Stimuli

The earliest memories that I can recall was the feeling of dew brushing up against the soles of my feet. It was one of the coolest and calming sensations one may ever experience. Grass is a rare sighting where I come from, it comes and goes is waves closest to what you may know as seasons. In the distance, I could make out a vast array of hills and dips in the atmosphere, each one extending its arms out towards the sky as if hoping to bottle up all the stars in the vast night sky.

Today I sit in the same little clearing, atop the same little hill but this time with a different feeling. The last time I was here, all those years ago, I was filled with bubbling laughter and excitement. But now I am filled with feelings of distraught and confusion.

People of our kind experience development around age 7. It's a series of discovery within yourself. A series of connections and countless hours of listening and learning. You listen and learn until you can smell the oncoming storms, taste the sweetness of spring in the corners of your mouth, and feel the buzzing of life within the hemlock tree.

Our people can do many of these wondrous things. They had all the answers to the questions they never asked. But many wanted more. They didn't just want to be able to feel and hear all the textures of life. They wanted to become it. They wanted to seep into the cracks of winter and bind with every snow storm within it. But in order to do these things they had to answer the questions.

I drifted over to a nearby pool of water to stare at my reflection. The first question the greedy people of our kind had to ask themselves was simple. "Who are we?" The answer was simple. We're currents. Not currents of wind or water. Currents of drifting and aimlessly lost particles of this world. Currents of pieces of the universe that have tried to fit in so much they've become outcasts.

We're bodies of refuge for these particles. We don't have a defined shape at first glance. But the more you look at us, the more you start to notice us. We're creatures of the shadows, yet we're made of light in a way. We have a slight transparency glow to us. The most defined shape we can make is that of concentric circles, alternating between dark and light but only choosing one of the two when necessary.

We define ourselves as some type of animal. We animals may only be able to interact with the atmosphere around us by doing little simple things, such as making the grass grow or providing for animals. But the big things, like changing the course of storms or turning day into night with our free will is merely impossible.

We feed off of smaller, useless particles of the universe. What becomes of those particles is energy to move and float around. What is wasted from them are smaller bits of dust and even more useless molocule.

Of course, our kind has the option to reproduce, but nobody sees the use of it. There's too many of us in this small world of ours anyway.

The second question they were left to ask themselves was "why are we here?"

That answer was lost in the complexity of the question.

The general consensus on the subject was that we existed to listen and learn and feel through every breath and sound that existed through nature. We do this to be its companion and guardian. We're meant to find a way to help these things around us strive and live. But we're not meant to stop the karmic things of humanity. Those things are for them to deal with.

The most dangerous and boundary testing question was "what can't we do?" We can defy the rules and laws of reality and of all being but this power is limited to small, but not inconsequential actions. Our power is not finite but can last throughout many infinities. So what is it really limited too?

The question was answered in an accidental discovery. One of our kind was strolling through the streets of some ancient town when they saw a dog. This dog was standing face-to-face with the bear. The dog was covered in mud and caked with blood, he was also shaking with fear. That was when the current realized it. It sensed the bear and the dog, and the dust surrounding the road, it could sense the love the dog had for its owner, but It couldn't sense the fear or terror that the dog was feeling.

This current spread its knowledge with its community. This spread throughout our entire small world. After multiple experiments, they realized the truth of it. We were completely oblivious to fear. Deaf. Mute. Call it whatever you want but it was completely beyond our reach.

Now, remember the currents that I mentioned earlier? The ones that wanted to become life itself? Well, they'd finally realized why invading all forms of life was beyond our grasp. It was because we hadn't conquered all forms of life and emotion and feeling itself.

They wanted to extend our stimuli beyond anybody's reach to the point in which we could feel, taste, and touch fear. At that point, we should be able to seep into all of life's pores.

They started experimenting on currents. Most of them willingly signed up for it too. Most of them faced mere oblivion afterward, but recent findings have shown positive results.

I'm still facing the pool of water. I slowly lean into it until my whole body is submerged in it. The water feels cool against my skin. But only parts of it. I can see the faint squares drawn into the pool. It looks like a glitch. I enter a part of it that feels like silk. This part feels like velvet.

I slowly rotate back up to the surface of the water, a huge white stone licking the skyline. The water-pool trick was a manipulative trick we learned quite some time ago. It was what would have been known to you as a portal.

I walk through the front entrance to the building and am greeted by old stale air. There's another current waiting there for me.

You see, it might sound crazy, but we deserve to merge with al life forms. We've spent so long without a pure understanding of our power and if this is what it takes to get there.

Then so be it.

I'm led to an operating room. The current says that It's not going to hurt one bit. It attaches something to the center of my body and I wait. The last thing I see before falling asleep is an outstretched band of molecules about to puncture me.

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I wake up to a blinding white light surrounding me. I wait for a moment, trying to make sense of it all. I move forward. It seems as if I'm in a room. Except the whole room is white. It's a whiteness that seems to stretch on for miles. It's so white and so bright that burns start to form on my skin.

I move forward again and this time the ground sinks into a deep hole. At this point, I'm free falling.

A deep, stomach-lurching feeling envelopes inside of me before I hit solid ground. It takes me a moment to realize where I am. I'm back in the operating room, the current that was operating on me is hovering over me.

They're saying something but I don't know what. That's when I realize why I can't hear them. There's a strange buzzing, hissing, high pitched squealing sound enveloping in the air around me. And it's progressively getting louder.

I try to speak and then cringe. It feels like flames have enveloped my throat.

The sound has reached a forte now. I can barely hear myself think. I try to scream again. Nothing.

That's when I realize what the sound is.

Fear.

It's a stomach-wrenching, ear bleeding, downright agonizing sound.

I now realize why we were never meant to understand fear.

Because fear has formed our world.

And now we can never escape it.