London, England

London, England.

A chilly morning, with mist in the air.

     I exit my stone house. It rests beside others like itself. A meadow lies across from me. The mist stands above it like a perceptual peace might take over it. Sparrows chirp from the rooftops, singing their own little songs. I pull up my coat to combat the cold. The sun continues to rise from the east, bringing light back to my homeland. The world will be waking up now, just as I have.

     Steam rises from my coffee mug. I take a sip and the black liquid runs down my throat. It is refreshing and wakes me up a little bit more. The mist limits my sight from what may be beyond the meadow. I believe a forest lies beyond it. I am not sure. Today will be a cool day. Perhaps even rain in the afternoon. The boys will enjoy that, I think. They've always danced around in the rain. Sometimes they sing too. I have never been one to enjoy the rain. It makes me sick. I don't like being sick.

     An hour passes. My mug empties. The mist begins to rise. I am sure the boys are getting up now. They tend to rise like the mist. I don't know why. They aren't normally as concealing though. The window to their room opens. Fresh air seeps into the house. The boys are up now.

     They would go to school this morning. It's Sunday so it will be Sunday school. I do think they enjoy Sunday school. They only ever complain about the reading that they must do. The boys find the bible very dull. I find the same thing. We have to read it though. In a couple hours we'll begin to walk to church. The top of the church peeks over the treetops that lie across from the meadow. The green grass is full with dew. Our shoes will be wet from travelling through it.

     Today is the Ninth of September, 1940. Last night bombs were dropped on our city. They have not yet reached our home yet. The Germans want to take us over. That's what the paper says. The boys are afraid. I am too. I have seen the ruins that the bombs make. They don't stand. The ruins are grey images of the past. I have seen the past before the bombs fell though. The ruins were quite beautiful once. If only this war never started.

     The war started on the First of September, 1939. The Germans started it all. It is a dreadful war. Over a year now it has gone on. Barbarians are what we have fallen to. Death creeps across the land. No one wants him to. He does anyways. Soon he will come. He will steal the boys away from me. There is nothing I can do to fight him. I am powerless. He is unstoppable. War is his dearest friend.

          Sometimes I wish the mist would not rise. I enjoy the mist.

     A delicious smell wafts from the open window. The boys are making breakfast. They will call me out to join them. I will refuse. In the cool of the morning I would rather be. The kitchen will be hot. I do not like the heat. It reminds me too much of fire. I like water. I do not like fire.

     Sirens go off. German planes have been spotted. The boys call out to me. They want me to go into the bomb shelter. I shake my head. “Have Faith.” I reply. My body warms with the world. I put my mug down on the ground. It chills with the ground. I step onto the meadow. My shoes get wet. I like water. I walk towards the church top. It barely over reaches the trees.

     Behind me, a bomb drops.

-Zero

Wanderer's Journal #9

       There was not always happy feelings between Marie-Lynn and I. I will recall a time, perhaps the first step leading to her murder. It was almost March in reality and I found myself drifting apart from her. It was the hate and violence she had shown that threw me away the most. While I did respect her for being brave enough to do it, I strongly disagreed with what she did. I expressed my worry for her, it seemed that she brought more negativity than there was needed. The strange feeling of mistrust brewed inside of me. I didn't understand why at first, but later I pieced it all together. I let myself believe what she said, but doubted it all the same. I grew sick of her, almost to the point that I wanted to scream. She had seized visiting me in my world, and I spent the years alone. I was glad she was gone but, she would find me in reality instead. I would smile at first, as if I couldn't even control it. Then she told me she was going to hang out with him. His name was Luke, I never bothered to learn his last name. He was one of those guys I just couldn't stand. I didn't trust him with her, I knew he would try to take advantage of her. He would take her under his wing and crush her with it. He would bring her into drugs then leave, with her there begging for more. She would become his little puppet, and it would not take long for him to have tried to have sex with her. He was the extreme of his kind. I warned her and she disregarded my warnings. I told myself that she would not end up being with him. I was wrong. She told me and I didn't like it. That's where in drew the line, I was going to disappear. I warned her one final time, then started to fade. She wouldn't notice my disappearance for a while, he would keep her distracted.

       But I was wrong. She noticed my disappearance, but I had found myself wanting her to. I found myself fighting against myself, a war with no weapons as to whether or not I would reply to her attempts to talk to me. Finally, I found the answer I was looking for. Two days had passed since my disappearance and it was tearing me apart mentally and emotionally. She was the only thing on my mind and every time I heard her voice calling out to me I wished she would come grab my arm and trap me. She did not enter my world, left me to my self induced torment. My heart raced every time I saw her, it was not according to plan. The answer to my problems for the time being was not according to plan either. I found her instead, and apologized for my rash actions. I explained everything to her, let her know my dislike for her new relationship. She accepted and forgave me, I was lucky.

