River Of Horrors - A Schlattbur Story

PART 12 - CHANGE

RIVER OF HORRORS

PART 12

───── ❝ CHANGE ❞ ─────

Déjà vu — a the feeling that one has lived through the present situation before. The instinct somebody feels when what you see; what you hear; what you experience — everything you feel in that moment, strikes a part of your brain that makes you envision that exact past memory happening before.

A part of you can never be truly sure if that feeling is just something your brain made up, or if deep down, it has happened before. Maybe in another life. Another reality.

Maybe it's some sort of precognition — a prophecy — that determines something important that will happen or is happening in your life right now.

But what really draws that line between reality, and something you made up?

This. This is what draws that line.

That pathological hallucination — enigmatic sensory experience — isn't deja vu. It's a foreshadow of something completely the opposite — something real. Something you know for a fact that your brain cannot make up.

That's when you begin to question the roots of the Universe's early existence itself — time. When did time start? When will it end? Is time even real?

But assuming it is, time is just a construct humans have invented in order to understand how the Universe works, changed, and cycles — isn't it?

In the end, time is just a speculation created by us; a simple way to say that reality's sequence of existence is never-ending.

But how do we know that it's just one continued, never-ending line of existence? How do we know that this world we live in isn't just a world made up of one single ending, but rather a story with a beginning and end?

What if this world was connected? Like a time loop. Could reality be in a constant, flowing loop of time?

It's an idea that doesn't strike somebody very often unless they're stuck in some sort of dire situation — whether it be mentally, or physically. It certainly wasn't an idea that had struck Wilbur in his life before...

Until now.

Like the barrel of a gun, the philosophical questions revolve relentlessly in Wilbur's mind, spinning round and round until the chamber stops and the bullet triggers.

In this case, that bullet fired is a bullet of realisation — and that realisation jars the gauze blanketing reality, making the world around him slow down. The answers to his questions are right in front of him. Blurred, and smeared, but in his hind sight; he knows what will happen, and what he has to do.

He would drop Tommy, and everything would go silent for a few moments. And then, he'd finally open his mouth and speak, saying 'Wilbur Soot.'

Beneath the surface of his gyrating mind, lies the jigsaw board, with all its pieces clicking together.

That's right. And then, I'd say 'Yes... that's me, Schlatt. I'm Wilbur, Wilbur Soot.' He'd give me a mischievous but spine-curtling grin, and then I'd follow up saying 'and I'm here to put you to justice.'

For the first time in his life, he knows what will happen. He knows the future.

And that's why he needs to do all in his power to stop that. To stop that future from happening. To break this continuous chain; this continuous cycle, of his damned fate.