This lady once told me that sixty-twelve. I never understood that until she disappeared.   

-Page sixty-twelve

I dreamt of my home. Not the decrepit city whose beauty was just a façade for the travesty beneath its shining crystal streets and gleaming spires. Beautiful beaches of cocaine-white sand embracing its partner, a still cerulean sea, unblemished, undisturbed. Despite the whiteness, the sand was scorching under foot. I held her hand. Little blue crabs skittered across the sand, pausing to stare with their stalky, beady eyes. We giggled together. I held her into me tight with an arm draped over her shoulder as we watched the little pinching critters. A small hand grasps me, only a third the size of mine own, with soft skin and tiny pink nails. She gasps at the little creatures, but it is too quick for her clumsy hands.

“What are they? Da?” her little voice squeaks.

She chased after them, not even waiting for a reply. I turned away from the distracted child to gaze into the eyes that had captured my heart since we were ten. There was nothing and I woke up abruptly with an incredible sense of loss, a miner working away at my soul, but the mine had gone dry long ago.

“Bloody hell…” I groan.

Next to my chest, my head emulates the sensation of loss. Everything is gone, but it shouldn’t have been there in the first place. I saved what I could, but I know much will have changed. I knew why, but had a hard time understanding why I knew. Just trying to say that sentence gives me a headache, and that was not due to the paradox. Trying to figure out anything gave me a headache.

“Your thinking is probably what’s causing it.” A bloody, beautiful, and snide voice spoke in my head.

“You… stinker!” I said in a half sob, half laugh.

I regretted the words the moment they left my lips.

“You… I don’t even want to insult you. I feel bad now.” She said.

“Wh…” I started.

“I mean, stinker? You are such an idiot.” She interrupted.

“What happened to not insulting me?” I asked, still laughing.

“Is it insulting when I enlighten you with such divine… umm… divinity??” she said gallantly.

“Still doing it. Are you telling me that you are a god?”

“Oh hush, you have been asleep for like foooooreverrrrrr…” she groaned.

“How long was I asleep?” I asked, worried.

“Two days.” Marrin’s voice came from the corner of the room.

I spun, seeing my friend sitting in the corner of the room, staring directly at me with his pale, blind eyes. Apparently there the entire time. None of his armor was up. The man was utterly sightless, or so I thought. He had a way of always looking at me in the eyes. I tilted my head, curious.

“Why…” I began.

“The darkness brings me solitude. It is the only time I can see my wife and sons.” He explained.

I shuttered… the darkness… the memory buried itself away where the million years once occupied. Marrin stood and walked towards me. His hands stretched cautiously as he moved, yet nothing obstructed him. The wisdom of such a man baffled me, as he somehow read my mind again.

“Deckel is a little shit. He sometimes likes to put things in front of me, when I’m like this. It doesn’t matter how much I beat the piss out of him… he never learns.” He said but with a light chuckle. “Reminds me of me… unfortunately.”

I reach up and feel a scraggly beard and at least another inch of my long, dreaded hair. It was past my shoulders when pulled it straight, but sprung back up when I let go. I always preferred long hair; I was too cheap or lazy to cut it. Now, everything changed.

“How are you feeling?” he asks.

I look back at him, leveling a gaze that screams exhaustion. I rolled my eyes, remembering, of course… his blindness. That never seemed to stop the strange man from seeing right through me, no pun intended. He chuckled at my silence.

“How do you do that?” I groaned, falling back down on the bed.

“It comes with years of experience.” He replies.

“I have years of experience…”

“Of being a father.” He finished.

He doesn’t know. How could he? How could any of them know? The silence stretches out as I am dragged back into my past. I couldn’t see her in my dreams, but I could see her now.

“Son… oh my boy. I am so sorry.”

Marrin’s hand rested on my shoulder. Tears fell freely, pooling below my eyes before trickling down around my neck. I couldn’t…. I couldn’t stop; I didn’t want them to stop. It had been too much, too long, a million years since the last tear. 

“Pinky… My little Pinky…” I said after a few minutes.

“Tell me.” Marrin said.

He was not forceful; he was not rude or aggressive. It was the tone you give your child; stern, but letting them know everything would be all right. He knew what was best, I’m sure he did, but I didn’t know if I was ready.

“There are more important things to discuss.” My voice shakes.

He shook his large head but said nothing else. The quiet must have been awkward for him, but I relished it. I don’t know what came over me; perhaps it was his blank face. Maybe it was those black eyes. Maybe it was that this kind man reminded me of Corey. He was an honest man with not a cruel bone in his body. They were what the world turned them into. I could have said the same about me, though I knew better. A million years of memories now gone forever spoke a different story. Though I could not remember, the emotions remained. I hated myself. For a million years, I hated myself.

“We named her after my aunt, Pikshousa. She was the one who got us out of the Foundation… that holy abomination…”

Marrin didn’t speak, didn’t interrupt, didn’t ask questions about the things he did not know of.

“We ran. It was my fault. I was supposed to fight, but… I was afraid; I didn’t want to die for something I believed in. It was a terrible war. They wanted… they wanted everything. My little Pinky… She was only four.”

I snorted out a wet laugh.

“Sayla… we were only seventeen, just stupid kids… We were never married, but we might as well have been. I only meant us to be there for a week, but it was so beautiful and warm. We were so far from them. I thought we were safe. One week turned to two… turned to three. They left me alive as a punishment, saying that I could go on living knowing that my family was gone for my crimes. They just walked away, and I couldn’t lift a hand. I couldn’t even kill myself… I was such a fucking coward. I am…”

It was quiet except for crying. It was from me and my large friend. His bloody tears streamed down his cheeks, giving him the look of a vengeful warrior from the old Earth cultures. Only Corey ever knew. My mother remained in the Foundation, and I wouldn’t tell her what happened. She went missing trying to find me. I wanted to escape a terrible place and only succeeded in killing my entire family. 

“Son… you are here. You are no coward.” He said.

I knew what he meant, but that was not how I felt.

“Do they still wait for me? I was never meant to live for so long…”2