        Something however came back, or resurfaced. You can't swallow hate, you would choke. I was angry, how could she abuse my trust? Surely she knew I would have wanted to know right away. He was scum, I didn't understand why him and not me. Why did I have to wait and he didn't? Why can't we go back to regular friends? They lasted longer than I did, much much longer. I felt discarded, used like a toy. Thrown away like I was broken. March was approaching slowly, this month was almost over. And perhaps even this chapter of my life, but you never did know back then.

        March came, and hit us like a train. There seemed to difference between days and to most people it seemed fairly regular after too. I found a change quickly, something I couldn't hold in any longer. It was the hate, coming back to ruin things once more. At first I kept it away from her, but that only lasted just under a day. I couldn't hold it in anymore, it was choking me. It slid out of me like a snake, ready to strike. She didn't know. Soon she would. It attacked, flaming words were thrown. She tried to retaliate, but her anger was nothing to me. Regular insults are laughable in my eyes, she couldn't touch me. Power corrupts, and that's just what happened. I was in power, a god among mortals. I'll tell you this now so you can remember it and not make the same mistake I did. Power isn't happiness. The argument was much shorter than usual arguments, she drew the line quickly. I remember before this argument she told me something I knew not to believe, she told me she needed me. She cut me out, cut me off. She vanished and at first I felt victorious, but what is victory when you have no one to celebrate with? It's a victory on paper, a loss where it counts. I chased her away, like the idiot I can be at times. You can win an argument with quick thinking and logic but you can't win someones love like that, only their hate. After she cut me out when I would see her, I couldn't look into her eyes. Actually when she was close by I couldn't look at her at all, it would have been the end of me. I couldn't stand the idea of seeing the hate she has for me in her eyes, even though I deserved the torment for what I did.
-Zero

Wanderer's Journal #8

     Back before all of this chaos I remember the competitions there were between people. Why did people wish to feel above another through some trivial thing, like marks on a test. I normally kept my marks a secret; I did not wish to reveal how I was different. I only did well because I wished to understand everything the teachers would try to explain, completely. There was no details I left out when going over things in my world in the nights following. I would not be surprised if I understood most things better than the teacher.
     People were the only things I could not observe in a controlled environment like that. I hated them. They were loud in groups and often had the attention spans of goldfish. Their brains were equally efficient, all of the teachers words went in one ear and out the other. They came in all shapes, sizes and colors, idiots were what comprised a majority of the population. I do not miss these people in this world, it's perhaps the only thing I love about it.
     I am alone and for once I dislike it. I wish Marie-Lynn could at least be by my side in this world. Something tells me that this world would have torn her apart, giving her just as many problems sleeping as I do. She was human, perhaps also different from the rest but she instead learned to ignore their stupidity. She learned how to blend into the crowd and seem just as normal as the person beside her. I never entertained the idea of looking like I belong with them; they were not my people. I would prefer the most deadly of animals over these people. Humans by nature are both easily predicted and unpredictable. They were capable of only small accomplishments, we were nothing special. We couldn't run as fast as a gorilla even. We weren't as strong as our cousin the gorilla either. Humans seem most of the time almost entirely based upon their intelligence. But what I see is not intelligence; I see ignorance.
     Many animals with smaller brains than we have seem just as intelligent as any human, sometimes even smarter. Many people would try and argue that if dogs and cats were so smart, why couldn't they speak? This is born of pure ignorance and idiocy. Other animals do not have the correct vocal chords to be able to speak like we do, it's not a measure of intelligence. Many other animals do not have opposable thumbs either, only other primates do. There were chimpanzees that painted and there were gorillas who did too. They were of course taught to do this but so were we. I think that the feral children should have been left where they were found, why bring an animal among ignorant fools? Most people would think that the feral children should be taught english and reintegrated into human society. The problem with this is that abandonment issues run deep and if you don't learn language by a certain age, you will never quite grasp it. These feral children would soon become adults living in a world they don't belong in. They understand animal body language better than anyone but can't explain it because well, their language skills are pathetic. A girl raised by wolves would know how to communicate with wolves and other canines as well at a level we can only just start to comprehend. Humans are also the only race that kills each other for trivial reasons as well. We are freaks in the natural world, we murder each other for reasons beside survival. Every animal, including humans is born with the instinct to survive and breed to continue the species.

