Run From the Sun

[Pippi]

((Matthew Omeruo continued from Gazing at Sirius))

Matthew had now experienced this forest in three separate states.

He had first entered it during the earliest hours of the morning, when his own personal torch had still been required in order to navigate the darkest sections of the forest, but a pale and silver light had still shone through from the morning sky above the leaves. He had been forced to leave it again when the sunshine had changed from silver to gold, mysterious plants now visible in their full colour and glory, the ground speckled in shadow and light.

And now, he was back in this rainforest during the dead of night, with the light from his torch the only way he was able to see anything at all, the moonlight not able to filter down through the canopy over his head, the sound of what he had to believe were unfamiliar animals coming from the undergrowth surrounding him. It was as dark as it had been when he had been lost in the caves, but the feeling of walking through the two locations could not have been any more different. The tunnels had made him feel trapped, as there had been nothing but walls and floors made of stone surrounding him at every point, and he had only been able to hear the echo of dripping water and his own footsteps.

But out here, in the rainforest, he was in the open air, with grass underneath his feet, and the smell of nature filling his nostrils. It was a warm night, even though it was very late; Matthew could not tell whether the island was naturally this temperature, or whether it was due to how closely all of these trees were placed together, but it made the walk a lot more of a pleasant experience than it might have otherwise been. His father had never allowed him to go outside after dark by himself. He thought, now that he was doing so, that he perhaps understood one of the reasons why. It felt as though he had trespassed on something, or as though he had found some great secret that he had been forbidden from knowing about. His father had forbidden Mark and himself from ever entering his study, located opposite the bathroom, and he thought that what he was currently feeling would be similar to if he had ever managed to sneak inside there.

He should not be here. And yet, he did not want to leave until he had seen everything that there was to see.

It was strange, he did realise, to be thinking such things while he was attempting to search for and catch up to somebody, and, perhaps, while he was trapped in a life or death situation. He had thought a similar thing when he had first escaped from the tunnels, and he had been greeted by the light of the early morning. But he could not help himself from feeling this way. Everything that he was feeling, every sensation that this island was giving him, it was all so different to his daily life in Lagos. The journey from his house to the school on the outskirts of the city, or walking with the rest of the football team to a rival school’s football field in the downtown area, none of those journeys ever allowed him to wander through a rainforest, or to make a path through a green and open field. He did not think that anybody, in any situation, could be blamed for being left in awe at an experience that was entirely new to them.

And, if things did not go well, and he could not resolve the situation peacefully, then he wished he could spend the last of his days on this planet admiring the majesty of the world his God had provided to him.

There was something odd about the forest, however. Matthew thought that he could see something off in the distance, a very faint sensation that was a long way off from his current position. There was an orange glow, warm, and fuzzy looking. He did not think that it could have been the sunrise, unless he had actually been wandering around for far longer than he had expected. So, then, what was it? What could it be? Was it just the light from his torch, attempting to play a trick on his mind? Or, perhaps, it was something else?

Matthew walked in the direction of the light. He moved slowly, but steadily. Even with the beam from his torch providing him vision, he still had to avoid tripping up over roots, or stumbling into thickets of leaves and vines. He did not know what he would find when he reached the source of the light, if he did indeed find anything at all. But maybe the boy he was searching for had also seen it. And maybe he would also be heading in the same direction right at this moment.

If all of this turned out to be true, then there was always a chance that everything could be resolved, simply and peacefully, before this night was over. He had to hope that this would be the case. He would always have hope, clutched in his fist.

[Carrion Queen]

Soraya turned when she heard footsteps. She had a stick that she held over a bonfire, roasting marshmallows.

“Oh, hi. You found us.”

She seemed to be alone. Soraya smiled at Matthew like she had always known him.

“Have a seat. Let's get weird.”

[Jilly]

Abel came back from the grocery run and reappeared from behind the trees, cradling as many chocolate bars and wheatmeal biscuits as he could carry.

"We don't have graham crackers but this is pro'bly close enough."

He nodded his head at Matthew before dumping the goods next to the 4m tall mountain of marshmallows behind Soraya and taking a seat by the bonfire as well.

[Pippi]

Matthew closed his eyes.





