Beyond The Horizon

Armonia, the continent of Pantia, the planet Manchas, 2025, CE

A sky blue moped sped through the city under rows of pale yellow street lights.

Dozens of skyscrapers grasped at the black, cloudy sky like stone monoliths. Faded lights filled almost every window. Artificial light projected from the windows and signs, covering everything in neon greens, blues, and reds. People walked about, either making their way to the next bar, exploring or going home with their chosen partners. Music poured out of the clubs, a trio of young people stood beside a gaggle of sleek, cherry red scooters on the side of the street, all of them unlocking the scooters with their flat black tablet devices.

''READY TO RIDE.''

The young man on the sky blue moped watched them all woop with excitement before riding off on the opposite side of the road as him in search of a fun night. Looking down at his own ride.

It had a few rust spots near the wheels and the paint was chipping off at a few parts, and it was manufactured eleven years before his own birth. But, it was his. He could say he owned it.

He passed by his favorite club, Jumpin' Jannah's, and watched a group of four girl go in, and waved to the heavyset bouncer with the spiked hair. The bouncer didn't wave back despite he had gone there every Thursday for the last two years.

Perhaps he had forgotten. Venser was an easy character to forget.

Venser often went there to enjoy the live music and to drink and dance the night away. Oh what nights those were, with all the drinks he ingested, navigating his way through the purple atmosphere and the crowds of numerous people, everything caught in a drunken, hazy dream like state while he flailed his body about and encouraged everyone sitting at the tables to come join him on the dance floor to escape from their everyday lives.

Bright, brilliant and terrifying electronic signs lit up the sides of many skyscrapers with brief images of advertisements and brief videos of people played. Screens on the side of the street, screens on the sides of zeppelins that hovered in the sky above the port city, shouting for attention from the video ads, and a strong atmospheric hum permeating everything.

Venser looked up at the starless sky and sighed as he drove to the harbor, the smell of sea salt in the air getting stronger and stronger as made it out of the downtown area and to his favorite dock near the ocean to think.

Arriving, he took a short breath of relief upon the sight of the empty docks and parked his trusty bike, taking his keys went him as he went for a walk, shuddering a bit feeling a cool night breeze against his hooded leather jacked.

Venser sat there with the waves and the wind and the breathtaking beauty of the moonlight reflecting the dark sea beyond the horizon. He himself was twenty one, and had fair skin, grass green eyes, thick bushy eyebrows, a strong jaw and dark hair. A stoic expression painted across his features as he sat and thought, reaching into his pocket and lighting up a CBD cigarette.

A ceaseless fall wind blew in from the water, caused he knew by the difference in pressure and temperature between land and sea. The young man closed his eyes and breathed the salt air in deep through his nose, enjoying the pristine beauty of the moment.

The sky was moody, with great swaths of cloud like soft mountains stretching out over the horizon. The black sky around the moon veiled by clouds, created a silver luminescence, giving thenight an almost surreal, dreamlike feel.

What was he doing with his life?

He had auditioned for a minor role in a local romantic comedy play, Like Love, and while he deeply enjoyed the theater and the musical arts, he rarely landed a role. Normally it was nothing more than a nameless extra with no lines, or a simple volunteer who mostly stood outside.

Letting out the breath he had been holding in with a depressed sigh, Venser looked out over the ocean, taking in the ardent beauty that bounded all about her and considered filling a his pockets with stones and jumping into the dark waters.

This wasn't the first time he had contemplated this. Well not this exactly; not standing before the ocean deciding whether or not to jump and drown himself. It simply wasn't the first time he had considered ending his life.

What was he even doing with his life?

Venser's mind worked in circles, spiraling out endlessly. One thought chasing another, connecting to still others, on and on forever. And always spinning. Often a mess of disconnected wires, caught in the middle of a great hurricane of his own thoughts. No matter how he tried to work a way out of them, he always found herself back in the middle of the storm, not much helped by the ocean waves crashing against the bottom of the dock.

Though he was young, he was at a point in his life where he was completely discontent and lo need for something better.

Venser longed to save enough money to pay for a ticket to cross the sea and go to the island of Kupidnos.