     Humanity seems to ignore these basic instincts as much they can it seems. Look at suicide, it's an idiotic act that's unthinkable in nature. I understand why my grandfather chose to do it, but that does not make it an intelligent choice. People suffer from diseases of the mind, love, hate and depression. Love is perhaps the most influential and damaging of the diseases. Love can bring a man happiness but it can also tear him apart. See the best part about the world I used to live in was the freedom that couples had. If a man falls in love with a beautiful young lady, she can leave him broken and alone. This is where things get fun. Love is like alcohol, you bring in too much and you'll be happy, until you wake up the next morning. The moronic thing about it is that people still do both, sometimes even at the same time. Love leads to the other two diseases as well, oh how much fun this is!
     Hate is a powerful infection. If it becomes strong enough it will and trust me on this, begin to control you. It like love rids you of logic and common sense. Murder is most likely to be committed by someone infected with hate. Look at the murder rate that there used to be for husbands murdering their wives or ex-wives. It's actually quite high. This comes to no surprise to me, men are generally more susceptible to hate than women. Most men lack something called logic and a decent thought process.
     Depression is another effect that is brought by love, an end product. When someone leaves someone who loves them, it could bring either hate or depression. Depression is the cause of suicides, most of the time. It is not a pleasant feeling, you never feel good enough. Let's use an example here, take a healthy person and a depressed person getting back a test. Let's say they both score 100%, which is something to normally feel good about. The healthy person will take credit for the 100% while the depressed person will claim it was just luck, or was an easy test even when it wasn't. Now let's say they both got a 35% on the test. The healthy person is more likely to blame it on the difficulty of the test and not blame themselves as much. The diseased person however will and with plenty of belief, entirely blame themselves even if it really wasn't their fault. They would call themselves stupid and hate themselves for it. Depression is my favorite of the diseases of the mind however; I love the sound of someone calling themselves stupid.
       Humanity is at fault, we were created on this world, by this world and we destroyed it in return.
-Zero

Wolf Rock

My people used to believe that when the sun would set on the horizon that monsters would come out of hiding. The monsters were often described as aspects of nightmares, but what if that’s all they were? No evidence has ever been found of these so called monsters and, in this time, nobody believes the old legends anymore. The sandy beaches and tropical trees bear no marks of evil, and neither do the people who live here. It is foretold that one day the monsters would show themselves, a laughable tale. The tale also tells of a hero rising up in the darkness to save the people, a man of true courage and love. Back when I was a teenager, my friends and I would make jokes about the legend all the time. On Halloween we would dress up, have one friend as some knight in shining armor and have him slay us. It was all fun and games. We’ve outgrown the jokes and games, but now that we have kids of our own, we’re thinking we should tell them the legend and see what happens. My parents named me Wyatt Leblanc. But that’s just a name; it’s not who I am. My life really began when I found a strange stone along the beach.

It was a cool December evening, the night of the winter solstice I believe. The sun set earlier than any other day that year and a cold breeze blew from the north. The sand felt smooth and loose under my feet, eating each foot with every step. Behind me, light radiated from the city’s docks. In the ancient times, back when the city was just a village, going out on a night like tonight was suicide and they would actually do what ever they could to prepare your burial without leaving their houses. That evening they didn’t even think about the legend; I didn’t think about it either. I had been walking towards Wolf Rock, a gigantic rock named for its odd resemblance to a wolf head. I guess you can call it the Lovers Lane of our city. I was heading there to think, to remember, and to wish. I went to think about all of the mistakes I made with her, to remember the good times and to wish that they never ended.

The cold wind blew harder and I found myself thinking that I should have worn pants instead of cargo shorts. Shivers covered my body, but not from the breeze. They felt unnatural. At first, I considered the legend but I quickly dismissed that idea. It was crazy to say the least. Wolf Rock wasn’t far away when I felt something strange in the sand. I stopped right away and bent down to find what it was. I found a small rock that fit almost perfectly in the palm in my hand. Finding a rock was common, but the rock was smooth beyond belief. I couldn’t make out a shape so I pocketed it, thinking it would be nice to pet while I’m thinking up on Wolf Rock.

The thoughts I intended for later crowded my mind and Brianna popped into my mind. Images, of a woman around my age with hair that seemed to turn into fire in the sun and eyes that were both green and brown, flashed through my head. No! I thought. I’m too close to town still! I can’t let anyone see! Tears fought their way out of my eyes and fled down my cheek. There was nothing that could stop them; they were a marching army heading towards their next victory over me. I fought desperately, but I knew I wouldn't win deep down inside; I knew it was a pointless battle. But I fought for control nonetheless.

Brianna was the love of my life, the girl with flaming hair. The way the sun hit her hair ignited it, almost as if it was the fire of the sun.

Fire took over.

Fire knew all.

Fire controlled me.

Fire destroyed me.

But it was the ocean blue, the one I found elsewhere, that extinguished the fire that was taking me down to the level of those who's hearts had stopped beating centuries ago. The calming sea washed over me and granted me life, a life thought to be long lost. It was the only thing that kept me alive, her ocean blue eyes. Her name was Juliana. But even she could not save me from the darkness that the fire carried itself in.