When he felt them open once again, the light had become a lot closer to him. In fact, it could not have been more than a few feet away any more. But that, of course, made sense, did it not? He had been walking for a very, very long time now. It felt like he had been walking for his entire life in this forest. It felt as though the entire world was within his forest.

He stood where he was, and watched as the shape of a girl turned to look at him. She had brown hair which was cut just above her shoulders, he thought. She offered him a warm smile. There was a collar around her neck.

Matthew closed his eyes. The light from the warm, crackling bonfire remained even with his eyes shut. He opened them again. It did not feel like blinking, but he could not think of another way to describe what he had just done. He blinked once more. There was no collar around her neck.

Another being appeared from behind a tree. It must have been a boy, Matthew was certain. He also had brown hair, but it was much shorter than how the girl had styled her own. The form nodded towards Matthew. Matthew returned the gesture. It was the polite thing to do, after all. There was no neck behind her collar.

He felt himself move forwards. He sat down on the wicker chair near to the two forms. The girl sat at a throne constructed from pink and white. He thought that he recognised the Erko label on a few sections of the chair. If he were to stand up and grab one, would the entire construction fall? Would the girl and the boy collapse into pieces as well? Then there would be nothing else. They were surrounded by a ring of trees. The ring was surrounded by the universe. The ring was the universe. He looked into the fire as it towered above him, a pillar that reached up into the stars.

“Have we always been here?” echoed a voice from his mouth.

[Carrion Queen]

Soraya shrugged and turned her stick at a steady pace.

"Blah. They never have graham crackers. Americans don't know how good they have it with their easy access to graham crackers. Whatever, these will be ok. Thanks for trying, Abel."

She leaned back in her squishy seat and eyed Matthew as he came and sat in his own chair. Her smile grew wider and her eyes sparkled.

"I guess, if you think about it a certain way," she said in response. She took a marshmallow off the stick and tossed it into the air. A brightly coloured macaw swooped down to grab it, landing on the wicker chair.

"Tell us about your home."

[Jilly]

Abel popped open one of the marshmallow bags and got to work on his own not-quite-what-a-Yankee-would-call-a-s'more-but-close-enough.

He offered a stick to Matthew as the fire continued to rage.

[Pippi]

The voice that had taken control of Matthew did not say anything for a short while. He reached his arm out and scratched under the chin of the bright scarlet bird that had perched upon his chair. What was the name of it, again? A parrot? Or was it actually a macaw? He felt he had seen this type of bird before while studying, but he had certainly never seen one of them before in person, up as close as this one was, as he was much more familiar with the pigeons that perched on electricity lines, of the gulls which flew across the many rivers and docks of Lagos, and of the drastically lost nicators which occasionally flew over the rooftops on their search to return to their rainforest homes.

Perhaps it was nothing at all. Perhaps it did belong to any family of bird that anyone had ever heard of. Perhaps it had only ever existed and would only ever exist within this ring, within this universe, within the pocket of space which he had found himself within. But, of course, if this was the universe in its entirety, then nothing that was outside of it would ever or had ever existed.

Did he exist? And if he did not, did it matter?

Matthew took the stick graciously from the stars in the shape of a boy, the collar around what could have been his neck fading out of view as he did so. The pale pink candy impaled on the end of the branch shimmered brightly. He felt his skin and his body melt and fall away into the darkness below. The bonfire erupted and scorched away everything, and from the ashes he was reformed once again. A splattering of melted marshmallow fell away and hit the blank space below like a raindrop, ripples distorting the stars that hung below them. Ruby - for that was the name of the bird, he knew this for a fact - fluttered up to rest on his shoulder. He looked deep into the flames that billowed ahead of him.

“Of course. That sounds like a good idea.”

It also seemed quite strange to Matthew. After all, this circle which they were sitting within was the only location that existed, was it not? He had always been here, as he had pondered before. And if he had not, then he had never existed anywhere at all. But he smiled at the girl made of stars regardless.The collar around her neck fell into two pieces, and both of them sank, slowly, down into the not-ground, turning slowly, over and over, a red light joining the pale white dots of the night sky. There was a location in his head that he could practically see in front of him, a place he might one day go, perhaps, or a place that might one day exist.

