Partner

This took like ten minutes to write. The internet had died and I had started writing. Sequel may very well update soon (as in like an hour) as well. Depends really.

This was not what I was intending to accomplish with this bit. Which sucks, but maybe Mik will have a freaking epiphany because I'm tired of trying to drop hints and him being a dolt and not getting them. He's frustrating me to the point where I'm tempted to beat him.

Read, Review and Enjoy.




Breath in, hold and let the breath out slowly. In, hold and out, pause, breath in. His breath formed a rectangle in his mind, long sides for the breathing in and out, short for the pauses. Round and round, slowly the corners of the rectangle were worn away and he was left with a nearly perfect circle of breathing. Like so many things in nature. Strength and protection. The sun, the moon. The very earth itself. His eyes.

Mik slid from consciously meditating to the state of zoo-zoo in a fluid motion. He opened his eyes to the green room, darkened by a twilit sky speckled with stars brighter than reality. Mik let his breath out slowly before considering moving.

The apartments he could see still had lights on. The drones buzzed by and the billboard that had gone up across the street flashed through its animation. He had never really watched the ridiculous little rabbit hop about its candy tree before. Eat candy, the bunny likes it, so it must be nutritious and good!

Mik let out another breath and very nearly sighed as he eased himself to his feet. He moved to the window and looked out over his world.

“Pathetic, isn’t it?” an image of himself stepped up beside him, looking down on the city with distain, “build up, forced labour. When was the last time you really relaxed?”

“We.” Mik corrected him quietly, “the last time we relaxed. Must have been… I don’t know. You wouldn’t be asking that question if sex with Paw counted as relaxing time.”

“Not really…”

Both sighed and watched a drone hover by the window.

“What do I-” Mik turned to his other self only to realise that that aspect of him was gone.

Created and then destroyed in a moment. Existing for a fraction of a moment as he considered such things, as he worried about his own relaxation. And then poof. Gone in the blink of an eye.

“Do…?”

“Can I make a suggestion?” another image walked out of thin air, looking older than Mik recalled being. The lines on the man’s face and the gray hairs. This was an older, supposedly wiser version of Mik.

Except that as far as Mik knew, he couldn’t reach into the future and listen to his future self’s advice on matters. Perhaps Lillow could do such a feat, but he was just a normal, born and bred people. Nonetheless, Mik steeled himself and answered.

“What?”

“Let the lights go out.”

Mik frowned and turned to the windows as the lights flicked out, one by one. The drones fell from the sky.

The darkness was not eternal. It lasted for less than a moment before his eyes adjusted and the moon began rising above the horizon.

“What would it do?”

“Cause the end of the world…”

“No. I mean, really, what would it do? If the power went out and never came back on again, what if electricity suddenly disappeared like power supposedly did? What would happen?”

“Millions would die.”

“Billions would live.”

“We the people would suffer.”

“Would be the only ones to suffer. Certainly. Other species would have difficulties, but they would quickly adapt.”

“We’re selfish.”

“Most definitely,” his older self sighed out, “which brings about the question… what would happen to us, truly, if the power went out? If the lights died?”

“I… I’ve never known any other life. I couldn’t tell the difference between most edible plants and grass. I don’t know how to fashion arrows or hunt deer or build a fire.”

“You think too negatively. What I ask is simple. What would happen to us, truly, really, if the lights went out?”

Mik looked down, watched as plants crawled up the side of the apartment, even though night did not turn to day, even though no passage of time seemed to show in this place. Up the plant grew, covering most of his view of the dead city.

“We have Paw.”

“We have tribe. Though. Souse’s tribe isn’t capable of surviving without people. Not completely. That’s where you and Paw would come in…” the older version scratched at the day old growth on his chin, “Paw has lived free, right? So has Essuan. Not the best tribe to be aligned with. But better than being aligned with people, no?”

“I don’t want the lights to go down.”

“Why not?”

Mik opened his mouth but stumbled over the answer, unsure what it was until it finally stumbled out of his mouth, “I’m afraid.”

“Afraid of the lights dying? My boy, if I were you, heh, and I am, I would be more afraid of if they stayed up.”

“Why?” Mik turned to face his other self only to find himself completely and utterly alone. Not a peep, not a creak. He knew that if he went searching all of the planet he wouldn’t find a single other soul. He would be alone. Completely and utterly.

Mik swallowed the welling feeling of tears and clenched his fists. He wasn’t certain he was reading the message clearly, but he was certain that he didn’t want to risk this being true.

He didn’t want to end up all alone on a dead world.


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