The Hall of the Betrayed Read online

up one corner of the stranger’s mouth. “Good questions. Unfortunately they are questions without easy answers. I am not someone you would recognize. You have not heard any of my names before. Instead you may call me ‘First’.”

  “First, right. Where am I?” Lestari insisted.

  “You are in the space between movements. I stopped you here to give you a choice. A choice that most people are never given. You can continue on with your destiny in this reality as it is. Or you can come with me to stand between stories.”

  “That doesn’t make any sense. What do you mean my destiny in this reality? Are you talking about that?” Lestari pointed to the missile about to impact his fighter. “Am I dead?”

  “Not yet. But you are within moments of death. Should you choose to stay here, then within milliseconds that missile impacts your space craft and you die. You will then continue on with whatever afterlife this reality has.”

  “So I can come with you or I can die. Is what you are saying?”

  “Not at all. You are mistaken to believe that I am threatening you in some way. What I am saying is that your life here has already ended. Only instead of going wherever you will go after death, I have intervened to give you a very rare choice.”

  “What happens after I die?”

  “I do not know. I have never died. And I have died times beyond count.”

  “You just contradicted yourself.”

  “It is only a contradiction from your perspective. If you were in my shoes then that statement makes perfect sense. But regardless, I cannot tell you what will happen after you die here and now. Only offer you this choice.”

  “So if I come with you, then what will happen?”

  “You will enter a space between times. That unique space takes the form of a library. There you will experience things beyond your imagination. You will learn, grow and become more.”

  “Do you purposely try to be vague and confusing?” Lestari demanded.

  “Somewhat. I try to not reveal too much information so that it does not influence your choice. And some of what I say appears vague because you and I have no common frame of reference. We are two completely different beings.” The man sighed. “Unfortunately it has been so long since I left my life behind that I really cannot remember what it was like.”

  Thoroughly confused now, Lestari turned away to look back at his ship while he tried to think. His eyes traveled to the frozen features of the angel. “Can you tell me who she is?”

  “She has no name. An unfortunate accident resulted in the consciousness of a human being becoming trapped in your communications network. Unfortunately the process left her without memories. As a result that consciousness was forced to learn anew. As it did so, the consciousness grew, and she chose the form you see now. What you call the ‘Angel of the Deep’. She spends her time trying to save the lives of those doomed to die in space. A noble endeavor, trying to save people. But one that she fails at most of the time, like with you. However, it has drawn to her the attention of those like me and earned her the same choice as what I am offering you. When she reaches the end of her life, someone will come and offer her the chance to enter our Hall.”

  “Why are you doing this? Why don’t you let everyone in?”

  “Because we only offer this choice to those beings who have been betrayed by their stories. Beings who have tried their absolute best to be good, honorable and true. But through no fault of their own they are forced to be the villain, to unpleasant and unhappy ends. That spark which fights to resist impossible odds over and over is essential to our way of life. Without it, those who live in the library would wither and stagnate until eventually it would be the same as never having lived at all.”

  “I still don’t understand. I haven’t been ‘betrayed’ at all. I’ve had a pretty good life.” Lestari asserted. “I can understand why you would offer this choice to the Angel. But not why you would offer it to me. How have I been betrayed?”

  “I cannot answer that question for now. It would provide you with motivation in this choice I am offering, one way or the other. But either way you choose, you will learn the answer shortly.”

  “Is everyone in this library of yours as frustrating as you are?”

  “Yes.” The stranger was definitely smiling now. The smile completely transformed his looks. Before there had been a slightly sinister cast to his features that Lestari hadn’t realized was there. But smiling, the stranger emitted warmth that Lestari could almost feel.

  A thought occurred to Lestari. He could not believe he had not thought to ask it before now. “What about my family? My friends?”

  The smile vanished. “You won’t like that answer.”

  “I still want to know.”

  “Alright,” First sighed heavily. “I do not know what will happen if you stay here. I have never died here before. But you should know that most forms of afterlife remove the memories of those who die. If you enter the Hall, on the other hand, you will remember them. You may even see them again, some time when you return to this story. But if you come with me, you will change. You have never experienced anything like it, so I have no words to describe the change in ways you will understand. Just know that you will remember your family and friends. But they will not mean the same to you as they do now.”

  Lestari closed his eyes and rested his head against the wall of the cube. When he spoke, his voice was low and quiet. “Maybe this is the ‘betrayal’. Either way I’m going to lose the people I care about.”

  “Perhaps it is.”

  “Can I think about this?”

  “Yes. Time has no meaning here. So take as long as you want. But in the end, I think you will find that thinking about it changes nothing. You will be forced to trust your heart. And your heart has already decided, although your mind is not listening”

  Lestari sat down, facing away from the man and his infuriating answers. He looked out over the battlefield, at the explosions killing the people he had worked and played with for years. In some ways they were his second family. Beyond them he could see the edge of the planet. A mushroom cloud was forming over one of the major islands, devastation certainly caused by the attackers or a futile defense he couldn’t know.

  He tried to think of everything he knew, tried to think about everything the man had said, so that he could make the best choice. But his thoughts proved impossible to organize. The idea that he was dead, or so close to dying that it did not mater, was so alien he could not wrap his mind around the thought. He thought of his family, who he hadn’t seen in almost a year. Would they ever know what happened to him? Or would they be killed in the attack on the planet as well?

  Thoughts raced through his mind, until he realized that he was not really thinking about anything at all. He was just sitting there, staring at the angel’s tear stained face. A new thought appeared as he looked at her frozen features.

  “You said that the angel is also going to be offered this choice?” He asked.

  “When it is her time to die, yes, she will.” Lestari could hear the smile back in the First’s voice. “Although I will warn you, if you are the one to offer her that choice, you will not be allowed to attempt to persuade her in anyway.”

  “Somehow I have the feeling that she won’t need persuading.” Lestari scrambled to his feet and turned to face the man again. “I will….”

  He trailed off. Next to First a door had opened in space. Through it he could see what looked like a private library. Tall wooden bookshelves were filled with leather bound books. A comfortable chair was pushed close to a warm fire. He could smell the warm, friendly scents spilling out of the room. Everything was perfectly combined to make the most relaxing looking room he had ever seen.

  “But I hadn’t answered you yet!” He tried to sound offended but failed miserably.

  “Yes you did. You answered long ago, before you were even born. And y
ou have not answered yet.”

  “You’re being vague and confusing again.”

  “So I am.”

  “What will I do in there?”

  “What we all do. Learn. Learn more than there is to know. Forget and learn it again. This is the journey without end, a story with no finish.”

  Lestari swallowed and took a step forward. The first was the hardest. His feet kept moving until right before the door. Turning at the entrance, he took one last look at the angel’s face. Then he stepped through the door. As it closed behind him, Lestari heard First say:

  “Welcome Friend. Welcome to the Hall of the Betrayed.”