Everything The Light Touches

Three people run from a wall of golden light that is eradicating everything in it's path. What is it and why is it chasing them?

Everything The Light Touches

The team, despite being punished for their crimes, were making the best of a bad situation. They worked day and night, stopping occasionally to look longingly at the open horizon through the massive glass windows of the high-rise office.

Quin felt a twitch ripple though her. She stopped and looked up unseeingly into the setting sun.

“Get back to work.” The guard snarled, prodding her with the butt of his gun.

Her brow furrowed. A small wave in the golden light was rolling towards them.

She turned to the rest of the crew and was slammed into the far wall by a wave of solid energy.

Screams filled the air as the glass walls of the lab shattered and their work went flying. The dark-skinned Keisha tumbled past her, almost falling right through the open door. She clung to the handle, almost horizontal against the flow. “What is it?” she screamed.

Quin, despite being pinned, managed to turn her head enough to look behind her. A wall of golden light filled the horizon. Everything before it shattered. Behind it… there was nothing.

“We have to get out of here!” Keisha yelled and grabbed her wrist.

“No!” Quin cried but it was too late. Keisha let go and the pair tumbled through the open door and through the lab, smacking into every piece of furniture they found but never quite stopping. Quin began spinning head over heel until the world became a large nauseous blur. She froze in shock as cold water suddenly enveloped them.

She thrashed around, disorientated, trying to find the surface. She glimpsed Keisha drifting upward and followed her. They broke the water with a gasp.

“Keep moving!” Keisha spluttered. She threw out a hand for a chair floating past. It fell into the water with them. “Grab on!”

The pair held onto the chair and began to kick for the nearest flat surface.

“Help me!” a small figure was waving from the far end. Quin turned around. The figure was silhouetted against a solid wall of gold light.

She watched as the light consumed the figure.

Crying, Keisha kept going. Reaching the bank they hauled themselves out and just lay on the tiles, panting.

“What do you think happened to him?” Quin whispered.

Keisha struggled to her feet. “Don’t think about it. Just keep… moving.”

Quin gazed blindly into the approaching light. “It’ll just follow.”

“We don’t know that, now come on!” Keisha dragged her to her feet and pulled her toward the open door.

The world bent. One minute the floor was flat, the next everything was tossed in the air and curving at impossible angles. Quin flew through the air like a ragdoll and landed back in the water, directly in front of the light. She broke the surface and gasped for air, her eyes closed against it’s brilliance.

“You idiot! Don’t leave me!” Keisha screamed from the bank.

Quin opened her eyes and let the light fill them. “I have to.”

The light poured over her, slamming energy into every pore. She felt her body sing and scream. Overloaded with energy it began to die. She could feel it, falling away cell by cell. She sighed and closed her eyes.

 

“You there!” the queen pointed at a thin scraggly man. “Tell us where we are.”

The man looked at her blankly. “Just past the field your highness.”

The queen turned to survey the field behind her. It was a yellow grassland strewn with abandoned hunks of wheat and corn.

The man plucked a fruit from a nearby blossoming tree. “Apricot?”

“I don’t want your fruit. I want to know where you can go from here.”

He rolled the apricot around in his hand, thinking. “Well, you can go forward or you can go back. Or you can stay here, like me.”

“Why on earth would we choose to stay here?”

“Because there’s something important I’ve forgotten.”

The queen paused. “Why is that?”

He gazed at the yellow field. “I don’t… know.”

“What happens if we go back?”

He shrugged. “You go back.”

“And if we go forward…”

“You go forward. I don’t know, I’ve only been here. With the apricot trees.” He continued to roll the fruit around his hand.

“Well for gods sakes man, eat it if you plucked it. You’re letting it go to waste.”

He looked at the small orange ball as though he had only just noticed its existence. “Oh yes, of course.”

He broke the apricot into two perfect halves. Juice poured onto the grass in a waterfall of golden liquid.

“That’s why.” He whispered, raising his head. He gazed across the yellow valley.

“This is the place that I died.”

The queen looked back at the field and could suddenly see the place he was buried. The ground was wet.

She turned back to him. “You were the figure in the water.”

He nodded. “Why didn’t you save me?”

She looked down at her hands. She was wearing golden gloves. She looked up at the apricot trees. “We must go forward.” She said determinedly.

“Take me with you.” The man grabbed her arm.

“Follow me.” She demanded and strode towards the foliage. Pushing past the onslaught of apricots she stepped out the other side.

 

Keisha awoke. She stared into utter darkness. She reached out and touched nothing.

“Welcome.”

She tried to scream but nothing happened. The voice had spoken inside her head.

“Where am I?” she tried to say but only managed to think.

“The other side.”

“Why can’t I see anything? Why can’t I touch anything?”

“You have closed off your mind. You must release it to see and feel.”

“What? Why? How?”

“Look inside yourself. Know yourself. Then when you find yourself, reach out and touch someone.”

“I don’t understand!”

“Relax. Your body is an empty shell. See your hara, a small ball of light glowing like a sun. Feel it. Let it expand to fill your body.”

Keisha struggled. She thrashed around in her mind, desperate to find a way out, but the voice just kept repeating that mantra. Finally, she listened. And followed.

“Relax.”

She relaxed.

“You body is an empty shell.”

“My body is an empty shell.”

“See you hara. A small ball of light glowing like a sun.”

She was startled when a small ball of red light appeared. It pulsed lightly.

“Feel it.”

It felt warm. She felt her body fill with the warmth.

“Let it fill to expand you body.”

“I have.”

“Good, now let it fill to expand past your body.

She relaxed and let the warm red light overflow her boundaries and leak into wherever she was.

She felt a ping of warm yellow.

“Hello?”

“Hello Keisha.”

“Quin! What happened?”

“You kept running from me Keisha.”

“What? No, I was running from the light!”

“You kept running from me Keisha.”

The warm yellow hardened to a cold gold.

“You did this to me?”

“Not just you. Everyone.”

“Why? Why would you do this to us?”

“See for yourself. Feel for yourself.”

Keisha let the warm red go further. She felt a ping of cold blue.

“Hello?” it said.

“Hello.”

“Keisha, I found this man wandering the point between worlds. Maybe you can help him.”

“You’re that queen, aren’t you?”

“Yes. And you’re the man that drowned. It would have been a lot more pleasant if you’d let me do it.”

“Where are we?”

“The other side.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Don’t try to understand. Just see and feel.”

“You poor man. You’re so cold. I’m sorry I didn’t stop to save you.”

“You could save me now.”

Cold blue and warm red touched and bled to make a striking purple.

Pleased, the golden light drifted across the rest of the saved. There were many pings of colour waiting to bloom. Muddled brown, shining pink, simmering purple, tepid green, cold black, harsh violet. All waiting for her.

Golden light glowing stronger, she flitted between each and every light she could feel, bringing them out. Hundreds of thousands grew brighter. The lights mingled and entwined, creating new unknown and incredible colours.

She stopped at the last one.

“Hello.”

“Hello? Whose there? Why can’t I see you?”

“You need to open your mind. It’s okay, I’ll help you. Relax. Your body is an empty shell. See your hara, a small ball of light glowing like a sun. Feel it. Let it expand to fill your body. Let it expand beyond your body.”

The orange grew brighter and stronger. It shone vibrantly.

“You’re golden.”

“Yes.”

“The last thing I remember is gold light. …You were that wall of light.”

“Yes.”

“Why would you do such a thing?”

“Isn’t it better to see and feel than to live your life in a dark shell?”

The orange light reached out and touched the impossible rainbow that made up the entirety of humanity.

“…Yes.”