“My home is a city named Lagos, in Nigeria. It is the largest city within the country, although it is not the capital. That title belongs to a city named Abuja. I would like to visit it one day however, in order to see what the differences between it and my home are. However, I digress. There are a lot of rivers in Lagos. It is a major port city for our country. Even when you cannot see the cargo ships arriving, carrying goods from America and Europe, you can still hear them in the distance. There are a lot of skyscrapers in the city as well, although I do not live near them or near any of the most visited ports. On the outskirts of Lagos, the buildings are smaller, and the roads are less well looked after, but it is pleasant all the same. It is peaceful. My father is a church minister, and my mother looks after the house and church when it is not in use. I play football with my school team, and many of our games take us into the inner city, across bridges and past tall buildings made of glass and metal. We pass by many different buildings of faith when we do. There are a great number of churches and mosques within the city, but there are some smaller Hindu temples and some synagogues as well.”

As Matthew spoke these words, the images of the places that he described appeared within the bonfire. They crackled loudly, visible on all sides, and drifted up the pyre into the void that rested above them.

“I think that I love my home very much. But I do not love the way that it is run. There are so many of my classmates who have lost family members and friends because they attempted to speak out against the government.”

He was silent for a moment. There was something itching against his neck, and so he slid his hand up against it to scratch it away, feeling it crumbling beneath his fingertips.

“I do not think that it is right that innocent people should die like this. That they should be punished simply because they wish to have a better life than they are currently living. It is not something that me and my father agree on, however.”

He felt the bonfire flare up in front of him, attempting to coil its flames around his hair and torch him where he sat. He heard Ruby chirping in his ear, and he looked up and smiled, feeling the fire become tame once again.

“But, I thought that you would have already known all of this about me.”

He was not quite certain which form he was speaking to when he said this. Perhaps it was to both of them. Perhaps neither. Perhaps it was directed at himself.

[Carrion Queen]

Soraya sat, assembling s'mores from her melted marshmallows and the supplies that Abel had brought. She put a few of her extras in front of the two others.

"I had a Nigerian friend," she said, sounding like the wind. "She was also from Lagos. Her biggest dream was to work for Deola Sago. She loved fashion. I think that that's how she felt she could express herself safely. Everyone needs that, verdad?"

She began eating her snack in a somewhat dainty manner.

"I guess we know some things. I know how the story of Sampson ends," she said in a conspiratorial manner. "It can be our secret."

Soraya removed herself from her throne and sat on the ground. She leaned back and lay down among the foliage with the lights to of the fire illuminating her legs while the rest was only visible by the faint glow.

"I think that even if you know something, the way that someone tells it and the way that they remember it is more important."

She reached out and the tips of her fingers touched the tips of his, still on the armrest of the chair.

[Jilly]

Abel nodded his head as he affixed the marshmallow into the chocolate bar-biscuit sandwich. He tossed one of the wheatmeal biscuits to Ruby who caught it by the mouth with such skill from her perch.

He scooched his seat away from the fire, his face barely illuminated by the cold embers before he started to eat the s'more.

"Lot'ta the world's really unfair, especially to ankle-biters like us. People hate change and things that remind them how wrong the status quo is."

Abel sucked the marshmallow residue that had squeezed out onto his finger.

"But, things always get better. It takes time, and also bravery... whatever that means to you. You gotta do what you can with the cards you get dealt."

[Pippi]

Matthew did not recognise the food creations that the beings of stars were constructing. It was not difficult to understand how they were intended to work; the melted marshmallow heating up the chocolate while the two were sandwiched in between these biscuits. A simple and comforting food, yet one that he could not recall ever having seen until this moment outside of moments.

And how strange that was! After all, this was their universe. Their life circled this bonfire. He had always been here, and he would never leave. Everything that had ever been and that ever would be and that ever presently was, all of it existed right at this moment within this circle. So how was it that he was not aware of this? How had this knowledge escaped his mind, when he could see, and he could hear, and he could touch everything that was ever present? Did it matter in the slightest? Did anything but it matter?

Perhaps these beings of stars did not come from this universe. Could they be aliens instead? Or angels? Or ghosts? If they were indeed one of the first two, he thought it strange that chocolate remained such a constant between this universe and their own.

