SWORD

I have reached a point where I am worn out. Like a pack of dogs chasing me into a hole, where I have neither the strength nor the stamina to continue crawling to safety. As I lay there, waiting for my fate, I still feel fear — this means I have not resigned to it, just spent.

I start to see things… Whom was I dragging my sword for? My tired legs just dragging across the grassy cliff. With my last ounce of strength, I fell to my knees… tired… soul half-left my body.

I wake up to my reality and realise… FUCK THIS. If I am to die, I am going to do it fighting and take down a few with me! And then a hand stretched out for me… !

“Kill one in the hole. Leave it behind to block the pack. Get out of the hole. Face your new adversary,” it echoed.

THE SPACE BETWEEN TWO SPIRITS: SPIRIT THREE

When a dawn is gone, a dusk is born.

I never liked to watch horror movies. I don’t see the point of paying to bring fear and shock into my time. My life is already full of it.

Although so, sometimes I find myself trying to take a peek at the horrors humans inflict on ourselves. Maybe because I cannot believe it can happen, and as if staring at the movie would help me come to terms with it.

As for the spiritual world…

Then one day, I found myself wandering into a room. A Séance at work—she began to summon the spirit of a loved one lost too soon. A brother and father stood by to welcome the possibility of rekindling their lost time with a sister and a daughter.

The Séance performed rituals I was all too familiar with. Having grown up around animism and pagan beliefs, I awaited what I thought would be the sign of her presence.

Suddenly, the lights flickered. A sound was heard. Everyone looked around. The air turned cold. The hair stood at our edges. Even the Séance seemed surprised.

I closed my eyes and, as usual, I uttered, “I apologise for my trespassing. I seek your permission for safe passage through. I thank you for your generosity, for I am of a lesser being.”

A sudden calm overcame me as I excused myself from the room.

“Sir, don’t we want to stay to observe?” asked my mentee.

“No,” I replied as the reluctant mentor. “There are some spaces you don’t want to explore.”

My mentee looked perplexed. This was one report that was difficult for me to type. I very seldom finished them and just left them unreported. In the darkness, I saw a shadow lurking and then disappearing.

“Sir! What are we waiting for?!” exclaimed my mentee.

“No,” I hesitated. “Let it be.”

My mentee again looked perplexed, with a growing hint of strong frustration. She was about to mouth off at me when she was interrupted by the Séance. The proceedings had completed. The family did not look like there was closure. In fact, they did not know what to think of it all.

The Séance was seen walking away like it was another day at her job. She dropped by a liquor store and then stumbled throughout her way home. In the alleyway, she suddenly turned around with fear in her eyes, screaming, “Who are you?!”

We stopped. She then calmed down and said, “Ah, you have been tracking me all night. You want to learn, eh? Well… you are going to need (hic) a bottle of a-lot-of-ass-whuppin’ for this.”

As she tried to stand still in her stupor, she went on a storytelling journey. “I really don’t know what I am (hic) doing. I know how to trigger it, but I can’t control it. If you think about it, all that free energy dissipated the day she died. If there are any remnants of energy in the vicinity, it’s just bits and pieces of data. You never know which bits get left behind.”

As she picked herself up again, she continued, “I have seen (hic) power of yearning so strong that it can bring back that dissipated energy. Then again, we can’t be too sure whose or what data were brought back. Anyway, you shouldn’t be playing with spaces you don’t understand. They ain’t a box of chocolates.”

As she turned and continued her journey home, I stared at Aurelia and said, “Why don’t you make yourself useful and go after that Agitator you spotted just now? I am going to meet an old Archer friend to catch up.”

“I am kinda’ tired of chasing after sad things,” I concluded with a calm smile.