressure, presence, structure—like being born and remembering it at the same time.
Then, just as suddenly as it began—
It stopped.
Silence.
Stillness.
Completion.
Sam—if he was still Sam—tried to move.
Tried to breathe.
Tried to understand.
Slowly, uncertainly, he opened his eyes.
The reflection met him instantly.
And it shattered whatever remained of his expectations.
Staring back at him from the dark was not the face he knew.
Not even close.
Wide, bright violet eyes blinked in confusion, framed by long, delicate lashes. Soft brows curved gently above them, giving the face an almost fragile innocence. Round cheeks—full, smooth, undeniably baby-soft—caught the faint glow of the surrounding void. A tiny nose. A small mouth.
Pale skin, almost luminous.
And a faint dusting of short, platinum-blond hair.
Sam stared.
The baby stared back.
They blinked at the same time.
"…no, it can't be."
No matter how Sam wished that what he saw was a lie, deep down he instantly knew that it wasn't.
A ripple of white light passed through the void, and suddenly something soft settled over him—fabric forming out of nothing, wrapping around his small body in one smooth motion. A full-body suit. White. Plush. Warm.
Rabbit ears flopped gently to one side.
His hands—tiny, mittened—lifted instinctively into view.
Small.
Ridiculously small.
Sam didn't need anyone to explain it.
He just stared at them for a long, silent second.
Then—
"Oh, you've got to be kidding me… did that baby angel seriously turn me into a newborn baby girl?"
The words came out sharp, disbelieving—then broke into something louder.
"Like come on?! No, no, no, this is not what I meant!"
Her tiny body jerked in midair, mittened hands flailing, little legs kicking uselessly against nothing as panic and outrage flooded through her all at once.
"I was being sarcastic, you know! And maybe a bit delusional, but that's it." she snapped, voice rising into a full-on shout. "Besides this isn't how wishes work, you gotta at least warn me or something!"
She twisted, trying to turn, to grab onto something—anything—but there was nothing there. Just that endless, black, mirror-smooth void reflecting her back at herself: small, soft, undeniably not him anymore.
"This is so unfair!" she yelled, squirming harder now, like sheer protest might undo reality. "Give me another chance! Come on! If you're gonna grant wishes, at least do it properly!"
Her tiny fists clenched, shaking.
"You could've made me taller! Richer! Stronger! Literally anything else! I don't wanna be a baby—!"
He kicked the air, did a little wiggle and a full-body, furious squirm.
"—and I definitely don't want to be my own girlfriend, noo!"
However, no matter what she thought or what she did, there was only silence as her answer.
"…hello?" she tried again, weaker this time. "Angel baby? Chubby cheeks? You still there?"
Nothing.
Her frustration cracked into something quieter, more uncertain, her movements slowing as reality settled heavier around her.
"…you've gotta be kidding me…"
And then suddenly, something changed.
From beyond the darkness, came a glow.
Faint at first, then growing.
Golden light moved to gather around her, like threads of radiance weaving themselves together in the air. It brushed against her skin—warm, gentle—and began wrapping around her small body.
She froze mid-wiggle.
"…what the—"
The light thickened, layering over itself, shaping into something more solid, more defined. It curved around her, enclosing her without pressure, like a shell that didn't trap so much as hold.
"What… what is this?" she whispered, eyes wide, watching it form. "Am I… powering up or something?"
The golden glow pulsed softly in response—once, twice—echoing the strange second heartbeat inside her chest.
Then the world moved.
Or she did.
The black space around her shifted, its smooth surface warping as if it were suddenly fluid. The golden cocoon tugged—gently at first, then with growing insistence.
Like a string had been tied to her.
And something was pulling.
"…wait—"
The void stretched.
The surface bent inward where she was being drawn, the black mirror thinning, distorting, turning elastic beneath the pressure.
"Wait, wait—hold on—!"
She reached out instinctively, but too late.
The surface gave way, and with a sharp, sudden release—
Pop.
She was gone.
