Glowien ~ (Sphingo & The Black Empire, ch. 5)

Previous ch.: 1, 2, 3, 4

I am Osiris the king, who led My armies into all parts of the world…My substance is of the same nature as that which composes light. There is no place in the universe where I have not appeared, to bestow My benefits and make known My discoveries.

(The Osirian Column near Nysa in Arabia)

~

Sphingo & The Black Empire

~

The Man deemed Sphingo sat patiently aboard his first-class flight, having just landed at PDX International, his Beats faintly humming Daft Punk’s Motherboard, eyes closed, with his copy of the Shoninki resting in lap.

A gorgeous blend of Choctaw, Blackfoot, Cherokee, & Ghanian blood, he was strikingly beautiful, though deliberately emitting an unassuming air of dispassion towards his natural grace & poise.

His primary indulgence, aside from thick, beautiful women and fine red wine, is of The Mystic Sartorial Art.

Casually dressed in muted-grey, Tom Ford slacks, slip-on custom loafers, and an exquisite navy-blue, Egyptian-cotton v-neck, Sphingo was younger, healthier, stouter looking than his age of fifty let on.

His virility, potent.

He’s a squared six ft., with mid-back, thick, shimmering, black hair, which he mostly wore partially pulled back.

Sphingo’s incalculably wealthy.
Not rich…wealthy.
They’re two completely different statuses.

Chris Rock once made an appropriate joke: “Oprah Winfrey is rich. Bill Gates is wealthy.” Though Sphingo surpassed the aforementioned by the droves.

The only being in humanoid-history who was comparable to his providence of monetary-value, assets, and influence was Mansa Musa.

It’s not known of the 0%, let alone the one and ninety-nine, as to what Sphingo’s occupation is that garners him his pharaoh of the top-tier fortune.

He’s adoringly admired for his secrecy, discretion, and his uncanny ability to understate himself – it’s what his profession, mission, and true nature requires.

A light traveler, Sphingo had only his Louis Vuitton Pégase-55 rolling luggage piece as he disembarked the plane.

He was fond of this item, being synonymous with his personality: Elegant. Tactical. Luxurious. Black.

“Thanks for riding with us,” a cute, ample-hipped, middle-aged, flight attendant said as he passed.

Sphingo flashed an attractive grin with a slight drop of his head to acknowledge her.

“I’d like to ride him,” whispered her colleague as he passed, thinking he was out of range.

With his back turned, he smiled inwardly, always feeling gracious that he effortlessly attracted women.

Both attendants chuckled. They’d been swooning over him the entirety of the flight. His appeal was so seductive they forgot about the airline’s policy about engaging in sexual interactions with patrons. They didn’t care though – they wanted him. And that was precisely what Sphingo intended.

He knew this airport well.

Born and raised in NE Portland until the age of 18, Sphingo always disapproved of the way native-Oregonians seemed to act like they were above all who were transplants or who weren’t the hipster-vegan-indie-rock-type.

He saw a few of these Arcade Fire worshipers sitting at his preferred table at his favorite airport tavern…or rather, the tavern he owned.

Pondering on whether he should commandeer the area that was allotted him, he decided instead to act as an average citizen and sit at the bar enjoying whichever lame game was being broadcast.

“Glenfiddich 40,” motioned Sphingo to the bartender, the balance of his tenor resonating beyond the counter.

Felix did a double take.

“Mr. Candorberry!” He said hesitantly. “Good to see you, sir!”

“Just Sphingo,” he replied in his polite manner.

In an era where Natives were culturally debased and looked at no better than a homeless drunkard, Sphingo enjoyed his celebrity treatment from those whom knew or recognized him. He gloried in it, not only for himself, but for his people – the rightful inhabitant protectors of this Utopia.

Felix reverently handed Sphingo his drink, poured gently in his favorite crystal, with a spritz of purified spring water.

“Management didn’t tell us you were comin’ in this evenin’.”

Sphingo projected a cold, hard stare, letting Felix’s inquiry linger past the point of comfort.

“Deliberately. I like to surprise My establishments on occasion. Keeps everyone alert,” he said flippantly.

“I understand, Mr. Can…I mean, Sphingo, sir.”

Sphingo bellowed a hearty laugh.

“Relax, man. Your job’s not on the line. I’m mainly in town to visit My parents, not to speculate on the quality of My businesses. You’re aware that I employ a great general manager. I trust her and those she hires. Everything’s all good.”

Felix smiled, nodding in relief.

A mild feminine commotion filled the entrepreneur’s ears as he turned to view the sight he was waiting for – his two flight attendants who just so happened to walk into his bar to have a nightcap before retiring to the airport’s hotel, which he also owned.

They spotted Sphingo.

One of them whispered mischievously into the other’s ear, laughed out loud dramatically, and tried to look nonchalant as they found an unoccupied table near the front of his pub.

Felix noticed their interest in his boss.

“Have fun, sir,” he smirked enviously, wiping the counter’s spheres of condensation.

“Thanks.”

Sphingo gracefully picked up his drink with two-fingers & thumb, transitioning to sit with his prey.

He arrived.

“Two bewitching women walk into a bar, owned by a Native. One of the ladies says to the other, ‘Look what I’ve found – a successful Indian who owns a business.’ The other says, ‘So? That’s nothing. I’d be impressed if this successful Indian had a big dick.’”

The Milfs, staring upward, sat gawking at Sphingo as he finished the punchline.

After gaining her composure, the more extroverted of the two spoke.

“Tell me…does this rich Native have a big cock?” She said with her most non-obvious tone.

Her companion held back a snicker.

The left corner of Sphingo’s perfect mouth turned upward, happy that she’d played along.

“I live in the West Hills. Escort Me there to find out for yourselves,” he stated imperatively. His confidence, undeniable.

The giddy-one replied, “She would love to,” nudging the other.

“Perfect,” he said, gently lifting his chiseled chin. “Meet Me here in five minutes,” he crooned as he reached in his left pocket, pulled out, and slid them a card with his private terminal number.

The flight-attendants’ eyes went wide.

“Why the hell do you fly first-class when you own a private jet?”

“I don’t like to advertise my wealth…unless it gains me favor with beautiful women, of course,” he said flirtatiously. “Besides, it’s fun sometimes flying like commoners. If I hadn’t today, I wouldn’t have met you two.”

They grinned sillily.

Checkmate, he thought.

At a nearby table, an army-cadet, who was on leave, overheard Sphingo & The Nymphs’ conversation.

He was outraged.

Being undisciplined to keep his mouth shut, he got up from the table, his comrades in line, walking over to their area.

“S’cuse me, ma’ams…s’this guy botherin’ you?”

Their minds were elsewhere – conversing with one another, talkin’ ‘bout the things that women talk about when discussing a man they’d like to fuck.

The soldier turned his attention to Sphingo once he realized he’d been ignored, his southern-pride not allowing him to maturely walk away without being a hero; that was, after all, how he’d been programmed to act.

“Hey, bud,” the soldier grimaced condescendingly. “I think it best you let these gals be.”

Sphingo’s phone rang. The ringtone was Jay Z’s Open Letter. “Ya’ll gon’ learn t’day…”

Slipping his hand down his right pocket, he retrieved his Blackphone, turned his back on the soldier and posse, then checked it.

He opened the text from B.E.:

Roselle, Alaniah, & Eva
have been located. With
Belladonna’s assistance,
they’ve defeated Datura.
Deploy to St.
Vincent Children’s
Hospital in three hours.

The Blackphone’s camera scanned Sphingo’s retina, self-deleting the text upon him ending the reading.

Hm. Datura’s been defeated, he thought. An Initiate can’t complete The Masters’ task.

He took a cleansing breath before turning around, eying the slags.

“The Maybach’s waitin’. See you in five.”

He walked back to the bar to snag his luggage. After he extended the handle, he summoned Felix.

“Sir?” he said, a little ruffled due to how the cadet spoke to his boss, clearly unaware of who he was.

“Pay them no mind,” Sphingo said soothingly, downing his drink, yet savoring it.

He placed the crystal on the counter neatly, then palmed Felix a Benjamin as he shook his hand goodnight.

He stared at the greenback.

“Sir!” He exclaimed.

“’Till we meet again,” said Sphingo cooly. “The restaurant’s closin’ early tonight.”

He turned & departed, the wheels of his luggage rolling silently.

As he walked a few paces, he swayed his head to the left to catch glares with the soldier.

Sphingo winked, tuning his attention on the cadet’s abdomen.

The soldier hadn’t the knowledge to compute what Sphingo triggered within his body.

All he would remember is some distinguished, well-dressed, powerfully mild-mannered Native Man gazing at him, as he passed to exit some restaurant that he and his friends decided to try, while waiting for their families to arrive to welcome them home for two weeks, before they deployed on another leg of duty in the current war.

He’d never see his wife, nor his two sons and daughter.

The vomit mingled with blood spewing from his nose and mouth as he slumped lifelessly on Sphingo’s restaurant table would be his final ponderance.

His friends couldn’t perform mouth-to-mouth due to the excessive amount of sick, bile, and other intestinal fluids gushing from his oral cavity, the seizure not helping either.

The restaurant’s patrons were in an uproar.

Everyone was terrified of catching whatever this soldier had. They scrambled in an attempt to escape the vicinity.

In a panic, Felix grabbed the phone behind the bar.

“911, state your emergency.”

“Hello, yes, I’m at Duke’s Place/PDX International and a soldier is having some kind of seizure! There’s blood and puke everywhere, send an ambulance, quick!”

Felix disconnected the call before the dispatcher could ask any stupid questions.

Everyone on the west-coast knew that Duke’s Place was celebrated & well-loved; and that emergencies, here, never happened.

The patrons trammeled out the rathskeller into the airport walkway, the soldier’s crew included.

Felix calmed himself before slowly moving towards the decrepit body.

A Black-man yelled, “Stay back, bruh! You dunno what the fuck he’s got!”

Felix concurred with his logic and halted, treading reverse a few steps.

Bewildered, he blew forced air through his cheeks, his beard twitching as he grazed both hands through his mangled mane, trying to comprehend wtf just happened.

He’d never witnessed anything of this kind.

Dropping his arms to the sides, an intuitive spark igniting in his mind, he remembered what Sphingo announced to him before exiting.

“The restaurant’s closin’ early tonight.”

~ author: Hiram Surtyr – illustrator: Ruth Barbee ~

Glowien ~ (Gunman, Bespoke: ch. 4)

Previous Chapters: 1, 2, 3

I and the public know what all schoolchildren learn, those to whom evil is done do evil in return.

