The Tale Of The Wanderer

Being a strange tale comprising of three scenes.

Scene I : Despair

As the scene begins, you find youself standing in a place, the likes of which, you have never seen. All you see is white sand, here blown up into a dune, there rippled by the wind.

No sun is in the sky above, only stars set in constellations unknown. Yet it is light, and it is hot, you can see the air ripple with the heat of the invisible Sol.

At your feet you see a single golden seed lying in the scorching sand, a poor thing, destined to lie here and dry out in this white wasteland. You can feel a slight breeze picking up, as you turn your head to keep the white particles out of your eyes, you become aware of a small black dot moving down the side of a dune on the horizon. You find youself being lifted into the air and carried at an incredible speed towards it.

As you come closer you can make out that the dot was in fact a man. You land mere feet away from him, yet he appears to be oblivious to your existance.

The man is young, in his early twenties at most, yet he looks haunted and haggard. His long brown hair is a tangled mess, white sand trapped in it everywhere. He wears black clothing, though save for his woolen coat, the black of his clothing has long since faded to a dull gray,the only color you can see is in his eyes, sunk deep in his sockets, they are a piercing sky-blue in color and locked onto some distant point.

As you take in his appearance you become aware of his staff, it is made from a black wood, eight notches line it's side, carved with some sharp instrument.

The man sighs and proceeds to sit down, taking from his pocket an aluminum flask.

He takes a small sip and looks into it, his face grows darker and finally he speaks, his voice is a dry whisper:

"Oh cursed I am!
That I find myself in this desolate place!
What gods have I offended to deserve this fate!"

He shakes his head to get rid of the hairs that stick to the sweat on his pale, gaunt face.

"I cannot remember -- how did I come here?
Plucked from my lush, green, home
To find myself in an otherworldy hell!"

He fingers the staff, taking in each notch cut into it's smooth, black, surface. A single tear runs down his left cheek and traces a line through what appears to be dried blood that trickled from his mouth days ago.

"Scarcely can I recall what brought me here,
My mind struggles to remember what I witnessed upon my arrival.
Am I to die here alone?
What cruel games the gods play upon me!
Woe unto me.
Woe unto me."

With a soft grunt of exertion he struggles to his feet, clutching the staff for support, the knuckles of his hands are encrusted with dried blood from the wounds on them, left by his dehydration.

"I can see not what lies beyond,
But in key with the cruel nature of this place,
I believe nothing lies over the next dune of pearly white,
Than yet another heap of white dust!"

The young man stands, squinting against the birght reflection of the sands, hoping to scry out in the distance some form of habitat, some hope for survival. His coat flaps like the wings of some dragon in the increasing winds, white sand blows against his face as he grimaces at the pain that causes him. Finally he surrenders to the force of the unnatural wind and turns his face from it, his sky blue eyes project a feeling of great dispair.

There's something different about this man, he is not like other men, perhaps so in appearance but not in the forceful emotions that seem to surround him, again he speaks, louder and more determined this time:

"Hah! Curse my own folly!
For it was none other than I that condemned me to this test!
Thinking myself better than other men!
And now comes the test, and look what has become of me!
Such a sorry excuse am I..
Such a pathetic weakling!
I sought to distinguish myself from lesser men,
And now I find that I cannot survive the dark night of the soul,
Which I brought upon myself!"

He burst out in an insane laugh, clearly pained by having no escape of this land. As he laughs all suddenly begins to grow darker, though there was no source of light to begin with, the non-existant phenomena that illuminted the vast white plane must surely have gone.

The young man stops laughing, painfully aware of the impending cold night. He stands to his full height, somewhere around 6 feet, surveys his surroundings and with a scream throws the staff to the ground after carving yet another notch into it's side

"Forsaken piece of wood!
Surely it is you that damned me!
Thrice times three days and nights have I endured this desert!
Nine woeful nights of cold and unforgiving winds!
Look!
Look!
Only two drops of water remain in my flask!"

He stands, shaking, for a moment and picks up the staff, his face unearthly calm and cold. As he stands he looks to the skies, so unfamiliar to him.

"Alone..I am alone
Why must I be alone?
How sadistic to lead me to die Enduring the one thing I fear!
Loneliness..
But my sorrows shall not last much longer..
I have scant water left to keep me alive for half a day..
And nothing grows in this land.
This land, the most pure I have ever envisioned.
It would be a marvel,
If not it's deathly nature were an abomination to men's hearts.
Surely no man can exist for long,
In such a desolate wasteland."

