“The dead are here, in the shadows and hidden corners just out of sight, in the periphery, whispers only just heard. The departed, with their still echoing influence, walk with us now. So much of their hopes and dreams rest on you. I have cleared the air, as best I could. They would choke you, I think, and be glad to puppet your body around to fulfill their long starved desire. I leave the choice, though, to you. Their promises are not pure falsehood. Power, fame, money, comfort—but they shall make you as they are in the end, withered copies of copies, walking the well-trodden road of perdition.”
The poor man gasps. It has been years since he has tasted an atmosphere so free of terror. Like a waking man, his eyes wander the room, his mouth hanging open. As his head panned the great necropolis whose towering monuments of ancient steel bears testament, in their rusted ruin, of his ancestors’ triumph over a forgotten age, he hears, as though distantly, the man beside him saying:
“…and the choice then will be yours. Were you born to be their vessel? They say so, but it was not their hands which formed your bones or weaved your flesh. In the dark matrix of your mother, another knew you, a spirit greater than these demons. You breathe His air now. Cry, now, O man, and fill your lungs with life.”
Tale Told 