LIFE

Volume One, Prelude - “Sunrise and Butterflies”
Written by A.J. Charlton

         In these times; these times of war, these times of great insecurity, there is but one thing that most, but perhaps not all, would describe as one certainty; one certainty of protection; one certainty of light; one certainty of warmth. That certainty, of course, is the rising of the two suns - Mohila, who is east and who is orange, and then later, Taknil, who is west and who is white. Each and every day begins with the beautiful warmth of Mohila. And this day is no different…
         From out of the sheer black and coldness of the night hour, and the darkness and the shadows of the moon - or as some would say, the forgotten third sun - comes a steady burst of vibrant orange, washing over the sky in much the same way that a paint brush water-washes paper. With its careful and deliberate strokes of color, the clouds are revealed, pulled out of their hiding place, their moody disposition exposed to the world. They are grey and heavy, holding on to their water desperately, squirming dreadfully, trying to hide their embarrassing incontinence from the rest of their peers.
         And beneath them, perhaps praying that their water does not fall and so ruin his introduction - for his introduction is always spectacular viewing to say the least - is Mohila, his massive face proudly peaking out over the horizon, over the ocean, tinting it the most captivating shade of orange. With him, he bears the gifts of heat and light to his old friend, the planet -- to Eronil. And Eronil, thankful as ever, responds - as ever - with a welcoming flock of large, plain white Butterflies, who rise from within the ocean itself and yet are bone dry, as if rising from the land; each one fluttering their wings eccentrically; basking in Mohila’s gifts, embracing the magnificence of the new day, the majestic glory of Life; of light; of light’s victory, once again, over darkness. Then they stop, all at once, and they open their wings wide and absorb the energy that surrounds them, sucking it deep into their souls through their torso. Their wings flutter again, this time slowly and graciously, and in turn, they themselves emit their own light back in the direction of Mohila; a golden light, that shines even brighter than his. The light of Life.
         The Butterflies dissipate in different directions - very deliberate directions, for these Butterflies have a purpose and a mission; a purpose and a mission that they must accomplish each and every day to keep the planet whole. Some fly East, some fly West. And there, past the Butterflies heading West, swoops the wonderful Pitractol. A creature - a bird - one of a kind - whom to describe as massive would be an understatement of the highest order. This bird, grey and old - older than any other creature by many, many aeons - is far more than massive; perhaps obscenely gigantic would be a more fitting description. From the edge of her beak, which itself must be at least the length of a large street, to the end of her tail, which must be length of a small city, is a distance so long and vast that even the fittest and fastest of humans would struggle to cross it in a day. Her wings, which, from tip to tip, are even longer than her body, and, from edge to edge are as wide as her tail is long, pull herself through the air elegantly and slowly, almost ponderously, covering relatively little distance; her enormous eyes simply taking in the sight of Mohila. And she is grateful for that sight; grateful that, at the sight of his unstoppable light, the darkness of the night hour has fled in terror. Thankful that she can now move again without the fear of demons pulling her to the ground and slaughtering her like they did the rest of her species when the darkness first came.
         On that ground, far below, a pack of wolves sit on a cliff-top overlooking the orange-tinted waters of the Cerenial Ocean. Together, in unison, they let off a haunting howl, acknowledging that it is time to start their journey to the feeding grounds. An elderly woman sits not too far behind them. In her frail, withered hands, she holds an apple, which she crunches on intermittently. Her eyes and the wrinkles beneath are focused on the sun; her entire consciousness entangled in its astonishing vibrancy. And with those eyes not once flinching, she takes the slightest of sips from a jug of water and smiles a patient smile, as she does every morning. She takes another crunch of her apple, allowing the delightful juices to seep in between her teeth, as she does every morning. Then she waits and watches, with an air of serenity and expectation, as she does every morning.
         The day has begun. And she asks herself; could this be the day where everything changes? 