A viscious gust of wind knocks the man to his knees, his hands sliding down his staff, he clutches his right hand to his chest with his left, bright red blood seeps through his fingers and drips onto the white sand.

The man whinces and stares at the torn palm of his hand, the notches of his staff tore off most of the skin, as he looks his face contorts in anger.

"Hah! I can barely believe you think this will hurt me anymore!"

He shakes his bleeding fist at some unseen person in the velvet, starlit, skies above, then he curls up in the sand and shivers in the unholy cold that dominates this landscape by night, as the scene fades to black you can just make out his final words before he drifts into sleep:

"I must be strong!
I must be proud!
I must survive, this ordeal so wretched..
For if I die I will have lost..."

Then everything becomes black, and you can hear nothing but the howling of savage winds.

Scene 2: Acceptance

As the light returns you can once again make out the desolate white desert, next to you lies the seed from the first visit to this realm, it is still a bright, golden, yellow in color, but it's surface no longer smoothe, it has become wrinkled by the lack of moisture.

A few feet away you can make out the young man, partially buried under the fine grains of this hell's surface.

He begins to mave slightly as he awakens from what must have been a night filled with nightmares, as he sits up he grimaces in pain as he tries to brush the sand off his skinned palm, as he does so he only manages to make the bleeding return. He looks around for his staff but is unable to find it. His eyes grow wide in terror as he frantically digs around in the sands where he was sleeping.

"Cursed cane!
You have taken me this far, I demand your return!
If you have taken me into this hateful place, you shall stay with me,
'Till the flesh has fallen from my bones,
And nought remains but a skeletal figure in darkened rags!"

As ever the young man has that strange quality, that undefinable thing, you can almost feel his anger and dispair radiate outwards from him. He pound the ground with his fists, a sign of his powerlessness, leaving droplets of crimson in the sand. The he stops and directs his gaze at the seed, the sky blue sparkles for a second with amazement as he scampers to his feet to examine it closer. With a subtlety unexpected from such a destroyed soul, he gently scoops up a handfull of sand with the seed lying on top of it.

"What strange fate befalls me know?
What bizarre cosmic joke is being played here?
That I may find a seed in this lifeless void?
Surely 'tis a trick, a ruse,
To confound my battered senses!
But nay, I can touch it, feel it
And, if it were not for the sand in my nose, smell it!"

A slight smile plays on the young man's shattered lips, a childlike innocence cloaks his sorrowed face

"Hah! Perhaps the one prize this hall has to offer is mine!
A seed, wrinkled and dying as I surely am too!
So daringly I entered here looking for something greater,
Only to be mocked with this useless gift!"

The madness ebs away from his face as he carefully examines the dying seed, and ponders his own demise, a deep sorrowful cry emerges from his parched throat as he clenches his unused hand, sending a thin stream of crimson into the pearly white below.

"Oh poor thing!
All appearences have it that we will dry and evaporate together!
But let me have a sparkle of pride in my dying moments!
Share with me my last drops of water "

Using his calloused index finger he makes a small hole in the sand and drops the seed in, he smiles the smile of a damned man to himself as he reaches into the pocket of his tattered coat to bring out the flask. As he unscrews it's cap a single tear forces it's way out of his dried left eye. He stands up, and looks down into the hole, a shimmer of determination playing across his mournful features. He hold out the flask and turns it over, sending not one but both gleaming pearls of water into the hole.

"Hah! Take them both, it matters not,
Maybe they will soothe your agony for a while!
For I was lost the moment I entered here!"

The young man stands proud, feeling he has made a fool of his tormentor, yet woeful of the loss of his final drops of hope.

"May these droplets not be wasted on you little seed..
For thay are all I have left, and now are yours."

As he throws away the flask, he is suddenly thrown to the ground as the ground lurches with a rumbling sound. From the tiny hole a gnarled, spiked tree bursts, it's branches like claws,digging into it's own trunk, piercing it's heartwood.

The man stands, agape, for a moment at this bizarre occurence, and then his shoulders slump as he reaches out to touch the rugged bark.

"Alas! Poor sapling, so like my soul art thou!
Twisted in upon itself
Opening wounds that blacken your heartwood
Stunted in growth by malnourisment!
Oh, how I pity and lament thee!"

