He left the alley continuing to stumble in a loop. To the entrance of the underground subway, back to the arcade, down the stretched-out stairway, and to the alley once again. This pathing occurred without issue.
All in his mind during such dreamlike wandering was a barren landscape. Nothing ran through to satisfy his ignorance of his situation.
That was until his feet began to bleed. Alerted to this fact by the soppiness of the inside of his shoes, Daniel rested on the nearest bench, beaten and pillaged of two of the back boards which contained a gap that a small child could fall through if not wary.
Head hung low teetering between his thighs, he watched as a praying mantis tore apart a dragonfly. Cracking its head only to draw it away from the torso feasting on the creature's tasty guts.
Bustling buses ended their trek. Tired fathers returning to grateful mothers and lackadaisical sons and daughters. Sheltered by lights that blinked out one after the other perpetuating the still darkness. Few were alone without refuge; even the pitiful managed a tin cup for shelter having confidence brimming from their conquest as well as ability to survive despite the odds.
This was all that remained in the empty can jostling in Daniel. How he obtained more than any of those kinder, greater, or worse than him. But bore no pride in his recognition. Husk, shell, doll, puppet, objects more alive than what he mustered on that bench.
Sleep massaged his temples, closing his eyes for what may be the final excuse…
'Purple…'
A blinding purple glow flung the shutters open with a swat, breathing a newfound pigment to his skin. Now, adorned by a pink hue, Daniel could express no more than a gape to his mouth as what he believed to be the apparition of a divine being sat beside him.
The bench gave no sound from her arrival. She willed it to be silent and so it shall, using the same method she had acted on to will herself to manifest at this instance. Sheets of a color so pure in its essence that the closest human sight could comprehend, transformed the tint to a flaring blue seeped from her towering figure. Standing statuesque, her extensive legs bore no footwear at their ends so as not to create departure from the natural to a processed ideal. The appliance of cloth suited as an accessory on a lithe but feminine structure which could hypnotize the other sex while soothing the cry of a babe. Yet blotted by a face unsuitable to the rest. It was masked behind a marionette's resting gesture, violet hair pooling from the back and over the front. Of this hair, Daniel swore he saw parts spreading out like an octopus' tentacle searching for a hidden secret in the air.
Sizing her up, she took more than three feet on top of his height, becoming the tallest person he had ever laid eyes on, in person and from television. An inferiority seized his struggle to withdraw from her presence deciding his outcome.
Rising he didn't take a step before she spoke a floating purr, "Darkest are days as we bequeath them similar responsibilities, but lightest are those we sought much and lay hold of, with quiet satisfaction, prickly little." The sheets poured over his shoulder redirecting his body back to the bench while turning his gaze to the orange irises inside the marionette. "Day yet set, time lost may be rummaged further to a medium allowing for great awakenings in the morn. Seek or fall, it's the shortcoming of them who cannot broaden the wasteland of curiosity."
Daniel sat back where he had left, wary but calmed by the gentle giantess. The sheets returned to their holder stirring the stilled quietness pierced by the occasional honk of a distant horn or barks of stray dogs. A gnawing question provoked Daniel to ask, "Why are you wearing a mask?"
Her voice showed no change in the inflection to her words thus leaving little indication whether Daniel's rudeness conveyed annoyance or anger; she had complete mastery over her emotions. "Native to foreign organisms mantle a mask to cover their true selves. You partake in it just as I have now. This is not the question you wished to ask." Her chin pointing his way, Daniel experienced a barrier weighed stronger than any aura. The barrier was not solid but a malleable substance that permeated Daniel's entire being sucking out the neurons from his very brain. "Apart you have strung the pieces to your soul, curiosity evades thy footprints and lost thy knowledge roams."
Blue fingers reached straight out in a motion to grasp some unseen object away from the two of them. "Goal drawing further away, no insight can be guaranteed. Standing is thee unable to unroot thyself from the sticking place. Poisonous mines lie here corrupting bountiful gardens."
"Why are you telling me this? I don't understand!" Daniel yelled at the woman, she continued.
"Anger bred by pitiful malice to be cindered by a demon alike. YOU have hit the end of the line. Matter not the path taken from which way as its conclusion plotted to be navigated once, twice, and thrice over. Remaining is an endless sadness. Aching more than physicality." She straightened her back adopting the mannerisms of a proper noble lady with either hand clasped to her lap.
Biting his tongue, Daniel dared not insite another outburst. "How do you know what's going on here?
Have you been watching me?
You haven't seen what's happened at all and are rushing to some fucking lesson that doesn't matter at all!" Ending his rant, Daniel caught her terrifying stare. Even by the biting he had raged again.
This woman, unknowing and strange, assumed countless characteristics about him. Elements that deeply rang true for the boy.
Staring into those eyes, Daniel realized that he was not in the presence of a human being. Fleeting seconds were less so from the scope of where she stood in the universe. On high up this was a matter of wisdom versus childishness, a similar experience that Daniel maneuvered in his entire life. This experience conveyed a familiar presence to him.
'How long has she known me? Before I moved? Since my birth? No, she had her sights set on me at the period of conception. Possibly even that of my parents'.'
Indeed, the outcome was buried under some files in her archives. Files that could be shifted and taken out at the slightest whim. However, these whims were growing modestly slower to conjure each time.
"Nature surrounds to cleanse the sludge which enters our veins. Sludge procured from sinful behavior. The more sludge on a person the more likely their time of ending is greeted not with a bowing smile but with bared fangs accompanied in gnarled agony."
She removed herself from the bench turning her back to Daniel, yet her voice was still clearest as she spoke directly to him, "Walk not in hidden distress, bottled whilst vilified, but under an umbrella of expressed stress. So shall the cloudy muck be made cleared then the physicality returned to a realm manageable. Pungent stenches dissipate once it is all expunged." Leaves blasted themselves across her back and front, flying off in the direction of a road never trekked upon by Daniel.
The absence of motion from her hair emphasized the point of her index finger, rising horizontally at the street. "Ought to explore sterling paths, perhaps tiresomely strange but may provoke responses in likeness. Catch terrifying luck but bestow great fortunes."
The street was jam-packed full of cars on either side, lights bristling out from the curtains of the complexes and small shops for coffee as well as candy. Just ready to close but prepared in case of one last customer for the day. Reading the street name, he recognized it to be one that led straight to his apartment room. It would probably be much longer to reach home, however, tonight he had nothing but time to reminisce.
"Th-thank you Ma-" Shifting to where the woman had been, he found her to be gone. Was it an encounter made up to save his own life? Daniel shook his head, clapping a hand to his forehead. Feverish it was with the scratches on his back not helping the situation. He smelled of potent blood causing a dizziness over himself.