novelraw Chapter 121: Dreamscape
Chapter 121: Dreamscape
He had a nightmare.
He dreamed of himself lying lonely and hesitant in the frozen mud. His legs were unable to move, much less stand up. His body was helplessly enshrouded by darkness. His two eyes still gazed at the night sky, attempting to read an omen from the silent, cold sea of stars.
However, the sea of stars was silent this night. The night sky was gloomy, granting a person not even half a point of solace.
He could not find an answer, so he struggled to rise from the mud and looked around, hoping to see some slight signs of light.
But within the darkness there was neither activity, much less hope. There was only a dreary, cold silence.
The giant hand of the dark night concealed the surrounding scenery, and also painted upon it flickering shadows. He was just abandoned all alone in the dark world like this, hopeless of being saved.
For a moment, he even felt that he was already the last person in the galaxy, and due to its terrifying nature, hurriedly expelled this thought from his mind.
"Who am I?"
This question reappeared in his mind of its own accord.
"Why am I here?"Amidst his perplexity, various discomforts followed.
The cold wind bit down on his exposed face and neck, forcefully making his mind groggy. Fear, loneliness, and solitude coiled around him like phantoms.
But all of this was far from being as terrible as the silence.
He had never thought that noise could actually grant a person peace—
This silence highlighted his loneliness, making him directly face his fears.
He was in the darkness, accompanied by fear, his heart's tide difficult to calm.
"Who am I?"
This question still lingered on.
"Why am I here?"
He sometimes felt his heart palpitate wanting to howl: wanting to ask for help, wanting to beg for mercy, wanting to start Screaming, wanting to roar, wanting to pray, only praying to be able to break this terrifying silence.
Whenever this happened, he had to restrain himself with all his might, biting his lips tightly to avoid screams slipping out.
He did not know what he was fearing, but instinct made him remain quiet.
Thus, he could only silently endure this silence. Even if hope was slim, he was powerless to promote it.
"Who am I?"
When this question appeared once again, a thought rang out in his heart with a bang. He remembered.
"I am Bahram Tate. I am Bahram Tate..."
Although the first question received an answer, the second question still troubled him.
But he only felt that he had absolutely nothing, and nothing at all to care or worry about.
Those crucial matters of the past—family, relatives, faith toward the God-Emperor—had all faded far away.
Even his memories were akin to a fantasy dream. Various scenes of the past flashed before his eyes, rapidly withering away just like his future.
His heart had once been filled with bright visions, yet now they had collapsed at the point of death, leaving behind only choices that could be counted on one's fingers—howling or silence, staying awake or falling asleep.
For a moment, sleep seemed so wonderful. He was already completely exhausted and drained. Drowsiness was just like an old friend, pulling him into a dream.
But he was unwilling to yield. He knew that if he fell asleep he would not wake again, and these various choices would also turn to naught.
In the final analysis, all he had was a strict and harsh choice: life or death.
And he refused to die.
"Why am I here?"
This question rang out heartlessly, but there was no answer.
He admitted that his fate was no longer in his own grasp. He could only wait, refusing to give up or fall asleep.
He waited, his life hanging by a thread, like a single spark of candlelight amidst the tidal dark night.
Suddenly, an ethereal holy hymn descended from the sky. A golden beam of light enshrouded him within it.
It wasn't until this moment that he realized he was surprisingly an Astartes clad in gorgeous Power Armor. A snapped, dark-green longsword lay right at his feet. And within the surrounding mud, various terrifying and fiendish monsters lay strewn about; they were just like patterns adorning a brown carpet.
The song's tone gradually rose in his mind. Bahram also unconsciously relaxed his body, drifting toward the golden pillar of light that tore apart the dark sky.
Then, his feet landed on the ground once again, yet he was already a child.
The world steeply changed in his eyes.
At the ends of the earth, the sun had already sunk in the west. Red clouds reflected through half the firmament, once again washing the salt fields amidst the evening breeze into a swath of golden splendor.
In his short life, he had already witnessed such a sunset a thousand times, yet exclusively stopped his steps for this single one.
He stood there, letting the world silently revolve around himself. Carrying an unspeakable sentimental feeling in his heart, he gazed at the descent of the night's curtain.
"Is my family all well?"
Family—
This thought made him turn his head around to look toward the house on the other end, through the piles of crudely processed salt.
He saw the chimney on the slanted roof, the tower-shaped warehouse, the chicken coop his father built, and the stable keeping the beasts of burden.
He gazed at that small tin-sheet house where he had grown up, a small two-story building with a low, wooden foyer. The window sashes were wide open, welcoming the afterglow of the setting sun.
Bahram didn't need to enter to know that at this moment his mother was in the Kitchen preparing dinner; his sisters and younger brother were laying out the dining table; and his father was in the workshop tidying up the tools.
Very soon, they would take their seats to dine.
His family rested and worked like this day by day; this kind of life had been continuing ever since he could remember.
On a similarly ordinary night, he secretly left his home, bolting toward an unknown future, abandoning his family...
Beep-beep-beep-beep—
Suddenly, a burst of piercing noise dragged him back to reality from this blurry Dreamscape.
"Mhm?"
Bahram shook his swelling head and fumbled about in a daze, eventually finding the source of the noise.
His walkie-talkie was ringing.
This gave him a sudden jolt, immediately sobering him up. Because he clearly remembered that this walkie-talkie could only connect to the one on Ford's body. And after Ford previously died in battle, his walkie-talkie had not been retrieved.
Then that would mean...
"What's wrong?"
It wasn't just him; Haomo and the several others were also jolted awake. Under this environment, no one dared to sleep deeply; everyone was only sleeping lightly. So the moment there was any activity, they had immediately woken up. Some people even instinctively reached out for the weapons by their hand.
Even the two standing guard upstairs also popped their heads out from the staircase entrance, wanting to see what had happened below.
It seemed that only Bahram had fallen into a deep slumber.
"It's the walkie-talkie. Someone picked up Ford's walkie-talkie, and even plans to establish contact with us."
Quickly, Bahram used the shortest words to describe the entire matter.
Hearing his words, the surrounding people all revealed surprised expressions. Only Robin sank into contemplation.
"Generally speaking, the communication distance of this kind of small civilian walkie-talkie doesn't exceed one thousand five hundred meters. They aren't far from here."
As Robin spoke, he stood up and looked outward from the small observation port. But he didn't see anything, so he shook his head and sat back down on the ground.
"You guys upstairs, stop watching the show. Stay alert. There are quite a few wolves around us."
Hearing Robin's words, the two above immediately returned to their respective stations again.
"Should we pick up?"
Haomo looked at Bahram. The others were the same; everyone was waiting for him to make a decision.
"Let's listen to what they have to say."
Bahram considered it for a while, and finally pressed the talk button. Subsequently, a low voice accompanied by the static noise drafted out from the walkie-talkie.