The Awakening

by Colleen O'Flaherty-Hilder

  Copyright © 2017 Colleen O’Flaherty-Hilder

  The moral right of the author has been asserted.

  Apart from any fair dealing for the purposes of research or private study, or criticism or review, as permitted under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, this publication may only be reproduced, stored or transmitted, in any form or by any means, with the prior permission in writing of the publishers, or in the case of reprographic reproduction in accordance with the terms of licences issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside those terms should be sent to the publishers.

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  ISBN 9781788030380

  British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data.

  A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

  Matador® is an imprint of Troubador Publishing Ltd

  To the bright star that is my daughter, Siobhan, whose presence in my life is a constant reminder of the magic that is Creation.

  Contents

  CHAPTER ONE Innocence

  CHAPTER TWO The Crystal Paths

  CHAPTER THREE The Gifts

  CHAPTER FOUR The Screening of the Fear Myths

  CHAPTER FIVE Return

  CHAPTER ONE

  Innocence

  Orla walked into the flurry of activity that always accompanied the twins’ bedtime routine, and observed the boundless energy and enthusiasm her children had for absolutely everything that appeared in their lives, an aspect of their personalities that never ceased to fill her with amazement and joy. Even the most repetitive of activities like bathing, cleaning teeth and putting on nightclothes triggered their mercurial imagination and enthusiasm in anticipation of what was to follow these mundane activities. But at the close of the day their excitability, whilst admirable, needed to be calmed so that Orla could continue with their bedtime ritual, the ritual that was preparing them for the unique and important role that would be their destiny. She clapped her hands with regal authority and lovingly ordered them into their respective beds, which they obeyed eagerly. As they climbed noisily into bed, and with the typical impatience of youth, they directed a stream of questions in stereo at Orla trying to guess, as if it were a game, what new aspect of their night time story would be revealed. Although the twins were only nine, their verbal reasoning was razor sharp and she normally loved the cut and thrust of their discussions but she had to silence them. Ignoring them completely, which was difficult, she picked up a dark green glass bottle from the bedside table and sprayed aromatic flower essences over their beds and around the room, delicately infusing the molecules of their bedroom with the memory of the plants, soothing and calming the frenetic activity of their young and fertile minds.

  Sitting down in the easy chair between each of their beds she breathed deeply, lovingly placing her hands gently on each of their brows. When they eventually stopped speaking and closed their eyes, she began tracing the specific sequence of strokes on their foreheads that regulated their breathing until they were completely relaxed and receptive in the deepest parts of their memories, gently opening the doorway to the Crystaland promise of the Perfection of Eternity.

  She sighed contentedly and took a moment to reflect over the time since the twins had been born. They were now nine years old and already beginning to demonstrate very different characteristics from those of previous royal children of Crystal Island. They were more enquiring, more intense in their pursuit of knowledge, and sometimes positively uncomfortable to be around, always pushing the boundaries and patience of their mentors. This personality progression had evolved because the prominent Crystaland genetic line had been duplicated and therefore intensified in twin children. In the history of Crystal Island this occurrence of royal twins was unique. In all the previous generations there had been only one child born to the Queen and her consort to ensure Crystal Wisdom was never diluted. When Orla had realised that she was bearing twins, she knew that this was heralding a new level of transformation for the Earth that would require an amplification of that Wisdom.

  Whilst Orla was unsure of the detail of her children’s future, she was relieved that the world they had been born into was a very different place from when she was young. Thanks to the efforts of Orla, her husband Finn and their team of helpers from Crystal Island, the Crystal memory had been reignited and completely awakened in the leaders of the world. This, thankfully, led to mankind being interrupted from its dystopian path of destruction and degeneration as they embraced and embodied all the gifts of Crystaland. The Earth had eventually healed, and a peaceful and abundant life had evolved for all. However, Orla knew that this was not the end of the story; there was much more to come. The royal family of Crystal Island would not be allowed to sit back and rest on its laurels. The transformation of Earth was just the beginning, and she knew her children were the key to that final challenge, the final piece in the jigsaw puzzle that would bring peace to all the worlds in all the universes.

