Wanderlust

From beneath the shadows, every night, a cloaked man emerged, his face white against the black contrast of his attire. Every night, he walked through riverbanks and mountains, valleys and forests, villages and pastures, surveying with great detail. A curious little beeping instrument was attached on his temple, as if burned into his skin. Its light blinked red on interval, like fireflies. At times, especially on tours to the forests, it beeped more occasionally, more frequently, it was then that the man stood perfectly still. When finally, the beeps sounded with such frequency that it was impossible to distinguish between it and a whistling kettle, the cloaked man responded. Sometimes with a kick to the ground, sometimes with a swift slice through air, sometimes he just ducked. It was only long after the cloaked man departed, that you would find a lifeless snake or a decapitated bear on the ground where he stood. 

***************

Earth is not earth anymore. It is TERRA - 0001. The original. The one where it all started. Millions of potential homes lay scattered in the vast sky, thousands of them already colonized. The humans were taking over the galaxy. Soon they would rule the Universe. The light of their power was blinding, with their eyes squinted, they could barely see the full picture.

Earth was not earth anymore. It was a manufacturing hub. A factory, to produce and manufacture humans. Men and women deemed reproductively superior were utilized to produce fit children. Fit, in every sense of the word. They had to survive and populate planets, after all. Divided into sections, the children were shipped off—this lot to Kaeds, this one to Kok, the best ones to TERRA - 4480. Gradually, the new humans learned to build fire and agriculture and villages on these new homes. Some were already prosperous kingdoms. Each planet, with one superior from the race of Old Humans - the Tral, who oversaw evolution.

***********

The cloaked figure emerged each morning to address the New Humans. The Tral, he referred to himself as such, swept his lifeless eyes over his crowd. He looked, but did not see. The field could be packed with people, or be desolate, his glance never changed. Each morning, he taught them to keep their animals well nourished, he told them of dangers in the forests and how to counter them, he taught them the uses as well as location of life saving herbs. He taught them to read the stars and gauge the weather. He taught them, most importantly, that superficial differences on their bodies are unique but common. 

"We are one." 

"We are one." The crowd would chant louder.

**********

The Tral would move from one part of his world, to another, as the New Humans were spread all across. 

The Tral never taught the New Humans this, but the history of his ancestors was something he was extensively made to go through. He was made to read books upon books on how to read crowds, how to control them. One thing that was never amiss in a transforming society was - the desire to overthrow a ruler, to overthrow power. The desire to take their lives into their own hands. Every civilization had this phase, which was usually when things started to get tricky. Ignoring rules and orders, vandalizing property, increased disorders and tensions, and assassination attempts followed, like in every emerging society. 

The Tral noted the crowd shrivelling up, avoiding looking at him. A few, outright sneering at him. He held their gaze, especially, not unnerved by the pure rage and hate in their eyes. Slowly, they lowered their heads, clenching their jaws.

The Tral saw the crowd for what it was - the first sign of an impending revolution.

The next thing he knows, the Tral is staring at a small boy with a slingshot aimed at him. Beeps from the instrument on his temple rang furiously, but the Tral tapped once behind his ear, and it subsided. He looks down at him from his dais, his eyes widening ever-so-slightly. The people held their breaths waiting for something to happen, their hearts on overdrive. But unbeknownst to them, the Tral's heart was beating wildly in his chest, too. His breath falters, but he keeps his composure. "It cannot be," he thinks.

"Give me back my bags of rice!" The boy screamed.

The Tral didn't move to speak.

"Four of 'em! I worked hard to grow them, how could you just steal it from me?" The boy said, his voice breaking. 

The Tral looked at the boy. Really looked at him. He watched his curly amber hair tied up behind his head. He watched his nose, scrunched up in an angry frown. Finally, he took in his eyes. Those green orbs, the same intensity in each of them, as once had been in a certain someone's. This cannot be. But it was. And it was staring right at him.

"I did not steal your bags of rice," the Tral replied, tersely.

"The tribe-head has revealed to me everything. Stop lying!" 

The Tral slowly stepped down the dais. He reached the little boy, no more than ten years of age, and held his shoulders lightly. Bending down to his level, the Tral said, "alright, I’ll give you to them. Will you come with me?" 

