The Ancients and the Angels: Celestials
Page 4
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Glam’ryn How’dann was dozing off in her bed in the Corosa Community Hospice. Her children had committed her to this facility after learning that she was suffering from a rare degenerative disease which affected her entire body. They did anything they could for her, but their caretaking abilities and knowledge of this condition just couldn’t compete with its strong and rather strange effects.
The elder lady would lapse from time to time into confused states where she could no longer remember who she was or where she was going. Sometimes, she was under the impression that she was one hundred years younger than her true age and would attempt physical acts that could break her brittle bones. In one incident, at one of her grandsons’ birthday parties, she had attempted to join a pickup-game of runta while she was still wearing her old bedgown. When everyone present had tried to stop her and speak some sense, she became agitated with frustration and angered because nobody would let her play.
As the disease began to run its course stronger than ever, some of the autonomic processes of her body began to fail as her poor, confused brain could no longer send the proper messages to their respective systems. Sometimes she couldn’t breathe because her lungs forgot to bellow. The most embarrassing symptom was that her digestive tract would not work very well and this caused a rather frightful mess for those who had cared for her.
It was in this hospice she rested on the momentous day of the puzzling objects’ arrival. She was watching the tray of food set before her with a bit of wonder. The venerable lady was having a difficult time remembering if she had already eaten, and noted that she must have done so because she didn’t feel a bit hungry. She wanted to go outside and play with her friends instead, imaginary as they may have been, but her weak and frail body prevented this. This was a terrible disappointment to her and she began to cry in frustration.
When the lights throughout the facility began to flicker on and off, she found herself very short of breath and a sudden wave of fear hit her. Out in the hallways, doctors, nurses, and all manner of health wardens were milling about in a state of frenzy. Their shouts and hollers were making her nervous. The big machine that would hum with a steady rhythm day and night next to her bed ceased its whispering, minimal tune.
Medical instruments of all kinds were falling off their shelves and trolleys as the quake rumbled through the guts of Corosa. The hospice’s staff was in a panic as they attempted to stabilize monitors, salve pumps and the equipment on which they relied to keep the residents of the facility alive through their final days. From under the relentless manascream, “Code White! Code White!” cried for attention. During the tumult, Glam’ryn’s terror and confusion was replaced by a sudden, general sense of well-being. The door to her ward opened as a very tall doctor strolled in with a gentle stride. He made quite the contrast against the frazzled faculty who were still shouting orders to each other in a rather futile attempt to maintain order in the rumble.
He was golden; white-gold, as she saw it. This doctor seemed to be cast from the shimmering element. Glam’ryn wondered if he were perhaps a sun or a high elf, but he wasn’t just of a tan or dusky complexion; his skin emitted a glow. Unlike any of the other doctors in the ward who would strut in an elite fashion with their long tresses and braids, he was bald without a stubble and looked like one of the steadfast statues installed on the Royal Promenade come to life. Glam’ryn had been dreaming about him on and off again with increasing frequency. This had to be him. He peered down with gentle grace over her as her life monitors screamed a warning of total failure.
“A good day to you, Glam’ryn,” the doctor intoned in the kindest of voices. “I can see you are already feeling much better.”
This wonderful being’s voice was musical like the mana itself. The tone was steady and calm; however it was not ghostly like all the mana-fed objects and devices that had served her throughout her whole life. His song matched the beauty of the face and the form. The elder lady felt so lucid for the first time in years, yet could not pin her current surroundings, and her ears were no longer getting hot.
“Hello, doctor. It really is a beautiful day,” she said as an entire cabinet toppled face down on the floor nearby with a crash she could not, or perhaps cared not, to hear.
“I have great news! You are to be discharged immediately,” he informed his patient as he took her hand. Although his grip looked firm, she could not feel it with any true physical force.
“Yes,” she agreed. “I really want to leave now. Where will we be going? Are we going to Mars?” She felt like a six-year-old on Wintersfest morning again.
“No. We aren’t going to Mars. That world is not for you,” his voice continued to sing to her with a musical gleam.
“But we can go there now! It’s all over the news!” she protested in a voice which was that of a little elfmaid.
“We will go to a much more incredible place,” the doctor began. “All of your friends are there and they want to see you again.”
“Yes!” she cried with happy brightness. “We’re going to a party! I love parties and all my friends will be there!”
“Sure,” the doctor smiled with a bit of condensation. This was an aspect of his lot that caused him problems. His wards could never seem to grasp the great journey ahead of them. “Are you ready to leave?”
The arthritic cramp that had turned her hands into painful stone over the years felt pliant and strong again in the doctor’s grasp. She raised herself from the dirty bed and felt like a miracle patient who regained their youth in an instant by drinking an elixir featured in one of those old snakeoil cartoons she would watch when she was but a little maiden. Around them, the emergency sirens and alarms, now powered only by dumb mana, continued to blare over the hollers of the confused denizens of the hospice. None of this mattered to Glam’ryn anymore because she was going to a wonderful party away from the filth and pain of that terrible place.
“Yes, I have everything!” she exclaimed with youthful glee as she stood beside the gilded doctor in her soiled bedgown. “Let’s get out of here and have some fun!”
And to that party they went…