Volume One, Chapter One - “Blackout”
Written by M.P. Ragghianti
Story by A.J. Charlton


         The dark, rotten cell oozed emptiness and stunk of loneliness. Bitter cold mist crept slowly but mercilessly underneath its rusty steel door; invisible to the eye, scentless to the nose and silent to the ears, but chilling in its inevitable, unavoidable, icy-cold prickling of the flesh.
         Priscilla huddled herself into the corner, as far away from that door as possible; her spine digging itself deep into the frosty wall behind her; the hairs on the back of her neck stretching desperately up from her pasty skin, as if trying to pull themselves free from her body; her arms wrapped hopelessly around her ankles; her chin buried deep into her knees; her agitated hands picking furiously at her toe nails; her teeth clattering together rapidly in between her quivering pale blue lips; her skinny, naked body shaking uncontrollably in the chill. Her gigantic green eyes fixated themselves on the steam emanating from her every breath; floating upwards, outwards and eventually disintegrating into nothingness. That breath was the only evidence of heat that she could now remember, but it offered her little comfort other than in the fact that she was still alive.
         To her right sat a cheap wooden table; her only form of company. Nothing sat upon the wooden table but a thin light blue layer of frost, and no cheap wooden chair accompanied it. The cell didn’t have a window; there was no natural light, and only a speck of vividly dim blueness, which originated from the corridor outside and shone dully through a small glass opening in the rusty steel door, provided the ability to see.
         The walls that encased her were padded, here and there, with what had probably once been white cushion, but were now brown and moldy and dingy and smelly. It smelt something like a cupboard full of rotten fish that hadn’t been opened for months. The bumpy, uneven stone floor was hard and uncomfortable to sit on, and that seemed to intensely multiply the feeling of coldness that sharply and consistently bolted between itself and Priscilla. The low, flat ceiling that loomed over her brittle figure like some kind of evil, shadowy creature was covered with what looked like horrible, dark green slime, mucus and a range of other unpleasant and unmentionable substances; it was disgustingly dismal and was lined with cobwebs from spiders who had probably frozen to death many years previous. This place was the true definition of Hell, thought Priscilla. She was definitely going to die here.
         And as she sat trembling in that same spot in that same corner of that same miserable, dark and bitter cell, the same confusing questions would bounce around uncontrollably inside of her increasingly tired and bored brain. Why was she there? How long had she been there? Was it day or was it night? Which city was she in? Which country was she in? When would she be fed? Were they just going to let her die, or did they need something from her? Who were they anyway? But for the questions she had not one solitary answer, or at least not one solitary answer that she could remember anymore, or that she could be sure of, or that made any semblance of sense to her whatsoever. She didn‘t know why she was in jail, or even if she was in jail; and if there was a reason, and that was uncertain to be sure, then she had forgotten it long ago. She felt like she’d been in there for months, but, truth be told, it could have easily been weeks or even years; it was impossible to keep track of time in such circumstances. Her gut instinct informed her that it was daylight outside, but that was probably only because the days in the world of Eronil were almost infinitely longer than the nights, and the laws of probability therefore suggested that it more than likely would be day. Not that it mattered much anyway, because regardless of the time, the dim blue light from the corridor always seemed to remain the same exhausting levels of dim and blue, and the bitter cold temperature always seemed to remain the same spine-tingling levels of bitter and cold; neither of the planet’s two blistering suns were anywhere close to bringing her light or warmth or protection, and day and night were now just one and the same thing; distant, fading memories with little or no relevance to Priscilla‘s current existence. The only existence she had at that moment was that cell, and that breath that flowed upwards and outwards from out of her mouth before disintegrating into nothingness. The existence of both of which, she was beginning to loathe.
         The questions sometimes seemed to form an orderly queue at the door to her brain waiting patiently to be answered, and she’d try to deal with each one of them in turn - but the conditions she was in - the coldness, the darkness, the hunger and the terrible fear that surrounded her consciousness - made it impossible to concentrate herself on any one particular thought for very long, and then they’d start to uncontrollably  bounce around inside her brain again like plastic balls inside of a spinning dome, making the task of figuring out the answers to them a frustrating, tiring and almost impossible task.
