Brain Damage

A Story by Blue Bird II

This was written for an Edgar Allen Poe assignment in 8th grade Mrs. Zutali's Language Arts class.

Hello, my name is society. I am the person sitting across from you at the coffee shop, the man you passed today on your way to work. I'm the driver of a car that you waited to pass so you could cross the street. I'm the voices you hear, the preferences you follow, and the way you live your life. I am society.

However, as I tell this tale, you may refer to me as Thomas Black. Though I do not influence any of the linking chain of events in this story, I shall guide you along the way.

So let us begin with a cold, frigid day in December, in the town of Nagasaki, Japan. A man, Alexander Hart, was walking down the blanketed streets of his home district. He was on his way to an old, abandoned warehouse, where he was to meet up with someone.

A council, in fact. The Shi no Masuta was their name, and they were no ordinary group of pedestrians you would see on a sidewalk. Heavens, no. These were the Shi no Masuta, which means Masters of Death.

Nervous, he was, as Alexander walked through the courtyard of the warehouse. This was the day he finally rid himself of his ... mental disease. He entered the warehouse, feeling the ominous dread, and called out for the Shi no Masuta.

From an unhinged door, they entered the scene. Three cloaked men, burly, and intensely belligerent-looking.

"Why have you dared to return?" The one in the center said with intimidation.

Alexander fixed his stance.

"I want it gone!" Alexander began. "I want you to rid me of this plague you have bestowed upon me!"

"Impossible." The one to the left said. He was holding a strange, fancy-looking mirror in his arms.

"Well I'm done with it! I'm tired of this fear and paranoia. This was supposed to give me intelligence, knowledge. Instead, this gift has become a curse." He yelled, and his voice echoed through the darkness of the warehouse.

"Not our problem." The one on the right said. "You asked the mirror for this."

"No, no, no! I can't take it anymore!" Alexander barked back. "Do you have any idea what its like to wake up every day and your brain is two days older?"

He looked into the Shi no Masuta's faces. "Its far too maddening! I want it gone!"

The one in the middle let out a cough. "You do realize that death is your only escape. There is no other way to break this ... curse."

"Then kill me already! Kill me! Please!" Tears welted up into Alexander's already gelid and lifeless eyes. He began to cry as he fell to his knees. But the Shi no Masuta could not do it. They were forbidden from ending the life of someone who was a victim to the mirror's curse.

So with that, Alexander was asked to leave, and he walked away in an unbearable disappointment. Hmm, quite a sad story indeed. When Alexander returned to his home, he plopped down onto his living room couch, and began to ponder.

Screams, he heard. Screams of blood curdling fear. He listened to the thoughts of the damned, as they passed through his head. The shadows of their memories, intelligence, and life, were all being collected into Alexander's mind. All because he wanted to be ... abnormally wise.

A spider lingered above his head, though he was too lost in thought to care. Not a sound was heard, yet Alexander heard it all. He could hear the dust be carried off by the wind, the whispers of the window moth, and the requiems of his future. The darkness of the ebony night, was not so dark to Alexander. For when you see darkness, he can see the light beyond it.

Soon, however, the thoughts began to overwhelm him. He began to squirm, and clutch his hair with an intense grip. He groaned and moaned, whispering words that seemed to ramble out of his mouth.

Falling off of his couch, he began to scream in pain and sorrow. The sound waves filled his vision with rainbows of color, and his sight slowly grew dim. His head becoming more heavy, and his mind drifting off into sleep.

As he was closing his eyes, waves of color, sound, and memory seemed to flood his mind all at once. Absolutely magnificent.

However, the waves trapped him inside his own head, and carried him in a rapid current of thoughts. Finally, the contents of his thousand-headed mind began to wither, revealing a blank, open space.

In actuality, Alexander had merely fallen asleep into a dangerously real dream. The poor fellow would be stuck in that state of limbo for a long time, too. Some might call it, a coma. Society would call it that. But this is not a story about what physically happens, its a story about the mind of man that ... you do not know of.