It only lasted a few weeks before even the ocean left me. The fire did not return. No, this time I would be left alone in the endless darkness at the bottom of the rise I used to live on. All but the darkness hated me. Fire, water, wind and earth, they all hated me. That was my reason for going to Wolf Rock. It was no sanctuary to me, but it kept me sane and alive. It's dark stone could not keep me sane forever though; I knew that one day my insanity would return. The rock that was found in the sand would become something else entirely, perhaps even a portal into some strange world.

The great Wolf Rock was cold to my dead hands, and I tried to climb up it, but fell down. Screams echoed from the woods, just some people screaming for help. The moon was full about a week before, but no one thought that the monster would come a week after. No hero would rise up and save the town from the monster. It would consume the town as a whole, turning the population into cannibalistic monsters.

Wolf Rock would be my sanctuary, as I saw it. They would come, the abominations of nightmares, but I would be safe among their ranks. I didn't know why, but they treated me as one of their own.

She screamed from the top of the rock, Juliana did. She screamed much like Brianna did when I found her earlier, but Brianna was silenced quickly. I wasn't quite sure why. “Help! Help!” She screamed pathetically. No one was going to save her from the monster, hell, they had become monsters themselves. She became the only voice still alive as the monsters came towards us.

I reached my hand out for her, and gave her a twisted, but friendly, smile. “Get away from me, you monster!” She yelled at me angrily, throwing her words about as if they were solid weapons against the approaching darkness. But I, smart as I was, took the secreted rock out of my pocket and threw it at her. It flew through the air like a missile, colliding with her dreadful face with great force.

“Get... Down... Here...” I said to her, finding it surprising hard to speak. It was almost as if I myself had gone through some sort of transformation, but that was a crazy thought for me to have. She landed in the sand, a little stunned. I hobbled over to her, slowly working up a hunger. When she saw me, she began screaming again and tried to get up but her leg was twisted in an odd way. I reached down to help her, but she told me to go away; she told me to go to hell.

I saw her face twist and turn, warped by the madness that had taken over her. She had become a monster and recognized the hero within me; she was afraid. I was the light and I was beating back the darkness. She tried to attack me in some crazed attempt to save herself from retribution. But I knew what I had to do.

I stood over her. The hunger grew. I climbed on top of Juliana. The hunger grew. Her face was twisted beyond imagination. The hunger grew. I gazed into her cold blue eyes. The hunger grew. Unable to fight the hunger anymore, I sunk my teeth into her. Blood gushed forth. The hunger grew. The sweet blood sated my thirst. The hunger grew. Her flesh was soft. The hunger grew. Her flesh was delicious. The hunger grew. I devoured her body and soul. The hunger grew. The eye balls were eaten like olives. The hunger grew. The beating heart tasted the best. The hunger grew.

When she was nothing more than just bones, I left, aching for more food. The hunger overtook me, and I went to go join the others in the woods. My people were waiting for me.

-Zero

The Girl in the Leather Jacket

 

It was a mid autumn day that I came across a place that seemed invisible to the world. My last lecture had just ended and I wandered outside, absorbing the sun’s radiant energy. My eyes squinted at first, but quickly adjusted to this new light. I began to walk towards the bus stop, briefcase in hand. Something I had only carried as a joke at first quickly became my everyday object, or even my trademark. If my classmates knew me for anything, it would be my light brown briefcase. It’s nothing special, but it sticks out in modern day society. I am probably the only person in the entire college who actually uses a briefcase at all; they’ve gone far out of style. But it’s my style now.

I normally dress like any other young adult that attends college nowadays, but on occasion I like to dress up a little. I did the first day of school, after all. I walked into an unfamiliar building full of unfamiliar faces with a black fedora, dark blue blazer, red t-shirt, and matching dress pants and shoes on. I’m positive that I got quite a few odd glances here and there. One thing that I knew would happen, but I chose who I am over who they want me to be. I am by no means a serious person, I dress this way to send a message (and because it makes me feel pretty). What that message is you might ask? “It is not the clothes who make the man, but the man who makes himself.”

Anyways, enough about me, back to the story I was telling. It was a mid autumn day; I think it was mid October, to be more exact. I was walking to the bus stop with my briefcase in hand, in the clothes that I wore on the first day of college. My shoes tapped against the cement pathway leading to the bus stop and my fedora slept on my head peacefully. I was almost there when a gust of wind blew out of no-where (there were no clouds in the sky that day), stealing my hat away from me and stashing it in the ditch to my right. But this was no normal ditch.

From the road the ditch dropped about twenty meters before it hit its least shallow point. A stream swam through it, waving its way around the bushes that had made their home there. I remember looking into the ditch thinking that I’ll never find my little black hat in the blur of yellow and brown. I followed it in anyways, thinking “what’s the worst that can happen?” I took off my blazer and hung it from a branch, securing it so the wind doesn’t blow it away as well. I braced myself for small cuts and began to make my way through the bushes. The stream wasn’t very visible from the road; everything was hidden by the leaves and endless branches of the bushes and the trees. The search seemed utterly hopeless, especially once I made my way through the bushes.

