This was a weird dream I had last night with a very interesting plot. I thought it was a really sweet story and I didn't want to wake up this morning because it was so fun and adorable.
I've been playing a lot of minecraft lately, so I guess my brain borrowed the name "Ghast" from that. LOL but the rest....I have no idea where it came from. Seems like I always have weird dreams on Saturday nights. Lulz.
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There was a creature called Ghast whose appearance morphed with the world around it. He was fearsome in the hellish dimension he came from, a world of fire and monsters, and shadows and demons. He mirrored the environment he lived in, and this was a violent environment so he was the most dangerous of them all.
Fished out of the netherworld by a band of researchers, for years he lived in a university surrounded by knowledge. There he took the appearance of a squat, learned man, always a book in hand and reading glasses glued to his face. For hundreds of years he stayed there, researching and learning, and students would come to him with questions. Ghast had no personal relationships at the university, because the university was a place for learning, teaching and organizing data, and so, knowledge was his life.
One day the sultan requested that Ghast relocate to the palace, where he would act as the sultans vizier and teacher to the royal children. The palace was place of responsibility and he was the most responsible of them all. For generations he led and influenced the royals, and the country blossomed under his watchful eye.
Like dawn, the modern era was breaking, illuminating the world. He stayed with the royal family for many years into this dawn. One day they decided to take a trip over seas and invited him to come with them. Bound by his responsibility to the king, he agreed.
They took him to an amusement park. This was a huge place full of color and laughter- a powerhouse of happiness for all who visited. He felt younger here, more energized. The family he came with left him behind, no longer recognizing him, but that didn't matter to him. In the form of an exuberant young man, he came to work at this amusement park.
The theme of the park was family, laughter, and happiness. He had been content in his previous lives as a philosopher and leader, but here he felt a different kind of happiness he had never experienced. Even so, there was something missing, but he didn't know what.
There was a young woman working there, a mirror of the age he appeared, who had gradually fallen in love with him. He noticed that the more time she spent around him, the warmer he felt. Eventually he discovered that the happiness of the park paled in comparison to the bright burning feeling he felt when he spent time near this young woman. When she went home for the night the light inside of him burned out, and he felt empty and lonely. The feeling of being around her was addicting, and so he tried to spend as much time around her as he could. He discovered that her hands fit perfectly in his and that her hair was soft and that the laughter and happiness from the park followed him wherever he went when he was with her.
One day he asked this young woman if he could marry her and she agreed. Whatever she felt, he felt it too. When she was sad, so was he. When she was happy, so was he. When she felt love, so did he. It wasn't always perfect, but she had become his environment, and it was a much more surprising and fulfilling one than any he had been in before.
The day his child was born, they went to the hospital and he felt her pain and anxiety, but then her overwhelming happiness and the sight of their new baby. Not long after that, another baby was born. His environment was changing, and so did he- into a fatherly type man who was good with kids and responsible for his family and loved his wife.
But the woman wondered if he was only mirroring her. Did he ever have his own feelings? She thought sadly. She had a dream one night where a shadow had come and spoken to her. "Your love for him is what keeps him here." It had whispered. "If you turn around he will disappear. You are his purpose, and without purpose he will be nothing."
Ghast awoke in a panic, for he had had the same dream. From that day onward he followed his wife wherever she went, because if he left her sight, he would disappear forever.
She kept an eye on him, also unsettled by the dream, but not understanding it's true meaning, it was only a dream after all.
Laying in bed he thought back on his past lives and how empty they were compared to this one. Where before, the world was what he lived for, now his family was what he lived for- and they we were more important than anything else in the universe. Academia, power, meant nothing to him. This small group of people where what mattered, and he had never lived before he found them. But where the world was a permanent thing, the lives of his family were fragile and fleeting and there was much more a stake if he lost them. If he lost them, he would lose himself as well.
He kept his wife close every night, afraid of the day he would disappear and never see her again. He thought of his children and what they would do without a father. In frustration, he silently cursed himself for not having his own feelings. Why could he only live through what was around him? It was a curse! He was convinced that if he had his own feelings, his own thoughts, he would be able to stay.
His wife could feel his frustration. With surprise she realized that the more time you spend around a person, the more you become like them. His extreme ability to perceive what was around him wasn't a weakness or a fault, it was a strength, and it was one she was learning to acquire herself by spending time with him.
Still depressed, he drifted off into a troubled sleep and didn't wake up that morning. In his dreams he was back in that place with fire and shadow. He looked at his hands, which were changing, becoming bigger, sharper, and gaseous. His eyes were huge and burning- glowing red like the fire of the surrounding landscape. Shadows were attacking him, and in defense he set them ablaze with just a thought. Some laughed and some screamed as the fire danced over them. Their masochistic horror was infectious. He laughed as it filled him. He was one of them, the monstrous, pale shadow rising up from the flames, back in its element. He had missed this.
He wife leaned over him, worried. His kids shook him, we're hungry, they said, wake up now, but there was no response.
Kill the humans, the shadows whispered in his nightmare. When they come kill them. The shadows whispered again and again, until the void was filled with their feverish whispering.
He was fading, losing grip on the real world, falling into the void.
His young son shook him and then pulled his hand back, confused. Did his hand just go through daddy?
Kill them, the shadows whispered, kill the humans. A huge shadow raised up, it's glowing purple eyes meeting his red ones. Ghast nodded at it in recognition. We were all humans once, it said. We are dwindling. We need more. Kill the humans!
Daddy is sleeping kids, his wife said shooing them away. Go back to bed, let daddy sleep. But the truth was she was much more worried then she let on. She snuggled down, hugging his unresisting arm and closed her eyes.
Being here, Ghast could hardly remember his days spent on earth. He remembered this place very well though. He had spent an eternity here. It was almost like he had never left.
Almost. Ghast knew there was something essentially different about himself. His surroundings were the same as before, but he wasn't.
I won't. He replied to their echoing whispers. I do what I want. He said to the bubbling magma and the fading screams.
Do it! they hissed.
He ignored them.
You have become too human they snarled. You have spent too much time on earth.
He shrugged. Earth was a fleeting memory. Maybe he had spent a lot of time there, but it didn't matter. And neither did what they were saying.
He turned away from the shadows. Their influence wasn't over him.
Then he saw her, in the distance, through the smoke and fire. His wife.
He sped towards her, feeling younger and happier the closer he got.
There you are! She said.
Her hands fit perfectly in his. He leaned his forehead against hers. She was his life. He realized he wanted to go back with her. He wanted to see his kids again. This had been just a test to prove to himself what he had gained. He had gained free will, the ability to make his own choices, feel his own feelings. He had earned a life.