Anyways, while in the everlasting blank realm of his mind, there was finally silence. Alexander peered his head in every direction, searching for a single stain of his mind left. None.

Then, a knocking sound caught his attention. He turned to find where it had come from, and then saw it. The fancy mirror that the Shi no Masuta had in their possession. The mirror, that had given Alexander the curse in the first place.

He carried his gaze to the reflection of his eyes, and stared lifeless into it.

"Why?" He said to his reflection. "Why have you done this to me?"

The reflection chuckled ominously, and Alexander glared at himself.

"You did this," his reflection began. "You were the one who asked for it."

"But I didn't know that this would happen! I just wanted to know what was best!"

"You would lie to your own reflection?"

"I'm not lying!"

"Pathetic."

"I did it for Japan! So that when I joined the armed forces I would know what was best for our country!"

The reflection in the mirror lunged forward, crashing into the glass. He slammed his fist into it, and cracked a small portion of the mirror. Alexander faltered back in pain, clutching his suddenly scarred shoulder.

"You were doing it for selfish reasons" The reflection yelled, and then struck a lower part of the mirror. This time, Alexander's leg burst and he fell off balance. Blood began to trickle out of his pants leg, and formed a puddle below him. He let out a shriek of pain.

"You had to be better than everyone else, didn't you!" He struck the mirror again, and cut formed over Alexander's eye, and the blood ran down his face.

"Just because all of your childhood friends made it into the military and made high ranking positions, you just had to be like them!" He The reflection pounded on the mirror once more, and a fragment broke off. With the noise of a crackling bone, Alexander lets out an immensely horrid scream of pain.

Alexander looked up at the mirror, and saw his reflection towering over him. He staggered to his feet, and launched his fist at the mirror, and it shattered into broken pieces.

The next thing he knew, Alexander had awoken on his living room floor. After re-configuring his senses, he got to his feet and headed out the front door.

Trudging through the pallid snow, he ignored the raging thoughts that continued to flood his mind. He was on his way back to the warehouse to confront the Shi no Masuta, and end his curse once and for all. He burst through the door, and stomped into the warehouse. The Shi no Masuta were still assembled in the open space, and all turned to see the spectacle.

"I've come to end this!" Alexander yelled throughout the warehouse.

"We told you before," the one in the middle began. "The only way to stop your curse is to end your life, and we are forbidden to do so."

"I don't want to just stop my curse, I want to end you all once and for all." Alexander pulled out his pocket knife, and began walking towards the Shi no Masuta.

"You plan to kill us? You truly have been driven mad." The one on the left said. The one on the right remained in his seat, sitting next to the mirror. Alexander continued walking towards the Shi no Masuta, and the three of them stood up in defense of each other. As Alexander neared their rounded table, he readied himself and his blade.

He lifted the knife, and prepared to strike. But instead, he hurled the blade at pass the Shi no Masuta, and it struck into the mirror. The three Masters of Death stopped and watched in aw as the mirror shattered. All Alexander could hear, was the sound of his breath getting louder and louder.

In an instant, it seemed as though all the pain, fear, screams, and hollers of the damned, drifted from Alexander's soul. He fell to the floor, and collapsed. His heart had stopped, and he was finally dead. Finally among the souls who's cries he had heard. The veterans of war, or, his childhood friends that had died, greeted him in his passing.

Well, that marks the end of this life tale, and I guess I should go back to being me. The person sitting across from you at the coffee shop, the man you passed today on your way to work. I'm the driver of a car that you waited to pass so you could cross the street. Back to the voices you hear, the preferences you follow, and the way you live your life. No longer am I Thomas Black, but now ... I am society.

© 2011 Blue Bird II

Author's Note

Note; Characters and locations in this story were also used in my Blood Lust Trilogy, so do not confuse names, instead disregard the similarities and focus on the story.