She took the fabric. It smelled like nothing. Like a body that had never lived, never bled, never loved anyone.
She had volunteered. That was the worst part. soul descent
She gasped on a steel table, her new lungs raw as sandpaper. Above her, a halo of diagnostic drones whirred, their blue light painting sterile white walls. She tried to sit up, but her body— this body—refused to obey. Too heavy. Too slow. As if her consciousness had been poured into a suit of wet clay. She took the fabric