|
Prelude, The Burn
He had the power. Where it had come from he had no idea. All he knew was that it was there. However, it was not his for the asking, nor had he ever wished it upon himself. The Voice, as the boy chose to call that conscious echo deep within himself, masterminded everything. It was, in a manner of speaking, in complete control.
The lad, Jeffrey, pleaded with it several times to let him be, to leave him alone, but the answer always came back the same. For his insolence, Voice would punish him by assaulting his sinuses with migraines that had him occasionally on his knees begging for mercy.
Jeffrey recalled when he could communicate with his brother by means of telepathy. It was not like this. Not a battle of the minds, one trying to control the other. It'd been a game with two of them, one they enjoyed. They used to love to wile away the hours talking to each other in their heads. Those times were long gone now. Ever since his brother's accident, their direct line to each other had been severed completely. And as far as Jeffrey knew, his brother might as well be dead.
Voice came mysteriously on the scene shortly after Jeffrey's father split to parts unknown. Everyone guessed Maine to be his new stomping grounds but nobody could be really sure. At first, Jeffrey thought Voice to be his brother coming out of his coma-like state and trying to reach him. Voice came nowhere near that happy-go-lucky kid that Jeffrey HAD spent nine years of his life getting to know.
For a time, he had regarded Voice as his new inner friend. Not as great as his brother, but seemingly a good sport, nonetheless. It always arrived in his mind just in time to help and guide him through difficult times. It always seemed to know what to do. Grateful, the boy allowed Voice to see the world through his eyes, experience his daily encounters, firsthand. Their inner bond soon became a friendship that would never know the meaning of the word, end.
Then overnight everything changed. Voice started making demands of him, directives meant to alter the boy's reasoning. It wanted him to break the law. Little things at first. Steal fruit or candy from a local store, anything to say he'd done it. Eagerly, Jeffrey went with the idea. There'd be no harm done. No one would be the wiser for it, not even his mother. Worse things began to follow: flattening tires, soaping windows, and stealing out of cars. There seemed no end to the demands and whims of the Voice. It was having a field day using him as its portal to the real world. Voice began to lead the boy down the long and twisted path of crime, one that saw him attract as companions, toughs who would do anything on a dare.
The friendship began to teeter. Die. Whenever Jeffrey debated his differences with the Voice, argued out the notion that what they were doing was wrong and that he wanted no more part of it anymore, he began to know a pain like no other. There came a malevolent force that drove him to the brink of almost instant insanity. He began to see it as payment for daring to rebel or question the motives of the one that controlled him, one that had given him so much in the past.
Now, the Voice could control him at will. It would creep up on him when he least expected it. It could easily take over his mind. It would assault him with such horrific pain that Jeffrey adamantly refused to try to fight it anymore. The Voice did exactly what it wanted. When the headaches came, the boy allowed it to come forward and dominate him. What was the use? He had asked himself that question often. He hated pain, hated the kind of suffering that Voice ran through his mind like a jackhammer jumping all over his skull. As long as he gave in, the Voice left him alone. The headaches weren't too bad. He might even grow used to them in time. If he did as instructed and allowed Voice complete power over him, he would not have to worry about those searing head pains. He had enough of them. Any more and there was no doubt in his mind at all that he would go completely mad from such agony.
|
