Slow Chemical -- Beautiful Midnight

Previously: Cloven has had to abandon school to care for his mother after her husband's untimely death. Moving back to the town where he grew up, he has struggled to accept the realities of his suddenly changed life. We left off behind Cloven's apartment, where on his way to work, Cloven was shot by an unknown assailant.

It was searing hot and a bitter cold at once. I knew the true wholeness of peace in this moment of terror; I knew all the pain of the world, yet I knew nothing at all. Or at least, what I knew didn't matter to me anymore -- nothing mattered to me anymore, and for a moment I accepted it. At last there was total silence inside of me, despite the chaos and confusion that burned through every nerve in my frozen body. No, nothing mattered, and for a moment I embraced it. I tasted my own death on my lips and could imagine nothing sweeter. I was more mentally awake than I had ever been as I slipped into the deepest sleep I'll ever know. I was tired, simply. I was weak. Finished.

Shot dead in an alley at age twenty-three. I thought of the headlines in the local papers, surprising myself with the reality of having been slain. I worried for my mother, and who would find my body. I hoped I hadn't crapped myself, and at least died in a respectable position. I saw a picture once online of a guy who was hit by a car and wound up wedged between it and a brick wall with his pants off and his head between his legs. It would make sense, somehow, for me to die like that -- to die wrong. As I considered these things it occurred to me that I was using a mind which shouldn't be functioning at all. I found that mildly amusing, but didn't have the time to comprehend what it meant before slipping back into my frozen slumber.

I remember the dream. I was alone in a world screened in blue. I walked along a cobblestone path past massive, angular houses built on stilts and silver platforms. I could see for miles ahead but not where I was going. The houses were then far behind me, and the path I had been traveling turned to a river of brilliant gold. Light reflected off of the water's surface and came up to caress me, and it sung to me. In the distance I could see a large wave to one side, and a mountain to the other, and directly between them and in front of me was nothing at all, not time nor space. A child was walking with me now, but I could not see him, and I felt alone again. The light released me, screaming for me, and the river went grey. My companion and I soon came to a fork in the river that we stood upon, and I asked the child which way to turn. The sun was snuffed out in an instant, and all the pressure and noise of the world was frozen. The faceless boy turned to me and said, "Anywhere but here."