"THE CHRONICLES OF ARA: CREATION" The Unexpurgated Version

"THE CHRONICLES OF ARA: CREATION"

Pen to paper and from here, I bleed. A bastardization of something Hemingway once said. As these pages are reviewed and analyzed, remember this opening. It's history. Not historic; this isn't about ego. History. If I presented to you that the entirety of man's artistic process, from inspiration to product, has been recorded and bound within a collection known as "The Chronicles of Ara", would you call me crazy? Two notes: I use the word bound correctly, and much of what is included therein has not yet been created. Are you confused yet? What if I followed with this: There is an endgame to our collective entertainment? Thought so.
The most soulful of all pursuits ("art") by definition can never be considered innocuous. Light or dark, visionary expression through creation and invention begets influence and influence begets direction and dissonance. The rest will come together soon enough.
At the moment I'll only imply that I have been tasked to record the "Chronicles" in full, as that's a whole other ball of wax. Detailing issues related to multiverses and other cosmic anomalies as I begin this opus will only serve to confuse you more. Best that we all focus on the contents of this current volume for now of which I am, make no mistake, your storyteller.
The muse visited me in a dream. She inspired this endeavor and I trust I had no say in the matter. I've always wanted to write. I mean, I've always wanted to be a novelist. A New York novelist. A successful New York novelist. Better. A successful New York novelist with women issues and family issues and respect so I could get my mind off myself for a change. I'd still agonize or I wouldn't be me, of course, but I'd also have other problems to worry about. Best intentions ...
But I lacked the confidence and now I'm obligated to see this through. I cannot otherwise explain but such was the impact of my reverie that, truthfully, when I dwell on the matter I'm not so sure I was dreaming after all. It's as if she paused the world just long enough to show me the way, then left me to my own devices to finish the rest of the job in a manner befitting those I needed to convince.
You.
The personal volumes that are forthcoming, of which this is the first, will seemingly explore all the usual tropes and omniscient narrative flourishes of just another science fiction or fantasy allegory and yet ... this is nothing of the sort. Understand this: I'm a truther. Always have been. I have no time to waste, especially now, and frankly, as I've learned, neither do you. Believe me, I wish I could have left this Pandora's Box alone. I agonize over this ordeal because the real narrator of this goodie bag is the smartest kid in the room and he immediately realized what he had to do. Why me? No idea.
Regardless, we'll begin with the events of the following morning. I am en route to my mentor's office, overwhelmed with a keen responsibility to warn you all ...

Monday.
His greatest hope is that the world doesn't have to fall with him. His concern, which is larger ... is that the world doesn't have to fall with him. If this martyr-tale begins to play out the way he expects, based on one particularly troublesome dream and little else, surely he will be blinded to any other outcome: He will go down; of this much he is convinced. Still, in the end, after all the mess and despite his authorial ambitions, among the survivors nobody will have any idea who he was, really, nor what made him tick.
Assuming, that is, that there are any survivors. When his dreams are as vivid as they were last night, they are usually prophetic. He's just never had a dream like this before. All of this he ponders as he forcibly opens the swinging glass doors that lead to a smallish corridor that hosts the office of his mentor, a former college professor, who has been patiently waiting at his desk. Behind the desk stands a single bookshelf lined with history books and inches-high ceramic knick-knacks; across from the desk is a lone folding chair where the student, a prodigy, slips his knapsack to the floor and slumps.
He wears a gray sweatshirt, a Yankees cap and a hood that nearly covers his face.
"Take off the hoodie. Who are you hiding from?" the professor asks.
The student complies. He is African American, early-teens. "Right word, there."
"Hiding?"
"That's it. I gotta get used to it. You'll see in a few minutes."
"Guess so ... Well, you made it, anyway," the older man says. "From your demeanor I'm sure this will be diverting --"
"Sorry in advance," is the disingenuous response.