“Our secret, yes,” he smiled, as warm as the fire beside him. His hands were filled with squares of chocolate, spilling out onto the ground like rainfall as his arms rested on his chair. “A secret to go alongside the answer of who broke the mirror in the bathroom. I am sure he will be thankful for both.”

Ruby swooped overhead, circling and soaring through the fire, their phoenix, on the hunt for scraps of melted chocolate and pieces of cracker.

“It is true. The way that he tells me the bible stories that he has learned from listening to him, they are never the same as when he speaks them, and they are very rarely accurate as well. And yet, I would much rather listen to how he says them, time and time again, than to anybody else recounting them.”

Matthew smiled again, and his fingers touched the stars, crackles of electricity flooding into him through her own fingertips. He could see her, lying there, right next to her, right above her, miles and light years away from her. He could see the boy of the stars, molten wax dripping from his fingers, and he could see his collar, no longer situated around his neck. He could see himself, small, insignificant, nothing at all, and so content and happy in this truth. He was wearing a full Nigerian football kit. His emerald body shimmered and glittered.

“And you are correct as well. But, of course you are. How could you not be? As you see and have seen everything, and as you know and have known everything.”

He looked down at his own self, and he watched as the charcoal took over the lower half of his body, a black and white scrawl covering his legs.

“I have never considered what it means to be brave until now. Because, after all, everybody knows what bravery is. It is to stand tall in the face of evil, and to fight when other people cannot do so. But how can you be brave when you do not have anything left at all, and when those who should have been fighting by your side are now, instead, attempting to bring harm to you?”

He blinked, and for a moment, as his palm pressed against that which belonged to the girl, the stars that covered her body reflected against the emerald that made up his own, and he too was one with the universe above.

“I think, then, that being brave is to do what you know is right and what is just, when all other paths lead to a blackness in your heart. Even when you know that you cannot succeed. That is what I think.”

“Or perhaps instead, bravery is to take food from strangers and eat it.”

[Carrion Queen]

Soraya’s hand took hold of Matthew’s when he acknowledged the contact. She pulled him down with her, to land among the leaves, the flowers, and toys from Nigeria, Belize, and Australia. A stuffed kangaroo cushioned his head as he landed. A football rolled by, disturbed by his placement.

“Where I come from we have our own bible called ‘The Book of the People.’ It tells the story of how the earth was created. Two gods created the earth. For their first attempt, all they could make animals and plants. After trying to make people out of many materials – mud, wood, straw -- they found the only one that worked was corn. From corn, came man."

Off to the side, she glanced at Abel and the bird and his opinion on the unfairness of all of their systems. This was just another system to run around inside. Both of them on the ground were green, him bright like an emerald jewel in his soccer uniform and her green tie from school. She touched the bottom of his jaw and her hand was hot.

"Later, a pair of holy twins would be invited to the land of the dead to best the gods in a game of ball. In their victory, the clever twins become balancing entities. The sun and the moon. Life and death. The earth and the sky," she said in her velvet voice.

She looked at him and her eyes were deep back pools that reflected the stars and the fire light.

“Tell us how the world was born, Mister Sacred Heart," she said, close enough so that her lips brushed against his as she spoke.

"Tell me about the labor of being alive."

She kissed him.

[Pippi]

The ground, which now so suddenly existed when it had once been a layering of leaves atop stars, rushed up to meet him. There was no instant jolt of panic, however, no accompanying surge of adrenaline to match his movements. He felt, or some part of him instead, as though he should have felt fear. Maybe he was, and he had simply forgotten how the sensation felt. Perhaps he was mistaken, and everything would make sense when he closed his eyes. Perhaps these beings of stars had stolen the feeling away from him, but left the knowledge of it intact.

Perhaps this girl, who blazed as bright as the sun itself, had taken it away from him in an act of kindness. He was here, in a universe where he no longer needed to be brave, after all.

Matthew gazed at her as she spoke, his eyes gleaming bright, brilliant sardonyx in a sea of emerald. The world shifted as their bodies did. He saw for a moment, above her shoulder, a toucan come to perch on the pile of toys, yellow-breasted and curious. The fire blazed upwards and upwards behind them, cold as the bottom of the ocean in an attempt to compare to the heat that radiated from the touch of this girl. The bird took off, sending a pile of Scrabble tiles scattering into the distance, talons clutching an ‘I’.

