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"The Third Floor" is the first book in the series, "The Six Writings of LBK" |
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The Third Floor A True Story Luke Bradford Knowles Before I begin relating to you the events of my dream, I would like to make clear that this book will not appeal to everyone. For this I apologize but have little control over because I am not creating this story. I am simply relating what I have experienced to you. There are some people who will not enjoy certain parts of it. To these I also apologize. I would like to remind the reader, once again, that I am not making this up. There are some who will enjoy almost all of it. There are some who will enjoy all of this. I thank them profusely and with that I would like to say that most people, overall, will enjoy something. There is fantasy, sci-fi, the mysterious, the frightening, the noble, the religious, the action-packed and even violent, the romantic and above all, the hopeful. Without further ado, I hope you enjoy. Luke Bradford Knowles The First Chapter In which I enter the third floor The Second Chapter In which I realize my own shortcomings The Third Chapter In which I find more hope and strength The Fourth Chapter In which Love saves us all The Fifth Chapter In which I disrespect another’s beliefs The Sixth Chapter In which I understand more The Seventh Chapter In which I try to fix things in all the wrong ways The Eighth Chapter In which I lose control The Ninth Chapter In which I do all that I can for all the wrong reasons The Tenth Chapter Where everything ends and I realize what needs to be done First Chapter T his house is more than it seems. I’ve lived here for close to two years now, I think, but I didn’t know up until recently that there was a third floor. Here in Boylston, MA many of the houses, including ours, date back from the Revolutionary War. These houses possess very irregular architectural features, especially in the upper floors. The sloping roofs which intersect at crazy angles with each other and ceilings which force you to shorten the frame if you are installing a new door. My creative younger brothers and sisters have often discussed with me the possibility of secret passages hidden within the eaves. I, being somewhat creative, childlike and arguably immature myself, have often entertained such thoughts myself, but never have I been so naïve as to believe in a third floor on our humble household. But last night has changed my mind. I don’t know exactly how to get up there again and I don’t know why you can’t see it from outside because so far I’ve only reached it once and that was when I was asleep. But I think that its there. Maybe its only there in my dreams but that means its still there. I firmly believe that if something is enjoyable, so long as it is wholesome, then it is beautiful, we are brought to God in the afterlife and, if we have earned it, we see HE Who is all things beautiful and concordantly, we see our Beautiful dreams again. With this knowledge, I relate this story to you. It is a true story in that it was a real dream. I write this just as much for your enjoyment as for mine. If you are patient, you will find why this memory is yet another reason to get to heaven. The third floor is enormous and has a floor area much larger than the lower portion of the house. It’s probably a good thing then that you can’t see it from the outside because it would look very ugly overlapping the rest of the house. Seeing it from the inside is breathtaking. That is not because it is at all luxuriously furnished but because of the series of balconies extending far above in the large central chamber. To all other themes, it is dead. There is no furniture, no wall coverings, no carpets. It is not decrepit; only bare. It’s floors are all rough, though well constructed wooden planks. There are the remains of exquisite molding and plastering around the creases of the doorframes and in the corners. The only decoration remaining, it seems, is the woodcarving on the banisters of the stairways and around the arched doorways. The main chamber is exactly centered and there were rooms in the walls to the left, right and directly in front of me. There were stairways both to the left and to the right. The stairways were cleverly situated so that they began with an opening curving out from the wall towards the center of the room. It was quite steep after that so as to be on a level with the top of the door before intersecting with the frame. There are rooms with concealed doors underneath the portion of the stairway that extends on the other side of the doorway. In this way the staircase effectively forms an arch around the doorframe. My seventeen year old brother and I have remembered lines from movies after only seeing it once. This not only applies to audio, however. It also applies to images or sequences of events. We could see it once and remember it for, well so far we’ve remember things for no more than seventeen years but that is enough for me to provide you with some of these images. With this in mind, I can provide you with strange examples which, if you’re lucky enough to have experienced them, can aid you in picturing the images from my subconscious. If you ever saw the Disney version of Cinderella you might remember the staircase to the balcony of the prince’s castle. That image, if you are fortunate enough to possess it, may be helpful. It is similar to that except it only has no finished stonework. It is, as I said before, rough and bare planks. It only has no landing but connects to the balcony encircling the second level in the middle of the wall opposite where I came in. In this way one staircase would come out facing its counterpart’s opening on the other side, not even close to the staircase on the side where it started. There are no rooms on the two middle levels (there are four levels including the floor). But there are arched niches in the walls at regular, symmetrical intervals. They may have at one point housed some form of statue or painting but are now completely empty. They would make an excellent hiding place in times of trouble as you could be able to survey most of the floor below while remaining completely concealed. This series and configuration of staircases and levels continued in succession until the top level. This level had a balcony section protruding into the upper space of the central chamber. Above that was not visible because of its great height and the darkness due to the apparent lack of windows. Alright, it’s not just a third floor but a palatial extension. These were the things that I instantly observed upon my entry. The rest went something like this: “This is amazing. I can already see (I have a constant habit of talking to myself when I am alone) where my new room will be. Wow, Luke, nice of you to be so selfish. I’m sorry. I guess I’m just a little bit overwhelmed with all of this. It’s not every dream that you get thrown into an unknown section of your own house. I looked around, there was little light. There wasn’t much to look at, though, as I mentioned before. The atmosphere was less than comfortable. As you can imagine, an enormous abandoned chamber with only minimal light can have any comfort only in a dream. “I wish that there was more light in here. There’s a light at that balcony on top. Thank God. I would not like to be in here in pitch blackness. I do think I could have my room here. These stairs look like they lead up to the upper balcony. I wonder if there’s a light switch or window somewhere. I hope there’s a skylight at the top. Let’s head up. Oh, and Luke, remind me to eat an entire bottle of olives every night before I go to sleep.” I began to walk up the large flight of stairs on the left side of the central chamber. I passed the niches in the second level and ascended the second staircase on the right side. I was my id’s typical subconscious concept of perfection: easygoing and carefree and confident. Another characteristic of this ideal is how I am rather oblivious to danger and anything but my ideal’s ideals. For example, as I passed the bleak staircase in a deserted and barren house with little light, all I could think of was how nice it would be to have such a spacious house with such interesting staircases. “Look at this wood! (Continuing in an intentionally stupid voice) It must be real mahogany or something wooden like that.” In my dream, I was my subconscious’ ideal self-image. Being completely without arrogance could possibly have been the central feature of my ideal person. I so much abhorred arrogance after years of past dreams (and life) where I was the pinnacle of it that I wanted to make clear to people that if they marveled too much at my greatness I would show them how lowly I really was. I know now that even in my dreams, this is neither ideal nor humility. I quickly regained my composure when I tripped on the wood, creating a large abrasion on my shin. “Aw damn! They should invest in some carpets in this place. A place this big should be all fancy looking with chandeliers and (By now, my elevated position on the stairs granted me more insight into the things above the third level)… Oh they do have a chandelier … what the crap (a common interjection used in my house on the first and second floor; used in order to be more forceful and original than what the heck and not as profane as what the hell) … Oh no. I should be going. Oh yeah!” During this entire time, my eyes could not be torn away from their focus. “I’m outta here. I don’t think I should stick around in a place with a skeleton hanging from the chandelier.” At the moment of my fall, as I do often, I looked around in anger for a symbol of what I was seeking and all I found was a reminder of mortality. “Wait a second. I don’t remember coming in… I have no knowledge of how to get out.” Looking down at my initial position, I realized that there were no doors or other means of access within at least a twenty foot radius. “Well I guess I’m here for a while. I might as well keep exploring.” I wasn’t a very street smart (or skeleton smart in this case) or responsible or rational person. You must also consider that I, just like any person have less of presence of mind in my dreams than would be beneficial. I have just enough to enjoy myself and feel completely oblivious of my own shortcomings. These elements were all factors in my decision to continue into the unknown rather than examining the known. “These stairs seem to lead to that large balcony overlooking the chamber….I’m almost there now.” I opened the enormous, presumably mahogany door. Looking inside such a sight met my eyes. “Wow. Here’s all the luxury. Hey, there’s even a chandelier without a skeleton. That’s nice. (I’m always making jokes to myself but only sometimes laughing at them.) There’s everything that I could ever want in my own room already here: a globe ten feet around, a thousand old and nicely bound books and, ha ha, a complete collection of KC and the Sunshine Band on vinyl. Wait a second. Oldies? Whoever lived here must have been here within the last thirty years.” I looked over to a single, single (size) bed in a small alcove in the corner. Again, this lonely item should have increased in me a fear of foreboding. Unfortunately, it did not. In fact, I was still considering moving my bedroom to the third floor and quite possibly sleeping in that bed. “And whoever was here, it looked like there was only one of them. Judging from the things he or she kept in their room, my guess is that it was a he. I also guess that he’s hanging on the chandelier outside.” I sat down in an enormous leather recliner. I was not tired but I felt a little bit (unfortunately only a little bit) unsettled by this chain of events. There was an aura of secrecy in this place. There were no documents or clothing or stamps or seals anywhere to be found. He didn’t want anybody to find out who he was. That was clear. He must have left at times to get food and other necessaries. He certainly didn’t pay a utility bill, though, because whoever living downstairs at the time (if anybody) would have known of it downstairs and in the town. That word, downstairs, ran through me like, in the words of General Patton, “crap through a goose”. “Downstairs! Why didn’t I think of it. I’ll go back to the central chamber and bang on the floor where I came up. Maybe someone will come up and show me how to get back down.” Apparently I was even less “skeleton smart” in my dreams than in life. I ran down to the central chamber and saluted both the blood on the stairs and the figure suspended gruesomely from that large and elevated instrument of light. The stairs groaned and, as is common at certain parts of dreams, some invisible force was holding me back. I panicked and forced my steps with all my might, not wanting to be the ceiling’s next ornament. “I must get home. And there’s only one way. Wait, Luke.” I paused on the steps. “If I am inexperienced in life, one thing is true and that is that I am very experienced in dreaming. I know that in a dream you sometimes have to do the opposite of the obvious to get where you want… I should be running up, not down!” I turned, but the force that was holding me back, as if losing its clemency began to firmly and gently drag me to the center of the chamber floor. Without any control, I witnessed in horror as my leg was raised several inches and then slammed down on the floor three times. This section of the story, you will find, is the most mysterious of the book, and if you are feeling a bit lost then that’s good. Well, I’m hoping you feel that way because lost and afraid was exactly the way that I felt in the dream. Please, take no offense. Remember throughout this entire story that even though there is a skeleton hanging from the ceiling of the invisible third floor of my house, this is a true story. It was a real dream. I am not making this up. I hope you continue. Second Chapter T hen there was silence. There was a pause. I’m not going to give the clichéd: pause that felt like an eternity. I won’t give it because it really wasn’t that kind of pause. This pause was filled with wishing you had more time to get back to safety. I looked powerlessly at the stairs, my only hope of escape…to nowhere. I could feel something was coming. That something was a dangerous something.. Only a dream could give that feeling of incredible and certain danger when there were no actual stimuli which were indicating that. But soon, the pause was over. This was the part where I said to myself: I want to wake up. This dream was different though. I usually had the ability to wake myself up at will and control things going on around me. This was somewhat more real. I truly was trapped in this one. No getting out until some entity, presumably my subconscious self was satisfied. I heard a sound. It was a stifled thump or bump, whatever you want to call it in