The Deepest Shade

The Spotless Journey III

Goodbyes are the literal aisle down the slowly perishing sun, down an aisle straight into a grave, a bottomless grave. Goodbyes are the mournful funeral of a seemingly unwilling virgin bride, a funeral where the only attendants are grief, regret and soaked up tears on hypothetical cheeks and the only resounding question over these attendants is the prominent hypothetical question "What if ?".

It is heartbreaking to accept the fact that humans part ways at some specific point of the immense schema, a schema that has been long ago decided on a board of fate, that grievous point is more like of a grain of sand that is related and connected to every other golden grain of the vast desert, of the vast fate. 

Somewhere along the "nowhere road" at the peak of the mountain was a flickering light illuminating the summit, that lone light belonged to the camp made by Han and Ana.

It was late night, there was Han and Ana sitting on what seemed and felt like sitting on a heavenly purified land, underneath a starry limitless sky lit by the dire whiteness of the crescent. The whole scene felt odd, for how everything took its ideal place, for how everything was perfectly positioned, it all appeared to be a vast riddle placing its bets on fate.

Han was standing in front of the fire gazing upwards into the enchanting stars and there was Ana sitting on the opposite side looking at Han in confusion, Ana wondered about how heavy was the drag that Han is enduring upon his shoulders, upon his heart, for how Ana felt unease about the sheer despair and sadness surrounding Han.

"Is it that beautiful?" said Ana whilst moving her feet towards her and putting her chin upon her knees.

"What is it?, what do you mean?" responded Han as he was staring upwards.

Ana propped her chin on her palm and said "Isn't it obvious?", "The sky...the same sky that you have been looking at the past 3 hours."

"I actually lack the words to describe it...it is somehow bewitching and frightening to look at" replied Han.

"Why is it frightening?, does it remind you of something...?" asked Ana with both of her eyes locked at Han

"Does it remind me of something?, no, not exactly, but i get this weird sensation followed by shivers while looking up there, as if i'm remembering a certain past of an inexistant future." said Han with concern drawn on his face.

"Are you hearing yourself!, your words!, they don't make any sense!" said Ana followed by a giggle. "Staring at late night for 3 hours at the sky is starting to show its effect on you." .

"Yeah, i guess you are right, i will get some sleep now, you should too." said Han while bringing his sight from the sky onto Ana.

At that moment, at that exact moment, Ana was looking at Han through the haze of the fire, suddenly an old man's face appeared in the haze in front of Ana's bare eyes for a brief moment, she saw an old man with a messy hair and beard, the old man reached his hand for Ana's face whilst tears were streaming down his old furrowed tormented face then slowly disappeared. Little did she know that that old man was the embodiment of the etheric soul of the 52 years old Han. Ana's vision was focused on the haze for that brief moment then quickly focused back onto Han's face, her pupil was bigger than the ordinary human pupil in reaction for the thing that no human eye is supposed to see that her mind instantly engraved as an unreal illusion for the safety of her own sanity.

"Aah ye-ye-yeah, i th-think you're right, we should sleep." Ana stuttered her phrase out of her shaky lips.

It was almost midnight, the two adventurers got into their separate tents facing each other, while zipping their tents both Han and Ana shared a look for quite a while and a smile.

Han laid down to sleep after a long day journey, little did he know that the elder Han was exactly in front of his face except that this time the 52 years old Han was enraged, he was struggling to break the barrier, the insane Han was slowly gaining back his long muted voice, but was unable to pronounce words, the elder Han kept on mumbling random sounds while dripping saliva under both rage and grieve as if he was trying to prevent something, the least thing he could do was to pray and beg god for the ability to place letters into a proper word but sadly even thoughts of his limitless mind were scattered  and long sealed. Insane Han's eyes and nose were all wrinkled in purple and red for the tears and snot he had shed uncontrollably. 

"G-g-g..."

A few hours later, Ana was going through an ordeal in her sleep, her skin grew all red for how severe of a fever she was going through, sweat drops down her neck...Ana's nightmare was no ordinary one, she found herself out in the outer space breathless, deep deep down within the cosmos Ana saw something hellish yet so mournful, something beyond the comprehension of her limited mind and heart, something beyond her soul. Ana saw a black sun, as she slowly got very close to it, all of a sudden, a hand out of the lurking blackness, a hand out of the dark matter reached out to grab Ana's hand and whispered "tick tock.".

It was exactly midnight, Ana's watch rang up and that alarm woke her up from that unpleasant dream, she rapidly gasped her breaths then immediately a scream crossed her eardrums, her whole body trembled in fear and panic, she quickly got out of her tent just to find the weather all stormy, rain was pouring heavily, as if the skies wrath was all upon that mountain, Ana saw Han's tent opened and empty, she ran shouting his name that is until she found him beside the cliff, as she slowly got closer to him, she heard Han wailing in total despair, as the lightning stroke, Ana quickly rushed in and hugged Han from behind.

"It's all gonna be okay, it was just a bad dream." whispered Ana 

"Goodbye.".