Chapter 5 – The Eternal Prisoner of Time
(Recommended background music while reading this, "The Rose" by Ola Gjeilom)
I have been sealed inside this small and cold chamber for a long time, long as I can merely remember. It almost feels ETERNALLY. Time does not matter in this place, and it can make a person insane. I sometimes forget who I am, but whenever that happens, I am forced to recall who I am.
I am Machfeit, the last civilized human warrior from ancient times, and I am also the prisoner of this chamber. When the humans lost against the Forerunner in the war, they put me into this prison as the ETERNAL punishment for my sin, blaspheme the Didact. I was bald and naive, and my choice made me what I am now.
When the Didact and his army conquered the capital city, "Charum Hakkor," and the research facility, we used to wake up the ancient one, "The Precursor," everyone accepted their fate. However, I didn't. I couldn't tolerate the death of my teammates and my loved ones by the hand of the Forerunners. So I challenged him. I grabbed my knife and tried to cut his throat to show my resistance to his victory, to show the "Mantel of Responsibility" is still in MY HAND! It was my "responsibility" as a warrior to fight until the end and prove the meaningfulness of my comrades' deaths. But, my act turned into a vain. I was defeated, just like the others.
However, my blade reached him and made a slash on his armor, but it wasn't deep enough to make him bleed. When he realized it, he was furious, and he used his telekinesis to pin me down on the ground. I hated myself for being useless and miserable. I was never the one to make a miracle happen.
The Didact admired me as his worth foe. He claimed that I am the last human who hurt him. With respect and hatred, he trapped me in a small Forerunner world filled with prisons and exiled me somewhere in the universe.
In this tiny cell, I cannot die, and I am not allowed to kill myself. The device implemented in my body forbids me to commit suicide. I also don't age. Alone, I have felt desperate, angry, regression, fear, and sorrow countless times. I have cried and mourned infinite times. Yet, nothing happened, and only my voice echoed inside the chamber. Inside the prison, I could only see what the Didact and his people did to the remaining humans. I could only see and hear the voices inside the screen from my side. I was a timeless observer.
They devolved all the civilized humans into the primitive stage by modifying their genes. It was madness to see them turning the advanced and intelligent human race back to the animal. They mercilessly destroyed human civilization and culture that has been reign for decades in one moment. We were treated like their cattle.
Then, the next insanity I saw was the Didact himself used a machine called the "Composer" to conduct experiments on the remaining civilized humans. First, the "Composer" scanned the human victims and decomposed their bodies, then reconstruct them into their battle A.I., "Prometheans." During the process, I could hear the loud painful scream of the humans. I couldn't listen to their suffering, and it was too much. My tear was everywhere on my face, and my body could feel the burning of their bodies like I have tortured. I kept yelling at the Didact to stop what he was doing, but my futile voice would never reach his ears. I begged God to shut my hearing and, but he didn't grant my wish.
I wanted to forget my past and always hoped if this entire thing was just a bad dream. But even in my dream, I saw my people were burning. Their skins were melting, and their faces were decaying. They haunted and asked me why am I the only one who is not suffering, why was I still alive? I couldn't answer, and all I could do was to listen to their cursing. There is no way of escaping from this chaos, and I have compelled to live ETERNALLY.
Thus, only time has been passed. People of my generation are all dead and gone. The primitive humans have no idea who I am. Even the Forerunners cannot remember me because I have been imprisoned in here too long. I was forgotten by everyone a long time ago. I am the forbidden past, the hopeless living fossil, and I am an ETERNAL prisoner of time.
