Following

In the world of The Cylinder's Library

Visit The Cylinder's Library

Ongoing 669 Words

Face to face

5548 5 2

I wasn't the same person this morning.

I don't mean it in the sense that some thing incredible happened that changed the way I see the world. Though, I suppose that would work. No, what I mean is I wasn't the same person this morning.

It's hard for me to wrap my head around this. My name is Pepperbloom. I am sitting at my desk, writing. If I look deep within my memory, it seems I always was Pepperbloom. It seems I always lived there. An yet, this morning, I was not.

I woke up being called Eos, a worker. I was in my burrow, not here in Nightmare Square but down south, close to the Block. From what I gather, Pepperbloom never lived down there. Still, waking up there seemed perfectly usual at the moment.

After waking up, I took my breakfast, and left for the workshop. I worked in a woodcarving manufactory. Not me right now, though. For the past two years, Pepperbloom was a shopkeeper in a curio cabinet. Anyway, I - Eos - spent the morning working, perfectly naturally. We had just received a shipment of tempered oak, things were busy.

I think I took my lunch break around midday. I don't remember where Eos usually goes to eat, but that day, I decided to try try the Nakaran, a Condor kitchen my friends had told me about. However, I suppose I took a wrong turn, and I ended up in a dark street going down, while I was supposed to go up.

Adventurous as Eos was, I tried to find my awy around. I was surprised to even find a street that I didn't know of in my neighborhood, so I went down and tried to see where it went. Then, just as I crossed a left turn, I saw her. A Sheherper, I think - a girl, maybe in her twenties. She was walking slowly towards me, eyes opened so wide you could see the white all around her iris.

I tried to call. As she didn't answer, I approached carefully. That's when it happened. I don'texactly know whether it was when I reached for her, when my hand touched her shoulder, or even after that. All I know is, suddenly, I wasn't Eos anymore. My name was Pepperbloom, I was ashopkeeper in Nightmare Square. And right next to me, ina street I didn't quite recognize, was a towering worker from the Block, starring at me with their eyes opened so wide I could see the white all around their iris.

Without thinking twice, I bolted. I only slowed down when I reached Sp. Lisma square, the small patch of wood near the Ring road. After that, though I certainly was shaken, the day pursued. I had lunch at the [name of the restaurant where Wakey's friend lives], bought something to bring home, then I went back to the cabinet. I sold a few exotic bugs to a knowledgeable collector; a normal day for Pepperbloom Donvegger.

I don't get it.

I mean, I know it sounds absurd. But the only logical explanation I can find is that somehow, something caused me to switch from Eos to Pepperbloom. I used to be Eos, and yet I am Pepperbloom now. And I always have been.

What I cannot help but ponder is, if I did switch place, then what did I exchange with? Was there someone in there, before? Was there something? Back there, for the short moment when Eos touched Pepperbloom, it felt like I was sucked out of my body, and into another. It didn't feel like I touched another person's mind, or soul, or anything like that. I only felt a deep, dark void.

Wherever they are, I hope Eos is okay. I hope they are inhabited by more than this hard, cold nothingness. However, I will not check myself. If there is one thing I hope, it is that I will never cross the thing that took my place ever again.

Please Login in order to comment!
Oct 16, 2021 16:18

It was a little hard to track who's who, or who's when? Which is good, it really put me in the mindset of confusion the narrator was in; Eos, Pepperbloom, both. It's a bit brain wracking how one both knows they were someone else and always have been yourself (unless that's a reassurance, which is possible).   I think you put more emphasis on Eos's character than Pepperbloom's. I feel I know more about Eos, where I feel it should be an even mix to emphasize the melding/swapping of consciousness, or whatever happened.   We may not have always been ourselves, but is that such a bad thing?

Kriltch, arcanities not included.
Oct 17, 2021 11:38

Thanks for the feedback, Kriltch! Indeed, I felt like the point of this story was to be a tiny bit confusing. And indeed, the whole thing is that the character has very distinct "recent memories" of being someone and it being normal, but from a certain moment on, when they "switched", they were someone else. And when looking deeper into their memory, they "always had been". Or rather, they kept the long term memory of the body they currently are in.   That's a good point: I might lenghten the story a tiny bit in order to give more weight to Pepperbloom and her life.   As for whether all of that is really such a bad thing, I don't know. I'd wager it must be excessively confusing, is all. I think I'd be more worried by the thing that caused the "switch" to occur, that big empty inside a person, than by the perspective of switching bodies.

With love,   Pouaseuille.
Oct 17, 2021 04:08

Oh-ho~ This is the big uncool and I don't like the idea of waking up as someone else and going "but wait, tho" forever. I personally find horror involving concepts you can just sit there and think about the most impactful as one can constantly just put themselves in such an awful situation.

Oct 17, 2021 11:41

I'm glad you liked that! I'm also more into "big think" horror than simply awful stories. They are a bit harder to write, though!

With love,   Pouaseuille.