  Orla switched on the essential oil diffuser next to her chair and a stream of fragrant mist enveloped her as she breathed in deeply and rhythmically. With every breath the molecules of oils permeated her memory, penetrating and opening the many layers of Crystaland programming, allowing her to access a wealth of truth and knowledge. She settled deeper into the chair, fully relaxed in mind and body, and began the programming of her children’s memories that had happened every night of their lives since they were babies. Their bedtime story was not from a book normally found on the book shelves of nurseries, it was the epic story of the gifting of Crystal Wisdom to the Earth, how mankind turned its back on Wisdom leading to a path of catastrophic near-destruction, and its final journey of transformation. Such was the intensely complex nature of the story, the children could not have fully comprehended the detail in their waking, conscious minds. Nor did they have the luxury of time afforded to her when she was young, to spend several years in the many worlds of Crystaland receiving the initiation into Crystal Wisdom. Her progeny had inherited intact, in every cell of their bodies, all of the Crystaland knowledge from both parents, but they also had to understand the disasters which befell the planet when the Crystaland laws of Wisdom were not followed. The Earth that the twins had inherited offered no evidence of that destructive aspect of history, so it was Orla’s responsibility to instruct them, in a language and at a level that they could understand, what happened when the Crystaland laws were ignored.

  When the twins were born, she had asked her mentors in Crystaland the best way to teach her children about Earth’s dark history without them being overwhelmed, or indeed traumatised. They reminded Orla that, whilst having 80 per cent Crystal memory, the twins still retained human memory and suggested that she use the familiar time-honoured oral tradition of weaving complicated lessons about life into the safe tapestry of a fairy story.

  So, each night she would start at the beginning, adding more and more of the detail as the days and years went by. The story gradually filtered through to their deep memory and influenced the development of their characters, the character necessary for the creation of brave pioneers who would one day push against the boundaries of their Elders to achieve the ultimate healing of the universe.

  Orla brought her attention back to her children, focusing her mind in the unique way that she had of filtering through the levels of a person’s deep memory
, penetrating the layers of human experience and opening the chamber of their memory that was receptive to Crystal Wisdom, and she began the story… Princess Orla’s story.

  Once upon a time in the future there lay an enchanted island in the Atlantic Ocean, midway between what was later to become known as the east coast of America, and the south west coast of Ireland. It had once been part of the same continent but, after one of the many ice ages, the Earth had become warmer, the glaciers melted, the landmasses shifted and when the chaos had ceased, the parcel of land that was to be the island, had gently and quietly disengaged itself from all of its surrounding continents. At the moment of its freedom, the sea swept the little pocket of land into its secure embrace, holding it firmly from all other influences. This was a very special island unlike any body of land the Earth had seen before. It had grown out of turmoil and formed from a combination of the primal powers of centrifugal force, heat, and the indestructible continuum of Creation. A bejeweled island that was to be the place from whence the possibilities of all peace for the future generations of the planet hailed. Its name, Crystal Island.

  After the ice age the Earth had been left dormant for thousands of years, covered in an impenetrable glacial sheet but, whilst there was stillness in its frozen outer world, the inner world was still warm and very much active; its fire having only been dimmed, not extinguished. Over the millennia, Earth’s inner fire burned stronger, its fierce strength surging closer to the surface of the sea bed and, when all the elements were in perfect alignment, the fire burst violently into the icy waters of the ocean releasing a multitude of atoms from the Earth’s core urgently seeking their rightful place in the next chapter of Earth’s story of necessary transformation and evolution.