that general category. And it sounded like it was coming from beneath me. Was I overjoyed, knowing that someone from downstairs was coming up to help show me the way out? No. Again, the strange intuition which only dreams had was telling me once again that this was not a pleasant thump. I almost didn’t need this intuition. There was something that came afterward that scared away all hope from my mind. There was, muffled again, a scream that pierced right to my heart and made it scream as well. Suddenly, I found that I was no longer being held. I ran. I ran as fast as I could upwards on the illustrious stairs. I had gotten to the third level when I quickly decided that a new development to the situation was now suggesting a change in strategy. I dove into one of the arched niches and peeped out cautiously. If only we could have these instincts in our waking hours! I watched as there appeared from the dark rooms on the ground floor’s left and right, at least fifty creatures of completely Tartarian appearance. They appeared to be covered in dust as if they had been lying in it for an extended period of time. They were brushing it off as if they had only recently noticed it. It almost seemed as if they had been dormant under the floor and catapulted back into activity by my injudicious action. They all searched the area of the floor, as if expecting to find a sign of who had caused the disturbance. This didn’t last long however, and they began to gather around one of their own standing by the center of the far wall. The whole time, they had not made a sound, as if they were supremely intent on their quarry. As they realized that their efforts were fruitless they began to utter the most disgusting, frightening and cacophonous howls and screams. It was clear to me now what I had heard under the floor. Then one appeared who was smaller than the others, but who commanded their attention in an extremely authoritative way. He screamed to quiet them. He must have been the first to wake for my heart screamed again. They became silent as he indicated that he wanted to communicate. I felt sure that if these vile creatures were capable of speech then it would be base and unintelligible. To my surprise, the leader silenced the horde with the words: “My esteemed colleagues, if I could have your attention please. I would like to restate the obvious simply because it has been two decades since our last performance. It seems that we have ourselves an intruder.” His words were sophisticated, but so was the tone of his voice. He sounded like an aristocrat running for political office. Here there was such a celebration made up of the foul screams that I covered my ears and closed my eyes. I was terrified by now. This was not so much by the horror of the situation as by the knowledge that for once in my existence there was no waking up from this nightmare. He continued: “So…please gentlemen lets keep it down…thank you. As I am sure you all know. We have work to do! The only beings we know of besides ourselves were the beings of the kind as the individual whose bones now dangle from a rope above us. Perhaps then, we can have double vengeance on our master and destroy the only one of his kind to enter our domain since his demise. Now I’m sure that we are all very enthusiastic about what we are just about to carry out but we must realize that we are dealing with an opponent who may be just as clever as our previous master. Therefore, we need to spare no diligence or efficiency in our hunt. In fact, you should know that he is most likely listening to us right now, somewhere in this enormous chamber. However, we have reason to believe that he is just as great and powerful as the master. I need not remind you of the incredible power of the old master and his incredible dignity. We must keep in mind that this intruder is only a few increments short of being a god. No doubt, he has a great empire where he came from and a harem of thousands.” I could not take this. It made me angry after all my painful failures in interacting with those of the opposite gender. And my compulsion for making myself look stupid prompted me to stand up and yell: “Kookaburra sits in the old gum tree. Merry, merry king of the bushes he. Ha Ha lalalalalala.” All of their attention was fixed on me yet they said nothing. They stared intently and looked back at their leader. He held his gaze slightly longer and I could see in his eyes nothing short of contempt. He looked around at his “colleagues” and raised an eyebrow in mockery, saying: “Well, let’s get to work.” They screamed and howled and began running up the stairs. I had an excellent lead on them and planned on locking the door to the balcony on the top level. I reached it quickly and slammed the enormous doors. I knew that they were close from the sounds of their horrible screams. I looked for the lock on the solid doors but to my indescribable dismay I found nothing but the large brass handles. Again, thinking with a presence of my mind which is impossible to attain while awake, I vigorously shoved the large mahogany desk from the center of the room to block the doors. I then ran to a series of similar doors on the opposite side of the luxurious room. I opened them and hid behind them. “Whew, that should take them a while. This looks like a dead end. I’ll have to think a bit before I plan my next move. I could charge out just when they lower their guard and make a break for the door. These things don’t lower their guard, Luke. They’ve been sleeping for twenty years just to kill anyone who came in. Well, I could…” I was interrupted by the sound of the door being pushed open with minimal effort and then… only the sound of the creatures breathing heavily. As it is easy enough to observe, I was at a complete loss for what to do next. All those super-alert and quick-thinking reactions had deserted me. But there was still one dream element which was quite easily attainable in this type of circumstance. Since I had gotten here, I had begun to feel less and less sure of myself. I questioned everything I did and became genuinely contemplative. In my awake life I had thought a lot, maybe too much about what was going on, but never did I understand that true contemplation is completely void of self-pity. If you contemplate while pitying yourself or being apathetic towards your current status, whatever it may be, you are not contemplating. You are doing one of two things, obsessing or depressing. Now, I was concerned for my safety and regretting the foolish decision I made to give away my position. Everything I had seen here: the skeleton, the lack of light, and the fall on the stairs, followed by the great danger I was now in, had slowly brought me out of my apathetic pseudo-contemplative state. It is a pity that it took a dream to do this to me. But, if we consider that statement closely life in ignorance and complacency is more a dream than any vision of Barney with a Jersey hooker. Alright, bad example. “Enough contemplation Luke. Listen. What are they stopping for?” I wondered. Then I heard one of them speak: “You’re not really going to enter the master’s chamber, are you?” said one. “I am…really…going to carry out the brutal living dismemberment of the intruder and kin of the old master,” replied the leader in a tone of cruel determination. “But you remember what ha…” “I remember that we lost our beauty because we didn’t accept the master’s help and for that I will never forgive the master. (here there was a tentative lapse in all sounds of any kind) Move in.” I was, as the old adage goes between a rock-solid mahogany piece and a hard place also made of solid mahogany. “Oh crap. What am I going to do? Wake up Luke! Wake up Luke!” What happened next was another thing that happens frequently in dreams. I did something without any possible explanation and found myself within a whole new world of challenges….Literally. I inexplicably charged at the wall opposite the doors where I came in and the impact made me a bit dizzy but more importantly, the wall opened and I stumbled into a fenced in pasture filled with light. I will not give you the clichéd: I was blinded by the light and could not, at first, make out my surroundings. No, I could make out my surroundings because the sunlight was not nearly as bright as the sun from the unknown town of Boylston in the United States of America. I looked up at the sky. The sun was large and red. This world was near its end. Third Chapter N ow here’s a good turn of events, finally. I think. At least I’m clear of the darkness and those creatures…Wait.” I pressed my ear to the door and listened for any clue of what was happening inside. I heard the leader shout: “There!” I heard a scramble for the doors and heard them open as well. Then there was silence. “I don’t understand. Where is he?” “Well, he’s not here is he,” the leader snarled. “Well, I heard him slam something in here. We all did.” There were mutters of well-spoken and eloquent affirmation as seemed to be common to these creatures. “What do we do?” “We carry out our goal in any way possible. We slam ourselves against every part of this room until we get any inkling of a possible means of pursuit. Now get going.” A dozen of the most zealous of his followers ran full force at the wall or door. I couldn’t be sure about anything that was not spoken but I could gather the following chain of events. When the first bunch hit the wall, they were immediately immobilized and landed with a thud on the floor. The others backed away, screaming. “Silence,” the leader called. He quietly examined the bodies while the others whimpered in fear. “You,” he singled one out. “Go, now.” The whimpering was great now and there was a long pause. “NOW!” There was a quick whimper, a slam which made the wall shudder and the ensuing thud as the body hit the floor. Now there was uncontrolled cascade of whimpering and thud after thud after thud which I took to be the angered leader throwing his “esteemed colleagues” to incomprehensible deaths on the floor of that room. “Well. I guess that’s the end of that. Even your colleagues can’t get through a door that kills on contact.” I sneered as I walked away. “I think I’ll make my way to that cozy-looking farmhouse and find out what time it is. I’ve been to many worlds in my nights but I’ve never experienced this realism. It’s enjoyable but frightening as well, as I just found out. But as long as I’m here, I have all of my experience from my life to guide me in this…what should I call it? It’s almost another life in another world. It’s still a dream-world, though, since I reached it through my dreams. That means this life, no matter how realistic, is still a dream-life.” This couldn’t be made any clearer than when (and I am forced to use two cliché’s) something happened that was both too good to be true and could only have happened in a dream. There, before me, was a garden of incredibly large vegetables. This was truly a different world, that much was clear, but I was able to recognize all of the vegetables in the garden. There were a few squash and beans but an abundance of tomatoes. True, I could recognize the vegetables but there was something in that garden that I did not recognize. And though the vegetables were too large to happen anywhere but in a dream, that wasn’t what I was referring to when I gave that description. For a few seconds, I felt certain that it was an angel. Then I decided that an angel would probably not be picking tomatoes. It still took me a while to get the idea out of my head. Now, at long last, my eyes became used to the imaginary light and the pause that seemed like it lasted forever finally ended. I was ecstatic. That is true. Then I realized that, not only was I stupidly and childishly staring at her but that she was doing the same to me. It was time for yet another cliché. I apologize for these usages but they alone can convey the surreal and slightly immature quality of this dream, bifurcated between good and evil. Anyway, I could not take my eyes off her and seemed to be glued to that sight. She turned away before I did and that…(last one, bear with me) broke the spell. She went back to her gardening and made a show of working like she didn’t notice me. I didn’t realize this at the time but this childlike belief in life as a constant fairytale was already being displayed in her character. This was the first of the not-so-noticeable similarities. I stood there for a long time, waiting for her to notice me and initiate the conversation. Apparently, she was now kneeling there, waiting for the same thing. She continued gardening, but occasionally glanced up furtively to see what was causing the delay. Dreams could be the way that we rationalize our lives. We create stories that are tangible enough to be enjoyed but vague enough to be labeled as unreal when we rise the next morning. I will always enjoy dreaming because there are no lasting repercussions of your actions. You know that you will always wake. With this thought, I realized that it didn’t matter if I messed up because I will eventually wake. I realized that this wasn’t going anywhere fast. “Good evening to you.” “Evening? It’s almost noon.” I have never felt more stupid in any dream or in my life for that matter. It was a legitimate question for one who was in my situation but just that initial failure in her eyes was killing me. Her disarming smile (I don’t think a nuclear arms race could stand up to it (good one Luke ( ha ha ha))) diffused this explosive anxiety and made it sink into nothingness. You, as the reader, are lucky that this dream is more realistic than most. Some of my dreams are so bizarre that nobody could listen to them. And certainly no one could read them. There are some things which cannot be avoided however in a dream. Some minor differences from reality are always, without exception present. One of these breaks from reality is her attire. She had a long dress on of white with dark blue stripes that extended down the entire length from the shoulders to the ground. The sleeves extended to halfway past the elbows and possessed the same stripes. It may sound unappealing to some, but you should know that the red light from this sun cycled in its brightness about every minute. Her outfit glowed red and showed the blue which was piercing in this light. So, in every sense of the word, she was radiant. Crowning this radiance and surpassing the rest of the outfit was a half-circle of a silver-looking material being used similar to a hair band. Behind it was her hair done up into a very orderly bun. She was a blonde and the silver and gold went nicely together. All this applied to the central theme of her appearance. She looked good in three ways: her appealing blue eyes and girlish face made her, for lack of a better word, pretty; her orderly and well-kept outfit and hair made her look stately yet her figure, as with all males of my age, dreaming or not, was her most readily enjoyable