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Do Not Look Into His Eyes

Credits: Username- PostingLoudly

"Do not look into his eyes."

That was the last thing they told me before they threw me into the room. Just ask him a few simple questions, and get out, but do not look into his eyes. Do not look into his eyes.

The magnetically locked door slammed shut behind me as I swiveled about. The locks clicked into place, creating a wall of impenetrable steel. I turned back around and scanned the concrete room I was in. Nothing, save for a huddled figure in the center. It, or he, was kneeling on the stone floor as if he were in the middle of prayer. His back rose and fell rhythmically, the man breathing as he sat there.

I tentatively approached the creature, looking down to the ground. Do not look into his eyes. I wouldn't look into his eyes. "H-hello?" I called out. "My name is-"

"Alice Williams, I know. Daughter of Sabrina and Paul Williams. Twenty-four years old, and sentenced to death for a gruesome murder you didn't commit." The man spoke in a harsh and raspy voice.

"H-how did you-"

"I know all past the point of creation. I know the questions you were brought to ask of me. I know how to set you free." He chuckled. It sounded more like a raspy cough as it reverberated betwixt concrete walls. I was sure that they were listening.

"They listen, but they cannot understand. They will never understand."

"What w-won't they understand?" I asked, still being sure to avert my eyes should he decide to look my way.

"The joy of reality. True. Unadulterated. Reality. They want to understand, but they will never understand because they cannot possibly perceive the type of understanding that they are after."

My breath hitched in my throat as I saw the man stand. His haggard body leaning off to the right as if he were slumped over. The tattered overcoat he wore waved in a ceremonious fashion in an unfelt breeze, and his worn leather campaign hat covered a paltry amount of patchy light gray hair. I closed my eyes and swallowed a lump that I barely felt in my throat.

"H-how do you p-perceive it?"

"Look into my eyes. Look, and I will show you. I am as Eve, offering you the fruit from the tree of knowledge. Bite, and you will understand."

Do not look into his eyes. What had happened to the others who looked into his eyes? I had asked this question before they shoved me into the chamber, but they just repeated the same six words. Do not look into his eyes. It wasn't a question. There were no questions to be asked. It was just a statement of resolution. Just do not look into his eyes. It couldn't be that hard. All I had to do was close my eyes, or look at the floor, or-

"This is it for you, Alice. You won't be leaving this room. You were on death row. Here? This is your sentence. Even if you do not look into my eyes, they would terminate you. A failed test subject. That's how they would see you."

My heartbeat ever more quickly. Was he telling the truth? Would I really not be leaving? Am I going to die here, in this room?

"Why don't t-they want me to look into your eyes?" I barely whispered. I was afraid, more afraid than I've ever been in my entire life. Just catching a glimpse of him in my peripherals was enough to send my brain into fight or flight mode, sending adrenaline pumping through my arteries. It was a terrifying sensation.

"Because they don't want you to see the truth. They don't want you to escape. They sent you in here to die. Do not look into his eyes, they told you, but really? You'll be just fine, darling."

"I-If you understand everything, and know everything, then w-why haven't you escaped?"

"I have been waiting for you. You're a special girl, Alice. More special than you know." He let out one of those resounding laughs again. The walls shook, that time. Dust rained down from the ceiling, collecting on my head. I couldn't bring myself to wipe it off.

"How am I special?"

"You're curious. You're asking the right questions, and want answers that you understand. You don't want what they want. You want to know for the right of you. A trailblazer is what you are. A good person. You don't deserve to be here. You wanted a righteous life. You wanted to spend the rest of it with your husband and your little girl."

I choked. Tears flowed freely underneath my eyes and dripped to the rock floor below. "I-I didn't do it." I managed to get out between sobs. "Y-you k-know I didn't do it."

"Of course, you didn't! Your husband just got a raw deal from a disgruntled biker looking to blow off some steam after a game of poker went sour. And your daughter. Well..." I cried even harder at the mention of my daughter. "We don't have to talk about that."

"I-I just w-want my life back! I want to be home with Jacob and Lucy! This isn't f-fair, life wasn't supposed to g-go this way!"

The man, being, creature, whatever he was chortled. "Oh, but sadly it was supposed to be this way, Alice. We cannot turn back the tides of time, but we can change the world as we move forward. A better world, we could make."

"H-how?" I sniffed. "H-how could anything possibly get better?"

"It's easy. All you have to do is look into my eyes." The man turned around, I caught his rough boots shuffling against the cement. I dared not look up.

Do not look into his eyes.

If the man was telling the truth, then what difference did it make? Did these people send me in here to die? Were they going to let me out of here? All I've been doing is crying and crying and crying. The man was right, everything he said has been right. I didn't want to be here anymore. I didn't want to die. I wanted to understand.

I sniffed, then slowly looked up.

I looked into his eyes.

And then I understood.

I understood everything as he vanished, leaving me in that cell.

And I understood that I shouldn't have looked into his eyes.