The stream was perfectly clear and was carried along by the rocks that made up the stream’s bed. The trees almost seemed to sway from side to side together like a synchronized swimming team. In a way, they almost seemed like guardians, guarding this place from the evils of the outside world. It’s crazy, I know, but it still seemed like that was their purpose. They were guardians, and they had allowed me to enter peacefully. I came to understand that place as safe and hidden from the world. Years later that sanctuary might not have the same feeling to me.

Alone, I stood among the guardians, unsure of what to do in this place. I had actually forgotten why I was there to begin with. A voice came out of the natural silence, beckoning me to speak to Her. I tell the voice off, that my insanity must be cast off and ignored. But it was persistent, like a woodpecker trying to get grubs out of a new tree. We argued, back and forth, until eventually I gave up. I agreed that I would talk to Her, the Girl in the Leather Jacket. The voice faded, pleased with my submission.

Suddenly, I was reminded of my purpose in this forest sanctuary. My fedora, no longer stashed away from the insanity, rested upon a branch now, hovering right above the pure stream. I reached out to seize it, much like a hero seizes honor. I placed it back on my head, and risked a quick gaze into the waters below. The eyes that met mine were not my own in the mirror reflection. They were much darker than my own near-black eyes, and yet carried a certain light in them. I recognized them immediately as Her's. Trapped, I stood there, but reality beckoned me back.

I quickly left the sanctuary, shaken from the event. The voice returned to guide me to yet another downfall. I hated it, wished the greatest doom on the voice that spoke to me. But smile at me it did, and a warm feeling in my chest did it bring the next time I saw her. I stood beside her at the bus stop, and gave her a quick smile before I looked away again (I could not look at her for more than a few seconds). The bus pulled up, and we gazed inside of it.

“Looks like a full bus to me.” She said to me, mystifying me and confusing me. This sort of communication was unheard of in years past, a quieted whisper was all I could summon alone. But as we got onto the bus, Aphrodite came and aided me. The Girl in the Leather Jacket was her daughter after all. I was just a common man, so who was I to speak with daughters of Aphrodite? But it was the goddess who guided me to the Girl in the Leather Jacket, and to defy a goddess would be insane.

The bus was nearly full, with only a few available seats. The daughter of Aphrodite took the first seat near the front of the bus, and perhaps I should have stood there, but I continued down the aisle. When I found my seat, I could still set my eyes upon her. It was a twisted day, but pleasurable nonetheless. Many cursed thoughts would wander through my mind that day, like Maybe, in some twisted way, I actually do have a chance with her. This was reinforced by the voice when she looked back at me when the seat beside her became available. I was tempted, but too soon was my chance taken away from me by an unknown person.

“Hey, I thought I would give you some company.” I said to her when the seat was freed and taken by me instead. A smile, incomparable to any you will ever see, appeared on her face. My stomach churned restlessly and my heart pumped my blood at 163 beats per minute (abnormal for my athleticism). The voice laughed in its victory over me, still giving me the warm feeling around her. I began to shake, but I tried to hide it from her, the daughter of Aphrodite. I am still not sure whether or not she noticed me shaking, but I pray to Zeus that she didn't.

I would later come to realize that around Her I get the 'shakes' and even suffer from a small anxiety attack, giving me some sort of crazed feeling around her. I have tried, time after time, to cast away and ignore the insanity inside of me. But it stays like the voice wants it to. These small anxiety attacks would come to calm themselves around Her, despite her being the daughter of Aphrodite. The obsession the voice had with Her, the Girl in the Leather Jacket, would never fade though; it would carry itself around with me where ever I go.

We spoke for the rest of the bus ride, up until she would be picked up at the bus stop by her father. I sat down after she left, lost in the wonders of this daughter of Aphrodite. The shaking began to stop and my mind slowly became my own, but my heart would not. My, once thought to be cold, heart beat with the force of a thousand men and with the speed of a gazelle's flight. It seemed to be a curse she laid upon me, a curse that the voice praised. But the curse gave me strength, a certain strength that I hadn't felt before. It seemed to be another ally of the insanity that bound me so. It was at this time that I realized that the insanity had won.

After that talk on the bus, supported by both the goddess and the voice, we began to talk more often. We began to call each other 'friend', something I never thought I would ever be able to do. But this friendship, as deep as it ended up growing was never going to satisfy the voice. It hungered for more, like a starving lion does after eating a mouse. Nothing ever seemed to sate the hunger that the voice had.

I found myself in the ditch once more, this time in the winter time. Snow covered the ground and rested peacefully on the trees. The crystal clear stream had a thin layer of ice above it, giving it an enhanced mirror image. The sun, as rare as it was in winter, slowly traveled across the sky, fully in view. Its light came down upon us, the Girl in the Leather Jacket and I. I brought her here, just because the voice told me to. I knew my insanity would not end, even as I stood there in my winter jacket, shaking from something besides the cold.