feature. She was not skinny but still not far from slender. Her proportions were excellent in all the ways that the world will emphasize and she was tall. How could her outfit be conducive to her sensuous image? It was conducive because it emphasized her shape in a way that highlighted, but not exhibited her good features. It was sensuous in the simple meaning of the word and not the connotations. You saw her and her appearance made you want to touch her but only in a way that was loving. In short, and in more simple words she was sexy, but not a Jersey hooker. Sorry Barney. All this added to the central theme. Her face was, I will not say the best part of all because she was one-hundred percent beautiful, simple and plain. There were no Angelina Jolie lips. There were no seductive eyelashes and there was no super-defined nose. She simply looked good and we come back to that word: pretty. And if you haven’t guessed what the central theme is yet. Try angelic. “Forgive my ignorance, but I am very much a stranger in these parts.” “Oh really, what part of the Alliance are you from?” I hesitated. Do I tell her everything? How many times in life have I said too much? Come on, Luke. I thought you were a veteran dreamer. Yes but this is different. I care about this dream more than any of the others. “I…I’m not from the alliance, actually.” She looked at me in horror. I realized that I must quickly qualify this statement. “I don’t even know what the Alliance is. I’m actually, you probably won’t believe me, but I’m from another world.” I was dismayed to see that the look of horror didn’t leave her face. “From the world above or the world below?” “Well I came from the third floor and that’s above almost everything, as far as I know.” The look on her face changed. It softened and I could slowly understand that it went from horror to joyful respect and reverence. I was puzzled by this. Apparently, I had not only lost my skeleton smarts at the sight of her beauty but all my knowledge of the relative positions of heaven and hell. She spoke again, “I am honored to be the first of our world to speak to you, messenger of the Almighty. I apologize that I am in no condition to greet you. Stupid gardening. I’m bound to it by my household.” “You seemed to be enjoying it.” She paused, looked at me and then looked away, ashamed. “I was…but I wish that there was something more glamorous that I could be doing. But enough of this meaningless talk. Please follow me to the hospitality of our home. My father will be enthusiastic to see you. We are some of the few who still believe in you and the Almighty, who rules all worlds and created all humans.” For a while I thought that she may have been speaking of the man which the “underdemons” (as I recently had decided to name them) called master but when she mentioned ruler of all worlds and creator of all humans I realized that she was speaking of the Holy Trinity: The Father, Son and… “Holy Ghost…yes, that’s Who I was referring to,” the girl interrupted. I was speechless and stared at her for close to thirty seconds and then I just kept looking at her unconsciously because I was so enamored with her. She smiled the whole time. “Uh yeah.” I roused myself from my highly immature stupor. “How did you know that?” “We few remaining followers of the Almighty have developed many abilities. Telepathy among them. I should think that an experienced dreamer like yourself would have considered that possibility.” “Well, I am alert enough to ask you why you couldn’t see where I was from.” “I was afraid. Oddly enough, those of us with this ability cannot see through our own fear.” I was satisfied. We continued up the stairs leading up to the farmhouse’s wraparound deck. I stopped and she did the same in order to see what the matter was. “You shouldn’t be ashamed of enjoying gardening. In the palace of the third floor, we need good gardeners. The Almighty always used to talk about gardening where I come from…” “Are we thinking of the same Almighty?” she interrupted and looked at me quizzically. “Well, what does your Almighty speak of?” “He speaks of justice and other things and uses the symbolisms of building. That’s not all, he speaks of the need for peace and hope and love. But he also tells us, like a strong building, one of his followers must rest on a foundation. Without this foundation there is no safe or trustworthy explanation for how the building stands at all. Although this foundation may not be beautiful to those who do not rely upon it, it is always beautiful in its strength. I could tell you more, but we call it…” I interrupted this time… “Faith.” She looked at me in amazement, not knowing that I was built upon the foundation she had described. “I think that I’ve picked up some of your abilities.” She looked at me. “No. Just kidding.” “Oh, you really got me there.” She said with sarcasm. She smiled once again and it made me not want to try to be funny for the rest of my life. “So…we are talking about the same Almighty.” “Yes but I usually call Him…” “Don’t say it! Within the Alliance it is forbidden to say that word.” “How will anybody hear us.” “After the Alliance discovered the power source greater than the sun, they agreed that there was no more powerful weapon to be discovered and began working on a way of observing every inch of the planet at the same time. They succeeded and created the Oculus. Now they can see everything. Except our thoughts. That’s when the Almighty granted us telepathy. That’s how we pray. The only thing that we have to do physically is…” “What?” “Again, I can’t say it.” “But why is it that the government doesn’t care about what we’re saying now?” “I should let father tell you the rest.” We continued. Just as we reached the door I paused and said: leading up to the farmhouse’s wraparound deck. Just as we reached the door I paused and said: “There’s something you should know.” She looked at me. “It’s funny that for a while, you thought that I was an angel because I’ve been thinking the same of you this whole…oh, right… you know.” “Yup.” She said this simple, grammatically incorrect word and looked down at the floor for only a second and then: We walked inside. Fourth Chapter M y guide led me through the door and into a parlor whose walls were lined with silver. There was silver inlay on the borders and on the wallpaper. All the plates and cutlery were silver. Even the chandeliers were silver. I remembered the silver headdress on my recent acquaintance. I need to be careful what I think. I have no idea when she is listening. “Shhh,” she urged. I was worried. Does that mean I should keep my thoughts quiet too. I never have been very good at yoga stuff like that. I saw a man, probably in his fifties, sleeping in a large armchair of, yet again, a silvery fabric. If you’re getting annoyed with all the silver in the house or if you’re wondering whether the entire place is silver then I should tell you that only the linings and objects were silver. The rest was mahogany. “On second thought,” she reconsidered, “I’m going to wake him up. He’s been sleeping all day. He’s not feeling well lately.” I assumed that this was her father and was looking forward to speaking with him. Then I remembered that I was in an awkward position. I was only a strange boy (not even from this world) who his daughter had brought home without any communication (presumably) with him. That’s all. “Daddy…” She shook him gently. There was no response whatsoever. There wasn’t even a shudder. She tried again. “Daddy…” He woke up with a terrible scream. There was nothing that could have prepared either of us for this. She jumped back and covered her ears. I, in a less than masculine manner, did basically the same. I don’t think that many who heard that vocalization of fear could restrain themselves more than I did. I highly doubt anyone could restrain themselves more than Martha did. Wait…Martha? She hurriedly went over to comfort her father once the initial shock had passed. “Daddy, what’s the matter?” He was breathing heavily. He took a few minutes to regain his breath and then…he smiled at Martha with complete tranquility. Martha and I, however, were not as transformed by the time our breathing was under control. “Daddy?” she asked urgently. “Well, who’s this?” he asked with perfect composure. Martha stared at Batis for a long period of time. She tried to read his face and know doubt his mind but found nothing. I couldn’t eith… “Ah Luke, I’m pleased to meet you too. Now, after such a long ordeal you must be very hungry,” he said in the most casual manner that I had seen in years. “Well, yes I am sir…” “Please. Batis. We’re on a first name basis here.” “Of course.” I was beginning to realize that I had begun picking up the telepathy which “those few who still worshiped the Almighty” possessed. This was quite a positive development. I hope the reader will forgive me, but I had been dying to look into Martha’s mind and see what she was thinking about me. An indignant look from Martha followed this endeavor and I realized that someone can block another’s prying thoughts if they want to. “As I said before, would you like something to eat?” “No thank you. I’ve never been hungry in a dream before.” “Well. You’re hungry now.” I paused, extremely puzzled. I was hungry. But this couldn’t be. This is… “Just a dream, huh? Is it really?” suggested Batis. “I think that you’re in this deeper than you realize, Luke. But for right now, we are all safe.” “Safe?” “Safe?” Martha and I asked simultaneously. She had no idea that we were in danger, other than the brief thought of the underdemons which she intercepted. That was my first thought. “They couldn’t get in when I left.” I stated optimistically. “Two things…that was when you left and its not just the underdemons to worry about. But please. Like I said. We are safe for now. Do not worry.” Martha commanded me to forget it until later. Luckily her father was not telepathically searching her mind. “Now, how many times do I have to say it?” he asked jokingly. “Let’s go eat.” I knew that he had so much information that I would want and need within him but he was closely guarding it. He certainly had no intention of disclosing it. He talked about how nice the food was and commended his daughter on her good work in both the garden and the kitchen. The food was, as I predicted from the composition of the garden, mainly tomato based. I considered the possibility of such a meal being quite boring. I was also considering how it would be less than stimulating to eat here for a long period of time. I went on considering, right up until I looked over and noticed that Martha was glaring at me. She defiantly took the serving bowl and piled an enormous heap of tomato and squash casserole on my plate. I looked at her again and watched her smile smugly as she sat down at the table. I think that this angel had a little bit of a human side. If I have ever been wrong, then I will not say that this was more wrong than I had ever been before. I will say that it was in the top ten erroneous thoughts of my life. I never dreamed that what looked like just tomatoes and some small squash could burst with the kind of flavor that it did. I know that you are probably not interested in reading such a predictable event. Suffice it to say that my reaction prompted Martha to smile and send me an “I-told-ya-so” transmission. My respect for this girl continued to grow every minute that I was with her. “Martha said that you could explain some of what I have been experiencing tonight or today, I suppose.” Batis continued eating and seemed not to have heard. At the time I could not determine whether he was acting or not. I later found out that it was entirely voluntary and theatrical. He was not feeling up to the challenge of revealing the subconscious events which prompted the terrible scream which he had uttered. He made a convincing show of not noticing by finishing a large spoonful of the tomato and squash casserole. He drank a gulp of tomato juice and turned to me saying: “Beg pardon? My hearing is going.” Martha looked at me and shook her head at this remark. Again, this man must have been an actor because I wouldn’t have picked up on these detours had it not been for Martha. “Daddy, I was hoping that you knew something about where Luke came from or what he is doing here? I think that he’s been sent by the Almighty. He knows of our precepts and commandments. I think that he might even recognize…” “Well, you could ask him. He seems to have picked up our abilities.” Martha turned too me, looking very stern and grave. I had no doubt that what she was about to communicate to me was very serious and that the two of them had great reverence for It. All of my veteran dreaming skills combined could not have predicted something of this magnitude. It came in slow as she was concentrating mainly on keeping me from speaking in reply. I heard: meal…sacred…wine…bread…blood…body. If Martha had not been telling me the entire time to keep quiet, I would surely have shouted in complete shock. This was, without a doubt, the same Almighty that I believed in. And now I remembered that the Oculus of the Alliance could not read our thoughts and that I was now capable of telepathy. I expressed to her “Credo in unum Deum, Patrem omnipotentem.” She replied: “et incarnatus est de Spiritu Sanctu, ex Maria Virgine et homo factus est”. You could see the look of happiness on Batis’s face. There was a look of serenity on Martha’s. She was too happy to show it. She looked at me once again and then began cleaning up. I offered to help but she rejected the offer. Batis called me. “I insist that you remain with us until further development.” “Further development?” “Let me show you to the guest room.” The stairs were very steep and, better yet, they were spiral. Even the palatial third floor could not boast this functional and enjoyable aesthetic effect. I thought: “Now this is where I should have my room.” “You can stay as long as you like,” stated Batis, reading my thoughts almost as fast as I could think them. I thanked him. As we walked up the long stairs Batis inquired, “So what were you doing when you left the first and second floors. Did you have any plans for education or a career?” “Well, I graduated from high school with honors. It was a very rigorous preparatory high school. But…I have a lot of problems with my…emotions.” “I see. I see.” I knew that he really did. “So what are your plans for the future?” “Well, I’ll get back to school and study politics. I’ve always said that if G…the Almighty is really calling me then I would become a…can I say it?” Batis shook his head. “I know what you mean though. What if you meet someone?” I paused on the steps. “Well, this is just a dream though.” I knew who he was referring to. “If this is just a dream, and this is a different you, you have a different calling before…” God, he finished telepathically. “When you enter a world, you enter it for a reason. You