The Way Ahead Feels Lonely | Act I: There Is No End

The dark had returned.

Inside my mind was the returning thoughts of pure conceit and malice that could only be conjured by one thing and one thing only... myself.

Inside these thoughts were things I had generally formed out of things I've seen. Things I've experienced. Things that... I could've done.

These... These thoughts had that told me I should do something like this or that...

My soul said otherwise, however.

"Why should you continue on like this? Things are only getting worse my friend." A voice had said.

"I'm not your friend, demon. Nor will I ever be." I replied strongly.

"Oh, maybe that was a little harsh, wasn't it? Calling us demons and everything in between."

Another voice had stated.

"Telling me to give up is a little harsh, isn't it? How about that?"

"There is nothing about it that was harsh. Besides, that's what you're thinking, isn't it?"

"It isn't."

"Oh but it is." The first voice came back in.

Continuing from this was the voice telling me that "You know it is. Otherwise, we wouldn't be here, reminding you of your shadows."

"You don't need to remind me."

"Yet again, here we are."

"Why do you do this to me?"

"Correction... you're doing this to yourself."

The second voice comes in, saying "Why are you just so... hopeful for the future but at the same time, so fearful of it too? You know things can go wrong, yet you don't want them to."

"Like how you believe you can really have a future with her." The first voice said.

"Ah yes, her. Your sweet Kiri. Oh, how fortunate are you to have her, aren't you?" The second mockingly said.

"You better watch your mou-" I said as I raised my voice ever so slightly before the first intercepted me and said...

"But we don't have any mouths."

"But you do. And you use them so well, don't you? To talk. To smile. To frown. To even kiss." The second continued.

"Oh, wasn't that kiss last night so sweet? You could almost say that it was heavenly, don't you think?"

"To think that he can have such a beautiful lady by his side."

"Oh, but we mustn't think that. After all, it's not like he has her for long."

"What? What do you mean by this?" I intercepted their small conversation.

"Why, Deus, you know what we mean." The second responded.

"Which is?"

"Don't act stupid with us. You know that she isn't for you." The first continued.

"And she probably won't be with you for long." The second stated.

"I know her. I know Kiri. She won't leave me." I replied firmly.

"We know. But it might not be up to her." The first suggested.

"No. She will defy them. She won't let them."

"Oh, you think so? But what if she didn't? Do you know her and her family that well? Do you really think she'll sacrifice her place in her family just to continue spending time with you?" The second ever so stated with complexity.

"This isn't some fairytale, Deus. You know it." The first stated.

"I KNOW. But I just... I just... I just have some faith... some hope that she...

that we'll be together." I said, starting to feel a little somber.

"But you know that's rather hard. Dare we say... impossible." The first continued

"And you know that too. Remember, for as much as we fight with you..." The second stated before the two grew silent for just one second before returning with, in unison:

"WE ARE YOU."

"And you know this. For you are scared." The first stated.

"No, I am nervous."

"But you are scared. You fear for what may happen with you and Kiri." The second corrected.

"You fear for Lentil, for his parents are fearsome and merciless and overprotective, and even for those friends of his as they seem a little... wild." The first commented.

"But they will be fine. They know what they're doing. I know Lentil is going to turn out just fine." I replied, feeling a little bit numb as the streets seemed to have dissipated from my vision.

"But are you sure of this?" The first asked.

I paused. I...

"..."

"...No. I am not."

"And you never will, won't you?"

"No. I never have been."

"You know, we are strange, don't you think? The fact that you are so observant of your environment and the people around ourselves is always so fascinating in itself, but at the same time, we never seem to find ourselves in a righteous state. And that's truly something. Never truly happy even in our happiest moments. Never truly sad in our most degrading moments. And so, we spend our days, void of all things except our will to live. And even that fades over time. Just remember how the Brothers' parents took their own lives and brought their own children down with them. Even the Brothers in some form." The first stated, making the world seemingly form to the reminders of the truth.

"We aren't here to bring you down to the worst position in your life. But we are not here, in your mind, and in your soul, to comfort you and tell you that everything will be alright. Because we all know it will never be. Not when you fill your mind with ridiculous things with your fantasies and rubbish like that." The second firmly stated.

"We are here to bring you back to god-forsaken planet and remind you that this is your life. And as much as the light carries you forward, it will only take you so far until you have the rely on the ugly truth to determine whether or not you will succeed." The first continued, making me feel so enlightened yet so very numb.

"We are not your enemies but until you make up your mind about how to live and how to think..."

"We will remain so very critical of you. Because, lest we need to remind you..."

