As I Lay Dying: Lilies of Sharon (4) (892 hits)
Category: NoneLabels: aild
Rating: 1.92 on 21 reviews (Rate this item) (V)
Submitted by Axolotl (View user info) at 2006-09-12 10:20:41 EDT
AS I LAY DYING
(1) Unto Dust, and story information: http://www.ubersite.com/m/92393
(2) Pillar http://www.ubersite.com/m/92560
(3) The Balances of Justice http://www.ubersite.com/m/92621
Adam Waters awoke suddenly, breathing the air of a strange world. He looked swiftly around him—there were trees, and he was in a large field. Next to him was Amaliel, looking broody as he looked out into the distance, as though he was seeing something Adam couldn't.
"Awake, finally," Amaliel snorted. "You need to go and meet leadership of my troop. You're important, you know?"
"So you're a guardian angel?" Adam asked, pulling himself to his feet. He had been lying in a bed of grass, tall and rough.
"We're in Eastern Anglia, of a new world," Amaliel said, walking off toward a dirt path. Adam rushed up to follow him side-by-side. It was a sticky August in this foreign world, and mosquitoes buzzed through the swampgrass, shying away from the angel but piercing Adam's flesh. "There are many worlds...many, many, many worlds..."
"How many?" asked Adam, swatting away the bugs.
Amaliel sighed, wondering to himself. "Let's start again from the beginning...I'm going to say some things, and you have to accept them as true no matter what. There are subatomic particles in existence far smaller than atoms. Your consciousness affects the behavior of subatomic particles. These particles move backwards as well as forwards in time, and appear in all possible places at once."
"Oh..." Adam said, confused.
"The universe is splitting, every Planck-time, about ten to the negative-forty-third power seconds, into billions of parallel universes," Amaliel continued. "There are maybe ten or so main ones, several trillion uninhabited ones, and uncountable billions of secondary universes. The multiverse holds them all, and each universe is interconnected with faster-than-light transfers of information."
"Trillions...I can't even think of all that," Adam said. "And they're all just inches away from our faces..."
"Angels are the ones who can pass through universes freely," Amaliel noted. "Our particles can sense other universes, but it takes time getting used to. I've been doing this for six thousand years."
"Where are we going...I mean, right now?" asked Adam.
"My troop is camped out very close by," Amaliel said. Adam noticed that he was no longer luminescent and shimmering, but looked just like a regular human. "Each troop has a senior angel with direct communication with the Kingdom."
Amaliel and Adam entered the forest path; it was a beautiful place, unspoiled by industry, and it looked like something out of a fairy tale. Adam sensed a deep chill, a sense of danger and excitement in the woods...something beyond the haze.
"So is there a God?" Adam asked, voicing a concern that had been bothering him.
Amaliel was silent. This troubled Adam, who looked in bemusement at the angel, who seemed torn. "I don't know," Amaliel answered at long last. "Maybe there is, maybe there isn't. There are senior angels up above in the Kingdom...but just between the two of us, I don't know if there ever was a God, or an Authority."
"That's blasphemy if I ever heard it," said an unearthly female voice; Amaliel's companion Opaiosaita appeared as if out of nowhere, guiding them along their path. "The Authority exists, and he communicates his will to his angels."
"Don't just appear like that, I'm talking to the boy—" Amaliel complained as Opaiosaita took Adam's hand and pulled him through the trees. Before he knew it, as if the curtains of the reality had fallen away, the forest path was far behind him and he was outside a low, grey building in the center of the woods. Men and angels of all types walked in and out.
"You are now in the test world of the Kingdom," Opaiosaita breathed. "The Authority controls every aspect of life here...this is our headquarters when dealing with the rest of humanity, but the Kingdom is in a different realm."
It was too much for Adam to handle, and he clutched his hair, leaning against the steadfast form of Opaiosaita. She too looked like a human now, and had long, sleek black hair and a conservative blouse. Adam tried to imagine her as he first saw her—a powerful angel, spear and muscle—but he couldn't.
A girl appeared in the doorway to the building, and Adam could tell at once she was human. She was around his age, with chin-length brown hair and a little shorter than he was, but she looked at the returning angels with pure excitement and exhilaration.
"Adam, this is Elizabeth," Opaiosaita said, forcefully walking Adam over to the doorway. Elizabeth smiled and hugged Adam as though they were old friends meeting after a long separation.