I knew what I had to do. The voice had already explained it all to me. I was nervous, yes, but still confident, thanks to the insanity that cursed me. But no amount of confidence could or would make this easy, the request that the voice made. To me it made the insanity look sane. Winter butterflies danced around in my stomach, giving me flight but a sinking feeling simultaneously. The prized question, you know the one, was the one I had to ask. From Hell, I might be. From Heaven, she truly is. I looked the daughter of Aphrodite right in her eyes, the near-black eyes that carry that special little light in them. I took a deep breath.

And the question was asked.

-Zero

The Room

     The closed door seals the room away from the world.
A broken window, boarded up now, used to promise freedom from this fate.
     Darkness dominates the detached room, concealing the terrors hidden among it.
But this eye can see beyond the veils left there to block our eyes.
     It sees a death. but, in that death, it sees life come.

     Blood stains the broken knife on the ground.
A struggle that was never won, it seems.
     A flower blooms in the broken sunlight seeping in from the broken roof.
White is the color of the flower, as expected.
     A special flower, white with a dark core.

     Broken boards of various types of wood lie scattered across the small floor.
Some are charred, black like hate.
     But the fire that caused the hate was not hateful itself.
It was a passionate fire, that burned red, yellow and orange.
     It was a powerful fire, the fire of love.

     No flies circle the long dead corpse.
The man that lies here gave life before death.
     But no broken knife took life from him.
A sword, honorable and strong, lay beside him.
     The blood left long ago, for it was not worthy.

--------------------------------------------------------------

I thought I would write this story a bit differently. It looks like a poem, yes, and it might be considered one. But I wrote this like it was a short story, just separating the different sentences and keeping it short and sweet. Tell me what you think! It keeps me going and helps me get better (critize away.)
-Zero

Wanderer's Journal #7

     I think it's about time I explained what things were like back in those times, in reality. Reality was often cruel and unforgiving for our generation. I remember watching others and observing their corrupt ways. Corruption ran deep with my generation. Many children, some still in elementary school had already found their way to drugs somehow. It was a sad thing to hear about, for it made me worry about our future. The draw of sex reared it's ugly head at the females not long after they hit twelve. Boys, not men who were older than me went after these girls hoping to trick them into sex. Many times the females did what the boys asked of them, as disgusting as that is. Not only would these older boys take away their innocence, they would soon introduce them to the world of drugs. Drugs like marijuana were generally harmless to adults; they could heal. Children were different, their brains were still at a peak point of development and the drugs would damage the development. This could cause sever depression and addictions to these drugs, even the non-addictive ones. The endorphins in your brain would die off thanks to marijuana, one day they would return but it would take time. This time of recovery was often too long for most drug users; they began to need the drug to be happy. I will admit that this is perhaps the most pathetic thing I have ever seen. What a concept! To be a slave of something that does not live. It controls your mind because you let it and only you suffer. Many children our age succumbed to such problems, lost forever in a sea of tears. Perhaps one day they would stop but now they have no choice.
     I'll tell you what started all of this. Civil war. The war in drugs was perhaps the worst idea I had ever seen, I saw an uprising coming. With so many children supporting the legalization of drugs and the power the drug dealers held over the users, it was obvious what would happen. One day the government made a huge error, they sent in the army reserves to physically fight the war. The war on drugs had been a more political thing in my country but now the guns are being shot. The drug dealers saw something like this coming and prepared, preparing the users. See many of the users were relatively close to someone completely clean who didn't know. So when war broke out, the reserves found them fighting each other. There was no victor in those battles, no side went home. Then the government panicked and withdrew our troops that were off fighting in some foreign country because they did not know better. This is where I came in.
 
     See I was a nobody, I was invisible to everyone else. Marie-Lynn only seemed to notice me most of the time. I passed through peoples lives like a specter, almost like death itself. I never stood out to my fellow students, well except for when they would see my marks. They wouldn't remember me anyways. My grandfather on the other hand was an incredibly powerful man. He was the man who lead this country. He was the sole person who could call off the war on drugs and bring peace to our home once more. He knew that people would riot if that happened, most of them afraid because of all the propaganda surrounding drugs. But I'll ask you this, what is worse, a war between your people or little riots from time to time? I think the answer is obvious here, but he was afraid to do so. I knew all I had to do was say it and it would get done, for he trusted my judgement despite my age. Maybe he trusted me because I was one of them, I saw everything from behind enemy lines. I knew how to please the mass that I watched ever so closely. Marie-Lynn, my best friend and so much more tried to bring me to say it to him. I knew that his choice would get him killed in the process and I did not want that. He was a righteous and honorable man, he was honest and trustworthy. He was a very odd politician, but his determination brought him to this point, to this choice.
     She begged me to ask him, to murder him. I knew that I was not a hero, no matter how many times she would call me that. My head became blurred and my world became confused, emotions and logic do not mix well together. One day, right before he released the troops onto themselves I had a chance to speak with him. I said nothing and wished him luck. I walked out, empty now but filled with dark thoughts of things to come. Marie-Lynn begged me to go back, and I was about to. That was, until I lost it. Control has never been a strong point of mine, sometimes I snap back and it's never nice. I took my sword, a blade that was honorable like my grandfather; a blade given to me by him. I took it and pierced her in her large, caring, beating heart. I murdered her instead of spilling the blood of an honorable man. She was no worse than he was though and he died two days after, suicide. I was the murder of both and soon after he died, I ran away. This world was not safe anymore, and it's all my fault. There's a beginning to every end, why didn't I see it.


