“Follow me, combatant.”

  Zoe whether as her dream-ego dream-self or her earthly-incarnated self did not like that word one bit. She obliged her spiritual-master, her god or god-self form, though she would not think to call him that.

  Zoe pressed on.

  “But why am I here? Who are you?” She began to pester him with all the feverish-ness of awe that these once holy grounds generated in her.

  He effortlessly ignored her and continued his Eagle-Man strides forward, as if he were the only one walking in this self-enclosed space.

  She followed him with eyes ajar until she caught up to his side, forgetting to shout “wait!” from her impulsive dash forward. She then walked in equal pace with him. She stopped when he stopped.

  His magnificient folded wings kept stealing Zoe’s attention. She would at times forget to look around at her surroundings with how much this angelic-solar being mesmerized her. He was a bird of war after all. His fierce talons of ebony somehow entrapped and reflected light in equal measure.

  One of Eagle-Man’s wings folded-in was the length of Zoe shoulder-to-shoulder – and Zoe was what her mother and grandmother would endearingly call a “big-boned girl.”

  She could not imagine how big his actual wingspan was nor the powerful gusts generated during his ascent though she had caught some flurries of his generated winds when they had landed.

  Again and again Zoe found herself entranced with her higher self.

  “Who are you?” She asked him more than once as they walked through the temle’s halls. There was, in truth, not much to look at given its current vacant status.

  She expected him to be angry with her inquisitiveness but he remained silent and unaffected – “just eagle,” she could not help but joke.

  “The time for discourse is nigh,” he communicated to her mind-to-mind. “Now open this stone doorway!” He pointed with a powerful outstretched hand, his folded-wings lightly fluttered about in closed movement.

  Zoe had not even realized they had stopped moving right in front of a stone slab that occulded some inward dwelling of the temple.

  “But why? What is this place?” She knew the answer to the second question.

  Zoe felt tired from her rollercoaster of emotions, from fright and terror in the small apartment to elation and expansion during the wonderous flight to tired and inexplicable sadness when she had touched-back down in her spiritual home.

  “What’s wrong with this place?!” Zoe demanded to know.

  If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.

  “I can tell there had once been a vast ocean here teeming with life. Why is everything dead?!”

  Zoe grew frustrated with the Eagle-Man’s effortless silence. It was somehow unwilled and unoffensive in equal measure. It’s unassumedness frustrated her further and she finally did as she was told and push the big square engraved rock that blocked the way inside.

  She did want answers after all but nothing happened. There was an engraved ancient stoic face at the center of the slab. She tried to use it as leverage to better grip and push this weight of matter but to no avail.

  “It’s not working!”

  “Nothing’s happening.”

  “Yes,” the divine being spoke. She was not sure if that is what he had wanted to happen.

  “Only a human can open this door he told her.”

  Zoe grew under the spell of a strange case of dejavu. She realized though they both had stood in place they were now somewhere else in the temple.

  The same doorway blocked the entrance.

  “Is this an effect of the akashic fields or the work of this divine being?” She wondered but not for long as there was a strong sense of nausea in her.

  The stone slab gave way to a stone door composed of two very flat individual slabs. The first door had unfurloughed itself to reveal its hidden secondary entrance.

  “So I did open it?”

  “Now what?” Zoe looked at Eagle-Man and asked.

  “How do you open a door with no knob, keyhole, or hinges?”

  She was really hoping he would not tell her to push again though she no idea how that movement would work unless thee ancient cosmic doors folded inwards like the wooden entrance of a mid-Western saloon.

  “Your world is at war, combatant.”

  “It is our duty to play our part.” The divine being told her. “We must do our utmost, you and I, to fulfill our roles. This is the duty of everyone born from the Tree of Life.”

  “The Cosmic Calender is in effect.”

  Zoe somehow grew happier and more confused with each passing sentence. She had sensed she had a higher place in the unverse than the chains of mediocrity the mundane world had foisted upon her – yet, in truth, she did not want to enter a full-on war.

  “Can’t we all just live in peace? Kombaya.” She wanted to childishly quip.

  He continued, fully aware and ignoring her inner monologue.

  “The world torn between intoxication and the present moment can not survive for much longer in this imbalanced and unhinged state. The past and future versus the here and now. Neither can triumph but only learn to give way to something greater.”

  “The one-sided favoring of one position over the other has put the world in turmail and as a result the akashic fields have fallen into ruin and neglect. Heaven is dying, Zoe.”

  Zoe’s eyes widened. “That doesn’t sound good…”

  Zoe spoke without thinking – from an external perspective it looked like Zoe was continually talking to herself since she was the only one talking outloud while Eagle-Man communicated mentally to her.

  “But…but. Isn’t ‘Heaven’ supposed to be immortal or something? That’s why it’s called ‘Heaven,’ everyone goes there to die.” She awkwardly chuckled.

  “Now is not the time for sad remembrances,” her higher self told her.

  She knew exactly what he was referring to with his comment.

  “I didn’t mean it like that…” A silent veil of despondency covered her face.

  “Your grandmother is alive and well, Zoe.” He told her.

  A flash of joy shot across her face and left just as abruptly in a moment’s notice.

  “In heaven?” She said angrily at her higher form.

  “You have lived a thousand lives, little one.”

  “And you will live a thousand more. Nothing is final. Everything is uncertain. This is what it means to be alive.”

  Zoe replying back with force and fast as lighting, still not knowing what she was saying but just letting herself talk – “then how is there a Cosmic Calender?!”

  “Nothing is certain but I have a role to fulfill? A duty to accomplish??”

  “I just want my grandmother back!” She began to shout teary eyed.

  “I just want my grandmother back! If you’re so powerful then make her come back!”