Look I think we can just mix the whole stuck in a dream coma for six months hovering between two states of being and add a horribly painful transformation into it, for enrichment.

Or maybe after the Statement, or during, reading it and feeling his body twisting, fighting to keep the words in as bones snap and reform, mouth suddenly too small for the teeth inside, slicing into his own skin but still unable to stop reading, even as his tongue no longer feels like one that should be able to make the sounds necessary for speech. Each second that he fights feels like a lifetime, until those final words and everything slides into place.

It’s euphoria, suddenly his body is exactly how it’s supposed to be, and for once it doesn’t hurt. Everything always hurts, every step down this road, but here at the end the pain is just gone.