-Zero

Wanderer's Journal #6

   To tell you the truth Marie-Lynn was a girl of low self esteem. I never understood why, she was beautiful. When I finally was given the chance to explain the fire fully she fell to her knees, ashamed. She didn't know, and that was okay. I remember once she brought herself to apologize for being herself, a notion more caring than always seen. You see, by blaming herself the other person would normally feel better, but this blame was no ones. I hadn't even known, I wasn't even aware. I'm sure I'm not even aware of how much she cares for me. Sometimes I think she would have died to save me. She was a brilliant girl, and always surprised me with her abilities. She could learn from me easily by just watching me work, even when the work isn't visible.
   This journal was written as a recollection of feelings and events in my world and a little in reality. These were the events that caught my attention and captured me in the moment. I know that a terrorist attack was carried out in one of the years in reality, I think it was called 9/11. I will never understand how so many people found that terrifying, it's idiotic. Those buildings were built to survive a plane hitting them and somehow a plane clipping the side of one took it down at near free-fall speed. It is illogical to make the assumption that the planes were not just cover for the explosives placed throughout the skyscrapers. But enough of that, trivial events are not what I intend to write about.
   Marie-Lynn incase I have not mentioned has hazel eyes and auburn hair. Her eyes capture me every time I look into them. I never told her how much I loved seeing her looking at me in return because when she did, I existed in reality. Reality was not my reality in a way. Life is a perception of your own reality. Who's to say that the time, the centuries I would spend in my world would be lost life instead of an extension on a usually short life? In the time someone reaches the age of thirty five, I will have lived one more year for every night in those years. Let's say I created my world when I was ten, that would mean I, by the time I'm thirty five would have spent nine thousand, one hundred and twenty five years in my world. That's nine millennium in twenty five years in reality. That's countless hours dedicated to improving my mind and harnessing my thoughts. That's endless days in sweet serenity. That's my life.

   I never told Marie-Lynn about this journal, for I was afraid of how she would react. What if she didn't agree with letting another person read it one day, in a world free from this chaos. I suppose it doesn't matter what she would think now, considering the fact that she is long dead. By writing this wanderer's journal I preserve her memory and honor our hardships. One day, I hope to meet up with her again in my world.
   The last six months I spent with her after entering my fire were not bad at all. Actually they were quite good. She accepted the truth of the fire quickly and soon joined me in it. I showed her the passion and power that it carried over this world. She was soon able to create small animals, something I never thought of doing. We created fish for the lakes and rivers, even for the great blue that lies far beyond. We created squirrels and chipmunks who would feed off of the trees, and some lynx's to hunt them as well. This world, just like reality needed a balance between the animals. When the year came to an end we had plenty of living animals running around, ignoring our presence so we could observe them. It was something out of a regular persons most beautiful dream, and it was real for us.
   Reality the next morning was bright and hurtful on my eyes, this sun wasn't friendly. I checked the alarm clock thats display glowed a light blue, it was eight forty six. I had gotten exactly eight hours and forty five minutes; I fell asleep at one minute past midnight. I felt rejuvenated and strong this time. My mind was ready for the idiots of the world today. I did not have school that day, so I spent most of the time reading and writing, skills I mastered in my world. I could speak and write English, Latin, French, Italian, and Portuguese. My parents had no idea about my world so they were surprised when they heard me speak fluent Latin one day at the dinner table. Sometimes I can forget what language I'm speaking so I won't notice if I start speaking another one. My parents did that morning ask me what I do at night. They thought I had been studying languages every night for the past few years. If only they knew. To be honest I spent ten years studying each language, perfecting them. Which for five languages would be fifty years (I studied English as well). Fifty years amounts to fifty nights in reality, time seemingly lost to most. I was centuries ahead in all of my classes, which allowed me to ace every test and assignment assigned by all of my teachers. I had all the time in the world.
-Zero

Knife Life: Part 3

Part 3: The Attack

   The letter said the attack was coming in two hours. No war would be fought, it would be a slaughter. As it stands now, only two people inside of the city know about the attack. The worst part is that they have no power over anyone. They could tell anyone they want, and no one will believe them. This is the situation that Julia and John find themselves in now. John was an object of death, but only in times that he did no fighting. He used the natural need for certain things kill his victims, even fire was unfamiliar to him, despite having lit his first kill on fire. He was twenty-two back then, and a college student. He never learned her name, but heard that she was twenty. He came across her along one of his 'calming' walks in the Gatineau hills and ended up shooting an arrow through her stomach. She began screaming and he panicked. With his homemade bow in hand, he knew what he had to do. The second arrow hit its mark, right in between her eyes.

