Astral Echoes (A Finish The Story Entry)

Opening by @raj808

Rain bounces off the frying pan streets, dowsing the city’s mid-morning swelter. Bangkok on a Monday screams its frenetic cadence into my sleep-stained head as I leave my apartment for the breakfast of kings. A hastily wolfed helping of Khao Neow Moo Ping and I’m on my way. This meeting is important for my continued livelihood. A prominent business man is convinced he’s beset by demons. 'Fung shui gone wrong', the words of his PA echo in my memory as I hail a tuk tuk and jump in.

“Sa wat dee”. I greet the driver as I scramble into the cramped cabin.

It is advisable to enter your tuk tuk promptly as the never ending stream of scooters can sweep you out and away at a moment’s notice. I’ve seen a tuk tuk's door taken off by one of these suicidal bikers before now.

“Sathon Nuea road please.”

Pulling off into traffic, I find myself staring into the frantic smog choked kaleidoscope that is Bangkok. Five lanes of traffic jostle for position as scooters whiz between them, reckless of traffic lights, wobbling with giggling teenage passengers stacked three apiece. The salt-singed smell of frying shrimp and coconut oil mingles with diesel fumes as I sit back into the sticky red foe leather and consider what I know about this particular clients Astral footprint!

---

A room bathed in a dull indigo with a bed by the wall pulsing with ethereal light. A book sits half open on the bedside cabinet, pages twitching in the gentle flow of my aura. Light envelops this scene, green through to red as my aura shifts with the pulse of the indigo ether. I drift over the open book, a single word jumps out of the page like a lightning bolt ‘FATHER’. It seems to echo in my mind like a scream. I glance to my left and my adversary is still moving through the treacle I’ve set in front of him. I still can’t tell whether he’s human! The impossibly wide smile, desperate and hollow speaks to me of one possessed. A soul lost in the astral, then found by one of Them.

BANG, I spin as the wardrobe door slams open and closed over and over. The noise echoes through me as an icy wind spills from the flapping doors. The indigo glow subsides to a dull shimmer as the room darkens and I turn back to my advisory.

He is there right before me. Mouth impossibly wide the teeth icicles and his breath covers me in the stagnant smell of the swamp as my bones numb and my knees give way. I choke as my breath sticks in my throat and the scene fades to night.

---

“What are the symptoms Mr Xioin?" His pallid face twitches as I stare into sunken eyes, unblinking, pupils wide. "How do these daemons manifest?”

“The night is where they reside. Between dream and waking. Sometimes I wake from a dream only to be enveloped by a strange light. After, I walk in the wakening world, around my apartment and... everything is enlivened." He breathes in short gasps as he talks. "It’s as if everything has a soul, the lamp, my leather chair even the books call out there stories, words that wash through me like fire." His head dips and rests in the palm of his hands. "There is no rest”

“Go on...” I lower my voice as I watch his body shivering in the pain of memory.

“Then there are the dreams that seem to be reflections of my life. I'm working at the company, except it’s like I’m looking over my own shoulder as someone else performs my daily routine. I’m convinced I’m awake until I actually wake and it feels as if I’ve never slept at all." He stares into my eyes, pupils contracting back to a normal size for the first time since I’ve been here. "Can you help me?”

---

My heart strains against my chest as I struggle to close my third eye, a dull ache in the center of my forehead. He smiles like a clown, an open wound across his face, mocking me. White mists swirl around us as a landscape forms in the astral firmament, his mind superimposing a tapestry in the space between dimensions. I look around searching for any clue to his nature. Any clue that will help me to defeat him.

My Ending

I found myself pushing back into the embracing tacky leather of the tuk-tuk seat. The cheap fabric melded to my skin in the heat, as he pushed his mind into mine. I tried to force my inner vision to close, to break the connection I’d opened. Fire burnt through my blood, pain throbbed with every crushed heartbeat. The hanging tapestry searing in my mind as I fought, failing to sever the astral pathway.

Intricate bamboo, stitching in fine silver, twisted in the background of the tapestry. The elegant detail spoke not of good fortune, but an echo of something darker, long forgot. The spindling branches evoked the icicle teeth of my adversary, yet carried a beauty alien to the creepy smile.

Pain fractured through my mind as I stared into the centre. The lace-like pattern had no distinctive image, no form I could grasp. In the shadows of the design, in the gaps between the blossomed branches, I slowly became aware of a figure. The graceful monochrome of twisting trees slipped out of focus, and the looming figure came into view. The floral branches of the tree of life became veins, lotus flowers gave way to reveal dragon-faced shoulder pads framing the dark apparition of a man.

A wave of memory crashed through me as the vision of the open book, the hanging letters, rushed back.

Father…

The tuk-tuk jarred over a pothole as bikes raced past, but the spine-cracking jolt didn’t break the hold the astral being had over me.

The tapestry burnt deeper into my mind, as though it had wedged my third eye open. I pushed through the pain, the pressure, searching for comprehension.

I struggled to understand; the image being forced into my mind must hold some significance to the daemonlike being.

Hesitant, I stopped fighting the astral invasion. As I relinquished my metal grip, the tapestry began to fade. The swirling mists of the astral landscape took the same form of a man I had seen in the image. As the face began to shape, I recognised it as my waiting client, Mr Xioin.

The faces of Xioin's shoulder pads slipped from his arms, dragons taking form in the astral plane. As the image faded, the wide, needle toothed grin returned, cleaving through a pale face. The dark eyes that met mine glinted that of the dragon.

The dragon who brings the fortune a man is worthy of.

Suddenly, I understood.

The tuk-tuk shrieked to a halt outside my destination. Through the thick glass door, I could see a proffered PA scanning the street, clearing anxious for my arrival. I lent forwards, calling to the driver over the cacophony of traffic,

“Take me back to the hotel”

Some things were more important than livelihood...

Well this was an interesting one to write, I struggled a lot understanding everything in the opening - which of course gave plenty of fuel to the crazy train rumbling round my head as the conductor screamed his usual derision. I am really not sure if I have hit the mark on this one, we have been getting further and further out of my depth recently but I am still very grateful for the opportunity to push myself.

This is my entry to @f3nix 's Finish The Story Contest hosted by the wonderful @bananafish - make sure to give it a follow for writing contests, this one runs every week and is a great imagination workout. The first half has been provided by the insanely talented @raj808 who, if you haven't encountered, is such a skilled story teller, you should give him a follow not to miss out!

Photo Credit via wikicommons. Can you see the figure...?