BOOK of KNOWLEDGE,
a novel by Alexandra Kryuchkova
in the “PLAYING ANOTHER REALITY” series
PART 1. PLAYING ANOTHER REALITY, or the WAY to the LIGHT
Chapter 11. TURN ON THE LIGHT!
I sat drinking tea in a cafe with my friend and classmate Alexey, who sometimes played with speed.
«Alice, can you really tell from photos whether a person is alive or not?»
«Photos are no longer needed,» I said thoughtfully.
«Could you help me?»
«Tell me what.»
«Ten days ago, six fishermen went to the lake. Three people per boat. One boat returned, the others did not. The lake is large, in some places it reaches even 100 kilometers by 100 kilometers, and its shores are invisible. They are looking for people, walking around villages.»
I saw the night, a boat. As if I was nearby standing on the water to the left. A big wave hit the bow of the boat, as well as on the left side, coming exactly to the middle. One man was sitting at the bow, the second one at the back, and, for some reason, the third one was standing at full height on the right side of the boat, closer to the second one. The boat capsized to the right.
«Dead,» I said.
«Why? What happened?»
«Are there waves there? Isn’t it a lake?»
«There are. Rarely, but they do happen. Nobody knows where they come from. Suddenly a strong wind and waves arise. Big ones.»
«No need to look for them. They’re dead. Do you have a map to look at the lake?»
«I’ll send it to you tomorrow.»
«Okay, I’ll take a look again at home at night… Do you happen to know whether post-impregnates are used in short-cycle presses? And what does Anima Mundi need to gain as a result of this earthly cycle?»
Alexey looked at me meaningfully and laughed.
I returned home, lit candles, closed my eyes and tried to imagine the lake again. There was something at the bottom, they got caught on something sunken. Perhaps they would find one, maximum two, but definitely not three of them. I imagined a map in the shape of a rectangle, divided it with a vertical line in the center, they needed to look on the right. Then I made two horizontal lines to get three equal parts. They were in the middle part, to the right of the center. «Okay, I’ll look at the real map tomorrow to double check!» I thought and went to bed.
The first thing I did in the morning in the office was checking my email. I saw the letter with a map attached. As I opened the letter, the mail froze. Then everything collapsed. I tried to open it again, it didn’t open for an error. I restarted the computer. It repeated 5 times in a row. The system administrator would be there in the evening. I sat down to work at an empty computer nearby and wrote to Alexey, «Call me». He called back, I told him about what had happened to the computer and what I had seen without a map.
«Years ago, many villages were flooded there. In some places the domes of churches still stick out. Christmas trees at the bottom, flooded, are growing. But it can’t be as you say, Alice. Do you know why? One boat has been found now below, on the left side.»
«Sorry,» I smiled and even rejoiced, however, not for long — two hours later I received a message, «One was found. Dead. In the place you said.»
In the evening I received a letter from an emigrant spell-caster. She felt my bad mood and offered to count me. No longer surprised by anything, I sent the required dates. According to the miscalculations made a year before by my godmother, almost a fairy, I accidentally ended up on Earth, my roots were lost somewhere in the Universe, and I really missed my real home. According to the midnight miscalculation of the emigrant, I had extrasensory abilities of bio energetic healing, magic, magnetism, influencing the world through Love and Creativity, and carrying vibrations of the Higher Spheres. I clenched my head in my hands, «What should I do here? Why did I come down anyway? Who am I?» My Future was still closed. I always saw something ahead before and walked into the distance. At that time, nothing but the Void, which in its essence was Death.
That day I was informed that RAM came in our city again. Six months passed since the previous seminar, and after the film shown on the 1st TV Channel, there were twice as many people wishing to get to the Teacher as the hall could actually accommodate.
I entered the hall where about two hundred people had gathered. Sea of flowers. TV team. I walked up to RAM and silently handed her the books. She smiled, «Is that YOU?! Are these your books?!» Millions of people passed before her eyes, but she recalled me. The hall fell silent. The TV cameras turned on. At first, RAM, as usual, spoke about herself, about the capabilities of everyone. People came to her from all over the world, expecting a miracle, but for a miracle to happen, we must create it ourselves.
I was looking at the golden glow around her head when RAM introduced me to the seminarians. I came out with books, said that after the seminar they had published my spells written two-thirds of my life for the table drawer, I had been officially recognized as a spell-caster, awarded a medal, and I had painted a series of meditation pictures about the Girl with the Moon Cat. At that moment the audience burst into applauses — I seemed to be the happiest woman in the world.
