Halfway Between Worlds: Bloodline of the Pure

by S. B Terra

  After lying on the bed and staring out the window for a while, Alice closed her eyes and slowly drifted off to sleep.

  Alice woke up a couple of hours later and grabbed the Terra Times that Bella had given her. On the front page was a large, moving photograph of a man being escorted out of a busy court room.

  As Alice watched the man being escorted out of the court room, she realized that it was the man who Bella had choked the other day.

  JULIUS VARL SENTENCED TO LIFE IN PRISON

  Julius Varl, nefarious assassin and loyal supporter of the Medelle family has been sentenced to life in prison on several charges including war crimes, crimes against humanity, murder and conspiracy. Julius Varl acted as one of the head assassins for the Medelle army during Lars Medelle’s five-year wave of terror and is believed to have been involved in the murders of over sixty people.

  Varl was captured during a raid conducted by the People’s Forces in the Wild Lands less than a week ago that resulted in sixteen deaths and multiple injuries. P4

  Alice opened the newspaper, read the table of contents and then flicked through to one of the back pages where the lectures were listed.

  Lectures running Tuesday – Terra Education Department

  Defensive Spells I – Intermediate- 9am – LH4

  The Arg Plant & Its Uses – 9am – LH10

  Introduction to Shamanism – 9am – LH12

  Criminal Law IX – 9am – LH2

  Ravens & Magical Creatures – 10am – LH3

  Creative Writing II – Intermediate – 10am – LH14

  Intuitive Learning I (Childhood Education) – 10am – LH5

  Political Systems of History IV – 10am – LH7

  Lucid Dreaming II – Beginner – 11am – LH16

  Ecosystems of the Higher, Natural World of Magic III – 11am – LH9

  Offensive Spells II – Advanced – 11am – LH4

  Defense Against Remote Incursions I – 11am – LH12

  Will Power Techniques II (Meditation) – 11am – LH1

  The Alerra Tree (Forestry) – 1pm – LH9

  The Magic Council, People’s Forces & System of Governance – 1pm – LH11

  Tribes & Sects of Alora II (History) – 1pm – LH7

  The Nature of Thoughts & Attachments II (Meditation) – 2pm – LH1

  Healing Potions II - Beginner (Natural Medicine) – 2pm – LH6

  Child Counselling II (Psychology) – 2pm – LH19

  The Oak & Its Species (Forestry) – 3pm – LH9

  Mushrooms & Their Uses II – 3pm – LH10

  Narz: A History – 3pm – LH7

  The Nature of Suffering II (Karma) – 3pm – LH1

  Woods & Materials I (Property) – 4pm – LH17

  Gold, Silver & The Monetary System II (Economics) – 4pm – LH13

  Teleportation I – 4pm – LH15

  Intuitive Learning IX (Higher Education) – 4pm – LH5

  Criminal Law I – 5pm – LH2

  Child Counselling IX (Psychology) – 5pm - LH19

  Zoning Laws II (Property) – 6pm – LH17

  Introduction to Meditation – 6pm – LH1

  The Press II (Journalism) – 6pm – LH20

  Event Management IX – 6pm – LH3

  Creative Writing II – Beginner – 6pm – LH14

  A feeling of freedom came over Alice as she got up off the bed and walked out into the living room to check the time, realizing that she was now completely independent for the first time in her life.

  It was 5pm, and after briefly pondering what to do, she decided that she was going to go and check out her first lecture. She quickly read over the lecture listings again and decided on Introduction to Meditation at 6pm.

  Alice had always been interested in and had practiced meditation whilst she was in the material and was curious to see if the teachings were any different in this world.

  Alice shut the balcony doors and then made her way downstairs and down to the Student Plaza. She quickly stopped into the office supplies store and bought a few small notepads, and as she was walking over to the T.P, she noticed a small sign out the front of one of the cafes.

  ‘VEGGIE BURGERS $2.’

