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Worlds, Here I Come

"Father, help me in my time of need. Allow me the strength to persever in this time of adversity that has befallen me as of late. I thank you for watching over my mother and my father, and Jacques and Marie, may they rest in peace despite what has happened to their corporeal bodies. Please grant me the patience necessary to do Your bidding, for I am a mortal man, and my physical needs weigh heavily on my mind as if to tempt me from Your path. This of You, I pray. Amen." Such was his prayer each time a new candle would lose its life, for it was his only source of light from day to day. After his prayer, Bruno watched the tiny lumination of the candle whose flame would soon be snuffed. Along with the candle, Bruno received a plate of food, served to him with the derision of the guards, and a cup of water. Because there was no window in his cell, there was no sun with which to see well his surroundings. However, he did know that the walls all round him were made of stone which were very thick and hard to scratch. He had gone round the room with his candle one day to survey his surroundings, and had found a partially etched word. The door to his cell was heavy, wooden, and banded in iron to keep it held together. Each time the cell became black, Bruno would meditate, allowing all thoughts to take on lives of their own. Today as he meditated, his thoughts brought him to the day he overtook the responsibility of being the preacher in his father's church. "A few nights ago, Jacques and Marie were taken from us. Let us have a moment of silence for him." The congregation bowed their heads and said a silent prayer for the man and his wife. "Everything I do here in the church, I do in memory of my father, whom God called home thirteen long years ago. I am certain that I will not let you, my congregation, down in my endeavors to lead the church." He looked up at the high ceiling of the church for a moment before looking back down at his bible. "Today's sermon comes from . . . ." Bruno fell asleep with the sermon in his ear. Each "day" Bruno occupied his time with prayer, eating, exercise, meditation and sleep. He had heard tell from lifetimes ago, before he was imprisoned, that some prisoners in the Bastille would occupy their time by counting the stones; while others scratched things onto the walls, and yet others actively tried to escape from the prison. His father had taught him patience through communion with God, and Bruno practiced this with all his resolve in his present situation. Bruno saw the candle was about to go out, so he said his prayer and began to meditate. As Bruno meditated, his thoughts gravitated toward his father. Guillaume had brought Aglaë and Bruno to the church where he preached so the the boy could be christened. Aglaë performed the aspersion on the head of baby Bruno while Guillaume performed the sacrament. After Bruno had been properly introduced into the kingdom of Heaven and the Protestant religion, Aglaë sat down to listen to Guillaume's sermon. "In this, the year of our Lord, sixteen hundred and seventy-three, my wife and I have had our first child. A child is a beautiful thing; a child allows us purpose in life . . . ." The sermon drew heavily from different verses dealing with children being the light of life. By the end, many of the parishioners were weeping openly from joy, including Aglaë who was holding baby Bruno the entire time. Each time her husband spoke about children and how they affect a parent, she looked down at her own child and smiled. After the congregation was dismissed, they were met with a massive uproar and a large crowd of people in the streets. Guillaume hurriedly tried to push his way through the crowd to see what was going on, and to offer any assistance he may be able to. When he got to the front, he saw a cart with food on it, accompanied by a cadre of the royal guard, who had brought food to the people. Guillaume approached the man who appeared to be the highest ranking officer, the guard on the horse. He was dressed as the other guards in black, except for the plume that stuck out of his chapeau, which was blue. "My son, what is it that has my brothers in such a state of discontent?" Guillaume asked of the guard. The man looked at Guillaume and responded simply, "Father, the people are not happy with the food that we have brought them. They would rather starve than take charity." Guillaume watched the man as he spoke, who acted as though he were above everyone else, and of course, he was, as he was sitting on a horse; Guillaume made a gesture toward the cart filled with food. "Might I have a taste of this food that you have so unselfishly brought for us to eat?" The man on the horse made a gesture toward the food, as though to say he did not care, and Guillaume reached out to grab an apple and took a bite out of it, immediately spitting it onto the ground. "But, my son, this food is rotten. Why would you bring us rotten food to ingest?" The man on the horse seemed to think about the question for a moment. "Father, our orders came from the King's adviser. I will let the King know about the results