Then the mantras came again. I didn’t feel my body. The body was petrified and empty. I knew, when I returned, it would be difficult to assemble it, and for a minute or two it would be still alien. The same meadow, the same mountains, ordinary and other. 108 springs, the abyss, a thin thread to the monastery on the hill. My Monk, that time all in white. He emanated such a strong dazzling radiance that his face was invisible. Radiance, similar in shape to a huge luminous egg. I walked to the monastery. The same monks. In orange, as usual. I wanted to enter the temple. If I had no right, they would stop me. So I stepped inside. There was a statue of Buddha in front of me. I held in my hand the cross bought in Tibet in reality, similar to the Orthodox one, but made of metal wire tied with threads of rainbow colors, with a multi-colored tassel of the same threads at the bottom. I stopped at the Buddha statue and asked to help me understand who I was. I entered the room to the left, the book depository. There were a lot of old books there and almost no light. Very quiet. The racks were located at a distance of a meter from the floor to the ceiling, along all walls. There was a niche under the shelves. I bent down and passed under the books when a monk appeared in the room. I didn’t know him yet. I was afraid he would say I must not be here, but he smiled, and a books flew off the shelf into his hand. He opened it and showed to me. I saw entries in Sanskrit. I said mentally, «I don’t understand», and smiled. The monk pointed with his eyes at the third room, located to the left, the entrance to which was hung with a thick black cloth. I was scared, but the monk silently waited for me to enter it, and I did. The secret room was small. Blue walls were in a foggy haze. Exactly in the middle, a silver light was pouring straight from the sky. I stood under it, and it poured into my astral body, filling it with energy. Monks appeared in the room and read mantras, walking around me in a circle with ancient books in their hands.
A small monastery garden. An old well. Monks took up silver-colored holy water with wooden buckets. Each of them came up to me in turn and poured the water on me. I rejoiced and smiled at them, and they at me. It was getting dark. The monks began to dance around the fire or a vat of incense. I used to dance next to them, but that time with each of them in turn, and then they walked around me, dancing inside the circle. I tried to count them, but I kept getting confused, due to the misty haze of incense (or fire?) I could hardly see their faces, and they were constantly moving, probably twelve of them in total. I felt the time for me to leave. The monks came up to me in turns, and as a farewell, passed their second and third fingers, without touching, exactly in the center of my forehead in the area of the Third Eye, blessing me. I left for the fire-colored Sky and felt good floating in it. I was not even a ghost. I had no contours anymore. I had nothing else. My Self didn’t exist anymore. I threw away everything superfluous and became everything. I was Sky.
During the break, I was lying on my rug with my eyes closed, when I suddenly heard RAM’s voice.
«Alice, wake up! You know, I’ve read what you wrote about Another Reality.»
«Who am I?»
«You are the same as me. You can everything. The Universe database is open to you. You can take any information from there. There is nothing strange or bad about this. It’s just given to you.»
«I am in the Void.»
«I realized it, but you did the right thing to give people what you created and carried in yourself all these years! Just think of what a heavy burden you have just got rid of!»
«I don’t see my Future. I cannot understand what I’m doing here. Why did I come down? If it’s all about those books…»
«No, not those. It will be a completely different and higher stage than the previous one. First, publish your „Another Reality“ as a must and as soon as possible. After all, everything you wrote is true. It’s not a game. People are playing on Earth. WE don’t play. You are real.
Publishing your book will make you freed. Something new will be revealed to you, not seen yet.»
«I’m so lonely.»
«Yes, I know, but the Higher Forces gave you much more. Imagine how strong you are in Spirit and what your Man Who Was Not should be like! Such people are rare! He will come, but the path is very long. I said to you six months ago that I saw the Light. You must wait instead of screaming into the Sky, thus blocking your Path.»
«What else should I do, besides the book?»
«Find the key to your Door. Make an important decision. In fact, step over yourself. The only thing you feel yourself unable to do today. I don’t know what. You need to understand yourself. If you do so, you will move to a new level, the next round of the spiral will begin.»
«I know what I have to do, but I can’t. I want to, but I can’t, because if I do it now, I’ll die.»
«You must die. For everything old. For your Past. To be born again. This is the only way you can save yourself. For the Light.»
…I entered the Temple of the Soul. Everything was the same, but… not the same. Where was the Light? Darkness. As if all the invisible light bulbs had burned out. Dazzling white walls looked gray. I needed to turn on the light. I tried to find the switch, but it was missing. No switch. I went to the niche where I had met the Patriarch the previous time. The table and chair were in place. No Patriarch. Very dark.