The boy hesitated, but nodded at last. At the granaries, he was met with bags and bags of not only rice, but so much more. His stomach rumbled at the sight. From across the room, the boy caught the Tral watching his every move. He stared at him, as if working out a puzzle. 

"I would not steal," he said, feeling insulted.

The Tral didn't know what he said. He only heard his voice. Even not wanting the answer, he asked him, "Are you from the Cottage?"

"Do not think me weak just because I grew up an orphan," he warned.

"Tell me your name," asked the Tral.

"Why would I?" 

The Tral walked towards the boy. He unbuttoned his cloak and let it fall down. As he took the boy's face in his hands, one could see, clear as day, the lines that decorated his face. His eyes were brimming, and held an emotion he was afraid to name. 

"My name is Alfred. And yours?" He asked, his voice, a whisper. 

The boy stood stunned. He believed he was standing before a different person altogether. 

"I'm Price." 

Price didn't know what enchanted him to trust this man he stood against not moments ago, he just knew he did. Perhaps, it was because he saw in the Tral's—Alfred's eyes, not sympathy for an orphan child, but genuine recognition, longing, love. Perhaps, that was why he could not deny his invite to dinner that night. 

"How long since you had a full meal, my boy?" Alfred asked, concern lacing his features.

"Thank you for inviting me to your home. I appreciate it," Price said instead.

Alfred got up from the chair he was sitting in, beside Price, and wandered toward the window.

"Home," he said with a chuckle. "Yeah, I'd like to be home." 

Alfred turned around to watch the puzzled expression on Price's face.

"My home...is far away. You know what it is—was called? Earth," he said, a wistful smile on his face. Alfred walked back to Price and settled beside him. "That is where i was born, where i grew up. The sun there, spread a golden yellow hue all across our lands, unlike the violet here. We'd play an awful lot of games together, and finally when we tired out, we would tell each other stories that once our grandparents told us," Alfred stared at the boy's half-empty plate, but his thoughts were far away, floating in the memories of another world. 

"That is where I met your mother," Alfred looked at Price. "Cecilia, was her name. I remember," he closed his eyes, "my Cecilia, the love of my life. I remember her long, red hair cascading down her back. I remember the way my hands trembled the first time I held her. I remember the fierceness, the sheer rage in her eyes—much like yours—when I told her I was appointed as a Tral for this planet." 

Alfred looked down on Price, waiting for a reaction.

"Was my mother..." Price started, but was apparently unable to come up with anything. He resorted, instead, to "Why don't you go back? You need to go back, go back to your home if you are not happy here."

Alfred shook his head, "that will only be possible on the day I die."

A little unnerved with the whole conversation, Price asked him about the instrument he always carried on his temple. 

“This, my dear,” Alfred said, taking it off, “is called the Beeper. It alerts me when their is danger nearby. It is my only friend, so to speak,” he chuckled. 

“I could be your friend,” Price offered reluctantly, earning a bright smile from Alfred. 

Soon after, with a full stomach, Price fell asleep on the dining table. Alfred smiled fondly at the boy, and lifted him up to take him to bed. And all of a sudden, it wasn't a little boy he held in his arms, it was a ray of hope that he cradled. Maybe, things wouldn't be so bad anymore. Maybe, I could try to fit in this world, someday, call it my own. For him. For him. 

Lulled with happy thoughts, Alfred fell into a dreamless sleep and only awoke just before dawn to find Price staring up at him. Alfred chuckled and asked him what was on his mind.

"I had a bad dream," he replied, seriously.

Alfred stroked the boy's hair, "nothing will go wrong anymore. I promise, my boy."

Giddy with optimism, Alfred sprung out of bed and washed up.

"I've got to go to work," he said, ruefully, "but don't worry, I’ll bring you cherries tonight!" 

The boy only looked at Alfred. He wanted Alfred to stop, to never leave. His dream hadn't ended so well.

"Wait for me," Alfred said.

But he did. Price waited for him the entire day, and then the entire night. Sometime in the night, he remembered clutching the Beeper Alfred had forgotten home that day, clutching it close to his heart and sobbing. What happened after that was a blur. He faintly remembered the enthusiastic chants of "freedom from the Tral!" He recalled being dragged out of his rooms, hands shaking his shoulders, lips kissing his tear-stricken face, relieved voices thanking god that he was safe. The only thing he would vividly remember is detesting the sight of cherries for the rest of his life.