  Alice walked over to the café and went inside, she had only eaten breakfast and was starving. The cafe was rather small and had long, comfortable couches and tables wrapped around the room, it was dimly lit and there were large paintings and pieces of artwork hanging on the walls.

  There was a couple who looked to be in their thirties sitting in the corner of the room, eating. On the other side of the room there was a slightly chubby, young man with short brown, curly hair who seemed to be a few years older than Alice, sitting along the wall and reading a book.

  The café had a nice atmosphere inside and seemed very relaxed.

  “Hi. What can I get you?” asked the girl behind the counter as Alice approached, she looked to be around Alice’s age.

  “Hi. Veggie burger, please.”

  “Sure, lentils, mushrooms or soya?”

  “Soya, thanks.”

  “Two dollars, please. Take a seat and I’ll bring it over.”

  Alice paid for her burger and then went and sat down on one of the couches along the wall, and as she sat down, she noticed the young man tap the book that he was reading with his wand, and a second later, over a quarter of the pages automatically flipped over.

  Alice stood up and curiously walked over to where the young man was sitting.

  “Hi, how did you do that?”

  “Do what?” he replied with a rather confused, humorous look on his face.

  “How did you make the pages flip over like that?”

  The young man paused for a moment, seemingly confused.

  “I just told it what page to go to.”

  Alice paused for a moment.

  “Do you mind if I try?”

  “Sure” he replied, sliding the open book down the table towards Alice, he had a large, surprised smile on his face.

  Alice pressed her wand against one of the pages.

  “Fifty” she said in her head, and a second later, the pages flipped over and landed on page fifty. “That’s so convenient, it all seems so simple” she said.

  “It is simple” said the young man, nodding his head in agreeance, he still had the large, surprised smile on his face. “Did you recently cross or something?” he then asked in a kind tone, trying not to offend Alice.

  “Yes, about four days ago” replied Alice, slightly embarrassed that she had asked what now seemed like such a simple question.

  “I thought the crossing channels were closed?”

  “They are. I was first crossing in years, they’re closed again now.”

  “Wow. Feel free to sit down if you want” he said, pointing to the couch.

  Alice sat down on the couch and placed her notepads on the table.

  “I’m Brian, nice to meet you.”

  “Alice, nice to meet you too” said Alice as the waitress walked over and placed the burger onto the table, it was quite large and had fries on the side.

  “Thanks.”

  “No worries, enjoy.”

  “What are you reading?” asked Alice before taking a bite of her burger.

  “A book about the war. I suppose you’ve heard about the war?”

  “I’ve only heard a little.”

  “It was bad. They killed my uncle, he was in the People’s Forces” said Brian, sounding slightly disheartened.

  “Who did?” asked Alice in a shocked tone, before taking another bite of her burger.

  “The Medelles, thankfully they’re no longer around.”

  “Sorry to hear” said Alice sympathetically.

  “It’s fine. What are you up to this afternoon?” asked Brian, smiling.

  “Going to my first lecture.”

  “Nice, what lecture?”

  “Introduction to Meditation.”

  “Nice, the guy who gives that lecture is really good, I’ve sat that lecture four
times”

  There was a short moment of silence as Alice continued eating her burger.

  “Do you mind if I ask how the crossing was?” Brian broke the silence by asking.

  “Sure. It was, um, pretty scary.”

  “Really, why?”

  Alice paused for a moment before responding.

  “The crossing channel was bewitched, I landed in the Wild Lands right before the raid happened.”

  Brian’s face dropped.

  “Are you serious?” he asked.

  “Yeah.”

  “What happened?” he cautiously asked.

  “A woman called Bella Turnox found me, blasted a woman into a tree and got me out of there.”

  “Bella Turnox? Really? Who was the woman?” asked Brian attentively.

  “I don’t know who she was, her and another man appeared not long after I crossed, a few seconds later Bella found us and hit the woman in the chest with a spell.”

