Beacon from Beyond

Leven and his family were sitting down at a restaurant, enjoying their meals. He had turned six and finished his first week of school, his parents deciding to take him and his eleven year old sister Sophie out to celebrate his “growing up” as he had thought of it. He remembered that, as a kid, he was enthusiastically talking about all the interesting things he’d found out about his new best friend, Jared.

While waiting for their food, his mom had excused herself and said she needed to use the restroom, while I kept telling my story. After a few minutes, I remembered seeing my mom out of the corner of my eye near the bar, so I stopped talking for a second to look at her, confused. She was talking to a man he’d never seen before, the guy was swaying back and forth, probably drunk, blocking her way. What caught his eye was how his mother kept worriedly throwing glances at his table while saying something to the man, who wouldn't leave her alone.

Leven locked eyes with his mom, and hers widened slightly. He saw her look at his sister, motioning something to Sophie. His sister had just barely caught her moms instructions when she reached out to grab me, but it was slightly too late.

“Why is momma talking to that man?” I said, with all the naivety of a child.

Immediately, he heard Sophie slap her hand over her own mouth instead of his as he suddenly saw his father whip into the direction of the restrooms and see what was going on.

That was the very first time he saw how quickly his father could change. The smile dropped off his face, and even though he did not scowl nor express even the slightest bit of anger, the absolute absence of emotion caught me off guard. Even as a kid, I realized almost instantly I had done something wrong.

“Dad!” Sophie had shouted, but it was drowned out over the din of noise around the restaurant. His father ignored her and quickly stood up, his chair not even making a scraping noise as he silently weaved around tables and approached his mother and the man. His mom saw this and her face hardened too, she grabbed the man by the face and quickly turned his head towards his father, making his way over.

Every table his dad had passed by gave a startled jump and glanced in his direction, even those who never looked at him in the first place or heard him pass, it was like they could feel his presence.

The man paled, and while he couldn't hear his mom, Leven saw her mouth moving as she told the man something while still holding his face.

‘Run, now.’

Without a wave goodbye to his friends, Leven saw the man quickly move around his mother and book it out the door, avoiding touching her as though she were the deadliest thing in the world. The man knocked over multiple empty chairs in his rush, but was out the door faster than Leven had ever seen anyone move.

His father changed directions to go after him, but his mother quickly intercepted him and placed her hands on his shoulders as she stood in front of him. Leven couldn't see her anymore because her father was blocking the way, but to him she seemed so much larger, so much stronger than he had ever known her. He thought she had done something impossible at the time, stopping a mountain dead in its tracks. His father made slight movements to get around her, but was completely unwilling to shake her off completely. He moved with the strength of a swaying oak, trying to gently pull her from him without leveraging his strength enough to hurt her, but she clung to him like he was her last lifeline. A few people were watching this happen as they had been startled by the noise and my father passing by, but nobody intervened. After maybe a minute, maybe five, or maybe just a few seconds as Leven wasn't thinking clearly at the time, his father stopped struggling, gently placed his hand into his mothers hand, and allowed her to guide him back to their table.

Sophie let out a breath next to him, one that he hadn't realized she was holding, as she saw them both moving back.

He didn't know how to interpret the expression his father had, but with everything Leven knew now, it was probably regret.

They had sat down, and his mother asked him to continue telling them about his week, but Leven had resisted until she shot him a look, and he realized it wasn't really a request. Awkwardly, he continued where he left off, but after a few more seconds of talking, he quickly got back into the nature of things and, slowly but surely, the incident with his father was pushed to the back of his mind; he didn’t forget it, it simply faded from relevance to him and seemed unimportant.

For a time.

A little over two years went by, and while his perception of his parents changed a bit, nothing else really did. The memory stuck to him, but he rarely thought about it at the time. He only thought it was strange because it never faded in clarity, like all of his others did.

Third grade was the first time it came up again. Jared and him had grown to become best friends, a dynamic duo. Leven wasn’t very social, usually avoiding other students that Jared hadn’t introduced, while Jared loved to embellish stories to others in his grade and make as many friends as possible, but there was only one Leven to Jared, and Leven knew that Jared considered them best friends too.

Normally, Leven would have either played with Jared during recess or sat alone reading a book, but Jared had been out for three days, and he was feeling a bit lonely, so he decided to go play with one of the friends Jared had previously introduced him to. Leven had his favorite wooden car toy, and Taj had his marbles.

