Heaven’s Path

"Is this thing…" Astra struggled to say as she muttered under breath. "…looking at me…?" She had a nervous smile as she continued to stare at the hand. Her heart began beating faster and faster, her body warmer and warmer.

She was so nervous and uneasy that she felt as if she could feel the blood moving through her veins, she could've heard her own heartbeat pounding through her chest as if it was alarming her.

But even despite this, she had felt curious, and in awe. She felt as if she was a child, staring at the night sky for the first time, seeing the twinkling little stars with unbridled innocence.

"Was this what I was trying to connect with…for all these years…?"

The hand continued to point its finger towards Astra, as the pupil-less "eye" that the hand is coming out from stares right at her. The ground began to rumble greatly, as if a massive earthquake was vibrating throughout the land. The sound of both the hand and the earth moving made an awful whirring sound that sounded as if reality and existence wanted to tear itself apart.

Despite that, everyone seeing this event was silent, staring at the reality bending event. Those around Astra…Xavier, Aria, the security. All of them were speechless, and none of them could've moved their eyes away from the hand. Their thoughts were like static, and they stared almost mindlessly, as if they were puppets.

This phenomenon, and this experience, was the same for every single human being on earth.

"Unbelievable…this could be the true meaning behind the nature of the Polaris shift! This could be the true reason as to why it shifted so early!" Astra thought to herself in slight glee. As she was used to a similar situation from the scream, her mind was able to naturally adapt to this situation despite it being much larger in scale.

"AHHHHHHH!!!" Suddenly, screams were heard from Xavier, Aria and the security!

They instinctively held their heads in pain, letting out awful noises. Veins bulged out from their heads as they tried to shake and move their heads but to no avail. It felt as if a hammer was continuously bashing against their head, and at every spot on their skull! Their screams sounded like a terrifying mixture of weeping and moaning.

The pain was so bad for each of them that tears began to stream down their faces!

But even so, they could not stop looking at the hand and the pupil-less eye!

"Ahhhhh…" Shortly after, Astra was able to clearly hear the screams from those at the facility as it echoed in the distance. She tried to look around her to verify the conditions of Xavier, Aria and the security, and she tried to look in the direction of the facility. But again, she could not move her head. It was as if it was stuck between two slabs of concrete.

"What in the world!?" Her child-like innocence left her as she heard the screams of the people around her.

"Do not look at the night sky…was this it?" Is this what I was looking at? But why…why does it have to be so painful for everyone…?" Her expression was frozen, but her thoughts were visibly shaken by this scene.

In less than a moment, the hand retracted itself and began retreating into the sky, as if it was being sucked in by a vacuum. As it was completely pulled in, the pupil-less eye that contained it shut almost instantly, sending terrifying shockwaves throughout the atmosphere and throughout the ground. Soon enough, the cracks were gone along with the eye and hand.

Then, there was silence.

The rumbling of the earth and sky were gone. The night sky had returned to normal, the cold wind was completely still, and the terrifying screams that had vibrated and inundated the atmosphere had completely vanished.

All that was left was a strange tranquility.

Astra breathed a sigh of relief, thinking that everything was finally over. She discovered that she was finally able to move her head and body again, and immediately looked around her surroundings with a cold sweat.

She wanted to make sure the rest of them—everyone else, were okay. She also wanted to see if the thing that happened to her earlier also happened to them, where their appearance had changed.

She looked and gasped in surprise. 

She saw that Xavier, Aria and the security had disappeared entirely. All that was left next to her was the motorized vehicle, the strangely calm desert landscape, and the eerily silent place she was in that was enveloped in absolute darkness.

"Xavier…? Aria?" She asked as she looked around, her eyes showing a rare occasion of worry, her curiosity beginning to leave her.

"Where did they all go? What the hell was that? Why did that happen? How did that happen? Is everyone okay, or were they erased? That's very scary! If so, did that thing cause it? That was definitely supernatural and strange! Or was it a hallucination? Was it a strange dream? This all happened in one night too…" Astra's thoughts raced as she attempted to process what had just transpired. Evidently, they weren't organized, as she tried to come to terms with what happened.

Astra was looking forward to something strange happening, and this was that strange thing!

At that moment, she felt that her uneasiness had completely left. She looked down and examined herself. She touched her arms, legs, waist, head and hair. 

"Ow…" She even began to poke her eyes, however she instinctively closed it when she did so.

She wanted to make sure that she wasn't dreaming, and that she wasn't having a strange hallucination.

"Haha…" She let off a dry laugh. She knew that what she saw and was experiencing was very real.

Tap. Tap.

Astra moved around, hearing the faint sounds of her foot pressing against the sand. Everything was dark, and even the light from the Milky Way and the facility seemed to be drowned out due to an illusory darkness.