"WE ARE YOU." Both voices said in unison, with their voices seemingly echoing across the hollow black that encompassed my space.

And as I continued to walk in singularity, I started to feel...

I started to feel so very lonely.

My mind had grown numb and faint as all thought had seemingly faded for just a while.

And for those moments...

I felt nothing.

As much as I was alive, I felt as dead as the corpses rotting by my side, popping up by the corridors between buildings.

And as my vision would grow stale and my eyes would not focus on the road ahead and by the way I walked and how my thoughts and memories all seemed to have disappeared for just a moment, I only soon realized that...

The path I'm taking...

The path I'm taking to return back home....

Back to somewhere I used to know.

Back to somewhere I used to feel safe in.

The path I was taking right there, in that very moment....

"The way ahead feels lonely to me." All said.

And maybe it's because there is nothing I feel attached to anymore.

My family? Feels too far away from me to ever hug once more.

My friends? Feels too close for comfort.

My lover? Feels too scary for our future's untold.

My life?

....

Honestly, I'm not that sure about it anymore.

I don't know what I want anymore.

I don't know how I'm supposed to feel anymore.

And as much as I know how to live...

I really don't know how to live my life anymore.

I only feel like my life is living without me.

And all that remains of me is the slow and numb body that I encompass every day and every night.

I know I sound so... So weird... and so dethatched but to be quite frank...

When you're living a life like this...

What are you supposed to think of other than this?

And so, the only thing I thought right then and there was the slow decline of my feet as I continued to walk across a barren town, which soon enough, almost felt like a barren wasteland instead.

The dark was still present, but I could not hear the voices anymore.

What replaced that was the sounds of my voice speaking all of these... these thoughts... All of these thoughts were spoken to me inside my dysfunctional excuse for a brain.

Slowly, my head finally felt something after growing numb and when I finally looked straight...

I saw it again.

The buildings of the neighborhood disappeared and what rather replaced it was the unfathomable sight of structures floating once again in the sky, where it now grew darker.

The colors have seemed to have narrowed down to shades of gray and hues of white.

I did not panic no more, for I had felt too far out of my body to fear such things.

And so I continued to walk, with an ever-growing presence, circumcising my walking corpse.

"So do you feel it, Deus?" A voice had emerged, seemingly darker and less sharp than the others.

"Do you feel it? Do you feel reality crumbling all around you? Do you feel the deception and the lies all destroy each other and the truth and all that remains is the void? Do you feel all of these ideals of yours hold on to you for dear life as they slowly fade into the whites of this dimension? Do you feel it, Deus?

"..." I had said nothing.

"It's all so horrible, isn't it? It could be nicer for someone else, but right now, it's much more unbelievable than before, huh?"

"..."

"You know, Deus, silence isn't going to help your situation, isn't it?"

"Well... it won't make it... It won't make it worse, now, would it?"

"It won't, yes. But it won't delay the inevitable, now. We all know that things aren't going to last. Nothing ever will."

"I know that."

"So, what will you do about it?"

Suddenly, I stopped. I had no control over my body, yet I wanted to stop.

All of my thoughts had ceased to play in my mind, and all I could scream was mute bliss.

Everything seemed to have responded the same, as for only a moment, I could hear nothing.

Deaf.

Mute.

Silenced.

And only after then, did the noise return back to my ears and only then, did one statement pop up.

"..."

"....."

"......"

"..........."

"....|....."

" "

"...."

....

"Nothing. I will do nothing about it." I claimed, staring blankly in front of me, with my mouth expressing only such a firm statement.

"So you will let your life only fade away into nothingness?" The voice replied.

"No. I will let my life fade... knowing that I've tried to live. That I have at least tried."

"Tried what?"

"..."

"Tried to do something that makes this wretched lifestyle all worth while."

With that, the voice grew silent.

And as it died, the world around me suddenly seemed to have awaken itself as the faint lights returned and the buildings seemed to have grounded itself once again.

My mind had grown sane again and my synapses seemed to have remembered to work again.

I looked at my hands, inspecting it for a moment, like if it was a foreign item to me.

I then looked back up, which right in front of me, appeared a familiar place and a familiar feeling returning back into my soul.

I then looked around, seeing the world revitalize itself at least by a small caliber.

With a sigh, I walked up the stairs up to the door and ever so slightly, I opened the door.

Life may not be the best.

Life may be confusing.

Life may be a wretch and ruin everything for me.

Life... may be unexpecting.

And for what it is, I had to accept that.

For the way ahead may feel lonely...

But it's only going to be that way forever if I don't accept that it will be for me.