Leven needed to use the bathroom, so he told Taj he would be right back. He left his car on the mat and got the hall pass, left and came back, and moved back to play with Taj. The only issue was, Taj was playing with his wooden car. Leven wasn’t really mad, but he wanted his car back.

“Taj, give me my car. Please” Leven added, remembering his mothers lessons on politeness.

“No! You’ve been playing with it all recess. I want a turn, you can play with my marbles.”

His teacher glanced over after Taj shouted no, but Leven hadn't noticed. Instead, he scowled with more fury than a child had any right to do, but still, he remembered how he wasn't supposed to hit anyone.

“TAJ!” Leven shouted “Give! It! Back!” balling up his fists. He saw the teacher moving towards them in his peripheral vision but ignored her.

“NO!” Taj screamed and turned to start running away.

When Leven realized what Taj was doing, he instantly lunged for him with his fists raised, ready to bring them down. Instead, he was quickly scooped up out of the air by the teacher and pulled back as she held him in a hug from behind

“Shh shh, its okay, its okay” she started to quietly console him, but he didn't want to hear it, he had wanted to hit Taj, the thief who was still running away! His teacher picking him up had distracted him for a moment, but when he saw Taj again, he started struggling in her grip. She had held his arms down with her own, but as he pushed back against her, he could hear her grunt with exertion as she squeezed as hard as she could, but still, he felt her arms move open ever so slightly.

“Leven!” she said in a strained voice. His rage at being stolen from was drowning out all other sensibilities, but when he heard the pain in her voice, a second emotion joined the first. Guilt cut through the static in his mind, and he realized he was hurting her. Letting his muscles relax, he allowed her to quickly carry him towards the door. He had suddenly felt incredibly tired, and whispered out “sorry” in a meek voice, before falling asleep.

He woke up some time later in his mothers arms, and as he looked around, he noticed that he was in the room right outside of the principal's office. From behind the door, he heard his teacher say “Geez, I know you warned me about it but still… I was barely able to get him under control. No, it would be better to say I didn’t get him under control, he let himself be taken away…”

When his mom realized what he was listening to, she hoisted him onto her hip and took him to the car. It was a quiet ride after his father got out of the meeting, and when we got home, my parents explained to me that anger issues ran in the family. They had warned my teacher to watch out for it just in case, but it had skipped over my sister so they had hoped it would do the same to me.

I was told that I needed to make sure to watch my actions and to not let myself become too angry. They explained that normally people would use medicine to help control the issue, but for some reason it never worked on anyone in our family.

The next day, my father stayed home from work while my mother went out shopping to let him talk to me in private.

“Leven” he said with a gravity that ensured I would take his words seriously “when I was your age, I let my anger get the better of me too many times. Nowadays I can mostly contain it, but there are always outbursts. I know that this is unfair to ask of you, but I need you to try to be better, so that you don’t have to look back over your childhood, regretting all the things you said and did in anger.

“Today, I’m going to teach you meditation and breathing techniques to calm yourself down, and we are going to start working out together. I’ve found that when I stop myself from acting out when I'm angry, it doesn't go away. You will need to work off your anger in a productive way, and exercise can become that. Lets start with meditation to keep your mind balanced, and breathing techniques to bring it back into balance when something spikes with your anger.”

Like that, my father started a routing where, after I got home from school and he got home from work, we would work together to undo any buildup of stress through the day. I was used to my emotions fading after a few minutes or hours, but in this case my father had been right, after suppressing the desire to break free from my teacher, I had a rage simmering below the surface that never fully went away.

On Friday the next day, Taj came up to me and apologized, giving me my car back. I remembered my fathers words about trying to be better, and felt like I needed to live up to the expectations. I stiffly accepted the apology, even when I really still wanted to hit him, and we never talked about it again.

Over the next two years, incident after incident happened that caused my anger to spike, but I always managed to wrangle it into submission until I got home to work out my stress with a punching bag or dumbbell, never quite freeing myself from it, but always getting enough out of my system to make it to the next incident.

In the cafeteria, a student tripped and knocked a tray from my hand, but for some reason it didn't really bother me and no anger rose.

I saw one of Jared and I’s mutual friends talk about how good of a friend he was with Jared, and talked about how they were best friends. The anger spiked badly, but I managed to ask to go to the bathroom and calm myself down enough to return to class.

