We slipped out of the shadows one night, my elders tell me. We were brought to this unknown land, from an unknown place, for an unknown purpose. The others here, they accepted us blindly as if we were their own. But that was only because they did not think, or feel. They were not even much in control of their own bodies. They followed a blind pattern that told them vaguely where to go and what to do.
Luckily, we were not like them.
There was another, though, in this land, with which we shared a likeliness. It was the ones around which this land was centered, and thrived. They were beings who thought all the land was theirs, just because they came across it. It was, of course, but there was no reason why.
It was rumored that they killed everything they came across, to salvage their skin and bones and meat, and that is why we pursued them.
We all wanted desperately to die.
Sulking in the darkness, in a land with no light or life, to painfully burn to ashes before the sun fully peaked, and to be reborn once the moon had risen once again…
To never have it end…
Every once in a while, one of us was brave enough to make the trip. They would brave the three days of wretched pain to be freed from eternity. The rest of us stayed in the caves, too cowardly to die.
The other night dwellers seemed to not feel the pain of the burning light of the sun. They cried out but seemed to not hear themselves. They were content to live outside and be scorched by the rising sun every day. Though they showed some sign of consciousness. They would charge at the Ones when they saw them, making a last break for freedom.
When I was younger, when I was first hearing these stories, I always wondered why my kind did not just stay in the caves, did not just content themselves with staying in the dark.
But as I grew older, I would sneak away from my elders and explore the caves, going a little farther up each time. And finally, when I was almost fully grown, I found a small hole, just barely big enough for one of my kind to crawl through.
And as I gazed out to the bright, colorful world, filled with life and joy and mystery, a world so different from the dull walls of dirt and rock I had grown accustomed to, I knew.
We were drawn to the outside world, and to the sun, like moths to light. It was nature, and if we did not stay true to our nature, we would not be what we are.
So, you get sucked out into the world, and then you experience your first morning. You can't stand the thought of going back to the cave, so you keep going. And another morning, and the crippling pain comes again. You keep going, slowly breaking, but still eager. Still in awe of all the new and amazing things. And then, on the third morning, you break. You are too far from the safety of the cave, you are out in the unfamiliar, you dread the next morning filled with suffering, only to be repeated again and again.
And then you see a house.
So here I am, fully grown, but still young, sick and tired of this bloody cave. Sick and tired of this bleak life. Anxious to see what's out there. Not even realizing, after my own analysis, that I am a moth about to fly into the light.
My elders would never let one as young as me leave. Usually, when my kind start the journey, they announce it in front of all the others, and we celebrate, if you could call it celebrating. We bring together mushroom soup and raw cave fish and have a small feast, and they call the one leaving brave, a hero, and they idolize them.
Even though their will shatters three days after that.
But, for me, there is no celebration. I have told no one. I'm sneaking out at dusk, right before everyone wakes, but with enough time for me to get outside. No one would dare follow me past that point.
It takes a bit, but I find the hole. The sky is oddly purple, streaked with clouds textured like thin wool pulled even thinner.
I see other night dwellers rising up from their ashes and dug dens, and know it is safe. I step out, feeling the strange texture of grass, and the soft warm wind, so different from the cold breezes in the caves, blowing across the field.
I let my jaw fall open and I breathed in deeply, inhaling the sweet air filled with so many tastes and scents and sounds.
Something snapped in my brain, and I felt myself moving forward, without a thought at all. I was not registering the world around me anymore. I just heard the steady beat of my square feet hitting the ground as I walked forward, never changing direction, never stopping.
I could see the light.