  To ensure the success of this particular cycle of transformation, all the knowledge of Creation had to be released and dispersed around the planet to activate Earth’s, beautiful and natural gifts. The vehicle to transmit this information was the Earth’s minerals; the basic building blocks of all life on Earth that had not changed or been distorted over the millennia, remaining in their original form since the beginning of eternity. Each mineral held within its atomic structure the pure memory of all Creation and each mineral carried its own unique intelligence knowing exactly what its role was in the multifarious options of Creation. But, as is so often the case, this process was not so straightforward. This latest explosion of the seabed had been so ferocious that it had catapulted the atoms chaotically into the ocean and the key minerals, being the most reactive, had become disassociated from their core groups causing confusion and conflict. A situation that was far from conducive for transformation. For the successful broadcasting of Creation’s knowledge, the minerals had to be in their correct form and synergy to activate their collective intelligence that carried the original imprints of Creation.

  With a keen sense of urgency, their survival memory scoured the waters searching for that unique pulsing rhythm of the energy that would help them to regroup and, at that precise catalytic moment, when all the minerals connected in their correct groupings, the doorway of Crystal Wisdom would fly open allowing Earth’s natural gifts to be birthed.

  Throughout its physical experience, Earth had undergone many cycles of eruption, cooling, transformation, transfiguration and evolution which had ultimately been a protracted process of purification; that which was found to be redundant or harmful for a particular stage of the planet’s evolution did not survive. The particular location of the island in the ocean had gone through a much more intense and rapid process, which had resulted in this small landmass becoming a reflection of the pure essence of all of Earth’s natural gifts; all the magnificence of Creation had been brought together in this one small but noble island. And the sea had recognised in this island those unique qualities and had lovingly surrendered daily doses of Wisdom onto its shores; every wave whispering the memory of eternity into the atoms of the crystalline sand, forming and shaping the future of its landscape and ultimately the future of the planet.

  The Wisdom increased the intensity of the atoms’ magnetic strength that pulsed sound waves through the Earth’s waters and they became powerful beacons for information that was felt by other atoms thousands of miles away stretching into every corner and distant recess of the planet. They responded collectively to that primal call, the signature melody of the universe, gathering and speedily navigating towards the deep pulsating rhythm that rippled through the waters of the vast oceans. The object of their intense attraction was this unique island that had taken all the memory from the larger landmasses, condensed it into a much smaller body of land and, combined with the intelligence of the ocean, had produced an amplification of magnetic strength far greater than anywhere else on the Earth; broadcasting a sound like no other that had been heard in the planet’s very long and troubled history.

  As the tiny atoms journeyed eagerly through the oceans towards the island, they combined and connected into larger and larger groups. Their collective intelligence recognised and identified the rich qualities of this island, which they knew needed to be preserved and protected at all cost. They understood that the planet could not continue with the constant depleting cycles of destruction, which had caused so many shifts in its structure; the next process of transformation had to be completely successful – there could be no mistakes this time.

  Eventually and predictably, over a relatively short period, the atoms made their way towards the perimeter of the island, collected and regrouped themselves into 1144 large diamond shaped crystalline pillars, implanting themselves deeply and securely into the seabed forming a protective circle. Each crystal pillar reflected a different colour from the multilayered hues of the aqua of the sea, the blues of the sky and the many shades of brightness from the sun’s rays. Once in place the crystal pillars not only protected the island, they were also a constant source of stabilisation to all the minerals of the oceans, assisting in the regrouping of those atoms that had become lost and disenfranchised in the original explosion of chaos that inhibited and suppressed their individual intelligence. The creation of the Crystal Fortress was complete, and Crystal Island was born.

  In those early days when the sun shone on the Crystal Fortress, shards of light bounced back and forth from each crystal pillar, each one reflecting the brilliance of the other, and that reflection bounced off the surface of the sea creating a crisscross of light and a melody of subtle sounds which formed a dome of musical brilliance radiating for many miles like a gigantic jewel, glittering and singing happily on its own adorning the vast openness of the ocean.

  It was some time after this, that supra intelligent travellers from a far off galaxy were attracted to planet Earth. These travellers were a species who had first been alerted by the sound radiating from Earth’s solar system. Their attention intensified when they identified the melodic activity of planet Earth. As they entered Earth’s solar system and travelled closer to the planet, they recognised that the frequency of sound was similar to that of their own planet – only Earth’s tune was discordant – they were immediately intrigued.

