by Nico Augusto
The atmosphere suddenly got thicker and Yann knew before he saw it that the monster was close. With fear ripping through them, he and Ani got into the little boat.
“Hurry Ani! He’s right behind me.” They jumped into the boat but the monster wasn’t deterred by the water as half of it was immersed and the other half of it remained stuck to the walls. They were both shaking from the terror, but a beam of sunlight ahead beckons them like a savior. The long, slimy looking tentacles of the terrible thing were swinging around them, grasping at the air as it tried to capture them. It was almost like the arms were so far from its brain that it had a hard time controlling them. The monster was so huge, black and shapeless that if it weren’t for its terrible, glowing eyes it would have blended in with the walls of the cave. It had to be thirty feet high or more, but as large as it was, it moved quickly. Yann found himself suddenly looking into the strange orange eyes and for a second he thought he might have glimpsed something inherently human deep inside of them.
While Yann was mesmerized by the eyes, one of the long tentacles struck the boat and it was shattered to pieces. Yann was ejected and his small body was thrown against the wall of the cave and knocked into unconsciousness. As Ani plunged into the water, desperate to save his friend, Yann was scooped up by the monster and carried away. Ani swam towards the bank in a desperate hurry. He had to find his friend….
CHAPTER TWENTY
“REYNALD”
Reynald was an exceptional man, with extraterrestrial origins. He was a member of the Ancient People, originating from Mars. Four billion years ago they used to be a very advanced people, more advanced than the human civilization. Not much evidence still exists of their inhabitation of earth.
They had to leave Mars because of the global warming and because of the excessive consumption of combustibles. As they faced environmental degradation, the leaders decided there was no other chance of their survival but to leave the planet. The entire population of the planet couldn’t be evacuated however so the people who were chosen to go were children, pregnant women, doctors, intellectuals, architects and politicians. The other members of the community stayed on the planet and ultimately perished, suffering through volcanic explosions and glaciation.
The final explosion of the planet propelled billions of bacteria and germs into space. Some of these germs arrived to the Earth. At that time it was the only planet that was capable of developing organic forms of life. The local bacteria mixed with the extraterrestrial ones, resulting in an extraordinary richness of the ecosystem. Some mutations very likely caused the appearance of the Cro-Magnon man.
Those who fled the planet made their journey into the nearest solar system. They had enough supplies for a very long journey but they had to find a new planet before the provisions ran out. The leaders decided to stop on the blue planet “Earth”. They explored the planet and decided that they would be able to survive there and for thousands of years they made it their home. They lived simply for all of that time, rejecting all ideas of progress and technology, communing in harmony with nature and using the resources of the planet in a way that protected themselves against the animals and the difficult climate.
Very quickly, the extraterrestrials met the humans and mixed couples began to appear. The mutations of the terrestrial endemic genes met and mingled with the genes of the Ancients. By 10,000 B.C. the humans were being helped to create the Sphinx and the Great Pyramid of Giza by the extraterrestrials. They also helped them design the empire of the Mayas and the stone spheres of Costa Rica. They were all unique monuments, meant to exist for spiritual reasons and as a gigantic calendar. The refugees served to help the humans become an autonomous civilization.
As time went on, there was some dissention amongst the terrestrial peoples. Some of them wanted to stay on Earth and continue to help humans so that they wouldn’t make the same mistakes that had driven them from their own planet. Others of them wanted to quit the planet Earth and begin a new civilization somewhere else. The discourse caused a split amongst them that lasted for centuries and only worsened as the ones who advocated for leaving also tried to prohibit mixed unions, citing the disappearance of their own pure civilization.
In 5000 B.C. the birth of one man would change everything. This man was born from the last union of mixed parents. His father was an Ancient and his mother a terrestrial. They named him Reynald.
During the first years of Reynald’s existence the conditions of life on the planet were harsh. A great deluge flooded a major part of the Earth, and, among other great things it destroyed the library of Alexandria. Numerous relics and documents concerning the past of the Ancient People were lost. The flood also wiped out a huge part of the civilization. Only about thirty of the terrestrials survived. A committee was created by these survivors to ensure the continuity of helping the humans. Reynald was appointed the ambassador. He lived discreetly amongst the humans, without revealing his real nature. He was present at every important human event such as the First Council of Nicaea, the construction of the pyramids, the birth of Christ and the creation of the New Testament...He was able to do this because of the particularity of children born from the mixed union that allowed them to get old very slowly and therefore their life was almost endless.
