I gasped as I fell backwards from the saw which I had been working with, the pain from my mutilated hand shooting up my arm as blood splattered across the workbench, gushing out of the wound onto my left arm like water bursting from a broken dam, spurting out of it until it didn't. The pain kept sharp, however I felt my breathing become shallow, and it became harder to breathe, or even think clearly.
I collapsed onto a chair, barely able to even see clearly, blood still dripping from my arm, a metallic taste emerging in my mouth. I should have been screaming, crying, anything, but I just sat there, accepting my fate with a grim finality. I felt my heart rate slow, and as I looked up at the dim light of the laboratory, and the blueprints on my desk, I breathed my last and my head lolled to the side. I saw my life flash before my eyes, as my body went limp and then I thought no more.
The next thing I felt was the feeling of being half submerged in water. I opened my eyes and I realised I was in a completely dark space, with water that reached just above your foot. I got up from the floor and looked around.
Where was I? Wasn't I dead? Many, many thoughts rushed into my head as to why I was here, each one more unlikely than the last.
I started walking through this endless void, water splashing as I wandered aimlessly, searching for a way out.
I walked, and I walked, a sense of hopelessness growing inside me as realisation dawned unto me - I would not escape this place. I would be trapped in this dark, lonely void for the rest of eternity.
Or so I thought.
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a small ray of white light, shining through the black void. I instinctively walked towards it, hope igniting within me once more as the bright white light shined in the darkness.
I ran towards it, panting for dear life, hoping, praying even, to get out of this dark, lonely abyss.
Yet I could not reach it, I ran and ran for what felt like hours, unrelenting as I chased the light, not willing to let this opportunity to escape me and so I ran, the water splashing rapidly as I sprinted towards the light as fast as I could, my heart beating against my chest as I scrambled through the void.
Finally, after what seemed to be hours, the source of the light lay before me. Its shape I couldn't really make out as it seemed to be made of pure light. I reached out for the object, and the moment I touched it, I felt a tug on my arm and I was pulled into the object.
_________________
Sultan Abdulhamid I paced the floral silk carpets nervously, twiddling his thumbs together as he waited anxiously. Every now and then, he would look up at the doors. At his moment his seventh consort Nakşidil Sultan would be giving birth. But to a boy or a girl, he did not know.
He was a man who had spent most of his life in the Kafes, and he knew that the child would spend most, if not all, of their life the same way he did; in paranoia and uncertainty.
Suddenly, a cry of a newborn cut through the air, interrupting his thoughts and making him freeze mid step, his heart pounding with anticipation.
The midwife rushed out, her face beaming.
'My hünkâr, it is a boy, mashallah!'
'Alhamdulillah, may I enter? Abdulhamid replied, a smile forming on his face despite his worry.
'Of course, my sultan.'
Abdulhamid entered the room, his eyes drawn to the small child whom Nakşidil was cradling in her lap.
He gently picked up the child, looking down at it with a particular fondness in his eyes.
'From this day onwards, you shall be called Mahmud.'
____________________
Where was I? The void seemed to have gone, and I felt I was in a body I could not control.
My lungs burned as I inhaled the air of the room, unable to focus on one thing.
Images and descriptions slammed into my mind, confusing me as I struggled to even move my arms.
I tried to cry out, say that this wasn't right, but all that came out was a strangled wail.
A man, looking like he was in his mid 50s, walking up towards me, and cradled my small body in his arms.
'From this day onwards, you shall be called Mahmud.'
Mahmud.
Mahmud.
Where had I heard that before?
Images continued to pour into my mind, and one of them, one of them was similar to the man cradling me.
Voices and images continued to crash into my mind as I tried to focus on the man in front of me, to get a clear view of his face.
He was a weary, tired looking man, and I could place my finger on who he was now.
But.. it couldn't be.
If he was-
No.
The thought of his true identity struck me helpless.
My breathing jerked as panic overwhelmed me, gripping my small, frail from head to toe as my thoughts began to spin, the voices and images rushing into my head fading away into background garbling, unintelligible and not understandable.
This seemed to calm me down a little, and everything came into a little more focus as I managed to fully process what was going on.
It was 1785.
Yes.
I am Mahmud II.
That's true.
I tried to move my hand, yet it would not budge.
Frustration bubbled up inside of me as I realised that I would not be able to move my own body properly for the next couple of years at least.
Yet, within my frustration, and confusion, I realised.
I knew.
I knew a lot of things, things that I hadn't even heard of, yet I knew.
How?
That was one thing I didn't know.
But as my lungs burned, and as my body lay still, twitching at irregular intervals, I knew that I could turn history on its head.. but for now, I was not able to touch it at all.
For now.