Challenge #182
Option #1: at the back of the wardrobe
Note: A little bit of explanation from Vincent. Hopefully at least some of it makes sense. At least as much sense as it must make to Alice.
Peeping Alice pt.17
Shaken, Alice doesn't move into the room further, but instead grabs the door and quietly pulls it closed. She shakes her head at Vincent and makes her way down the stairs. Rex is loitering near the bottom watching their decent with a large grin.
"See everything you needed to?"
Alice just nods, and makes her way out the front door. Vincent gives his thanks to Rex for letting them visit. Alice quickly rushes to the van, and before they're both inside with the doors closed, she fixes him with a stare.
"What the hell?"
"Something dark is going on in that house."
"Well no shit Vin. But what IS it?"
"Not here. We will head back to the apartment and talk there."
Alice sighs loudly, but eventually nods in agreement. The drive home is quiet, broken only by Alice's occasional tapping against the door handle in anxious rhythms. When they reach the apartment parking lot, Alice doesn't wait while Vincent locks up the van. She walks quickly towards the building.
"My apartment Alice, not yours."
With that thought, she stops and glances back at him the surprise evident in her features. He gives a small shrug as he falls into step beside her.
"You're keeping secrets Vin. You never invite me in," she says nervously as the door to his apartment opens at his touch.
"Yes," is his only answer as they step inside and the door closes of its own accord behind them.
For a moment, his apartment looks normal. A low sofa sits in front of a moderately sized television in the front room. An island counter separates the room from the kitchen on the other side. It looks like a typical bachelor apartment all dark colors and a slightly unlived in feel. As Alice takes a few steps into the living room, the room shifts around her and in a second all that's normal is gone. She blinks once, twice, trying to realign her thoughts with what she sees. Instead of a small furnished apartment, they are standing in a large open room. The walls are no longer the plain white stucco of a typical apartment, but each is instead covered in murals and frescos. The only furniture is a small desk and chair with a few large books resting to one side on the floor and a small cot in the far corner covered with a light blanket.
Alice lets out a soft noise of surprise turning around and around to look at the room.
"You have been keeping secrets!"
Vincent nods. "I have been debating on when it was best to tell you. I fear I have waited too long, the others knew long before they reached your age."
"The huh...what? Others?" She fixes him with an incredulous stare.
"I have told you about your powers Alice. That you are gifted with the ability to pick and choose what souls can move on to finality and which can return, be reborn. You have done well, but it has not been enough. It has not been nearly enough. I have never started with one so young as when I met you."
Alice makes her way over to the cot never taking her eyes from Vincent, and sits down, pulling her legs up to her chest as she listens.
"There are many things I have been remiss in telling you. I explained some of this to your parents, when they agreed to put you in my care. There have been others like you, through the years. I have always placed myself in the position to help them, like with you. You are not merely gifted, you are selected...chosen to be a replacement."
"Replacement, for what?"
"The Cycle. It is the life and death of all the world. What you can do, is not some small Talent. It is not as local as I may have led you to believe." He pauses a moment, pulling out the chair from the desk and taking a seat.
"What do you mean, not as local?"
"Just that, Alice. Your Talent cannot be restrained to a small locality as you have been using it. It is to be used at all times, on all people."
"I don't know how to do that!"
"I know. That fault lies squarely with me. As I said, I have never taken in one as young as you."
"So, how many others are there?" she asks quietly.
"Now? There is only you. Only one. That is one of the reasons we needed to speak. Each Cycle can last hundreds of years, an only when it reaches the end does the next one begin -- that is the nature of any cycle. What happened Sunday and yesterday, the darknesses, these are signs of an imbalance in the Cycle."
"I don't understand. If I'm the...replacement...how can this Cycle be ending?"
"The Cycle doesn't necessarily end with the birth of the replacement. When the Cycle truly ends, you will understand how your Talents need to be used at all times."
"So what does that make you? How old are you, really? And I thought you said I was the only one?" She asks letting out a loud sigh of frustration.
"I am to be your guide, just as I told you when we first met. Just like I told your parents. You have a Talent that needs to be nurtured and grown. Think of the Cycle as a process and you are the key to that process, the only key. Without you, it cannot continue..." he pauses as a look of recognition crosses her face.
"Fianne..." she says softly. "She was like me."
He nods and gives her a soft smile. "In a way, yes. You dream of her," he says matter-of-factly a hint of sadness in his voice. He clears his throat before continuing, "She was one of many, just as you are Alice."
"So what happens now?" she asks, looking away.
"You learn how better to use your Talents. There are other things you can learn as well, small things that will help you keep the Cycle in balance. And, we explore this darkness that is causing the current imbalance. If the Cycle is truly ending and being reborn...it is only the beginning of how behind we are in training."