Unknown 9 by Layton Green (each kindness read aloud txt) 📕

said in a soothing voice between breaths, “no one under hypnosis can be made to do something against their moral or ethical code. Our subconscious blocks these attempts. We can be made to squawk like a chicken onstage, or even prance around naked, but ask someone to kill their best friend or harm an animal, and it won’t happen. Whoever implanted the suggestions within Cal was very clever. Your friend was made to see a layered illusion that induced him to take an action that he believed was moral and justified.”

“Plus a terrifying Kali manifestation.”

“Yes. It was a traumatic experience for him. In my opinion, the hypnotist took quite a gamble, because to risk braving the horror of what Cal thought he saw, he had to be helping someone he truly cared for.”

Andie swallowed. “He’s a principled man. He would have done it for anyone.”

“Be that as it may, it took an act of great willpower. Close your eyes, Andie.”

Caught off guard by the sudden command, she obeyed.

“Keep breathing. In and out. In and out. Listen to the birds, and the babble of the stream, and the sound of my voice. Let your mind wander where it desires. Try not to think of yourself as bound to this physical place, or to any place at all, and let yourself become one with the natural world, the air around us, the sky above, the universe. Everything is one, Andie, and we are all part of something greater, each and every one of us, something vast beyond belief.”

As Rajani continued to speak in the soothing voice, her intonation never varying, Andie’s mind began to relax, lulled by the cadence of the words and the enveloping sounds of nature and the intoxicating aroma of the incense candle. Still, she did not feel as if she were entering a different mental state. She had never succumbed to hypnosis, despite many heartfelt attempts, and had become convinced she was impervious to it for whatever reason—probably because she could never relax enough.

Not wanting to interrupt Rajani or make her feel bad, Andie waited patiently for her to finish, though after a few moments she decided to take a peek and see what the other woman was doing.

When Andie opened her eyes, she was shocked to find herself inside the world of her visions.

She had never had an episode while surrounded by nature, and the experience felt more surreal than ever. The stream was a ribbon of ash disappearing into the inky horizon at the edges of her vision. The charcoal-hued trees and foliage, though less substantial than in the waking world, shimmered with a complexity beyond their appearance, as if their root system and canopy spanned dimensions.

Rajani, though cast in deep shadow, was still seated cross-legged in front of Andie. Unlike the woman in Andie’s vision in the office of the fake passport dealer in London, Rajani’s facial features were intact and not horrible mockeries of a human being. Still, she was frozen in place, and did not move or respond to Andie’s frantic cries, which bubbled into watery echoes as they left her mouth. As always, Andie wondered if this would be the time she never woke up and was trapped forever in her own mind.

Just as she started to panic, she noticed movement beyond the borders of her immediate environment. Thinking it was one of the ominous, inchoate forms that roamed the void, or the spectral figure in the frayed Renaissance clothing, she backed away in fear, only to gape as a raven-haired woman with East Indian features stepped into view from the opaqueness of the borderlands. She was dressed in a traveling cloak with the hood thrown back, and while Andie could tell she was very beautiful, her form seemed molded from shadow like everything else in that realm.

As soon as she crossed into view, the woman beckoned for Andie to join her. She had a calming presence that Andie could not explain, and she wondered if it was a manifestation of Rajani as a younger woman, perhaps some weird quirk of time and being. Or maybe it was Andie’s own subconscious projecting the image.

Confused, she watched as the woman beckoned again. Her eyes were pricks of starlight, and Andie took a hesitant step toward her. The woman turned and walked into the void.

Andie didn’t know what to do. Was she supposed to follow her? Or was the woman dangerous and trying to mislead Andie? She didn’t think that was the case, but she had no way of knowing.

Or did none of this have any meaning and it didn’t matter one damn bit what Andie did?

The woman was rapidly disappearing. Andie took a chance and decided to follow her. Normally she entered her visions while inside a room or a building, and had always assumed she was trapped inside her physical environs. But now that she was outdoors, she saw that the same rough dimensions were in place. She could see clearly for only ten or so feet in any direction. As she tried to enter the congealed shadows at the border, she found it was like pressing against a brick wall.

Almost, but not entirely, because it felt as if she could get through, if she could only push hard enough. Even more curious was the sensation that the other side of the barrier was not as terrifying as she had always thought. That instead of a deep, dark void full of horror and lost souls, something else awaited, something mysterious.

Dangerous, perhaps, but not necessarily evil.

Had the Archon spoken the truth? Was there far more to this place than Andie had realized?

But Zawadi had said the Ascendants are liars, that Andie could never trust them.

Where am I? Who am I?

Convinced the answers to her strange affliction might finally lie within her grasp, Andie tried her best to push through and follow the woman in the ash-colored cloak. But Andie couldn’t do it. She couldn’t move an inch farther. It was frustrating beyond belief.