~ W. H. Auden

~

Gunman, Bespoke

~

Once Alaniah, Neil, and I were in the hallway, we walked shoulder-to-shoulder without talking, the exited class deep in contemplation over Religious Studies.

Before stopping in front of our lockers, I noticed my younger sister, Eva, waiting for us.She was relaxedly uneasy.

“I’ve got a message for you,” she said in an almost whisper, her long, curly hair in two pigtails framing her cherub, light-brown face. She’s beautiful, short, muscular, and most people thought she was still in elementary.

“Okay?” I said, reaching for what she was handing me. Not another fucking note.

Neil’s curiosity interrupted my reading.

“So what’d Bella say to you?”

“Donna,” Ali piped in. “It’s Belladonna, asshat.”

He gave an acquiescent smile. She, a satiated grin.

I looked at him, half-dazed from what Belladonna’d urged.

“She jus’ told me to be sure I read everything thoroughly.” It was kinda the truth.

“Erriight,” he responded.

Ignoring him, I caught Eva staring at me intensely.

“Giz, why’re you lookin’ at me like that?”

“You haven’t read the note.”

“My reading of it doesn’t require your attendance. Don’t you have class?”

“Yeah, so do you. Plus, the guy whom gave it to me asked to assure that you’ve read it before I go. He wants me to tell ‘im that you understood it.”

The three of us looked at each other oddly, then turned our glares back on Eva.

“This’s odd as hell,” said Cheeky uncomfortably.

“Concurred,” said Neil.

I stayed silent. Oddities were the order of the day.

I read the note: The Sacred History, Mark Booth.

“Is this a joke?” I blasted.

“I dunno?” Eva said defensively.

“What’s it say?” Ali inquisited. I showed her.

“Didn’t you jus’ buy this book last weekend when we went to Powell’s?”

“Yeah,” I said softly. So many things were cascading through my mind.

I came out of my daze and looked at Eva.

“Tell me who this man is.”

“Obviously, he’s the author of the book.”

I closed my eyes and groaned.

“Bro. Not the guy on the note. The one who gave it to you, nerd.”

“Oh. Jus’ some guy who stopped me when I was walkin’ to class. He asked if I knew you, referenced you by name…I didn’t tell ‘im you were my sis, jus’ that I knew who you were. Then he asked if I’d give you this note. I was weirded-out, but he wasn’t a creeper. He had a visitors’-lanyard so I knew he was legit to be on campus. Still kinda strange though.”

“And he wanted you to report to ‘im once you gave it to me.”

“Yeah.”

“So, he’s still here.”

“I guess so. I’ll go check.”

“Word. Be quick about it.”

Eva darted off.

“Guys, we gotta go or we’ll be late for psych,” Neil stated.

Alaniah sighingly eyerolled upon the realization. “Shit, I totally forgot about class.”

We quickly tucked our tech in our lockers.

Our psychology professor wasn’t so much for mechanical devices. He liked things the old way – books, paper, pens. If he had his scholastic druthers, he’d have us using quills, parchment and ink.

We were just down the hall when a couple of kids ran past in the opposite direction.

They trailed something on the floor behind them, seeing their shoe prints consecutively patterned one after the other in what I thought was glossy paint.

“Rejects from art class, prob’ly,” Neil groused, as we gathered ourselves from the mild fright of their speed.

“I don’t think this’s paint,” Ali said with moderate shock after a further examination of the substance.

She touched one of the prints with her long, slender index.

“What is it?” I asked.

Neil and I squinted while crouching together to take a closer look.

“It’s blood!” She squealed.

“Fuckin’ gnarly,” Neil said with morbid fascination of the standard eighth-grade boy.

“Fucking gross!” I proclaimed, frightened by the thought of what caused a couple of kids to run through blood.

“Dude, we gotta see where these prints lead!”

It was too late when I reached out to stop him. Neil had already jumped up and ran toward the origin of the tracks.

“Wait!” I screamed.

I shot up, kicked off my Birkenstocks, and ran after ‘im, surprising myself at how fast I was.

Neil turned a few corners before disappearing out of sight. I knew the school well enough to guess where he was going.

My speed increased. Whose legs were these?

Ali tried keepin’ up, but to no avail; which was weird ‘cause she was in great shape and super-quick, too.

A loud bang pierced the clutter of my rapid footsteps and panting.

The lights flickered on the fritz. I could hardly see in front of me.

Halting breathlessly, I listened cautiously to my surrounding environment. The school was huge, so with the vast space between segments of the facility, I could only make out garbled tones of voices, high-volume movement, and the fire alarm, though the overhead extinguishers refused to spray.

The bioelectrical spatter of the school’s defunct nanobots made the strangest noises, accompanied by an even stranger scent: burning hair.

At this point in the pursuit, I’d ran to the school’s backhalls, way off the grid of the main floors. Students do some sketchy shit back here.

Ridding myself of those thoughts, and once again listening attentively, I realized there was an abnormality about what I was hearing.

Awareness acute, pressure within head intensified.

A familiar tingle swept my body.
I groped the lower portion of my abdomen.
An indomitable electric-surge panned through my brain. I winced and gasped. The headache blooming was herculean.

Reflexes taking control.

My head swung back in an attempt for air.
On inhale, I felt the energy of the infinite number of the school’s nanotech data outputs. They pervaded through me.

My thoughts unhesitatingly traced to Valhalla.

I shook my head and blinked, deciding to keep following Neil in the direction of the noise.

Ignoring my migraine, I ran down a few flights rapaciously, reached the landing, then slid on something at the bottom. I’d been running unconsciously, cognitively unaware as I skipped the last few steps and landed right in it, feet bare.

I slammed hard on my chest, eating it big time, registering within seconds that I’d just done a slip-n-slide through more blood.

It took a moment to collect myself after having the wind knocked outta me.

While rolling on my back, groaning, I wiped hair from my face and pasted a streak of blood on my cheek. A dollop of it brushed against my tongue – salted rust.

I spat, scrambling up.

A sharp pain jolted up the side of my right foot. My ankle. Fuck. The absolute worst sprains.

Yelping in anguish, I limped around the final corner of my quest for Neil. He, nor Ali, could be spotted anywhere.

I tripped over a mass below me. Jesus fucking Christ.

While getting up, I whipped my head around, disregarding the inevitable pain from my ankle, curiosity overpowering the physical.
Although a moderate pool of light shone through two nearby exit doors, the malfunctioned nanolights strobed uncomfortably, making it difficult to see.

I focussed.

It was him.

“Neil!” I span around on my left foot to take as much pressure as possible off my right. “Neil!” I shouted again this time hopping toward his face.

He was on his back, face leaning away.

I lowered my frame to his and put my hand on his chest, noticing his blood immediately. It’d congealed from a hole in the center. I scurried backward in a panic, falling speedily, jarred by the scene.

I kept rapidly trying to grip myself in a hugging fashion as I kept my head turned away. The delirium that my mind was in compelled me to reenact a calming and reassuring gesture.

A body hit the floor closeby.

It was Alaniah, who’d just done an instant-replay of what I was gathering myself from. The wail of her shriek put a banshee to shame.

In her scream of terror, she reached out for me.

I had an instant maternal inclination and grabbed at her. I rushed up to meet her halfway. We were almost clawing each other in a panic for normalcy.

We melted to the floor, heavy from the weight of emotions.“Are you ok?” I begged, grabbing both sides of her face to look her in her dark, brown eyes.

“Yeah…no…Neil…is he…?” She whimpered through cries and sniffles, her eyes lucid with water.

She could hardly breathe. I embraced her tightly.

“I don’t know,” I said, still panting hard, staring at Neil’s body over her shoulder.

He didn’t move.
I couldn’t peel my eyes away.
Is he alive? The hole is so close to his heart.

A clamor jolted our senses, the bottomless feeling that tortures you during airplane turbulence arising in my gut.

A white boy, about seventeen, dressed in a bespoke black suit, came busting through the nearest exit.

Alaniah turned speedily.

Upon him noticing us on the floor, he froze transfixed, our eyes locking with his.

Shakily, he quickly lifted his right arm; in his hand, he held a suppressed Beretta Px4 pistol. Through all the flurry of that inexplicable moment, my mind recognized the piece right away, owing to being co-raised by an uncle who was a retired Navy SEAL.

“He never saw it comin’,” the shooter said, grimacing, his head slightly lowered and tilted.

I saw a faint hint of a smile on his mouth.

The fear of his gun pointing in our direction, mixed with the evil excitement of the moment, contracted my insides.

His mouth parted. I could hear his breaths as if he were an inch away from my ear.

Senses enhancing themselves, mental-awareness ascending.

I could taste my sweat, saliva, and blood. I could smell the shampoo in my hair along with Ali’s, and the interior of the school – that smell of metal, sex, broken-hearts, body-odor, and living up to your Parent’s expectations.

With my muscles tensed, I stared at the dark, wide eyes of this child who didn’t look at all like the quintessential teenage gunman.

He was clearly insane, although calm about it.

He looked at me rabidly.

“Do you want to live?” He asked gently.

I was frozen.

“DO YOU!?” He screamed, gunned hand still vibrating with uncertainty.I was appropriately startled, and perplexed by his question.

My mind wandered.
He cocked his gun.
It brought me back.

“Yes, I wanna live!” I said with as much sincere passion as could be mustered.

I gripped Alaniah tightly, burying her face in my chest so she couldn’t witness the horrors.

I stopped breathing, waiting.

“Good,” he said drolly.

He dropped his arm and proceeded to unscrew the suppressor, thrusting the naked barrel in the soft, taut spot between his chin and throat.

“NO!” I yelled at the top of my lungs, and I don’t know why I did. It was better that he pointed it at himself.

He smiled as he spoke.

“I found you,” he whispered.

I stared.

He continued.

“Ha’il, Mansupra.”

My eyes widened.

The loud, metallic bang pierced the silence, echoing through the stillness.

Globs of dark, wet, chunky material splattered against the door behind him as his body hurried down.

I lurched back with Ali still held.

The invigorating energy of intrigue possessing her to turn around, she eyed the horrendous sight, yelling with more ardency than before.

I snatched her by the shoulders and turned her back with such force that I knocked us both on our sides.

We sobbed uncontrollably, faces drenched, burning from our salty opened pores of tears and sweat.

Through all the adrenaline and shock of the moment, I felt the agony of my ankle. I reached for it while turning from Ali, the pain reminding me of Neil a few feet away.

Another jolt from below shook me.

I glanced toward the shooter, mechanically, and saw his body in a pond of his own blood, bone fragments, and brain matter.

I vomited.

Coughing, I wiped away the puke from my face with the end of my shirt, glancing at Ali between breaths.

She had moved over to Neil, crying as she loomed over his body.

I crawled to her, afraid that if I got up something worse would happen.

