by Tim Hawken
“That’s it,” I blurted upon seeing the door. “This is where I get out.” I moved to exit the cab, not wanting to face Mack after watching such a private moment of grief without him knowing it. I felt like a liar.
“Michael, before you go,” Mack said earnestly. “This Perceptionist ain’t no push over demon. This guy is the real deal. Don’t go in there unless you really need to.”
I was moved at his concern for someone who was practically a stranger.
“I need to,” was all I said. He looked in my eyes and nodded.
“Well, good luck then, pal, I hope I see you again in one piece.”
I pulled the remaining cash from my pocket and gave it to Mack.
“I don’t think I’ll be needing this anymore,” I said. He tried to give it back to me; I simply dropped the bills on the seat as I got up and stepped out onto the pitch-black street.
“Good luck,” Mack said again, leaning out the window. “If you ever get out of this joint alive, look me up. There’s something about you I like.”
“I will,” I said, smiling for the first time since I got in the cab. “I like you too Mack.”
I turned and started down the alleyway without looking behind me. I heard Mack’s cab roll slowly away and focused on the door at the end of alley. The light above the door flickered and I caught movement in the shadows ahead. A voice boomed out at me.
“Who dares come to the lair of the Perceptionist? Reveal yourself and your purpose or I shall cut you down.”
I heard the distinct sound of ringing metal and saw the flash of a long blade being pulled from its scabbard. I could see the shining sword, but not the being that held it in the darkness. I stopped, deciding to reveal who I was. If this Perceptionist was the powerful, all-knowing being he was supposed to be, then he already knew I was coming.
“My name is Michael,” I said into the shadows. “I come with a gift for the Perceptionist. I come seeking knowledge.” In the darkness, I saw white teeth spread into a smile.
“Hello, Michael!” the voice called from the shadows. A tall, bearded African man stepped into the light, lowering his weapon to the ground. “We’ve been expecting you.”
“Marlowe?” I cried, taken aback at seeing the man I’d met in the Prophet Casino the day before. “What are you doing here?”
“I’m employed by the Perceptionist to keep him safe from intruders,” he said. I had instant respect for the man in front of me. Marlowe must be an extremely dangerous and cunning person to be working for such a being as his personal bodyguard. He slid his blade back into a scabbard strapped to his back, and thrust his hand out in greeting. I shook it strongly.
“You’re lucky I know your face,” he said. “Normally, I lop off heads and ask questions later.”
“I guess I’m lucky to have met you in that bar, then,” I replied.
“More like fate than luck,” he said. “A few hours after I met you, I also met the man you were looking for, Phineus. He is a very interesting character.”
“Phineus!” I started, suddenly full of questions. “Where did you meet him? Is he okay? What happened to him after I had the visions? Do you know where he is now?”
“Relax, my friend,” Marlowe said soothingly. “You can ask him all of this yourself. He is inside.”
two
“INSIDE?” I blurted at Marlowe. “What has Phineus got to do with the Perceptionist?” I asked, stunned.
“Let’s go and ask him,” Marlowe replied simply, turning around and opening the yellow door.
He waved for me to go inside and followed me into a perfectly square room. All of the walls were painted the same yellow as the door we’d just come through. I heard the door shut. Looking behind, it was completely gone. Just a smooth wall stood in its place. We were now in this fever yellow room with no apparent way in or out. I was completely disoriented and confused.
“Where to now?” I asked Marlowe.
“Through that doorway,” he said, pointing at a solid wall.
“There’s no door there,” I said, exasperated.
“Well, that depends on your perception then, doesn’t it,” he replied smiling and walked over to the wall. I followed closely, and as he got to the wall, he walked right through. I tried to walk through the space he had just disappeared through but hit hard against solid wood, smacking my nose painfully. I stumbled backwards, shocked. Marlowe’s head appeared through the wall again, smiling from ear to ear.