The darkness snapped back behind her as she was flung forward, shot out of that space like a spark escaping a flame.
For a heartbeat, it was as if she flew through oil. And soon enough bright orange light came before her, somehow not blinding, but overwhelming.
She tore through it before she could even process what she was seeing—vast, roaring brilliance surrounding her on all sides, a world of fire so immense it defied understanding. It wasn't just heat. It was motion, force, something ancient and endless, something that had no beginning and no intention of ever ending.
She didn't have time to think.
Didn't have time to react.
She was carried through it—through towering currents of burning plasma, through rising and collapsing waves of light larger than continents, through a storm that could have erased her without even noticing she existed.
And yet she wasn't erased.
The soft golden cocoon held her steady, and untouched.
"What—what is this—?!"
Her voice barely existed against the scale of it.
She was a speck.
Less than that.
A thought drifting through a star.
The realization flickered at the edges of her mind—
And then—
She broke through.
The fire vanished behind her in a sudden, impossible shift.
Instead, cold endless darkness rushed in.
And her world turned silent.
She slowed, drifting now, the golden cocoon still wrapped around her as the chaos fell away.
And there, behind herself she saw it.
A star, but not just any star.
The star.
The Sun burned in the distance, vast and alive, a roaring sphere of light hanging in the void like the heart of creation itself.
He—no—
she—stared.
For a long, stunned second, her mind simply… stopped.
Then—
"…no way."
The words came out small, breathless.
Her eyes widened further as the truth hit all at once.
She had been inside it.
Inside the Sun.
And now she was out.
Floating in space, alive and well it seemed.
"…no way…"
A laugh slipped out—half disbelief, half something wild and uncontainable.
"Okay… okay—yeah, that's—"
She shook her tiny head, still staring at the blazing giant shrinking slowly as she flew further away.
"—that's definitely not normal," she muttered, a grin tugging at her lips despite everything. "Not even for a magical baby girl, I think?"
The golden cocoon hummed softly around her, steady and warm. Then beneath her, something shifted into motion and speed.
The cocoon was moving again.
Not in a straight line—but searching.
It wavered, adjusted, corrected, like a compass needle caught in a storm. Each shift tugged faintly at the light inside her chest, as if the cocoon itself was listening to her heartbeat, using it to find its way.
She didn't fight it.
There was nothing to fight.
So she let it carry her, like an elevator carrying a passenger.
A small, ridiculous figure in a white rabbit suit, drifting through the vastness of space with wide eyes and a glowing heart.
Gradually, the rush softened.
The humming around her deepened, steadier now, calmer—like the cocoon had found its rhythm.
Inside it, warmth replaced tension. Not the violent heat of the Sun, but something gentle. Safe. Like being held.
Her body relaxed for the first time since everything had begun.
And so she looked outward, into the vastness of space.
It wasn't empty.
It only seemed that way at first glance.
But the longer she stared, the more it revealed itself—dust drifting in faint currents, distant blue glimmers scattered like forgotten sparks, stars burning clean and steady, unmoving in the endless dark.
They didn't twinkle here.
They simply… were.
Each one a sun.
Each one a world.
The sight filled her completely.
"Wow…"
The word slipped out softly, almost reverently.
Then her gaze drifted downward, and there it was, far in the distance, Earth. So small and fragile looking, yet so beautiful.
A blue sphere wrapped in white clouds, turning slowly in the infinite black.
She laughed again—quieter this time, softer, touched with something deeper.
"How funny…"
Down there, people fought over land. Over borders. Over scraps so small they meant everything to those who lived on them.
And yet here—
There was all of this.
Endless space.
Countless worlds.
More than anyone could ever claim.
The thought made something ache inside her chest.
What if they knew?
Like really knew, if only they could see this themselves with their own eyes? If maybe he managed to do as the Baby Angel had said?
What if humanity could leave that small blue world behind—not to escape it, but to grow beyond it?
To build not out of necessity, but out of imagination.
To create something beautiful.
