So my run at Tessa's Seven Wishes comes to an end.

A brief peek behind the curtain: I originally hadn't planned to write a connected series of stories. In fact, my original "King" story was going to be completely different--something about Patrick Stewart and Men In Tights--but I saw an opportunity to weld them into a running storyline, and better yet, to hold them to a theme that is close to my heart: growing up.

Time was to me about realising the power--and responsibilities--of becoming something more than a child, whilst also being less than an adult.

King was a simple piece about rebellion--that period in a teenage life when they believe everything is owed to them and nothing is forbidden.

Migration is about that difficult point in life where you realise that you know what? You're not infallible. That there are bigger and scarier people out there than you. But for those who come through the other side (like the narrator did), they gain a different kind of strength.

Obvious is more about the harsh realities of life, about realising that there are no support mechanisms out there beyond those you build yourself.

Sharing is about developing lasting networks--realising that you need to lean on others as well as relying on yourself.

Bear is about that all too human realisation that there's more out there you don't have...that there's always somewhere else you need to go, something else you need to do, or you won't feel complete.

And Revolution is about the point in life where you finally take control of your own destiny. I can't say I've reached that point yet, but I try every day.

I did wonder whether Tessa thought the bear had stumped me. ; )

This has been a fascinating experiment for me, and I'd like to thank Tessa for giving me permission to play along in her sandpit. I hope I didn't kick over your sandcastle, Tessa.

ETA: Time King Migration Obvious Sharing Bear Revolution? Sign me up! ; )

--Mike

"Congratulations," he says.

I raise an eyebrow.

"Well," he explains. "You're here."

I lower my eyebrow and raise the other one.

He leans forward in his chair. "And you're the last."

He doesn't seem inclined to explain.

"The last what?" I venture.

"The last human."

I laugh at him. "There are plenty of us left, old man. We may not look like me any more...but we're still human."

His turn to raise an eyebrow. "Really?"

"Yes. Really."

He smiles. "Well, I guess I'm allowed to have my little jokes. Eternity would be very boring without them."

I smile in return. "Quite." And I have the experience to prove it. "So...where am I?"

"The end of the universe," he replies.

###

It's been coming for quite some time. The universe has been contracting, all the matter being pulled inexorably to a central gathering point. Galaxies have smashed together in an awesome and terrifying display of gravitational forces. Scientists from all of the races have sought a solution--a place to go, outside our universe, but without any luck. It appears the end is really the end, and no amount of wishful thinking will render it otherwise.

###

"So how...?" I gesture at the room. Utilitarian. White walls. White ceiling. Beige floor tiles, perfectly aligned. And an old man. With a deep voice. In a chair. Another question occurs to me. "Are you God?"

He chuckles. "Perhaps. But a more useful and more interesting question: who are you?"

I'm taken aback by the question. "I'm not sure."

He smiles again. He looks hungry. "Excellent. You pass."

"Pass what?"

"The test."

"Test for what?"

"Humanity. Oh, I know what you're thinking. I could have gone all Frank Herbert on you and forced you to stick your hand in a box that makes you feel excruciating pain whilst holding a poison needle to your neck, but this way is so much more...efficient."

"Yes," I agree. "It is that."

"But one thing you shouldn't forget: you might call it 'humanity', but it doesn't mean your race has a monopoly on it."

"Yes, I know." I've seen plenty of the good and the bad over the years.

He stands up, pats the pockets of his suit. "Well, guess I should get going..."

"Um...going where?"

"Retirement! It's been a long time. Good luck."

"Luck? With what?"

"Starting over. Cheerio." He waves, and then disappears.

I'm left alone in the room.

With the chair.

###

Read the original here.

On the fiftieth anniversary of Reza's death, I pay my respects to her spirit the same way I have for the other forty-nine. I get up before dawn, and make my way to Yume no Oka, just outside the outskirts of the still-small human settlement. I settle down into a kneeling position, facing east, and close my eyes. And when I feel the first rays of sunshine on my face, I open my eyes, and whisper her name, wishing her well on her journey.

She's out there, somewhere.

I pull the faded photograph of her from my pocket. Despite my best efforts to look after it, the photo has become dog-eared and creased over the years. But it's still my dearest possession. I don't think it matters how far I go, I will always treasure the memory of the first person who ever treated me as human. As worthy of her attention.

I watch the sun until it is a handspan above the horizon, then I turn back to the settlement and make my way down. People are beginning their days here, on the newest human colony in the galaxy. I've spent much of the last fifty years drifting from place to place, in search of I'm-not-sure-what.

