Nostalgia

 

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Introduction

Completely and utterly alone, I welcomed death like an old friend. We had danced before, but never with such grandiuer. The black tendrils prodded at my mind, my vision clouding with peace. This would be the release I had been waiting an eternity for. In this burned, ashen clearing, I knelt, surrounded by whispering pines. Staring at my hands, the blackness curled around my fingers and slithered up my pale arms. My breath slowed as I willed myself to let the vines overtake me, and I was nothing.

| - - - (  ) - - - |

    Rays of early sunrise sifted through the open window to my right, willing me to open my eyes. It was the same damn dream I’d had for three months now. There wasn’t a pattern. It didn’t frighten me - not unless I thought about it for too long. There was something so real about these dreams. I could still feel the dry earth on my hands, the scent of something burning, and the copper taste of blood in the back of my throat. I would have to face it someday, but right now I had my own personal hell to deal with.

    It’s not so bad. The thought drifted by with the rest of my early morning brain fog, disappearing as I splashed cold water on my face from the marble basin on the floor. Sure, I wasn’t starving or without a bed. Some had the gall to call me "blessed." But I was a slave. Personal slave, for that matter. I dried my face and looked into the oak mirror that hung precariously on these barren walls. I didn't even recognize myself anymore. I was a shell of someone else...someone who looked like they glowed from simply breathing. But it was an act, wasn't it? I was a slave. Slave to the one creature who single-handedly destroyed peace on Earth, and wiped out his entire race in the process. Not the human race, mind you. The Gaurdians.

    They were beautiful. At least, he was beautiful. I swear his pale skin was almost translucent, as if it was only a thin layer holding his body together, but I never saw it break. He didn’t have any visible veins, no source of life to take from. His voice was like the listening to the ocean waves roll over at midnight, and it captivated my attention without reason. His eyes were deep amethyst caverns that could swallow me whole with wonder, but I couldn't stare long before I felt the sickening sadness that resonated from them. 200 years had passed since the last of them had completely disappeared. Maybe they lost hope and left. Maybe they too, were consumed with sadness. Many were put to death, and few were “put to rest,” as he says. I had never seen another one of his kind. To go on living...knowing that you are all alone.

    But that was immortality, I guess. I braided my silvery tresses as the sun rose higher, reminding me that it was another day. Another set of hours I would spend with him, doing whatever his heart, or otherwise, desired. Mornings like this I have to ask myself, why did they even bother? There is no reason for a being with endless days to care about us. About me. But he did.

 

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