Foreword
~*~
There was a time in my life when I thought that I would never find my place in the world. I moved, drifted really, from one pointless job to the next. I had lived in the same town for most of my life. The only time I ever left the place was my failed attempt to be all that I can be. Army life, it wasn’t for me. I had a hard time conforming and following the orders of people a decade my junior.There were no amazing jobs in this town. I could not afford to live anywhere else. Sometimes I would look up at the night sky and wonder why I never ended it all.
Why did I never end this pointless and futile existence? What possible purpose could I serve, right? I was thirty, no girlfriend, no job worth mentioning to people, no real hope for anything better. The only thing I had going for me was my rich inner life. I wrote stories, played lots of games. I shut myself away from the world and dreamed of something worthwhile. I dreamed of a purpose. What I never dreamed was that a purpose for my existence might actually exist and that it would come looking for me.
~*~
Freelance Saga: The Legendary Hero
Episode I: Doorway to Reality
Chapter I -- Part 1
The
perpetual mist that blanketed the area was thicker now than he had ever seen it.
Each time he had come to this place the mist had shrouded everything but the
door. This time even the door seemed to fight with the mist in order to be
seen. The golden door, the reason for his confusion, was the only thing to see
in this mist-shrouded dreamscape. It was a constant image that had invaded his
slumber and called to him on a nightly basis. Just as it had done for the last
month, the door waited for his return. He had hoped that it would.
Scott Hunter, former soldier and current
part-time writer, gazed at the all-encompassing entryway that had haunted his
dreams. He had rarely moved toward it during these nightly excursions. It had
never opened on its own either.
Night after night he had simply stared at
it. Sometimes he would try to walk around it, but would find that no matter
what angle he attempted for his approach nothing would change. The door always
faced toward him and his efforts were rendered pointless. Each morning he would
awaken and try to understand what this vision was supposed to mean.
In the days since the dream had begun,
Scott had checked every dream dictionary and online website about dreams that
he could find. A wide range of possibilities were offered, but none of them
felt right. The one bit of advice that he agreed with was that he should open
the door and see what happened. Tonight was the night. No matter how strange
things may become in this dreamscape he planned to open that door.
Scott took a step toward the golden
entrance way. “Tonight things are going to be different! You hear me!”
Scott made a big show of expressing his
desire to open the door, his accusatory finger pointed at the unresponsive
nocturnal specter. One way or another, he would find the purpose of this dream
and that damned door.
The odd symbols emblazoned upon it lit up
with an eerie luminescence as he approached. He ignored the soft music that
began to play in the background. With each step that music grew louder, more
intense. The illumination rose to match the tune. When he began to reach for
the door the light and music exploded outward in a dynamic show of force. Each
time that he had tried to come close to the door before he had stepped back and
awakened immediately. The dream would not come again that night. In a way that
sudden awakening had begun to feel like a rejection, one that he would not
allow again. This time things would be different. He was ready. He would know
what secret that door held.
Flames began to lick around the edges of
the doorway as he pulled the handle. It was hard, incredibly hard, to pull that
door open. Scott could feel a powerful force pulling against the door from the
other side. Whether it was some form of suction or magnetism he did not know.
All that he knew was that the door fought against his efforts. He was forced
him to pull with all of the strength that he could muster.
The fire burning around the edges of the
door increased in length and intensity. Heat, terrific searing heat, washed
over him but he would not give in. He cried out as his efforts began to strain
his arms. Neck muscles bulged and it seemed as though his body would burst
apart from the Herculean attempt. The riotous sounds coming from the other side,
the music of the doorway, became like the deafening wail of an electric guitar.
It seemed to Scott like there was a heavy metal concert going full blast on the
other side. He gritted his teeth and ignored the pain that suddenly lanced
through his body. He was absolutely determined. Tonight he would have his
answers. He pulled with everything that he had left.
“You. Will. Open!” Scott snarled furiously.
His snarl changed to a sound of surprise when the force pulling against the
door stopped altogether. The door rocketed open like nothing had held it at
all. He fell back and landed hard on his ass.
For a moment he sat there, stunned by both
the realization that the door was open, and the pain in his ass. He looked
through the open entrance and could not believe his eyes.
He could see a stone corridor through the
open portal but noted something bizarre even for this strange place. The stone
passageway seemed to exist only within the door. He looked to one side of the
door and then the other, but saw only mist shrouded emptiness. The corridor did
not exist in the same place that he did.
“So, where do you go?” Scott had never
spoken in this place before. His voice echoed strangely, like the dissonant sound
of a broken echo. That did not matter at the moment, however. What did matter
was what he would find beyond the door.
He wanted answers. He needed answers. What did this door mean to him? He stepped through
the opening and into the stone corridor that lay just beyond.
~*~
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