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ethereal_fauna
Perpetually Distracted
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 Posted: Tue Feb 21, 2006 10:22 am Post subject: Finite Cosmos Final Chapter |
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Chapter 19 Finite Cosmos
I thought days may have passed, or perhaps merely moments, or maybe even a complete Turning. I really could not remember. My mind swam in a tumultuous sea of ennui and resignation, along with a faint will to resist. As awareness slowly crept into my shattered soul, my first regard focused on aching feet.
Holden and I walked along a rutted path. The surroundings were completely unfamiliar, and I became aware of my intense thirst.
“Where are we?” I croaked, my own voice sounding detached and strange to me.
Holden stopped and released my hand. He cupped my face tenderly and searched deeply into my dilated pupils. Tearstains tracked from the corners of his eyes, and sand clung to the sticky stains forming a silvery crust that framed the lower half of his face.
“Chakra,” he breathed my name, before embracing me. “You’ve come back to me.”
I returned his embrace, although impatience tugged at me. I wanted to know where I was, how I’d gotten here, how long had I journeyed. So many questions, and the pressing weight of diminishing time boiled inside me and threatened to erupt in a spout of anger. I swallowed my annoyance with some effort, and repeated my query.
“We’re traveling towards Miflim, although I intend to bypass the tree village.” He held my gaze momentarily before continuing. “After we found everyone’s dissected bodies in Aetna, you told me that you just wanted to go back to Diasis. You wanted to warn our people of the Aetnaen threat, and of the coming end of our world.”
Despair reclaimed me for a time, and Holden and I resumed our trek in silence. My heart struggled with the desire to just end it all now and be done with it, as well as a frantic yearning to simply run away and live a pretend life. That faint resistance found purchase in my churning thoughts at last, and began to swell into a desperate plan. I wanted to save our world.
“I’m going to contact the Dreamers.”
Holden made no response, and we walked several paces with the sounds of shuffling feet and twittering birds as the only backdrop. “How will you do that?” he asked at last.
I wasn’t sure, although I imagined if I could connect with Aayii and that Aayii could connect with the Dreamers, then there must be some way for communication to take place. I wasn’t even certain what I hoped to accomplish with this contact, only that it seemed much better than blithely accepting an unhappy fate. I slipped my hand back into Holden’s, and sought an audience with the Keeper.
My visions had always come to me, but I fumbled through my mind until I found that swirling mist, and then I shouted into the shrouded expanse. Directly the Keeper appeared to me, and I saw an image of myself standing before the great, saddened eyes of Aayii. I asked to talk to the Dreamers.
I will arrange that. You might not like what you find.
Before I could consider the implications of that statement, I felt my thoughts pulled along, and I tumbled in an uncontrollable wash, buffeted by the current of insubstantial contemplation. I beheld an even more shadowy vision of the gel-encased sleepers than what the Windows Between the Worlds had afforded me, and it seemed as if I squeezed into a coiled vine that funneled me into the mind of the nearest Dreamer.
The impulses of energy and thought fired around me like a lightning storm assaulting a lone tree atop a hill. The vine snaking into the brain of the sleeper absorbed the activity, but otherwise I remained alone in a vacuous space, devoid of any true cognizant thought other than my own. Another funnel exited this Dreamer and I entered the mind of the next, and again the sensation repeated.
I visited the minds of several Dreamers only to find that the spark of awareness had fled them long ago. The bodies continued living, the minds continued to generate the necessary impulses that the A.I. harvested, but that frail definitive ember that separates living beings such as plants from the more complex sentience of the Peoples no longer existed in the Dreamers. My words were wasted as if I spoke to the watery lettuces sprouting on the floor of the MotherSea.
Disappointment flooded through me, and I cried out in utter loneliness and despair. Head hung low, I eventually stood before the eyes of the Keeper once again. I existed in a predetermined universe, a finite cosmos that rapidly approached terminus. Suddenly my grief lifted and I no longer felt frightened or angered by the prospect. Realization dawned that this actuality basically was, and life existed for however long but always did eventually end.
Stay with me Chakra, appease my solitude and share my sorrow.
I had no need to consider, because the Keeper knew I’d stay before it even asked. Perhaps if I stayed, in time I could find a way to stop the Dreamers from passing. Or possibly something…greater.
My vision altered and my mind filled with innumerable ideas that weren’t my own. Voices poured into my thoughts, and reminded me of sinking in the shifting sands of Holden’s mind when I ventured there. However, instead of only Holden’s thoughts, I sorted through the thoughts of all the Peoples.
With deep concentration and the assistance of Aayii, I eventually organized my mind and focused on what I wanted to see. How strange, I reflected, as I peered down on my inert form cradled lovingly in Holden’s arms. I wondered at his anguish, because I found my own death a liberating experience.
The End
Last edited by ethereal_fauna on Thu Feb 23, 2006 4:33 am; edited 2 times in total
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Smee
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| Posted: Tue Feb 21, 2006 10:42 am Post subject: |
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Awesome 
A great ending that is a fitting closure despite the sorrow of it.
Congratulations on completing your second storygame, and your first main page one. 
Happy Writing 
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The path of my life is strewn with cowpats from the Devil's own Satanic Herd!
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Shady Stoat
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| Posted: Tue Feb 21, 2006 10:57 am Post subject: |
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Definitely the spirit of a bunny in there, if not the bunny itself 
Well done Fauna. A very satisfying ending to an IF epic.
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Ingrothechundyer
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| Posted: Tue Feb 21, 2006 2:11 pm Post subject: |
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| Great job Fauna
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Chinaren
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Ravenwing
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| Posted: Tue Feb 21, 2006 9:36 pm Post subject: |
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*wipes a tear* That was so sad to read. It is very interesting that both our storygames end in death, neh?
Sad, and wonderful, fauna. Good job!
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New Story: Glassbreaker Presently on Hiatus until further notice.
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Our greatest glory is not in never falling but in rising every time we fall.
-Confucius
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Mother Goose
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| Posted: Wed Feb 22, 2006 1:38 pm Post subject: |
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| A sad but always surprising and imaginative story! Thank you, fauna, and congratulations on its finish.
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kingcappie
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| Posted: Fri Feb 24, 2006 4:11 am Post subject: |
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Excellent story, just as I expected. 
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luvd
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| Posted: Sat Feb 25, 2006 3:13 am Post subject: |
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It's all finished  Lovely ending and a great story  
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