Chapter 2

And Walk the Walk

Our world is a random seed of points wherein your consciousness are the catalyst, explorer, and redeemer of it all. Different mindsets create different outlets of expression. It's all in your choice of interpretation that creates your reality. In much the same way as a cipher sequence of numbers may come out as music or as a text or as a picture. All depending on your choice of rendering. The difference here being that the universal rule normally only allows precisely one rendering per view. Herein lies the true power of the lore. It may also be said as we see our selves fall down the line of entropy that only our consciousness travels, all else are unmoving, allowing us the illusion of freedom and space.

I know that I most desperately searched after my Lady, in a way one might say that I was very lucky. At least I knew that she truly existed. Most of us seek in vain after that special one, that one and only. While searching we tend to end up with broken relationships, more often than not wondering whom to blame. But there are two to a relation I say and no one is wholly blameless. Now you might joke about this and say that 'why satisfy yourself with only one?' It's a possibility I will admit but I think only for those of a stronger creed than mine. For me the thought of my Mouse was fully sufficient and no more was needed. As the time now had come for us to depart our safe harbor we stood gathered at the deck watching the receding lights of the little town depart. Count Drach was with us as we slowly glided out of the harbor of Ysanta with Ilisa safely sheltered under his arm and as we slowly moved out on the gravitational tide I could hear them murmuring sweet nothings to each other. Over them a velvet-textured dark canopy of clouds slowly swallowed up what light there still was to be seen. I felt both happy and depressed at seeing them so in love.

I couldn't help but thinking that it should have been me there with my Mouse. Puss who was standing beside me choose this moment to talk ' Laur ' he had shortened my name as he often found it difficult to get his tongue around it. ' Why are you sad? Look, our little sister is finally happy. ' I looked at them and then turned with a slow smile at Puss. ' You're absolutely right Puss. I am happy for them, I was just thinking of my Mouse. ' Puss shook his head ' Humans! ' he said with a snort. 'Our prey is still waiting for us. You must not let discontentment weaken you when we meet it.' I thought about what he had said and nodded ' You're right Puss. Don't worry, I won't' said I. 'Good.' Said Puss and with that discussion done we all went down to our respective cabins to get some rest.

The next day found us at the wheelhouse laying out a course into the quadrant of Chmeer again. Crator smiled at us as he explained the need for us to as he said 'acquire a closure of some unfinished business'. 'But Sir!' I said. 'What about Count Drach?'. Even though we might be bound by our oath of secrecy he wasn't and I wouldn't want to be the one wreck his and Ilisas chance of happiness. 'Don't worry boy' said Crator. 'I've already spoken with him and Ilisa too. They are quite happy to have their honeymoon journey on this splendid ship surrounded by mates and friends. 'Are you sur ... Honeymoon! Captain? What are you talking about? There are no priests on our ship Sir!? And she would have talked to me first if she... ' Crator stopped my tirade with a broad sweep of his hand. He then bowed towards me in a most magniloquent manner 'Allow your humble servant to present himself' he said. 'Captain Crator of the mighty brigantine Seamistress and furthermore serving at his full capacity as of a hand joiner of love. Ahh, that is to say boy that I'm as fully competent to officiate weddings as funerals.' Here he looked at me most meaningfully and in an almost menacingly manner. 'You do want it to be a wedding boy, don't you?'

Redemption alley

He woke up again, not feeling the slow tears running down his cheeks. In this cold of night his grief had at last had become so encompassing that it now not only filled his soul but his whole body. He knew he had lost what little he had and this silent grief made no impact on his mind anymore. In the end he had only found some old papers to cover himself with as he had laid himself to. It felt as he had came a long way to find himself here in this uncompromising alley, but now he just couldn't mind to care anymore.

He didn't even know which city he was in, he had been hitchhiking when the fever had struck him. The truck driver had just let him off at a gas station just outside the town and then he had started walking. At least I tried, he thought as he had lay himself down at the corner just outside the light cone of a slowly swinging street lamp. The cramps were almost gone and he was beginning to feel strangely warm as the freezing wind worked it's cold magic on him.

Once he had had a work and a family too but that was now long gone. The woman he had lived with him unbeknownst had found another and then told him to leave, and as he couldn't understand and she didn't find it in her to explain about her newfound love it took him some time to find out why. But that was another dream and another life, not his any more, somebody else's. I wonder whom that man really was he thought lethargically as the cold slowly seemed to lose its bite on him. He was deadly tired of this life, even though he vaguely remembered moments of laughter and joy from before it all seemed so distant now.

He could have tried to take his kids with him, he thought, and then try to rebuild his life, but he knew that even though she wanted to leave him she still was the best there was for his kids. He did not want his kids to lose the stability of living and growing up with friends and known ones as he had. So in the end he left with nothing, leaving things as normal as it was in his power to do. But now the directions were all gone and his life too.

