Science fiction. The Violent Verse

 

Science fiction. The Violent Verse

“Yes, let him come!” 

These were his last words. When he spoke about the man whom he had seen once; and he knew he would return. And along with him he would bring a world replete with horrors of a different kind, and shadows of agony that shall follow him wherever he sets his foot.

And when the man entered, the room turned dark, filled with shadows, there were so many of them that it was difficult to establish which one belonged to him. They say he had been raised by the kingdom of the Sun and that is why the Moon was bound to fall in love with him, and in recognition of this love, she gifted him shadows. Endless and infinite number of shadows. 

Well, that is the myth many people believe in but the man who said, “yes, let him come!” Knew a lot more, because he knew the reality of the Shadow Man.

And these shadows are not what you get to see everyday, or the ones we cast everyday. These shadows are different, they are cast by some mysterious source of energy, and whatever is covered by these shadows gets consumed and vanishes forever. Erasing its every trace of existence. So, a few of us believe there is more to the myth of the Shadow Man than what most of us know.

Right now, in this room, it is the man who said, “Yes, let him in!” Who is being consumed by the shadows and he is disappearing inch by inch right before our eyes. 

In a few minutes there was nothing left of him, just a memory that his mirror bore of him, apart from that nothing else. Every bit of him had disappeared, and when the shadow fell flat on the floor, the strange man , the Shadow Man, looked at all of us and addressed us with words that revealed his desire for absolute authority. Over us, and then through us, over our entire planet. His message was clear, “ From now onwards, you will be the planet living under my shadows. And from today on, the Sun will shine but your planet will get to witness its sunshine only when and where, my shadows please. And if any of you disobeys my orders you will meet a fate similar to the man who welcomed me into the room. So, you better get used to this new life or you find a life that suits you better, and of course it shall be a life without the Sun and the Moon. Because now they lie in the domain of my command.”

We all were speechless and we had nothing to say at all. We kept looking at his shadows. Shadows that were constantly shivering, shadows that spread far and wide; and then rolled back unto him after having spread out freely for a minute or so. Seeing these dark and ever stretching shadows felt like witnessing a dark sea that had turned violent. And it had been so violent that it had developed a taste for an obedient but decency seeking restlessness. And right now, each one of us was being careful not to fall into this restless sea, because if that happened the ill fated person would then be lost in these endless waves of dark shadows. Whose mere touch could make you disappear forever. So, we had assumed body postures where our heads popped out like a keenly watching kingfisher’, and our bodies resembled that of a meerkat on guard.

While we stood there completely startled, the man moved a bit and gradually turned around, and somehow the shadows turned too, and in a moment he contained them like a Japanese foldable hand fan. That he constantly furled and unfurled at will. And as he walked past us trying to understand our moods, the texture of his shadows varied whenever he looked into the eyes of each one of us. It felt as if his shadows were trying to establish our physical identities and our biological signatures as well. 

As soon as he had stored the biological signature of the last one of us, he unfurled the shadows and they began crawling in our direction. He could read the terrified looks on our faces, and before we fainted or did something awkward, he tried to make us feel comfortable, “Do not worry! I am the master of these shadows, and they only obey my will. And I neither have the reason nor the need to kill anyone of you. And that means if these shadows fall upon any of you, you shall not be consumed by them. So, there is no need to panic because I have no reason to hurt anyone of you!”

We heard him like a docile herd of sheep and in a moment we all were covered with shadows, many layers of these dark shadows. They felt a bit warm, but with extremely cold veins running across them too. It was like drinking rum and then instantly filling your mouth with a tiny sip of cold wine- Being wrapped in these shadows was stranger than this. 

In short it felt very weird.

But, after a moment they felt like a sunny day that is bright and warm. Faintly forcing our minds to believe that we were covered with millions of glow worms that do not burn. Because they are meant to light up their small surroundings in beautiful ways. 

However we knew these shadows were nothing like glow worms because we had seen them consume a fully grown man right before our eyes, and we were not willing to give in to this false belief they were coercing us to accept as their only reality. 

The man realised this from our eyes and he instantly withdrew them. And once again they realigned like a Japanese hand fan. 

“So, you dread these shadows!” Was his instant response. And we did not even utter a word. There was complete and moanful silence that answered his self approving statement or question, whatever it was. Because it sounded like a remark as well. And our silence complimented his remark because our silence too, just like his question, was accepting his claim and denouncing it at the same time! We were there in a cogitating state and he was examining our expressions with a look that was self assuring. As if he had sensed our fears and our resigning spirits.

For whatever reason the Shadow Man chose to remain silent and we chose to be as silent as we could possibly get. To the extent that we began breathing slowly and in short breaths.

