The Undoing Of Heroes | ✓

twenty three

twenty three

TO BE OR NOT TO BE was not the question I was asking myself at the moment. I didn't know if  had a myself anymore.  

I felt wobbly, like existence was something I didn't belong in anymore. Everything just ... passed through me. Something hurt, ached within me, and I couldn't twist my head to see what it was, because I simply didn't have one anymore. 

My body had vanished, and the only thing I felt was the low, content humming of my powers. They, if I could refer to them that way, seemed to be waiting in anticipation for something to happen. 

But the worst part was the silence. The overpowering silence. It was so overbearing I found myself wishing for something to listen to, even if was just my heartbeat (which I couldn't hear, by the record.) 

And like I had snapped my fingers, a clear, vivid blue path appeared in front of me. The darkness had birthed a glowing path, built out of the same neon blue of my powers, and I swayed when I looked at it. 

I swayed. I moved my hands, and saw only darkness, but then a glimmer of a limb. Whatever form I was in - it would have to do. 

I took the path, completely lost. My sense of direction was lost. Everything seemed to be lost. 

The glowing path seemed to go in a straight line, until I spotted a sudden stop in front of me. It had just ended, abruptly. I looked down, and jumped away from the void when I saw it had curved, and ran in a straight line toward that darkness.

If the body I was in had a heart, I'd have fallen into a heap of cardiac arrest by now. Never had I felt so afraid.

And it was odd to refer to myself that way. The strong, villainous Nightspark. The vulnerable, unapproachable Rae. Somehow, they'd mixed. And what emerged - I wasn't sure if I liked it yet. 

But I had no other choice than to play the cards I'd been given. Turning around, I looked for the way back, but the path had vanished, and so did my hope.

I remained standing on a small, rectangular piece of that glowing blue, so bright it hurt. So I steeled myself, and wished I could've clenched my fists so hard my nails dug into them, feeling anything but this silence, this emptiness. 

Placing my foot beyond the boundaries of the path, I pitched forward, and fell into oblivion.

≠

There was a girl arguing with her boyfriend just outside a grocery store, her gesturing wildly, then she slapped him, oblivious to the security camera. A boy was crying helplessly over the screen of his phone, heartbreaking news just delivered to him by text.  

Meanwhile, there was a game of soccer being played in a small stadium. Dozens of phones were recording the game, and cheers rose when a player clad in bright blue scored a neat goal.  A professor sat hunched over his laptop, shaking his head at the essay one of his students had written. The webcam on his laptop flickered to life, unnoticed by him as he adjusted the glasses on his nose. 

The scene changed, and again. Soon, I was not able to grasp them for moments, or scenes. They'd turned abstract, and somehow I could still see the girl arguing, the boy crying. The cheering crowd, the disappointed professor.