must not confuse yourself between both worlds. Here, you are lucky enough to have all the experiences of your other life. Now, you can use that experience to carry your new…” cross, he told me silently once again. “You think very highly of her. There are some thoughts, however, which you are guarding. Among them the true extent of your love.” He scanned my face as if it would help. I think it did because next he said. “Yes, I just don’t want it to get to any more than virtue would allow. But there is a virtuous extent.” We continued walking. “So you feel like a failure in life and that you will never do anything important,” noted Batis. “You try to make yourself look foolish and have no self-respect. Do you want to change that?” “Well, I do now.” “Watch it!” I slipped on the step but caught myself before any injury was made. “Good, you’re learning from your mistakes.” When we reached the room, Martha was tucking in the sheets and fluffing up the pillows. She saw us. “You must have talked a lot on the way up. I went all the way around to the back stairs and still beat you. You were blocking me too, I noticed.” Batis looked at me with a smirk. “And there’s nothing you can do about it,” he said playfully. Martha gave him a strong hug and left the room. I could see, not from her mind but from her face, that she was worried. I’m sure that my worries surpassed hers regarding the danger which Batis had implied earlier today. As she left the room she communicated to me: Stay close to me and you’ll be alright. Batis waited until Martha had walked down the hall and said, “She’s right. Stay close to her. And yes, there really isn’t much in this house that gets by me. Good night.” I was trying to keep in mind all of these warnings but I couldn’t resist thinking about Martha instead. I lay down in a comfortable bed, with my acid reflux reacting severely and some very pleasant thoughts running through my head. What a day it had been. My first day in another world had started out with utter terror and had ended with comfort and affection…and anxiety. My eyes closed and I drifted off. It was the first time I had ever slept within a dream. I suppose that if eating excessive portions of olives sends you into another world, that eating excessive amounts of tomato products when you are not accustomed to it invariably gives you nightmares. I dreamt of the underdemons besieging a house and of a heroic man fending them off with a shotgun. Using both the shells and the heavy butt end he defeated each underdemon who came at him. Apparently, the underdemons were having a competition to see who would be the one to kill him. Someone was calling me. I woke up quickly and saw a figure standing in the doorway of my room. It was too dark to make much out. “Luke.” Martha called, almost crying with fear. I switched on the lamp next to my bed and ran to her. She embraced me, trembling. All this time I had been half asleep and acting on impulse. She shuddered and said, “Don’t you hear it?” I regained full consciousness and immediately I heard loud and clear the terrible screaming of the underdemons. I took her and sat her on the bed. “So the dream was real! Your father is out there! I’ve got to go help!” “No! He told me to stay close to you.” The true meaning of Batis’s words was realized. He wasn’t using any figure of speech when he said that. “Listen.” I tried to reassure her. “So long as I am here and you are with me, I don’t care what happens to us.” “But what about daddy?” “He said that if we’re together, all of us will be safe.” “Oh yeah! I remember. Well, we’re watching out for each other now and those awful screams are still going.” I smiled. She, being afraid could not see what I knew Batis meant. “You should know that there were so many girls in my own world who I had an interest in. It would be a lie to tell you that I didn’t have strong feelings for them. And I can’t tell, but I think that your feelings are just as strong for me as mine are for you. That is something that has never happened before due to how strong my emotions are. But now I have found someone who can match my feelings and maybe even surpass me. So I’m not scared to say this…” “Say it.” Said Martha. “I love you.” Martha closed her eyes for a few seconds. “I’m not scared anymore.” My thoughts were quite busy but slowly I could understand: I’m glad you came to our world and survived all those problems with your emotions because I’m in exactly the same boat. Now we both closed our eyes and leaned forward for one of those moments which has been in books, movies, plays: true love’s kiss. Of course I was so involved that it took me a while to stop and say, “Martha, the screaming is gone.” At this point, the door to the room was thrown open and there stood Batis. Martha immediately started to get out of my embrace and off my bed in the presence of her father but Batis shouted, “Don’t stop! I’m getting too tired of fighting them off!” He walked out and closed the door. Martha got back into my arms and we recommenced our life-saving activities. I couldn’t have been happier. That’s an understatement. Even with horrible screaming creatures and a new, difficult destiny before me. I was happy I came, for one reason, one person… Love conquers all. Fifth Chapter A fter an hour, she became tired but I told her that I would not tire for as long as she was in my arms. She smiled but explained that as much as she wanted to stay, for the sake of her foundation (her beliefs) she must spend the rest of the night by herself. I agreed, saying that my own foundation is not crumbling but getting stronger. “How?” she asked. “Because my strong foundation has been tested and approved. I believed that someday the Almighty would send you to save me from my confused emotions.” “Ditto.” She said this simple, grammatically incorrect word, looked lovingly at me and then: She left the room. I was feeling something which I had felt before but never in this magnitude. I was feeling happy and confident at the same time. This time it was true contemplation. There was no narcissistic self-deprecation. I was happy. I knelt down to thank God for all that had gone on in this eventful day…and night. “Almighty, I come before you as one who has strayed from your will many times in the past. I had deserted my cross for my self-interest and self-image. I have said many times in my life that I would be strengthened by a reassurance in my life. I have also promised, after I had received this reassurance, that I would doubt you no more. This promise I have not kept. I do not presume to make this promise again. But I do promise that as long as this reassurance lasts I will try to make it last longer and that as long as there is time to try, I will try harder to carry my cross. May the Almighty bless whatever it is that I was brought into this world for. May You also bless, in a special and loving way, the one who brought me to respect myself and to pray sincerely for what is truly needed and virtuous.” “Amen.” I went to bed. Not realizing that the preceding word would be the beginning of the end for all of us. The next morning, I was awakened hastily and roughly by Batis. “There’s a man from the Alliance Organization for Protecting Democracy. He says that all members of this household must appear before him at once. You must have said something last night.” “I don’t remember. I was praying.” “Out loud?” “Yes and…oh…I know what I said.” “Well don’t tell me now. Just hurry.” I was quickly getting dressed when I heard a loudspeaker outside calling: “Come on old man. We don’t know who you have in there but you won’t be able to hide him. And don’t try to run. We can see you perfectly.” I ran down the stairs and outside to the porch. I realized that Martha and Batis were both still in bathrobes and slippers. The man with the loudspeaker came up to examine me. Looked me over and sniffled, giving away his feelings at my disrespectful and brave attire. Apparently I was committing a serious breach in protocol by dressing. I suppose that the time taken to dress was considered disrespect. Martha told me telepathically: good going, show him what you’re made of. I was encouraged and put on a confident and extremely friendly face. “You are under suspicion of being part of a cryptic cult known as the Cornerstones of Truth. Would any of you like to confirm or deny this?” He asked this sarcastically, knowing that nothing would change his decision of what was to be done. There was silence. The man began again, “Alright phase two…” “I’ll confirm it, happily.” The man, astonished, turned around and regarded me very closely. After a few seconds his eyes were drained of astonishment and filled to the brim with conceit. He sneered and chuckled and walked closer to me. He was right in front of me now. He looked straight at me. “Do you know what this means?” “Not exactly, but I’m sure that some form of injustice…whoops” I exaggerated this feigned slip-up… “justice is about to take place. He sniffled and turned from me. “Well, without further ado, you are now going to be placed under arrest and placed before a court of the law of democracy at the request of the Alliance of Democracy. You are then to accept a sentence appropriate for your transgression.” He recited this as if it were a common statement in his line of work. “Take him away.” “I go willingly,” I yelled. “Now that I can say it, I proudly proclaim my actions as the work of the Almighty, the Almighty God Who rules all worlds and created all human beings.” Each man there, excepting Martha, Batis and I, shuddered and turned away. I would be similar if a child heard a swear. Like a child is taught all his life not to say bastard or bitch or fuck or any of those words, so had all these men and no doubt most men of this world been taught never to utter the name of God. “You are quite an unruly and rude man. How dare you insult those around you who do not have your beliefs. You must know nothing of democracy.” I was so angry at this last statement that I held my tongue. The two Alliance security agents present stepped up on the porch and grabbed me forcibly. They seemed to be intentionally rough on one who had violated their tender ears. As I was going, Batis conveyed to my mind: God bless you and I will help you however I can. Martha eagerly conveyed to me: Don’t think for even one second that you’re going without me. “No Martha!” I yelled out loud. The investigator and the two agents stopped in puzzlement. “May the God Who died to save us, Jesu Christi, bless you on your journey. And I will give you my prayers.” “How dare you utter that vile name in the presence of those who do not take part in your disgusting beliefs.” Screamed the investigator. Once, I went to a summer camp run by the brothers (essentially non-secluded monks) that taught at my school. They had organized prayers for this all-boys camp. They made the rosary an activity as mandatory as meals. They had Latin mass every day. Most of these kids, especially the younger ones, had experienced only the sheltered world of that church and school community. There was a tradition of showing a movie every year on the Wednesday of this one-week camp. I remember one time when the brothers brought in an action packed world war II movie after the technologist brother attempted to edit out the numerous swears. He failed miserably. The campers who were familiar with some of these words thought the mistake very humorous. But there were some who were so sheltered that they did not recognized them at all. Just before night prayers after the movie, I went to Brother Matthew and commented: I think you missed a few Brother. Brother Matthew hung his head and apologized. I assured him of my forgiveness but a fourth-grader next to me inquired: Missed what? Swears. I said reluctantly to which he replied: There were swears in that?! It was exactly that type of reaction which Martha received from the agents. They had been so sheltered from this highly un-democratic phrase that they had no knowledge of it whatsoever. The only reason that the investigator was familiar was that he specialized in dealing with the sort of felon which we were now labeled as. They carted us off roughly to the prisoner transport that they arrived in. This small detail indicated even more that they did intend to come just to investigate. “Do you want to come too, old man?” The investigator shouted at Batis. Batis simply turned around and walked back into the house. The investigator was fuming by now but couldn’t do anything. Under democratic law you can disrespect someone all you want because its part of your beliefs. Its only when the person who’s disrespected has the majority in congress and doesn’t agree with your beliefs that you get arrested for it. Martha held me tightly as we were being carted off to the capital of the entire Alliance of Democracy. Tolerance City, Martha told me. “We’ll be alright,” I told her. “Not necessarily. But the beauty of it is, that because of our beliefs, it doesn’t matter what happens to us. It only matters if we do our job or try at least. I think that’s one thing we have that Mr. Investigator and his two henchmen don’t.” “That’s right. But this time, we’ll be fine. I promise.” Sixth Chapter The ride was long. I fell asleep just after Martha did. I woke again. We had no clock and no windows. All we had was a harsh electric light in the back of our transport van. Then Martha woke up. She indicated that the corrugated iron bench, though wide, was not very comfortable to sleep on. I was blessed in that regard. I could sleep anywhere. I pained for her though. I felt very responsible for her now, since she was following me on my rash crusade attempt. “I can take it. I’m tough. I don’t want you to worry about me, Luke.” I didn’t say anything in response. She knew what I was thinking even without her telepathy. I realized that it would be very easy in some regards and very difficult in others to have to deal with our telepathy in the long run… Then I thought, how long will this dream last. It certainly seems like it could last a while but there were any number of ways that this might end. The sun could go supernova at any minute. I could easily be executed by my Alliance of Democracy captors for telling them beliefs that they didn’t want to here. And, most depressing of all in my mind, I could wake up at any time. I would regret that most of all. If the sun imploded then I would know I would die with Martha and wake with the memory of that honor. If I was executed by the Alliance, I would have served a noble purpose and achieved the same honor. If I woke from this dream, I would have no honor, no knowledge and no Martha. I fell asleep again. I woke to Martha calling softly to me. “Luke, one of the agents gave me this. It’s tomato soup. The Oculus gave them a lot of information I guess.” “Why are they giving you your favorite food?” “It’s one of our inalienable human rights,” Martha said with more than a hint of sarcasm. “It’s