A Self-Study Within A Broken Mind

Weeks passed before I returned to this. I wanted to abandon it, leave the three of them sleeping in bliss. I would go on to write children’s stories where drama did not rule over everything. The characters would be bright-eyed fools, and nothing too bad happened to them. I wanted to protect that innocence JJ championed. For that, I would need to fix what I broke inside Kara, what I fractured by trying to be something I always wished I was in secret. Maybe a part of life is meant to be disappointment, so that we sought completion through reproduction, channeling hopes and dreams into the children when they are but sponges. No. I would never let that happen to someone created by me. I would never… It already happened with Rebecca. She split her mind because she saw mine. In her mind, that was the only thing she could do to connect to me, to try to help me. And for that, I spat in her face and shunned her. Not literally. I shook the thoughts away. This was not about Rebecca anymore. This ...

I came back the next day, from a downpour of rain outside that cooled my mind down. It felt like I put obstacles in front of myself just to trip over them, but this was at an end. If anything, I wanted Kara to be happy again. Maybe I could even reverse Tarne growing up inside Garr. Kara and Lila could head off into the other worlds with child Tarne, living on the run from the Rahin. I would be a decoy in that scenario, allowing the destruction of this space, which I knew was coming anyways. Waiting to die was a truly depressing way to live. Even after I promised Rebecca I would seek happiness. Part of me never trusted her, or rather the Rebecca on the computer screen who told me she went to talk to Alexander Virtu. It did not matter. Lila’s and Kara’s happiness was paramount. I appeared in the library out of a puff of smoke to find it empty. My antics were wasted. I walked up the stairs to see if Kara and Lila were still at Tarne’s bedside. When I reached the top step, the door to the ...

(26k words, unedited) Wouldn’t you like to get everything you desire through simply talking to those who have that everything? Well, keep dreaming. This isn’t a story of some magical mind-control crap. This is a story of the past, when people were illiterate idiots. Among them was me, Atroano. Call me Ano. While millions starved to drive out certain members of certain groups into the open, the Capitas only cared about profits. Greed ruled the land and killed the land. Smack dab in the middle of it, I was born screaming out for food that wasn’t coming. My family name, Zisi, meant a lot a while back, or so I was told. Now the name meant nothing. Another few letters dragged through the mud. Early life was short and burdened. I had to earn my keep as soon as I could hold an excavator. Our group wondered around looking for opportunity, food, and love. The Capitas called us Wonderers when in public, but they called us trash among themselves. They were the rich and powerful of Ahedis. What co...