«Turn on the light!» I shouted into the Void, going up to the upper floor, where my dead relatives had gathered waiting for me the previous time.
Dead Darkness! I needed to find the switch. The Light must be on there! I was scanning all the walls as I moved. In vain. I opened the door to that room. No those of mine. The room looked different. The same rectangular wooden table, chairs, but the window was covered with thick black fabric. White plasterboard partitions, usually built at exhibitions to separate the stands of neighboring companies, divided the room into several compartments. There was something hanging on the walls. I saw everything bad for a foggy haze. It looked like a museum, but a… dead one, because no one visited it.
Suddenly the Patriarch appeared from behind the right partition. The previous time he had been wearing something green, embroidered with gold, without a headdress. That time he was in black. White headdress. White-green-red ribbons. The Patriarch sat down at the table opposite. I looked at him and mentally asked,
«Mine won’t come, right?»
«Right, you let them go.»
«Where are we? What is this? A museum?»
The Patriarch nodded in agreement.
«But it’s dead. Nobody comes here, right? And why? Is it possible?»
The Patriarch didn’t look at me as the previous time, he was dissatisfied with me.
«Look carefully. What is it?»
I entered the first compartment on the right and saw… my photos on the walls, my childhood photos. Black and white. One of them was enlarged. I was four years old. Summer. I rode my bike and waved to my dad. There were my spells under glass next to the photos.
«Is this MY museum?» I asked in surprise.
The Patriarch nodded silently. My whole life was there, from birth to…
«This museum is exactly half full,» said the Patriarch and repeated slowly and distinctly, «Exactly half.»
And indeed, the right side was filled and ready, the left was absolutely empty. The museum was dead, because I was still alive!
We went down to the ground floor into a niche. The Patriarch stopped and looked at me, expecting the question with which I came to the Temple of the Soul, but for some reason I remained silent. It was so dark. The Light must be on there! I needed to find the switch…
Suddenly, fiery letters began to appear in the air to the right of the Patriarch. They were lit up with a foxy-red flame. The first letter, then a dot. The second letter, a dot. I already knew what would be next, the surname, in full, the surname of the Man Who Was Not.
«He was not there! He doesn’t exist! I invented him!»
The Patriarch silently held out a photo. Standing somewhere to the left behind, someone had taken a photo of the MWWN. I saw a part of His face, but not the eyes.
«He doesn’t exist! Do you hear me? Phantoms, ghosts and mental images don’t appear in photos! He doesn’t exist!»
I started weeping. The Patriarch was silent. The letters continued to burn, and the photo was hanging in the air right in front of me.
«WHAT SHOULD I DO?»
A giant church candle appeared in the Patriarch’s hand, and he held it to me. I took the candle with my right hand and mentally lit it.
«What should I do? Pray? For him? For myself? Or burn it?»
The Patriarch kept silent.
«Okay. I’ll think about it later. Show me what will happen.»
The Patriarch turned and quickly walked to the right. We hadn’t walked along that corridor the previous time. I followed him, or rather, we seemed to be flying. The corridor was very narrow. There was a shabby burgundy carpet on the floor, like in the old flat of my grandma the witch. On the ceiling at the end of the corridor, a switched on light bulb in a rusty metal cap that looked like a plate, was creaking, swaying in the wind, although there was no wind there. I realized, that was the last Ray of Light in my Temple… The light bulb was very dim, it clearly wouldn’t last long. It blinked, then suddenly went out, then shone again, but very, very weakly. As we move, the doors on the right spontaneously swung wide open, and I looked inside the rooms.
The first one. Small. White walls. Small window. Small bed. Black pillow. Black blanket. A piece of white sheet was visible. Nobody there. Only in the middle, right opposite the front door, a huge black… LOOP… was hanging down.
The second door. There was no one there either. The same small room. The same walls. The same bed with a black pillow and a black blanket. A piece of white sheet. There was no loop there, but a WINDOW was wide open…
The third door. Nobody inside. The same small room. The window was closed. There was no loop. The bed was rumpled. There was… BLOOD… on the white sheet.
«No!» I shouted. «Stop! Enough! I don’t want it like that! No need!»
The Patriarch stopped. So dark it was, so dark! There must be the Light on there!
«I need to go to the Library,» I said decisively, turned around and ran along the left corridor, because I knew which door would lead me there.
The Patriarch came up to my shelf on the rack to show me my books. I could see for myself, it was there, the Blue Book I had written to the Man Who Was Not.
«Are you sure of it now?» the Patriarch asked.
I nodded and heard a Voice, the earthly voice of RAM,
«You have 3 minutes left.»