only when the majority doesn’t like your rights that they take them away. The rest of the time, it makes them look politically correct.” “How long is this ride going to be?” I asked Martha. “I’ve fallen asleep twice already. “I know, I was asleep too. We might have only slept an hour total though. There’s no way of knowing.” We were so uncomfortable and the van had such excellently smooth traction that we hadn’t noticed that it had stopped. Suddenly the back door was thrown open and we looked out into a night sky. There were no stars though. Instead, there was an expansive skyline as far as the eye could see and every bit ablaze with neon lights. I marveled at it for a while and then Martha thought to me: Trust me, its not as nice as it seems. I was inclined to believe her and I told her that when we were led into a building. This building, though we had gotten our first impression from the dingy front door was much more grand in its upper levels as we were soon to see. We were shoved into a mediocre but comfortable hotel room and actually seeing beds again could not keep the thought of sleep out of both of our minds. As soon as I reached my bed and she reached hers, as virtue would ask at this point, we fell asleep. I think that you might not understand this virtue which Martha and I held to. I can tell you now the only way that I can understand it is that I have to give everything, including my individuality and my freedom, before I could receive hers. I could tell her as much as I wanted that I loved her but to give something that I should never take back, showed her, more than any words could ever do so. Did I have to hold back? Not physically or mentally was I bound. But I chose to do so. Simply because I loved her, more than anyone, including myself, could ever promise, verbally or telepathically. Anyway… As I said before, I was a sound sleeper and I knew that any person without the beliefs which Martha and I possessed would be up all night paining about what tomorrow’s trial would bring. Martha knew it. I knew it. She said it to me in the van. The worst that they can do to us is give us a good beating before we die. I wasn’t looking forward to that. I could read that Martha, despite her superior bravery, wasn’t looking forward to it either. Still, I took comfort in the silent prayer I said, thinking that I would save the best for later. I closed my eyes with good thoughts in an evil time. I woke suddenly when a harsh light rushed through the comforting darkness at me. The source looked to be a large rectangle spanning the entire length of the wall opposite the beds. I was puzzled. It took me only a few seconds, even though I was still in a daze, that this was an enormous viewing window and that this room was no more than a human exhibit. What’s worse, the viewing window had been opened by a tour guide with a large group of tourists. “And here we have pair of criminals accused of being disrespectful of the beliefs of others. They were spotted by the Oculus and taken into custody by the famous, agent Vladimir Ulianov. They were confirmed by Agent Ulianov to be part of the Cornerstones of Truth, which is an organization outlawed by the six hundred and thirty fourth amendment.” “Excuse me…” The tour group looked at me through the window and one of the younger tourists said with excitement, “Look, one of them is talking!” “Yes, excuse me. I would just like to make clear that I confirmed our beliefs. Don’t give Laddie Vladdie too much credit.” Martha had been barely suppressing a laugh ever since I said excuse me with so much sincerity but when she heard this new abbreviation she could not hold it in anymore. She laughed loudly, prompting a more elderly woman in the crowd to comment: “These things disrespect everyone, don’t they.” The tour guide agreed and was suggesting they move on when the same younger tourist shouted again. “Finally, some activity more in accordance with nature,” agreed the old lady. “The female is mounting him!” shouted the first. (Bear with me as Martha, even up to the time I write this, has not attempted anything…without the blessing of the Almighty.) The whole time that Martha had been laughing, she had been coming closer to me. And now indeed, she was in the position that I described above. She leaned forward. I said, “I hope you know what you’re doing because I don’t.” “Watch this”, she said. As she was just about to kiss me, she spun about and shouted: “God!” The looks of horror, indignation, disappointment and conceit were all over each one of their faces in varying degrees. At this point neither Martha or I could hold our amusement in. We laughed hysterically as Martha descended to make some coffee generously fed to us in a Donut Dunker brand coffee bag metaphorical trough. As the tour walked away and the window was closed, I remembered what had just happened. I commented, still laughing in separated spells, “You know, I’m glad you stopped because I’m telling you right now if you were ever to…I don’t think I could resist.” “You could,” she said without looking at me. She brought me the coffee with her eyes down the whole way. “And you would.” I was worried that this was a negative statement in some way. “What do you mean by that?” “Just read me,” she said. “Does the Oculus have to know.” I’m afraid. She told me. Without the knowledge that I’m doing everything I can to serve Him. I don’t think I’ll have the strength to be a martyr. Two things. I replied through thought. First of all, if you’re doing everything you can to serve him you must know how you serve Him. How are you serving Him? By loving Him? How are you loving Him? By serving Him. If you truly do one, you won’t fail in the other. She looked at me in wonder. “I wish that I could think as optimistically as you do.” “I think that could be just because you’re more mature than me. I am at least slightly immature.” “Not anymore. I think you’ve learned a lot about yourself here. I think that might be why you were sent: to truly learn for yourself what you will have to teach other people.” She thought for a moment. “I f you love God with all your heart, with how much of your heart can you love me?” She stared at the floor. I did not know whether she was serious or not. “The answer is simple.” I replied. “God is all things beautiful. If I love you with all my heart, God will be happy that I love something, so close to his heart.” I was curious to hear her reply. Unfortunately I did not get an answer. At least I didn’t get a verbal one. Fortunately, I got a light kiss from the one person in this, my current, world that mattered most to me. “You said two things.” “I did.” “Is it a good thing or a bad thing.” “A very good thing. You couldn’t see it just now while we were talking about such a sensitive and ominous topic but I am still dreaming, no matter how real it may seem.” “Continue,” she urged. “And as a veteran dreamer I have just realized that I can do many things here that others cannot.” Her face lifted with hope and a slight smile appeared. “It could be just from my veteran dreaming status or it could be that I have been granted them. It depends on whether you’re on our side of democracy or not. But I have seen some of what will happen to us and some of what we must do.” “Tell me!” Martha said hopefully. “I can only tell you some.” “Why?” “Because I don’t know that much.” She looked away. I looked at her and thought I needed to try to get everything I can possibly know. And, as it often happens in dreams or elsewhere, love can make you do things incredible. In an instant I had the whole plan laid out in my head. I began blurting it out as fast as I could. “We need to convince someone to let you out and you go with them to any television reporting company. There should be a lot around this place, especially for our trial. Then…” “Wait!” Martha interrupted. “Are you crazy. The Oculus can hear all of this. This entire plan is now doomed.” “No, I can’t tell for sure but I think the Oculus will soon be working for us.” “You are crazy.” She said happily. “Yes. I know. I’ve been told many times and I’ve decided that myself many times too. But anyway… You have to tell the reporters that you’ve got a great story. Tell them that you’re an escaped prisoner and…whoa…Luke. You should proofread this whole divinely inspired plan thing.” “What?” “Go and tell them that you’re an escaped prisoner?!” “Why not, the movie industry bought the rights to the Fifteenth Civil War and choreographed most of the battles. They don’t care what they do, so long as they can make money off of it. The populace doesn’t care either. If it’s entertaining I’ve got a full popular pardon.” “Well, can’t I just get out that way too?” “How interesting would it be for two prisoners to come up and say, we already escaped? The money to recreate the escape alone would not be viable.” I sighed. “Stick to the plan though. It sounded great until you stopped.” “Well, tell them that you’re an escaped prisoner and that they should secretly film a really good court drama that’s going on in the capitol building. I guess that’s where we are. Then, when I say “olives”, have them start broadcasting to as many tv’s on this planet as they can.” “Olives?” She said in rather sarcastic tone of disbelief. “Yes, olives.” She composed herself again. “Alright.” “Well, there you have it.” I told her triumphantly. She looked at me, shocked. “I think you missed something. You missed something like the part where both of us escape.” “Oh, I didn’t even realize that. I couldn’t see anything about that.” “Oh well.” Martha sighed. She walked over to a closet and took out a pair of jean shorts that were no more than a jean thong in reality. She rummaged in the closet and found a positively tolerant see through tank top. “Well, I guess I’ll have to blend in.” I just waved at her to put them down, picked up the phone, waited for the operator and said: “Yea, I’m one of the prisoners downstairs, could you connect me to room service.” I love the way tolerance treats its prisoners! Seventh Chapter T wo hours later, a tall, attractive blond (no, its not me, the only thing I am there is blond) with a close-fitting black skirt that came to just above the knees and a white blouse with a ruffle v-neck, was walking through the door of Porn and War Studios. This was conveniently situated near the towering capitol building, both to get at the first news of a new civil war or riot and to easily intercept Paris-Hilton-style home videos which frequently occurred in the Alliance government. Of course this company was quite famous for its own storylines and screenplays. They specialized in both the gold and silver screen. If this studio had not been within walking distance, I can look back and see that…well…you be the judge. Our excellent luck, though not so improbable possibility, was that there was an entire shopping mall in the capitol. The majority in the Alliance was, understandably, very consumer oriented. It only follows naturally that the government which is for the betterment of all its people would have a very nice set of clothing stores in their capital building (along with any other type of store you could think of. The room service attendant who answered my call was thrilled to help this escaped prisoner and soon-to-be television star, as she was now describing herself. As this gorgeous specimen of moderately well-covered body stepped into the lobby, she looked around for someone who she thought could assist her. She didn’t need to look very far. As soon as she took her stylish sunglasses off, every director and producer in the room ran to her and began offering her million dollar contracts. Pitiful. Martha thought to herself. I wonder how many of these jobs involve filming with actual clothes on. She managed to suppress her disgust and realized that moving slowly to the owner’s office in an aloof manner would only increase their groveling. Martha had them wrapped around her finger. The plan was working perfectly. Ignoring the secretary’s protests, she walked boldly to the door of the office and threw it open rather quickly. It swung hard and hit the wall, causing a huge rip in the plaster. Martha was completely at a loss for what to do. The whole plan was down the tubes. She told herself that she was getting way too into this. She stared at the owner. She put on the most defiant face she could manage, placed one hand on her hip and put her leg in a slight contrapposto stance. She was so depressed inside. She had failed. The owner stared back at her for close to a minute and then said with a crack in his voice: “How much for ten years?” Martha was so thrilled, and not by the contract offer, that she resumed her charade with unstoppable vigor. “I’m not interested in a contract at this point.” Every man in the room sighed (and some movie star women too). One shouted, “How about dinner?” Martha turned to the direction of the exclamation, feigned thought as she ran one of the stems from her sunglasses across her lips and then rolled her eyes in ultimate disgust. Lucky for both of us, she could have had a career in acting. “I’m here with a story for you…” The owner laughed. “Wow, an intelligent bombshell too. I thought all the intelligent women wanted to run for political office.” Martha was tiring of this. She tapped her foot impatiently on the ground and threw back her head to shake and reposition her hair. All noise, wisecracks, or other exclamations instantly ceased. “I said…and don’t interrupt me this time…I’m here with a story for a live and reality court drama.” The owner stared in amazement. Clearly he was not regarding her in this light. “I am an escaped prisoner,” Martha continued. “Get a camera in here, now!” “Way ahead a’ ya’ boss,” shouted a producer. Martha held her excitement inside with the skill that only movie-stars possess. “I escaped from the capitol building and there is going to be a huge court case going on in approximately one hour. You should be there. There’s going to be a dramatic speech given by a prisoner there who I am deeply in love with.” “This is awesome. Get me a special ops crew in here now. We paid off the architect when they renovated the capitol. He created passageways all over the building with power outlets every sixty feet. We can get anywhere in the building unnoticed.” This is going to be easier than I thought. Martha told herself. Luke, fame, here I come. Waiting within the lonely hotel room, many thoughts came to my head. I thought about fear. I thought about love. The main thing that I thought about was something a little bit more…human. It was a little bit less noble. I was second guessing my actions and my plan of actions. Why was there such an enormous difference between the beliefs of myself and Laddie Vladdie, for example. Why did there have to be such enmity and such difference. There were so many questions that I had to ask. Had what I been doing been the right thing to be doing. These are enormous generalizations of the