   He almost left the body there, but decided to try and conceal who she was from the world. Let's give them a little game. He had thought. In mere minutes he had already set her on fire (he had planned to make a campfire), and he watched her body boil and melt at the intense heat. Back then he only knew the basics of fire, but now, several years later, he has long forgotten the look of fire. He spent so much time in the dark, he forgot what the light looked like.

   “John... What do we do?” Julia asks him, staying close to him because she doesn't know where else to go. Fires would burn and destroy it all in a matter of hours. Nothing would survive, not if the men in suits got their way. The window's blinds slide closed by John's hands. The light disappears and they are left in the strange world that the ceiling lights create.

   “We don't have to do anything. We can escape if we leave town now.” He says, ice encasing his heart and his words. But a fire burns underneath that ice, melting it from the inside. Conflicted feelings arise inside of John's head. Can I really just leave? Or am I trapped in the grip of a thousand lost souls?

   “We can't just leave!” Julia screams at him, thinking that he is out of his mind. “We have to warn them at the very least!” John's head begins to hurt, causing him to shake his head. The pain stays, but finds an ally in Julia. “We do! What sort of cold twisted person are you?”

   “I am a murderer. I've killed thousands of people before, people I believed to be guilty. This is just another murder I'm committing, I just have to leave town so I don't die as well.” While his words signify a cold halfhearted person, he can feel the want to help creeping up inside of him. This want to help scares him; it's an evil thought. Evil like the sun shining on the meadows. Evil like the innocent child playing ball.

   “You weren't always a murderer. What were you before that?” Julia's voice seems to glow as it speaks, bringing John to a different world entirely.

   “John Mason!” The teacher calls out to the small third grade class. This is the year he'll meet her, a girl of his dreams. He has many dreams at this age, some while he's asleep and some while he's awake. By the time he will turn thirty-six, those dreams would be all but forgotten. A younger version of John raises his hand and opens his mouth, but no words come out. “Oh there you are. Say hello to John, class.”

John has just started his first day in a brand new school and nobody knows him. Only one person will come to know him, a classmate by a name long forgotten. What he will remember would be her black hair, near-black eyes, and light brown skin. Even in the darkness that comes to surround him in the future he remembers her. She becomes his first love, and perhaps his only.

   “Hi, John.” That girl with no name says to him at lunch time. He's shy and can hardly speak to boys his own age, yet alone a girl. What doesn't help is that he thinks she's the most beautiful thing he's ever seen, something even children understand. In the years to come, mostly high school, many boys his age will chase after this one friend of his for her beauty. But she will reject them all and continue to wait. No one is ever quite sure who, or what, she'll wait for but it will never come. A sad fate it is, but fate cannot be changed.

   “I was a fool.” Present day John says. “Nothing else.” John closed off his heart, and his truths, long ago. Perhaps he closed it off after she left, but he'll never be sure. Currently, he's oblivious to the ice melting inside of him. But soon, very soon, he will be unable to miss it. The fire will consume him and destroy everything he's become in the past twenty years.

   “You were innocent once. Now let's go. We have to spread word.” 

------------------------------------------------

I have way too much time on thursdays. Between writing parts of this story and studying for class, I actually go hiking in the woods nearby and write poetry when I am bored. While perhaps I might want to put more time into my creative writing and focus on one story entirely, the dreams I have when I am asleep cloud my mind. Of course a poem I conceived in Literature class is the one that most represents that dream of mine.

By Day,

A haunted man I wander. 

By Night, 

Twisted dreams and ideas I ponder.

Her hair swings from left to right, 

Tormenting me in the dead of night. 

I see nothing but her until I wake, 

My beating heart does she take.

I follow her much like a god,

Praising her like she is god.

She sees this deep within me, 

A crazed love, forever to be.

By Day, 

A haunted man I wander.

By Night, 

Twisted dreams and ideas I ponder.

The dream was spent with her, a girl you may see start to appear in many of my stories. Dark hair, dark eyes (much like my own, but much nicer) and light brown skin. I share classes with her, but there's always been this barrier between us. Something keeping us from going near each other. This something fascinates me, but I still wish to look into her world. Anyways, I've rambled on for long enough, time for some work. 

-Zero