The 14 Stages Of The Most Brilliant Mind

The crime scene was unlike any Detective Garcia had ever seen. No signs of struggle. No clear signs of violence. But a large chef’s knife lay on the kitchen floor, as clean as the day it was first unwrapped. It lay next to the dead body. A teenager, face down on the kitchen floor, no blood anywhere. Garcia didn’t have the stomach to turn the body over. He feared he may recognize the face. This wasn’t an enormous town.

The other cops on the crime scene were chattering in the living room of the modest home, discussing theories. Someone asked who was speaking to the mother. She was upstairs with another cop. That poor woman.

Garcia looked back to the teenager on the floor. Half of his right foot lay on the floor near his right leg, completely… unattached, would be the best word. Not severed, not cut, not ripped. Just not attached. And incomplete. The top half of the foot, with all five toes intact. The heel and the ankle, nowhere to be seen. The teen’s right leg ended somewhere between the shin and the ankle. And again, no blood. No cuts, the leg just stopped, as if that’s how it was supposed to be.

To Garcia’s left, a swirl of wind came in from outside. The kitchen wall that should have been there, completely missing. The dingy yellow linoleum extended across the floor and expected to meet a wall, but instead, just a 12-foot by 10-foot opening which led to the backyard. Garcia moved to the edge of the kitchen, just before linoleum met grass blades. He knelt down and touched the edge of the linoleum. Smooth to the touch, no jagged pieces, no cracks, no splinters.

Garcia had no idea how a person could have removed a wall from a house like this without leaving a trace of evidence. You could potentially build a kitchen and just stop your work, and perhaps end up with this result. But no one could go backwards, dismantle and destroy with such precision. Garcia was a firm believer in Science, but this scene was making him question everything he thought he knew. What happened here? What happened to this kid?

“Victim has a stab wound!” One of the cops calls out as he has turned the kid over onto his back. Garcia shutters, but he knows it’s his job to see who this kid is. He turns to view this tragedy. The cop is continuing to examine the kid as Garcia recognizes the face. “Right in the chest. Weird, no blood.”

4 WEEKS BEFORE THE CRIME SCENE

The church is deafeningly silent. This is the worst sound in the world. Silence in a church. Every tiny noise and non-noise echoes with the wrath of every God that every living being fears. Someone shifts on their hard wooden bench, and it sounds like a rifle goes off.

Aaron and Ethan stand in the back, leaning against the wall. They see students from school get up from one of the front rows and trudge up to the casket in the front. Jeremy and Nick. They kneel down before the casket. They take their time. Aaron and Ethan watch.

“I don’t know why I’m here.” Aaron whispers to Ethan. “I hate it here. And this is all pointless.”

“I wouldn’t say it’s pointless.” Ethan responds. “And it’s good you’re here, for appearances at least.”

They watch Jeremy and Nick return to their seats. Another student, Shawna, gets up and makes her way to the casket. She bursts into tears before she can even kneel down. Her mother runs to her and comforts her.

“I don’t have anything to say to a corpse.” Aaron says bluntly. Ethan looks at him with disbelief. “I know that sounds horrible, I don’t mean it that way. I mean… it does me no good talking to anyone in that way. If a soul is a real thing, its not in that bag of skin up there anymore. It’s somewhere else in the universe.”

“Do you really believe that?” Ethan is curious.

“I don’t know what I believe.” Aaron answers. “I don’t know what I believe the meaning of life is when we’re alive. I don’t know what I believe happens when we die. All I know is, that’s just a dead thing up there. And I have nothing to say to it. Because it can’t hear me.”

“Maybe he can hear you somewhere else.” Ethan is a little worried with Aaron’s souring attitude. Aaron nods in a comforting manner, as if he is truly taking in Ethan’s words.

