Through the Breach

Crossroads - The Choice

This short tale participates to the @ParanormalCommunity Contest.
Challenge 1: "Crossroad".

Good reading!

499 words.
Sent from Italy at about 17:15 (PST) o'clock, 16th september 2017.

In the beginning I was only a thought, a confused interference in the middle of the cosmic vibrations.

Then, the awareness of my physical body struck me as a bullet and I started to feel, feel myself and remember. I remembered having eyes to see, hands to touch, legs to support me, feet to walk. I remembered having a face, a heart, being a man in a distant time. I remembered my name.

Almost forgotten memories. I wasn't sure I found them pleasant; in spite of they were there: fear of the unknown, sense of guilt. Feelings that I never wanted to try again. I tried to throw them out, where they could no longer harm anyone.

Disguising, pretending, ignoring: my better abilities, the ones that led me up to that moment, up to here.

Yes, but... where was "here"?

I looked around and I realized I was surrounded by the gloomiest darkness. I saw nothing, neither walls nor windows. Was I outdoors or indoors? I didn't know.

The lack of sound painfully pressed against my ears. With caution, I groped hoping to find an escape, but nothing helped me.

From the inscrutable depths, a low growl spread with a guttural echo.
I felt hunted, as if a predator was crouched in the dark, ready to leap.

In that moment, a sparkling hit the boundaries of my eyes, the evanescent shadow of a twinkle. My eyes followed it until I saw a blade of light shining right in front of me.

Without hesitation, I ran toward it, my hands stretched forward as the light enveloped me.
When I opened my eyes, the dark prison were vanished, in its place a peaceful, quiet clearing.
I crossed it with circumspection. At every step a memory touched my mind. A long life full of love, hate, passion, uncertainties, victories, defeats, sins.
Stranger whispers murmured in my ears. Persistent, spine-chilling, incomprehensible. Ghosts of other lives.

Terrified, I lift my eyes. At the edge of the clearing, a large, lush willow grew. Two opposite paths separated from it.

As if attracted by an invisible force, the more I came closer the more the light, coming from the trunk, became stronger until it reached an almost anthropomorphic shape.

«Come closer, Son of Man.»
A powerful, quiet voice reverberated in the air.

«What are you?» I asked, dismayed.

«I am the Keeper. The time of choice has come.»

«The choice?»

«Your everlasting soul knows the path. Scan its abyss and you will obtain the answer.»

«How can I make a similar choice?» I stammered.

Suddenly, every moment of my life exploded in my head, overwhelming me.

«Mercy, my Lord! I can't...» I screamed with pain, but the creature thundered imperiously, imposing on me a choice I could have never made. Crying, I lift my eyes again and I saw him in his puissance. His phenomenal, multiform, shining face. And while the darkness of divine punishment clawed at me, sinking me into eternal agony, I yelled for the last time.