Post by Gabriel Constant on Aug 25, 2015 1:45:11 GMT -5
I don't wanna run
I don't have a place to run to
I don't see the sun
I don't understand what I must do
-Ra, "High Sensitivity"
I don't have a place to run to
I don't see the sun
I don't understand what I must do
-Ra, "High Sensitivity"
15 August 2015
The Los Angeles skyline was falling apart.
Buildings were in a constant cycle of decay and renewal. The city could barely rebuild before it was torn down again, and it was only getting worse. Dust and debris clogged the air as much as smog, such that medical masks and even hard hats were becoming not only commonplace, but necessary.
And there was the U.S. Bank Tower. That building had been destroyed years ago. It was being rebuilt, but what he was looking at was the old Tower. In the future.
Gabriel stood in the middle of it all, watching days pass into nights at hyperspeed. What year was it? He couldn’t tell. The date he had sought was the seventeenth of August, 2017. It had been difficult to even reach it, as though his mind had had to force its way upstream. Backwards. And now that he was here, he found himself with even more questions than he’d had before.
He took a few steps forward. It was shaky; the vision was. He would have to be very careful. His ability had begun to tax him greatly of late. It was like trying to establish a stable connection with a cell phone - the more the phone tried but couldn’t get enough bars, the faster it drained its own battery. And Gabriel was definitely feeling drained already.
Stooping down, he touched the sidewalk. The concrete felt grainy, over-dry. The whole city was like a mirage on a desert, he thought to himself. A very large mirage.
It took some effort, but Gabriel managed to phase fully into the vision. Immediately he stopped a passing man with a hand to the shoulder. “What’s happened?”
The man shrugged. “What do you mean? It’s just another day.”
Gabriel frowned. “Okay, then why is any old day like this?”
Now the man stopped and scoffed. “What, you been in a coma the past few years, man?”
“Let’s say I was.” Gabriel narrowed his eyes.
The man huffed, then looked over the skyline. “We should’ve listened to them. Looked after them. They were right, wouldn’t you know it.”
“‘They’?” Gabriel asked. That earned him an even stranger look from the man, but the man leaned in a bit, as though there was anyone around to overhear him.
“Kilvayne and them. No one talks about it anymore, all right? Let it go; this is how things are. We’re all gonna die. That’s it.”
“We don’t have to.” Now Gabriel leaned in. “Tell me what happened.”
Gabriel lurched forward and fell out of his chair.
The floor he landed on was cool, dusty wood tile. He knew where he was; he let himself lie there for a few minutes. He was safe there, perhaps more so than anywhere else, now that he knew what he did. As little as even that was.
But if that was the future, or at least a future… that meant he had failed somehow. He had failed even before he had started. Talk about discouraging. Now he had to make room in his plans against something even he didn’t think he could fight.
Time.
He exhaled and propped himself on his palms. His body was starting to recover from the shock and strain of the vision. Balancing on his laurels now, he reached for the chair and pulled himself up to his feet with a soft grunt. Then he took a few stumbling steps forward, pulling the chair along him, until he reached the balcony and Royal Street was beneath his feet.
New Orleans. One of those rare places where the past and present met and fused with taste. Setting the chair down, Gabriel leaned into it and propped his feet up on the balustrade. It had been some time since he had visited this place; after setting roots at Hamiyah, the Constants had kept this condo as a safe house… and perhaps a bit of sentiment. It was appropriate, then, that he had slipped out of home and onto the continent for “safety” from something, that something being time itself.
Forty-three. Two mornings coming he would be forty-three years old. He sighed. At least he could say he had done something with his life. Something “good,” at least. He had done plenty of evil, but when he looked at his two beautiful daughters he thought he just might be a little bit redeemed.
Redemption. Why was it that, lately, whenever the world needed saving, it seemed to turn to him? He had not been the one to “kill” Lilith, no, but he was the one who had weaved it a safety net in the form of the Kilvayne administration. He’d been in on the ground floor with the other Horsemen as well. Why, he was never entirely sure. His family had been perfectly safe on Hawai’i. His friends were capable of handling themselves.
Yet again Gabriel found himself weaving a new plan to save the damn world, a world that had ever done what for him again? He glanced at the street below, and the littered passersby dawdling along it at this hour of night. Four years had passed since he had nearly been horrifically disfigured by an attempted attack on his face. He might have had it coming. And he might have married the crazed would-be attacker a year and change later. Life happened that way.
And life always had to be especially wily around precogs. Lucius was another one he hadn’t seen coming. Well, had seen, but as a cohort, not as the brother the man was to him now. The same went for Christian. So he supposed the world, or God or whatever you wanted to call it, had given him a few things to be thankful for. To protect.
Things worth fighting for. Even against the most impossible enemy.