I settle down to a table at an optimistic café and watch the people go by.

What is it I'm searching for? I'm not sure I know any more. My life's been empty for fifty years. I live it only because I am conditioned, like every other sentient creature in the universe, to desire my own survival above all else, to believe that I am the pinnacle of creation and that I am special.

Yes, that's right. I am unique. Just like everyone else.

And yes, I'm aware that I may be the first person in history to whom the word "unique" can actually apply in an unqualified fashion.

And, as I sit there and watch the people passing by, sipping my coffee, the same thing keeps playing in my head over and over again. I'll never find anyone like me, no matter how far I search...

A family passes by. The little girl with them must be around two and a half. She stares up at her father with unalloyed admiration, her tiny hand enveloped by his. In her other hand, she drags a teddy bear along the ground.

Not for me, that life. No teddy bears in my future--no matter how long that future lasts.

I hurriedly finish my coffee and stand to go, but not before a tear makes its way down my cheek.

###

Read the original here.

We send Reza's body into space. Like the way they used to send bodies overboard on ocean ships. Back then, it was because it was unsafe to keep the body on board as a breeding ground for disease. Now, it's just a tradition. The body could be broken down into its component atoms if necessary, but that's not how it's done. Instead, the deceased is dressed in their finest clothes, wrapped in a blanket--or a Confederation Flag, if they were a soldier--and then sent out the airlock. Sent to roam the far reaches of space for eternity.

I watch as the bundle recedes into the distance. She didn't look the same, dead. The indefinable spark had been taken from her body, and what was once a living person with hopes and dreams became little more than a shell.

After her funeral--such as it was--everyone gathers at Reza's quarters. They nominate me to preside over the ceremony. One by one, Reza's friends and acquaintances lay claim to one or another of her possessions, taking them as theirs. It's up to me to judge the veracity of the claim, to determine whether the person has a right to take the item...or not. But nobody makes more than a simple claim, and soon the ceremony is over. My share of her estate is a photo of her with her mother and father. Something to remember her by.

It's another spaceborn tradition, giving away the deceased's worldly goods--a means of saving resources in space where they're at a premium.

I take another look at the photo when I get back to my quarters. Reza seems happy, like she's content with life and looking forward to whatever might be coming next. I wonder how she felt in her final moments. I place the picture on the wall next to my bunk, which has up until now been empty.

It looks so lonely by itself.

###

Read the original here.

Six months since I escaped the prison station and hitched a ride on one of the huge ships. You could spend almost an entire lifetime exploring one of these things. I could spend an entire lifetime exploring it. I am immortal, after all.

They're not generation ships. They're supposedly designed to make their way out to Neptune orbit, where they will be boosted into hyperspace by a grav-catapult; new technology borrowed from the Askani.

There are so many people aboard each ship that I've had no problem insinuating myself into daily life. Knowing that there are still people looking for me, I've tried to keep a low profile. No more using my powers on a whim, no more believing that I can have everything that I want. Although the years spent in solitary confinement were largely responsible for that.

It's been an edifying experience, living like a normal human being. And finally, I have realised that it doesn't matter how much power I wield, nothing can compare to being accepted as a normal part of someone else's life. A friend. A confidante.

Which is why it hurts so much to watch Reza dying in my arms.

An accident, they say. Could have been anyone, they say.

It isn't anyone. It's the first person I've met in almost seven hundred years who meant anything to me, the first one who looked at me and didn't run the other direction or call the authorities.

She was my friend. And if I had been there, I could have prevented it from happening. But I wasn't.

As the last vestiges of life fade from her eyes, I finally understand how insignificant I really am. I have the power to change destiny at my fingertips, and yet I couldn't save Reza's life.

What good am I, then? Why do I exist, and what will anyone say when I'm gone?

I'm afraid I may not like it very much.

###

Read the original here.

Tick...tick...tick...

I can hear the clock ticking through the door. They have left it there, deliberately, its regular ticking a needle in my mind. I have ranted and raged, I have threatened, postured, and even pleaded with them. Nothing made any difference. My life is theirs and they know it.

Tick...tick...tick... It's going to drive me insane.

Things have changed, over the years. I make my way across the cell to the window, the chains that bind my ankles forcing me to shuffle. I don't know how long it's been. I lost track of the time some years ago. Funny. That I should lose track of time.

Tick...tick...tick...

There have been tests, and operations, and many more things beside. I bear scars on my body and my mind that should never have to be borne by any normal human. Of course, I'm not normal...but that's the problem. But in all the years since they brought me back here, they've found nothing.

