Chapter 6
The next morning Mary wakes to an overcast sky of dark menacing clouds; lightening crackles, thunder booms and icy raindrops fall from moisture-laden clouds. The morning reflects perfectly her mood and she looks out at the raging storm for with some satisfaction. The storm makes her feel so at home and wanted. The icy water washes away the foulness and lightening crackles in the air rebounding off steel building after steel building, and thunder booms. The storm is wild and Mary rides it with glee. Throwing open the windows and with arms spread wide she welcomes the tempest outside.
Calm, I am with you.
The voice sounds like it is next to her ear, yet when she looks nobody is there. She takes a deep breath, then another. The storm continues to sing to her blood but now she feels the fears and the hopelessness of the homeless as the try to flee to safety. She cares little for those she touches for she feels nothing but wrongness from them, but yet…. the weather may be hiding those she is searching. She takes a deep breath and then another; the storm outside starts to subside.
She feels intimate with the rain and the lightening, so intimate that she is reluctant to let them dissipate but the frighten voices drives her on. She cares nothing about the frightened ones but what about the others, the others that may be hiding, they may…no not may; they must be out there somewhere.
Mother Nature they call her, never realizing how close to the truth they are. The other…..who is this other…..the other does not have the patience for the gentleness that nature usually required so this naturally fell to her, though every now and then when her emotions went wild….well a glorious day such a day as today occurs.
By the time Mary opens her eyes, the storm is nothing more than a gentle rainfall. She smiles a welcoming smile. For eons, the humans have complained about the weather but they have no notion of what is required to stabilize the different areas around this planet when intervention is required. Most of the time it is preferable to let the weather happen naturally but occasionally a little help is needed and that little help she has always been more than happy to provide.
When it comes to the weather, Mary usually insists on consistency so as not to give the humans an unexpected surprise.
Humans, why would she think of them as such.
What is frustrating is that even though the weather has always been consistently good or bad in the various areas on earth humans still insisted in living where they were never meant to live.
And then there is the pollution. Sure they….who is that other in they…..they had made contingencies for the pollution and under normal circumstances it should not have bothered the weather for at least another eon but they had under-estimated human greed and it is this greed that causes much of the human suffering today. Mary gives her head a shake.
You are loosing it Mary, now you are thinking of yourself as…..well I am not going there.
Mary takes another calming breath, the rain gentles and the sun becomes just visible behind the clouds. Another breath and more calm, she reaches out not touching those who seek and not hunting so much as letting herself guide.
Her eyes snap open. Mary suddenly realizes that the hospital is where she needs to be. She dresses quickly and dashes out the door. She does not know what it is pulling her but she knows that something special awaits her at the hospital.
Mary runs to the subway and quickly scans the schedule to determine what train she needs to take then makes her way down to the platform. As she waits for the train, she becomes restless and paces until the train finally arrives. When the train stops she enters quickly and then sits in the first seat she sees free.
As the train surges forward she beings to think about human ingenuity, about how they have leap forward in their use of technology, their ability to design anything they require to solve whatever they perceive as problems. Need was the catalysis, greed the driving force.
She and the other had no idea that the humans were capable of such great leaps in technology at one time. As they watched the humans over the eons, they had seen the slow and steady progress they made; keeping their societies stable and secure. The last fifty years though, things had changed. What had once been slow steady growth had become a hotbed for the greedy and it was these greedy that cause the explosion in technological advancement.
The other…..who is that other….he always told her to watch for those who wanted more than they needed for it is from them that the most profound changes will come. Mary has to agree for she cannot remember one instance where a major change on earth was not the result of someone’s greed.
The stopping of the subway car and the entrance of half a dozen youths and an elderly woman interrupt Mary’s thoughts. The youths are harassing the elder as she enters. Mary probes and then turning her head looks back out the window of the car. She has little thought for the plight of old lady or for the harassing group as none of them burns bright and that brightness she now feels is what she is looking for.