Taj, the source of his first incident, started glaring at Jared any chance he could. He never approached us, but always looked displeased when he saw us. It led to a continuous buildup of anger any time I caught a glance of him, because who was he to hate us? But I never let myself lose control

Over time, the simmering rage beneath the surface became something of a constant companion to me. It never went away, but I realized it was becoming easier to control, every spike not quite getting as close as the last from breaking the dam. The anger continued to grow, of course, but the walls that contained it seemed sturdier than ever.

I even started going out of my way to do kind things to people who wronged me, proving to myself that I would always refuse to let it direct who I was. After all, I had reasoned, if I avoid people that make my anger spike, that's just another way of letting the anger decide who I talk to.

By around the middle of fifth grade, I was notorious for being a gentle giant. I was naturally tall, and the workouts with my dad put some muscles on me that other kids just didn't have.

One day though, I arrived oddly early. Normally I’d only get to school five to ten minutes before school started, but my parents had been excited for a shared day off they both had, and we left early, followed by getting every single green light.

Arriving thirty minutes before school started, I remembered that the school served breakfast for people who got there early, and thought it would be cool to see if there was anything nice to eat, even if I already had mine.

Making my way to the cafeteria, something in my head started to bother me. I’d found that sometimes my anger would tell me to do things, a little devil on my shoulder so to speak, but this time it was something else. The wall I used to contain my anger was starting to say something too. Not words, the anger had never said words and neither did this barrier id built around it, it just sent a feeling of urgency

Behind the agriculture building

I didn’t know where the feeling had come from, but it felt important, and it was coming from something I considered to be a source of pride in my head, the container of my anger.

Moving quickly towards the edge of the schools boundary, between the fence and the agriculture building, I started hearing a familiar voice, Jared.

“What do you have today?” Jared said in a growl, a voice Leven had never heard him use. To him, it sounded malicious.

Someone else mumbled something he couldn't hear

“Speak up!” Jared snapped

“Just… just some french toast and orange juice” he heard another familiar voice say, Taj.

Quietly moving from around the corner, walking towards them, he saw what was happening

Taj had his eyes downcast, Jared was standing in front of him, with another one of their friends behind him. Leven didn't know this one, Jared never wanted the two of them hanging out.

“Do you think im stupid?” Jared snarled “I know there was chicken with this too.” Raising his arm. Bracing himself, Taj did not put his hands up to defend.

Quick as lightning, Leven grabbed Jareds elbow. “That's enough.”

He said in a voice that brooked no disagreement

Jared turned around, mouth agape “er, Leven, why are you here so early?”

“That's not important” he said, watching as the other kid Leven didn't know shuffled awkwardly next to him ‘he won't do anything’ Leven thought.

Taj looked up, surprised at the new intrusion too, and his eyes widened in terror.

Leven held up his hands placatingly “I’m not going to hurt you, come with me and we can get you a new breakfast. I want to know whats going on”

Jared tried to stammer something out next to him, but turned beet red when he heard what Leven was saying. Turning around, he ran away and Leven made no move to stop him.

They went to the cafeteria and Leven gave Taj his breakfast, french toast, orange juice, and chicken strips. Taj explained to him while on the verge of tears that Jared picked a few kids to terrorize, and he would use Leven as an excuse to make them shut up about it.

‘Say anything, and Leven is going to find you before I do’ was what he had said to Taj specifically. Leven was horrified, and told him that it was completely untrue, much to Taj’s relief. He wanted to know why Jared had done such a thing, but he never found out. Later in life, Leven would realize that there doesn’t always have to be a reason for some to cause pain, but he still regretted letting someone like that get close to him.

Jared and him had a falling out after Leven pushed Taj to speak up about what had happened, and four other kids admitted to being bullied in much the same way. Jared was suspended for a month, and Leven ended up befriending Taj, much to Jareds dismay.

Not much changed over the next decade or so. Sometimes I would be hit with a desire to be somewhere near me, and I found that every single time, there was someone in need. If the feeling faded before I got there, it meant I was too late to help. I kept quiet about it, but was proud of my random acts of kindness.