Embracing her, I stroked her hair and face in hope that my touch would be comforting.

I peered at Neil’s remains, losing the ability to think or feel, my mind chasmic.

My peer progressed into fixation.

With my volition buried in the abyss, instinctively, I gently moved Cheeky away from me, my focus on Neil as I did this.

I shifted my knees to his shoulder – they touched.

Valhalla’s visage crept in.

My head jerked and twitched as if trying to remember something that was out of reach, the penetrating eyes of Valhalla emblazoning in my memory, her eyes glowing ultraviolet, emanating that wavelength.

Twitching again.
A convulsion.
Fuck, no.

“Eva, stop!” Alaniah belted, noticing her getting to the upper landing of the stairs, surveilling the wondrous event before her.

Eva stood there, catatonic.

“…what…the…fuck?” She squeezed out through a strained whisper.

My chest swelled rapidly, body bulleting forward directly on Neil’s, torquing violently.

I was having a full blown seizure on the corpse of the only male friend I had other than my brother.

A final vision of Valhalla,
a climactic fit through my body,
then I collapsed on Neil.

Unconscious.
The Absolute Void of All Being.
Dreamless.

The feeling was complete.
Infinite.
Still.

Without warning to Ali, my body bent upward with a fluid speed that knocked her backwards.

Energy surged through me.

My arms were lifted, muscles flexed beyond what was comfortable for any human.

My head shot back, face vaulted to the ceiling, a golden-blue ether churning through the spectrum of my eyes.The impression that pushed its way through me was encompassing.

I held my breath.

This energy used everything I was.

Eyes closing involuntarily, they shot open, my mouth along with them.

Glistering amber light shot vertically from my eyes and mouth:

I, Am The Aensupra:
The Great Attractor
Tetragrammaton
Khurum Abai
Evolutus
Brahmin
Allah.                                                                                                                                                 Ai.  

I knew the voice doubtlessly. ’Twas the same vocal apparition that was first introduced in kindergarten.

Identifying as many names, this power, this entity, took upon itself to manifest through me.

I was burning from the inside out, awkwardly writhing under the force of its magnificence.

There was so much syncopation and rhythm due to its vibratory-intention.

I starved for oxygen.

With a final contraction of tension, my arms, hands, and fingers stretched to the heavens, chest heaving, to a final rush from this power.

My amber fire radiated through and lit everything in the area.

My arms dropped with as much speed as the suicide-shooter, amber still blazing from my eyes and mouth.

A screech escaped through my vocal chords – a yell so piercing that Ali covered her ears and scampered away from me and Neil as fast as her fear would allow, all glass in the vicinity shattering.

An electric-blue, spherical, etheric, audible flare exploded from the base of my spine, the sacrum, through the environment in all directions.

The energies felt and looked like what I encountered at my meeting with Valhalla, only more galvanized.

The light pent back, my eyes and mouth closing, a burnless heat radiating below my navel.

Even though my back was arched and my head lifted from a fit of supernatural discharge, I had the physical wherewithal to clench the area with my hands.

I hunched forward, head butting Neil’s bloody chest.

The light transformed, illuminating gold, swelling in the clenched area.

I stayed motionless and panting for a moment, groaning as the light intensified.

I gasped a deep inhalation, forehead still posted.

As the goldilight grew and climaxed, I was blown backward into the air with blinding speed, crashing into Alaniah.

We fractured through a wall twenty feet behind us.

Time seized.

I blacked out, and although I felt pain everywhere, nothing hurt.

Pressure,
tension,
release,
relaxation.

I focussed on my breathing.

It was paradoxical being conscious and asleep simultaneously.

Consciousness gained control.

I waited a moment before moving, making sure there were no more surprises.

Then I got one – the surprise of my life.

Deep coughing and choking trickled to my hearing. Strained respiratory babbling peeking through the rubble.

I felt the soundwaves. They tremored me.

All of my senses were alive and vibrant. I was one with them; and they, with me.

Dust and debris floated everywhere. Residue from the blown out ceiling, glass, dry wall, wood, vending machines, water fountains, splintered fiberoptic cables, various metals, all performed with destructed whimsy.

I heard sporadic words through the chaos of demolished materials and five floored souls.

I coughed to clear my throat as I moved to uncovered my head, turning it to each side in search of Ali & Eva.

Found them.

They were knocked out, Eva slumped yards away, Alaniah crumpled in a heap, slabs of the wall she just pulverized blanketing her.

I thought it was her I heard coughing and muffling out incomprehensible words. She should’ve been dead from the impact.

As I crawled slowly toward Ali, I saw movement from the corner of my eye.

In irrational panic, I thought it was the suicide-shooter and scurried faster toward my best friend. I grabbed an arm of hers that was closest, hid with her in the debris, looked toward the movement and waited.

I heard a mumble.
The voice was anguished, pushed beneath the surface.

“…waateer,” it squeezed out.

The voice was closer, clearer.

I made room to view the sound, seeing the figure to the voice.

It was Neil, Eva piggybacked on him, crawling towards Ali and me.

I stared in disbelief.

With all the unfolded circumstances of the day, I shouldn’t have been surprised.

A fine frenzy my mind was in.

I took a deep breath, an immense wave of repose sweeping over me.

I became numb.
I couldn’t feel anything.
I was relaxed, completely.

The only sound I took in was my breathing – a sound so familiar, and yet in this instance so strange and new, that it took my recollection processes to deeper depths.

I recalled memories when I was still in a crib. Impossible. The looks on my parents faces as they changed my diaper. When I first crawled. The pain of my first tooth. Finally, the reenactments took a leap to when I saw first light on my entrance into this colorful, loud, confusing, bizarre world.

The memories faded, my inward reality scotched by the truth of the moment.

Neil reached us. He had to climb over shards of wreckage to do so.

He reached out.
We touched.
He spoke. His voice a solemn reassurance.

“You’re alright, but we all need water.”

I blinked at him, like I’d just been born and this was the first face I’d seen. I only remembered his words thoroughly after I’d fully recapitulated this event.

I was still laying with Ali, hiding in the aftermath.

I blinked again.

The sound of police, ambulance, and firetruck sirens could be heard.

I felt the weight of my eyelids, squinting, trying to apply cognition to what I was seeing.

Light blindingly glared from the tips of my eyelashes, retinas rolling back, head leaning as they did.

Eyes closed, head bowed.

The final wave of exhaustion was making its appearance.

Neil whispering my name softened the landing of my blackout.

“Roselle.”

 

~ author: Hiram Surtyr – illustrator: Ruth Barbee ~

Glowien ~ (The Old Religion, ch. 3)

chapter 1, chapter 2

Tantum religio potuit suadere malorum…Religio peperit scelerosa atque impia facta. (How many evils has religion caused!…Religion has brought forth criminal & impious deeds.)

~ De Rerum Natura, The Nature of The Universe, Lucretius

~

The Old Religion

~

I went to my gym locker to change into another pair of skinnies (stonewashed), and white short-sleeved v-neck I kept for emergencies.

Usually it was my period, or laughing so hard at a friends’ joke that a bit of pee leaked, that would require me to change midday. I wasn’t planning on fighting & saturating my legs in lunch.

It wasn’t until I put my shirt on that the brunt force of the morning & early afternoon’s events settled in.

I got a li’l lightheaded, coughed, and began to weep. I leaned against the wall-of-lockers for support. Breathing became difficult. I thought I was going into another fit until sitting stabilized my mind & breaths.

A myriad of emotions poured from me.

I needed this salvo for mental-balance.

The heady weight & sensation of all those feelings after a days worth of convulsions, fighting, confusion, and meeting a peculiar woman in some kind of parallel reality had taken its toll. And the recompense, was complete abandonment of emotional stability – which led to catharsis…full, utter, and euphoric catharsis.

I held nothing back. I couldn’t. The mass of the events was just too great.

While sitting on the locker bench, I buried my face in my hands. My long dark hair fell over my shoulders and draped my arms. I noticed I was still sweating from the fight – adrenaline & endorphins still coursing through my veins.

I gradually sat up after a few moments more of sobbing, trying to breathe deeply.

My body jolted at the sound of footsteps and mild panting behind me.

It was Alaniah.

“Bitch, there you are!” She exclaimed, moderately out of breath.

I quickly wiped my face.

“Yup, here I am,” I said dismissively while sniffing up the snot that was leaking out.

She sat down, half skidding on her keister.

“Ok, THAT was fuckin’ rad!”

“What was?” I said muffled, now wiping the mucous with my arm.

“Omagod, don’t play dumbass with me. The epicness that just unfolded in the cafeteria!? You makin’ SlutBob NoPants make out with the floor, smeared in her nasty-ass-mama-can’t-cook-homelunch!”

Her savagery was on level a trillion. I loved her and her sharp wit and brutal tongue. It always made me laugh when she and kids our age cussed. I did sometimes, too. Name one teenager that doesn’t.

“Please don’t make a big deal out of it, Ali,” I said, whining in that Kristen Stewart sort of way.

“A big deal? It’s already a big fuckin’ deal! Everyone’s talkin’ about it!”

“Yay,” I said blankly.

“Oh, c’mon! You of all people knew she deserved it!”

“That’s not the point.”

“Then what IS!?”

She was more excited about this than needed be.

Ok, and yes, I’ve always wanted to kick that girl’s ass, but after fights, even at the dojo, I always felt sorry for the other person. Nobody likes a defeat, especially if it’s a humiliating one.

“Jus’ ’cause someone deserves to get beaten up, it doesn’t mean they don’t have feelings,” I said.

“SO!? Why aren’t you enjoying this more? She’s the school’s most notorious thot, ratchet as fuck, she picks on EVERYONE, AND she’s been talkin’ shit about you all year! Sayin’ how she wished she would’ve slapped you at homecoming…fuckin’ ho-bag.”

“Yeah, I heard.”

“Then what’s the problem!?”

“The problem is that now she’s prob’ly gonna wanna try to kick my ass again! I’m only supposed to use my training to defend myself. I could really get in trouble ’cause of this.”

“Oh ma’god. Bro. SHE WAS GONA FUCK YOU UP! You DID defend yourself!”

“Ok, will you stop yelling me?” I said half laughing.

“Jesus. You’re gettin’, like, Mother Teresa all of a sudden.”

The fact there was another 8th grader who knew who Mother Teresa was in this new epoch, was another reason why she was my day-one-bestie.

We both had parents who read a lot and they raised us to do the same. Our mums & dads actually met and became friends at the Central Public Library in downtown Portland when we were infants. Weird, but cool.

“Listen, if anyone asks you about the fight…”

“Say no more. I’ll tell ’em that you’re not happy about it and that you’re super apologetic to Thotie McThoterson.”

