A Falling World: Chapter 6: Final Introductions Part 2

Before turning back David decided to fall. He held on with a solid grip to the plank but the rest of his body hung in the abyss. Looking back he could only see the underside of the planks he had been walking on. He held himself where he was waiting for something to happen. He closed his eyes and waited but nothing reached for his legs from within the darkness. When his arms began to grow tired he pulled himself up and returned the same way he came.

Starting with leaps, David’s efforts slowly dwindles into jumps, then hops, then a gentle walk as he did his best to retread his path back. However, he noted the hallways shifted. Every turn that should have been a left was now a right, every stair that should have gone up now went down, and vice versa. In addition to this the upholstery regained its delicate composure much more quickly than it should have.

Upon his retreat David stopped announcing his presence at every twist and simply followed the path laid out in front of him. Once the hallways pristine condition returned it only took a few turns until David found himself in a room holding other people.

There were five people in total. Three males, one female, and one figure in the back. Sitting at the table was Henry staring intently at his guest.

David walked into the room, the walls were similar to the hallways however the floor was covered in a black carpet. Henry greeted David and welcomed him into the room offering him the only other seat available at the table.

“You were expecting me?” David said flatly and in a mixed tone between a statement and a question.

“It’s hard not to given how many times you announced yourself.” Henry replied.

As David walked closer to the table the air tensed and thickened ever so slightly. The source could have been Henry but apart from his glare his body was relaxed. Excluding him the source was likely from the other people present in the room. About ten feet to his left there was a girl with black hair wearing brown jeans. Then standing behind Henry on his right was a muscular male in a grey sweater. On David’s right there was a younger man with black curly hair and several visible tattoos. Unlike Henry’s they all stood stiff and rigid. They were likely the source.

Coming up to the chair David pulled it out. It had four basic feet and was made of hard plastic. The kind of chair designed for people whose comfort are not of concern – the kind designed to keep conversations short. Still standing he looked down at Henry and then the group “You’re stressed.” Addressing Henry again “I took the liberty of locking the shop before I came down. You shouldn’t expect to have any surprise customers for the time being. Am I a surprise or was this planed?”

“Sit down,” Henry replied without a moments hesitation “You are exactly where you ought to be though your timing is laggard.” Henry paused as David took his seat and leaned forward resting his arms on the table. His posture was still and focused on Henry. When it was clear that David was not going to say anything Henry continued “My name is Henry, and I must say you are very calm given the circumstances. Would you like a snack or a beverage? We have quite the selection.”

Flatly David replied “No thank you. And sorry if this isn’t the response you were hoping for. I can only take so much stress before I start shutting down. You have successfully shattered my worldview. What I’m interested in is rebuilding it as quickly and correctly as possible. So if you would be so kind what is going on? You have my undivided attention.”

“So you aren’t questioning your reality – is this a dream? A hallucination perhaps?” Henry paused as David only shook his head. He continued “Yes well, magic is real as you’ve no doubt begun to realize. And as for why you’re here you are part of prophecy to save the world, congratulations. Among the billions of people on this planet this means you are one of the few who get the privilege to do something truly remarkable with their life. You will be able to see beneath the fabric of this world and in the process learn magic to protect yourself and others.

“If you look around this room you will find the others in the same boat as you: Olivia, Luther, and Marcus are the ones standing about the side here. There is another who I hear you are already familiar with.”

David heard steps on the floor grow closer and felt the air gradually thicken. Whoever this person was either did not want to be here or did not want him to be here. Sarah stopped and stood behind Henry as David recoiled slightly at her sight his expression shifting from disgust to surprise then indifference in less than a second. No longer diluted by distance the air grew heavy and tense. In response David had to correct how he was interpretating what other people were saying. He felt he was skewing other peoples words as he could swear he heard a mocking ring in Henry’s tone as he said “Is there anything you want to say or questions that you have?”

David looked from Sarah to Henry to his left at Olivia. Pointing at her David asked “Olivia, everyone is here because they want to be right? No one’s being forced?”

Olivia seemed shaken by the question as if she wasn’t expecting to actually have to say anything “Uh, yeah. No one is forcing us to be here. Just uh, learning magic and preparing to save the world”.

“Cool. Good to know.” David turned back to Henry with more strength in his voice than before “What is this prophecy?”

“That can wait. Instead I” Henry got out before he was cut off.

