Horrible New World

So I followed him. Even though parts of me were giving me such a feeling against it. We left the building. Silence. So silent a pin would have been heard at the decibel level of that of a jet taking off. An uneasy silence, the kind of silence that makes you feel unwanted and disturbed at the same time. I wanted to run, I wanted to jump out of the car and run away, far far away. He scared me a in a way, I had never seen someone with the same kind of composure before. It was as though he had perfect balance. He was enlightened, that frightened me. It turned my whole view of the world upside down. No one was ever supposed to be able to reach that plane of existence because we are too troubled by our own neurosis and tendencies. Here was this creature sitting next to me who proved everything I had ever thought of wrong. It made me want to dissect him, it made me want to take him apart bit by bit and see what was in the center, what was making that heart of his tick. Did he even have a heart? What was a keeper after all, was it like some sort of angel? There were no angels, there were however things that resembled angels that perfectly good Christian peoples referred to as angels but they weren’t angels they were the demons of the light. Which is I suppose the same thing, but it isn’t at the same time.
I looked at him, perhaps I stared too long, he met my gaze and I looked away. Why is it that we look away? What is programmed within us to make us look away from the challenge instead of excepting it. I looked back at him. Where were we going? We had been driving for quite sometime now. It was agitating, not being in control, letting someone else guide you as though they knew better than you did which direction you should be taking. I suppose he did really.
“So where is eternity?” my voice came out so clear it was terrifying.
“In the beginning”, was I going to get a better answer, probably not. I hated how he danced around, brushing the topic and changing to the next.
I gave up and sat back and enjoyed the drive through all parts of the city that good girls like I used to be were never allowed. It wasn’t quite proper for the daughter of someone who’s aspirations were council, to be running around in the rather unclean parts of town. Yet, here I was in a car seated next to a virtual stranger who was telling me he was taking me to eternity, and yet, he wouldn’t tell me where this was. I suppose this would have frightened anyone else, but at the moment when I knew Dorian was leading perhaps everyone who was capable of fighting into a suicide mission, it seemed like the only thing I could do. And then my mind spiraled downward and I thought too long and hard about what was going on, how the fighting was going.
“You have such a heavy soul, do not think about the fighting, it will depress you, think only of yourself for the moment, pay attention” I don’t know why but I listened to him, I cleared my mind of the worries and I stared blankly out of the window as we drove longer, we drove for so long.
I only knew that we stopped because I felt it. Like some kind of sheet sweeping over my skin, it felt like it was making me clean. I got out of the car. We had stopped in the middle of no where, it looked like ruins. I couldn’t help but to wander off it was part of who I was. I had to see all of it.
“Welcome to the beginning” he laughed as I tripped over the first of many many skeletons. “Welcome to eternity” he walked in front of me. “This Celeste, is where the first clash took place, no one comes here because it is haunted, it possibly is, I myself refuse to wander around after dark,” he stopped and looked down and picked up a skull “I am telling you all of this to prevent you, from making some rather grave mistakes. How do you think I became a keeper?” I shrugged and met his eyes, he made terrible eye contact looking into my eyes forcing me to meet his. My gaze had to wander, he was too much at once, his aura was welcoming and so strange it made me want to shrug away.
“You were simply made a Keeper, since the beginning” he laughed and looked at the skull before tossing it behind him.
“No, I was born, quite near the beginning of civilization, sometimes those above smile down upon children when they are young and bless them with gifts, either the gifts develop or they fester and when they fester that is how a Keeper is made”
“And what does a Keeper do exactly?” he shook his finger at me.
“I cannot exactly tell you this, it is a very well kept secret, only we and the above know” I looked over the deserted field, so many bodies, so many lost lives, so much tragedy. It was all so sad, every skeleton had once been someone, and someone’s mother, brother, sister, son,. daughter, lover. Tears came to my eyes, I covered my face. He pulled my hands away. “Never, be afraid of emotions, they are some of the most beautiful things we have” and then I noticed that right now, as we stood amongst this old forgotten place of death, that there was death going on as we were standing around conversing.
“This isn’t going to happen again” I shook my head, the tears on my cheeks were so cold.
Suddenly I knew, I knew exactly what was going on and I blinked my eyes open. We were still standing in the room. My mouth was pursed and flattened so that it was quite miniature. He looked shocked and then pleased like he got more than he had expected.
“You broke my hold on your mind”
“What did you expect? It isn’t going to happen again, you are going to take me to them, and you are going to do it now” He shook his head.
“It is too late I am afraid, they are all dead and Dorian, who was never quite alive to begin with, he is captive, so me, my part in this is done” He folded his arms, such a closed in gesture.
“So you were here to what, make sure that there was a large loss of life, the loss of the leader, what will happen, once they know that we are vulnerable, they will come after us and kill us all, you, you are worse than all of them”
“No, you will see, maybe not now because you are distressed but you will like it when all the pieces fall into place, I guarantee it”
“How can you be so sure?”
“Because Celeste, this is of course the part you were meant to play, as this was the part I was meant to play”
“I thought you believed in the cause?” it was my turn to close myself off, I crossed my arms. He smiled again, the Cheshire grin thin lips curving into something that seemed utterly poetic, he had a mouth that seemed to inspire emotion.