Then as a final reminder of his unmatched and unchallenged supremacy, he asked us not to forget what we had witnessed today. Then he began walking towards the main gate and before closing the door, he turned and addressed all of us once again, “Now I must return to the moon and take some rest, but as you sleep and wake up tomorrow, you may not find me around, but my shadows will be everywhere and watching you. I need to set up a new colony on the Moon and for that I will need slaves. Anybody who resists will be thrown into the sea of my shadows, and there he/she shall lie trapped forever- Existing but not living, dead but not dying, seeing but not seen, feeling just like before but not felt, free to travel anywhere over these waves of my infinite shadows but always my slave. Remember this always!” 

Having warned us in his own belligerent style he disappeared and the shadows spread like smoke that rose to conceal the Moon for a few moments and then he disappeared somewhere into it along with his infinite plume of shadows. Not forever, just for now, for the moment. 

Because we knew the man would return. Just like the man who had welcomed him, knew it, but we treated him like a fool. And if we did not believe it still, there would be no greater fool than all of us, and then, we shall be the cause of our own doom, our own endless perils, that we are now trapped in. Because henceforth we shall be the slaves of his will and his kingdom of shadows.

With these thoughts in our minds we retired to our homes, and we quietly interacted with our family members and friends. The night passed by slowly because we all spent the night, not looking at our loved ones or that special loved one, but we kept staring at the Moon. Fearing that the shadows would descend now, or any moment. And in this anticipation we spent the entire night.

Next morning, for everyone else, other than all of us who had witnessed the grotesque and severely scary act of the Shadow Man; life returned as usual. For us it returned with questions and fears about the future that awaited us with a maleficent gaze. A gaze that could stare into our eyes but we could not even know it was there. And this fear had already begun enslaving each one of us.

As we gathered in the main hall, we chose to be silent and not speak our minds, because we were scared, we felt intimidated, left at the mercy of fate whose every aspect was now defined by the Shadow Man. So we chose to remain silent and moved into the acoustic ring that absorbs sounds.

We sat there, not looking at anything. We all thought about the facts surrounding light, and how it makes something visible. And in the case of the Shadow Man, his shadows were somehow cheating every principle of light. What surprised us the most was the source that cast them. Because even if the Shadow Man was the source, there was no visible proof that he was casting them. And, the man who had warned us about his arrival, had also warned us about the energy that the Shadow Man uses to command these shadows.

He had referred to some verse. Yes, the most Violent Verse, where these shadows are born as particles of strange matter that only bond with humans. Only a few humans who are very special. Those, whose minds have the ability to tame the forces of these magical particles. 

And once you tame the energy of a single particle from this Violent Verse, it begins to obey you and then fulfills all your wishes. It becomes your God who only answers your prayers, because the God only believes in you. 

And the Shadow Man had wished for his magical particle to be cast as infinite shadows, that shall consume whatever they come in contact with. And the particle that was now meant to have an existence of servitude towards its tamer, the Shadow Man, obeyed always.

There was something, something very different about this man. He looked like us, in every way, in every sense. Still, there was something very unique about him that we were unable to understand.

We all silently thought about this quality of his. That existed, we felt it, but what was it, we could not understand it. We were struggling to understand this quality of his. 

Then. Exactly then, I realised something and I sought the attention of the other members, “Did you notice his eyes? They are black. All black. It is as if a black hole has sunk into them. And I think on our planet there too exists a man who has similar eyes. Very similar. If we can find this man, maybe we can defeat the Shadow Man. Not maybe, I am sure we can!”

Everyone looked amazed and their eyes lit up with hope for a moment. Then one the men admitted he too had heard of such a man, and that he can summon the man via an acquaintance who lives in his town.

But we also knew, the Shadow Man would be listening to our thoughts and our conversations too. And that is why we had enhanced the acoustic vibration of the room that is designed to absorb sounds and not let them disperse into the free space. So our discussions were held in acoustic rings of vibrations, where every sound was being absorbed after few seconds or minutes, depending upon two factors:

1. Length of the sentence and the time it took to travel as a sound wave to all participants i.e. listeners

2. Distance between the speaker and listeners 

So, these super sensitive acoustic rings absorbed sounds as soon as a listener had heard them. We trusted our technology and we were sure the Shadow Man would not have heard anything about this plan.

Our agents accompanied the pilot of the spacecraft meant to locate and then convince the man to visit us in person.

The man arrived in 5 hours and he stood in front of us. We looked at him without saying anything. Then we held his hand and slowly led him into this acoustic ring and we explained the situation to him. He heard us patiently and replied in simple words, “But how can I help? Just because my eyes look like his, does not mean I can be him or I will possess similar powers.”