I snorted while laughsmiling.

“Thanks, hun.”

“No worries, bae. Although, I do think your pity for her is fake. Y’know you loved every minute of whoopin’ that ass.”

I smirked. Reluctantly.

 

With my composure reestablished, Alaniah helped me up, noticing that I was still a lil’ shaken – certain that she thought it was only ’cause of the fight.

“I know you just got in a brawl n’all, but you are going to class, right? I think we should get there, like now, to avoid any teachers trying to swoop you in the office for questioning.”

A little shocked that they haven’t…

“Um, yeah, what class is next? I’m kinda in a haze, and also surprised that no one’s sought me out yet. That like never happens.”

“Word. And Religious Studies is next. You do remember it’s your fav, don’t you?”

“Yeah, mos’ def’. Thanks, my mind is distracted. Adrenaline still flowin’, y’know?”

“Hm, nah, I don’t. Not all of us are ‘Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon’ like you, bruh.”

We laughed.

I loved hers.

‘Twas a supercute chuckle. And so was she – supercute. You know how some of us have that drop-dead gorgeous friend? Alaniah was mine. Although, I seemed to get more attention from boys & girls. Odd. Perhaps it was due to the fact that I gave off a very tomboyishly-laidback, pansexual vibe.

Cheeky’s confidence was superheroic (Cheeky was the nickname Alaniah’s Dad gave her since she was a baby), she had the most positively infectious personality in the room, always the smartest one, and I think that intimidated people. Anyway. We both had our fair share of guy and gal admirers, but we never really gave ’em the time of day. We’d always just rant about our crush-of-the-week. More so her than me.

We exited the locker-room and headed towards Religious Studies.

“Ok, so did I tell you that Neil sexted me last night?”

I shook my head quickly, more out of confusion of her jargon than an answer to her question.

“No, you didn’t. And what th’ hell is sexting?”

“How the fuck’re you alive and don’t know what sexting is?”

“Sorry if I don’t keep up with popculture. Guess it’s all those old books I read.”

“Yeah, well, those ol’ books should tell you to keep current with the modern age, Joan of Arc.” That reference for the win. “Sexting is texting with sexually explicit content – either with pics or words, or a combination of both. Get wit’ it.”

“Fuckin’ loser,” I said playfully.

“Fuckin’ winner, you mean,” she said with a light smile. “Didn’t they tell you that I was a savage?” She sang, while dropping her head slightly and looking cutely menacing, her curly locks bouncing as she walked.

I beamed.

We were more than halfway to Religious Studies when Neil came running around a corner, almost ramming into us.

“BRO, SERIOUSLY!?” I yelled as he brushed against me.

Guys annoyed me. Him especially.

“Lay-deessss,” he oozed as he halted in front of us.

We were all headin’ to the same room. I totes forgot he had this class with us. Cheeky didn’t seem to mind.

“Hi,” Ali said spryly.

“Fancy meetin’ you on the way,” he replied.

She blushed.

“Fancy Nancy,” the sarcasm seeped outa me. I couldn’t help it. They were being disgustingly obvious.

“So, Neil…” I spoke sharply, “…heard you were busy sextin’ last night.”

“What? Oh yeah.” He glanced at Alaniah. “Kinda,” he said cooly.

Bile rose, and I vomited a little in my mouth. These two were supergross.

There were a few dope things about Neil which inspired tolerance.

Being named after his parent’s favorite British author and the world’s most-beloved astrophysicist, Neil Gaiman & Neil deGrasse Tyson, notwithstanding, he wore all black most of the time, had this sorta long, ratty, dark indie-rock hair, he read a lot of good books – graphic novels and such – and he wrote good stories himself too. He was a shoe-in for AP writing & English-lit next year in high school.

Finally, on cue, as I couldn’t stomach any more of the subtle sexuality, we reached homeroom where we had Religious Studies.

KAOS was a technological blend of the old world and the new. The school board decided to split the ratio on automatic to manually operated doors, so while the main doors to enter the building had to be manhandled to keep with the antiquated charm, each door to the classrooms, within, were fixed with biothermal-genetic monitors that could only be accessed by the teachers and students who were legitimately enrolled in the course.

Neil, in feigned chivalry, waved his hand over the sensor.

I flashed him the true to form, sardonic, closed mouth smile, while hot panties next to me gave ‘im the cheese and batted her eye lashes.

I couldn’t help but notice the glances and quick looks the class gave us as we made way to the seats with our invisible names on it. Why did students always sit at the same place?

Neil floundered himself at the collegiate style desk in front of me. He leaned around as he sat.

“Everyone’s staring at you,” he whispered.

“Really? I didn’t notice.” Duh.

“Is it because of the fight?”

“Ya think, genius?”

“Cut the shit with me,” he whispered aggressively.

And that was the nature of our friendship. We had that habit every time we communicated. Our banter would start off cool, then my consistently scathing brand of passive-aggressive humor would piss him off and he would go all loco on me. Not really crazy, just a bit harsh. To be honest, I kinda liked it. It made conversations with him unboring.

“You might as well get used to it,” he said with finality as he turned around.

I threw my disgusted, mock look behind his back, then stuck my tongue out. Childish, I know. But as irritating as Neil could be, he was fun. I guess I hadta have at least one boyish friend, right? Plus, I was tired of being called a dyke just ’cause I didn’t have a parade of guys swarming around me between classes. Kids are so fucking immature sometimes. Although I wouldn’t mind dating a girl. People thought Alaniah and I girlcrushed hard on each other anyway. Stands to reason.

At this thought, I caught a whiff of something good.

Not a strong smell, but light. Airy. Delicate…barely noticeable if you weren’t paying attention. I received my insanely acute olfaction from Daddy. His was like a bloodhound.

I looked up and put the scent to face.

Finally, something alluring to distract everyone from the deer in headlights glares they were berating me with.

“Good afternoon, class.”

“Good-af-ter-noon-Ms.-Bel-la-don-a,” sang the room harmoniously.

She strode gracefully to her desk, placed her belongings down, grabbed a stylus, then tapped the smartboard that was built into her desktop, as the title of the days discussion manifested calligraphy style on the iWall behind her.

The Old Religion

I read the caption a bunch of times to let it sink in, knowing as I always did, the more I read something, the deeper the revelation and understanding I would glean.

I kept staring at the title.

The inscription was a digital representation of her handwriting. She had such gorgeous cursive. I wished I wrote like her. And I loved the fact that she didn’t always utilize I.C.D.U.S., for she was a firm believer in promoting & perpetuating the lost art of handwriting.

Ms. Belladonna.

Izdjalah Hermes Belladonna.

Her first name is pronounced I-SAY-la, I-ZAY-la, or I-SHAY-la, and ’twas obvious why I and so many of my peers knew her full name. It’s exotic as hell. Just sayin’ it aloud is appealing. Try it. Sounds like you’re speaking a bygone romantic language.

“The Old Religion,” she began. “Does anyone know what it is?”

Did I mention she was British? Welsh, actually – making her all the more provocative.

She had 1920’s cabaret fair skin. Long, red, healthily-thinned wavy hair (which she mostly wore up), and everything she wore looked fabulous.

Today, it was a black, striped, wool silk chiffon pencil skirt. It’s très chic, I’d never wear it, but she looked great in it. She topped it off with a stone-blue and white long-sleeved dégradé lace blouse, rolled to the bow (unbuttoned one button too low, no doubt to titillate the onslaught of our pubescent desires – her bust was humble & legendary), and a pair of Louboutin Pigalle Follies. Both her shirt and skirt were Burberry.

I know this due to the fact that Ms. Belladonna kept a daily blog of her notorious ‘What I’m Wearing Today’, and I was certain to peep it from my phone during the drive to school. Most of us did. She was a fashion role model as fuck. Amongst other things.

As I continued My mental admiration of her appearance, I observed that I felt deeply soothed & empowered by the ease in which she wore her attire.

It reminded me of Valhalla.

My mind flashed with a vision of her illustrious face. The regality of both women was synonymous.

Ms. Belladonna surveyed the classroom, east to westward, in an almost A.I. type of head sweep.

She turned slowly to face the iWall, herself mesmerized by the clear glow of her own words.

Upon her turn, the posterior of her frame continued to enthrall its viewers, just as the front – and it was the artistic rendering on the nape of her neck that captivated most.

I fucking love that tattoo, I thought.

The Eye of Horus, an obscurely infamous Egyptian hieroglyph, was expertly tatted in the area of her third & fourth cervical vertebrae.

“No one?” she questioned. “Well, brace yourselves to be severely disturbed.”

“Why?” A kid from the front row blurted.

“Because of truth, young man.”

She paused.

“Truth which’s been suppressed and omitted from the school history books. But I, as you all well know, do not abide by standardized curricular guidelines.”

The class chuckled.

She was right.

Ms. Belladonna always veered from the ‘board approved curricula’. And we loved her for it. Even the slackers & misfits couldn’t wait to get to her class.

Her approach to learning was to, “…always share information from as many perspectives as possible. Because with a generally insightful understanding of all things, one could see the similarities in strangers.”

I know – poetic proverbial idiom game strong.

That’s what she was: allegoric, philosophic, metaphysic, mysterious, inward-outward-thinking, beautiful.

Izdjalah Hermes Belladonna.

She continued, “Please access your device of choice, patch in to the I.C.D.U.S. mainframe, then in your browser type ‘pantheon.org.’”

A silent flurry of teens typing swiftly upon either laptops, desktop smartboards, handhelds, wristwear, eyewear, or digital contacts permeated the atmosphere – the mild hum of nanotech sensors above were barely audible as they scanned the room through Icdus, energized by Teslas’ Powerwalls buried beneath the school, with funding provided byway of the National Nanotechnology Initiative.

It became obvious when all in class booted the required site.

Encyclopedia Mythica.

Never heard of it. And I was completely in-the-know about sites dealing with philosophic mythology. This one, however, escaped me.

“In the upper right corner you’ll notice a separate search bar for this site. Go to it and type in, ‘witchcraft.’”

“But I thought we’re studying The Old Religion?” chimed in a kid from the back row.

“We are, my dear,” Ms. Belladonna replied. “Everyone, read chapter 1 in its entirety. Don’t worry, I’ll wait.”

The more I read this introduction, the more interested and curious I became. It was well written stuff, and the writers were experts or doctors in their particular field. The article of choice was written by a Dr. Ilil Arbel.