fine details of where my thoughts journeyed during that lonely hour from the time Martha left to the time of the trial. If there can be only one correct belief, then how should it treat the other. I was certain that our belief shouldn’t be treated the way that the Alliance was treating it. They were claiming that our beliefs were disrespecting them. I still firmly believe that my beliefs uphold true virtue except for this one problem of how to treat the other side. If mine is right, should the other not be resisted with all effort? Christ, that same person who has been persecuted ever since His ignominious and (at the same time) glorious death, taught both that we must love our neighbor. Though he may sometimes be our enemy, we must show him love. Jesus Christ, that name which people feel insulted by, in schools and government and laws, did the owner of the name not also teach us to spread his doctrine to all parts of the earth? Is this not His command? How do the two… “Come on you. You’re coming with us upstairs.” I still didn’t have an answer as they escorted me up to the courtroom. I guess I’ll just keep doing what I do. Yes, never give up. I won’t give in to weakness…(that was not the end of this truly contemplative discussion.) I pulled myself together using all the strength that I had remaining. For all I knew, Martha might be arrested and detained and will be dragged up here any minute. That sounded like a possibility. Then I remembered that only human plans fail. I think I would be right. Martha and I will live to see…see what. We’ll see this world’s apocalypse. I remembered now that I couldn’t get back downstairs from the third floor. I had not figured out a solution for that problem. Let alone getting back to the third floor. As I walked into a small chamber with a hydraulic lift, I put on a face of defiance, not of congeniality or compassion. Defiance, I concluded, was the most powerful defense for this situation. It was not. Resolution is a much better word. At the time, that wasn’t the word I was thinking of. “Get on,” they told me, pointing to the hydraulic lift. Wow, I get to enter this place Coliseum-style. Great. Martha, I hope everything goes well for you. At least I got you out. Good luck. I hung my head for the few seconds before the hydraulic lift opened out into an amphitheatre of a court room. It had all the trimmings too: cheering crowds, praetorian agents in black suits and sunglasses, and there, next to good old Laddie Vladdie, was the President of the Alliance of Democracy himself. I could see from the way that his attendants crowded around him, he was the one that gave the imperial thumbs up or thumbs down. Just like the emperor, however, all of his power rested upon the people. He had to go with their will. “Order!” Laddie Vladdie shouted so loud that he turned red. The populace continued to roar. “Order!” he shouted again. It made me lean to the praetorian on my left and whisper: “Don’t you have microphones?” “It might interfere with how well the people can hear the commercials,” he replied in a very matter of fact way. This made me smile. It made me smile at first because I thought this fact in itself to be humorous. Then I smiled because I realized the perfection of the plan which I had received. Every person in this courtroom could see on the big screen what I was actually saying and how I was saying it, instead of the car ads that they were watching. If everything was going well for Martha, the plan would work perfectly. Laddie Vladdie didn’t bother to shout again. He leaned over to the president who in turn gave a nod to the technician sitting in the place where a scribe would usually be. The technician, who was in full military regalia, took a large remote, pointed it at the enormous screens suspended from the ceiling of the stadium. He clicked and what he put on the screen made me lose all semblance of my defiant and dignified attitude. I laughed uncontrollably when an ad for some of that world’s best brand of beer. Often times attempts to legalize or endorse sloth and unbridled self-servitude are so absurd that you cannot help but laugh. Everyone who wasn’t paying attention to the skyscraper cooling goodness of refreshment was glaring at me. I managed to stop and wipe the stand up straight. Laddie Vladdie began. “You, Luke…(he looked at the technician who just shrugged in reply)…we don’t know your last name but I don’t think that anybody here really cares. Luke, you are charged with belonging to the cryptic cult…” “Do you know of any other adjectives that you can use to describe that. It’s kind of insulting my beliefs when you say cryptic.” Our Laddie didn’t know what to say. Neither did the president upon his throne. They looked at each other for a second until I added… “Could I have some whipped cream on that too please.” Once again. The members of those guards, interrogators and the tribunal who were listening frowned once again and then Vladdie nodded to the technician. The technician smiled and played a dubbed over clip of my last statement where I appeared to say something about the president being a common colloquialism for cat and then a breeder’s term for a girl dog. I simply shook my head and waited for the next statement. “As I was saying before I was so undemocratically interrupted, you are charged with being part of the cryptic cult known as the Cornerstones of Truth. Do…you…want…to confirm that?” “No.” Vladdie and the others looked at either with a great amount of self-satisfaction. “I mean,” they quickly shifted their attention back to me. “I know that I believe everything they believe, but in my world they call it the Roman Catholic Church.” They all gasped. The thing that confused me though was that the populace in the balcony above me gasped before I even said the central phrase. While the rest of them were busy gasping in response to my actual statement, I looked up and saw that the initial gasp was to a new horror-thriller involving a porn star and a werewolf. I looked back down at the throne in pitying disbelief. “Are you then a servant of the old master known as Elijah?” “Elijah?! He was taken from my world in a fiery chariot thousands of years ago. It was considered legend that he had not died while on Earth, my planet,” I added. “It was said that he would return at the end of the world.” “How did you know about…the end of the world…That is strictly classified government business.” “Well, everybody knows that the worlds going to…wait….that’s it! Everybody’s so oblivious, they don’t know that this world could end at any minute. You’ve been trying to keep it from them! I have to tell them, but…” I couldn’t have been happier than to hear in my head: What did I miss? Anything good. The glass ceiling just above the enormous television screens smashed into a million pieces and a camera crew and a director in his chair came down from the opening and landed on the top of the screen. Then there followed, not quite the angel that I knew from the garden at the farmhouse but an angel that would probably have been classified as “Charlie’s” in my world. She descended on the service access stairway some of the way with the camera following close behind and the director shouting at the camera men. She then realized that it would take far too long and would be far too unglamorous to continue this way. She reached for her belt and took out a grapnel hook on one of those fancy launching guns that you always see in movies. She swiftly fired it with movie-making precision. It worked so well, it made me wonder for a second if it were computer generated or not. (if you haven’t learned by now, don’t take me seriously all the time.) She gracefully slid down the cable right into the technician’s box. Needless to say, I don’t think I’ve been more relieved to see anybody in a dream before. I don’t think the Pope himself could have saved me any more efficiently. I definitely don’t think he could have saved me anywhere near as stylishly. She was unexpectedly brandishing two large automatic pistols and with these, she persuaded Vladdie, the president and the technician to put their hands in the air. “Ask him how he got here,” she shouted menacingly at Vladdie. “How did…you get here?” he said in a barely audible manner. With a threatening gesture from Martha, he asked again much louder. I was about to answer when it occurred to me to look for why the president’s guards had done nothing. I watched as producers from Porn and War Studios swarmed the guards and insisted that they fill out the paperwork for appearing as extras in this great new film. “How did you get here!” I spoke the next few words with unyielding determination. “By eating an entire…bottle…of…olives!” Martha gave the signal and two burly cameramen pushed the secretary of the television out of his seat. They took the remote and began putting my personage on the screen live. The populace in the balconies and bleachers had been speechless this entire time. Now that I appeared and the initial intense excitement of the daring rescue had somewhat diminished, they began to cheer and howl for more. Martha had done her part. Now it was my time to shine. I leaned dramatically on the railing of the defendant’s box and began. “You like to see a happy ending no doubt. I am sorry. I cannot give you one, this time.” To my surprise, the crowd became silence. “What I can give you, is something better. A noble ending. Something that you may still see in some movies. I can give you hope if you listen. There is time for you to realize that this world is not entirely about protecting your own beliefs. That this world is not about insuring your own pleasure. This is not my world. I do know, however, that any human being is meant for more than himself.” There arose a mumble in the crowds but this was quickly shushed down as people in a movie theater do. “Do you not feel it? You may not everyday but I guarantee you that you have felt it before. It all comes down to loving another. And I think that those cheers that you’re sending up right now mean that you are not understanding me. I am speaking of what you’ve been watching on the screens before.” I couldn’t resist looking at Martha and she didn’t reject the look. “More importantly I’m talking about the feelings which occur in the heart and not the body.” There was complete silence now. “I think that you can recognize that. I’m glad you can see that. I knew that you could. Now, is it in accordance with that feeling…love…to bring people to court, possibly to execution, because I don’t think you should do some of the things that you do? Am I trying to hurt you? I can tell you right now (the next few words I spoke with dramatic vigor) I am trying…to help you.” The crowd roared with the thrill of the moment. I wondered how long this good vibration would last. “You could consider it, I won’t bother you, you won’t bother me. I don’t. I consider my duty to be not only the absence of bothering you or disrespecting your beliefs but aiding you in any way that I can. I encourage you, people of this world, to love love.” Here, there was such an outburst of applause and cheering that I was forced to stop and the sound crew hastily turned off the microphone to prevent blowing out the speakers. I considered my job nearly done. I looked at Martha and she gave her new look of movie-star approval. Then she banished her charade and the real angel flowed through in a laugh that gave my heart more courage than I could ever need. “I’ll tell you what needs to be done…” I was interrupted by my worst fear being realized. Martha and I had been oblivious, throughout my speech, to the movements of the secretary of the department of television that neither of us had any chance to react when he put her into a headlock. I was outraged and started to climb over the railing of my box to assist. Before I could do anything, there was good old Vladdie holding one of the guns that Martha had dropped and pointing it to her head. “Stop this foolishness now,” he ordered. “I am very much accustomed to your sorcery of love. I am not dismayed by it, as you can see.” I started to jump again but Vladdie replied: “Oh no, Luke, I wouldn’t do that if I were you.” He repositioned the gun closer to Martha’s head. “Listen to me now. I will pass sentence as the president is not prepared for this sort of thing.” A look from the president started several praetorians creeping towards Vladdie’s position. “You are going to be executed and we’re going to do things a little bit backwards just so your noble revenge cannot be enacted. We don’t want anybody getting too angry. So, I am going to kill you Luke…we don’t know your last name…right here, right now.” He quickly raised the gun and pulled the trigger…nothing happened. “Do you really think that they’d give me a real gun?” Martha managed to say. “Arrest him.” Shouted the president. “Fine. Hold her still. I’ll beat her to death with this…play gun.” With all the movies he no doubt he had watched, it is surprising that he didn’t see Martha’s legs come up and push him right off the balcony. To both of our dismay, it was the end of Vladimir Ulianov II. “Put on some kind of movie,” ordered the president. I was crushed by the realization that it had all been lost on them. “You have proven yourselves very worthy of the punishment that I am about to give. Most of my people believe that what I am about to sentence you to would not be a punishment at all, especially with the appearance of your lovely companion. I am neither as idiotic as my people nor as fanatical as Vladimir. I realize that something more insulting to your beliefs than death, as I know death is very highly regarded in your cult, would be much more efficient.” All cameras were now fixed upon the president. The entire plan had been a failure as far as I could see. “I sentence you to be placed in an observation cell and not given food or water unless you engage in at least…six hours of sexual relations every day, for the viewing pleasure of my people.” The populace cheered at this broadcasted announcement. It now became clear to me that the Roman bread and circus had been replaced in this world by porn and chicken. Martha wouldn’t look at me and blocked my thoughts. I knew that this was quite a setback of a development. I won’t lie however. There was another element which I think is obvious that both Martha and I were contemplating. This kind of contemplation however, was the self-interested kind. “Take them to the breeding chambers!” ordered the president with theatrical power. “Good luck and smooth sailing my fellow actor.” The president said to Martha. She lunged at him but was instantly restrained by the guards. She struggled the entire way down to my position but managed to attempt a strong kick at the secretary of the television. He laughed at its missing the mark. While he forced hilarious laughter, he tripped on a cable and fell off the balcony… Eighth Chapter I don’t remember much after that. The guards