  These beings were not like the majority of travellers found in this cosmos, and indeed there were many, they were not only supra intelligent but their physical appearance was very different. Their structure was crystal-like, but with a much higher energy value than that of Earth’s crystal, to the point that they were not material; they had form but were not dense; they needed neither food or water; nor did they need to use words to communicate with each other. These were the Crystalanders, the Guardians of Eternal Wisdom. Their sole responsibility being to surf the open vastness of space seeking galaxies, solar systems and planets that had fallen out of balance with Creation’s rhythm and, for the continuum of Creation, it was critical that this rhythm was never interrupted for very long.

  However, other travellers of the cosmos who had very different agendas and much lower intelligence, nearly always created the
greatest imbalance. The whole of outer space was full of explorers from different universes and galaxies with varying levels of intelligence, who sometimes brought with them very different intentions; they plundered and took what they wanted from each solar system leaving behind shells of former planets. Those species were often the product of a planet in the process of transformation and evolution that had tired of the discipline and responsibility required to adhere to the Wisdom of Creation, and had decided to make their own rules, which was always a disaster. So they took what they thought was the easiest and quickest route for survival – take and consume rather than nurture and conserve. In response to this abuse, the planet would rebel, take action and withdraw into itself rendering its environment uninhabitable.

  When the Crystalanders arrived on Earth they were immediately impressed by what they saw; a planet made of crystal. Not the crystal from which they came, but a simpler form of crystal constructed from minerals with a less sophisticated structure. The Earth was covered in different forms of crystal, from the gigantic pieces of crystal rock, which appeared randomly on the landscape, down to the beautiful red crystalline soil that covered the vast open planes of the planet. The waterways were liquid crystal as the same minerals present in the soil were present in the water. The Crystalanders saw that these minerals were quite primitive, but that there was potential for further transformation; new minerals from their galaxy could be added to the mix enabling transformation and evolution to take place. The basic ingredients for Crystaland intelligent life were present in the atoms of minerals and that was all that would be required to begin the process.

  However, unfortunately, the Crystalanders were not working with a completely blank canvas. Previously, the Earth had been visited by rogue galactic explorers who had left their mark of disrespect behind them. The rich supply of high quality minerals on Earth was the attraction, but they had needed a workforce for the extraction of minerals from the Earth’s crust. So, in a quest to provide a constant supply of strong workers with limited mental faculties, they had begun to experiment with life, and the results of these experiments were the primitive humanoids that the Crystalanders found inhabiting Earth – desperate creatures with primitive brains trying to survive in an unforgiving and terrifying terrain, their coarse behaviour being mirrored in their appearance. But, the Crystalanders identified that, underneath the aggressive behaviour, they could see that these poor beings were frightened and lost, and they desperately needed help. Their days were a constant battle for survival; they had no natural Wisdom so were confused and confounded by nature. Fear stalked their waking hours and nightmares plagued their dreams. The Crystalanders realised that these beings had been manufactured as an experiment solely to create a beast of burden requiring great strength but minimal intelligence and, whilst they were like this, it was impossible for them to become Crystal Guardians of planet Earth. They had been developed before the last ice age when Earth’s minerals were being plundered and, as soon as the mineral stores were depleted, the travellers had abandoned Earth seeking another planet, which offered an abundance of natural wealth, to be pillaged. They had left behind the humanoids, discarding them without a second glance. When the ice age had eventually taken a grip on Earth, their numbers had gradually diminished. The freezing temperatures of that ice age had reduced their numbers considerably, so that only the very strongest had survived but, without their creators, they had no way of knowing how to use their physical strength constructively. They were like children inhabiting physically strong bodies with powerful primitive hormones coursing through their veins, affecting their thought patterns and behaviour, driving them relentlessly through cycles of fear and aggression.