I
Meeting the Maker
Matvei Andreivich Stolovsky stood there, eyes glaring, completely slack-jawed; his entire being unable to absorb the reality of the event he'd just witnessed. 'It couldn't happen. Impossible.' he thought to himself, unable to speak. He'd seen the flash from across the street and almost instantly, he felt himself choking on a ******'s seven millimeter bullet.
He felt the sticky warmth slither down his neck; his hands began to tremble. Next, it was his knees. Less than a half second later, the tunnel vision came. Finally, the darkness of oblivion took complete possession of him.
His limp body crashed into a tangled pile next to the American made leather chair he'd spent so many evenings in, planning, plotting, scheming, scraping, scratching, clawing, losing sleep at night, wondering if he'd done everything within his power to avoid this very occurrence. Now, here it was, the end. One by one, each of Stolovsky's hopes, dreams, and aspirations flowed freely from his body, exiting through the **** left by the ******'s bullet. All was lost; all of his work and worry, in vain; or, so it seemed.
'I, I'm not...,' the words spun through his dying mind. He ceased to notice reality; he no longer felt the choking sensation in his throat; instead reality became the written words, 'I, I'm not...,' actually spinning inside his mind; which, at the present time, for an unknown reason, was colored as a cloud would be, with a pinkish-orange haze. These words, currently soaring effortlessly through Stolovsky's perception of consciousness, were balloon like in appearance, each and every color represented in some way, shape, or form; each pixel doing it's part to reproduce the amazingly beautiful, but horrifying images, revealing the true nature of humanity against the infinite pinkish-orange haze that never began, and never ends.
I, I'm, the two commas, not, and even the ellipsis, who was there as well, shot up and down, spinning and swirling in every direction, flashing and snapping as they traversed the endless expanse of Stolovsky's new found purgatory.
A few moments later, Stolovsky realized he was actually viewing this spectacle, the inside of his mind, as we've chosen to call it, in the third person. He watched what appeared to be himself floating through space towards his current vantage point. Matvei squinted his dark brown eyes to try and get a better look. 'Is that me?' he asked himself. 'I can't be in a good way there,' he continued; 'that is almost certainly bad.'
As he made his observations, a cold northern wind began blowing violently, chilling what would've been his nose. 'Is it there?' Stolovsky thought to himself, startled. 'Could it be? Here and there, all at once?'
Then, without warning, the pinkish-orange haze oozed a deep, dreary red; and the written words, that so violently shared the truth of mans nature with Matvei, transmuted into a pack of ravenous dogs; howling and wailing, foaming at the mouth, as they began to tear each other to shreds. The flesh and blood flew in all directions; painful yelps, angry, threatening growls, and the sound of tissue being torn from the bone filled the air.
The violence of the atrocity dripped from the mouths of the dead dogs and ran flowing across the expanse; the river of life unleashed, meandering through the empty vacuum until it began to swirl and pool at the feet of Matvei's double.
Stolovsky felt the sickness of the act wash over him, striking his presence in much same way as an angry ocean wave, bitter from it's long journey, unleashes it's pent up fury on the piling of an unfortunate fishing pier.
Matvei's double was bound by his hands and feet; he was bleeding from the corner of his right eye. Stolovsky noticed how the double's crows feet dispersed a briskly flowing river of la sangre into thin streams of liquid ruby; some of them traveled over and into his ear, others ran flowing down his cheek before becoming nutrient, consumed by the roots of his tangled black beard. His shirt was tattered; the gaping holes revealed hideous wounds, partially obscured by the ***** blue linen still loosely draped around the double's upper-body. It was a nice sweater once, but no longer.
The double screamed frantically, wrestling his wrists in a futile effort to free his hands of the burdensome chains fastened tightly around them. Realizing the hopelessness of the situation, Stolovsky's twin began laughing the laugh of a mad child; a child who has just seen something that no one else could ever know. Matvei felt the scent of freshly cut lilac drift through him; then, as suddenly as all it began, everything stopped.
A woman's voice filled the air from every direction.
“Well, now you've gone and done it, haven't you?” she spat. The voice was surprisingly present, though there was no apparent source. “Haven't you, you fool?” she continued.
Neither Stolovsky felt compelled to answer, so both remained silent. The auditory assault continued, “Answer me while you still have the pleasure of a tongue, Matvei!” The venomous sounds came as an echo, rippling up Stolovsky's spine in thunderous waves that seemed to penetrate to his very core, making what would've been the tiny black hairs on what would have been his thin, serpent-like neck, stand on edge.He knew not what to say to this invisible creature, so he maintained his silent vigil, hoping no further harm would come to him; his double followed suit.
Stolovsky watched as his twin continued wrestling with his chains, apparently completely befuddled by all that he was experiencing. Who could blame him for being confused? This wasn't the type of situation folks typically find themselves in.
The silence prevailed for a few more moments, until Matvei felt the smooth, cool, silk of her flowing robe as it danced on the cold wind of the north, lashing out every so often to lick him behind the ear or slither across the back of his neck. The vibration of the silk flowing through crisp, cool, air sent shivers bounding outwards across the landscape, causing poor Stolovsky to feel as though the very particles holding him together were being stretched to point of separation, then snapped back into place with a brutality that simply can't be captured with words.
Matvei was petrified by these goings-on, and refused to even consider what unwholesome outcome may transpire should he turn to face this unholy presence; instead, he focused his attention to his double, who was staring back towards the image. Matvei struggled to read himself; his double appeared dumbstruck, like a man who has just realized that his whole heart belongs to an evil that terrifies him, yet simultaneously, it fills him with an unshakable love; the unrequited love that an unfortunate slave feels for it's tyrant.