20 - The World Voice

                                    

                                          
Loud shrieks pervaded the impact ground, as Colin, OOOO and Bibi rolled on melted land, fallen from a disintegrated airplane. The World Voice irradiated its powerful sorrow through every pore of their mystical bodies, and each of them suffered its presence. Bearers of minds, creatures of mood swings, none of them lived safe from misery. 
                          
"Run! Run! You see, out of here, all of us!" OOOO shouted.
                          
"Not one word... Not one soul to greet me... Who did this to me? Why... Why..."
                          
"I have no chance against it, it's too much! We have to get away! Take Colin! He's not moving," Bibi said.
                          
"Life is meaningless... An illusion... When will I wake up..."
                          
"He won't go, will he?" OOOO said, struggling against Colin. "Run, run, we can't stay longer!"
                          
"I'm never going to be happy... There's no winning... There's no way out... It only gets worse..."
                          
"Let him be, that's what he wants!" Bibi said. 
                          
Colin stood up in front of the pillar, digesting the depressing bombardment taking over every cell in his body. OOOO and Bibi fled at high speed, hopping and hovering above the slime, until finding a big hill from where they could keep an eye on Colin, who stood in the middle of the World Voice's roaming circles. It struck him with the full strength of its voice.
                          
"I am a nobody... A pitiful man, a useless human... I am the only of my kind, the unlucky idiot who got the chance to see his beloved ones die twice... They are gone, and I'm here forever... No, I won't be here forever, I have nothing to gain... My parents disappeared in the first life, then got mad and killed themselves in the other... Angeline melted down at first, and then exploded and melted down again... I created them, I brought them to life, knowing that they could go wrong, knowing that I can't do anything right... And how could I get things right this time, of all others... I can't, I couldn't, I could never... My beloved... Oh, the loved ones who didn't really want me... No, not my parents, not Angeline... She didn't wait for me... I had to sacrifice for her, because she wouldn't do the same for me... She went to the beach, instead of spending her last times with me, and she dared saying that she loved me... Only because she was scared... That's when people remember me, when they have nothing else... When everybody is gone, when I am the only one left, then I am worthy... But I am not, not even being the only one of my kind, I can't do things right, I can't..."
                          
He fell on his knees, weakened from inside. Something in his guts collapsed, unable to hold him up longer. His knees plunged in the mud, but his spine held him straight. He looked down, blind from the intense pillar's shining, watching a festival of regrets screen in his mind. 
                          
"If I am near mountains and birds, I am still alone... They all chose to desert me, to melt down and escape the world, the world they shared with me... Only because I was there they did so, because who wants to be with me anywhere... I am just a scene prop in the backdrop, something that is always there and of which nobody takes notice... Angeline loved me out of pity, she was only interested in being nice to others... I could be anything, I could be the one everybody hated, the one everybody admired, the crazy one... But no, I was the forgotten one, the one so bland and banal and disposable and replaceable that it was worse than being hated... I was a nobody... I am a nobody..."
                          
When Colin was 13, he still liked to play catch with his friends. They would go to the riverside and run after one another, touching the fleeing ones to pass the catcher's burden. They often improvised with throwing balls or rubber bands, performing roles of police and thieves. In a group of nine boys and girls, Colin was the oldest and slowest one, entering his teenage years and not realizing it. He had no one to push him further in the expectations of his age, and so his still infant friends leveled him down.