"I'm Elizabeth Barret," she said, speaking in a flat, plain accent that sounded strange to Adam. "Did the angels take you from your world too? I got here three months ago, and they said that we couldn't leave until we found you."
"What?" Adam said, his mind awash in thought. Relaxing, he forced himself just to stop thinking, and answered, "Yeah, I'm Adam Waters, the angels got me last night. What world are you from?"
"I don't know, the worlds don't have names, only the angels know them," Elizabeth said. "Do they have a United States of America in your world? That's where I'm from."
"United States?" repeated Adam, shaking his head. "No, they don't have that where I'm from. I'm from Britain, near Southampton. Oh, where is my sword—?" He realized he was unarmed, and groped frantically for his weapon.
"Amaliel probably has it," Elizabeth answered with the air of someone who was pleased that she knew far more than he did about their new surroundings. "You have a weird accent. Whaur is my sweard?" she said, aping Adam's pronunciation.
Amaliel stepped next to Opaiosaita, gesturing at two approaching men. "Jean-Claude d'Aphrodite and Jackie McCoven, two of the humans that serve the Authority. The Chosen."
"New blood?" asked Jean-Claude, a large Haitian man with a rifle strapped across his back. Jackie, a grey-haired Englishman reminiscent of Albert Einstein, nodded his head. "Must be the kid."
"Opai, take them upstairs," Amaliel said, leaning in to whisper into Opaiosaita's ear and kissing her lightly on the neck. This simple gesture would have taken Adam by surprise, but he was too numbed to all the change to be affected. "Elizabeth, make sure Adam has an idea of what's going on."
"Come, children," Opaiosaita said, herding Adam and Elizabeth into the low, grey building and into the spacious but austere entrance hall. Elizabeth looked back to the angel as if to protest, but Opaiosaita butted in "When you're eight thousand years old, the word 'child' can be used very broadly."
The three of them walked through the building; Adam was impressed by its structure and depth, but saw it was a barren place devoid of love, unfeeling. The walls were bare, and every dimension of the building was coated in the same color, built of the same grey material. Up several flights of stairs, Opaiosaita handed Adam a key while Elizabeth used her own to unlock the door. The three of them walked in to find a sparsely-decorated office, with an angel seated in a wooden chair.
"This is the boy in question?" the angel asked. He had a long, solemn face, the typical office worker in Elizabeth's world.
"This is he, Raphael," Opaiosaita responded, bowing her head to his superior rank.
"I received Amaliel's transmission an hour ago. Lodge him with you and the other."
"With a lot of concentration, they can communicate telepathically," Elizabeth whispered to Adam. "Some of them don't speak too good English."
Opaiosaita shuffled the two through the maze of hallways, and led them to a stark, bare door, as grey as the surrounding walls. "I know it seems cold to you, but the three of us and Amaliel will live here for a while."
"This world is colder than mine..." Adam said, sniffing the air. "It's supposed to be August here."
"You get used to the temperature after a while," Elizabeth said to Adam. "This world is so much colder than mine as well...maybe it's from my global warming. Our industries...I don't understand it, but pollution and gases make the sunlight stay in our atmosphere. I miss my world a little..."
"It sounds nice,"
"I can occasionally take you back to your world, if there's something you miss," Opaiosaita said kindly. "But you know you cannot go back home. Maybe after this is all over, but not for a long time..."
"I don't even want to know why you'd want to go back to that world," Elizabeth scoffed. Adam was silent, suddenly reminded of the destruction of Corbury, the loss of what little family he had. Maybe someway they were alive...
"You can come to my world," Elizabeth said quickly. "You probably don't have Chili's, or like, Apple computers and stuff. Do you live in a nice world anyway?"
"I don't know, it's all I've ever known," Adam said, feeling unworthy in the presence of someone from an obviously superior world. "The Magesterium of the Church controls my homelands, and they use the Inquisition to attack heretics and people who disagree."
"Shitty world," Elizabeth grinned.
"Pope Urban X is our leader," Adam said, laughing at the purely novel concept of Elizabeth dismissing his universe as 'shitty.' "People seem to like him."
"Pope Benedict XIV is kinda powerless," Elizabeth responded. "He's a tool and he looks like Darth Sidious. My parents taught me to question authority, no blind faith."
Adam's face was blank, but Opaiosaita chuckled. "I get the Star Wars reference..." she said. "I get it...your world makes the best movies. I should tell you about the string theories later..."
