Prologue - Dreams in the Void

Prologue - Dreams in the Void

There was nothing. It wasn't black. It wasn't white. It wasn't even blank. There was literally nothing.

Eons passed in instantaneous points of time. There was no flow of time. One moment of eternity was simply, suddenly another moment of eternity.

Then there was something. An attraction. A movement so subtle, that if there had not been absolute nothingness, it would have been impossible to perceive. The movement neither accelerated nor decelerated. The movement didn't move in any direction. It just was.

There was something more. A whisper of an echo. A glimpse of awareness. Recollections just at the edge of perception. There was no straining to catch this glimpse. There was no thought or action. It was just there; passive.

Suddenly, a jarring crash of discordance shook all of existence. A tsunami of cataclysmic proportions shook the whisper of an echo into a ripple. Another whisper of an echo in an infinite nothingness had gently come into contact with the first. New recollections appeared at the edge of perception. This time they threatened to spill into focus, yet they still remained outside.

More crashes of dissonance turned the ripples into mighty waves, surging violently back and forth. The new motes of infinite nothingness, in turn, formed their own titanic waves. The waves swirled around each other from all directions and none simultaneously until they began to overlap. A vortex of twisted whirlpools formed as the motes overlapped with each other and became one.

A spark of true awareness came into being. A sense of self was formed. The recollections at the edge of awareness came into focus. At first there were simple concepts: I am me and I am not other. The concepts slowly got more complex until the first emotion was realized.

The Self was content. A feeling of rightness permeated the Self. Everything was as it should be. The vortex that had formed, while out of the ordinary, was nothing to be concerned with. In fact it was that very vortex that had allowed the Self to realize itself.

Concepts and emotions slowly morphed into fuzzy images. Muted colors and shapes formed. The shapes consisted of a multitude of simple and complex patterns. Some shapes started to move around in strange, unpredictable ways. Over time these movements became more natural looking: Of course that shape would move that way, it's only natural. This vague, unrealized thought did not surprise the Self and it continued to exist in contentment.

Something tugged at his awareness, and there was discord again. He glanced about himself, but he couldn't put his finger on what caused the sensation. He turned back to his memories, anticipation filling him. He had a sense that something profound was going to happen, like he already knew what it was going to be, before he knew what it was. And then she was there.

A young woman, in crystal clear focus. No blurry images obstructing his view. No blank faces attached to human shapes. A sweet, innocent smile. Sparkling, mischievous eyes. He didn't even have to experience the memories with her. Everything came to him in a flash. The courtship filled with romance and love, the wedding ceremony with his brothers in arms and family in attendance. He looked down and into the gaze of his two children, one boy and one girl. The ups and downs of marriage and raising a family. The car acci...NO! We'll leave it here. He spent an eternity staring into her gaze, the family of four together forever in his memories.

"Wait... Something is there. I just experienced it. What was it?" He stopped all other thoughts, trying to recall something that was eluding him. It came to him, "Death. I'm dead. I'm reliving my life after death." One was supposed to be sad upon such a revelation, but there was no sadness in him. He looked at his wife and children expectantly, nothing but a smile on his face.

That feeling of discord rang through his being once again. Something was terribly wrong. He looked around once again. There were his memories, and the memories of that other self, but nothing else. What could be the cause of the disturbance?

Abject fear consumed him as he recognized what the problem was. One other set of memories. Just moments ago, there was over a dozen. He watched in horror as what appeared to be a curtain of mist encroached on his center. Everything it touched melted away into nothingness again. While the vast expanse once occupied by the others still existed, it was only him and his own memories now. The mist continued its inexorable tide towards the center of his being. Previous memories that he had just experienced disappearing and slipping away to be forgotten forever.

He looked at his wife and children with panic and unwillingness. This was his family! His memory! He was not going to lose them again! With an unknown power, he martialed his will and ripped his memory of his family from the swirling vortex. It was a jagged tear, and many of the memories of his time as a War Fighter remained tethered and went with him. He pulled his being into himself and encapsulated the memories he refused to lose within.

The curtain of mist finally reached the center of his being, and he felt it trying to tug at the last refuge of his mind, but he refused to compromise one single step, throwing every last bit of willpower he could muster into the task. Everything went dark again as he felt as if he was being sucked and pushed simultaneously into a tornado, and almost all of his being was wiped clean.

...

Almost all.