Walking Among the Shadows: Awakening: Revised Edition (23 page)

“After the murder of
Anshargal, no more Baraqu warriors were conceived, and this planet fell into
darkness and the Shadows led by Alal took complete control over this planet.
Their purpose as it has always been is to create an environment conducive to
their addiction for negative energy. They are the facilitators of chaos and
mankind carries out their orders with perfection.”

I sat there confused and
terrified at everything I was being told. Any other person would chalk this
conversation up as the ramblings of a lunatic, but his revelation spoke to me
deeper than any poem or song; it touched the very depths of my soul and at that
moment I knew I was being fed the truth. A truth that billions of people on
this planet were not privy to. But there were still some things that didn’t add
up, like why me? Why now? And what kind of powers did I possess?

“I know you are wondering
Aiden, what all this has to do with you.” My grandfather had now taken over the
conversation and began to reveal to me that even though no other Baraqu warrior
was born after the death of the hybrid, the bloodline never died and there were
people on this planet that were born with extraordinary abilities. Athletes,
musicians, soldiers, etc.—all kinds of people born with an edge that gave them
abilities others saw as superhuman and the ones gifted with the more extreme
abilities were recruited to join the fight against Alal and the Shadows. They
were everywhere, working in secret trying to prevent a complete global meltdown
of everything good in this world. But they were seriously outgunned and
outnumbered and with the humans siding with the Shadows, things had gotten
worse. The Shadows had heads of state, businessmen, and people of influence in
their pockets doing their bidding across the globe. Anything that caused
mankind pain and anguish wasn’t an accident.

Everything was planned, right
down to small details like traffic jams and bad customer service. Anger, pain,
murder, injustice, hunger, wars, pollution, racism, religion, disease, and
oppression. All these things were assets in the Shadow’s general ledger, and
from what my grandfather was telling me, business was booming. Manny and my
father were a part of the resistance and they carried out dangerous covert
missions against the Shadows to weaken their grip on the realm. But they never
had a Baraqu Etlu, or warrior, on their side and this was basically a
recruitment meeting for me. They needed my help to fight the good fight and
even though all this sounded so noble, I had my reservations and anyone in my
shoes would have the same reservations.

“Okay, what is so special
about a Baraqu warrior exactly?”

“We are wielders of time and
space.”

“Huh? Jaffrey, you have to
break that down for me because I don’t follow.”

Jaffrey got out his chair
smiling and walked towards the far side of the room.

“We have the ability to
control time and space, which means that anything that falls under the realm of
time and space we can change. For example, the chair you are sitting in is
controlled by time and space. Right now that chair is sitting at that exact
location at this exact time and it’s taking up an exact amount of energy and
real estate within space and time. Well, if I wanted to I could remove it from
the equation and move it on the other side of the room instantaneously.”

“Bullsh—”

Before I could finish my curse
word, I was falling to the floor, the chair having disappeared from beneath me,
and just when I was bracing myself to feel the hard floor connect with my ass,
the chair reappeared underneath me as if it had never moved.

“What the hell was that?!”

“That was me moving time and
space and altering reality.”

“So what you are saying is
with all this power all we can do is move chairs around? Great, call UHaul and
tell them they’re saved.”

“No, that was on a smaller
scale, Aiden. If you possess enough positive energy you could do things that
would seem impossible. You could appear to possess superhuman strength by
altering your muscle density. You could soar through the skies changing the
rules of time and space to fit your desire to fly. You could split the earth to
swallow an entire city or you could just make the entire planet disappear.”

“Wait, are you saying I could
pull a ‘Kris Angel’ on the planet?”

“Yes, if you can harness enough
positive energy. Mr. Angel’s is a Shadow by the way; so it’s not exactly the
same thing but you are grasping the concept.

I knew something wasn’t right
about dude with the way he did magic…smh

Anything that falls within
time and space is at your disposal, but just like a car, if the tank isn’t full
the automobile can only go so far. Because there is very little positive energy
left in this realm making the planet disappear is impossible.”

“So if I feel all positive and
chipper I could do whatever I wanted?”

“Exactly! And with my training
paired with external positive energy, you can be a very powerful ally of the
order of the Baraqu.”

“Training?”

“Yes, I have always been a
keeper of our history and a teacher or trainer to those that possess the powers
of the Baraqu.”

“How long have you been doing
that?”

 “Over six thousand years.”

“What! You’re telling me that
you are over six thousand years old? Man, whatever. Now you are playing with
me.”

“The Baraqu don’t age like
humans. Yes, we eventually die if not killed in battle, but some of us can live
to be tens of thousands of years old before we succumb to old age.”

“Do the Shadows know about you
still being alive?”

“No, they do not. That is why
you needed to be blindfolded…”

“No, I got knocked out,” I
interjected.

“Yes, knocked out because we
can’t risk them finding me here.”

“So you don’t trust me?”

“Actually, no I don’t, and I
won’t trust you until you decide to accept the charter of the Baraqu and rid
the world of the Shadows and their evil leader Alal.”

“Accept the charter? What do
you mean exactly by that?”