Even when Astra's eyes were naturally much better than normal people, she was barely able to see because of the dark.

She decided to look inside of the vehicle. and around any sort of hidden spots near it, but she saw no one. Worry left her as she began to accept the situation she was in. She wasn't sure what to do next, and her thoughts that were once racing suddenly stopped to a halt.

"Am I really alone…?" Astra asked as she looked toward the facility, showing a mostly apathetic expression. She waited for a response, even though she knew the answer.

It was so silent that the wind didn't even make a sound.

Astra was the only person on earth.

As such, no one heard her, and she heard no one.

Taken over by one of the most ancient human fears of loneliness, Astra then fell on her knees, and bent over, allowing her arms to support her as they seemingly "touched" the ground. She looked at the ground with a completely unreadable and nonchalant expression; it was an almost sullen expression.

Her eyes that were once as bright as the sun turned cold.

"Why didn't you take me with you…" Astra whispered, seemingly talking to the heavens.

Then, as Astra looked down, she noticed that her hands were slowly phasing through the ground. Then it was her arms.

She was slowly being pulled in by something!

She couldn't feel or see what was pulling on her, but she knew there was something there, somehow it was making her phase through the ground!

"Sh*t! What in the world?" She shrieks, completely flabbergasted.

She tried to pull her arms up so as to not get pulled down. It worked as her hands and arms were "released", but soon enough, her legs were getting pulled down also, phasing through the ground.

"What is this thing trying to do? Why does it want me?" Astra says in desperation.

In an attempt to resist, she tried to raise her knees up to her waist, but it didn't work. As soon as it did, it instantly rebounded back down, causing some pain in Astra's hip area. She tried to swing her legs around, but again, it rebounded back down, this time causing pain in her thighs.

Since all of her methods were exhausted, Astra knew that there was no escape. She simply accepted her fate.

"Am I…going to die here?" Astra looked down as she was being pulled in with a sullen expression.

"I don't want to die…" She emotionlessly thought to herself, resigning herself to the pull of the unknown thing gnawing at her leg.

Her legs were absorbed by the ground, and then her waist, and then her neck, and then her head. Right before her eyes passed through the ground, she instinctively closed her eyes and prepared for the worst.

…

…

…

"Am I dead yet?" Astra thought as her eyes were still closed. 

"Wait…if I'm thinking this, I'm still conscious…" After thinking this, she proceeded to open her eyes very slowly. When she opened her eyes to the point where she could see properly, she then fully opened them.

All she saw was darkness. Boundless darkness. It was completely dark, void and empty.

She looked at her body and saw that it was still there, and she was still able to see it. However, she looked corporeal, as if she was fading. She also felt none of her senses. "How strange…"

She then looked up at where the ground should be and she just saw more darkness.

She tried to speak, but she couldn't hear herself. 

"Where am I? Am I really dead and this is where I'll spend eternity? But why? I'm pretty sure I didn't do anything?" Astra sulked silently as she looked around her and saw nothing but non-existence. "There's really nothing here. This is a terrible place to spend eternity, I'd rather be sent to the underworld…"

She then proceeded to try to move in a particular direction. As she moved, she flew through the darkness.

"Wow, I can fly here…that's cool. Well, things aren't so bad…" Astra began to do multiple acrobatic tricks as she flew through the darkness.

"☆⋆｡𖦹°‧★…Ahhhh!"

Astra immediately stopped doing her tricks as she felt something ringing in her ears.

"☪︎ ִ ࣪𐦍 ☾𖤓!!! Ah! Ah!"

Astra heard a language that she didn't understand, and then she heard the sound of weeping, moaning, and crying. It sounded as if someone was being tortured alive! This horrible sound had invaded her head!

"Someone else is in here? What the hell is happening to that person…" Astra looked around her, but still saw nothing. She wanted to help this person as the horrible sound got louder and louder. Soon enough, it got so loud it made Astra want to cover her ears, but this did not impede the sound!

It continued to get louder as Astra covered her ears and retreated into a fetal position. She couldn't feel anything, but she slowly felt as if she was going insane. 

Her thoughts were getting filled with a vision of a woman in an empty void getting fragmented over and over again by things that didn't seem to exist - which made it look like she was glitching in and out of reality.

Entire body parts from this woman, external or internal, continued to swap places with each other as she screamed in a language Astra couldn't understand.

This scene replayed hundreds and thousands of times over in Astra's mind. Astra's face contorted as though she was in pain, though she physically felt nothing.

In her fetal position, she tried to claw out her eyes, but her hand passed through her. She tried to rip her ears off, but her hand passed through her. She even tried to choke herself, but her hands passed through her.

When all else failed, she tried to place her hand over ears, attempting to cover them. However, her hand passed through her. 

"No!!!" Astra tried to scream, but no sound came out. She felt as if she was going deeper and deeper into insanity.