In 860 Reynald was contacted by archbishop Agobard of Lyon. He wanted to talk to Reynald about strange appearances. He had met some small grey people and Reynald thought that they could be the extraterrestrials. He used to hear these kinds of stories from his ancestors. Then, in the 12th century, Rapa Nui became a secret place of the Ancient People. They used the place to protect their memories and their own heritage. On the island they deposited their ancient vessel and this is how the story of Heaven began. Reynald wanted Heaven to be energetically self-sufficient; he needed only the energy to put it into orbit. He wanted to create for humans a possibility to live the last moments with their beloved ones, who had died somewhat too quickly. Amongst the Ancients some people were against this project and they did all in their power to delay its achievement. In 1614 Reynald assisted the marriage of Pocahontas. This event was what confirmed his desire to build Heaven. He was also impressed by the culture of the North American Indians and he recognized some similarity with himself. His last intervention in the human culture concerned the Indian Removal Act in 1830. Reynald felt profoundly shocked by its violence and hatred. He had held onto the stones that he and Olham had so painstakingly recovered ten centuries before waiting for the time to be right. Reynald had so many reasons for wanting to create a place where kind and decent people can live in harmony forever with those that they loved, but that single event solidified his plans, absolving him of any doubt he may have carried since that long ago meeting in Gaul. He was at last able to launch Heaven in 1840 and during the first forty years everything went smoothly. Heaven was an artificial construction.
Some sort of plasmatic energy covered it, so it remained invisible to the human eye. It was placed just beneath the ozone layer. It is comprised of 65% land, 30% water and 5% of the remains of its constructors. It had numerous beaches, three types of forests, mountain ranges and dark jungles, and numerous rivers that took their source at the lagoon at the Peak of Views. There was a city of a few hundred inhabitants. It was a magical place. The stars seemed to be bigger than seen from the Earth and the light was brighter. During the rain the water filtered into the Heaven. It is stored in an enormous basin, and is used for the city and for the vegetation. However, if it becomes too plentiful it has to be emptied. A special system was put into place for that. In the north-west portion of Heaven, a big white room with a small metallic cord exists. The cord can be pulled to release some of the water. The constructors used it only when Heaven was positioned above the oceans.
There was also an exit door built in. It was named “Infinite Field”. Those were vast golden fields with a door frame in the center that could be activated by the system of keys/towers. The constructors made this system that was quite simple in theory
. One had to put two irradiated stones on two towers. Then the towers would enter the ground and the energy created by this movement made a little hole in the infinite field, in the middle of the door frame. Only at this moment would it be possible to see the beloved persons, waiting at the other side for the great journey through the four seasons. The chosen ones would travel through winter, spring, summer and fall and as they did, the awareness… that they existed with on Earth slowly evolved into something more brilliant….an incredible level of consciousness that would allow them to exist beyond the expiration of the body they had inhabited on Earth. When not used, the towers sunk into the ground and to activate them one had to go down to the caves and move two irradiated stones first. This elaborate system was a safety measure so that the passage may be used only for the chosen ones.
The Ancient People voted each time and that was how a human being was judged worthy of accessing Heaven to share his or her last moments of happiness with their loved ones. However, the happiness of thousands of human beings caused a great sense of envy amongst some of the Ancient People. Some of them began living cloistered in theirs homes and others who were more adamant about stopping it, became banished from the group. That was how the fantastical evil was born, the Banished. They used to live in a dark forest as normal beings, and slowly their hatred and seclusion transformed them into something dark and evil. There exist remains of their homes in the forest.
*******
Heaven
Reynald’s office.
The office the man sat in was spacious and the grand oak desk he sat behind was centered in the room where it was bathed in the golden luminous sunlight. His longish gray hair was swept back from his face and secured at the nape of his neck. His short gray beard lay neatly trimmed against his focused face and the blue of his striped shirt matched his pale blue eyes. He was extremely focused on his work, a number of drawings of two keys…they both looked like stones.
Next to those drawings was a one of two towers. There was no sound in the big room other than that of the lead of his pencil scratching against the paper. He reached into the cabinet on his right hand side and grabbed a binder. It was very old and the pages inside were worn to the point of looking like a parchment. He sat it on his desk and quickly flipped through the pages, looking intently for something. He looked through pages of plans, a drawing of a big, white room with a ceramic tiled finish, a basin and a vessel. He closed the binder and got up from his desk then. With his hands on his hips, he went over to the window and thoughtfully looked out into the void. A door opened behind him and a man stuck his head through,
“Excuse me, sir? I am sorry to bother you, but we have found him.”
“What are you talking about?” Reynald asked, turning towards the man.
“He appeared just like that, but we did not chose him, did we?” the man was agitated and Reynald said,
“What are you talking about? Please, stay calm!”
“He looks like a samurai, but he’s not dead...I do not understand; it is not possible. This is the first time anything like this has happened.”
It finally dawned on Reynald what the man was saying. Someone had gotten in…But that was impossible! “Do others know already?”