“Well, then, Constant, you’re the Architect.” He clasped his hands over his head. He needed a start. He needed to place all the players, all the factors. Measure them up. And then bend them to his own will.
“Build something.”
Buildings were in a constant cycle of decay and renewal. The city could barely rebuild before it was torn down again, and it was only getting worse. Dust and debris clogged the air as much as smog, such that medical masks and even hard hats were becoming not only commonplace, but necessary.
And there was the U.S. Bank Tower. That building had been destroyed years ago. It was being rebuilt, but what he was looking at was the old Tower. In the future.
Gabriel stood in the middle of it all, watching days pass into nights at hyperspeed. What year was it? He couldn’t tell. The date he had sought was the seventeenth of August, 2017. It had been difficult to even reach it, as though his mind had had to force its way upstream. Backwards. And now that he was here, he found himself with even more questions than he’d had before.
He took a few steps forward. It was shaky; the vision was. He would have to be very careful. His ability had begun to tax him greatly of late. It was like trying to establish a stable connection with a cell phone - the more the phone tried but couldn’t get enough bars, the faster it drained its own battery. And Gabriel was definitely feeling drained already.
Stooping down, he touched the sidewalk. The concrete felt grainy, over-dry. The whole city was like a mirage on a desert, he thought to himself. A very large mirage.
It took some effort, but Gabriel managed to phase fully into the vision. Immediately he stopped a passing man with a hand to the shoulder. “What’s happened?”
The man shrugged. “What do you mean? It’s just another day.”
Gabriel frowned. “Okay, then why is any old day like this?”
Now the man stopped and scoffed. “What, you been in a coma the past few years, man?”
“Let’s say I was.” Gabriel narrowed his eyes.
The man huffed, then looked over the skyline. “We should’ve listened to them. Looked after them. They were right, wouldn’t you know it.”
“‘They’?” Gabriel asked. That earned him an even stranger look from the man, but the man leaned in a bit, as though there was anyone around to overhear him.
“Kilvayne and them. No one talks about it anymore, all right? Let it go; this is how things are. We’re all gonna die. That’s it.”
“We don’t have to.” Now Gabriel leaned in. “Tell me what happened.”
Gabriel lurched forward and fell out of his chair.
The floor he landed on was cool, dusty wood tile. He knew where he was; he let himself lie there for a few minutes. He was safe there, perhaps more so than anywhere else, now that he knew what he did. As little as even that was.
But if that was the future, or at least a future… that meant he had failed somehow. He had failed even before he had started. Talk about discouraging. Now he had to make room in his plans against something even he didn’t think he could fight.
Time.
He exhaled and propped himself on his palms. His body was starting to recover from the shock and strain of the vision. Balancing on his laurels now, he reached for the chair and pulled himself up to his feet with a soft grunt. Then he took a few stumbling steps forward, pulling the chair along him, until he reached the balcony and Royal Street was beneath his feet.
New Orleans. One of those rare places where the past and present met and fused with taste. Setting the chair down, Gabriel leaned into it and propped his feet up on the balustrade. It had been some time since he had visited this place; after setting roots at Hamiyah, the Constants had kept this condo as a safe house… and perhaps a bit of sentiment. It was appropriate, then, that he had slipped out of home and onto the continent for “safety” from something, that something being time itself.
Forty-three. Two mornings coming he would be forty-three years old. He sighed. At least he could say he had done something with his life. Something “good,” at least. He had done plenty of evil, but when he looked at his two beautiful daughters he thought he just might be a little bit redeemed.
Redemption. Why was it that, lately, whenever the world needed saving, it seemed to turn to him? He had not been the one to “kill” Lilith, no, but he was the one who had weaved it a safety net in the form of the Kilvayne administration. He’d been in on the ground floor with the other Horsemen as well. Why, he was never entirely sure. His family had been perfectly safe on Hawai’i. His friends were capable of handling themselves.
Yet again Gabriel found himself weaving a new plan to save the damn world, a world that had ever done what for him again? He glanced at the street below, and the littered passersby dawdling along it at this hour of night. Four years had passed since he had nearly been horrifically disfigured by an attempted attack on his face. He might have had it coming. And he might have married the crazed would-be attacker a year and change later. Life happened that way.
And life always had to be especially wily around precogs. Lucius was another one he hadn’t seen coming. Well, had seen, but as a cohort, not as the brother the man was to him now. The same went for Christian. So he supposed the world, or God or whatever you wanted to call it, had given him a few things to be thankful for. To protect.
Things worth fighting for. Even against the most impossible enemy.
“Well, then, Constant, you’re the Architect.” He clasped his hands over his head. He needed a start. He needed to place all the players, all the factors. Measure them up. And then bend them to his own will.
“Build something.”