  “Wow, I’m sorry to hear. You’re extremely lucky, Bella Turnox is badass.”

  Alice laughed as she finished her burger.

  “Are you studying?” she asked.

  “Yeah, I’m doing forestry at the moment.”

  “Nice, it must be interesting.”

  “Yeah, it’s good. What are you thinking of studying?” asked Brian as the waitress walked over and collected Alice’s empty plate.

  “Not sure yet, I need to finish the introduction program first.”

  “Ah, yeah, of course, sorry, I forgot about that.”

  Alice laughed again, Brian’s expressions were slightly goofy, exaggerated and humorous.

  “Do you have the time?” asked Alice.

  Brian removed a small pocket watch from his robe.

  “5.45.”

  “Well, I better get going to the lecture. It was nice meeting you, I’ll see you around” said Alice as she stood up.

  “Yeah, nice meeting you. I’m sure I’ll see you around, I’m here quite often” said Brian.

  Alice then made her way over to the T.P in the plaza and transported through to the Magic Council, quickly stopping and buying some flasks and then transporting on to the Education Department.

  Alice walked out of the T.P and waved at the blonde girl behind the reception desk as she made her way across the lobby and into the elevator.

  “Lecture Halls.”

  A few seconds later the elevator doors flung open and Alice walked out into the corridor and over to Lecture Hall 1, the door was open and as she walked inside, she stopped at the top of the room and looked around. There was a tall staircase leading down to all the rows of seats overlooking a presenting area at the bottom of the hall that had a presenting booth and a large, white screen setup behind. There were about twenty people spread out inside sitting in different rows and at least three quarters of them were children.

  Alice walked down the stairs and sat in one of the middle rows, there was a wooden platform to place things on in front of the seats that ran along the entire row which had small, microphone devices built into the wood in front of each seat.

  Alice opened and flicked through her Terra Times while she waited for the lecture to begin.

  After roughly five minutes had passed, a short, Asian looking man with a shaved head walked down the staircase of the hall and onto the presenting area below. The man was wearing small, round glasses and was dressed in a modest, dark brown robe, he slightly resembled that of a monk back in the material.

  After a few minutes of setting up, the man placed a small, black pyramid object similar to Alice’s hologram device into an object holder attached to the presenting booth, pointing towards the large, white screen, and few seconds later, the screen lit up and came to life in beautiful animation.

  ‘INTRODUCTION TO MEDITATION’ was written in large letters on the screen, the background was a live photograph taken from above a cloud forest and all the letters were made of moving, lively green vines. There were small hummingbirds fluttering around and landing on the different letters, and after a few more minutes had passed, the lecture began.

  “Good evening, my name is Samsun and I will be your lecturer for today. Thank you all for coming and thank you for your interest in mediation” said the man in a cheerful tone, he had a funny accent and the microphone he was speaking into was very loud and clear and echoed throughout the hall.

  “Now, while there are many different ways and techniques to practice meditation, such as selflessness, sharpening your mind, self-discipline to train your will and visualization to improve imagination among others, there is still a lot of confusion and contradiction out there regarding the actual concept of meditation. I would like to start today’s lecture by giving you all a brief overview of what meditation really is.

  “The traditional term meditation is the practice of letting your analytical mind, thoughts and mental conditioning and activities to weaken and fade away, allowing the true self to rest in harmony with the present moment. The practice of meditation starts by coming to an unbiased, nonjudgmental and undisruptive awareness and understanding of one’s own inner world, such as thoughts, emotions, attachments, aversions, beliefs, attention, focus and mental habitual and analytical patterns and processing.

  “Once one has come to an awareness of their inner world, the next step in the practice of meditation is to simply contemplate and to allow those inner processes to arise within and to let them play out and fade away on their own terms without engagement, clinging to them or trying to forcibly lessen or ignore the effects of the internal activity and its attachments that have arisen, whilst simply being aware of it.

