The True Story of the Vortex. The Transcendence Files. Prologue - New Draft Version.

‘Twenty by one point five.’

‘Focus on the green light, Agata.’

‘Twenty-one by one point six. You’re doing great, Agata.’

‘Thank you,’ I uttered feebly.

‘Twenty-two by two point zero. Focus on the red light now, Agata.’

My eyelids were unpleasantly itching, stretched and fixed so that the laser could easily cut through my eyeball. The picture was blurry; only two bright lights were shimmering in front of my vision line. Red and green. Like two Vortex suns, I thought. Naruanar, the Red One, and Laicanar, the Green Two.

And the rays of Helwanar, the bright blue sun, were presently warming him. He probably has already gotten married to a noble Ariser maiden… a young maiden who did not have my baggage, my complications, my awful temper and my responsibility for several billion souls, including his own… and his life is probably full of joy. Please, God, let him have joy. Forget me, forget what we had, Nolementar mine - no, not mine anymore - just be happy... 

… for creators and their creations should never ever fall in love with each other. It ends badly. For me, it ended very badly. Rob Nolementar came from the Vortex, saved my life, we shared love that moves not one sun but seven, then I made him go back and never return because life on my world was killing him.

Simple. Very simple. So painful.

I swallowed hard. I should not cry, because a) it has been eighteen months, and b) I was getting LASIK. Tears and lasers do not mingle very well, I imagined. And c) I would be dead by the end of next year the latest, maybe earlier, so I had to endure through a very small portion of forever anyway.

Why I was getting LASIK, you will ask, dear reader? Why bother if I was so certain of my demise?

I just wanted to admire my own world in all its glory before I am gone, to absorb as much beauty with as much clarity and precision as possible. I wanted to see.

So I found a clinic, scheduled the surgery, and was now laying on the operation table, trying to think only about the nurses’ instructions and nothing else, first and foremost – about my Ring of Togetherness that was presently off my finger and in my bag. And my bag was in Austin's car.

Yes. I went back to my old boyfriend. If you ask me why, it is probably the first question in my life to which the answer would be “I don’t know”. Usually, I have answers. Stupid, incorrect, totally off the mark, but answers. How I could give my body to a Human after I have been loved by a Luminite? I don’t know. Don’t ask again. Call me a whore, an idiot, a sex addict, call me whatever you like – just don’t ask me about my reasons. I don’t know.

Maybe I did it instinctively, just in order to survive. I knew I would die in 2012, so I savored every moment of my remaining life. Even as the laser cut through my eyeballs, I was enjoying it, but the joy was so bitter. Bile and ashes on my lips. They were kissed by the wrong man – what other kind of joy could one expect?

Yet I still danced, still breathed, was still kissed.

Still alive.

‘All done. You will be able to get up in a moment, Agata.’

I felt the nurse remove the fixators off my eyes. Wow, that was fast. I got off the operation table, adjusted my blue pajamas, put on some blacked-out shades, then looked at the doctor through the fog.

‘Your vision will be restored to one hundred per cent after you get some sleep,’ said Doctor Vlad. I smiled at him.

‘Did I do well?’

‘You did excellent, Agata.’

‘Thank you, doctor. Thank you, ladies.’

One of the nurses accompanied me to my room. I sat on the bed and tried to focus my vision on her. She was getting less and less blurry by the second. Amazing.

‘One case out of one hundred has pains. Call me if you feel any pain in your eyes. I will be here in a second with some painkiller drops. OK, Agata?’

‘You may as well go get them now. You’ll see – this one case is going to be me.’

‘What makes you think so?’

‘I have notoriously bad luck.’

The nurse giggled. I stared at her through Rob’s old Ray-Bans.

‘Do you find pain or bad luck funny?’

She was still smiling as she said, exiting, ‘Just let me know, Agata.’

‘My name is Gate,’ I growled through gritted teeth at the closed door.

And certainly enough, my eyes started aching in several minutes. One case out of a hundred. Yeah, no shit. I’m one in a million, I’m once in a bloody lifetime.

Well, I was no stranger to pain. The scars on my calves I got in Greece after my self-imposed autodafé were still there. Ugly, just like my first months of that summer. Beautiful, just like my reconciliation with Rob. Reminders.

Austin was busting my head about removing them surgically, but I was only rolling my eyes and telling him to find himself a new scar-free girlfriend if it was so important to him. He merely responded that the scars irritated his skin when my legs were around his neck.

This usually shut me up – I could not tolerate any mention of our intimate rapport outside the bedroom. When I was with Austin, my eyes were always closed. Outside my bedroom, I treated him like furniture. He responded with rudeness and insults, disappeared for weeks, then somehow, after yet another “reconciliation” dinner we ended up in bed together, then, the morning after, it was my cue. I could not feel the Ring of Togetherness on my finger, although it was firmly planted on, I threw tantrums, Austin realized I was thinking about Rob again, called me a slut, then disappeared again.

I cannot call this a relationship, dear reader. Especially after having lived a dream.

Yet it was no dream. I had one person in my life to remind me it was all reality.

Exceller Lenatireya Norui.