All is silent for a moment as the man tries to make sense of the symbolism of this spectacle. He slowly moves around the gnarled little tree, his face is calm, expressionless. After circling the tree for what appears an eternity,

He comes to a sudden stop as he realizes the difference between himself and the tree.

"What?
How can I have not seen through this.
It is simplicity, taken one step beyond!
As insane as it is brilliant.
The tree, it is contorded and malformed, yet it feels no sorrow.
For one reason and one reason only.
The one thing in which we are not the same,
The tree accepts it's fate.
And I fight it!
What a fool am I! "

The young man's sand encrusted eyes open wide as he gazes at the tree with his sharp blue eyes, for the tree is changing, it's trunk straightens and thickens, the branches tear themselves free from the heartwood to reach as hands towards the heavens. A vast foliage of golden leaves sprouts from the branches as the bark becomes whiter than the desert's sands ever were. A golden glow casts it's light in the face of the young man, revealing for the first time just how sickly and pale he looks, the skin underneath his eyes is a dark blue due to sleep depravation, his lips cracked by dehydration and his cheeks have sunken in for the lack of food. He finally understands the nature of this test, the dark days behind him shatter in his mind as he reaches out to touch the tree.

"Finally, my blind eyes see
They see what was always here.
I was searching for ascension when I came here.
I can REMEMBER!
And now the mystery is solved..by accepting our fates,
We can become one with The Whole
Lo! I have reached my goal,
And I shall have to die for it!
I must shed my body,
For it is of use to me no longer!

The young man touches his body one more time in a silent farewell as a bright light erupts from above and slams onto him in a great pillar, even as you are blinded by the fierce brightness of this supernatural light you can see the young man, his mouth agape in a silent scream of physical pain as his soul is torn free from his body, he has found what he was looking for. Just for a second you can imagine you see a pair of golden angelwings shimmer behind the body as it disintegrates. From inside the pillar of light you can faintly hear the man's voice, at first hoarse and dry but becoming stronger and more clear as he goes along:

"Ascend!
I Ascend!
And 'I' remains no longer!
For I has become one with all!
For such is the nature of god!
Not a bearded man who lives in a temple!
But the essence of all!
BEHOLD!
He is I
And
I am HE!"

With those word the ground shakes with a terrible explosion as the golden tree shatters like glass, sending a single staff of heartwood flying into the distance, meanwhile the light becomes a thinner, and thinner column, until at last it fades, where it shone, lies a single golden seed.

The scene before you fades to black .

Scene 3: Every story has a beginning.

The scene opens as we see the young man lying in the white sands, he suddenly jumps to his feet and looks around himself wildly. He is the same man as before only looking much healthier, he is still quite pale, but his piercing blue eyes are much more vibrant. His clothes are still in good shape and his hands soft and delicate.

He is looking around, as if he is not sure where he is, or has been, or will be.

"What kind of trickery is this?
Where am I?
Why can I not remember how I got here?
Am I asleep, is this a dream?
Nay! Though I pinched myself, I still remain!
What a bizarre landscape unfurls before mine eyes?
'Tis a desert, yet white as the beard of God himself!
And these stars? I know them not!"

The young man runs up a nearby dune in utter desparation, in hopes of finding a landmark, he scans the horizon, yet finds nothing there. Suddenly his attention is drawn by a light over the horizon, a white glow, strange and compelling.

"What is that I scry in the distance?
Perhaps the light of a city?
Perhaps I can find answers yonder!
But wait? I can see it no longer, it has vanished!
Now where must I turn for my salvation?
I am truly forlorn!"

Even as he speaks those words, he must leap aside to avoid impalement by a black, wooden, staff that flies past him at a terrifying pace, it buries itself in the dune behind the man, his sharp eyes squint in the coming darkness and he runs towards it's landing. With the fervour of a madman he digs to find the thing that so nearly killed him. After mere minutes he has retrieved the staff and cradles it in his arms, as the dark night begins to fall over him, we can hear him whisper:

"Hah! A gift from above you must surely be!
A staff to aide mine walking in this desert, a staff to hold direction with!
Truly fortunate am I.

After this, the night becomes completely black and silent, save for the sound of giant wings flapping in the distance. A soothing sound, for these wings carry a sould to freedom for ever more.

The End

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