Not cheap and convenient, but meaningful.
Like the great works of the past—Rome, Athens, Alexandria—places built not just to survive, but to be something.
Her voice softened.
"If only they knew…"
For a moment, she imagined it—cities among the stars, shaped by art instead of limitation, humanity reaching outward not in conflict, but in creation.
And drifting there, wrapped in gold, she believed it.
She truly did.
The cocoon pulsed softly, as though in answer to some distant call, and then it turned—not sharply, not with urgency, but with a quiet and deliberate purpose. Its hum deepened, steadied, and drew her forward once more, carrying her through the dark like a vessel guided by instinct rather than knowledge. It did not know where it was going, not truly; it wandered, searching, correcting itself as it moved, drifting like a thought through the vastness between worlds.
And so she was carried with it, not falling, not flying, but borne along as if in some unseen current, like a passenger in a silent elevator of light, rising and turning through the heavens.
A world came into view.
Mercury.
A scorched and broken sphere, half consumed by fire, half lost to eternal shadow. She passed near enough to behold its wounds—vast cliffs split open, plains hardened into jagged ruin, darkness pooled so deep it seemed to swallow even the memory of light. For a fleeting moment she could only stare, wide-eyed and breathless, as though she were a child wandering through some grand celestial museum, glimpsing wonders never meant for human eyes.
"...that's… actually kind of beautiful," she murmured, half in awe, half in disbelief, her voice small against the enormity of it all.
But the cocoon did not linger. It shifted again, almost restlessly, and Mercury fell away behind her, already forgotten in the endless sea of stars.
Then came Venus, veiled in its endless shroud, a world of soft golden glow and suffocating silence. It was beautiful in a way that felt wrong—too smooth, too hidden, like something that did not wish to be known. She pressed her tiny hands against the warm surface of the cocoon, peering outward as though she might somehow glimpse what lay beneath those clouds.
"It's real…" she whispered, wonder threading through her voice. "All of it… it's actually real…"
Yet even here, the cocoon hesitated only for a breath before moving on.
Not here.
Never here.
It drifted onward, deeper into the dark, and the stars seemed to grow wider apart, more distant, more eternal. Time itself felt strange, stretched thin across the silence, until at last another shape rose before her—pale, quiet, and familiar.
The Moon.
She passed above it like a wandering satellite, gliding over its still and silent surface. Craters lay like scars across its face, untouched and unmoving, and for a moment—just a moment—she leaned forward, searching.
Looking.
Hoping.
For a flag.
For footprints.
For anything that said humanity had once been there.
But there was nothing.
No sign.
No trace.
Only dust, and time, and the quiet certainty that whatever had been, had either never reached this place—or had been swallowed by ages too long to remember.
"…okay," she murmured softly, her voice quieter now. "I get it…"
And then, as if in answer, the horizon shifted once more.
Earth rose before her.
At first it was small, a distant sphere of blue and white suspended in the void, but as she drew closer it grew—larger, brighter, alive in a way the others had not been. Vast oceans shimmered beneath drifting clouds, green lands stretched wide and untouched, and nowhere—nowhere—could she see the scars of satellites, of cities, of the world she had known.
It was… pristine.
Whole.
Her heart quickened.
The cocoon responded.
Its hum steadied, deepened, and for the first time since her journey began, it no longer wavered.
It had found something.
Or perhaps… it had decided.
She smiled then, small but certain, warmth rising in her chest despite everything.
"I'm coming…"
The words slipped from her lips like a promise, carried away into the silent dark.
Then, with a breathless little laugh—
"Round two, baby."
For a moment, hope came easily. Despite everything—despite the absurdity of it all—she let herself believe in it. A second chance. A new beginning. Even like this… even as a baby girl… maybe it didn't matter. Maybe this time she could do things differently. She knew things now—investments, opportunities, the mistakes to avoid. Maybe she could grow stronger, smarter. Maybe she could still fight, still rise, still stand one day across from Eric and finally win. Or better yet—work with him, stand beside him, build something together. Something better. Something that mattered.
