Rockstones Scene 3: Reflections

 The bus turned onto Steelway Avenue, a busy street surrounded by tall buildings home to Visionary Incorporated. Jared sure knew a thing or two about that company. Anybody did.

Visionary, or viz for short, made the traffic rules seen through their technology. They created entertainment and games. They even helped journalists make their news stories dynamic by allowing viewers to experience incidents and events in real time straight from their living rooms. In short, they created a reality for whoever used their Visionary Lense, like half the world and the entire country.

But right now, all Jared could think about was what he was going to tell others about his life. The truth was that he didn’t know how he came to be. His earliest memory was when he was around twenty, or maybe he was even seventeen. Jared didn’t know his age, his parents, or anything. He just knew that he was lying on the floor of a dark laboratory of sorts. He was trapped in some sort of crystal box and was only freed when this yellow, scally creature opened up a door, allowing him to enter his study and gave him some sort of mission brief.

This man had a secretary, a guy who called himself Dorem. He had this cloak that didn’t allow anybody to see his face, or maybe Jared’s memory was fuzzy, and just didn’t remember how Dorem looked. All he knew was that Dorem said this yellow creature was called Lord Urunk, and he was tasked by him to find a portal to the elemental lands of Shosma. After that, Jared found himself trapped in some random guy’s bathroom in Oaksmeet, South Carolina. However, things started to make a little more sense from there.

“We can’t let Ethan just stay there,” Jared finally said as the bus stopped and Vile Road.

Greg shook his head and motioned that he was getting off by this stop. Jared followed him. It was the only thing he knew. Follow the ones that knew most about Urunk, Dorem, elemental lands, or anything about his vague past.

Greg looked at Jared and stopped walking. They stood there at the bus stop. Greg looked at Jared’s ripped-up orange backpack, and Jared looked at Greg’s blue button-down shirt and grey pants, which were somehow intact.

“You can’t panic. You can never give in,” Greg said. “Once you let the Lord control you, he has you forever.” Greg walked towards a building that read Already There. It was a hotel.

“We’re staying here?” Jared asked. Greg nodded.

“In Highliken countries, they have this system called godness.”

“Goodness?”

“No, not at all like goodness. When a magician gives his power to build you a house, a vehicle, food, anything that you depend on.” Greg walked to the booth and found an open room. He took out a credit card and paid.

“Sounds good to me,” whistled Jared.

“In this society,” Greg pointed around him, “people work and earn money. They use this to live. In a godness countries, that means serving magicians as gods.”

Jared paused. “Like wizards are gods?”

“Wizards make property. They allow people to live. In turn, people depend on them.” Greg opened the door to room 1F. “One can never stop serving these gods; they would lose everything if they don’t.”

Jared paused. He moved only to step into the room. He almost fell on the sofa in the room. “Did I ever … serve them?”

“I ran away from them. I don’t know you’ve passed, Jared, but I know what you want to do. You want to serve Lord Urunk. Maybe you have to; maybe you are brainwashed; whatever the case, you need to find that portal. Correct?”

Jared took a deep breath. Greg owned the house that Jared remembered being in. It was Greg who opened the bathroom door and then explained to Jared that everything was okay. Greg would teach him to work at an auto-repair shop, and then one day, Greg disappeared.

Jared would live in the shop. Eventually, he took the money he made from his work and rented an apartment nearby. He tried to find Greg but to no avail, until today.

“You came today, Greg. Why?”

Jared heard Greg put something in the oven, supper. Jared waited for Greg to sit down. When he did, Greg put his arms around Jared. “I was always there.”

“At Nic-Nac?”

Greg nodded. “You simply opened your eyes this one time. You channeled Sparkwitz.”

“No, no,” Jared got up. “I didn’t. I don’t know what got into me, but I was trying to show you something outside that restaurant. I … I.”

“It was your instinct, Jared.”

“No … I,” Jared stammered.

“Jared Seagol, look at me,” Greg cried.

Jared felt dizzy. He managed to lean against a wall. “What is it?”

“Your family now,” Greg said. “I’m a Seagol, and so are you. Look, I don’t know your past, but I do know that something is being triggered inside you. I just don’t know if it’s something Urunk wants you to do or something your parents or somebody else implanted inside you.”