The fourth & fifth paragraphs summed it up:

…much of what is known about Witchcraft is based on superstitious nonsense, causing a bias toward a large group of people. This is unacceptable in today’s enlightened society, when most people try avoiding bigotry and prejudice. There has never been a group of people as misunderstood as those who follow Witchcraft, or as its followers call it, the Old Religion. It is estimated that nine million people have been humiliated, tortured and murdered because the world did not comprehend their ancient way of life.

In its purest form, the Old Religion is nature worship. It is also called Wicca, or The Way of the Wise People, and the followers are far from evil – they see themselves as guardians of the Earth and servants of a nature goddess. They are connected with the seasons, the plants, the animals and the planet, and seek a balanced life. They have much in common with ecologists. True, nothing in this world is untainted, and in the long history of Witchcraft there have been those who followed Satanism, Devil worship, Black Magic, Shamanism and Voodoo, among many other cults. But besides the fact that all those disciplines profess to the ability of creating magic, they have very little in common with true Witchcraft.

After she’d seen that we completed the intro, Belladonna assigned for homework that we finish the final eight chapters of the installment.

Intense, right?

It was rare I got excited for anything related to homework.

This was definitely one of those rarities.

I couldn’t wait to get home.

“So why all the controversy surrounding the Old Religion?” asked Neil.

“Think about it,” she started. “Imagine you had a mission – a mission to make the known world, as mortals know it, a patriarchal society…”

“A what-a-whatie?” asked some emo kid in the middle section.

“Patriarchal. A patriarch is the male head of a family or organization, while a matriarch is a female head. For as long as any of us have known, we’ve been living in a predominantly patriarchal world.”

Again she paused, making certain she had the class’ full attention. She did of course.

“So, imagine you had a mission to make the world controlled by men, and suddenly you found out, or just realized that you’ve always known, that most old cultures worshiped various female demigods & deities, and advocated the One God as having both female & male personalities. Hence, The God & The Goddess – that some cultures actually profess the equality between Men & Women. You’d then have to be on a mission to snuff out any mention of women being just as powerful, or in some cases, more powerful than men…”

Another pause.

“…THAT’s precisely why there’s so much controversy, and a perpetual smear campaign towards practitioners of The Old Religion. The worshippers were discovered instituting feminine empowerment between the sexes.”

“That’s truly fucked up,” said a classmate next to me. Our glances met, as though we both knew something the rest of the class didn’t.

“I’d admonish the language due to this being an institute of learning, but speaking freely, both emotionally & rationally should be encouraged, so, swear on young ones,” Belladonna counseled.

“That reminds me of something I read by Virginia Woolf,” Alaniah tolled from behind me. “She said, ‘Perhaps a mind that is purely masculine cannot create, any more than a mind that is purely feminine…It is fatal to be a man or woman pure and simple; one must be woman-manly or man-womanly.’”

Silence.

After a comfortable duration Ms. Belladonna casually broke it.

“Bloody brilliant,” she said smoothly.

“Why not just share the power? There’ve been kings AND queens for millennia,” I blurted, a little more aggressive than necessary.

I definitely ruined the meditative vibe.

“Share power?” Ms. Belladonna questioningly laughed. “Young madam, there’re few cases in history where men of their own volition chose to share power equivalently.”

No one could argue.

Well, you could if you were an ignorant asshole.

She continued.

“But, there’re those who have rebelled against the Controlling Hand. There’ve been, and still are, even today, women and men who’re discreetly guiding humanity back to the old ways. And not the old ways of ancient times. But the old ways of approaching learning while remaining aware of the current social climate. To put it plainly, just mere acceptance of a persons’ individual right to believe and experience life the way they are inspired; to tolerate and respect different perspectives, knowing that it’ll only enhance, not hinder, your personal experience.”

“I doubt that the powers that be would officiate anything that allowed humanity to live individualistically as they pleased,” retorted Neil.

“True,” crooned Belladonna. “Which’s why the purveyors of The Mystery Schools, both lower and greater, took ardent care to make sure that their instructions stayed under the radar of the businesses and governments that infiltrate the vox populi. For the will that’s hidden, is the will that wins.”

“The Mystery Schools,” began Alaniah, “I’m deducing they imparted specialized knowledge that wasn’t taught to the masses, correct?”

“Yes,” Belladonna validated. “‘Clemens of Alexandria says that what was taught in the great Mysteries concerned the Universe, and was the completion and perfection of all instruction; wherein things were seen as they were, and nature and her works were made known.’ Albert Pike wrote that in his Morals & Dogma of 1871.”

“Where’d these Mysteries come from initially?” I asked, already having a notion, but wanting certainty.

“Pike also wrote that ‘…where the Mysteries originated is not known. It is supposed that they came from India, by the way of Chaldaea, into Egypt, and thence were carried into Greece. Wherever they arouse, they were practiced among all the ancient nations; and, as was usual, the Thracians, Cretans, and Athenians each claimed the honor of invention, and each insisted that they had borrowed nothing from any other people. In Egypt and the East, all religion, even in its most poetical forms, was more or less a mystery; and the chief reason why, in Greece, a distinct name and office were assigned to the Mysteries, was because the superficial popular theology left a want unsatisfied, which religion in a wider sense alone could supply. They were practical acknowledgements of the insufficiency of the popular religion to satisfy the deeper thoughts and aspirations of the mind. The vagueness of symbolism might perhaps reach what a more palpable and conventional creed could not. The former by its indefiniteness, acknowledged the abstruseness of its subject; it treated a mysterious subject mystically; it endeavored to illustrate what it could not explain; to excite an appropriate feeling, if it could not develop an adequate idea; and made the image a mere subordinate conveyance for the conception, which itself never became too obvious or familiar.'”

Quiet again.

You could cut the tranquility with a knife.

“My father loved researching these Mysteries,” she recommenced, “his admiration for ’em ultimately inspired his doctorate, and he even created his own symbol based on his assertion of what they meant.”

A kid in the class cried out, “Can we…” Belladonna halted a hand to silence him.

“Yes. Of course you may see it.” A grin skimmed across her face.

She delicately pressed an icon on her digital-desktop.

A macabre, unsettling, yet oddly mollifying image generated on the iWall. It was a photo of an oil painting.

“This, my Padre deemed & curated as The Emblem of The Glowien; or more concisely, The Glowien Emblem.”

The classroom gawked starry eyed at the vision – our mental mouths agape.

“What’s it mean?” Alaniah balked.

Belladonna peered at her inquisitively. “All in due time,” she lulled.

The bell rang and we all jumped – startled as shit. Fuckin’ obsolete school alarms.

I closed my eyes, annoyed, calming myself. I thought I heard a cadence of doors slamming.

I glanced at the time on my desktop, perplexed at how fast 45mins. went by in this course.

Ms. Belladonna was so relaxed & composed that she casually reached for her tea cup during the class’ moment of fright. She took a sip while lifting her free hand to steady us during our frenzy of shutting down our devices.

“Remember to complete the reading,” she temperately shouted.

We agreeingly replied while hurrying out the room. There was a mild student jam due to some douche knocking his laptop to the floor – it had a protective case, surely he was grateful.

Ms. Belladonna was leaning against her desk standing up. I was one of the last to exit. Before I did, she gently grabbed my hand and pulled me near. We’d never been that close in proximity. Gawd, she smelled good. Just like Daddy.

“Are you wearing bergamont?” I asked awkwardly.

“Yes,” she said, not with the jovial tone you would expect from someone who just got indirectly complimented, but with seriousness. “I’d like you to pay close attention to the final chapter of the reading. Chapter 9.”

“Ok,” I said with a hint of question.

“It’s of great importance for you,” she said.

“How so?”

She took another sip of her tea while glaring at me. Her crystal, neon blue eyes ethered my soul.

I shuddered from an instant chill.

She gave me her token mysterious smile as she lowered the glass. Her face was alive.

“All in due time,” was how she ended our conversation.

~ author: Hiram Surtyr, illustrator: Ruth Barbee ~

Glowien ~ (Valhalla, ch. 2)

chapter 1

~

 

Over dead and dying men, the Valkyries choose the battle slain. For Odin at the Ragnarok, end of time for gods & men. Heroes laid like battered planks on the bloody road, paving the way to…

– a portion of Ragnor’s Saga, A Viking Poem by Wulfstan Johnson

 

~

 

Valhalla

I stared at the card, trying to hide my shock from Dad & Amana.

I guess it worked.

They just went about their business, as if I never had a seizure before I even got out of bed to get ready for school. I felt both, anger & relief.

It took a few minutes to calm down.

I swung the blankets off and kicked my feet over the edge of the futon mattress.

As the card was placed on the bed-side table, I noticed that my phone was back on it. Daddy must’ve put it there before he left…so glad the screen didn’t crack. 

I snatched it in a hurry, opened the text.

I sobbed…a gentle sob – like the one you have when you’re really happy about something, or exhausted – the wistful cries.

Dad & Amana had already left, so I didn’t have to be too quiet about it.

The text said, it was real.

So did the card, and the hand-written note.

Someone was playin’ a fucked-up prank.

The text was sent from a blocked number. Asshole. Apparently, a hacker. Can’t wait for the next season of Mr. Robot.

On instinct, my mind spanned all the possible culprits, but also ruled them out due to the complexity of the joke. This was just way too elaborate for any of my friends to pull off.

I’d never encountered anything in my life that shook my reasoning like this. Nothing made sense. I couldn’t just shluff it off to being a dream anymore. I decided that what I was experiencing had a reasonable explanation.

This decision produced an interesting cerebral quandary: my sense of reality shifted, so to speak.

I was uncomfortable…so much to where I had to concentrate on the trivial things around me –

the wastebasket,

the poster on my wall of The Milky Way,

the suspended model of our Solar-System hanging center-ceiling,

my desk with my laptop, tablet, and iPod (circa ’07),

the bookshelf with my Father-suggested-collection of historic accounts of persons like The Medici Family,

comic-books (DC & Marvel, of course),

documents on masonic-gardening,

the entire catalogue of Francis Bacon – My favorite (which included the Shakespearian writings),

Carlos Castaneda,

A. E. Waite,

Manly P. Hall,

A. A. Bailey,

W. Stirling,

H. P. Blavatsky,

A. Avalon,

Plato,

Niccolo Machiavelli,

Danté,

Lucretius,

The Egyptian Book of The Dead,

and other ancient & modern writings on metaphysical-exo/esoterica & philosophy.

And yet, after skimming that small handful of authors in My library, every item seemed different – like, they weren’t really mine at all.

I remembered having this same sensation in the dream.

Snap out of it. “Breathe, girl,” I said out loud.

I came out of my trance and realized at once that I had to finally get to school.

I lifted one of my arms, giving a quick sniff to see if I smelled appropriate enough to skip a shower.

Figuring I smelled better than 95% ok, I gave my underarms a spot more deodorant, to mask the girly-musk, and commenced to trying to control the morning-hair frizz.

