Genesis [malexmale]

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Sixteen (Some Thousand Years Later)

The Source sent unto me a dream of great importance... and great sorrow.

A dream that came too late for me to act upon it, for the action had already taken place.

I dreamt of a beautiful female. She was tall with long black hair coiled into fat loose curls that cascaded down her back like an inky waterfall. Her bronze skin glowed with perfection, flawless right down to her toes and fingers. Her eyes were like pools of crystal water. And in her arms, she cradled an infant. A tiny creature, so tiny that I could not bear the idea of holding such a thing of fragility. He was sleeping in his mother's arms, his head dusted with black hairs, his thumb planted in his mouth.

This was a goddess. I was unsure how I knew such a thing, but I knew it. And the babe in her arms was a god... A god of great power. That such a tiny thing could contain so much incredible power was mind-boggling to me.

And I watched in fascination as the image faded, as the mother turned a circle, and as she came back around to face me, her babe had aged a year. His black hair was soft and fine, reaching his ears now, and his eyes opened to reveal eyes just like his mother's. The same shape, the same color. In fact, I'd say he was looking more and more like his mother as the days dragged on.

Until I looked upon the mother, and I watched her brilliant proud smile beginning to fade. Fear glowed in her eyes, worry lines marring her young beauty. She held the babe closer, and the babe wept, and she sang a soft beautiful lullaby.

She turned once more, and the babe was older, but still she held him in her arms, this time against her shoulder, one arm supporting his weight and the other wrapped tightly around him, her eyes watching the fog around us with clear fear and paranoia. They darted, locked on everything. Her stress and her agony was beginning to show upon her face. In her arms, the babe had longer hair, as black as the night, his blue eyes watching the world around him with utter fascination, his thumb still stuck between his lips.

She turned again, and the babe was now a toddler. Still small, still preciously cute, still innocent. The mother was distraught now, her arms squeezing her child, her eyes screwed shut as tears flowed own her cheeks, her breath coming in soundless sobs.

She turned again, and again, and again.

And the final time she turned, the child was no longer in her arms and she collapsed to her knees, throwing her head back and screaming in outrage, in raw agony. Tears streaked her face, her empty arms falling open at her sides as she wailed a sound so horrible that I felt as if my heart were breaking all over again. I reached up to clutch my chest, watching as the mother fell upon her side and wept, curling in on herself.

And the image spun in a tight circle before me, and the mother vanished, and was replaced with the child. He stood across from me, in this foggy emptiness of my dream. His long black hair fell to his shoulders, his blue eyes staring directly at me. He wore a child's black cloak, a matching tunic beneath, and the jewelry of a well pampered child.

And before my eyes, he began to age. His body stretched and pulled into that of a man's, his muscles filling out in between bouts of extreme starvation. His hair steadily grew down his back, growing short for only a brief period before once again beginning its descent down his back. His skin darkened over time, having already started with a rich shade of caramel, now darkened by hours in the sun... and becoming viciously marred with scars. As time dragged on, more and more of them spread across him until he was nothing, but a road-map of misery. One even sliced through his left eye, turning it from clear blue to milky white. And with his physical changes, so too came the emotional ones so clear on his face.