         She would often try to organize those thoughts that her brain could easily compute, even in the circumstances, into as structured a fashion as possible. Those thoughts were limited, however. Her memory had become little more than an empty void waiting to be refilled. She didn’t remember much at all from her life prior to imprisonment. She knew that her name was Priscilla, but she didn’t know much more. And she had only one real memory – her sister, Athena. That memory, was the one that kept her going. She believed that the other memories and thoughts, the ones that she couldn’t recall, the ones that would doubtlessly answer many of those questions that bounced around inside her brain every day and every night, whichever one it currently was, were still in her mind somewhere, but that they were somehow being jumbled, scrambled or outright blocked by something, and were simply being replaced by static and confusion and more plastic balls to be tossed around the spinning dome that was formerly her brain…
         Time passed slowly. And with hunger, the coldness grew colder. And with fear, the darkness grew darker. And with each and every passing second, the next encounter grew closer. Yes, she hadn’t always been alone in that cell. She hadn’t always been in that cell. There were times – times that she’d rather forget – that were far more terrifying than mere coldness and darkness.
         She sat perfectly still, shivering, as she seemingly always did, on the stone floor. Her spine still digging firmly into the stone wall. Her hands still wrapped around her bony ankles; her chin still sinking deep into her bony knees. Her big, tired, green eyes still fixated obsessively on her own breath. And then, she heard the clunk of footsteps from down the corridor. And with that, her body stiffened. Her eyes jumped to attention. The hairs on the back of her neck stretched out far and high. Fear overwhelmed her soul… He was coming.
         She gripped onto her ankles even more tightly than before. Terrified. Her lungs puffed out steam at a more rapid rate than before. Petrified. Her heart filled with anxiety and beat like a persistent drum, so frighteningly loud that she could hear it vividly through her own skin. The coldness and darkness and dinginess of the room seemed irrelevant now; her mind was focused solely on those footsteps; those footsteps that were getting ever nearer. His footsteps. She gulped, gripped her fingers together tightly and shrieked. Her eyes, focused on the door and nothing but the door, filled with panic and despair. What torture could he possibly bring with him this time? Was he coming to beat her again? Would it be the rats? Please don’t let it be the rats!
         Visions of repulsive rodents from a previous experience filled up one half of her brain; the other half was filled by the pain of his brutal fists on her face from another. It was hard to say which was worse. She closed her eyes and she could once again feel the ghastly sensation of their rough fur crawling over her face, their yellow teeth biting at her skin, chewing on her flesh until she couldn’t scream any louder, and his clenched fists pummeling powerfully at her weak body until it bruised and wept for mercy.
         Clunk. Clunk. Clunk.
         The loud, heavy footsteps reached the steel door. She wept, and under her breath begged for mercy. The drumming of her heart became louder and louder and faster and faster. She had nowhere to hide and nowhere to run. Her breathing was shorter and shorter and sharper and sharper. She had nowhere to hide and nowhere to run. Rats were chewing on her brain, their teeth tearing through her thoughts, and his fists - those big, brutal fists - were bruising at her mind. Then the door started to open, and she had nowhere to hide and nowhere to run…
         Her bloodshot eyes opened fearfully as he charged into the cell. With him came an exceptionally bright light that blinded her. She heard his footsteps approaching as he moved closer. Her heartbeat shifted from a drum to a thump. And he moved closer. Her breathing shifted from short and sharp to outright hyperventilation. And he moved closer. She could feel his dirty breath blowing viciously against her frail face. And he moved closer. The teeth chewing at her mind grew sharper. Her heartbeat grew louder. The powerful fists pounding at her brain grew stronger. Her breathing grew faster. The pain and the fear grew all around her. The situation paralyzed her. She blacked out, and he moved closer…