Thread: Lëzen's Submissions

Thinking of putting this'n in the Gallery.

6/14/09

Kindred Spirits

This one was strange, but memorable. The very earliest thing I can remember was driving mom and Sarah around...this weird thing kept happening where the camera angle would switch from a first-person view to a stationary third-person one, and I would see the truck driving off (even though I was still in it and controlling it), which made it very difficult to see ahead. I guess after that I ended up in my Japanese class. For some reason, this girl Kayla I knew back in middle school (she was a total bee-yotch to me back then) was in the class, and I ended up sitting in front of her. She was eerily nice, for some reason, and did seem truly interested in Japanese culture. Throughout the class we had listening exercises of sorts involving watching short, documentary-like clips on the T.V., with the sensei supplementing the lessons with his own bits of info. I remember one thing had to do with body parts, but I couldn't remember the words for any of them. Then the clip went into how in feudal Japan, the bow and arrow was the most deadly weapon you could find, and it showed how military commanders would sometimes give orders to take a bunch of arrowheads (with a little bit of the shaft still attached), load them into this catapult-like contraption, and hurl them up into the air to rain down on opponents. Then it said something about how this would often kill mass numbers of Japanese peasants - only those of higher rank were given helmets to protect against the arrow rain. Sensei then explained this spiritual process (I think the consumption of various teas was involved...) by which peasants tried to protect themselves, but most of them failed since they didn't have access to one crucial ingredient. At one point, I began to fall asleep in class, but was woken up by Kayla, who was telling me that sensei had just collected our notes on the documentary, and I noticed he was giving a kind of "last call" for any he might have missed with a ten second countdown. I had to hop over desks and stuff to get to him, and my control of my body was very slow and clumsy. But, I managed to give it to him by the count of 9. So at this point, I dunno what happened to me, but sensei dismissed class and went off on his way. As he reached his destination, he was no longer an old man, but a boy of about 14 or so. It looked kind of like a hospital room he was in, and indeed, that's what he was there for...his sensei was lying in a bed (although I didn't actually see him), obviously afflicted with some kind of terminal illness. There were a bunch of bright lights aimed at sensei's sensei (you know, I think I'm just gonna call young sensei "Toshio" [since that's his name IRL] and his sensei "sensei" from this point on). Toshio inquired about the lights, and sensei responded something to the effect that the light would help flush out the illness. Sensei then talked to Toshio about how he must prevail over the vengeful, tormented spirit of a young girl named Aki, yet display mercy as well. Toshio then went in search of this spirit. He looked up and saw her sitting cross-legged on top of the door frame (which was really tall, for some reason) he had just come out of. Aki started to throw these pink balls of energy, each one no bigger than a marble, at Toshio. They moved slowly through the air and spiraled around, but they were deadly all the same; deadly enough to cause a catastrophic explosion (or something to that effect) if any of them hit anything. You know how practitioners of so-called "ninjutsu" magic often do those fancy little hand positions? That's what he did, only he kept his hand in that position (which formed a sort of diamond shape) the whole time. He had to move so that each energy ball moved through the diamond shape formed by his hands. In doing this, the energy was, I guess, absorbed. It got progressively more difficult, as Aki would start throwing them in greater numbers. However, Toshio didn't miss a single one, and eventually I guess Aki ran out of the necessary energy needed to attack. Toshio then performed some kind of jutsu that caused her to disappear. The victory, it seemed, was a very hollow one for Toshio, as he wished there was something more he could have done to save Aki rather than just banish her. Then this weird thing happened where a talking can of Campbell's soup told him not to feel so bad. Where its ingredients label would be, a list of all Toshio's life accomplishments was displayed. The can then proceeded to tell Toshio that "There are at least 150 great things you have done in life that most others will never get the chance to experience." Toshio felt much better, although he still had lingering feelings of regret about Aki. Just then, his sensei (whom we can now see - a middle aged man who looks a lot like one of my OCs named Wolf) entered the room with what appeared to be a grim reaper-esque scythe. I guess he had been performing various spells, incantations and other ritualistic things to enchant the weapon, as it looked like swinging the thing could probably create a rip in time or something. Toshio was delighted to see that his master had beaten his illness, and told him about what had transpired. Sensei sensed that Toshio was not proud of having banished Aki, so he did this weird thing where he hooked up his magical scythe to a telephone. This allowed Toshio to call the lonely Aki and speak with her. They became quite good friends, I believe...and yet, somehow, by this point I had the distinct feeling that I might have dreamt this before, only the ending was different; an ending where Toshio's sensei had died of his illness, and therefore would have been unable to show Toshio how to contact the banished Aki, who would remain in solitude forever.