A Soulless Destiny (On hold, pending major revisions)

Part 4 - Scarier Than Nukes

Lama Thongwa Yeshe was leading a meditation session when the Lemurians attacked. It took everyone completely by surprise. In previous battles, the invaders had been strategic, targeting population centers, military bases, or food-production facilities; anything that the humans could use against them. Attacking a Tibetan monastery seemed completely arbitrary. With no means of defending themselves, the monks could only do their best to evacuate and not die. With the indiscriminate bloodlust of the Lemurians, there was only so much they could do.

Thongwa Yeshe found himself in a rather peculiar situation. Being the responsible teacher that he was, he had stayed behind to help the junior monks escape. Before he had the chance to save himself, the Lemurians had destroyed and sealed up the escape route, leaving him to face the squad that was now bursting through the doors, moving swiftly without a superfluous step.  Realizing he hadn't long to live, he sat back down on his cushion and began meditating. The Lemurians, however, did not fire their plasma blasters, or raise their scythe-like cutters at him. Instead, they all stood to the side as two larger individuals entered the room, walking towards the senior monk with a leviathan's pace.

Thongwa Yeshe saw everything that was happening and was confused by this new development. However, he continued to sit and meditate, determined not to break his concentration. The two larger Lemurians stood before him, the eyes on their torso twitching as they studied him and deliberated their next move. They then briefly turned to face each other, their giant mouths morphing between shapes with differentiated beats like code. One of them raised its cutters. Thongwa Yeshe readied himself for the end, but to his surprise, the cutter came down on its partner. His face and robes were splashed with the yellow ooze that sputtered from the victim's head. Unaware of possession capabilities, he had no idea what was coming next.

It started with a piercing pain in his throat like an invisible claw had gripped onto his larynx. Then came the pull, like his gullet was being ripped out. A normal person would have been screaming and writhing, but Thongwa Yeshe, through his decades of meditation practice, had learned to work with the pain. Instead of struggling and fighting, he accepted the pain as part of his experience. It was a matter of stepping back mentally and observing as a detached observer. Of course, if he had known what was really happening, he might have not been as serene. In this case, ignorance really was bliss.

Then came the strangeness. A new voice entered his consciousness, speaking in tongues no person could comprehend. Even so, it was pretty obvious that this foreign mind intended to harm. It began smashing away at memories, leaving behind only a select few. Thongwa Yeshe realized this mind wanted to take over his own, and that the memories it was sparing had mostly to do with his knowledge of reincarnation and the process of death. It was a unique experience, and he decided to welcome it. Just as with the pain, he embraced it, looked into it, integrated himself with it. He saw that the mind was taken by surprise. It had expected resistance, terror, but instead, it only felt compassion and understanding. Its attacks slowed and soon became docile. Thongwa Yeshe felt this new entity becoming one with him, both their identities dissolving and flowing into each other, like the meeting of two puddles of water. At this point, his soul had already been destroyed, but lacking the technology and understanding of the Lemurians, he had no way of knowing that. Instead, he focused on the dance of the minds, and soon, both he and the mind were no more. Somebody else now resided in his body.

The new person broke out of his meditation and saw the other Lemurians watching him in anticipation. He knew what he was expected to do, and he knew that they didn't know what had really happened. They wanted information from a body possessed by an angry Lemurian, but this person was anything but angry. He had a newfound purpose, and he needed to act on it fast. But first, he had to make them think they had succeeded.