Endless Embers

The divide between the shadows of the night and the dazzle of daylight becomes truly apparent at the dawn of dark. ‘The dawn of dark’, some may call it sunset yet those of society who choose to live at such a time decide it’s true purpose. That of which being the time when words turn to whispers and abysmal horrors unfold.

Duncan’s dreary head laid rest upon the begrimed bench, overlooking cliffs that competed with skyscrapers. As he calmly stared forward he couldn’t help but acknowledge the flames of a thousand infernos staring back at him. With agonising fury, the impeding star of the sky declined upon the horizon with an autumnal blaze. His head hung low as he knew what followed.

Without a moment to think he leapt from the elm and dove forth over the colossal overhang, avoiding the incoming bane of civilisation.

To the naked caveman eyeball, this may seem like a peculiar and rather unexplained occurrence yet to Duncan this was his natural way of living. For 3 years now he had lived in a Schrödinger’s cat methodology of life. Both dead and alive simultaneously. This was due to him being dead in the eyes of the law and alive in the contorted vision of darkness. 3 years. 3 years Duncan had survived such a lifestyle and it had become imperative to him that he must pursue it. For if he neglected it for more than a moment, he would no longer be both alive and dead, only 6 feet under…

As Duncan soared down the descending gale of despair, he positioned himself accurately and dove forth into an inconspicuous lake of cerulean. He stood up, brushed himself off, took a breath and looked up at the quite frankly unwelcome sight of people.

Evidently his tricks were finally matched as his last concealed environment had been discovered. A smirk slid upon his face as he turned and initiated his flight response. As he ran with the speed of a caffeine induced cheetah he briefly turned back to see the odd sight of no one on his trail. But how could this be? He had been in this exact situation more times than he could count and every time he had a constant barrage of humanity accompanying him. Duncan knew something was out of the ordinary right until the point where a steel blade flew into his abdomen.

A bellow of pain arose from his vocal cords, shunning the tenfold culprits and animals alike. Fighting back for the sake of his sustenance, he ripped the blade from his belly and struck it straight back into the user, tearing through swarms of cells and scattering carmine from every visible orifice.

With little to no hesitation, Duncan once again attempted his escapade as agony engulfed his senses and rendered him redundant as he fell to the ground in a state of denial.

After his unwelcome elongated slumber he awoke to the distressing cry of parakeets, screeching through his ear canals and shattering his adoration for winged creatures. He had not a moment to waste however, leaping up and out of the desolate environment and into the oncoming ocean of cedar.

He sauntered onwards, encroaching upon the even more darkened canopy of tenebrosity, though this time it was not self-inflicted, but merely Mother Nature’s depiction of torture. If there was one thing Duncan could count on, it was his sight, though in this land even that had stabbed him in his back. Nonetheless, he walked and walked until his legs dragged like anvils and his back broke like a biscuit.

Unfortunately in an inconveniently expected turn of events, his past had once again caught up with him. The repetitive armada of agony and enemies had arrived for his head once again and this time his manoeuvres of escape appeared limited.

“You knew this day would come Duncan, the day when your crimes catch up with you!” this particular message arrived via the mouth of his own brother, a man that Duncan had no respect for, the same man that had lacerated his stomach with steel not long ago. “The day my schemes end will be the day the world does the same you naïve brute,” with that comment an arrow sliced past his cerebrum and stifled the swaying of the leaves in the gushing wind. 

As to why his enemies were manipulating sycamore sticks instead of lead slugs he knew not, though one thing he did know was that he was an unwelcome visitor in this battle of wits. Pulling a pistol from his pants he unloaded an armada of bullets upon his foes, yet they repelled back at him as shields stood valiant in their arms.

With a mix of admiration and fury, he ran forth into the crowd, no longer ‘guns a-blazing’ but ‘swords a-swaying’. After a presumed eternity of slashing and stabbing, he fell to his knees with an army’s worth of blood upon his cloak. A cloak that had been passed down for generations, not by family but by victory in battle for it had been stolen a dozen times, until finally resting atop Duncan’s breastplate.

He arose from the ground, peering around at the battalion of no longer breathing men and women alike, before marching onwards in his journey of solitariness.

He knew not what to do nor where to go, though one thing was certain in his contorted mind, secrecy was now a necessity. He sauntered northbound in the hopes of some abandoned shelter for him to rest his dreary head upon once again. Sadly all that appeared was the continuous swarms of cedar and more cedar, now becoming his most hated tree. 

However not all was lost, for in some twisted plot he stumbled upon a familiar yet unknown beech bench laid rest upon an overhanging cliff edge. He sat down on the splintering seating and rested. As he looked up, he saw the sun appearing on the horizon, marking the dawning of day and the cycle of a journey. Finally feeling at peace with the world, a sudden solemn streak of sycamore struck through his skull in a cruel act of irony as his now truly lifeless soul fell down over the edge, his cloak flailing in the zephyr.