Chapter Eighty-One: The World as We Know It... I
1193 Words
“‘The stage comes to me?’”
I repeated Arusei’s words monotonously.
“Is that supposed to mean something to me?”
“I thought you were smart.”
She responded, then tilted her head to the side.
“Okay…okay, at ease. No need to get ‘quippy’ with me. I mean Regina, and I haven’t spoken in years.”
“Yet her fiancé, the very same one that killed you in her name not long ago, is obsessed with you. Where do you think that leaves you?”
‘In a s**t position?’
‘Is that the correct answer? I don’t know. But I know that her question is meant rhetorically to emphasise her point.’
I don’t like her words. Their content implies I will not find serenity no matter the level of education I whip into the cracks of those around me.
Does she not know how terrifyingly rigid I have worked to feel even a semblance of trust or how much resources I put into buying and training people?
How can she tell me that I live in a castle made of sand with a straight expression?
What am I to respond to that?
‘Oh, I thought I was doing well?’
‘Oh, I thought I dropped my guard for a second there because I….’
It all sounds…careless.
Why didn’t I realize that myself? What could I have been doing that took my attenti-
‘Right…pregnant, the first prince, war, clay….’
Rather than answer her rhetoric, I asked a question I was curious about.
“Why does he have his memories? The fourth prince, I mean. Why him and none else?”
“Because he and Regina identify with the world. This world protects them and ensures their success, at least that’s the gist; it is more complicated, but we only have time for mundane simplicities. If not, Étienne, it would have been Regina who remembered the past. She was not bred as critical as most. That is the only reason I assume the world chose Étienne over her.”
“ ‘Not bred as critical as most?’ That is the understatement of the year; Regina is an airhead.”
I interjected.
Arusei let out a short snicker before responding.
“Not quite. You underestimate her, don’t you? I will grant you that she is slower than most, but she bites. After all, she did sleep with your fiancé on your anniversary while you were in the next room uncovering the viscountess’s misdeeds, might I add.”
“He was your fiancé.”
That was the only response I could come up with to the factual truth that, to this day, stings. Not because I loved him…well, there is always that.
I did love him…a truth that makes me hate myself.
All in all, what a s**t feeling.
Arusei shrugged, then continued.
“Be that as it may, we do not have enough time in this space to debate semantics.”
“ ‘This space?’Where are we anyway?”
I turned my gaze around the space surrounding us and continued.
“It feels like…a dream, yet it is so vivid that I feel it foolish to discount it as such.”
“Well, I suppose that is one way to describe this space. But that will not suffice to you, will it?”
“No.”
She sighed before clearing her throat to begin her explanation.
‘Oh god, is it long? Should I just consider the space magical!?’
“Think of the world you live in as an alive, pulsing and intelligent script. One that, whenever an actor goes out of character, corrects itself by matching probabilities until a certain decided outcome favourable to the script direction occurs.”
“Ok…ay.”
“That is what the world in which I hail from, in a few words, is. This space is called ‘an uncertainty'. It is where the world calculates correction points to restore what fortune tellers will convince you is destiny, but they-”
“...are just reading from a script?”
I completed her sentence with a frown.
“Something like that.”
“But if that is the case, when does it stop? When does the play end? Don’t get me wrong, we all adore a good play, but the ending has more satisfaction because you can focus on other aspects of life. You get to drop the drama on the screen and move on. So when does it end? When do…when do we move on? Is there a particular checkpoint we reach for new characters to be selected to fill the roles that we have failed to com-?”
“No.”
She cut me off too firmly to leave even a prayer of doubt, as though sparing me from a pain she had had to endure.
“The play ends when you die.”
“Excuse me?”
“Though I suppose I should say when ‘I’ die.”
She clicked her tongue and picked her nails as though she had uttered the most boring piece of information ever.
“What do you mean it ends, ‘when I die’? If that’s the case, why are you not the main character? Why doesn’t the world exist for you? For me, for us?”
“Oh dear, it seems you have misunderstood me.”
She blew on her nails to remove imaginary dirt, and then the deepness of her green eyes bore into me.
“I do not mean you, the person, but you, the actor. You who poses the most threat to the world's chosen. As you are, you stand easily as one of the top ten most powerful individuals on the continent. Your sharpness alone puts you as an international threat. You would only serve to dim the light that has been appointed.”
“Then why am I in your body? Why wasn’t a romantic idealist chosen in my stead?”
“Ah! That is my fault.”
“Then undo it, get a different person? Why me? Why do I have to live your life? Why?”
“Because I have something you want, and you have something I want. I believe that I chose well, and I am unwilling to reprimand myself on my decision.”
“A decision about ‘my’ life that you made without ‘my’ permission.”
“I am not to blame for your death, no matter how fortuitous it proved to me. It was caused entirely by you.”
I shook my head to deny the validity of her words.
Yet there was no denying that I slid from my stance near the antenna because of the water the rain left behind.
My death was my fault on all counts.
But blame is always easier.
It stands easier that I did not leave Aran because of my carelessness…even if that is the case.
“I can help you undo it.”
Arusei’s voice rang amid the turmoil in my being.
“Undo what?”
“Your death. I can help you undo your death in your world.”
- Writer
