Aban's Accension

Chapter 30: The Dream III

Chapter 30: THE DREAM III

by Shireen Jeejeebhoy

The black silk waves swirl underneath her. She looks down into the familiar nothingness, yet this time she sees it not as emptiness or a void but a vain wasteland. Motion flutters on her left, and she swivels her eyes in that direction. The maggots are swimming into view, two by two. Their ribbed little bodies are wiggling in delighted anticipation as they swim first in a straight line towards the centre of the deep and then in a circle round her. She watches in disbelief. Disbelief: not fear, not disengagement, but disbelief. Why are they still coming? These familiar mushy white creatures no longer scare her, yet she had thought after yesterday that they would no longer haunt her.

Aban is angry. She kicks at them. But, like before, the wasteland grips her feet, yet that does not stop her this time. And neither does she disengage to avoid the fear, for fear isn’t driving her, but fury at their siren song of ease and disengagement. She will not be held down.

She wiggles and stretches. She undulates her body. She pours out resistance. Suddenly, her foot swings sharply, violently forward as the wasteland lets go. Her freed foot startles the maggots, and they swerve out of the way. Their unbroken line is broken. But not for long. Recovering their cool, they resume their journey.

Aban focusses on her other foot, and quicker this time than with the first, it too is free. She scissors herself up into the welcoming space above. The maggots stop; they raise the front of their soft bodies. They turn to each other, and then they snake up to close in on her on this different plane. But she does not give in, and she changes course. And as she does, she becomes stronger, faster, quicker in anticipating their moves and persisting against both them and the wasteland.

Suddenly, the space around her changes from insubstantial white to hot gold. A beam shines from above her, blinding her. Her right arm leaps up to shade her eyes. Like sunlight the beam uncovers the black silk surface of the black sink, the nothingness, the void, the wasteland, the vanity of it all. Like a searchlight it moves towards the encircling maggots until it reveals them. A scream shoots out. A high-pitched primordial scream vibrates the air above and the void below; the air and void sing back to each other in harmony. She lifts her hands to cover her ears as she bends her head and closes her eyes.

But she opens them again. She has to watch.

The wasteland heaves; its swirling surface suddenly froths here and there. Wisps of smoke emerge from the front maggot couple. They arch their triangular fronts up in a furious spasm. For the first time, she sees they have tiny black mouths, empty of teeth and gums, but rippling with death. They char into white ash. The light moves on to the next couple. She hears a sound and looks over her shoulder to her left. The millipede with its repulsive black and white spike-inflected stripes, the one that normally follows the pairs of maggots, the one that is chief to them all, has entered this space and stopped. It’s hard to tell, but it looks horrified and...grieved? It folds up into itself as if trying to make itself so small that the beam will not see it. But it knows that it is a futile move, for sharply it turns and scurries its feet faster than ever, away from the carnage of its maggots. The beam doesn’t catch it; it doesn’t even try.

While the millipede hurries away, the wasteland changes. A white glowing mist settles over it, and through it, Aban can see the white charred remains of all the maggot couples.

The frothing stops. The screaming stops. A hush descends. The golden-lit air around her hums and sings and smells of roses and lavender and lilacs. Her feet feel mass. She stands firmly on top of the mist. She steps over the charred remains and toward the light-filled space.

She wakes up. Sunlight is pressing on her eyes. She can feel its warmth; its brightness flushes her eyelids red. She blinks, stretches, and opens her lids, taking in all the colours of her room. Memories of the happy feast the day before fill her stomach. The feast had gone on long into the night, until after the sun had set and the candles had been lit. She had never experienced anything like it before, and she had loved it.