  “If you find that you have trouble with this, you can simply start by labelling and correcting your thoughts after they have appeared in your mind, and naturally you will start to become more aware of your inner state and the seeds of these hindrances that lay dormant within you.

  “There will be a feeling of loss when one first starts the letting go of their attachments, but once one starts to practice this more, after a while they will realize that the attachments of the internal processes, whether it be a craving attached to a thought, anger, jealousy or selfish, greedy thoughts and attachments to the false self-image, will weaken each time that you let them go and so will the feeling of loss that is accompanied with it.

  “Eventually, the attachments will disappear, and the internal processes and thoughts will then become neutral, unattached processes and thoughts.

  “Once the attachments of the internal processes have weakened, faded and neutralized, after continuing to employ the practice of meditation whenever the now neutral internal processes arise, the internal processes themselves will start to weaken, and will eventually completely disappear, being replaced with awareness and no longer hindering your mind and dragging you away from your intuition and unity with the self-revitalizing and replenishing eternal, present moment.

  “The practice of meditation will help you to see clearly at all times, it will help you learn how to live without mental hindrances so that your spirit can shine through freely and guide you on your many tasks and tests throughout your karmic evolution.”

  Alice sat attentively and riveted to the speaker throughout the entire lecture, she was amazed at his depth, knowledge and simplistic clarity whilst explaining what she otherwise thought to be complicated concepts and topics.

  There was a long round of applause as Samsun wrapped up the lecture before people started making their way up the stairs and out of the hall.

  Alice made her way out of the lecture hall and down to the lobby. She felt refreshed and was in a good mood after the lecture, and after having a quick chat with the blonde girl behind the reception desk, she transported back through to the Magic Council.

  “Hello, Alice, how are you?” said Darius Bane as she appeared in the transportation room of the Magic Council, he had apparently just appeared from one of the nearby T.Ps himself.

  “Hi, Darius. I’m great thanks, how are you?” re
plied Alice, slightly surprised to see Darius.

  “That’s good to hear, I’m well, thank you. I hear you’ve been settling in well.”

  “Yes, everything’s good, just heading home from a lecture.”

  “Ah, great, which lecture did you attend?”

  “Introduction to Meditation.”

  “What did you think?”

  “It was great, the lecturer was awesome” said Alice, she was full of energy after sitting down for an hour.

  “Good to hear, yes, Samsun is very special, he’s a great asset to the Education Department” said Darius, “well, I best be off, I’ll see you around, maybe at the Night of the Dead festivities.”

  “What’s the Night of the Dead festivities?” asked Alice curiously.

  “Bella hasn’t told you yet? Each year Terra hosts the Night of the Dead festival which is in a few days’ time, it is a night of festivities dedicated to the memory of all those who have previously passed. This year there will be an army parade in respect for those who died during the war, the entire People’s Forces will be there. All the information will be in the Terra Times tomorrow, so make sure you pick up a copy.”

  “That sounds great, I’ll be there. See you soon” said Alice, excited by the sound of the festival.

  “Safe journeys, Alice” said Darius, smiling and then walking off towards the elevators.

  Alice then walked over and a bought a container of scrolls and then transported through to the Student Plaza, quickly stopping at the furniture and home appliance store and buying some extra sets of cutlery, plates, and pans for her apartment before making her way home.

  Narz

  Alice slowly lowered the pot that hovered in the air and placed it onto the couch, she had progressed to up to thirty seconds of holding items in the air and had gauged her power enough to the point where she was less frequently using the cue.

  Alice picked up the pot and as she turned to walk over to the kitchen, she heard a tapping on the balcony window, it was Red. She walked over and opened the sliding doors, and as she walked outside, Red dropped a scroll onto the floor and then flew up and sat on the balcony railing.

  Alice picked up and unrolled the scroll.

  Alice Teller

  Hi Alice,