The anger grew too, but I grew with it. Each passing month, it ballooned inside of me, and each passing month I grew strong enough to contain it and more. I never had an outburst, and the term ‘gentle giant’ followed me through my life. I always looked angry or serious, but proved to be kind at every turn. Around a year into college, I met one of the prettiest women I'd ever seen, and four months later we were dating. Taj stayed my best friend and never did anything terrible to anyone, luckily, and he said he was happy for me and Emily.

Two years after that, I proposed and she said yes. Taj was the best man at our wedding. After another three years, I was well into my first engineering job. It paid well, I had a wife that I loved, and we were happy in our little apartment, with plans to buy a house in the distant future.

The next three years were the best of my life. Me and Emily finally got our home together, and we decided to have children.

Emily was three months pregnant when I was making my way home as the two emotions in my head spoke out simultaneously

‘Rush home, now’ The anger sent the directive with glee, while the calmness that contained it sent feelings of resignation.

Pressing down on his gas, he went over a hundred miles down the interstate and barely slowed down enough to stay grounded as he took his exit. Rushing through every redlight, a police officer started flashing their lights to get him to stop, but he ignored it. Pulling into the suburbs that he and Emily shared, he barely wove around someone crossing the road as he pulled into his driveway, or tried to. Where he would normally park, there was another car.

Taj’s car.

Fury built inside him but he told himself he didnt know everything. He parked in the yard and quickly stormed up the steps to his house as he heard the police officer shout “Freeze!” but he ignored that too. Not bothering with his keys, he crushed his houses doorknob and broke the door off its hinges from pushing too hard.

He felt something electrocute him from behind but didn't even slow, and stormed into his bedroom,

In bed with his wife, naked, was his best friend Taj, with his handgun that he kept in the nightstand pointed at him.

He watched as they both went through a range of emotions as the pressure built inside him

Pressure from his anger,

Pressure from his Wrath

Finally, cracks appeared in the box he always contained it with.

“SIR! GET DOWN!” the officer yelled behind him, but he ignored it

Letting out a beastial shout, he took a single step forward-

Six quick pops from behind him, and he was on the ground,

“Leven!” he heard Emily cry out as her voice broke, but it was too late.

Now, in the present his entire life, right up to the moment the officer shot him in the back and through his heart, flashed before his eyes.

‘Its unfair!’ he raged ‘my entire life I tried to be better, only to end with my loved ones betraying me!? Only to contain the rage of a life wasted? To never be able to feel peace, to never give up fighting the evil within me, to never feel normal because I did not want others to suffer for me being weak?’

He could feel himself being turned over as Taj looked at him with a grim expression, and Emily had tears rolling down her face.

He tried to lift his arm and brush away her shaking, but they wouldn't respond

‘If I could kill both of you, I would!!’ he shouted with all his might in his mind, but nothing came out.

The anger within him howled against the unfairness of it all, and the walls he had built up around it had no reason to reign in that anger. He felt as a coldness overtook his body, and a sensation he couldn't describe pulled something from deep within him. Death was the only word he could think of, but it did not truly encapsulate it.

Things moved through the nothingness, converging on him, trying to rip out parts of him that should never be touched.

‘NO!’ he snarled in his mind, and the shadows receded ever so slightly ‘I WILL NOT END LIKE THIS!’ years, decades of fury unleashed into the void surrounding him as the barrier around his Wrath fully shattered. Cries of pain from abominations filled his sense of awareness. He could not hear, but feel their terror. His soul was moving somewhere, and these creatures stood between him and wherever he was supposed to go.

For the first time though, he wouldn't reign himself in. He wouldn’t stop the rage, as his very soul might depend on it. He felt as the anger that was so tangible in life became tangible, he knew he was sending out his waves of fury in an attack he couldn't see, and the abominations fell by the hundreds.

His soul sped up through the void, and he continued to radiate his might, slaying any who dared approach him.

Anger, grief, and pain filled every attack. The injustice of his life, the injustice of his death, and the horror at being forced to forget who he was. He knew it, instinctually, that these entities he couldn't see or hear would feed on who he was if he allowed them to do so, snuffing out his existence in an instant.

He wouldn't allow it, his anger refused to be quelled. His rage lasted an eternity and a single moment, he persisted in a timeless place nowhere and everywhere all at once. He felt connected to the cosmos, yet so very alone in his battle to never forget who he was, who he is.

Yet just as quickly as it started, it ended. The terrors receded as though they were never there, gone without even the slightest bit of reluctance, fleeing as a larger predator appeared

[Hello, Leven] the God declared.