“Look at it as if you know there is a doorway there,” he said.
“What is this? A Harry Potter movie?” I asked Marlowe. He looked at me, puzzled.
I stood back and concentrated on the wall. Nothing happened. I must have frowned because Marlowe came back through the wall and stood with me.
“You must know it is there, not just think it’s there,” he said. “You must truly believe there is a door and it will appear.”
I stepped forward again. Logically there must be a door there if Marlowe could step through it, I reasoned. It didn’t matter that my eyes couldn’t see the porthole. As soon as I came to this conclusion, a black doorway appeared on the wall, growing from the center and framed itself to another room, where I could see Phineus. He was sitting at a table talking to a man who rocked back and forth, cross-legged on the floor in the corner of the room.
“Phineus!” I called. He turned his blind eyes my way and waved.
“Come in, Michael,” he said, “now that you can see the way.” I walked through the doorway and took a seat next to him. Marlowe walked in behind me and stood quietly in the corner, next to the rocking man.
“I see you’ve brought my eyes and fleece,” Phineus said. Once again, it struck me as ironic that a blind man was talking about seeing things.
“Your fleece?” I asked shocked. “I was under the impression it was to be the Perceptionist’s fleece. What the hell happened to you anyway, what happened while I had the visions you gave me?” Phineus looked at his feet as if ashamed.
“I’m sorry, Michael,” Phineus said. “I haven’t been completely honest with you. When I said I could show you the best way to getting what you wanted I was speaking the truth. However, I didn’t tell you this path would benefit me greatly also.”
“What do you mean?” I asked coldly. I hated the thought of being manipulated by anyone, including the blind man in front of me.
“You’ll soon realize why I couldn’t let you know the full details, but I’ll start from the beginning,” he said. I remained silent and he continued.
“When you told me that you’d been sent by Satan, I had to look in your heart to make sure that your intent was not of his doing, but of your own volition. Once I’d divined that you were speaking the truth, I envisioned the best path for you to take in completing your vengeful task. To my surprise, this path involved me greatly, but who am I to go against what fate wishes? So, I showed you what you needed to know.”
I sat with my arms crossed, ready for more lies.
“I saw that you would need tuition from the most powerful of beings in Hell, the Perceptionist, but that he would not help you unless I convinced him,” he continued. “How I would do this was by promising to teach him the power of foresight, one power The Perceptionist does not possess. I could not teach him properly without the use of my own eyes. I need to see whom I am teaching, and where he is focusing his energies. I could not do this with my inner eye alone, so I sent you to retrieve my physical eyes from Satan. The Golden Fleece was a bonus, since I knew you would have to acquire it in order to pluck my eyes from the base of the serpent tree.”
“Why didn’t you just tell me this?” I fumed.
“I could not,” he answered back. “If I had have told you why you needed my eyes, The Devil would not have given them to you. He would never assent to the Perceptionist gaining more power than he already has.”
“I wouldn’t have told him if you said to get it secretly,” I snapped.
“You wouldn’t have had to tell
him, Michael. You are aware he can read a soul’s deepest secrets while down in his domain. Otherwise he would not be able to do the job he was sent down here to do.”
“But the blood, your blood was all over the room when I awoke,” I said confused.
“Oh that,” he said waving it away as if it was nothing. “My eye sockets always bleed when I experience visions,” he explained. “Visions as intense as the ones I showed you cause me to spurt blood from my optic nerve. You were knocked unconscious by the power of what you saw. This is why, by the time you woke, I was gone. While I bled, you slept, exhausted from the experience. I wrote the note that you found pinned to the door so it would lead you to where you are now. I’m glad I was right.”
I sat silent for a moment, taking in all he’d just told me. It was all a ruse. I turned the events of the past two days over in my head. I accepted it all quietly, coming to the conclusion that it could not have been done any other way. I was where I needed to be. It seemed fate was working for me so far. I wondered if I could have possibly taken another path and still ended up in the same place if this was really where fate wanted me. I pushed that puzzle to the back of my mind for later; this was not the time for wondering, it was a time for revenge.