We all looked at him, with longing faces and hopeful eyes. And we did not know what to tell him. And in the midst of this silence one of our senior members stood up and interrupted this deathly silence, 

“Have you heard of the Violent Verse? Where particles, magical particles are found. If you can tame one of them, you will become God-like. We will take you to that verse, and you will have to try and tame one of these particles. If it is in you, which we all think it is, you can tame the particle. But this is where you will have to be smart. The Shadow Man’s wish was to cast shadows that can consume anything. And when you have tamed your particle you will have to wish for one thing, just one, to consume the Shadow Man! 

But it will be a battle between your desires and conscience. Because they say, once you enter the Violent Verse, demonic forces try to possess you and make you wish for things that are evil. If your soul is strong enough, you can overcome this desire and wish for good. Wish for what is just and in favour of the Heavens. That is where you will have to win the real battle against the Shadow Man.”

The man went silent and then he said what we all had wanted to hear, hear so desperately, “Let us go!”

Two of our members accompanied him and when they reached the Violent Verse, there were particles zipping around everywhere, almost like glow worms and falling stars. They were everywhere, it seemed they were chasing each other. And sometimes it felt one particle was behaving as two. There was something mysterious about them.

The man descended into the Violent Verse, while his companions watched from a distance in the safety of the spacecraft. Because in that verse only men and women with certain qualities can survive, it somehow recognises them, and whenever it sees a mismatch, it consumes them like the shadows of the Shadow Man.

And the Violent Verse appeared to have accepted him as a match. Now began his real trial, he was surrounded by many particles, he was trying hard to control one of them, they came close to him and then bounced away. He tried more than 100 times but the same thing happened again and again.

Then he stopped, did nothing, just stood there. And thought for a moment where he was going wrong. Then he did something, none of us knows exactly what. 

Our members who were watching him felt the Violent Verse tends to develop some sort of resonance with your mind, and if it feels it is you, the right match, it trains your mind to tame the magic particle. And maybe that is what happened, because after the pause, when he resumed, he had tamed 6 particles. So the Violent Verse had granted him more than the Shadow Man, because it believed in him more than the Shadow Man.

We are not sure what his 6 wishers were, and we hope one of them was to tame the Shadow Man. Because to us this was all that mattered.

They returned after a month from the Violent Verse, and then he asked us to step out of the acoustic rings and say things that would anger the Shadow Man.

And as requested by him, we said a lot of derogatory things about the Shadow Man. And in moments the shadows descended from the skies and the Shadow Man stood right in front of us.

And the moment he saw our man who had returned from the Violent Verse, he began trembling and he cast his shadows on him, but they could not consume him, because he had wished not to kill the Shadow Man. He had wished to tame him and transform him into a kind and loving Man. 

The Violent Verse had liked his selfless and kind personality, and granted him 6 wishes instead.

The moment shadows spread across the room they began fading away and the Shadow Man stood there just as a common man, wondering what had happened. He had no memories of the past and he had no memories of the shadows at all.

He had certainly become a kind and helpful man.

As for the 5 remaining wishes of the man, it is his secret that we may never know. Because we feel there is no need to know his 5 wishes. If the Violent Verse can grant someone so many particles, that is proof enough that he is worthy enough and he deserves to wish for anything, because that will always be for the good of all.

The man bowed before all of us and before leaving, he wished the Shadow Man and all of us well in our lives. As he was about to leave the hall, one of us excitedly asked, “What were your other wishes? Your other 5 wishes.”

He smiled, his eyes closed for a moment and then as he opened them, all 6 particles appeared before us, and he proclaimed, “I wished that when I leave, one of the particles shall be re-assigned to the Shadow Man, who will use it to spread love. And the particle is so designed that it accepts wishes and desires that only correspond to love. As for the 5 of them, I retained 3 for myself, and that shall be my secret, and about the remaining two of them. One I dedicated to the wellbeing of humanity, and the second one, I dedicated to all nations who strive to seek excellence in humanity focused scientific advancements. And this particle will help them understand new secrets of science, especially the human body and the Universe. 

And I am left with three that I intend to share with someone very special, because I believe in her kind heart too; and with a few who are close to me.”

Then the man left. We still meet when the need arises, but in his case we should say, when our hearts feel so, and our hearts feel so almost everyday because we like being with him. There is something about his deep eyes that could tame 6 magical particles.

Now the Shadow Man serves our planet with true and highest dedication. And this is the power of one good wish, one well thought desire!

To know how humans will emote, express love, in 2075, please read the science fiction novel, They Loved in 2075. Also to know what the man did with his remaining three particles you will find the scifi novel, They loved in 2075, very helpful. Although it talks about them indirectly and via hints, to a curious and kind hearted reader it shall be very obvious!

And I am sure you are kind, that is why, the sci fi novel, They Loved in 2075, is for you!