I ran to the shelf from where I had taken out the book with the word «WORD» the previous time. The ladder was no longer needed. No ladders were needed there. It was hard to understand where you were only the first time. I reached the very top shelf under the ceiling, took a book. Brown. Old. In the dust. There was nothing written on the spine.
«BIBLE». I opened it randomly. Page 235. Book of Judges. Very small typing. I read, «Awake, awake, Deborah! Utter a song! Arise… Then he made him that remaineth have dominion over the nobles among the people: the Lord made me have dominion over the mighty… They fought from Heavens. The stars in their courses fought against… The river swept them away, the ancient river… O, my Soul, thou hast trodden down strength!»
I closed it, blew off the dust, carefully put it in place. There was no time to finish reading the page. The main thing was not to forget, so that later I could think about the meaning. We returned to the Temple. So dark it was! There must be the Light on there!
«2 minutes left. Say goodbye! Come to the door!»
And then… suddenly… I rushed back to the Library. Or rather, I was pulled into it by a Force beyond my control, as if I had something left there, something very important, and I was unable to resist. I found myself next to my shelf and saw in the aisle between it and the neighboring one… the ghost of a woman who looked like a nun floating towards me. I recognized Akhmatova and recalled that Stalin had called her «Nun». She looked at me with interest, scanning, and addressed me simultaneously with notes of arrogance and condescension in her voice,
«So that’s what you are like, Alice… We’ve read you… We know… Hey! Everyone, go here! Look who came to us!»
Immediately, ghosts began to flock from all the halls of the Library. Ghosts of the spell-casters of the Silver Age. They surrounded me on all sides. I heard their voices whispering to each other. I turned around and saw Marina. Waltzing merrily around the hall, she flew up to me, looked kindly into my eyes and said with a smile,
«Alice, live! For all of us! Do you hear? LIVE!!!»
«A minute left. Open the Door!»
Someone took my hand, I turned around and saw Sergey Yesenin, and he whispered embarrassed,
«Don’t drink there, okay?»
I smiled. I didn’t drink. From somewhere to the right, from the crowd of ghosts, Mayakovsky appeared. He sat down on the floor, leaning against the shelf on the right, so as not to put pressure on me with his height. Carefully and seriously scanning me from head to toe, he sighed heavily, put his ghostly hand to his temple, without looking away, jokingly imitated a shot and winced,
«Do you know what is good and what is bad, Alice? This is not good…»
I nodded in agreement. There were many, many, many of them. The ghostly fog enveloped the Library so much that I could no longer see either the shelves or the books.
«Close the Door behind you!»
Meanwhile I was still in the Library! And I couldn’t move! I needed to get away from them, otherwise I would never come back. They were telling me something, they continued talking and talking more. Everyone, all of them, together at the same time… Where was the Patriarch? I urgently needed to see him! He would help me get out of there!
«Turn your back to the Door. Go down the Stairs. Back. To the Earth. To our hall. The PURPLE step… You see your Temple moving away and remaining somewhere far, far in the sky…»
The Patriarch stood at the door that connected the Library to the Temple.
«What should I pass to Earth?» I asked quickly.
«And now you are already on the BLUE step…»
He shrugged his shoulders,
«Well, in general, nothing…»
«There is a BLUE-BLUE sky above your head.»
I was already about to run out of the Library into the Temple in order to get to the Door and exit in time…
«And there is GREEN-GREEN grass under your feet.»
…when suddenly the Patriarch stopped me. He took something out of his black clothes.
«Take it,» he said, putting something in my palm…
…heavy.
«You see a YELLOW field of dandelions in front of you.»
«Thank you!» I said to the Patriarch.
«And in the distance this yellow field seems ORANGE to you…»
I looked at what he had given me.
«And you see this ORANGE color coming closer and closer to you.»
Ancient Egyptian Symbol. Sign. ANKH. KEY.
«And RED poppies grow behind it…»
I ran into the Temple. God, it was deadly dark!
There must be the Light on there!
Door! Where was the Door?!! I urgently needed to imagine that I was already at the Door!
«And now you enter the field of RED poppies…»
I needed to get out before RAM said, «Open your eyes».
«Light! Someone, turn on the Light there!!!»
If she uttered her phrase before I left the Temple, I could get myself back together incorrectly. My head was cracking there, in the hall, where I had left my body.
«RED, RED poppies… You have reached the end of this field…»
That was all! I knew what phrase RAM would say next…
I got to the DOOR finally! With all my might, I pulled it towards me and slammed it behind me.
Faster!
Through all the rainbow colors.
Down.
Back.
To Earth.
To people…