After my pj’s were fought off, I slithered into my favorite black pair of skinny jeans (which I wore yesterday) slid on my Birkenstocks, bra, a blue fitted longsleeve tee, mild foundation, top-lid-only eyeliner, mascara, a brush of periwinkle eyeshadow, and pomegranate-pink lip balm. My brows were already on point.

Amana taught Me that a lady of gorgeous modesty used mild make-up, if any at all. Simplicity was the best vice. And since I had a flawlessly fair skin-tone adjacent to my almost-black hair, the little paint that I applied to My face would stand out. She was right, as usual.

My best-friend, Alaniah, who I mentioned earlier, had a super-cute older brother who always drove her to our school – Keller Academy of Supercompugenics: KAOS.

I texted her and asked if she could pick me up on the way. She was always fashionably late so I knew she hadn’t left yet. We argued for a few minutes about it not being on the way, but back-tracking. I apologized, and told her it was a poor choice of words and that I’d had a very difficult & emotional morning already and that I didn’t need to get in a fight with her about something so trivial. She said sorry as well, admitted how we were both acting like fuckboys, said our “I love yous”, and finished getting ready.

This was all, may I remind you, via texting.

~

The school day began like a normal 8th grade procession and progressed uneventful until lunch time.

I loved that KAOS was well integrated & diversified – balanced as fuck.

Every school is a colorful garden of personalities, including the fast-growing weeds that try but fail to kill the more fragrant, desirable and beneficial plants.

Upon this thought, I was reminded of The Young Duke of York quoting his Uncle Rivers in King Richard III, saying:

Small herbs have grace, great weeds do grow apace,

and since, methinks, I would not grow so fast,

Because sweet flowers are slow and weeds make haste.

 

I was walking, tray decked with a beautifully seared salmon and salad (we the students adored KAOS’ partnership with The Oregon Culinary Institute), and as I checked my texts, while turning down an aisle to go sit with Alaniah & Eva, I smacked tray then head first into a girl that was coming from the other direction.

Now, commonly, the amount of force exerted while colliding with someone wouldn’t cause the two people to raze downward, but for some odd reason, this incident did.

Our food tumbled to the floor…we, and my phone, went following…

Time halted.

The immediate glare from the colors of sparkling yellow-gold & blue warping in front of my eyes blinded me. I shielded my head with my arms as if preventing the onslaught of something being thrown at my face.

I was on my back.

I’d forgotten where I was and I started yelling. I felt a nauseating fear, a dread so foreign, real, and terrifying that my stomach knotted worse than any menstrual-cramps. I clinched it and morphed into a foetal position. My fingers clawed at the cafeteria floor, everything was spinning.

I felt an essence crawl through my intestines & vital organs. It felt like a snake coiling, uncoiling, and recoiling in my uterus, through my gut, and in my chest. It hurt like a motherfucker. I thought I was gonna puke until it stopped. So did the screaming.

I was sitting upright, still on the floor. I don’t remember moving to this position though. My mouth closed and I looked around, startled, but calm. There was no one in the cafeteria except me.

I was completely abandoned.

That’s impossible.

…impossible for hundreds of kids to vanish out of a room of that size, that fast.

Psychologically speaking, this was all very jarring, while at the same time, I felt that peace that surpassed all understanding. Something wouldn’t allow me to panic anymore, especially after what I experienced earlier this morning.

 

As I stood, I noticed my body felt more stable.

A peculiar & comforting energy flinted within.

Not knowing why, I started walking toward the nearest exit, westward, perplexed at how empty & silent the environment was.

I reached the doors and shoved them open.

 

The sunlight was brilliant.

 

It felt like my first time outdoors.

The air, sweet. I could taste a sugariness upon my palate.

The grass, shrubs, bushes, trees, the infinite spectrum of color…everything. Radiant.

At that moment, the only thing that mattered was my breathing. It felt miraculous. I never had so much fun feeling my breath before.

A soft breeze swept over.

The scent of my hair reached my nostrils. Rosebud oil. Splendid. I loved this scent which Dad introduced me to. He was the best smelling Man on the planet to me. Amana agreed.

I’m not certain how long this moment of blissful intoxication went on, but at a particular moment I heard footsteps in the

Glowien ~ (Kindergarten, ch. 1)

It is true, that if the affection or aptness of the children be extraordinary, then it is good not to cross it…

– Francis Bacon, Of Parents & Children, The Essays or Counsels of 1625

~

Kindergarten

Death is Release.                                                                                                                                                                                                        

She is the stalker of all organic beings.                                                                                                                                                        

Always be aware of her haunting.                                                                                                                                                                           

To be properly aware, rid yourself of fear.                                                                                                                                                              

To be rid, know that there is none.                                                                                                                                                                       

To omit Death from Yourself, reject it;                                                                                                                                                                  

accept to Thineself, Physical Immortality. 

~

This was a mantra The Ineffable taught me after my accident.

I was scared to death – and how appropriate that was, being scared to death. I used to be afraid of dying, but I learned early in my training that the only way to conquer something I was afraid of, was to face it. Or, accept its challenge – but only when prepared and ready. I was arrogant and stubborn when I took my first challenge, and the accident was indicative of it; I paid a heavy price, though inevitably, it was worth it…

I was in Mrs. Merriweather’s class the morning it happened.

During math, I imposed my help on a fellow-student and she didn’t want to be bothered. I insisted though. Daddy told me later that I should, “…always ask if someone wants help, or wait to be asked. It should be their choice.”

I was just so excited, being a young-God at everything, that I wanted to flaunt my shit in front of everyone, especially the dumb-fucks in the class.

I, like all children, was obsessed with attention. Daddy also told me I should, “…never attract unnecessary attention. Remember honey, people obsess about things when they’ve lost control over themselves and the forces around them.”

I had absolutely no idea what that meant at the time. My Father enjoyed talking to me and my siblings like we were older and understood his terse idioms.

Anyway. Like I was saying, my classmate didn’t want help and I kept persisting to her that I knew the answer to the equation she was trying to figure out.

Our seats were next to each other at the circle table, so all I had to do was take a gander toward my left, and I was aware of her problem. I leaned in close to her right ear.

“The answer is…”

“I know what it is!” She whisperingly yelled.

“Then write it down,” I replied haughtily.

“Mind your own business,” she retorted. (Dad told me this, too.)

I began to think about what I was going to say before I rebutted. Try to diffuse her hostility, I thought. Well, actually, being that I was five it was more like, She’s being a meanie. So I just went for…

“I was only trying to help, gahosh..” To which she responded,

“Yeah well, help this.”

And then she slapped me. Thank the Jolly Green Giant she dropped her pencil first.

It stung, of course, but it didn’t hurt as much as the thought that I upset my classmate so much that she decided to hit me in the fuckin’ face. I had always been so nice to her. So, why did she slap me? I wasn’t mean to her. I didn’t take any of her belongings. I didn’t sit in her favorite spot during storytime. I didn’t tattle-tell to Mrs. Merriweather when she snuck candy underneath her desk and was eating it when Merriweather wasn’t looking. I couldn’t figure out, at the time, what would compel her to use such aggression. Perhaps she thought I was just being an asshole. I could own that, but I just stared at her, stunned.

Then the unexpected happened. She hit me again.

I was dumbfounded.

What the fuck was she thinking?

Was she crazy?

Was I crazy?

Were we both crazy?

I was appalled, to say the very least of a thing.

I felt angry and sad due to the physical and emotional pain from being hurt by a so-called friend.

I lowered my head while holding my hand against the left cheek she bitchslapped me on and started to cry, silently.

Then it happened…the accident.

As I looked down, I noticed a bright yellowish-golden pattern traced around the outline of my feet, sorta like the aura of a candle flame.

At first, I thought I micturated on myself (micturate = pee. Daddy was always teaching me fancy words to everything). While thinking this, I realized that the color was warping between yellowish-gold and blue, and I did NOT pee yellowish-gold AND blue.

It was weird.

So weird, in fact, that I thought I must be delusional from the impact of getting hit. Twice.

That would’ve been a more socially-acceptable response rather than what truly happened.

The colors kept warping. They got brighter around my feet. The yellows, golds, and blues started rising up the sides of my ankles, then to my Achilles tendons; calves came next:

knees,

thighs,

hips,

waist,

Love-handles,

belly,

ribs,

back,

chest,

shoulders,

arms,

neck…and then, I’m certain, my face and head.

It was then that I realized what was happening – I was glowing. The whole of My body had been illumed.

I panicked.

I’d only seen characters glow in those dope Animé cartoons my big brother Kadmon used to watch. But why was this happening to me?

The panic took over. I felt strangely hot; feverish. My body shook violently. My heart was beating faster than I’ve ever felt it before. Sound altogether ceased. Nothing could be heard. Fear birthed itself in the pit of my stomach, to the limbic, then through the remainder of my body. I was shaking so vivaciously that the laces on my Peds untied.

Mindfully, I couldn’t stop the internal dialogue (in other words, I couldn’t stop mentally talking to myself. I was taught, later, the importance of shutting off the internal dialogue for clarity of mind – I can do all superphysical things when my mind is quiet).

The inner conversation continued.

Does this happen to other kids? Am I dying? I want My Dad! I need a hug! Someone, please stop this!

By this time, Mrs. Merriweather had interceded during my convulsions. She had me in a firm embrace with one of her arms. She was vigilant, the other hand at the ready to make sure I didn’t choke on my tongue.

I felt my head move upward…looking at the high ceiling of the low room. I saw the lights and how they seemed to be moving synced with Me during the convellere. They got brighter then dimmer – fluctuating. A smoky fog of the same colors, yellowish-gold and blue, formed in front of my eyes and began waving in warpy circular patterns on the roof. I noticed a black splotch on the left of my periphery.

Death

Something sure and infinite within me, and removed from all doubt, knew that that small dark mass, an optical illusion or not, represented Death.

My mind flashed. A dream.

I was flying.

A distant scene,

…now not so distant.

I was floating on a particular consciousness of time – a shadow from what was.

The past.

A small apartment. It looked vaguely familiar.

A girl, about my age. Faint. Clearer.

Her face. In focus. My classmate; the one who slapped me.

Her mom.

A fight.

The classmate crying, bright red marks on both sides of her face.

…runs to her room.

Door slams.

Scene.

The shaking abruptly stopped and the colors disappeared.

I lowered my head, turned it to-ward the left, and was now staring directly at the classmate; she’d been hovering in her seat the entirety of the episode.

I was still seated on my chair in Merriweathers’ embrace. The purple and yellow hooded zip-up I was wearing over my t-shirt was down over my shoulders, though my arms were still in its sleeves.

