ignored their pleadings. I hadn’t cared about their pain. I was a monster.
True. The presence sighed.
Then torment returned…
For each life I took I suffered. I experienced the final minutes of their lives, was baptized in their anguish, felt their confusion, their despair, watched their hopes and dreams die, breathed their last breaths.
But there was no end for me.
No afterlife.
No emptiness.
Only searing, grinding, ripping, unimaginable pain.
The ravenous beast of madness clawed at me, devoured me and spat me out but failed to diminish my living Hell. I begged for death, called to it like a forlorn lover. Yet no matter how close I came to that black abyss, the presence held it at bay.
There was no escape. Not from this. Not for me.
Then, after an eternity of pain and madness, came whiteness.
I don’t remember it stopping. But somehow I passed through the depths of hell and madness and emerged with clarity and wisdom beyond understanding. I knew what I’d done to those tortured souls. I’d lived every moment of the torment, confusion, and despair I’d thrust upon them. I’d died every death. I could never take back my actions. I could never ease their pain or undo the destruction I’d wrought.
That saddened me in ways you may never understand. And be glad you can’t. For to understand my grief would mean you’d committed equally heinous acts over which to grieve.
No. I’d gladly sacrifice myself to undo my past actions, but undoing them is beyond even the power of the presence who spoke to me.
You understand now, it stated.
“Yes!” I cried. “I was blind... Forgive me.” And I did understand. For the first time in my life I truly felt for others. I cared about them and realized the value of their lives. I empathized with their hopes, dreams, loves, and pain. I knew that I’d not only robbed them of life, I’d stolen them from the world. Their gifts, talents, and potential, erased.
Mine is not to forgive. That power belongs to one greater than I.
“I know.” Tears streamed down my face, pooled at my chin, and fell to the floor of my cell.
You know what you must do. There was no question. No need for an answer.
“I know.” I answered anyway.
Good. The presence responded, now go. The presence faded from my awareness.
And once again I’m alone.
But now I know what I must do.
There is another presence, a twin of that which showed me light. Its darkness gathers. It gains new followers and grows every day. It hunts the weak, the innocent, the valiant. None are truly safe from its influence. Unknown to me, I was one of its first victims.
I was a devil. I know its ways. I know how to combat the stain of its existence.
I’m reborn, transformed, a warrior blazing in a sea of darkness, a protector of innocence, a champion of light.
So great were my crimes that I may never redeem myself from what I’ve done. But I’ll never stop fighting because the darkness must be held at bay.
˜˜˜˜
There’s a faint crack in the wall of my cell, so small I’d never noticed it before. A bare wire lies behind it. I can feel it now. The current calls to me. I place my palm against the wall, the wall that’s been the limit of my reality these many years, and open my mind to the flow of energy. My molecules shift, electrons rearrange.
I’m pure energy.
I slip through the crack in the wall and merge with the wire. I race along the copper alloy to the circuit box, switch to the main feed and move on. In less than a second I’ve reached the main transformer for Hell’s Tower.
I imagine my body whole again. I leave the current and it is done.
Standing outside Hell’s Tower for the first time in years I take a deep breath. The air is caustic, stings my lungs, but it’s free.
I’m free.
I feel different physically, powerful. Strength courses through me. Lifting my hands I flex them. Veins and muscles play beneath my skin. Examining myself, I realize this is the body I’ve always wanted, taller, stronger, and healthy.
Before my body was slack, weak, wasted skin over bones. Now I look like a world class athlete.
My body is clean and I’m naked. But as soon as I realize this my skin tingles and I’m clothed again.
Interesting.
The C-Net calls me, pulls me out of the moment. It’s everywhere. It registers with all my senses. It’s my blood, my bones, my body, the air I breathe is saturated with it. But it’s different now. The darkness, once so alluring now sickens me.
There’s no time to waste.
I think it and my body dissolves into the ether of the C-Net like a ghost on the wind.
It’s time to begin my quest.
If you’re tempted to visit dark, twisted, and vile portions of the ether, stop. Leave now and go in peace before the beast snares your soul or I take you. If you’re hunting the innocent or trying to damage another; Beware!
I’ll find you.
I hunt the hunters!