Once again, her thoughts are disturbed but this time by the slap of a hand on the window she is looking out of and the brush of smelly breath against her cheek. Turing her head she looks to the youth that is crowding her. She estimates that he is no more than twenty and looking closely she determines that his origins are most likely from Jose’ and Marie, the pair that was located in the area the humans now call Mexico.
Her mind flashes briefly to the past and she remembers fondly how those two had spawned some very troubling individuals over the eons, though every now and then one would be born that was so bright that the stars paled beside him or her. She is trying to reconcile how she can know this when she suddenly realizes that it is one of these “bright ones” that she is in a hurry to see today.
Once again, the brush of bad breath brings her back to the here and now. The youth, as are his friends are leering down at her. It is obvious that they are looking to cause trouble and only wait for her to say something….anything to give them reason.
Mary does not even bother wasting her breath. There is no use; these youths are well beyond redemption. She raises her hand, time seems to slow for the youths; they see her hand come up to touch their foreheads, yet they are powerless to stop that hand or to escape. An image appears on their foreheads, flares, and then fades.
When time rights again the youths find themselves remarkable changed. Where once they thrived on giving others fear they now fall over each other to make sure that all in the car are safe and comfortable…. never again will these youths be a bother to another, except maybe by being too overzealous in giving assistance.
Mary takes one last look at the youths and goes back to looking out the window. Somehow she realizes that the change she just invoked will eventually drive the youths mad and finally into seeking death, for a spirit cannot be forced to change. Mary and…. and whom….who is that other….had learned very early in the project about the spirit. A spirit is born as it is and to force a change as she just did will cause that spirit to howl like a demon until it finally breaks.
It is their failure….their…. who is the other in their, she can almost picture his brightness, feel his touch, his warmth……their failure in their ability to change the spirit that has caused much of the human suffering over the eons. Even though they had been warned….they…warned but whom…he is so wise, so all knowing….who…They had been warned but regardless of the warning they tried a few times and every try ended in disastrous results, which in the end always resulted in the death of the human. Therefore, over the eons, they had discovered that they can guide the spirit but cannot force it. The problem with guiding of course is that the underlying flaw is forever present and because the flaw is forever present, the spirit eventually ignores the guiding and returns to its original predefined, imprinted behavior.
Mary smiles when she remembers the immense amount of time and energy that humans have spent on trying to determine what makes one human do what they do; never realizing that the answer was simple and right there
inside their own spirit. Hours upon hours, theories upon theories they come up with when all they have to do is look inside to realize that the truth is simple; the spirit is defined at birth and nothing can change it thereafter. Murders will always become murders regardless of their upbringing, as will rapist be rapist, wife beaters, drug users, radicals, and sadly enough, Hitlers will always be Hitlers.
That is not to say that some spirits do not take the long or hard path in getting to their final destination. Many of the spirits are conflicted between good and evil, or at least what they perceive to be good and evil. They fight but in the end, they follow what their spirit demands. Others follow their spirit’s predefined paths without question and when it is one of those rare bright ones, like the “bright one” she is to visit today…well it moves humanity one step closer to perfection.
Mary remembers this “bright one” but cannot place the how of it. She remember its birth and the way the spirit had burned so brightly, so promising that it had caught both of their attention; which is unusual in itself as a spirit rarely catches his attention…..his, yes the other…he is a he as this world would know him…..
The life span of a human is no more than a blink of the eye for them but in this mere blink of an eye, this spirit did much to renew their belief that there is a chance of accomplishing their ultimate goal. This “bright one” had given of herself, as very few did and in that giving she had suffered hunger, homelessness, beatings and rape, yet her spirit never wavered.
He had promised Mary that regardless of what was happening, she could be there in the end and that end is very close indeed.
He…promise….he….yes a vivid memory, when he makes a promise he keeps it, now only if she could remember who is the he.