“Yes...We saw his horse in the fields, I am so sorry…They want to leave, they are scared, they say that anybody can come in here now… and Banished were right”
“It’s not possible...I am the only one who knows the way. Please calm down, call all political parties, I am coming.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
“SAMURAIS”
HEAVEN NIGHT
Roshi Tonobu, still alive came into the Heaven and woke up. He looked up at the night sky, which was a dark, navy blue. The stars shone brightly across the plain. He got up gently, his muscles sore and aching still from what he’d just been through. He looked down where his wound was and realized with surprise that it had almost completely disappeared. He could still feel a strong pain in that spot. He tried to shrug off his armor so he could move freely. One of his arms and his legs were completely numb. He took a few steps forward and then stopped. He could hear a strange sound to his left. Turning his head towards it, he thought he heard something that sounded like human voices. He kept quiet, not wanting to be discovered just yet. He wanted to discover where he was and what was happening first. He didn’t know if he was in a safe place…
Tucked down behind the shrubs he could hear the words of the conversation, but he didn’t understand them…the language was different than his own.
He snuck under the shrubs, holding on tightly to his katakana and his nanigata. He was staying vigilant, moving quietly on his knees. He was trying to move away from the voices. He’s so tired; he needs to find a place to rest. He finally got up onto his feet and walked slowly and as quietly as he could. The leaves and small branches creaked underneath his weight so he progressed slowly. The light in the forest was dim and he didn’t hear any sounds other than the gentle swish of the wind through the trees.
Above him in the sky he could see a strong light. It was shaped like a sphere and was flying away from him. What is it? He wondered. He looked away from it and realized that he was facing a field where a tree so large was standing that it actually looked as if it were touching the sky.
Tonobu made his way over to the tree and sat down underneath it. From his sleeves he took out several small pieces of paper. He suddenly had a strange feeling and he wanted to write down his last thoughts…just in case. He wanted to leave a trace of his passage through this place. Behind his belt he always carried a small inkwell and feather pen; he took them out and began writing. His hand was shook as he wrote his last words for his wife, the woman whose life he saved, the woman he had married in spite of the refusal of the divinities.
As Tonobu wrote, he could feel himself becoming weaker by the second. He continued to write in spite of it, attaching all of his words to branches of the tree. His hope was that someone someday would read his story and he couldn’t help but wonder if this was his payback for refusing to comply with the divinities. He had no idea where he was….certainly far away from his own home and country. This place looked like a lost paradise, and he didn’t even know how he had found it.
JAPAN
Roshi was dreaming as the wind blew soft whispers through the branches of the trees. The birds sang in harmony and although the light tried hard to penetrate his closed eyelids it was hard to open them because of the heat that came from the sun. He finally opened them and got up to look out on the luxurious landscape of his beautiful country. The mountains and trees dotted the landscape as far as his eyes could see. Numerous cherry trees in full bloom were scattered along the slope of a rolling hill near Roshi and his horse grazed happily nearby.
The beauty of the land was in jeopardy…it was a country at war. Strangers had already begun arriving by boats and the constant tension between them and the Samurai’s reigned. Each samurai had to pay particular attention to his honor. Once his honor was lost, he was obliged to kill himself, to commit hara-kiri. If he did not he would become “Ronin,” roaming without a master and without a goal. That was to be Roshi’s fate, he believed.
He sat now in front of the mountain thinking about his deeds. He’d chosen to withdraw himself from society and to end his days. He was looking for the peace and the serenity he craved in the middle of this plentiful nature. The sky was azure blue without a cloud in sight.
“What a beautiful day to kill oneself,” he thought out loud. He mounted his faithful steed then and headed in the direction of the valley. Not far away was an old temple. Long ago abandoned. It was hardly more now than a heap of rubble but because of stories his ancestors had told over and again about it, Roshi was attracted to it like steel to a magnet.
The story was that hundreds of years ago, a strangely shaped meteorite crashed in the woods nearby. The shockwaves destroyed many square miles of the forest. His ancestors used to say that it was an offering made to the mo
ther earth. A sphere of light disappeared and left behind the strange construction. No hint of an explanation as to what it really was. Roshi had to believe in this magic to be able to leave this world peacefully and to join his beloved ones beyond the grave.
Numerous conflicts ravaging his country caused death of many members of his family. That was really true for many samurais. He planned to join them all—to save his honor.
Roshi took a deep breath, feeling tight in his armor. Putting his knees to the ground one by one, he took his katana out of the sheath. With his right hand he cleaned its blade, using some water and a piece of cloth. He owed a lot to the katana’s sleek blade; it had saved his life on more than one occasion. He found it almost ironic that today, the very life that saved him so many times would be the one to take his life away. He put his gourd down next to him and with both hands touched the point of the blade to his stomach. He took another deep breath and then heard himself scream with shock as the blade cut through his armor and the soft flesh of his stomach underneath.
Roshi felt himself going into a trance. He used what little energy he had left to turn the blade to his right and continue the cut to that side of his body. Suddenly the light around him brightened and he saw a big tree in front of him. Death was taking him away.
Roshi was surprised when his breath suddenly returned. He wasn’t dead but the blade was still inside of his body. He was in a different place though, the forest was denser and the colors strange….He removed the katana in one swift motion. He no longer felt any pain, but he knew that he was dying.