He longed for a better job. A successful acting career. Venser thought about graduating from high school and being lost, moving out from the orphanage on Holcomb Street and trying to support him and Rachael while trying to get into school. But what else did he want to do with his life beyond acting? Chemistry was his major but he didn't know if he really wanted to commit to that.

Bartending was similar to chemistry. He could do that. Phlebotomy maybe, he knew his way around his veins.

He thoughts about the highs and lows of his life. He thought about acceptance. Acceptance for the things in the world that he had no power over, for questions that he couldn’t find answers to. Would that make it courage, or simply complacency he wondered.

He had been here, enjoying the view and the gentle sea breeze, when his mind had done what it was want to do in times of quiet. It started to spin lost in memories and contemplations.

What was he doing with his life?

The young man sat down once more, fully this time, crossing his legs, and setting his chin in his hands, letting out a sigh and removing his cigarette. This was not the first time Venser had considered ending his life. He could never really talk to anyone about this. It would be too difficult to explain. Even he had trouble understanding it.

Would it hurt to die? Not the damage to his body and the pain right before death, but the actual act of dying itself. Would his soul or spirit or conciousness or anything leaving his body be able to feel anything at all with no body to perceive the world around him. Would he even be able think with no mind for thoughts to pass through.

Round and round his thoughts went. Venser closed his eyes, taking slow and even breaths, he let the sounds of the sea and sky wash over him. Somewhere in the distance, a seagull’s cry sounded, shrill and insistent.

He thought about him and his beloved frolicking on the golden sands of Kupidnos, going to the clubs there, playing guitar in the streets and making a lot of money.

Just being with Rachael. Enjoying each others company in that beautiful, expensive land.

Often, he dreamt. Venser dreamt of the few good memories of the past, and of what depressingly limited future he had with the state of the country right now. His dead end food job had cut his hours and the Theater Company never gave him a chance. He would dream that he was flying, going faster and faster, blazing through the air off to faraway lands, then suddenly waking up in the middle of the night to find himself in his small apartment. He'd dream about running through an endless field of tall green plants with his two dear friends, Rachael and Joseph, when he'd trip and fall and wake up alone.

It had always been his dream, ever since he had started working to go to overseas. To the gem of the south. Kupidnos. A warm, temperate island with vast, endless golden beaches.

One day.

Sometimes, wanting was better than having. For years he had saved away his earnings for plane tickets for him and Rachael, so that they could cross the ocean and fulfill their dream of several years of leaving Pantia.

And then what?

Nothing but a happy life from there, he imagined. Despite all of the couple's problems lately one could dream.

With the state of the economy, all of the needless military spending and lack of jobs his dream became more and more distant each day.

It didn't help after high school he had joined up in the Pantian Legion with Joseph and had been dishonorably discharged for mouthing off to the officers too many times and incompetence in a few other places.

Venser was never going to live that down.

He was a nobody.

He sighed and got up from the dock, hopping down to the grey sands and looking up to the black, starless sky again and the ocean as he began to walk.

The tides were gently turning; high and low and high and low again. The ocean was quite peaceful, especially in the dead of night, when there was no one around to spoil the serenity.

Venser hated being alone, but there were a few moments where he was at peace.

And those moments were fleeting. There was always conflict within him.

The young man wanted more. He wanted a respectable job, he wanted to be able to support Rachael without the hell of Joseph the soldier, he wanted enough money where they could finally to go Kupidnos.

Just once. For a week at the least.

One day.

As he watched he noticed something shiny in the sand. A coin perhaps? Venser never passed the opportunity to snatch up a coin from the ground, even if it was just a simple one cent piece.

He bent down and grasped it, tugging the object free and shaking the sand off of it.

It was a strange piece of whalebone with an odd symbol marked into it, which pieces of warped wire sticking out of the side

Immediately, his mind was sucked into a vision of an endless void, with fragments of buildings and scenery from all different lands and eras floating on broken islands in the nothingness. In the endless dark blue nothingness with twisted and frozen pieces of normal reality floating within it, he heard the cry of a whale and the slither of tentacles beneath him.

In the distance a benevolent shadow lurked in the door of an unrecognizable tavern. A humanoid figure with its arms behind its back and stars swirling in his eyes watched him.

The Cosmic Jester crossed his arms in front of his body.

"Down on your luck? Let's talk. I can offer you something... Interesting. For you, and for me."