“The prophecy must really suck if you’re trying to get me onboard without telling me what it is.” David paused briefly to take a breath “That’s fine, you can keep your secrets. There are a lot of questions that I guess I’d like answers to but I’ve managed to answer the most mundane one here.” David looked from Sarah to the others before settling back on Henry “Everyone in this room except you and I are stressed. The air is so thick that if you gave me a knife I could cut it. I’m not wanted here. Not by her, not by them.”

Henry managed to say “Any tension you are currently feeling is all in your mind. Destiny doesn’t call many” before he was cut off again.

“They’re called stress pheromones and you may not be sensitive to them but I am. They don’t have a smell they just have a tension and I’m not going stand by as someone gaslights me. So let me ask you this, when I was on top I left the building the same way I came in but found myself on a sidewalk. If I go back up right now will I find myself back in my apartment or on the streets where I presume is the other side of the country?”

Henry did not answer immediately – he was not accustomed to being interrupted in a conversation let alone having it happen multiple times. Eventually he said “I will answer your question, but first you should understand that I did not bring you here lightly. There are significant risks that I am taking to give you and everyone else in this room the opportunity to learn magic because I believe the alternative will be disastrous. So forgive me if I’m limiting what I tell you to the absolute minimum. This whole thing is a lot to take in.

“The next thing you should know is that everyone else in this room is caught up on what will happen if everyone is not successful in playing their part in their destiny. They will die and so will everyone they care about. The same is true about you. You might feel uneasy right now but everyone here can and will accept you as a team member. If you really do leave you risk being responsible for a lot of innocent people dying – including yourself and your loved ones.”

“That statement doesn’t apply to me.”

“Why’s that?”

“You still haven’t answered my question about the doorway leading to my apartment. You’re deflecting.”

Henry was starting to get flustered – his face started to flush as his body began to take on the same rigidity of his students “You are currently in New York. If you leave now you will remain in New York and you will have to find your own transportation back to California.”

Henry expected a different set of difficulties when dealing with David. The way Sarah described him Henry expected an obsessive delusional perversion that would have to be cut out like a tumor but seeing how he responded to her presence David seemed as repulsed by Sarah as she was with him. Worse yet, while Sarah was willing to at least tolerate his presence it seemed like David was eager to cast his life and everyone else’s aside – which given the nature of the prophecy was a terrifying proposition.

Changing his approach from finding an opportunity to remove any unrequited feelings from David, Henry instead focused on David’s willingness to dismiss his warnings and to cast aside lives “You do want to help people. You should stay and focus on saving them”. At the end of his command David’s eyes glowed a dim white light.

When the light faded David responded “I think it would be wonderful to be a hero. A bona fide knight in shining armor. Wielding magic and wisdom beyond my years, but what I want doesn’t fucking matter. I’m not going to put myself at risk for anyone else.”

David’s eyes glowed again after Henry said “You’re afraid right now. Don’t be. I will teach you everything you need to know and when the time comes you will have a team you will trust watching your back.”

When the light faded this time David responded. This time his tone shifted from a flat monotone to one carrying a hint of aggravation “Fear has nothing to do with this. Tell me what to feel one more time I dare you!” David stood now and asked another question “You want me to learn magic? Please tell why that won’t be a waste of my time. That spell you used to bring me across the country instantly is amazing, why is it not being used commercially?”

Henry was confused to see that after shifting David’s wants and fears he was still as resistant as before. He knew the spell worked, but the effect was not as expected. Henry answered David’s question seeing if he could find the root of David’s resistance “First, the people who can use magic are very rare and just because you have an affinity for it doesn’t mean you will ever actually cast a spell. Second, learning magic is very difficult and comes with a number of risks. Lastly, no magician would ever waste their time acting as a ferry man in this world.”

“I don’t think anything you’ve said is a lie, but once again you are avoiding my question. The issue is that magic is a worldview shattering concept at all. It is irrelevant what spell we are talking about or how many people can cast it. There are charlatans world wide claiming preternatural abilities and despite their vapid existence they are successful in maintaining their quality of life. If any spell can be cast with reliability then that magician would be ground zero for a revolution the world has yet to see. They could do anything and set their price. And yet, they don’t. They don’t and you are tiptoeing around the reason why.

“So keep your secrets if you want but let me be blunt. Does there exist a reason why magic is not well known and will this impact my ability to use it in the real world if I ever learn it?”

“Yes” was Henry’s venom filled response.

