The Chosen

From behind the bar counter a young woman looked about and sighed. There was much that she needed to do before dusk arrived bringing with it her first customers. Diminutive sunlight made its way from a shattered window; the ones that were intact had so much dust caked on them they sucked everything in like a black hole allowing nothing to pass through. Like the windows, the floor was covered in a film preventing its true luster from being seen. Miniscule tables filled the room with dull chairs on top. She pulled her blonde hair back behind her, but it managed to come undone within the first hour of cleaning.

Children could be heard outside, giggling. With a heavy sigh she dropped her mop and headed toward the door.

The sun was shining down on her as she walked out of Eternity, a small building in the dilapidated part of town. A month of cleaning and repairs wasn’t enough to take the years of negligence away. It was a bar for the hopeless, the weak, and the poor.

She peered down the alley. It stopped at the main street and continued on until it hit another road before continuing on again. To her, the alley was neverending, forever testing a human’s patience, much like time. In front of her was a concrete courtyard the other businesses in the area used. The children, who were playing with a ball, hadn’t noticed her yet.

She waited, standing there until a little girl stopped and stared. Another child, thinking the girl was still playing, threw the ball toward her and it hit her in the head. Like a wave, the other children turned toward the young woman. There was a moment’s pause before they all ran toward her with open arms and bright smiles.

“Tell us a story, Catrina! Tell us a story!” they all yelled and shouted with delight as they fought to be the first to embrace her. She heard another child cry above the others, “Please? With a cherry on top?” The woman attempted to hug them all at once, but failed and instead laughed at their eagerness. The children were all war orphans and it pleased her that there was something that could still put a smile on their little faces. She knew herself that it was hard to go on when you lost everything. It had taken her years to truly smile again.

“I do have a new story,” she began.

The children’s cheers drowned out the rest of her sentence. Taking control of the situation she settled them down before continuing on.

“Hush, now. Like I said, I have a new story I haven’t told you before. A story about how the war actually started.”

“What d’ya mean?” a boy said.

“What have you been told about it?” Catrina asked.

“Everyone always says that the war started because of a family dispute!” an older boy said and the others murmured in agreement.

“And has anyone ever told you why there is a war?”

“To bring the world peace,” a girl chimed.

The woman grinned at them. “What if I told you, you were wrong? Everything that you’ve been told is a lie.” They looked at her perplexed.

She herded them inside the bar. They eagerly took seats down and arranged them around her stool. Looking down at their stares of anticipation, she began.

“The war didn’t start out as a family dispute.  That part, though partly true, didn’t happen until later. The real reason the war started was all due to one girl, a girl who didn’t even live here on this planet. This girl lived on our sister planet, Earth, a few years ago.

“There are certain parts of Earth where people can escape from the overcrowded cities and suburbs. Places where people can escape from the noise and the stresses of everyday life. A place where people can live off the land, yet ironically, to keep it hidden they had to work with technology to keep what they called the Outside World away from them.