Chapter 17A: Cycles and Sinewaves

Chapter Seventeen

I think to some extent that I am guilty of distorting true reality with a myopic lens. Eloquent excerpts and phrases danced in my mind as if they could in any way provide some comfort or closure, but closure as a concept is cathartic at its very best. I did not want closure; I did not want to accept our time together could end. I would rather cling onto a tiny shred of hope and use it as an adhesive to pull myself together just enough to pass as whole, like the pieces of a broken bowl bound together by a low-grade paste. I pushed myself toward this hope as if it were the only blindfold which would accommodate the way I refused the reality. The poisoned air of an unclean world had contaminated my lungs after years in a moment of living in my head, begging both adversarial stars and an unreal God for one last chance to see her again. If the stages of loss are worth anything at all, I accepted only that I would never have acceptance. I begged fate itself to give her back in exchange for my feeble attempt at bargaining.

I ran across the quiet beach empowered by a stolen skill to stretch my stamina beyond its ordinary limits. Though I had passed the edge of the Array and the countless corpses which covered the coast, I chased a trail of footprints in the sand which was speckled with the ash left by black fire. I took a final glance over my shoulder at the congregation of the dead, all killed by the crime I committed just for the chance to save the love for whom my soul had spiraled across space and time. Even as I raced across the trail of footprints which would pave the way to Claire, I compounded my crimes and concluded that I would justify my judgments if only I could save Aeliana in the end. If I could kill Claire and steal her power to bring back the dead, then I could reverse death itself and have her back.

The trail of footprints extended for a long way along the beach until it reached the empty shore at Ember Bay. I gazed into the starlit sea where I first found Aeliana on the wet sand above the burial grounds of Bellaina’s victims. Even from a distance, I could see shards of glass scatter the sand and shimmer in the starlight, left on the beach from the fires of the golden-eyed monster who had tried to kill us in this very spot. I glanced to the side at the burned buildings which had been caught in the crossfire of that fight. I found the spot in the street where Aeliana and I had slain our enemy and then became intimately entwined in a physical union. I could even see a touch of ashes still stain the street where the only witness had burned to death. But in that moment, a bolt of lightning in the eastern sky illuminated the world with a blinding flash. I saw in the light that a trail of sandy footprints split off from the beach and into that same street. It led into the same buildings which had burned in that fight.

A voice called from the building and pierced the night, “I cannot believe you brought me back to life. You are the same as the monsters who killed me in the first place. Innocent people are dead because you put your own desires ahead of human life! Don’t you remember? Someone did the same thing when they destroyed your home. How many people did you kill just so that I could live?!”

I then heard a response spoken by Claire’s voice, “You have to understand that I had no other choice. I did the math and calculated exactly how much quintessence I needed to bring you back! I built exactly enough of the Array to save your life with practically nothing leftover. I didn’t do this in some quest for power! The world took you away from me, so I sacrificed a small piece of it just to get you back. Can’t you understand that?”

“Don’t you dare pretend you never had a choice,” answered her son with a quiet voice.

Though I stood at a distance from both the street and the sea, I could hear every word they spoke piercing the silence of the empty city. As he briskly walked away from his heartbroken mother, the revitalized man sent a small shudder across the sky with every step he took. I watched from a distance as he emerged into the street and swiftly walked away. Claire scurried out from the burned building and tried to chase after him, but the excitement of the night had condemned her to a fierce exhaustion. I watched their silhouettes slowly diverge into the distant streets of Bones City, but I decided not to strain my eyes just to watch her heartbreak.

I stood silently on the sand, watching the future for which I fought and failed evaporate before my eyes. The light at the end of the tunnel extinguished in the moment Claire admitted that she used up her ability to bring back the dead, and so the tunnel became both dark and infinite at the same time. My dream had been dashed and discarded in the darkness of a collapsed cavern. I had lost Aeliana on my campaign to crush our curse and create our eternity, and I had lost the only thing that could bring her back. I let Claire wander off into the hollow streets to wallow in the desolation of a wasted hope. We had both sacrificed everything we had for nothing. I had no reason to kill her now. I had no reason to ever speak to her or anyone else ever again. A part of me considered using a stolen power to kill myself in the shimmering shallows as a surrender to the stars which crossed us, just so that I could reroll the cosmic dice and perhaps find her again in a future life. But if that were to happen, then I would sacrifice the knowledge that we were destined to do this tragic dance again and again.

Just as a sinewave always repeats itself even at its lowest, I convinced myself to trust the periodicity even though I had no reason to keep myself going. It was in such a way that I wandered through empty streets strewn with hollow memories. I saw empty market stands and unilluminated buildings on either side of the streets. I could even see the muddy footprints of people who had been alive only hours earlier. I had traded everything I ever knew just for a shot to save the woman I loved, and I’d exchange everything else just to see her one more time. The time on an old clocktower reminded me of all I had and that I lost it. I couldn’t help but remember Aeliana’s face even as she died in my arms. She was hurt badly but still happy. A voice in my head asked what was so wrong with me that I couldn’t have her same resilience. But then, another voice asked how I managed to make her pain all about me. I suppose that that is the way it has always been. It is a consequence of my avarice and my self-obsession.

The starlight shimmered on an empty playground in my path. I remembered this as the playground where Aeliana and I spoke to Donovan on the night we first met, and then I bid him a frozen farewell here on the day we made our escape. His children had played here and competed on the swings while he sat beside Anna on a bench beneath a tree. I walked over to the bench and felt an icy chill in the air as an echo of their lost love. The playground had fallen silent. No children climbed upon it now. No children would ever climb upon it again. Despite the thunderstorm growing in the eastern sky, the air in this place was as motionless as the city itself. The leaves in the trees did not dance or show any sign of life. Only a single swing swayed slowly in the stillness. It almost felt like this city was haunted by the vengeful souls of my victims, but all their souls were trapped inside my head. I am the conduit through which their empty voices echo into this ephemeral world. I am the vessel through which their empty souls will enter eternity.