“So, is this the Perceptionist?” I asked, indicating the rocking man that Marlowe stood over in the corner. Phineus snorted with laughter, while Marlowe said nothing.
“This is not the Perceptionist by any means,” Phineus said. “This is his old apprentice, Germaine. He was a lot like you in the beginning, strong of spirit and purpose, maybe not so strong of mind. The Perceptionist set out to teach him how to see the universe in a different light and control the elements around him. To help gain a different perspective on things, Germaine began to take many strange substances. He did this in order to expand his mind and gain an altered perception of reality. At first he learned incredible things and saw many ideas from an open view. His mind began to grow, but soon he took too many of the drugs and his mind expanded too quickly; his coherent thoughts were lost inside its expanse.
“Germaine’s ideas started to echo around the prism of cells in his skull, creating strange voices. He began to listen to these echoes of thoughts, believing them to be wise beings, and he was lured into false thinking. The voices told him to act and he did; they told him to ignore the instructions of the Perceptionist and take his own path. Soon he was following orders from an echo of an echo and became a shadow of his real self. His purpose faded away along with his brain and now Germaine sits in the corner of this dark room, just a shell of himself, void, catatonic, empty.
“The Perceptionist leaves him here to serve as a warning to others: that an expanded perspective on reality is nothing, if you lose sight of the reality you began with.”
I looked at the dribbling husk of a man in front of me and felt nothing but pity. I wondered if the person he was fighting for in the first place had any idea of his fate. I wondered if Charlotte knew up there in limbo what I was doing for her. Of course she knew, I decided. She surely understood I would do everything in my power to make everything right for us. Phineus cleared his throat loudly in his chair, and my attention was brought back to the room around me.
“May I please have my eyes now?” he asked.
I saw no point in keeping them from him any longer, and so handed him the fleece with his precious lobes wrapped inside. He unwrapped the bundle gently and carefully picked up his eyes. He lifted the bandage from his face, exposing the ghastly bleeding sockets beneath, before slowly placing his eyeballs back where they belonged. Phineus shrieked in pain as the veins of his eyes knitted back together and the nerves reconnected themselves. Falling to the ground, clutching his face, he writhed on the floor. I bent to help him but he waved me back, panting. The pain had stopped. The prophet Phineus was whole again. He wobbled to his feet and opened his eyes for the first time in over two thousand years. His eyelids were caked in blood, the red lids framing the strangest of eyes, powder-blue with clouds of white inside them, as if they reflected the skies of Heaven. No wonder The Devil thought they were the source of his power.
Phineus looked around the room, smiling. “I forgot how beautiful the world is,” he said.
I looked around the room, and what he was looking at: a table, a chair and grey walls. Hardly beautiful, but I guess even the simplest things become beautiful when you have been deprived of sight for so long. I gave Phineus a moment to take in his re-found vision, but I couldn’t wait long before I brought up the topic of my training again.
“Phineus, have you spoken to the Perceptionist about me and what I need?” I asked.
He dragged his eyes from the golden hilt of Marlowe’s sword.
“Oh yes, I’ve spoken to him at great length about you, Michael,” he answered in a mysterious tone. “He’s ready to begin your training as soon as you are ready. He has accepted my terms that he must first successfully teach you the power of the elements before I show him how to tap into the unknown future.” Phineus turned back to the African standing in the corner.
“Marlowe, if you please, we’d like to enter your master’s chamber,” he said.
Marlowe nodded and stepped back. A swirling blue portal opened in the corner behind him.
“Step through, Michael. Phineus, you must wait here with me until the Perceptionist has had an audience with Michael alone.”
