#[9]
Death is a cessation of existence.
His eyes opened wide. He felt something unknown course through his body, engulfing him from the inside. He looked down at the cup of wine in his hand, its rim resting on his bottom lip. It smelt of bitter almonds. Cyanide. He had heard about the toxic chemical before. During the Holocaust, the Nazis had used hydrogen cyanide to poison their enemies in gas chambers. It quickly drained a person of his energy, leading to the heart and brain shutting down - death.
He felt giddy. He reached out his hand towards the wall on his left, trying to use it for support, but it slipped and he crumpled onto the floor, his legs suddenly devoid of energy. He could feel a strange wave of warmth going through his body. It was probably the poison, flowing through his veins, rendering his vital organs unable to use oxygen, shutting them down. The warmth spread, increasing in efficacy, until it seemed to concentrate in his chest. His pulse quickened, as he felt an odd discomfort begin to grow in his chest. Clasping it, he tried to calm down, breathing slowly, but he realized he couldn't. He kept breathing faster and faster. His heart and lungs screamed for oxygen, and he panted frantically. The discomfort seemed to manifest in his head as well. His vision blurred, and a splitting headache made his head throb. His eyelids started to droop. For some reason, he couldn't keep them open. The poison was slowly draining him of his energy.
As his eyelids could stay open no longer, his head fell back onto the floor, and all he could see was darkness. It seemed to have a life of its own, pulsating, an oppressive energy threatening to devour him. He expected his life to flash before his eyes, yet there was nothing. No rapid flashbacks, no faces of those he loved, nothing. It was him, staring into the core of death itself. Its appearance was indescribable. It was ominous and alien, a figure and at the same time a concept he could not possibly comprehend. His physical body was gone, yet his consciousness remained intact, a mere ant before the overbearing manifestation of death. Where was the "heaven" or "hell" which people assumed lay beyond the boundaries of death and reality? Where was the pugatory? Where was the reincarnation?
Around him, he could sense the consciousness of a hundred others around him, in a sea of thousands, even millions, of souls. What were they doing there. He couldn't talk, much less move. There was no way he could interact with them, no way they could interact with him. They were together, yet so very alone. Would he stay here forever, loitering in the face of death for eternity? Would he be one of the millions of souls here, surrealistically frozen in time and space? He couldn't imagine an eternity being spent here.
Suddenly, he felt the presence of a soul beside him vanish. Slowly, he saw the souls being extinguished, one by one, like candles being blown out in the dark. What would happen when he himself was blown out? Would his consciousness cease to function forever? Would he be completely erased from existence? Slowly, the souls around him faded away, out of existence. The crowd began to diminish, getting fewer and fewer, until there was only him left. He felt the very fabric of reality wrapped around his being tear apart, and without warning, he was cast into the depths, the cascading waves of death and nonexistence.
(Note: Yes, I know that cyanide doesn't always smell like bitter almonds.)