Her smile widened slightly at the thought.
"…yeah… that wouldn't be so bad."
But then—
A pause.
Her expression faltered.
"…wait."
The thought came slowly at first, then all at once.
"I'm already a baby…"
Her eyes widened.
"And I'm… a girl."
Silence.
"…so how the hell does that even work?"
The cocoon carried her onward, but her mind began to race.
"I can't be born if I already exist, right? So what—what, am I getting dropped somewhere? Do I get adopted? By who? With what money? How am I supposed to invest if I don't have anything to start with?"
Her breathing quickened.
"No, no, no—wait—hold on…"
Her small hands curled into fists.
"And even if I do grow up… can I even fight the same way? Can I beat Eric like this? Do I even have the same body, the same strength, the same—"
She groaned softly, panic creeping in at the edges.
"…oh no… this might actually be worse…"
The clouds of Earth rushed up to meet her.
She broke through them in a sudden rush, wind screaming past her as the world unfolded below in a blur of motion and color. Oceans stretched endlessly, then gave way to land—vast continents rolling beneath her as the cocoon surged forward with impossible speed.
Asia passed beneath her like a dream. She glimpsed the distant outline of Mount Fuji rising above the land, then the endless sprawl beyond, seas and cities that were not quite cities, shapes that felt familiar yet… older. She flew on, over China, over rivers and plains, over the towering spine of the Himalayas where snow crowned the peaks like ancient kings.
"Where am I going…?" she whispered, the words nearly torn away by the wind.
Still the cocoon did not answer.
It only moved.
Faster.
Relentless.
Across deserts and mountains, over lands she only half recognized—arid stretches that might have been Iran, rugged ranges that felt like the Caucasus—until at last something struck her.
A city.
Fleeting.
Gone in an instant.
"…wait—was that Saint Petersburg?" she breathed, twisting slightly to look back. "And… were those steamships…?"
But there was no time.
She was already being carried onward, flung further west.
"Wait—am I going to Sweden? Or—"
Then she saw it.
The coastline.
Broken into countless islands, scattered like fragments across the sea.
Familiar.
Too familiar.
"…no way…"
Her voice dropped to a whisper.
"…home?"
A strange mix of relief and dread twisted inside her.
"Well… here I come, I guess…" she muttered weakly. "Don't worry… Sam's not dead. Just… a bit different."
Then another thought struck her.
Sharp.
Sudden.
"…wait."
Her eyes widened again.
"If I died… then what happens to me? Like—am I replacing myself? Or is there already a 'me' down there? What time is this even—"
The ground rushed up to meet her.
A forest.
Dark, dense, endless.
Snow covered everything, thick and untouched, blanketing the hills in quiet white. She felt the cold before she even reached it, biting and sharp, a world away from the warmth of the cocoon.
"…wait, no—no, no, no—hold on—!"
Panic surged.
"Don't drop me here! Come on—somewhere else! A city! A rich family! A farmhouse! Anything but the middle of nowhere—!"
The cocoon did not listen.
It descended.
Slowly.
Inevitably.
Toward a low, rocky rise overlooking a frozen lake beyond the trees.
And then—
It released her.
The golden light touched the earth first, melting the snow in a widening circle, and where it passed, life followed. Grass pushed through the soil, moss spread in soft green carpets, and small flowers bloomed as if called forth by the light itself.
She landed gently among them.
Soft.
Weightless.
For a moment, she simply lay there, cradled in that small pocket of warmth—snow falling softly around her, blue sky above, green life beneath.
The cocoon flickered once.
Then, like a candle in the wind—
It vanished.
The golden light scattered upward, dissolving into the sky as though it had never been there at all.
She watched it go, blinking slowly.
And then—
The cold returned.
A sharp wind swept across the clearing, snow blowing against her face, seeping into her tiny body as warmth fled just as quickly as it had come.
"…oh…"
Her breath hitched.
And she began to freeze.