Perfect Peace [part 7]

He sensed movement ahead in the shadows as he proceeded into the dank, cavernous tunnels.

“Holy shit!” He said, with an air of detachment.

A creature appeared before him, terrible and enormous, bearing more resemblance to something from the depths of an ocean than the innards of a mountain.

Without thinking, Paul had an empowering vision that he could simply overcome this being of darkness with focused light from within himself.

He unleashed a ball of white fury toward the beast by holding his hands out and channelling his inner calm and confidence toward the creature, which simply evaporated upon impact.

This discovery of power gave Paul a boost in spirit, and he realized that this was a test he could pass. He proceeded forward.

After a few minutes of venturing deeper into the mountain, Paul found himself in an enormous dark cathedral full of grotesque imagery carved into the stone. A hairy beast stood on two legs, even more terrifying and disgusting in appearance and odour than the last.

“I am your worst fear, your doubt and self-loathing. I am the emptiness in your soul, the nagging futility of your existence!” Grumbled the monster in a voice that echoed in Paul’s bones and caused his scrotum to shrivel into his abdomen.

Not so much from imminent danger to his person but from the jolting reality of where he was – and that he had left his family behind in the clutches of mystery.

Until this moment, he had been so absorbed by the overwhelmingly lost feeling of his predicament that it hadn’t occurred to him that he had no idea where his wife and children were or even where he had been taken. The enormity of the feeling of failure twisted his stomach, and he blasted back into his current situation with renewed rage, terror, and purpose.

“You aren’t real, and you won’t stop me! You’re just a nightmare, and I will destroy you!” Paul shouted in a voice that he barely recognized in himself. He closed his eyes and focused all of his fear and passion, and launched an orb of glowing red fury at the creature, who fell where it stood with a groan more of relief than agony.

Paul approached the fallen beast reluctantly. As he neared the body, he noticed that its face vaguely resembled his own – in a huge and disfigured way. W

hen he was satisfied that the creature was down for the time being, he crept around its bulk and found a large wooden door that opened at his command. Through the door, Paul found himself in a long, much narrower, and twisting corridor than before, with a slightly upward cant.

As he pushed forward, he drove himself to hurry, racing hopefully back to find his family. His sweat drenched him, and it stunk of an acidic toxic fear that made him nauseous. The knot in his stomach grew from the guilt he felt for leaving his children and wife and for having brought them here in the first place.

He had to get back to them, but in the back of his mind, he wondered what good he could do. He shook off this nagging doubt and pressed on.

He turned a corner and encountered another bizarre being from the depths, this time much smaller and seemingly duller than the previous ones he’d seen. He simply focused on his love for his family and vaporized this one easily without a second thought.

“I’m getting pretty good at this,” he thought sarcastically.

It dawned on him that he had no intention of having to stay to use these new-found skills.