of this action." He looked about at his men and waved them on without a word, they left the area, leaving the crowd to chatter angrily. Guillaume turned to face his people with a smile on his face. "All will be well, you shall see." With that, he moved around the crowd to his waiting wife and son, and they walked home. Bruno pondered in the dark the meaning of memories beyond his recollection, as the candle had gone out just before he began his meditation. He pulled gently at his long beard as he contemplated, but the mystery perplexed him no end. Finally, he went to sleep on the cold stone that was his floor, his home, his sanctuary. When he awoke, Bruno found a lit candle and a plate of food in front of his door. Judging by the length of the candle, it could not have been alight for very long. Bruno thought back to the reason he had been imprisoned in the first place. It was no secret he was a Huguenot, but it was much more than that. He had been the leader of a Protestant church under the reign of King Louis XIV, a Catholic king who had abolished the right to practice any other religion. His thoughts brought him back to the moment he had spelled his own doom. "Brothers and sisters, too often do we live in fear of the tyranny of evil men. We have not had food edible enough save for bread and sometimes vegetables for many a year. Normally, I would preach to you about persevering through such adversity by prayer and patience, but no longer can I advocate such action! Our numbers are dwindling daily, either by being betrayed or through starvation, and I refuse to stand for selfish acts such as our king has displayed." He paused and looked out on his tired-looking congregation, which was rather small by comparison to when he had first taken over as preacher. "No, brothers and sisters, it is time for action against our oppressors. Action so that we may once again be free to partake of sustenance and be healthy once more. However, life should only be taken if no other choice is available, for it shall weigh too heavily on the soul. So heavily as to disallow entrance into the kingdom of Heaven." ". . . that preacher would never survive with the three of us savaging him." This brought Bruno out of his thoughts with a start. He continued listening. ". . . must find a way out of here . . ." ". . . four thousand, three hundred and one, four thousand, three hundred and two . . ." ". . . why our food must be so sparce . . ." Bruno clutched his hands to his head as more voices flooded into his mind, unbidden and unknown to him. He screamed aloud and became unconscious. Several hours had passed, the candle was ready to be extinguished. He no longer heard anything, which was bliss compared to the cacophony he had just heard. He said his prayer and went to sleep without the meditation. He was normally awake to witness the candle and food being brought in, but this time when he awoke, the candle was already almost half burned away. The food on the plate was unappealing to him, so he ignored it completely for the duration of the candle-lit day. He also exercised more than normal, which had the desired effect of making him much more tired. He said his prayer before the candle went out, but once again, he went straight to sleep without meditation. He continued in this manner for a few months, which he was unable to measure in terms of days and weeks and months. It seemed an entire lifetime spent eating, praying, exercising, and sleeping. At any rate, enough time passed that Bruno finally felt comfortable with meditating once again. This time, Bruno heard no voices beyond those of his memory, which he gladly welcomed. Guillaume contracted smallpox while he was tending to some sick parishioners whose spittle flew whenever they would speak or cough, landing on the preacher. Aglaë and Bruno had a rough time watching the man they loved so sick with nothing they could do but pray, and pray they did. Their prayers were fervent, but despite that, Guillaume did not get any better, and eventually passed away. The seven year old boy tried his best to act like a man should at the funeral, but he could not prevent himself from crying alongside his mother. The service had been performed by Jacques, the man who was next in line to be the preacher of Guillaume's church. In the distance, yelling could be heard, coming from people rioting about the quality and lack of food available to the peasantry. Bruno paid no attention to the sounds, focusing sharply on the casket which contained his dead father as it was lowered into the ground, never to be seen again. The boy knew that his father had been called home by God, but at that particular moment, he did not care; he wanted his father back. The next year, Aglaë was given up by a man to the house of the French kingdom in return for a free exit from the country. The man who had parlayed for safe passage was granted with a swift execution as soon as Louis XIV had Aglaë, who was imprisoned and tortured, and eventually murdered for her religious beliefs. Had Bruno not been the adolescent he was, raised to be a devout Protestant, his faith in God might have been shaken to the point of non-existence. But the memory