Richard was troubled. He’d fallen into a dark place and, like a child stranded at the bottom of a well, knew not how to save himself. He clawed in vain at the walls of his prison and wept openly when he realized how utterly lost and desolate he was. Until moments ago, his soul had been, for the most part, smooth and clear. Like any man his age, there were a few blemishes. He consoled himself with the belief that no one could live a completely blemish-free life.

A lie to his father about who’d broken a window here. A neglected dinner appointment there. Over time, Richard had built up more than a few dark acts on the rap sheet of his conscience, but they were nothing compared with what had happened. In a moment of passion, he’d opened his palette to a darkness so consuming that he’d lost his sense of right and wrong. In a moment, his conscience was completely squelched by his thirst for vengeance.

He’d reached out and ended the life of another. He’d thought himself God and taken a life as his own. Even as the last flicker of life had begun to fade in the other, he’d tried to take it back. Just as Richard had willed the man dead, he tried to will him back to life. His memories flashed back to a childhood friend’s broken arm and how he’d tried to will it back to some semblance of whole.

“It’ll be OK. Just don’t tell your Mom.”

In the here and now he had done more than just harm another, though. He’d wholly and completely destroyed them. Consumed their body with fire and ended its ability to go on living. As a last act of selflessness he’d opened himself. Trying to take back the act and unwittingly opening his own body as a host for the other’s cast aside soul.

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