grabbed me. I remember that and Martha was lifted, now a bit more pacified, onto the hydraulic lift. I sank out of sight of the amphitheatre and all hope of resolving either my situation or the situation of this entire world. I came out of my deeply-depressed state. I hadn’t felt that way in several months and I haven’t returned to it since. I was dwelling and obsessing over the facts of the situation. Fact number one: this world was going to end and next to nobody cared. Fact number two: I had failed to make an impact in any way. Fact number three: soon we would all be gone and my efforts would be nothing. I was literally decaying as my hunger and thirst increased unnoticed, my heartbeat slowed and my brain sank deeper and deeper into despair. I never noticed but I found out later that Martha was reading my thoughts the entire time. She chose, for the better, as we shall see, to keep them to herself and allow me to go on. This continued until we arrived at the breeding cell. I can tell you that anger and revenge were much more on my mind than pleasure. I stared at the crowds gathered at the observation windows above. I stood up and shook my fists at them. They laughed, not maliciously but at the excellent entertainment they were receiving. I sat down and collapsed on the ground. Martha tried to help me up but I forbade her. To think that there are times when we attack the people and things most dear to us because our anger is excessive. I searched my thoughts and found others in my mind. They were trying to communicate with me. I could see from her face that Martha had felt it too. One came through louder than the others now. “Hello? Are you the ones we’ve been thinking of? Are you the ones who made the rescue attempt and broadcast at the capitol?” “Yes!” Martha told them. “You tried too then?” said one. “There’s nothing we can do,” said another. “Don’t say that. The Merciful One will save us all.” Wow, so they have the equivalents of Muslims down here too. I thought. “Yes, I think you’re referring to my comment. They didn’t like my beliefs. They said that they were too geared at changing the minds of others. They said that they weren’t tolerant enough.” “The followers of the Merciful One are peaceful and are very much like us but some of them used to be criticized for wanting to change the minds of others to believe,” explained Martha. I was not listening to most of this but I guarded my thoughts closely. “Yes, I have much in common with the beliefs of the Cornerstones but we differ in some things that we do not want to lose. We disagree with you in some matters but ever since the Alliance began full persecution we disagree and cooperate to help the world at the same time. Each side does not attempt to change the other. We trust that if we excel at living justly and with charity, those who are truly looking for the right will find it. We leave that to the individual and to the Merciful, the Almighty, God.” I chuckled at what I perceived as great naivety. “Clearly your world is quite different,” the Lord from the Northern Kingdom said with noticeable disappointment. Martha did not rebuke me as she wanted to, but watched me the entire time. She waited for the perfect moment to bring me back to the light. “If you laughed at him, them you might as well laugh at me. In fact you’ll probably laugh even harder. I am a homosexual.” “What the hell are you doing down here?” I shouted audibly. “Do you really think that they only persecute those who have different beliefs? I’m down here because the populace doesn’t understand that no matter what your stance, you must practice true tolerance. I advocated for the fair treatment of those with differing beliefs.” There was a thoughtful pause. “They…they…most people, if they don’t truly think outside themselves, try to suppress anything that goes against their own desires.” I had given up all hope for this world and almost all hope for my world. “It’s just natural,” I said in a defeatist tone. All the thoughts in my head stopped. Then Martha spoke quietly: “And that’s the beauty of it. Faith and altruism goes against nature. Discrimination and false tolerance are as natural as excretion or disease or…death.” She said this last, pivotal world so quietly that I could barely hear its vocalization. Its thought, however, rang loud and clear in my head. It nearly deafened me. Instead, I held to my dark thoughts with all my…selfish…might. Anger is truly one of the most selfish feelings that we can have. But, it’s natural; right? All of these thoughts built into rage. The more they were resisted by the wisdom in the cells around me and my loving companion next to me, the more I fumed inside and increased my defiance of the world. I thought that the things I was about to do were protecting what is right by destroying what is evil. After the events of the past two days, a legendary dreamer like myself should have known better. Still, being a legendary dreamer, I now called upon the powers which my dreaming status had awarded me. With a blast of light that blinded Martha and all the thoroughly disappointed tourists behind the observation glass, the observation deck and every floor above it were shattered and the rubble plummeted from the heights down to surround the protective aura that I had placed around Martha and myself. Only the section of the floors directly above our circular cell were effected. Martha with amazement and myself with grim satisfaction gazed up into the perpetual evening of this world’s sunshine. Martha looked at me with fear, not wonder, not happiness at this avenue of escape. I blasted out corridors between the adjacent cells and called to their occupants in a majestic voice: “I am called to obliterate evil once and for all. I will do the will of the Almighty by raising all forces I can and destroy the Oculus and the Alliance of Democracy. Do any of you wish to receive some of my powers and join my crusade? I can hear your feeble and foolish thoughts of protest and love. Love has failed the Almighty. Action is what is now required. Is there not one of you?” “I’m with you until the end of time!” Martha shouted with tears in her eyes. “No matter how wrong you may be.” “I am going to overlook that statement since I will require your assistance in my work. Rise and follow me.” The two of us launched in a blaze of light from the ground up into the opening and the blood-red sky. I could sense the location of the Oculus and as I streamed through the atmosphere I heard a voice in my head. It was not from Martha, who was lagging behind. I didn’t at the time know where it came from. It spoke to me. “And so you have come…Anti-Christ.” Ninth Chapter I followed my senses south. I followed them far south. So far south that the circle of blood in the sky began to pass out of sight around the other side of the planet. Martha realized, as she followed that we were hardly prepared to confront the Oculus on the nethermost point of the world. I sensed her fears and commanded that a cloud of heat surrounded us during our approach. The entire passage from our cell to the Temple of the Oculus was completely free of intervention from the Alliance forces. I began to become uneasy, even through my arrogance, as I was certain that the advanced Alliance military had some form of air force with which to counter our attack. My anticipation led to a determination to prepare any arsenal that I possessed against such an attack. I communicated to Martha which attack patterns to use. Martha felt guilty when she heard this. She had been observing the Gargoyle 911-2 class aircraft that had been following them by the thousands. I sensed her guilt angrily and swung about with a blast of blue light that passed through their ranks, taking the majority of them with it. It passed off another million miles until its enormous and blinding fluorescence disappeared. This was followed by an explosion “greater than the power of the sun”. Martha quickly dispatched the remainder with several bolts of chain lightning. As corny as this may sound, I can tell you that I was considering efficiency and glory more than popular opinion. We sped on for another few seconds and landed flawlessly in the barren landscape of the South Pole. I yelled: “What were you thinking? Did you want to get us both killed back there?” “They were way behind us. You just wanted to destroy them. You could have forced them to land or something like that.” “Can’t you just listen to me?” I yelled furiously. “I thought you believed in the will of the Almighty. I thought you loved me.” “If you looked with a little more charity you would find that I do both of those things even better than you do.” She retorted angrily. She had had enough of being yelled at. I did something then that I never thought that I was capable of or would ever allow myself to do, even in a dream. I raised my hand to strike her, proud in my superhuman strength. Sometimes with force of will, and force of love, a human can do superhuman things. Martha caught my wrist and gripped it so tightly that I, the Anti-Christ, cried out in pain. “I love you!” she yelled and threw me back. “I wish you loved me back.” She said sobbing. The heat wave surrounding us failed when my pride had been crushed by an angel of the Almighty. Even so, I got up and ordered her to follow me as if none of this had happened. I doubt, however, that as Martha pulled herself together she could notice the tear that fell from my ever-stern and ever-arrogant countenance. It froze before it hit the ground and was lost forever in the snow and ice. “There’s the temple,” I shouted through the increasing storm. I didn’t care how Martha responded. I kept pressing forward with only the dwindling ember of my conscience considering her well-being. The enormous door was made of mahogany. I found this surprising since this was a heavily guarded military facility. Or was it? I could not see a single guard, soldier, technician or pilot anywhere in the vicinity. This wasn’t saying much, though, since the storm kept both visibility and audio perception to a negligible level. Even my arrogance failed me when I looked at the symbols which were carved upon the door. It was a depiction of biblical scenes from the planet Earth. There was Noah, Adam, Moses and in the center, an enormous radiant triangle with a fiery chariot and a passenger in it, just below. Above them all was the ultimate symbol of death and life. “The symbol of the Almighty,” Martha informed me reverently. I bowed and crossed myself without acknowledging what a blasphemy that action was. I tried to open the door but it didn’t move. It didn’t even shudder. It didn’t waver. In fact my hands seemed to be frozen to it for an instant. With my hands still stuck to the door, I turned to my loving companion and joked: “Pretty cold out here, huh.” She pulled my hands off without effort and I couldn’t help myself from screaming as soon as they were removed. The skin was melting and blistering as if from a third degree burn. She tore off her sleeves and tenderly wrapped my wounds. She didn’t even look at me the whole time. I was starting to regret everything. She took the door and threw it open with minimal effort and with no injury whatsoever. I glanced up at the triangle and chariot and realized that both had been turned to molten fire. “Come on,” Martha said in frustration. We walked down high-ceilinged columned hallways until we came to a large central chamber with a balcony higher up on a stained-glass rotunda. “What exactly does the Oculus look like?” I asked Martha. “I doubt that anyone besides the president and the personnel here have any idea,” she whispered. “Come on,” she said again. “This must be it. Let’s go higher, maybe its up in the rotunda and we can see it from the balcony.” I ascended the stairway with all of my intuition and arrogance utterly gone. Martha was far ahead of me. She reached the balcony and peered into the rotunda. She scanned the top and then brought her gaze down. As her gaze came about level to her elevation, she put a hand to her mouth and recoiled in horror. I couldn’t see anything where she was looking. I ran to her and held her, hoping that she would forgive my incredible insults and hatred to her. She hid herself in my arms and pointed to where she was looking. I too, would have hidden my eyes if I could have. There, was suspended where the stained glass lighting from the rotunda concealed the subject from my old vantage point. There was the Oculus. I saw what appeared to be a woman. I could not see the color of her skin or hair because of the eerie light that shone upon her. She was held by her arms chained at forty-five degree angles to her torso and by her legs at relatively the same angle. She rested her head upon her chest with her hair draped in disarray around her neck and obscuring her face. She spoke in a voice that seemed to emanate from the rotunda and not from her mouth. It made the entire building tremble. Needless to say, it made me tremble too. “And so you have come….Anti-Christ.” I gathered all my courage and started to speak while still barely controlling the shaking. “I came to destroy you. But…” “You are too late. I am going to destroy myself.” “But now that I see you, I want to save you.” “Do you really or is this more of what Laddie called “sorcery of love”? I doubt from what I’ve seen of you. I’ve seen everything, you know. I’ve seen that you’ve tried one way and now you are using your full power to destroy everything that stands in your way. I can see everything and I know your actions.” “But not our thoughts,” Martha protested. The Oculus laughed weakly and so sadly that Martha continued without waiting. “We will save you,” insisted Martha. “You forget, that your thoughts are eventually revealed in your actions. Your sorcery of love has failed. I am going to die now. My life, if you can call it that, has been what you and the old master called hell. I am passing now to the original version. It’s all that I’m used to.” “The sorcery of love will not stop one as wise as you. I agree. But real love will.” “Real love! I have watched the last century of this world and have seen none of it!” “If you could see it now, would you show it to yourself?” There was complete and total silence within that temple, haunted by despair. Slowly, the Oculus began to speak: “I…I…would…” Martha had been preparing for this ever since the Oculus had expressed her plan. She instantly began: “Do you see this human being here?” The Oculus smiled. “I know you do.” Continued the noble Martha, the Angel of the Alliance. “You know how he has treated me? You do!” I cringed and the words cut to my heart so much that I was about to agree with the Oculus in her plan of action. “I…love…him!” The building shook and there was a sound that was heard around the world because she who saw everything, for once in her existence wanted to left everybody hear. She laughed. Not a sadistic or sarcastic or depressed laugh. But a