VIII - VOYAGE POURPRE
“The Crimson Spice, also known as Pourpre Spice, results from the Harkonnen experimentation on raw spice from Arrakis. They have irradiated xenomorph bloo d and burnt it with raw spice. The result is a dark red powder with significant mental and physical effects. It is highly radioactive and addictive. During the tests on the slaves, the raw Pourpe Spice has caused various sets of uncontrollable visions that provoked the deaths of our experiment subjects.“After these tests, the team of Dr Lankastt has created two variants of spice with various degrees of radioactivity. The Blind Pourpre Melange for soldiers and the Monolingual Pourpre Melange for Navigators.”
—Anonymous report on the Harkonnen Experiments, M9 10191 AG
His tongue froze, but it was too late. A vague vertigo seized him.
He experienced distorted vision, disorienting headache and a sense of floating despite not being on the sea any more.
His eyes burned violently. He fell down and closed his eyes to stop the pain.
What’s happening? I’m I going to die right now here? I need to breathe.
As he inhaled with his eyes closed, six inner eyes opened from the deep darkness.
He felt tense in his head and dry in his mouth. He started seeing visions.
Six visions: two of the past, two of the present, and two of the future.
The first sets constructed his memory and the other set deconstructed it as he tried to move into his vision.
Aargh, this is so extreme.
The endless flow poured painfully into his eyes. He saw peoples: dozens, hundreds, millions of people.
So much life here.
He witnessed his mother giving birth, celebrations, love, and a million screams of joy framed in a second.
A tear fell from his closed physical eyes.
The colour vanished.
So much suffering.
His big brother floating in his own blood dripping from a Harkonnen blade.
Death and pain imbued in everything he saw
But there was a light dancing around: the wind of change, perhaps.
So many ways.
A free realm, a land of possibilities, love, sex, food, happiness and perhaps less death.
Again, he saw too much. His brain melted in vivid colour.
I need to stop that. The suffering is beyond my mere existence.
He tried to focus every cell of his brain to force his six inner eyes together to fuse them into one.
But the exact opposite happened. His eyes scattered all around his mind and spun swiftly.
His eyes whirled so fast around his head that he broke his reality.
Every atom and molecule of him dissolved as he elevated his soul from his body.
Nestor was now floating and in the blink of an eye, a crimson butterfly pressed its wings through his astral body and reassembled his particles in the divine order. He was now innerly moulded with the golden ratio, like a cosmic nautilus shell.
If you encounter this narrative on Amazon, note that it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.
A perfect shape of life, a sublime form of existence, raw from any touch of living creatures. He acknowledged everything around him. First, he reached the clouds, then entire galaxies were in front of him.
Planets pierced his astral body like thin spikes.
He got to know every living thing at once—all planets—but all his galactic motions were not his doing.
Someone is in control, his inner voice yelled in the cosmos.
And the cosmos answered,
“Who are you in this land of grand vision? A little grain in all the desert moved by the high wind. I am the High Wind of the cosmos. I insufflate the flow of every moving thing,” said the distorted high and low voice of the throne.
“And who is that?” Nestor asked as he neared the throne.
The throne was composed of millions of tiny planets on top of each other, each constantly rotating with a wild sandstorm.
“I am. Everything—At each moment,” stated the voice without a tone.
He approached to identify the holy speaker.
It was a young man, but his face was inconsistent, formed by sand, wind and two giant worms inside his eyes. They deeply attracted the soul of Nestor.
When he got near him, Nestor looked again at his face and all went black.
Every cell of the cosmos cried in pain as the body of the young man decomposed itself and collapsed in sand. The sand turned red and constructed the body of a young girl. Nestor did not recognise her; he had never seen her.
Everything was quiet again. The life stopped buzzing; the planet ceased turning. Time itself ended.
An inner peace came to the frightened mind of Nestor.
“Now I see you and you see me. But who are you? You are not one of those lost souls I have encountered lately?” said the cosmic little girl.
Her voice was so pure, like in direct liaison with my soul. Kind of angelic.
“I’m Nestor, and I’m on a mission by the Emperor.”
“Everybody already knows that, Nestor; if people could read through you, they would look at infinite blankness. Perhaps an insignificant dot moving around on his little mission.”
Now she sounds less angelic. What does she mean by blank?
“Now, Nestor, reveal yourself, who you are behind this mission.”
“I am just a sp—” Nestor started to say before his mouth closed.
“You’re more than that, I know. Grief is upon you; you need to close your inner void and open to the world.”
He was betrayed by his own hidden feeling: grief—pain.
“Hector,” continued the little girl.
“You still hold the responsibilities over your dead brother.”
“That’s bullsh—”
“You can’t hide that from me. I am the Wind: Everything goes through me. Take a deep breath. Feel the breeze through your nose,” she said.
He breathed deeply. The wind stopped all astral noise. His emotional shield lowered its gate for her to enter.
“If you mock and fight the harshness of the Harkonnens, why are you that blank? Colour your life, Nestor, colour your life. Breathe through it as you do with the wind.”
“There is nothing from me left. I’m incapable of love again. Only my duty gives me the faith to stay. My brother was everything to me. I should have died on that day, not him. He was better than me—social and happy. This work is all I have,” he said desperately. More tears fell from his closed physical eyes.
“I see greatness in you; you are not what you think. But you never showed yourself. You always displayed the part of your disguise for a new Imperial scheme. You act like a puppet animated by burning strings,” explained the calm girl.
“How can I repent? How can I move on from this? I suffer as I’m held in my abyss. Left in an eternal decaying state,” he said with pain in his throat, “I don’t want to hurt myself anymore.”
“Open yourself.”
“HOW!?” Nestor yelled in anger before exploding in a million pale round dots.
She stood up and spoke in an commanding voice that resonated in all the dots of Nestor.
“Colour your life! Be aware of others. Fight not only for duty, but also for your life and what it could be! Fight for what you cherish. You may not repair yourself, but helping a lost soul can. From the ashes of the wanderer without purpose, greatness can be ignited. Let it spread their wings. I view grandeur, sheer joy and even love for you. Love yourself, Nestor, and be aware of life. Colour your life.”
She blew fiercely against the pale dot.
“Bon voyage,” she finished.
The pale dot turned into a million colourful dots in the powerful wind. They mixed and poured themselves into a maelstrom of emotions, down in the cosmos. They reconstructed him and rejoined the physical realm.
His visions drew inside a sinister red path.
Nestor opened his real eyes, and all the colour and pure light evaporated under a dark veil.
The dim light seen by his two eyes, real mortal eyes, gave him a chill.
Where am I? His senses were in motion.
And then he knew.
Shade of grey,
smell of ash,
hand tied,
cold cellar.
----------------------------------------
Astral Nestor Karfo [https://res.cloudinary.com/dxtl7maxi/image/upload/v1661078195/Art/Pourpre%20Conspirary/astral-nestor-karfo-avrip-and-the-machine.png]
Astral Nestor Karfo - Avrip & The Machine
Throne of the Wind [https://res.cloudinary.com/dxtl7maxi/image/upload/v1661078155/Art/Pourpre%20Conspirary/the-wind-avrip-and-the-machine.png]
The Wind - Avrip & The Machine