Dedicated to an Imprisoned Hero

The character is entirely fictional, but the writer is inspired by His life.

 

** This short story is dedicated to an imprisoned hero. **

 

It was wet outside. The hero could hear the rain and feel the hypnotic brown smell of the wet earth. Away from his cell in solitude, bells were chiming, the clock had stricken midnight. He stood there to hear some more to feel connected to life, but he knew what was missing.

The hero had inherited his determination and strength from Pagan Gods, holy spirits guiding him; however he felt he was going weaker and weaker, day by day. He was slowly losing his will to survive, seeing nobody but a trembling shadow and a scarred face in his cold cell.

How was the life outside, after all those years? Thirteen years – a great deal of time to end wars and bring peace out of light. Enough time to start a new life… Thirteen years, he sighed. For thirteen years, he had been doing nothing, nothing at all.

It was not solitude that worried him, but just what he had become: There were some better times when he felt like the prince of the entire universe, but then he was dust… Out of their sight, this made him out of their mind, forgotten. He should have never become forgotten, that was what frightened him, not solitude. Solitude could end somehow, he would have enough of people during his one-hour break, but when he was at the verge of insanity and as fragile as a child, he wished to hear the life outside for a moment, pausing. He loved it when he heard car horns, cursing ladies and chiming bells. He loved it when he could smell the sweat and realize that he was still there and had hope.

There were times when he picked up his guitar, played a song or two, but how could it help? He still dreamt, involuntarily, about the killed ones and those left behind. How could he guess that it was purely “the end”?

He used to love life. He used to love every single part of it. Then, after the incident and imprisonment, he did not. He would curse each and everyday at the judgment system. Yet, his time would come. He could not wait to be outside with the bulk of humanity.

He had never gotten into drugs… He knew a boy; they had met during his one-hour-break about two months ago. The boy was in his fifteens, but his eyes looked as mature as a wise man. The boy advised the hero not to use drugs, told him how his life would be ruined if he tried, described his comas briefly and these were enough to keep the hero away from those. Maybe his gloomy mood that day was just because he remembered his friend, who died about a week ago. He knew that the kid was killed, as the police were never OK with feeding an imprisoned addict who occasionally delivered drug comas.

What the prisoner missed the most was the nature, the welcoming embrace of Mother Earth. He wanted to run through the woods with almost no self-control, he wanted to become one with the universe. He wanted freedom, but it was not his time. His time, he thought, would come.