I took a deep breath, then said,

“Why did you hit me?”

At least, that’s what I think I said. My voice came from elsewhere.

“Um, because you kept bothering me?” The classmate voiced this like a question, which stood to reason, ’cause I’m sure she was freaked out by me goin’ nuclear all of a sudden.

“Forgive me. My intention was to assist you. I should’ve asked if you wanted my help.” (Fuckin’-a, so like Daddy.)

Then I gave her a command. Which I’m sure, for her, was a bit confusing.

“Tell me what you just saw.”

I was surprised she obeyed. Or rather, the other-me before the accident was surprised. The Me that was speaking from and in that chair intended everything happening.

After her re-telling of what she thought she saw, the Me that was acting in this strange event, during a seemingly normal kindergarten day, stood up slowly as Mrs. Merriweathers’ hands fell by the wayside, hoisted her hoodie up on her shoulders, calmly knelt down and started tying the un-done laces of her shoes. (During my later recapitulations, I remembered when I knelt down, I placed my hands over my shoes and the strings slithered into position by themselves. While they moved into position, I felt a strong heat radiating from the palms of my hands and fingertips. They glew golden with the familiar yellowish-blue aura around them.)

With my shoes tied, I stood up, as slowly as when I knelt down. When my legs were straight, I was taller. Stronger. More adult than a five-year-old.

An energy surged through and around me. It was as if a prominentia, sent directly from the Sun, plunged its virtues through the fiber of my body. ‘Twas as much intense as it was comforting. Empowering. Encompassing. Peaceful. Not a muscle was overwrought. I was relaxed completely. If a car were to drive head-on into Myself, it would’ve imploded from my solidity.

A commotion.

I felt the chaotic silent energy of a bunch of kinders listening and witnessing the post-traumatic stress of two peers in a potential fight. I ignored it, and them.

I looked at my classmate in her left eye. She looked frightened. I would’ve been, too. I spoke again.

“You should talk to the counselor about your problems at home.”

“What are you talking about!?”

“Your mom. You should talk to the school counselor. It’s not good to do to others what your mom does to you. Especially, if it hurts people.”

The classmate looked horrified. She cried.

“How’d you know that?” she asked, words slightly trembled.

“I don’t know,” I said tenderly. “But, what I do know, is that you should talk to someone about how your mothers’ actions inspire you to feel and react.”

“I don’t know what you’re saying,” whimpered she.

Time to dumb it down, I heard a voice in my head say. Talking like an adult was dead-ending this convo. Plus, as usual, I remembered Daddy teaching me that, “The conies are but a feeble folk..”, and, “..comfort the feebleminded.” So I simply said to her,

“After you hit me, I saw in My mind your mom hitting you. I remembered that your parents divorced last summer, and since then, you and your mom have been different.”

If my classmate was crying before, now she was bawling.

Without hesitation, I stepped, walked, glided, or flew into her personal space, and gave her a cuddle.

I felt a bunch of prickly-like things all over my body, like the feeling you get when you lick a battery or when you stick your finger in an electrical outlet (Daddy said, “NEVER put your tongue or fingers ANYWHERE they don’t belong!”). Only, this was a tickle-feeling, like a bunch of fast moving ants crawling over my skin.

Immediately upon feeling this, I thought of times when Daddy took me and my little sister to the park by our old apartment.

Near this park, there was a wood. Within it, there were a lot of old and ancient trees. We’d walk along the pathway, weaving in and out of the forest, in silence, like Daddy was studying the movement, or listening to the signals-intelligence The Trees were relaying to one another. He’d close his eyes and take sedated deep breaths, allowing the acerbic cool of the pacific-northwest air to permeate his broad lungs.

We live in Portland, Oregon. Here, there’re a lot of trees. I’m grateful for this.

After a while of this Nature Ritual, he would find a tree that piqued his interest, usually a pine of some sort. He gazed at it for a few seconds before walking towards it. He would stop directly in front of it, almost as if he were about to give it a smooch.

“Put a hand on the tree,” he would calmly tell Us.

This is when the magic happened.

As My Sister & I touched the tree, I noticed how my body released all tension. A feeling of tranquility and gratitude overwhelmed me. Daddy said we were, “…feeling the soul of the tree. Trees are closer to the characteristics of humans more than you know. They are True Warriors.”

As with most things Daddy told me when I was this age, I didn’t know what the hell he meant by the trees being warriors. I trusted, though, that he knew what he was talking about.

A few moments of elation would elapse after we touched the tree and, without warning, we would start to feel it. The it I’m referring to is the intense prickly-ant sensation streaming over our hands and arms. The longer we kept our hand on the tree, the deeper and more we’d feel this mild electricity course through our veins. Daddy said the electricity is, “…us becoming One with the Warrior.”

This, in consequence, made it possible for humans to know what the warrior, or tree, was feeling. And also, this link between Tree and Man would allow the tree to absorb and remove from us negative and harmful feelings and emotions. So, Daddy would tell us, if we were ever feeling upset, irritated, or sad for any inexplicable reason, to go touch a tree with the palm of our hand, or lay our spine against it, until all the bad feelings vanished. Or, gently stroke the leaves of a non-poisonous plant.

The only requisite was patience. Dad further instructed us that,

“It takes patience with Oneself when communicating with Nature & The Universe. Nature is very patient, so Nature requires us to be the same. Emotions and feelings run deep, and, just like our feelings, it takes time to understand why we’re feeling what we are and to rid ourselves of negative energy.”

As I hugged my classmate, every knot of tension and negativity within her dissipated. I actually felt her relax. I absorbed it, like I was a Tree. I made it my own; I was her and she was me. We became one body, one mind, one spirit, one consciousness. We were aware of everything and nothing simultaneously.

I was uncertain if it was just in mind or deep inside the soul that kindled the fire, but after what was an infinite minute of ecstasy, or being outside myself, I knew, doubtlessly, everything that happened to my classmate in her lifetime.

I saw every birthday party she had – and not just seent it, but felt it…lived it. There was no differentiating between my experiences and hers. They, we, were one.

This duality of worlds colliding as one, while pondering the experience later in my life, confused me and gave me a headache when I tried to make sense of it. But I remembered, then, another lesson The Ineffable taught me:

“Trying to make sense of things, through primitive reasoning, while operating in The Second Attention, is both rash and dangerous. Get used to the notion that there’re things within existence that will not be understood through base rations of The Mind. A Psychological-Ascension & Self-Awareness must first take place before those higher things can be ascertained.”

I gently pulled myself away from my classmate. She was no longer crying. I have no idea how long we’d been hugging. I noticed the tear stains on her cheeks. These lines, in contrast to the light brown tone of her skin, inspired a wonderful Mirth inside my head & chest. It felt good.

I realized, or just finally admitted to myself, that I liked the look of her face. I also liked how our skin color looked combined. My complexion was porcelain. I was slightly shorter. Both our hairs were long – mine dark, almost black, and straight – hers medium brown, thick and exceedingly curly.

We were holding hands down below and looking at each other in the eyes. We smiled.

The school bell rang its annoying buzz. Usually, this startled me. This time, however, it didn’t. I kept calm.

When it rang, I closed my eyes as if the bell reminded me that I needed to take a break and meditate.

As I opened them, after nine seconds, or so, I noticed things were sideways. The calmness left. Confusion entered. An intense hue of reddish-yellow light blinded me.

Daddy had just pulled the curtains open to flood my room with the morning sun.

“Wakey wakey, eggs and bakey..” (He said that to me every morning in homage to one of his favorite films.)

I blinked and sat up, slowly. My hair, which was usually up in a messy bun the evening before, was down and anarchic. I brushed a mouthful away, along with the drool that now resembled a thin paste-like translucent glue.

“Sweet dreams, baby?”

“Huh?” I blankly responded.

“Did you have good dreams last night?”

“Uh, yeah…I guess so.”

“Care to share?”

“What? No. I, um…can’t really remember what happened.” I sighed. “I was back in kindergarten, though. It was really weird.” I felt high.

“Kindergarten, huh? Shit, it’s been eight years since then. You three are sproutin’ like bamboo. I remember…”

“Daddy,” I stepped on his words. “Spare me the trip down memory lane. Not before I pee and shower, please.”

“Or pee in the shower.”

I eyerolled hard. “Seriously?”

“Don’t even front. We all do it.”

“Whatev.”

“Don’t whatev Me young…”

“Daddy!?” I said, exasperated.

He stood there for minute, a bit uncased due to my second interruption. He constantly reinforced to Me, My little sister Eva, and big brother Kadmon to never interrupt anyone. It was one of the rudest things you could do while conversing.

He forced a weak smile, doing his best to resist the temptation of setting me straight.

“Aight, love. Hurry. Giz is in the shower up here and I believe she still thinks that she can drain all the hot water from it.” He giggled. “You should use the lower-level or outdoor one.”

Like I didn’t know that, I thought. My mood was miffed so I felt it best to follow his example of levity.

“You’re still calling her Gizmo? She’s in 7th grade and you still haven’t showed her Gremlins yet. She’s still waitin’ to see this cute, little creature you nick-named her after.”

“I know…haven’t had a movie-night in a while. I miss ’em. Maybe tonight?”

“That’d be coo. You’re not gonna get too many more nights with me when I’m in high school next year,” I said, while scratching that early-morning-haven’t-washed-my-shit-in-3-days-scalp-itch. “Plus, Kadmon’s social life is already cray.”

“Fuck, don’t remind me. I trip every time I think about it; You, Kad, and Eva, all in the same school with some of the same guy friends…”

“…and that’s why you’ve had us in Aikido, Wing Chun, and studying The Shoninki since we were five. I think Eva and I can take care of ourselves with boys, Daddy. Also, Kady’s gona be a Senior next year.”

“Exactly. His Senior friends goin’ after his Freshman sister. I know what I was thinkin’ and doin’ when I was a Senior.”

“That, and you didn’t have a Father who raised us like you did. Don’t You trust Me?”

“Perhaps. Time will tell,” He said quickly.

I chucked a pillow at him. “You always say that.”

“It’s true. Time tells…”

“…all lies. I know. You’ve drilled that in for a while now, too.”

“Then maybe one of these aeons it’ll make sense to you. I think the Rites of Passage, that come with adulthood, will remind you of all the lessons I’ve been uploading in you and your sister that your brother has so kindly chosen to corrupt.”

“Perhaps,” I said smiling.

With that final comment, Daddy threw back my pillow (which he caught), smiled his proud fatherly smile, turned, and left my room.

I stared at the empty space…sitting there, trying to recollect what I woke up from.

