Blessed with a Curse

Part 1: Senses

His hands were colder than the wintry air which blew fiercely around him. As he arose from the icy ground, he stared above him into the low hanging clouds. He could hear noises alien to his sound vocabulary being emitted from the murky atmosphere.

The sharpness of his eyes parted the clouds like the hand of God as his sight took him on a journey through the Milky Way Galaxy.

Not only could he see the stars in all their detail but he could hear their radiation- feel their heat. He marveled at this. How could the stars be so far away and he still be able to sense the heat they gave off? It was however so weak that it was only a slight buzzing sensation to his new skin.

There were many sounds in the heavens. His eyes zoomed in closer to a specific star. From it came what sounded like singing. There was also a cavernous sucking noise layered across the expanse. He couldn't pinpoint it until he realized that it was moving away from everything in all directions. It was the space itself, like a vacuum not knowing from which way to pull.

A loud cry brought his attention back to the land upon which he stood. He walked slowly and could feel every pebble under his shoe- hear every small particle that shifted under his weight as they echoed sweetly. He peered into the darkness, trying to locate the sound. He found it. Suddenly, finding himself in front of a tree, he saw a small army of ants magnified to the point where they looked as large as horses. There was a frightening clanking noise like the jaws of a large water lizard snapping shut and opening again. Then there was the sound of flesh being torn followed by that of glass shattering. As he examined closer, he noted that the sound was coming from the ants. The terror-stricken crying noise was being made by some form of locust which was being ripped apart by them. Its carapace was cut through by their jaws like the needle of a mosquito through a baby's soft skin.

The victimized creature howled like a wolf and a woman performing a depressing duet. Its sad distressed song ended with the final crack of its carapace lining its underside. The ants carried it away buzzing and chirping triumphantly but in chorus. Their marching was unified and they sounded as one.

"Darius!" called out someone in the distance.

They were looking for him. He... he was Darius. With this sudden realization he slunk into the arms of darkness provided by the nurturing trees. With his back up against one, Darius could feel the life of the tree pulsating throughout its bark and traveling up to its branches then back down into the ground which housed its roots.

He could feel the rumble of verve as the tree emanated life. It sounded like it was breathing as its xylem transferred water to its parts like internal rivers and as its leaf cells absorbed the water. Darius closed his eyes whilst listening to the musicality of the inner streams of the beautiful organism. He let go a breath every time the leaves exhaled oxygen. He opened his eyes and trained them on a lone leaf. As the little pools of sunlight clothed the leaf, he could see the veins of water being brought to leaf to the then fill its tiny cells.

With his advanced vision, the leaf cells looked like green rectangular structures. He saw the light's molecules enter the leaf like a mothers breast coaxing her baby's mouth. Darius witnessed the light interacting with the water molecules within the cells of the leaf. The water molecules split, the smaller parts of the molecule becoming stored in the chloroplasts of the leaf along with some of the light. To Darius, it made the leaf radiate a glorious goldish color. The oxygen portion of the molecule, like fairies, escaped from the leaf to delicately enter the air. All around Darius could hear the exhalation of the trees as scores of this precious element entered the atmosphere.

He saw a deer in the distance. Many trees hid it from view but hearing its heartbeat gave him a profile of its whereabouts. As blood pulsated through every part of its body, Darius could see its silhouette perfectly outlined even behind the army of trees.

He wanted to stay in the darkness forever. He wanted to become one with the forest.