From time to time, stories form in my head while I sleep, and reflect in my mind through dreams. This one, which I am sharing with you now, is based on my dream from 2017-06-21.
The Rangers
Before the War, we were people, just like you. But we were too late; we didn’t leave the surface on time. And we were too good to become ordinary soldiers. So they turned us into Rangers. Yes, just like those in the TV series, we had our colors, our abilities. The show was even inspired by the real us, someone somehow emerged from the depths and brought it out. Our lifespan prolonged to thousands of years, just by bending the fabric of space-time.
After the War, gods know how it ended, we became memories and legends; nobody needed us anymore. There were only sayings that the Rangers will emerge at the end of the world and fight their last battle. But we were still there, five lost bandits with no future, whose world turned to ruins. People lost the knowledge of traveling through space-time, so now they have been trapped in the myriads of layers. Only the former soldiers who somehow survived the War kept the ability to penetrate several layers, and they passed their awareness onto their descendants. But they can only go through one or two layers at a time. Then, they get exhausted and have to stay for years. But there was us. They had equipped us with a core, our Heart, which allowed us to travel free anywhere we wanted. But it only worked when we were together. An individual one of us could not do better than a regular soldier. So one day, when one of our Hearts will have stopped working, we will be trapped as well. And the one with the broken Heart will eventually die.
After the War, each of us wanted to spend the eternity differently. Of course, it took us a long time to get where we wanted but we didn’t mind several hundred surface-years. In the deep layers, time is passing more slowly, so two of us even found their long-lost relatives. Yes, they were lucky. Other two found their love elsewhere. I was just a rogue bandit; I couldn’t stay anywhere for long, I couldn’t build anything so I was just ruining everything around me.
At first, I was searching, too. But I knew my parents didn’t make it and died when they tried to escape into the depths. Yes, I used to have a love, shortly before the War. It was just a short outburst; it didn’t last for long because he escaped. Nobody knew where he went. But I guess he was smart enough to go somewhere really, really deep. When we saw each other for the last time, I promised to find him, no matter where he goes. But hope left me after I searched through several thousand layers. So I became the Demon from the Depths, stealing knowledge and technology both from the emerging civilizations and from the remnants of the ancient ones. I wanted to travel free, just like everyone could before the War, provided they paid enough money. I wanted to connect to his mind and find him, but mind recognition seemed to have died with the last blasts of the War.
When I encountered the Ancient Ones, the looting descendants of the War generals, I was just a desperate lonely pirate. But they were the last beacons of the long-lost knowledge. I believed that if they couldn’t help me, nobody could. So I had to fight them and force them to give me what they were keeping. They soon recognized I was one of the ancient Rangers, so the only thing they wanted was to get to my Heart. And they were many. They tied me and cut into my flesh. I had never felt so helpless before. Without the four others, I was nothing. And soon, the Ancient Ones found my Heart was hidden in the flesh of my neck. Obviously, where else it would be. Head is something a human wouldn’t survive without and neck is the thing connecting it to the rest of the body. They tried to amputate my Heart. Then there was a blast and everything around was gone. There was just me.
They made our Hearts well. It was impossible to separate them from our bodies. When exposed, our Heart would trigger an explosion of the entire space-time layer. It would only keep our body. So the Ancient Ones ended, and with them, everything that was there.
This was the origin of the First Impermeable Layer.
In my desperate search, I went lower and lower. Down there, lower than any of the former soldiers would ever have gone, was a civilization. Yes, it was a real, proper civilization. It guarded the secret I was seeking for. I connected to his mind. He still lived. He was somewhere near. Maybe he even helped to guard parts of the ancient knowledge. And I was just a mere bandit. I was ashamed of myself.
Finally, I found him. He was waiting there for me. “I knew you will keep your promise”, he said to me. I was happy for the first time since the outbreak of the War. I hoped to stay there till the end of my days. I would say forever, but I knew my Heart would stop working one day. But the Bearers, as I started to call them, were aware of what happened above them. Since then, a few more impermeable layers appeared in the greatest uninhabited depths, and they knew. The structure would eventually break entirely. I only wanted to take him up to the surface and live there with him, no matter the stuff below. But that couldn’t be done. Without a Heart of his own, he won’t be able to penetrate the First Impermeable Layer. He was trapped, together with everyone and everything below the First Impermeable; except from us, the Rangers. So we had to part again. I had to try saving what was left of the great world that once existed.
That’s how my last quest started. The Bearers even knew how to save the fragile structures of space-time, but only with the help of all five of us. And it had to be done quickly. But it took me too long to go through the First Impermeable and to find the others, even when I knew where they were. They were avoiding me and escaping for a long time. And it took me even longer to persuade them to follow me. They didn’t believe the space-time was getting unstable. Till then, it was only happening at the great depths, so it didn’t bother them. They said the First Impermeable Layer will stop it all, that it won’t go above it. And why would they help the rogue one, which I have always been.
But then, an impermeable layer appeared above the First Impermeable. The space-time was dividing into segments and collapsing. Finally they started to believe. But they only wanted to help themselves. They took their loved ones to the surface. I pleaded, promised them to save the whole civilization we knew from before the War. I know it was an exaggeration. But it had to be done.
They went down with me. Every moment, the structure of space-time was getting less and less stable; we were fighting for every minute. It took too long to go through all the impermeable layers that emerged since then. When we reached the First Impermeable, they didn’t want to go any further. “It’s too dangerous”, they said. But I was already there; I penetrated it just with a single Heart. But there were more excuses. “We don’t have enough time”. “And by now everything is lost anyway”. “I bet they don’t know how to save the structures anyway.” “They are just pirates who want our Hearts.” And: “You made it all up. Just to save gods know who. Or to kill us all.”
They took me and forced me to go back up with them. Everything was lost. Forever. Maybe he still breathes somewhere down there, trapped. I couldn’t keep my promise. I failed.
When we reached the surface, I asked the other four to get to a certain place with me. There were mountains and the sky was starry and bright. Just like that night, eons ago.
“This is where we parted”, I said. I stared at the stars for a while. And then I ripped my Heart off my body.
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