Phineus nodded as if he had expected as much, and pushed me lightly on the back, urging me forward. I stepped past Marlowe into the glowing portal. Lacerating cold cut through my skin, like I was being blasted by a thick arctic wind. I closed my eyes to protect them from freezing solid. I pushed through the chilling air blindly. It was thick and textured against my body, almost like I was trying to walk underwater. I stumbled forward as the condensed air gave way to a thin feeling of nothingness. The shock of cold was immediately replaced with an overall feeling of warmth. I opened my eyes and almost fell over in shock. I now stood face to face with the most bizarre creature I had ever witnessed. I had no doubt in my mind that this was the entity I had been searching for.
three
“WELCOME,” the being in front of me whispered lightly. I studied it. I was quite sure it had no sex at all, it appeared purely androgynous. I guess because I’m male, I’ve since referred to the Perceptionist as him, but I’m positive a female would say ‘her’ instead.
The creature was about twice my size in every dimension, shaped like a giant human but with no hair at all on his body. He had five eyes on his face, two on each side, one above the other and a fifth in the dead-center where his nose would have been, if he had one. It was exactly like the number five side of a dice. Each eye blinked separately every few seconds. His mouth was where a normal human’s would have been, but it was without teeth or lips. It was just a slit that moved when he talked. His skin was as white as leprosy and almost completely covered in tattoos. The tattoos were of more eyes, all a uniform size and shape; each a different color. He was a walking rainbow of tattooed eyes.
The strangest thing of all was that these tattoos blinked and looked around the room at me as normal eyes would. I’m sure each eye was seeing a different side of me, seeing all emotion, all feelings and all thoughts. I stared, awestruck at this unique alien in front of me. He had created his own body and this was how he made himself, constructed out of the elements. I studied him and he studied me back, saying nothing for minutes on end, his eyes blinking, shutting and opening in a flurry all over his body. The Perceptionist slowly walked around me; his movements were completely fluid and agile, which seemed strange for someone so large. As he lifted his legs to move, he pointed his toes and arched his legs in a pronounced, graceful stride. He completed a full circle around me and then spun around himself so I could look at him fully. It was a strange ritual, as if he wanted me to see every part of him for what it was, to become accustomed to him. From behind he looked exactly the same as the front. The same face and eyes. So many eyes. His elbows and knees app
eared to be absolutely double jointed because they bent slightly towards me no matter which way he was facing. Finally, he stopped his display and looked at me, every eye now open and fixed on mine.
“So, Michael, you’ve come to learn the power of the elements to avenge your love, dooming yourself to an eternity in Hell,” he said.
“You are right about learning power and revenge,” I answered very slowly, not wanting to offend him somehow with a hasty answer or jerky movement. “However,” I continued, “I don’t plan on a life in Hell. I plan on reuniting with my love once my revenge is complete.”
A strange noise came from the Perceptionist’s mouth -- it sounded like birds chirping. I wasn’t sure but I thought it was the sound of him laughing.
“I sense that you are afraid of me,” the Perceptionist said. He was right, I was petrified. “It is only understandable to be afraid of what we don’t understand,” he continued soothingly. “But be sure that I do not mean to harm you in any way or you would have been negated in the alleyway outside. I am here to teach you. Phineus has told me of your destiny and the role you need me to play. In order to do this the way I wish, you must trust me completely. I can see your entire past mapped out behind you, so there is no need to explain reasons for your purpose. Now, you must take my word as truth. If you question this you will not be able to see what I see and, therefore, you will not able to wield the power I wield. Do you understand? Good.” He finished before I could answer. “Now look around you and explain to me what you see.”
“I see nothing,” I said, as we were indeed standing in nothingness. I was not standing on ground or positioned anywhere inside a room. All around us was nothing, it was not even a color, not even black, it was just a void. It was much stranger to have nothing around me than to be in some of the bizarre settings I’d experienced in Hell.
“This is what I saw when I first woke up,” the Perceptionist said, apparently referring to when he spawned himself into consciousness.