Jared took a deep breath. He sat by the table. He knew that he would wake up some mornings with glowing hands or bleeding legs. Sometimes he would float over his bed. Other times you would wake up in a valley surrounded by mountains. He would journey for what seemed like days throughout a forest with no living beings in it. No animals or people. No fish or anything except trees and mushrooms.

He would think he was a goner in those times, then, in one moment, he would wake up. It wasn’t any normal nightmare. He was living this. It felt like he was trapped for days, but every few months, he would go through this. It was horrible. Jared wanted to commit suicide at times. He couldn’t take away his life, though. He needed to complete a mission. He needed to find a portal to the elemental worlds.

“Whoever implanted these traits or desires within me wanted me to go made.”

“Perhaps it’s simply too much for you.”

“Perhaps?” Jared laughed. A timer rang; it must be the supper. “Why would they do this to me?”

“Who said they did anything? You know I’m a keeper.” Greg got up to get the supper out. Jared beat him to it.

“I can’t make you do everything, pal.” He got the oven mitts on and opened the oven to smell some chicken and potatoes.

“As a keeper, it’s my job to help people find their path,” Greg said, “in this case, you seemed to have found something for yourself,” he laughed as he got a hot plate for Jared to set the food down.

“After a quick bit, things might feel better.”

___

The pods flew around his head, making Ethan dizzy. Some pods crashed into others. Some seemed to fall to the town, only to blow up by crashing into the boundary field about two hundred feet above ground city level.

“Why are you doing this?” Ethen spoke to the voice.

“If it helps, you are not going to die.”

“But others are!”

There was silence as Ethen began to swim closer to the familiar structure. He stood by the gates of his family’s house. Totem. “Ethan Totem,” he spoke to one of the sharps by the gate. They paid no attention to him. “Totem!” he yelled, “I’m a Totem!” Nothing.

One sharp turned his head to another. They nodded and turned to eye a man in rags by the gate.

“Gruem Totem, yes, they merciful lord will surely sustain me,” the poor man begged. He paid no notice to Ethan, who was now dressed in a dark purple coral vest and had blue coral pants with golden speaks over it. He was wearing silver shoes and even had a white band around his head. He was a noble now, or at least dressed like one, so why would this poor man at least respect or even notice him?

“Gruem Totem is notified,” they sharp said. He took his black staff with curled sharp ends and pointed it at the ragged person. “You go no further. Stay here.” The sharp walked to the gate and seemed to phase through it, allowing him to enter the building made of two towering structures.

Moments later, the remained sharp spoke. “Lord Gruem is busy. But Nova will meet you with food.”

As the sharp spoke, a lady dressed in red accompanied the other sharply. Her orange skirts contrasted with the silver guard armed in a helmet with protruding spiky hilts by its tip. The lady has a plate of white and yellow food on it. She swam to the man in rags.

“My plea has been accepted. My … my God Critheni bless you, oh my, all the gods bless you!” the man clapped his hands and kissed Nova’s hand. Nova smiled and glanced at Ethan.

“You have come a long way without much notice, my son,” Nova spoke with a pleasing tone. She paced over to him and brought him in a hug. “How I wish I could see you.”

“Mom, I’m here.”

“I wish.”

Ethan tried to kiss Nova but found he Nova didn’t seem to notice the kiss. Instead, she backed away and took her leave.

“Wait, Mother!” he yelled. “Take me back,” he ran to Nova, and as the gates closed, he found himself by her side near the house. His mother didn’t notice and disappeared into the right tower.

“Do not step further,” the voice in Ethan’s head said. “This is but a vision. You seeing your mother is bringing her thoughts of you. You are not where you think you are.”

“What do you mean?” Ethan yelled. He ran to the tower Nova entered, but the tower began to burn. Ethan smelled smoke, and fire ripped throughout the house. The pods raced and fell; they broke through Totem Yard’s force field. Soon rubble fell everywhere. Ethan screamed. Nobody else did. Everything was black.

Light began to emerge as Ethan saw the face. “What have you done?” Ethan yelled.

“Do you think Totem is your home?” the voice asked.

“I wish I knew. I sense it.”

“Never let yourself go too far with these senses of yours. They manipulate you.”

“What do you want from me?” Ethan wanted to clench his fist, but he could feel anymore. He was back without a body.

“I am simply here to guide you on the right path,” the voice replied. “You must find a way to the ignition portal.”