Tick...tick...tick...

I swear... I try to put the ticking out of my mind as I put my palms against the triple-glazed cell window and stare out. Earth. What a shithole. The Earth floats below, rotating silently. It's daytime down there. North America is just sliding into the night, Europe just beginning its day. They tell me that today will be a day unlike all others, but I don't know whether they're just playing more cruel tricks on me. There's not a lot to do on an orbital prison, so the guards tend to amuse themselves by playing tricks on me and trying to wear down my mind. Like with the clock.

Tick...tick...tick...

They know it will drive me crazy, that because their control fields render me incapable of bending time, the regular beat of the ticking will remind me of my failure, of how far I've fallen. No longer King, no longer myself, no longer relevant. Or capable.

Tick...tick...tick...

I close my eyes and lean my head against the cold reinforced glass, wishing for something different. They told me yesterday that something big would be happening today. Something that would change my world. They were smug. That's never a good sign.

Tick...tick...tick...

I open my eyes again. Nobody has come in to give me breakfast so far, but that's hardly unusual. As I stare down at the blue-and-white globe, I see a shape off to the left. Not a satellite--not this high. And it's too big. It comes closer, growing impossibly large as it does.

Tick...tick...tick...

What is it? It's huge. Massive. Then it all clicks into place in my head. The guards' taunts. The snippets of news I've been able to overhear, about the situation down on Earth, growing more dire by the week. Something that will "change my world". And the absence of the guards since this morning. I turn and make my way to my cell door in a stumbling run, fearful of what I'll find, but needing to find out nonetheless. I crash into the door, yelling for the guards, demanding their presence, but nobody responds. I glance back to the small window--from this angle, the craft has swelled to fill the entire view. It's horrendous--the size of an entire city.

Tick...tick...tick...

We're leaving. Humanity is leaving the beleaguered Earth behind. I spot another glint of sunlight--another ship? Surely not. But it soon resolves into a second enormous vessel making its ponderous way out of the system. Shortly, there are even more of them. My God. I count twenty, then thirty, then forty of them. One of them passes quite close to the station. I tense myself, expecting to feel the vibration of its passing wake--then I chide myself for my own stupidity. I'm in space. There will be no vibration--unless it hits the station. The lights do flicker and then go out completely for a moment, but that's probably just the magnetic field generated by the ship's engines causing a minor power surge.

Tick...tick...tick...

This is a total abandonment. I'm sure the brightest and the richest are on board those ships, whilst the poor and disenfranchised are left to eke out whatever existence they can on the planet's scarred surface. And I'm left here. Alone. With the clock. In desperation, I reach out one last time for the threads of time, trying to turn them to my own ends.

Tick...t i c k ......t i .........

...the power surge!

I smile. The first thing I'm going to do once I get out of here is smash that damn clock.

###

Read the original here.

My demesne extends throughout all the known lands. Countless creatures mortal, fey and monstrous know the absolute power I wield. Connected to them all, I see what they see, know what they know, and I hold their very lives in my hands. With a mere thought, I can strike any of them down, destroy them body mind and soul, erase them from the history books regardless of their achievements or their connections. None are safe from my wrath.

This is what they believe, and I have chosen to let them.

I try not to appear rushed as I make my way through the colonnade, past the courtyard, towards the front of the palace. My predecessors were content to be carried from place to place in ever-larger palanquins as a demonstration of their power to command the might of others. I have broken with that tradition. After all, I only succeeded my predecessor when his palanquin was lost over a cliff. I consider the necessary bribes money well spent.

A functionary sidles up to me as I continue through the palace.

"Sire," he says. "They are making the preparations. Shall I assemble the guard?"

"Of course not. We cannot be seen to be perturbed. Minimal guard only." I glance at the flunky, but don't recognise him. He is so unimportant I can't even remember his name. How things have changed, since my early days of flight and fear. Now I command the awe of millions.

"But sire," the lackey continues, “we do not know their strength. They arrived unannounced, and we still have not seen their sky chariots closely. None of us has managed to penetrate their defences; we just don’t know what’s coming!”

I stop in the hall, the diplomats following me desperately trying to halt their momentum before one of them makes the mistake of touching my royal person. I put all the venom and condescension I can muster into my voice; this is important. "Let them come! They are just as feeble as you are against the powers I wield. You would do well to remember that."

The pathetic creature quakes in fear, lost for words in the face of my displeasure. He squeaks something unintelligible.

"Good. See that you do." I leave him behind and continue toward the gardens where they have said they will land.

Of course, I do know what’s coming. It makes me afraid. Hundreds of their years have passed…but I remember. And so do they.

