Call of the Aether.

Deacon stood on his farm and looked up at the sky. It was the year 1806 and the farms of Louisiana had been ravaged by the crop circles. Everyone was stumped by the incidents but Deacon had seen something more in the "signs". They resembled symbols of the constellations. Simple yet incredibly accurate.

He watched the stars and squatted right in the middle of one such design. His symbol, the one demarcated on his property was Orion. Above the fertile farm another Orion inched its way across the barren black sky. A dark cloud raced against the constellation. And then there was a flash and Deacon squatted no more on his field.

Deacon was awake. He couldnt see anything. Or what he could see was nothing. He could also hear the Nothing. It was kinda odd. Was he dead? He remembered the flash. It came from a star that wasnt a star. A proxy star hidden amongst the other stars. Remembering his current predicament, Deacon moved his hands. Yes he could move them freely. His limbs could perform free movements. They hadnt bound him.

Yet he couldnt see. Deacon then tried to speak. His mouth formed the words, the voice box exerted itself to generate sound but the sound issued could not be heard. Even if they had blocked his ears he knew it was possible to hear from the inside of his head, when the vibrations moved from his throat through the flesh and bone all the way to his ear. But all he got was Nothing. Deacon began to feel fear. His Captors held him in ways he could not understand.

Deacon in the darkness tried to feel the things around him. He wasnt lying down on. He wasnt sitting. His feet could not feel anything. Deacon knelt and felt for the ground. There was no ground. Was he floating? Was he flying between the stars? Deacon couldnt help his helplessness.
He tried to pinch himself and froze. His right hand couldnt feel his left arm. He tried to to touch his body. The arms swished in the empty space. Each arm tried to feel the shoulder the head. All there was was the Nothing. Deacon began to panic.

Then abruptly a blare resounded and slammed itself on Deacon. Deacon felt his head disintegrating against the sound and then it stopped. Again That Nothing crept back into his ears. Across the darkness a slab of pure white light slammed his eyes followed again by the same darkness. Deacon slowly recuperated what was left of his senses. Blankness filled him.

What happened next was atonishing. His eyes opened themselves. And so did his ears and his mouth. A whole room presented itself to him. Deacon mouthed a few words but nothing came out. He heard sounds. Yes his ears worked. He could see. What bliss it was to be able to see.

His eyes blinked and there it was. A giant room where indescribable creatures were calmly sitting on their indescribable furniture working their indescribable machines. "Is this hell?", he wondered. He waited and then saw a mobile rack carrying something to him. As it got closer what it carried became more and more familiar. Too familiar. It was his body. That plain striped shirt. Those comfy jeans. My watch, My hands, My poor body. He tried to reach out to it. Instead the poor body reached out for its head. Never have such valuables been stolen from in front of the very living eyes of its owner. Deacons panic became despair. He silently wept.

Deacon then knew he was in hell. He was defeated. Broken. There was no redemption. These creatures had destroyed him.


I apologise for the dark nothing nature of this post. This short was inspired by the book Phantoms of the Brain by Ramachandran. It was also partially interpreted from the CoD theory.