He had thought of keeping his dog but in the end he had left her too, after all, she belonged in the family and to make her lose her pack wouldn't had made any one happier.

Those first years he had tried to lose himself in work, and it did help some. At least he didn't think so much, and he didn't fall down a bottle either, even though there was times of almost losing it. Yet something was missing, something important, he had lost his dreams, even though he still kept himself clean and did what he hoped was a good work his soul wasn't in it anymore. As he never had thought that much about what he wanted out of his life before he now found himself suddenly forced to look back and take his bearings anew.

A family he thought, some love and someone to trust, those things that had bees sorely missing as he grew up himself, that was what he had wanted and that was what he had slowly started to believe that he had found in her. Not that overpowering feel of uncompromising love but a slow glow and trust, and as there had been none where he came from, he had found that sufficient enough. Maybe he should have known better but theirs had been a long relation and when the kids come also a slightly magical one. Now it was all gone and with any luck this life too he thought sleepily as his consciousness slowly was fading away.

After he found out about this new guy he just couldn't see her anymore. And as the kids thought that they had made their split in good faith he didn't want to disappoint them either so he kept his silence and tried to be there as good as he could. But in the end he just had to leave, he couldn't take it anymore, it was as that dream he had had when he just was a small kid, at that orphanage his mother had placed him temporally as she went searching for work. In it he had been walking a scorched mud dried earth filled with what looked as geysers that threw out a gray smoke, at a distant he could se others walking just as himself. He saw some people falling down those holes but nobody seemed to care or react, the rest of them just kept on walking. That dream had left him with a feeling of hopelessness then, and made him feel even more hopeless now as he looked back at his life. A premonition, that was his last thought before the gray darkness gently released him from his mind.

Dreaming awake.

Seldom it is said, the Gods themselves seems it fit to walk our universe. If that was it no one know but as he faded away there was some strange sounds coming his way. The yellow flickering light of the street lamp suddenly started to glow an unearthly gold and the cold wind seemed to stop its howling. There was a feeling as of someone bending down looking at him, someone seeing him at last. She seemed filled with goodness and laughter and also of a deep understanding. He seemed somehow to speak with her, a conversation of laughter and wit, his circumstances wasn't as bad as he thought he was told. This universe contained a multitude and his destiny was as yet not foretold. The last feeling he got was that of someone holding him, cradling him to sleep.

Awakening

He woke up in a room. At first he though he might be dead as instead of laying in the alley he was on a bed under clean crisp sheets and with a window just ahead of him opening towards a deep blue sky. He could hear birds outside and somehow it felt as spring. But his last memory was of winter and a strange town, it just didn't make any sense to him.

But he felt so good, life vibrating through his very marrow. It was as if he had at last found home. Yes he thought as he lay there, I'm dead and this is what heaven must be, then his stomach grumbled, 'even here' he said surprised to himself, even here I can feel hunger. Ah well, why not, he thought as he raised from his bed to walk to the door. But he found himself being strangely weak, it was as if there was no strength left to him, when he at last had arrived at the door and slowly opened it he heard a distant chime. Outside his room he found a corridor leading both directions in a circular fashion. And there was a lot of doors.

As he started to walk he hear someone approaching swiftly from behind, he turned around to find a girl studying him. She had a sunny freckled face and a pert little nose under lovely green eyes and a cascade of golden red hair. She was also somewhat taller than him but not much and arranged in a sweet cotton dress smelling of summer and blue berries. But she seemed to be somewhat in a state. 'What are you doing up' she said. 'You go directly back to your bed, you hear. Come, let me help you.'

With that said she took a steady grip under his arm and started to lead him back the way he had come. He didn't dare to speak to her, what if it all just would disappear, like a chimera of sound and light. If this was what it was freezing to death then he wished it never to stop. She led him to his bed and helped him with the covers, he could smell a weak sweet and earthy odor of sweat under her arms as she bent over him covering him up. She had a scent of summer he thought and of fulfillment.

When she was finished she smiled down at him and turned to start to leave. 'Wait!' he heard himself say. 'Please stay.' She slowly turned back appraising him with a clear and steady eye. 'Oh don't worry' She said. 'I wont leave you, I was just going to get us some food. We will talk more now that you have waked at last'. He looked at her 'Just promise not to leave me Lady' he said. 'I couldn't bear to loose you again. Not now that I just found you' She seemed to be at a loss of words suddenly as she looked back at him. Then surprisingly she smiled again. 'You have a most endearing manner' She told him. 'My name is Lillian and I will come back, promise, just give me a moment only to get us something to eat'. And with that she disappeared through the door.