The train finally arrives and Mary’s destination so she quickly exits the car and walks out from the underground subway station. Entering the street the smell assaults her senses. The smell comes from all around her, it penetrates her, invades. Pollution hangs in the air and the humans walk through it uncaring or unawares.
Mary takes a deep breath and then immediately regrets it as that very pollution she was just lamenting enters her lungs. Coughing, she reminds herself to take only shallow short breaths until she reaches the hospital. Taking one last look around her surroundings, she reaches out for the brightness. There, that is the way.
She enters the hospital largely unobserved, enters the elevator without so much as anyone blinking an eye and makes her way to the brightness’ room without anyone commenting. Entering the room, she comes across her first obstacle; the nurse is young, much too young and that spirit of hers does not belong in a hospital. If it were not for the coming, these humans would be sorry for the existence of this spirit.
Mary’s entrance stops the nurse’s activity; the needle stops just short of poking into the tube.
“Go, this one is mine and does not belong to you.”
Mary’s statement is so clear that it rings like a bell. The nurse stiffens for a brief period; the needle drops from her lifeless fingers.
The feeble voice of a lady quivers in the air.
“Is that you?”
“Yes bright one it is I. I promised you we would be here and here we are.” Mary replies.
“He is here too?”
“Yes he is. Something has happened and I cannot see him anymore than you can but I feel him; it’s like he stands close by my side.” Mary glances to her side in her attempt to identify the “he”.
“And now what?” the feeble voice inquires.
“Now what? Oh bright one you have given us hope when we thought there was none. You were true to your spirit and in choosing you struggled through life; you need not struggle in death. He has allowed me to give you anything, whatever it is you want. Say it and it will be yours, come sit by our side, choose to carry on…. tell me what is it I can give you.
By now, Mary has climbed onto the hospital bed and she lays the head of the old lady tenderly on her lap.
“Then hold me until I pass.”
“There has to be more that you want. All of your life you have done for others. You were born poor, you die poor but in the time between you gave so many others hope. Now lets us give you something.” Mary replies almost beside herself.
“Than give me your love.”
“Oh my dear bright light you have had that since the day you were born and you well know it. If you will not allow us to give you the desire that burns deeply in your heart than this we give.”
All the pain, present and past that she had ever felt dissipates into a distant memory. Joy and love fills her to the brink. She has always felt these two, always known they were there for her but never has she felt so much from them. It is as if they have dropped all that separates them from her and that they now hold her to their breasts. Visions…never has she seen something so lovely. Her mind would have been incapable of even imagining that such could exist, that such she would ever have the pleasure to see.
The two pour their love for this human into her very spirit and then take their “bright light” to places they have never taken a human before. Even in death this bright one asks for nothing, if all where like her….just imagine…The visions they show her are beyond comprehension for the human mind but the beauty of what they show affects the brightness deeply.
The woman could have asked for anything and they would have gladly given it to her but her answer surprises neither of them for the answer fits the spirit. Therefore, with little choice left and with little time remaining they give the one that spurred their hope all the love they can and the beauty that their “bright light” is experiencing is in direct relation to that love.
“Thank you.”
A nurse outside sees the burst of light coming from the homeless old lady’s room; she pushes the door aside. Inside she sees the old lady with her head gently cradled on the lap of a woman so beautiful that she glows. She sees a tear falls from the lady’s eye; so sorrowful is the sight that it breaks her heart. Even if she wanted to, she could not have moved as the light traps her much as the headlight of a car traps a deer. Such beauty, such light….the light flares so brightly that she screams and falls to the ground. How long she lies there, how longs she tries to blink away the blindness she will never know but she will never forget that when she finally does neither the old or the shinning lady are in the room. Trying to come to grip with what her brain is telling her the nurse runs to the bed and pats it as if that alone will bring back what is missing. Her hand hits something hard and the nurse picks up the only thing left of the pair; a gem so clear and bright that a diamond would pale beside it, so bright that it hurts the eye to look inside its flawlessness.