Come With Me

Chapter 3, Part 1

Hey guys! Sorry for the delay. (Procrastination!!) Anyways, I apoligize for the fillers these last too parts.  But they need to be in here, sad but true.  But I have gotten like a second wind or something because some more ideas finally filled the empty spots in my head where writers block was!  (hopefully they are good ideas!) Thanks for reading guys and VOTE and COMMENT!!  :D

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After about what seemed like ten minutes or so of aimless walking, agitation started to fill into the empty spaces in my mind where boredom once was.  “So, where are we even going?”  I said a little too bluntly. 

“Back to town.”  Anvil’s deep voice was blunt too as his head continued to stare straight ahead. 

I released a puff of frustration.  “Well, when are we going to get there?”  I rubbed the little crease between my eyes that my eyebrows made when they knit together. 

“Jesus, kid, you sound like a frickin’ twelve-year-old!  When you see a flag, that means we’re there.”  There was growl in his voice, and I felt like growling back.  This is not what I expected God’s welcoming angels to be like.

Anvil cold eyes turned towards me, tagging along behind.  “We are not angels, and we are not in God’s realm.  This,” he used his arms to gesture to the emptiness around us, “is No-Man’s land.  We are neither in Heaven nor Hell.  We are in Decision.”

“And what is that supposed to mean?!”  I yelled back.  I pushed the thought that he had just read my mind to the back of mine.

“It means you are nobody until your fate has been decided.  It means you don’t exist!”  Anvil’s hard eyes bore into my reddening ones. 

“Anvil…”  John said gently, “let’s go.”  As Anvil stiffly turned around, John’s warm, now sad, eyes rested on me.  When he also turned around, I roughly wiped my stinging eyes with the back of my hands and continued to follow without a sound. 

Sooner than I thought we arrived at a yellow flag randomly sticking out of the ground.  John approached the medium-sized piece of still fabric and glided his fingers across its silky-looking surface.  Anvil, on the other hand, seemed fed up with me, (and I with him,) so he grumbled to his friend, “I’m going to pull ahead while you explain it to him.  But hurry up.”  Oddly enough, he was looking at me when he said the last part.  He turned around and started strutting ahead, but within a few seconds, his form sputtered and fizzed out of existence. 

My eyelids moved slowly up and down as I turned towards John.  “What do you need to explain to me?”

John sighed and looked tiered.  “Why don’t you take a seat?  This may take some time.”  He twisted the flag pole and next to him, and a park bench sputtered and fizzed into existence.  He sat down with a huff and gestured for me to do the same.  I did, but a tad stiffer.  “Before I continue, you are full aware that you are a soul now, free of your worldly body, are you not?” 

I looked downcast at my bare feet.  I didn’t like it, but I knew he spoke the truth.

He rested his (I imagined it to be warm) hand on my shoulder and leaned his head down towards mine until I gazed back at him.  “Matt, you need to come to terms with your death in order to move on.  If part of you still considers you alive, then your abilities won’t become active.  You will-“

“Abilities?”  I interrupted.  John seemed glad to have gotten my attention.  He nodded in small little bobs.

“Yes, the gifts of the deceased.”

“Will I be able to walk through walls?  Can I fly?”  If I would have had a heartbeat, it would have risen.  John raised his hand in a polite gesture for me to stop. 

“It is unknown what you will be able to do; it all depends on what happens during the trial.  But what I am here to explain to you is the ability that every soul has – the power of visions.”  My slight smile waned just a little bit.  Visions?  What is that?

“You will learn.” John reassured me.  Oh yah, my thoughts aren’t private.  John chuckled.  “I’m afraid not at the moment.  We Collectors have that ability to better help us help you – the newly dead.

“Now, about your visions. This process of ‘Sight Waning’, as most others call it, used to take quite a while, depending on the trainee.”

“Then why don’t we get started?”  I asked impatiently.

“Well, because I was going to ask for your permission in volunteering for testing out a new way of helping the trainees learn this ability.  See, it can be quite difficult for some and it is very time consuming.  With this new method, they will be able to learn it on their own, through own personal experiences.”  I took note that he hadn’t clued me into what the actual new method was.  I squirmed in my seat and weighed my options.  I mean, if all comes to worst, at least it wouldn’t kill me…

“Yes, exactly!  So you will do this?”  John’s old, happy eyes waited like a trained dog.  After a few suffocating moments, I couldn’t handle his gaze any longer.

I shrugged my shoulders.  “Sure, what the heck.”  Only until later did I start to question my decision.