“Aiden, it’s no secret that we
are losing this war and I am unable to take the battle to the Shadows because
of my lack of access to positive energy. You have to understand that this world
is producing vast amounts of negative emotional energy and any positive energy
that may be produced is quickly eliminated. One of the best places to draw
positive energies until of late was sporting events. They were a  goldmine for
me and I could draw that energy from anywhere in the world. But now the Shadows
have moved to eliminate that source as well by allowing games to be rigged by
players or the referees; quelling any cause for the fans in the stands to
rejoice in a positive manner and give me the energy I need.

“But even if I was to act I
need to do so behind the scenes, because if the Shadows found out a Baraqu
warrior was still drawing breath in this world they would stop at nothing to
prevent me from seeing another day and I don’t have the access to enough positive
energy to repel all of them.”

“And he is important to this
war, Aiden,” my grandfather added. “Without him we would have no inside
information as to what we are up against. He has been around for a very long time
and even though he can’t join the resistance on the battlefield, he is a great
tactician and has led our cause to many victories.”

“So let me get this straight.
What you are telling me is I am a descendant of cosmic super beings that were
banished here on Earth. That I am some kind of half breed that feeds on human
emotions to gain powers and I have an enemy that is addicted to negative human
emotions. That enemy has managed to take hold of the entire world by creating
an environment of suffering  and pain; making it almost impossible to use my
powers and you want me to join in the fight to stop them? From the way things
look you’ve already lost. I mean potentially your most powerful ally is a dead
drained battery that needs recharging, but the enemy controls the energy source
so basically you are bringing a toothpick to a nuke fight.

“I don’t know but it doesn’t
sound like I could do anything to turn the tide. I am bound under the same laws
he is,” I pointed out.

“No,” Jaffrey said. “Somehow
you are able to produce your own energy source from within. And I can tell you
that energy source is very powerful if  you were able to destroy a Shadow like
Telal, the man you knew as Jason. Telal was the right hand of Alal and the
second most powerful Shadow in their order. He was also the deadliest assassin
this world has ever known. He was a master of getting so close to his targets
that they would actually fall in love with him and wouldn’t see their demise
coming until it was too late.

“Aside from being a very powerful
Shadow, he possessed a unique and powerful ability; a rare gift that very few
in history has had the privilege to possess.”

“And what is that?”

“He was a shape-shifter.”

“He could change his physical
form to look anyway he wanted?”

“Not exactly, Aiden. You see,
the world of men sees things in the physical form but the reality is who we really
are is embedded in our soul. The unseen denominator that determines what kind
of people we are and will become in the future. Our soul is what drives our
character and how we interpret the world around us. It is often referred to as
your Zini by our kind. It is true the flesh profits nothing; it’s only a shell
that covers up what really matters. Telal had the ability to actually see a
physical manifestation of your soul and change his soul to match your own,
causing a false sense of security and trust in him. It’s something that no one
can combat, not even the Baraqu and Telal is responsible for murdering numerous
key leaders of our order.

“He was a formidable warrior
and he commanded an elite squad of assassins that were insanely dedicated to
him. His death will send shivers through the Shadow’s ranks and and they will
want retribution. I am also certain his death has already gotten the attention
of Alal, who rarely gets personally involved in this war. He has minions both
Shadow and human across the globe doing his bidding with almost perfect
efficiency. So until now he’s had no reason to personally get involved; but
seeing that his second in command has been killed I can predict he may look
into this matter himself.”

“So is that why you guys
whisked us away to the other side of the world and then proceeded to get all
cloak-and-dagger with me?”

“Yes, after the events at your
house that ended with the death of Telal, your life is in more danger than it
was before. So if you are to face this danger head on, you will need to learn
how to harness and use your powers.”

“Okay, why would I want to do
that? I never asked for this nor do I want it! All I want to do is be normal
and play football, go to the NFL, meet a nice girl, get married, have children
of my own, and did I mention be normal?”

“Yes, you did mention that,”
responded Jaffrey.

I could tell he was getting
agitated by my lack of willingness to accept who and what I was.

“How about I just hide out and
don’t go back to Deerfield. Start over somewhere else where they can’t find
me.”

“Aiden, there is no place in
the realm you could hide from the Shadows. They can track you just by your
emotions. If you experience any emotions at all, positive or negative, they
will be able to locate you immediately and come for you and if you are not able
to master the power you possess they will kill you and your entire family.”

“Why them? They aren’t Baraqu,
are they?”

“Yes and no…you and your
siblings carry the bloodline, but you are the only Baraqu warrior. But all of
you are gifted and they will also murder your mother to close the circle. Our
experiences with their execution squads are they leave no one alive to carry on
the bloodline.”

“So they must have known I was
a Baraqu Warrior!”

“No, they didn’t, they
couldn’t have known because your powers were dormant so there was no way for
him to know this. Your family has a long history starting centuries ago with
fighting Alal and the Shadows and some of your ancestors are responsible for
some of the greatest defeats the Shadows have faced. So your family is well
known and we think he was sent there to get close and observe, waiting for your
brother Manny to make contact so that they could track him and murder him.”

“Manny? Why would they want to
kill Manny?”

“Because he and his team are
on to something big and not even myself or your grandparents know what they are
doing. It must be a serious threat to the Shadows for them to send their best
assassin and his followers to come after your family. I think his attack on
your family was triggered by something he saw in your sister, because from what
she said he was concentrated on her.”

“Do we know what he saw in
Sarah?”

“Not at the moment. She’s not
talking about it, but hopefully she will because we need as much information as
we can to better train you both in protecting yourselves.”