Chapter Eleven: A Few Good Songs

The meaning of time was lost while NiGHTS chased rings. It was hard enough to be counting time with someone constantly talking and giggling in your ear, but if said person was inside rather than outside your head, it was nigh impossible. Still, it was not a bad thing to relent to. It was a cathartic rhythm that I sank into, something that I could do without really thinking very hard about it. It was like walking around, paying more attention to my own musings than the world around me. Hard though it was to conceive, I enjoyed it.

I had plenty of things to think about, but nothing in particular that I really wanted to. I just started playing music in my head, and silently singing along to it. "Waiting" by the Red Jumpsuit Apparatus seemed to fit for the moment. Feeling sorrow… for all the things you have to steal and borrow… and bring the days we had before tomorrow… relapse and then collapse into yourself once more…

Waiting for this life to change, seems like it's taking me forever… And I can't, hold on, this life, is breaking into the day... this life is gonna change, seems like it's taking me forever, and I can't, hold on, this life, is breaking into the day…

I skipped a little, since I didn't quite recall the exact lyrics for the middle portion. Waiting, for this life to change, seems like it's taking me forever… and I can't, hold on, this life, is breaking into the day… this life is gonna change, seems like it's taking me forever, and I can't, hold on, this life, is breaking into the day… again… into the day, again…

Waiting, for this life to change, seems like it's taking me forever, and I can't, hold on, this life, is breaking into the day… this life is gonna change, seems like it's taking me forever, and I can't, hold on, this life, is breaking into the day--

Take time, to contemplate, who you are and where you want to go… Take time, to contemplate, who you are, and where, you want, to go… into the day…

Just as the last few beats of the electric guitar faded in my mind, NiGHTS burst my little bubble of self-containment with an aptly-directed question. Are you SINGING, Narrator?

Well, I was singing, to myself, in my head, which NiGHTS was so kindly eavesdropping on. I could sing a little, but I wasn't trying to at the moment…

You can sing? NiGHTs emitted a tone of excitement. Oooh, ooh, I wanna hear you sing!

I was more surprised that the jester was so eager to abandon her 'favorite pastime' than at the prospect of having to sing for her. I sometimes sang with my sister; how could this be any different?

NiGHTS landed on a large, level rock jutting out of the hillside, forming a decently sized platform for me to stand on without any restriction of movement. We separated and NiGHTS immediately began chattering, thankfully out of my head. "Sing a song for me! Sing a song for me!"

I laughed nervously. "I'm really not a very good singer, NiGHTS. My voice cracked when I turned twelve and since then I've been wretchedly baritone."

"It sounded so nice when you did it in your head! Come on, sing!" The jester snapped her fingers. "I'll accompany you on instrumentals. How about that?"

"Instrumentals?" I asked, raising an eyebrow.

"I can play the flute," the jester offered. She held her hands up to her head as though holding an invisible flute. I was a little startled when she actually began playing it, a twittering series of high notes.

"I don't know any songs you can decently put to a flute," I said, frowning. "I'm a post-hardcore/alternative guy. Electric guitar and drums maybe, but not a flute."

NiGHTS shrugged. "Oh, well, sorry then. You'll still sing for me, right?"

"What do you want to hear?" I asked.

"What's your favorite?"

"Artist in the Ambulance by Thrice," I said without so much as blinking. "I know that one pretty well. Wanna hear it?"

NiGHTS clapped her hands like a four-year-old. "Yay, a song!" She then leaned forwards in midair, listening contently.

I took a breath and started. "Late night, brakes lock, hear the tires squeal. Red light, can't stop, so I spin the wheel. My world goes black before I feel an angel lift me up, and I open, blood-shot eyes, into fluorescent white; they flip the siren, hit the lights, close the doors and I am gone…"

I paused briefly, in my head counting the beats of the guitar solo. NiGHTS was watching in blessed silence, looking quite interested. I continued. "Now I lay here owing my life to a stranger and I realize that empty words are not enough, they left me with the question of just what have I to show except, the promises I never kept, I lie here shaking on this bed, under the weight of my regrets I hope… that I, will never let you down… I know… that this, could be, more than just flashing lights and sound…"

"Look around and you'll see that it sounds impressive, no one really cares. It gets me down but I'm still gonna try to do what's right. I know that there's a difference between sleight of hand, and giving everything you can, there's a line drawn in the sand, and I'm working up the words to cross it and I hope… that I will never let you down… I know, that this, could be more than just flashing, lights and sound… rhetoric can't raise the dead up sick of always talking, when there's no change, rhetoric can't raise the dead up sick of empty words… let's lead, not follow. Late night brakes lock hear the tires squeal, red light can't stop so I spin the wheel, my world goes black before I feel an angel steal me from the greedy jaws of death and chance, and pull me in with steady hands, giving me a second chance, the artist in the ambulance, I hope that I'll never let you down, and I know, that this, could be more than flashing lights and sound… can we pick you off the ground… more than flashing lights and sound…"

I paused, looked shyly at NiGHTS, and smiled weakly. "That's my impression, anyways."

The jester seemed to explode with excitement. She pulled me into an embrace that would have cracked a statue, nearly knocking the wind out of me. "That was completely AWESOME! You are an awesome singer! Again, again, I wanna hear it again!"

It took some effort to free myself from her grasp, but I managed to push out of her constricting embrace. "Shamerdes, NiGHTS, I'm fragile!" I snapped.