laugh filled with the accumulated happiness of an entire century. Martha and I smiled at each other. The Oculus finished laughing and then spoke: “In the name of Jesus Christ, His Father and the Holy Spirit, that I’ve heard so much about yet now feel, would you let me down? For the Love of the Almighty, Merciful and Tolerant God, free me from my suffering!” Martha, as always, was thinking at least one century in front of me. She found a gilded and golden lever and pulled it. There was a sound of clicking and mechanisms and then the victim of knowledge was lowered down to the floor of the rotunda. We ran down the stairs and rushed to her side. I turned aside for the sake of modesty as Martha tore down a tapestry to drape her in. Like Adam and Eve, we had not noticed her lack of garb until she had been brought to the full knowledge of evil, which she understood well, and good, which she had just learned. We raised her to her feet and urged her to walk. She explained and drew attention to her eyes saying: “I can’t. I’m blind.” We both looked and realized that she may have had eyes but they were sealed tight by their lids. “My time is over. Even whether I want it to end or not. I have served my purpose. I destroyed the Anti-Christ while he destroyed me.” “Don’t talk like that.” I said. “You didn’t destroy me. I didn’t destroy you.” “Do you really think that the Anti-Christ is a human being. The Anti-Christ brings destruction. So does hatred in the hearts of truly good men.” “Thank you, I think.” Again, I felt bad about my levity in such an inappropriate situation. “That’s good. Never stop thinking.” We had been carrying the Oculus this entire time and now we reached the door. Martha stopped me hurriedly. “She won’t survive in this weather…” the door was thrown open and a burst of cold air blew into the hall. The Oculus groaned and it seemed that she aged in one a few seconds to be in agreement with the time she had been in this world. “I go now to see Him.” We looked speechless at the cold and now thoroughly frozen body and then our attention was drawn to a glow from outside the door. I don’t need to give an in depth description of what and who was there. All I need to say is that I saw two fiery horses and a man with ragged clothing and eyes that glowed with the blessing of the God of Abraham and of Isaac. The old master, Elijah, I thought. “The underdemons said that they killed you.” “The underdemons seek only their own interests. If they had not set that bait, you would not have awakened them.” “They certainly are very good liars,” I said and instantly felt stupid. “I have been coming back and forth between my original world and others where human beings are dwelling. I bring some of the best elements from each world to another. And most importantly, I bring the only truly important element to all worlds. Do not confuse incarnating with bringing. He was already incarnated on earth. Just like you must bring him to other places, I…I guess I have a head start on you.” “It is said in the holy scriptures and in the liturgy of the mass that you will be present at the end of the world. Does that mean at the end of each world?” Martha inquired. “I am the Baptist of the second coming. I have come for a reason. And don’t worry about a little bit of levity. Levity can be a part of Love when used correctly. So, I’ll have to say…Let me take it from here, Luke.” “Thank you.” I bowed my head. Elijah took the body of the Oculus from us and began to walk back to the chariot. “You don’t have much time left,” Elijah stated gravely. “You’ll find you don’t have any power greater than the sun but you do have enough power to get back to the farmhouse of Batis. “Batis!” I suddenly remembered. “Where’s your father?” I looked at Martha. “If the Almighty wants me to speak to you in language that you can understand, then I suppose I should say…simmer down, now…or something like that…” “Good try…” I began to say… “Who do you think drew the guards away from the temple?” With only a smile, Elijah snapped the reins to his fiery chariot and was out of sight as soon as he was off the ground. I was still watching the chariot (or where the chariot had been a second ago) when I heard Martha behind me: “Daddy!” I turned to see Batis with her in his arms, smiling and holding her tightly. I was about to ask but he was answering before I asked the question. “I couldn’t let you guys do it alone. I had to get some help though.” Several figures appeared out of the storm, which had been waning quickly since the arrival of the chariot. It appeared to be the remains of an army now. Half of them were wearing antiquated-style uniforms. The other half were clad entirely in fur. None of them were armed with guns. Those with the ancient uniforms bore halberds and wore energy shield belts. The others were armed with scimitars and the same defense mechanism. Defensive weapons were all they needed to protect what they loved. They all separated as a figure clad in white and a man in a fur robe passed through their ranks and embraced Batis. “I’m glad we could help” said the man in white. “We will come to your aid until the end of time, when the true path shall be shown,” said the man in the robe in a very poetic manner. Alright, so Martha made a really amazing rescue but I think the combined efforts of this world’s pope and the Imam of this world’s Muslims of the North showed her up. “Fine then. I see how it is,” Martha said playfully. (I think I’ll be glad to get back to a world where its easier to keep a secret.) At this point, the sun above us let off an enormous solar flare that passed the horizon next to us. “Go,” the pope urged. “Won’t you escape with us,” I asked everyone present. “This is our world,” the pope replied. The Imam kept silent. “We must stay. You are not of this world. You have more work to do elsewhere.” Martha looked at me silently. “And you two,” the Imam spoke, “the true love and the true love’s father, you must accompany him. If he leaves you behind, he will be leaving behind too much of his heart.” I looked at Martha and Batis. After taking a good last look at the people there and the Wooden Door, I said to my two companions: “Let’s go.” As we soared off in the direction of the farmhouse, the army below us let off a cheer that I will never forget. Each of them entering to the prayer that they were accustomed to. I began to worry, even though we were moving at the speed of a jet. The sun had been more and more active as we were making our way towards home. It was spouting more and more blasts of fire and light every second. We finally reached our destination and landed as fast as we had come. I watched the sun and was about to urge the Martha and Batis on but then I realized that they were all looking at me expectantly. My mind raced: “I came from….oh, right…I came through the wall on that barn right there.” “Well I’ve seen things I’ve never believed possible since I met you, Luke, but I don’t know how much that helps our situation,” Martha commented. “No, I think it does. Look,” said Batis calmly. He pointed to the wall that I was referring to. Emblazoned in molten lines on the door were the Triangle and the Cross and the chariot. “Come on!” Batis yelled and began running. As we rushed towards the engravings, neither Martha nor I realized that her father was not as young as he behaved. Just as the two of us touched the door and jumped inside, it happened. The sun shrank drastically and got brighter in the span of three seconds. Batis was still behind. As you can imagine, both of us urged him on. He panted and shouted to us that we should save ourselves. Then he said at a barely audible level: “This world has been both good and bad to me. It persecuted me for my beliefs but it gave me an angel for a daughter. All that matters to me now is that you two survive.” I wouldn’t except this. I was about to go back through the door and carry him when he found a great burst of speed and ran. We thought he was going to make it. He leapt just as we saw the supernova reaching out to envelop us and…he shut the door in front of our faces. The two of us were dumbfounded. For only long enough to regain our consciousness we stared in shock at the wall. Immediately after this time had passed I touched the door and looked out. We had only waited a second at most. That’s all it takes under those situations. All that met our eyes was the loneliness of space, the mystery of the stars and the bright light of a new star forming millions of light-years in the distance. Tenth Chapter Martha sank down onto the floor and would have cried hysterically if she wasn’t hoisted back into the air by a hand clutching her throat. There was no emotion left for my eyes but pain. I saw the leader of the underdemons strangling my angel. “Do you want her back Luke? Do you really? She interfered with your glorious plan. Without her there would have been no doubt in your mind of what had to be done.” He dropped her mercilessly on the floor. She gasped for breath. I was beginning to see the underdemon’s point of view. I still had at least one more world to redeem. I must begin correctly this time while I still have enough power. “We would ally with you in your glorious redemption. You must take the way of the warrior. You abhor tolerance don’t you. You must destroy what disrespects your beliefs. We could help greatly, Luke. If you will join with us. We will join with you.” “Yes, you’re right.” I was falling under the strong spell of this servant of the unmerciful, intolerant and cowardly. “So if you would just open the door for us, we’ll get to work.” Martha was tired with restraining her thoughts. She followed us all the way down to the door where I now knew I had entered. She threw demons out of the way as she went. “Luke, I thought you learned your lesson. I saved the world with you. I saved the world for you. I saved you for the sake of the world. You betrayed me once. You tried to hit me. I brought you back to reality…I love you and I always will… Doesn’t that mean anything to you?” “Martha, have you ever heard of sacrifice? I know you have. You know that it is almost always a good thing. I’m afraid that I must sacrifice love, even yours, in order to serve God.” “Oooh, please use a bit more tolerant word, my lord,” chimed in the underdemon. “I find that word somewhat disrespectful.” I stepped out of my stupor a bit (unfortunately only a little bit) at this major contradiction. I turned around and said to the demon: “Let’s talk this over a little bit more, shall we?” We turned and began walking up the stairs. The demon barely managed to keep up his congenial appearance and returned: “Yes, do let’s.” Martha saw her chance. “Listen Luke! If you want to serve God, you said it yourself, serving God is loving Him. Loving Him is loving his people.” “So…where were we?” interrupted the demon. “Wait,” I said. “Luke,” pleaded Martha. “Remember how our love conquered these terrible things?” “Shut her up!” the leader yelled and a large colleague raised his hand to strike her. He was shocked to find that his arm wasn’t moving because I was holding it in a grip which would have left an indent on an iron beam. “Come now, my lord. Let’s not get too merciful, please. You can’t do that while saving a world.” This lifted the spell a little more. I continued walking up the stairs, not listening to the babbling and desperate demon. “We had to climb all the way up to the chandelier to get the hands to that skeleton, just to have both of them break as we were opening that door. I don’t want to have to make a dead body do the work. It’s very inefficient.” Martha followed to a familiar place on the first stairway and as I reached the fourth level I looked down at her tear-streaked face and shouted: “No mercy. No tolerance. Only the will of God. And I want my will to be God’s will!” Martha stumbled on the stairs. She slipped creating a large abrasion on her leg. The world froze. Everything except for Martha and I moved. I looked down and my heart, as all human hearts, could not bear to see the one I love in utter pain and despair. Nothing made this girl give up. She pushed through the paralyzed demons and charged up the stairs. I was so enraptured with her, yet again, that I idiotically allowed her to come to me. She reached my position and said with a smile on her face, “What do we do now?” “I’m afraid we have to unfreeze the demons. But lets get ready for them. There’s the leader, right there. Do you know what I’m thinking?” “I may not have telepathy on the third floor, but I know what you’re thinking once again.” “Good.” I held Martha closely with her back to me and both of us facing the leader near the railing of the balcony. “Here we go.” The demons unfroze and the leader was shocked but undeterred by seeing Martha now directly in front of him. “So, what d’ya say? Be a good laddie and let us in, will you?” At this point, Martha, with my support raised her legs and placed a kick right in the chest of this leader of the servants of the unmerciful, intolerant, and cowardly. He fell over the railing but instead of hitting the floor with a hopefully fatal impact, he crashed right through the floorboards into an indefinite abyss. We heard him yell: “I’m sorry I failed! No, no, NO!” followed by the scream such as only he could make. The other demons panicked and pushed and shoved to hurry into the hole created in the floor. There was a great deal of horrible screaming. As it died out, I was about to confirm to Martha that all the things she said had been true when the ceiling groaned and the chandelier crashed through the floor in the center of the chamber. The third floor was soon to be no more. I need not go into the details of how we made it to the door since I have already described the stairs to you in depth. What is important is that before everything was destroyed, the two of us stepped through the emblazoned door and into the second floor “playroom” in my still-sleeping family home. “There are some things that will never change. One of those is that you altered, saved and enriched my life like no-one could have. Another is that, I truly love you for what you are, not what you try to be. My love will never end. And, as I am sensing now that you are going to wake up soon, even if I can’t be with you in life, I’ll be with you in your dreams.” A door appeared in front of (oddly enough) where the television stood. The angel, my angel, Martha, opened it, stepped into the third floor, now filled with luxury and all the statues and paintings. As the door closed slowly, she said again: “I’ll be with you in your dreams.” I sat up in my bed, in my room, in my house on Main Street in the unknown town of Boylston in the United States of America. It was now January 15th, 2007. A single, but sizeable tear, ran down my cheek, past my bittersweet smile onto the blankets of my bed and was lost for ever. Thank you for paying attention. |
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