of his father stayed strong within his heart, and he persevered only through his dedication to the church of his father. After the loss of his mother, Bruno was taken in by some parishioners of the church who had no children to speak of. Bruno continued to live with them, always in fear of being caught and murdered or imprisoned, until he turned twenty years old. Shortly after his twentieth birthday, Jacques was betrayed by a man named Ciel, and captured in his sleep along with his wife. Their disappearance made Bruno the next candidate to be the leader. It was no secret what had happened to the two, it was a hazard of their time. "A few nights ago, Jacques and Marie were taken from us. Let us have a moment of silence for him." The congregation bowed their heads and said a silent prayer for the man and his wife, and even though they were sad, they all knew the risk of practicing their religious beliefs in Marseilles under the rule of King Louis XIV. "Everything I do here in the church, I do in memory of my father, whom God called home thirteen long years ago. I am certain that I will not let you, my congregation, down in my endeavors to lead the church." He looked up at the high ceiling of the church for a moment before looking back down at his bible. "Today's sermon comes from . . . ." Then, as before, during his meditation, he heard a single voice enter his mind. Once again, it was the guard from before, then one whom had contemplated beating Bruno until he was once again one with the life force of God. The man was slightly more prepared for the flood of voices this time round, and steeled himself mentally, trying to keep open to the experience, for it may yet have been a sign from God. The moment Bruno began thinking about what was going on, his mind shut out the voice and everything went silent. He could not admit that he was sad it happened in this way, and was glad not to have so many voices in his head once again. Bruno continued in this fashion for several months, experimenting with finding different people. He had finally grasped just how much time he had truly spent in his prison by delving deeper than the surface thoughts of the men he was probing mentally. "A year and four months, huh? It does not seem so long when put into those terms," he thought after learning of his stay in the Bastille. One day during his meditation, a guard brought food and a lit candle to Bruno's cell, opened the door and set the plate in front of the door and the candle next to it. This guard was bewildered by Bruno, every time he brought the man's food and candle, he was sitting up, but still as death. Bruno heard everything the guard thought, but did nothing with the information. The ability to hear thoughts may have been a gift from God, but that did not mean he meant to abuse the privilege. The guard left after staring at Bruno for an uncomfortable minute, leaving Bruno completely alone to contemplate his current situation. His stomach growled loudly, and a moment later the plate of food was in his hand. The sudden sensation of weight being in his hand even though he had not moved a millimeter was baffling to him, and he puzzled over it until his stomach rumbled yet again. He ate a small amount of it, then set the rest of the food aside for later. Not one to balk at gifts from his Lord, Bruno decided to see what would happen if he so willed the plate move again. He had put quite a bit of energy into the thought and the plate shot forward as though it were launched from a cannon. The clay plate shattered upon impact, the noise from which had attracted a guard back to the cell. After unlocking the heavy wooden door that stood between Bruno and his freedom, the guard looked in on his ward and saw that the plate was broken. "What have you done? Is the food not good enough for you? We shall see how much you enjoy our food when you have gone without for a few days!" The guard stepped back and slammed the iron-banded door behind him, then locked it once more. Having gotten used to being able to read the minds of those around him, he would now devote all his time and energy to mastering this new ability that his God had seen fit to bless him with. Over the course of the next four years, Bruno mastered the abilities he had acquired. He never stopped praying to and thanking God for His infinite wisdom and having him imprisoned in the Bastille for as long as he had been. Despite this, Bruno's thoughts had begun to stray toward escape, and it began to show in his meditation; he would see images of dark holes in any surface he conjured up in his mind, and his dreams had brought with them visions of the outside world. These dreams were fragments he had picked up while reading the different guards' minds, which then manifested themselves in his sleep and made him yearn to see the sky. Bruno had also taken to pacing his cell, but only when these dreams overwhelmed his mind and it was all he could think of: to escape. He had grown so accustomed to his path that he could walk it with his eyes closed, and often did. Then, after one turn, he smelled geraniums in bloom, and he felt something that he had not felt in nigh onto six years: wind, a breeze! He