“I do, Dorian’s cause is so very noble, but as with all noble causes there is personal motive behind it, but I will help again. They will believe him dead, and you will need to keep hope alive, smile in their faces and say that it will be alright, because by the time this matter is resolved everything will be supremely better than before” he touched my cheek and let the grin fade, “Give it time, but I must be going” he turned around and I reached for him, I grabbed nothing but air, he was gone. I pulled at my hair.
Things only got worse, when word of Dorian’s supposed death came up everything fell to chaos. There was constant crying and people constantly asking what was going to happen now. We had minimal people guarding the armory. We were like veal, being raise in a box for the sole purpose of being slaughtered, no life.
My father got elected, and with his election came a lot of pain for us damned ones. Scanning was now a vital procedure, it got you in everywhere. Unlike in movies this kind of scanning could not be falsified. To open gates you had to have a finger sample taken, or you couldn’t enter public buildings. It was made to discriminate. People didn’t seem to care about this, many ended up being exposed. Several members of the council were gifted or part demon and they found themselves joining with us, ending up on our door step, sobbing in their tattered finery.
I never took a part in the process of the election of our new leader, I refused to vote. I knew Dorian was alive somewhere, or barely alive. Some of the council members we had adopted told me that he was being kept in a black out cell. No sight no sounds very little food and water. They were going to give him back once he had gone mad. How nice. They wanted us to be crippled, they wanted us out, we complicated things far too much. And as for Orion, he was always around, always watching, always making sure that everything was okay, that we weren’t wiped out. But he never told us everything and I was beginning to equate that grin of his with treachery.
My powers started to grow and at the end of the first month that Dorian was gone, I was a danger to everyone around me. I couldn’t touch anything, I couldn’t do anything but sit still and hope I didn’t make any sudden movements. I had shredded my room almost completely. Maybe that was why I had my own room. Maybe he knew that I was going to lose control. About a week into this dissent into a new plane of power people stopped leaving me food and water. I found myself isolated.
It was four days into this horrible total isolation when Orion opened the door with a tray with food and water. He seemed quite pleased with himself. He set the tray on the splintered table and sat on the broken and scarred chair. He looked at me for a moment. He didn’t utter a single word, he just looked at me, observing me. I watched him as he took a deep breath and closed his eyes. I suddenly felt like I was falling.
I was in a field a great big green grassy field like nothing I had ever seen before. There were flowers in the grass and butterflies and the sky was a tranquil shade of blue. I spun around, it all felt so good, the nice warm sweet air, the bright soft sun on my skin. However it was disturbing, there was nothing but this extensive massive paradise, no people no animals besides the butterflies, just endless greenery. When I stopped twirling about he was standing in front of me dressed in all crisp homespun cotton. He looked like some kind of monk.
“You need to learn to focus or you will kill yourself” He spoke in a near to silent voice as he walked around me. His voice was so toneless and as his eyes met mine I noticed that his eyes were hueless, they floated between colors as his voice floated between sound.
“So why are we here? You could have told me this in the room and not in some fantasy land created by your mind” He laughed and sat down in the grass in front of me.
“Perhaps, but you would not be able to focus as freely as you will be able to be here” He patted the grass “sit, sit and relax, sit and breathe” I did what he said, I sat next to him and took sever breaths none however were deep, they were all very shallow. He laughed at me “Breathe, really breathe use your mind to breathe, close your eyes and breathe” So I did what he said, I breathed slowly, taking in the air and listening to my body. My Body was noiseless, a vortex of sound as I felt my aura expand. You can actually feel it when it happens, it feels like a rubber band snapping and you suddenly feel free.
I felt free, it was odd but I knew I had done something wrong and I opened my eyes. He was bleeding all over. You can’t die in your mind though so I was okay but I must have had absolutely no control if I could do that. I put my hands in his blood and he took a deep breath and looked at me.
“You need to learn to listen to yourself, you need to learn to contain yourself”
“But I don’t want to contain myself, why should I contain myself?”
“Because if you do not learn to contain yourself Dorian and all the others died for no reason at all”
“I thought you said Dorian couldn’t die!”
“Well he cannot, but that is not the point Celeste, the point is sometimes when others are counting on you, you must give up something if it is needed, you cannot run around hacking people to bits without the slightest ounce of control” I gawked at him for a good moment as the blood vanished and the wounds healed in time lapse in front of me. And I tried again. And Again. And Again.
By the third time I was almost certain I had it. I could also feel what was going on around me. He was circling me, walking around me in a steady even circle. I could feel every blade of grass and every motion. And that was when it happened. I felt like I had unlocked a door. I could feel him smile.
“Picture the lone tree in your mind” I did as he said, there was a solitary tree standing in the middle of the field. “Now focus all of your energy on it, and imagine the tree splintered to pieces” his voice was soothing with it’s soundlessness and pulled me deeper into myself and my mind. I did as he said though, and I heard the result before I felt it and for a moment I was actually afraid to open my eyes. I did however and I stared at what was left of the tree. It was little more than saw dust. And he was standing there grinning that grin at me, smug like none other. “I knew you could, now imagine what you will be able to do with practice!”
“Kill people without even leaving my room”
“Not just that but, think of how you could aid the cause!” I fell silent and stared at him, it was that quiet kind of blank stare that never seems to go away. I stared at him and for a moment I saw a shadow of what he probably was once, he was generally happy. He was probably one of those terribly happy people who spend all of their time running about with a silly grin on their face. However he was very right in what he said and I knew what I had to do before he could even say it, and our eyes met in perfect understanding. I myself was going to break Dorian out. Break him out without ever leaving the room.