When I step out into the sunlight, I can see the functionaries have been busy. They have erected marquees and a dais, which I mount unceremoniously. No time for appearances now. I barely have time to settle my uniform and ceremonial sword before a glint in the firmament catches my eye. It’s them. They’re here. After so long, they have found me.

I have guided these peoples for more than a lifetime, been their King. Now that I have been discovered, I must be more than King—and at the same time, my own past conspires to make me less.

The spacecraft comes in low, decelerating with a flashy show of incandescent rocket plumes, presumably carefully calculated to cow the natives. It settles to a stop on the meadow in front of the palace. A hatch opens, disgorging a set of steps. They come through the hatch, and I realise that this tableau is doomed to repeat itself throughout history. The form is different, but no matter how advanced their technology becomes, they will still be clad in riot gear—helmets and shields, batons at the ready.

But I am not the same. Not any more.

I reach into the skein of time and take the nearest threads into my fist, twisting them to my will. The interplanetary police immediately slow to a crawl. A memory erupts into my mind, of a confrontation from almost six hundred years ago, when I was only human. I was nearly run over by a car. I smile—I haven’t seen a car in more than four hundred years. And although I may not have reached this place by hot air balloon, I have become the Wizard in these parts.

The smile evaporates from my face as a black-and-brown shape bursts out of the open hatch, bounding down the stairs—a dog. I try to wrap it up in threads of attenuated time, but my mind cannot grasp it—everything I try just slides off. They have done something to this animal, made it somehow different. The dog races toward the dais, leaps through the air at my throat. I raise an arm, trying to fend it off while I reach for my sword, and as its jaws close around my wrist and its weight bears me to the ground, a single thought slides uneasily across my mind: King or not, I will never be safe from their wrath.

My hold on the timestream fades when my head crashes into the dais. I see nothing but the intense eyes of the dog, feel nothing but the pain in my forearm as the dog bites deeper. But above everything else, I hear the sounds of gunfire.

They’re here for me. And nothing is going to stand in their way.

###

Read the original here.

Breath coming in short gasps. Needles of fire through my lungs. I can barely hold myself up…but they’re coming.

They come barrelling round the corner. Riot gear—helmets and shields, batons at the ready. I push away from the rough brick wall, lurch into a stumbling run again. They keep coming. They will always keep coming.

My dash takes me through a crowded laneway, the quaint little shops just a blur in my peripheral vision. I’ve been here, once. Bought something from a cake shop, just down near the end.

Bursting into the sunlight, I don’t see the car coming. She doesn’t mean to hit me. She was just running late for her sister’s wedding rehearsal. I screw my eyes shut, waiting for the jarring impact, wondering if I’ll actually hear my femur snap.

Stupid. Of course I won’t.

The car is moving like a drop of honey down a cold spoon. I see the terrified look on this poor girl’s face as she’s convinced she’s about to hit someone. My breathing’s still ragged, but I move aside calmly. Put my head down, rest my sweaty palms on the knees of my faded jeans.

I look back down the laneway. The cops have slowed as well. They look comical, some of them in mid-stride, in mid-air. Their expressions are manic; bulbous eyes and flared nostrils. Idly, I wish I had my camera. Just so I could post them their own photos.

But, such enjoyments are fleeting. I straighten, trying to bring my breathing under control, and begin walking through the quiescent crowd, trying not to bump the innocent people who can’t even see me as I move past them at a blur.

It’s been seven long weeks since I’ve seen my family, since the day I escaped the scientists and the police and the government and everyone else who wanted me. In the beginning, it was fun slowing time so I could get away with the little things. Taking a nap at work. Beating a deadline. Checking out a pretty girl on the train. Now, every time I slow things down, it only means that the chase will go on for longer.

But the worst thing? I have all the time I want, but nothing with which to fill it. I thought life was empty before—getting up, giving my hours to The Man, barely making a blip on the surface of the universe—but I didn’t have any idea what empty really meant. Maybe it would be better to go back to them, give myself up, get it all over with. Man wasn’t meant to live alone.

I make my way up to the university. There’s a good spot on the roof of the Redmond Barry building to watch the sunset.

I have a lot of thinking to do. And all the time in the world in which to do it.

###

Read the original here.

Over at her blog, Tessa is currently going through the rigours of night shift, and that means another edition of 7wishes.

Tessa's posts on the subject have always intrigued me, so I've decided to join in. So for the next seven days, you can expect to see a companion piece to hers on this blog. It's a bit of an experiment, so we'll see how it turns out. : )