It was too vivid to’ve been just a dream. But the facts were, I was sitting upright in my bed, Daddy had come to wake me up to get ready for school, we conversed about family-movie-night, my sister, brother, and high school. As you’re reading this, no doubt in wonder as to where this is all leading, I’m thirteen, and in the dream, or whatever it was, I was five and in kindergarten.

Reasoning took over.

I shook my head to resuscitate from the daze, and taxed the whole thing off to being a lucid dream.

I laughed out loud uncomfortably.

My red iPhone beeped from the bed side table. Before it was picked up, I noticed a small folded piece of paper next to it. I instinctively grabbed the paper, unfolded it with delicate haste, and stopped.

My hands began to tremble.

I couldn’t stop repeatedly speed-reading the calligraphy-styled writing.

In my left hand read three words.

The design of the writing was old, not of the young teenage type, so I knew it wasn’t mine, nor Kadmon’s, or Eva’s, nor any of My friends’. In truth, I couldn’t remember the last time I’d seen someone handwrite a note.

(At school, in every class, we use the network wide Intuitively Collaborative Digital Ubiquitous System, lovingly referred to as Icdus, that absorbs and reads the brainwave emissions that are dispensed in the air upon thinking, which are then immediately, with the speed of thought, added and synced in the data storage area of our personal computers and/or hand-held devices. This allows for our notes, when hearing the teacher’s lecture, to be saved in text format, precisely as the professor speaks, or the altered notes from our thoughts, on our computers without the need of typing, therefore freeing our minds to fully take in what our instructors are teaching, without obstructing the lesson by doing needless typing or writing.)

All this I thought in an instant while the words of the note held me captive.

It merely said: It was real.

What, the dream? What was real? And who wrote this message, got in my room, and left it next to my…cell phone!

I flicked the note in my lap, grabbed the mobile, then opened the text, and before reading it, dropped the phone to the floor.

Breathing hard, I realized I was about to faint from hyperventilating. I reached for the bed-side table to support myself, and instead, rammed my hand into the lamp that was propped, it, too, falling floorward. It made an awful racket.

Within seconds, Dad, and his personal-assistant, Amana, came rushing in the room to see what’d happened.

Immediately, Amana came to my side to help me lie down, to which she began to, in a state of mild panic, command me to breathe deeply and slowly. I must’ve been sweating before I was laid flat because I felt my eyes stinging with sharp moisture.

Daddy cleared the pieces of broken glass and cell phone to make way for him to crouch at my side.

A glimpse of the kindergarten dream glinted in my mind.

My breathing steadied.

I looked up into the angelic face of Dad’s beautifully-exotic assistant. Although obviously not related, I resembled her a little.

She’d been Dad’s righthand woman since he won The Powerball Jackpot.

Dad divorced mom (a pathological-liar) a few years before his lottery win, of which he was grateful for.

That was an epic time in Our lives. The current moment, was not so epic.

Amana was on the verge of tears. Daddy was wiping away a stream. Amana lifted me to an embrace across Her lap. I took Her in when I was calm.

“What happened?” I asked weakly.

“You had another seizure,” she forced out through a sniff.

“It scared the shit out of us,” said Daddy, “We knew there’d been an episode from the sounds we heard before you started choking.”

“Please, sweety,” Amana whimpered, caressing my forehead, “You must be careful.”

“I know,” I voiced, steadying. “I thought I had it beat this time.”

“Well, you don’t!” Blurted Daddy. “This could’ve been it!” And then He started to really cry. I’d never seen Him like this before.

“What your father means,” Amana said nurturingly, “Is that we were worried that this could’ve been the big one.”

“…my god, honestly, I get it.” I said sitting up while regaining my youthful zeal. “Can you two ever just say it?”

I realized then that it was more difficult than I’d thought it’d be to say the words. I hesitated.

“I know I might…die. The chances are likely with this brand of epilepsy.” I looked crossly at my father. “I’ve known this ever since the doctor told us about my first one in…”

My voice trailed off.

I’m sure Dad & Amana were trying to get my attention, but I couldn’t hear them. My mental clarity at the moment was the only thing worthy of attention.

Kindergarten.

I had my first epileptic episode in kindergarten.

Regardless of the notion that I found similitude between these unrelated events, I, however, could not understand the semblance of this note with those three words on it. It was nonsense.

Again, as before, I threw the thoughts away into the wastebasket of it being just a very vivid dream, with the keenest amount of realism I’d ever encountered.

I came out of my thoughts and back into my room with Amana & Daddy.

“Babe, did you hear a word of what I just said?” Amana asked. She was eloquent, even through the drama of the situation.

An erudite young-woman of the utmost degree, Amana spoke six languages – Dad’s favorite ones: Ammontish, Latin, Spanish, Aramaic, Italian and French. She had a doctorate in Psychology from Harvard, another of Dad’s favorites (and the college he’s been pressuring me to attend since I could talk), and was working towards a higher-degree, in between time, from L’Abode Via Herm – a suggestion from My Father, no doubt.

“No. I didn’t. I apologize. Just thought of something.”

“About how late you’re gonna be for school I hope,” said Daddy, calming down.

“Yeah, something like that,” I responded.

“André, I suggest she doesn’t go to school today.” Amana spoke firmly and without bullshit to Dad. He liked that. He treasured it. And, she pronounced ‘André’ in its proper French dialect. He really liked that.

I interjected. “What? I’m fine. Really, I’m good. I just need to get up and move around a little. I’ll be ok.”

“She needs to be in school,” Daddy said, now back to his normal parental self. “It’s her last week. She’s got a dance and music recital, testing at the Dojo and Kwoon, and I will NOT miss these events before I go on tour.”

(Oh yeah. Daddy’s an author & musician; he plays the drums. He and his band are going on tour in the late summer after he gets back from a June-long book tour of the U.K. to promote his global, #1 bestselling novel. It’s a marvelous story. He says that Eva, My best friend, Alaniah, and I inspired it.)

Amana looked at Dad with professional annoyance. She smiled faintly at him before looking at me to say, “Fine. But keep your phone in your pocket in case we need to get ahold of you, or if you have an emergency.”

“Got it.”

“Good,” then she kissed my cheek, got up from the bed, touched Daddy on the shoulder and turned to leave. She stopped right before stepping out the door.

“I just remembered,” she said. She turned back around to face me while Dad got up to finish cleaning the broken mess at the side of the bed. “Something came in the mail for you yesterday.”

As Amana walked over She noticed the note on the bed near Me. It had fallen between Myself and the wall which was to my right.

“What’s that?” She asked, motioning her head towards the folded-sheet.

“Nothing,” I hasted, while tucking it under My pillow, making it obvious I didn’t want Her snooping.

She smirked, probably thinking it was from a boy or some shit like that.

She reached into the back pocket of her jeans, looked at the object, then handed me a sealed envelope.

It was pretty, the kind of colors girls like. I was certain it was a birthday party invite. I was unassumingly popular at school so I always got invited to the coolest parties. I wondered why someone was sending a snail-mail invite though; it was so old-school.

“I wonder whose party this one is for,” I said half-sarcastically, half-excited.

I tore the envelope and opened the card.

It was real, was all it said.

~ author: Hiram Surtyr, illustrator: Ruth Barbee ~

An Illegal & Secret Supper

I recognize the men at the bar. And the one woman.

They’re some of the most respected chefs in America. Most of them are French, but all of them made their bones here.

They are, each and every one of them, heroes to me – as they are to up-and-coming line cooks, wannabe chefs, and culinary students everywhere. They’re clearly surprised to see each other here, to recognize their peers strung out along the limited number of barstools.

Like me, they were summoned by a trusted friend to this late-night meeting at this celebrated New York restaurant for ambiguous reasons under conditions of utmost secrecy.

They have been told, as I was, not to tell anyone of this gathering. It goes without saying that none of us will blab about it later.

…I still get the vapors being in the same room with these guys. I’m doing my best to conceal the fact that I’m, frankly, starstruck – atwitter with anticipation. My palms are sweaty as I order a drink, and I’m aware that my voice sounds oddly high and squeaky as the words “vodka on the rocks” come out.

…If a gas leak blew up this building? Fine dining as we know it would be nearly wiped out in one stroke.

…The large double doors to a private banquet room swing open and we are summoned.

There’s a long table, set for thirteen people, in the middle of the room. Against the wall is a sideboard, absolutely groaning under the weight of charcuterie – the likes of which few of us (even in this group) have seen in decades: classic Careme-era terrines of wild game, gallantines of various birds, paté and rillettes. The centerpiece is a wild boar paté en croute, the narrow area between forcemeat and crust filled with clear, amber-tined aspic.

Waiters are pouring wine. We help ourselves.

One by one, we take our seats. A door at the far end of the room opens and we are joined by our host.

It’s like that scene in The Godfather, where Marlon Brando welcomes the representatives of the five families.

…There is a welcome – and a thank-you to the person who procured what we are about to eat (and successfully smuggled it into the country). There is a course of ravioli in consommé (quite wonderful) and a civet of wild hare. But these go by in a blur.

Our dirty plates are removed. The uniformed waiters, struggling to conceal their smiles, reset our places.

Our host rises and a gueridon is rolled out bearing thirteen cast-iron cocottes. Inside each, a tiny, still-sizzling roasted bird – head, beak, and feet still attached, guts intact inside its plump little belly.

All of us lean forward, head turned in the same direction as our host high pours from a bottle of Armagnac, dousing the birds – then ignites them.

This is it.

The grand slam of rare and forbidden meals.

If this assemblage of notable chefs is not reason enough to pinch myself, then this surely is.

This is a once-in-a-fucking-lifetime meal – a never-in-a-lifetime meal for most mortals, even in France!

What we’re about to eat is illegal there as it’s illegal here.

Ortolan.

~ excerpt from “Medium Raw” by Anthony Bourdain ~

Astronomy in the Bible: 666 is positive

The Hiram Ros Imperare: publishings of rare esoterica

The wisdom of the Egyptians, what was it but principally astronomy? 

~ (St. Augustine, “City of God,” bk. xviii., ch. 39)

~

The Holy Oblation

According to the old Egyptian system, the earth stood in the centre, the sun was supposed to occupy the earth’s orbit, while Mercury and Venus revolved round the sun as satellites. Even modern astronomers, with all their appliances are uncertain as to the exact distance of the earth from the sun. It has been computed to be from 108 to 110 of its own diameters. Galileo called it 110, and the ancients seem to have usually taken it at this amount.

Origen (“Against Celsus,” bk. vi., ch. 23), after describing the cosmic ladder of the Mithraic mysteries, and the harmonic arrangements of the stars, continues:

“If one wished to obtain means for a profounder contemplation of the entrance of souls into divine things…let him…

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