snapped open his eyes so quickly that he had to turn away and shield his eyes from the brightness and screamed out in agony. The warmth of the sun's rays felt good on this Parisian spring day, and gradually he lowered his arm to allow his eyes to become accustomed to the light. After being fully reacquainted with the sun's warm rays, Bruno looked about at his surroundings, only to see that his prison was approximately one hundred feet behind him. He sighed heavily, knowing that he must not leave just yet, that it was not God's will that he be free as of this precise moment. He stood for another minute before he willed his feet and legs into movement, to turn around and head back into his cell, his home. The dark hole opened up in front of him, that smell of geraniums in bloom invading his nostrils once again as he passed through into the darkness that was his home. He was glad, however, that he now had a way to escape his personal Hell whenever he wished, which he would take advantage of as often as possible. After mastering his previous two abilities, getting the hang of teleportation seemed to be so simple to him that he thought an infant might be able to understand the process. But God would punish him for taking advantage of his new-found ability, but all things happen in His good time. After about six months of practice, God made him pay his dues. On that day, Bruno had been out wandering the countryside while a guard brought his food and candle, only to find the prisoner gone from the cell. When Bruno awoke the morning after his jaunt, he found three guards waiting for him in front of his door, locking it behind them. "Where were you? Hmm? Please, don't answer, we are going to beat it out of you." And beat him they did, to the point where Bruno had almost died, his heartbeat had slowed to nearly a standstill. Bruno screamed out and blocked with his arms and dodged as much as he could, but he would not strike out at these men because they knew not what they did. In addition, he had never felt anger toward anyone, even King Louis, just as his father never had, so fighting to him was foreign, a completely alien concept to him. Several hours later, Bruno gasped loudly into the silence of his room. They had left him for dead, and probably had not even told anyone they had done so. In fact, he knew that was the case, because he had searched through the minds of the men the moment he awoke. But how did he awake? Surely this was another miracle? Another gift bestowed upon him by God? He pondered this as he began to press his hand to his chest and legs, but there was no pain, only dried blood. When it came to be supper time, and his food was not delivered to him, he stood from his sitting position and went to the door. He began pounding on the door, shouting about how he had not received his supper, and a guard came to his door. Bruno backed up while the guard unlocked it and looked in at the man who was complaining about not getting any food. "Silence! Everybody had their food delivered to them!" Without another word, the guard slammed the door and turned the key in the heavy lock. If Bruno needed any more proof that the men who had made him approach the brink of death had not told anyone of their actions, that was it. Doubtless, this man would tell his comrades that the prisoner was still alive and well enough to begin yelling, which is exactly what he did. That night, the same men came back and beat him once more. This time, however, they did not stop until Bruno's heart had stopped beating in his chest, kneeling down to make sure there was no pulse in his heart to pump blood to the rest of his body. Only after making sure that he was completely dead did they leave. They would clean up the body in the morning for they were exhausted and wished to be home and rid of this nuisance. The next day when they came to check on Bruno, he was sitting in his meditation position, communing with God about his actions and why he was punished. He vowed never to go against God's will again and continued to pray to his Lord. The men called him a devil and vowed solemnly never to have anything to do with this man that they had killed, but was still alive. Two more years Bruno waited for approval from God to leave his prison home, when he sensed that he would be allowed to leave through one of the dark holes he had used so often long ago. But this time was different, and he knew it. The smell of geraniums in bloom accompanied the hole, but there was something fundamentally different about this one. There was a new smell that intermingled with the first, but not something he could place a finger on. Plus the coloration was slightly different than it had been before, it was still dark, but there were deep, bright purples and reds and yellows the like of which Bruno had never seen that mixed with the black so well as to be almost invisible. Bruno knew that once he stepped through that hole, he would not be on the same Terra Firma that he had grown up on. He would be in a new world, and it excited him. There was no trial, he did not tentatively put his hand through the hole first, he practically lunged through headlong into this new world.