David stepped away from the table a few steps and looked at the group surrounding it. He needed fresh air that was less heavy than where he was a moment ago. With a new breath full he addressed everybody “Good to know. Here’s a question everyone. Who knows why Sarah is so stressed out by having me here?”

When no one responded David continued “Cool. Well, she spent three years harassing me in high school and I decided to return the favor senior year. Of course it’s that year she finally decided to start acting normal around me. In any case I called her a bitch three times, I gave her a letter asking to help me find someone from track that I could carpool back home with, and I did something else that I can’t remember. We never threatened each other, and we never used violence against each other but holy fuck did we make each other feel uncomfortable during our entire tenure as teenagers.

“But it doesn’t stop there because I’m not that lucky. You see my iteration of a high school bully is a grieving teenage girl who lost their sibling sometime between freshman and junior year. A girl who I didn’t realize was grieving until graduation. I also didn’t reprocess all of our previous interactions through the lens of grief until after I was going to college. And guess what, it turns out she wasn’t trying to harass me.

“No, she was trying to reach out to one of the few people her age in our neighborhood who she thought was really nice while also being absolute shit at communicating. But it’s also not her fault seeing how back then I was oblivious to the wants and needs of other people and existed only in my own selfish world. Which makes me the bad guy. Fuck me.

“But it gets worse because why would I ever let sleeping dogs lie? No, I felt bad after I realized this and tried to reach out. I wanted to explain things in person and when that went no where I decided to create a false explanation for why I did everything and sent that out to her. Then a few years after that I felt guilty again and gave an actual apology online, and then when she blocked me I created another account and sent another apology and it wasn’t until the last message I sent that it finally clicked that despite trying to apologize and make up for harassing her in the past the only thing I was actually doing was harassing her with my constant attempts to reach out. Which is the very thing that made me feel like shit to begin with!”

David turned his attention to Henry “Sarah doesn’t have a good impression of me, she doesn’t trust me, she doesn’t respect me, she has no interest in anything about me – and the reverse holds true as well. So how fucking dare you tell me that we’ll be teammates who will trust each other and watch each others backs.

“I’ve been here speaking with you for all of five minutes and you have the audacity to tell me this while her body is screaming at my presence and thickening the atmosphere itself. You kidnap me from my home and offer me useless skills. You gaslight me when I bring up concerns and shift the responsibility of countless lives onto my shoulders should I reject your offer to learn magic.

“This is not an opportunity. This is a toxic environment and that’s not my fault. That’s yours. I will not be accepting your offer. I will be leaving.”

With a huff Henry removed himself from the table and headed toward the exit and David turned his attention back to Sarah “And you, I doubt you’ve changed a spec since the last time I saw you. This is how you communicate – with words. Not everyone can read your mind Sarah and not everyone can interpret your silence the way you want them to. So since you and I have always been shit at communicating with each other let me explicitly tell you that I hope this serves as a good example of how to tell someone to fuck off so there is zero ambiguity as to why.”

Henry had yet to make it to the entrance when he heard David call for him from behind and that he had one last question that he should answer. “I think you’ve said enough for one day David” Henry replied.

David disagreed and retorted “You should answer this for your sake not mine. How long is it going to take for you to find a replacement for me in this prophecy of yours?”

This stopped Henry at the exit. He turned around and said with resolution “That’s not how prophecies work. There is no replacement.” He felt a bit of despair when he heard David’s response that if what he said is true then they are all going to die. Henry left the room all the same.

Leaving the store David found himself on the sidewalks of New York rather than in his apartment. He looked at the time and it was well past when his first day was meant to start. He called his boss and explained that the day before was his fathers birthday and that he flew to New York to be with him. His flight was supposed to be the night before but it kept getting delayed until the airline cancelled it. David sent them a few pictures of himself in the state and after a lengthy conversation David at least knew that he would have a second first day tomorrow.

David reflected on the conversation he had inside the store. It isn’t often where he feels like a marionette being controlled by strings. He thought about his motions, his tone, the words he used and how during the entire encounter it was as if someone else was speaking. He knew the words were his but their substance were not the focus of his attention. Instead at the time he kept wondering am I going too far, there’s probably another way to approach this, they’re already stressed why keep provoking them?

David thought about how they would interpret what he said and innately understood that they would think of him as an aggressor and filled with rage and distrust and hate. While him being an aggressor might be true