The jester smiled sheepishly. "Oh, sorry, got a little carried away. I love a guy who can sing!"

"I'm not that stellar, I can't hit high enough notes," I muttered.

The jester paid no heed. "Again, again, again! I wanna hear more!"

"You have the manners of a four-year-old," I admonished, a shy smile breaking my features. "I can't begrudge someone that eager, though… what do you want to hear next?"

The jester shrugged. "Anything. I just wanna hear more."

I considered for a moment. "How about one I made, huh? I can't really write sheet music but I can do lyrics and a simple tune. It's a little short, but I think it's pretty good. It's called "Soldier's Anthem". Care to listen?"

The jester eagerly bobbed her head. "Sing it, sing it!"

I took a breath and began. "Some days you walk the world proud, some days it walks on you. Some days you're living easy, some days you kill just to make it through…

When your life isn't easy… when you're dodging iron rain… when you're living between craters… and you don't know if you'll make it through… just remember, heart-torn soldier: life is a war, and must go on…

Some days you feel like singing, were it not for all your tears. Some days you're breaking out of here, just to see you're breaking in. Some days passed flickered in the flames, some days go on a thousand years, some days you think you'll make it, some days you've died a thousand ways…

When your life isn't easy… when you're dodging iron rain… when you're living between craters… and your whole world is full of pain… when you feel that you've been lied to, and hot lead's now whipping by, when you just can't stop the bleeding, and in your heart you want to die—you can't give up now, you must hold on, we'll lose it all if you don't press on, though we don't care if you can't live on, life is a war, and must go on…"

NiGHTS was actually quiet for a moment after I stopped singing, as though hesitant to speak. She did, after a little while. "That song is very lonely."

I shrugged. "They say to write what you know."

NiGHTS was silent again. I found her stare unnerving. "That's the way it's always been for me," I said, as though reassuring her, although it would do little in that respect. "I am on the outside, looking in. Always there, but never really part of anything."

"You're a part of this," NiGHTS said, motioning around her. "A very big part, if I may add."

I sighed. "This… isn't real. It's all inside of me. I make it real… I bring it life. But no one shares it. Only I."

The jester drifted around me, tracing a line along my back with her hand so I swiveled, bristling, to face her. "You seem to be forgetting someone, Narrator, someone pretty important here."

I shook my head. "You're one of my Wards. You're another incarnation of myself. Silver Crescent is wrong; you're no different than any of us."

"You really do think so, don't you?" NiGHTS said, smiling enigmatically. "That it's all about you?"

I snorted. "Who else is there in this place? It's myself and my multitude of displaced facets. My hopes, my wishes, my desires, my hates, my fears—my dreams, my nightmares. That's what this place is, a twisted, convoluted swirl of everything that I'm made out of. Beautiful, yes, but utterly doomed." My voice became bitter, venom in my throat. "More wonderful than anything else, but all things will succumb to the shadows. All things will die."

NiGHTS gave me a long, sad look. "Dreams don't die unless you let them." She cocked her head slightly. "Maybe that's part of the problem, Narrator. You don't have hope."

"Hope is futile," I said dismally. "Whenever I dare to, my visions are smashed to shards before my eyes. The people in my life go through great efforts to see that I am not allowed such things as hope."

NiGHTS turned her head for a moment, thinking. She drifted towards me, pressing her hands against my shoulders, staring very determinedly into my eyes. "Nothing is ever beyond hope, Narrator. Forget the rules that restrain you in your world. This is Nightopia. Make your own rules. We'll go along with whatever you do."

"No… no one follows my rules, they aren't the real rules," I said, blankly, a hollow feeling of anxiety passing over me.

"The only rules are what you think is right," NiGHTS said. "It's your choice. Forget all sorts of things, forget your own name, forget me, but never forget, Narrator, that you have a choice."

I just shook my head. "I… I can't believe it. It… isn't true. It can't be. It's too… easy."

NiGHTS raised a hand and flicked me right in the forehead, causing me to twitch and recoil slightly. "Stop being so hard on yourself already! It's ridiculous; you're as powerful as Wizeman is, and yet you can't even believe it yourself!" The jester backed away from me, shaking her head in dismay.

"So, should I try being as stupidly reckless as you, then?" I asked cynically.

"YES!" NiGHTS exclaimed. She burst out laughing. "By all means, Narrator! You'll save both of us a lot of trouble if you stop being so afraid of everything in sight!"

I exhaled slowly. "I'll try that on the next Maren I meet. Hopefully it isn't one too big for me to handle, though…"

I paused. Something felt… hot. Very hot. Uncomfortably so. Very uncomfortably so, actually, it was burning, burning, burning!

I yelped as flames flickered over my shoulder, all over my back. I quickly unzipped my hoodie and yanked it off, pounding the conflagrated clothing against the side of the hill until it stopped smoldering. Tossing it aside (now that it was thoroughly ruined by flame), I looked up the hill, towards the source of the fire. The hill was emitting a tall pillar of smoke and tongues of flame, spitting sparks and molten rock. A blob fell next to me, sizzling as it cauterized the reddish grass that had been inhabiting that particularly spot. As the entire surface of the hill began to buckle and crack as a volcano began to form from it, I suddenly espied the source of the mayhem as a long, fire-maned head rose from the top of the hill—Firemind!