Chapter 12
#13 of Tales of Woe
Chapter 12 of Tales of Woe
Marko, September 29th, 8:02 AM
Space. Time. Neither can be separate from the other. Space, without time, lacks motion, change, beginning and end. Time, without space, lacks diversity, use, and purpose. Together they are reality, and there is no denying that. But reality is malleable. Reality introduces theory, a change without change. Reality shows us the variables, and some of us have the tools to see more than the standard three we're used to dealing with.
_ Reality is both like a river, and like an infinatum. Think of a river. Now think of every tiny molecule that flows through it. Each molecule has a path, a place it belongs in any frame of time. But the river is more like an ocean. Vast, seemingly endless. The river simply sorts this unfathomable multiverse. The river sorts between what is, and what is not. Those who get good with it, and make it more precise._
_ Think of an event. World War Two? Nine Eleven? The fall of Rome? The construction of Stonehenge? All adequate. But there are realities where some of those didn't happen. Realities that may or may not have turned out essentially the same, just with or without that event. But that's the simple part. Think of how many universes are out there, that the only differences are the color of a sofa, the livelihood of one beloved pet, or the naming of a child who fails to change the world. How many are there where the only difference is the isotope of an atom in a faraway planet, in a faraway galaxy?_
_ Now think on a grander scale. How many are there where the nature of physics, the rules we live by, are different? How many are there that state everything we know about reality is a lie? Or worse, subjective? Reality is infinite, but some of us can weed out the relevant and irrelevant. Some of us... are gifted._
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I awoke with a jolt. I'd seen Monday. Tomorrow. The day everything we know and love will be sent on a journey to its inevitable destruction. But that wasn't what woke me... What I'd seen afterwards was. Long after...
I'd glimpsed into a day, years after the fall. Cities overrun by wildlife, forgotten ruins and relics of a time when things were good. A world with monsters who's breath and sight could kill, and men who fought and smote their carcasses on the ground. People who remembered how it once was, and creatures that felt a global change... and yet. The world was at peace.
The world was without nuclear war, nature was taking back its land, and the people of the Earth let it. They helped it, and they used it to their advantage. The world was changing, and while some feared this change, most embraced it. No longer would we argue and bicker over politics or religion. Instead of justifying our distrust with religion and science, we justified it with fear and wisdom.
The world had become a better place to live, but at the cost of the lives of many. Many who didn't deserve that death. Many who didn't know it could even happen. And yet many who couldn't survive in this new world. Whether for better or for worse, innocents died in a world they understood, rather than being cast into a world they couldn't even begin to comprehend. It was left to the wise, the experienced, as well as the young, the new, and the still learning. It wasn't a dead world... It had hope.
I heard a whimper from the lion still asleep in my arms, and watched as he curled himself into a ball, his eyebrows knit, and the corners of his mouth curled into a frown. I stroked the long, golden fur in his mane as he continued to whimper, and saw the corners of his closed eyes begin to water. I felt bad for him, I could see the future and could understand the mechanics of time, but for the life of me I would never even begin to comprehend how or why he felt the way he did.
I decided to focus on him, his life, and how it played out. And instead of seeing the entire river, I saw but one path. I followed it, and saw how he grew up. Alone, single child, living out of town and being homeschooled. The only social interaction he got was when his parents took him to church. Every mistake he made around the people he thought were his friends he'd regret, but he couldn't take them back. From saying the wrong thing, to acting the wrong way, every tiny little mistake haunted him.
When he was nine, his parents moved across the country and into the city. There he started going to an all Christian school, and he made less mistakes with his old friends, but still regretted the new and the old. As he went into middle school he'd met Alex, and slowly he developed a crush. He wanted nothing more than to be with Alex, but soon that dream changed, and he wanted nothing more than for his parents to know how he felt, and for them to still love him for it.
He lucked out, and by ninth grade was holding hands and cuddling with Alex. They were good together, but they weren't entirely happy. Valen wanted so badly to kiss him, and for him to be the one, but something in the back of his head clawed at him and kept him from doing so. He was sure Alex felt the same, until Alex broke up with him, and shattered his heart. Valen cried and cried for days. He was so broken up by it that he couldn't hide it in front of his parents, and they knew something was off. He managed to cover it up, set them off track, and think it was something else.
The next year, his parents moved. They came to Amberstone City, and he went to another Christian high school. He'd gotten over Alex, he was fine with it, until a year later when he saw him walking down the street. Valen tried to make amends, but then someone else showed up, and together Alex and the fusky forced down Valen and made him feel like shit. Later, after the storm, Alex told Valen's parents about how they used to go out, and Valen's life was destroyed.
Everything he'd tried to do to be a good, proper person, was ruining itself. Two months later, I come over, and make him feel loved for the first time in two years. I helped him...
I leaned my head closer to his ear and whispered to him, "I'm here, don't you worry... I'm here..." The look of worry left his face, and his whimpering subsided...