She told him about how the world came to be. This world that they lived in. This universe. This little circle. Or perhaps something more? It was impossible for him to tell. But that was the point, was it not? It was impossible to understand the entirety of the universe. That was what made it such a beautiful thing. It was as the girl said. It was in the way that the story was told, and in who was telling it, that mattered.

Her hair shimmered with stars. She was see through, and nothing at all, and then she was back once again. His arms looped around her neck, a replacement for the collar that she no longer owned. Her hair felt like sand against his fingers. It felt like stars. It felt like the universe itself.

“Of course,” he said, as he smiled, in a voice that belonged to himself but that did not come from his lips. Hers tasted of marshmallow and chocolate, and of smoke, and of fire. The world shifted again, floating them above a barrier reef, above an old dockyard, above a great blue hole. Everything he said, and everything he did, with his hands, with his lips, it was a new step forwards. But once again, he no longer had to be brave - he knew this, although he did not know how. That time was passed. He was at home in the universe. They had all the time that ever had been and ever would be. Himself, and these two forms of stars, together.

“In the beginning,” his voice murmured, outside of his own body, low and soft in their ears. “There was nothing in the universe but darkness. And then God uttered, ‘Let there be light,’ and there was so…”

The bonfire, pleased at this, burned a path through the hole it created in the sky.

[Carrion Queen]

Soraya pulled back and a tear rolled down her face. The light of the fire was beautiful, and she was glad that Matthew had told her what he had.

There was an inherent unfairness present in life that wasn't present anymore. There is this sense in life, perhaps, she thought, that only bad things should happen as a result of you doing bad things. But sometimes bad things happen for no reason at all. Bad things just happen because some people are like that, and they decide they have to spread that as far as they can.

"Your world has teeth, you know. Sharp."

She waited a moment and looked at Abel, then at Matthew.

"Sharp like machetes. But we love you. I love everyone who has ever seen this island. Love is such a luxury. We'll see you soon."

[Pippi]

He sensed that something was amiss.

It was instant, this sensation. It was instantaneous, and as crystal clear as the sapphire tear that hung on the stardust clusters of her cheek. This was a world in which fear no longer had any place within it, in which he had no reason to be brave. There was no conflict. The fighting had all been long done and dealt with, and the ashes of the war now piled high in a great pyre, celebrating the universe.

So what was this sense of wrongness doing here? It hung in the air, like a dark cloud come to roost. He could see it, in the starry eyes of the girl, in the slouched constellation form of the boy. She spoke of sharp teeth. Teeth designed to pierce. Teeth purposed to tear. It did not make sense. But she had never led him astray before. She would never lie to him. She did not, he was certain, have the ability to do so, even if she had any desire for it.

And these words. These words of worlds. These words of his world. These impossibilities. For this had always been his world. This had always been his universe.

It had, had it not?

It was his world.

It was… his…

It was…


He floated to his feet, the grass surrounding them both relinquishing him from the comfort of a warm embrace. He could feel it, now, standing here in the dark, his back turned to the fire. The onrushing terror. The fear of something unknown. He did not reply to the girl. He merely gave a single nod of his head, weighed down by a crown of heavy gold. He knew that, once and forever and always, she was correct. He would be seeing her again soon. He could tell her all the things that she knew and that she loved to hear when he had come back to her.

But what knowledge would he bring with him when he returned?

He could see it now. He could see them now. The figure. The person standing with their own back facing him, far, far, far, far away in the distance, and yet close enough to be illuminated by the light of the bonfire, shadows and ghosts wrapped around them. They stood still. Their head was lowered. He thought that he could see something by their side.

There were teeth in his world. There were claws. Talons. Fangs.

Monsters, hiding in the dark, waiting for him to walk past.

“Hello?” Matthew said, as he started to walk forwards, and their circle of universe blurred past him as he did.

“Who are you?” Matthew asked, as the figure flew closer and closer towards him, the immense distance between them closing within seconds, and he thought that it was a girl, a girl abandoned by starlight. There was a collar around her neck.

“I do not think that you belong here.”

His voice echoed.

He was close enough to touch her.

[Lilith]

"..."