"I think we should go somewhere," proposed Elizabeth, her eyes lighting up with interest. "Another world, I've only seen this one and my own. Take us somewhere else, really foreign. The string theory can wait."
"Another world...?" Opaiosaita breathed, a thousand-yard stare filming over her clear eyes. "All right...we can do that...I can show you the corners of billions of filaments of the multiverse..."
"Let's go to it," Adam smiled.
User Reviews
Submitted by St_Jimmy (user info) at 2006-12-18 13:17:54 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by JoeyG (user info) at 2006-10-25 13:57:34 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by MyNameIsTim (user info) at 2006-10-16 21:36:50 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by Axolotl (user info) at 2006-09-13 14:14:33 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Submitted by Chroniclysm (user info) at 2006-09-13 11:46:04 (#)
Ranking: 2
At some point, I'd like to see them wander through THAT world.
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What world?
They'll be hanging out mostly in Adam's world, the Kingdom of Heaven, and OUR world somewhat.
Submitted by Brdn_Nkd (user info) at 2006-09-13 13:09:03 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by Chroniclysm (user info) at 2006-09-13 11:46:04 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
At some point, I'd like to see them wander through THAT world.
Submitted by ghola (user info) at 2006-09-13 08:19:02 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by WatchMyStep (user info) at 2006-09-12 21:47:23 EDT (#)
Ranking: 1
No Comment
Submitted by Axolotl (user info) at 2006-09-12 21:17:31 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Submitted by JonnyX (user info) at 2006-09-12 18:58:09 (#)
Ranking: 2
When does Colonel Mical Enderly show up????
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You remember that dude??
For the neophytes:
Mical Enderly: Officer in the Empire's I Corps who was shot in the face and maimed during the Battle of Geneva, in the Exodus Chronicles, my first major series.
Submitted by JonnyX (user info) at 2006-09-12 18:58:09 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
When does Colonel Mical Enderly show up????
Submitted by Axolotl (user info) at 2006-09-12 18:13:28 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Submitted by Susie_Derkins (user info) at 2006-09-12 12:23:09 (#)
Ranking: 2
Don't worry Ax, this happens to some of mine too. Don't let it discourage you...or deter you from continuting the series, I'll have to hunt you down for the conclusion.
The painting, if I'm not mistaken, is "The Rape of the Daughters of Leucippus"
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I'll be continuing. The painting came up when I was searching "Rubenesque."
Submitted by Axolotl (user info) at 2006-09-12 16:05:17 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Submitted by awesome_face (user info) at 2006-09-12 14:32:48 (#)
Ranking: 2
Spectacular young one!
Your skills are great. I am quite envious.
Why the fuck am I talking like that?
Fuck that. This shit was awesome. It's better than your pandemic series too and I have a weakness for zombies!
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That's some old english talk, hell yea
Submitted by MouthSore (user info) at 2006-09-12 15:39:33 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by awesome_face (user info) at 2006-09-12 14:32:48 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Spectacular young one!
Your skills are great. I am quite envious.
Why the fuck am I talking like that?
Fuck that. This shit was awesome. It's better than your pandemic series too and I have a weakness for zombies!
Submitted by MyTeeOne (user info) at 2006-09-12 12:50:54 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Good writing is a rarity these days. Well done sir.
Submitted by Susie_Derkins (user info) at 2006-09-12 12:23:09 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Don't worry Ax, this happens to some of mine too. Don't let it discourage you...or deter you from continuting the series, I'll have to hunt you down for the conclusion.
The painting, if I'm not mistaken, is "The Rape of the Daughters of Leucippus"
Submitted by Axolotl (user info) at 2006-09-12 11:32:24 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
omg lol wtf
Submitted by BLITZKREIG_BOB (user info) at 2006-09-12 11:20:36 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
OMG! NSFW!!!
Submitted by Axolotl (user info) at 2006-09-12 11:08:09 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Submitted by Susie_Derkins (user info) at 2006-09-12 11:05:11 (#)
Ranking: 2
I like the series so far. I'm a bit confused by the choice of painting for this installment.
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It was just on my hard drive. I just stuck it on, better than most of the horrific stuff I have.
Submitted by Susie_Derkins (user info) at 2006-09-12 11:05:11 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
I like the series so far. I'm a bit confused by the choice of painting for this installment.
Submitted by Axolotl (user info) at 2006-09-12 10:21:10 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Il a regle le volume, et je me suis adapte a la nouvelle situation.