The weekend has now passed, and Aaron is back in school. The world hasn’t stopped turning, so they say. Life goes on… whatever the fuck life is. A bunch of random events strung together which seem to have less and less meaning each time you examine one. But still, even with all of that knowledge, Aaron knows he must go to Health class. Just as Aaron must use sarcasm every day.

As Aaron strolls down the same hallway he takes every day at 10:45 A.M. he encounters the same sights. The couple that reads passages from the Bible before class. The three kids that are always positioned several lockers away, flinging all sorts of trash at them. And then, something new. Jeremy and Nick round the corner and spot Aaron. They zero in on him. Aaron never sees these two down this hall at this time. Usually, he doesn’t have the misfortune of these assholes sprawling across his eyeline until lunch, enough to almost make Aaron lose his appetite. Actually, Aaron never loses his appetite. That’s a weird thing he has noticed about himself. No matter what bad news he has received, no matter how horrible a day he may have had, he’s never skipped a meal. He couldn’t even imagine the feeling of ‘not being hungry’ when several hours had passed without him consuming any food.

But Jeremy and Nick are always competing for the title of ‘First To Ever Send Aaron’s Appetite Missing.’ They are clearly moving in a determined stride right towards Aaron. All the other kids notice it and the crowds of them part like they are a red body of water, and these two dipshits are Moses.

“Hey Aaron, you little fuck!” Jeremy allows this comment to be unleashed from his ugly maw. “What’s the matter?! You’re too good for a funeral service?”

“The funeral service I was at?” Aaron speaks in as belittling a tone as he can. “No, I don’t think I was too good for the funeral service I was at. If I thought I was too good for it, I wouldn’t have shown up for it.”

“You didn’t even go up to the casket and pay your respects to Mr. Davidson!” Nick belts out. The red sea of students have become one large glob of eyeballs that all watch the spectacle together.

“Mr. Davidson?” Aaron laughs. “Alright. And what, you two sharts are the keepers of the rule book that says how people need to pay their respects?”

The word ‘respects’ barely finishes exiting Aaron’s mouth before Jeremy’s fist plants right into it. Aaron recoils back, he spins back, gripping his mouth. Nick sends a fist flying into Aaron’s cheek. He stumbles backwards. Jeremy and Nick stand shoulder to shoulder, glaring at Aaron. Well, Aaron knows the importance of Health. And he knows the importance of that big, heavy Health textbook in his backpack. He flings the backpack off his shoulder and swings it directly into Nick’s head, knocking him off his feet. Aaron grapples with Jeremy and delivers a solid punch to his temple before Nick jumps back up and the two take him to the floor and trade punches and kicks to Aaron’s body.

Punch after punch. Kick after kick. A lot of time passes before anything is done to stop this.

Aaron sits in his bedroom. It is the next day, it is 10:45 A.M. Normally, he would be on his way to Health class, but he is suspended. So, instead, he sits at his computer, looking up whatever comes to his mind, watching daytime TV, and icing his mouth. Aaron knows the importance of Health.

Aaron’s Mom enters his bedroom. “I’m going to the store. Do you need anything?”

Aaron shakes his head no.

“You shouldn’t have gotten in trouble.” She reassures Aaron.

“I know,” Aaron says simply. “But the principal is a stupid fuck.”

Aaron’s Mom opens her mouth in a reactionary way and then shuts it. She won’t tell Aaron he is wrong when he clearly is not. “The time off will probably do you good. Those boys too.”

She leaves. As far as Aaron is concerned, ‘those boys’ could take a lot of time off… from school, from life, from anything.

Aaron continues searching the internet for anything and everything. The meaning of life. The secrets to life. What is life? There are a lot of interesting sites that show up when you allow your fingertips to lead you uninhibited to any destination. There are a lot of interesting theories out there. That’s all life is really. Theories. Nothing is proven.

Aaron already had little faith in everything he had been taught. Nothing he was ever ‘taught’ ever felt right to him. And now a feeling stuck in the pit of his stomach and wouldn’t leave. And the little faith that existed was being eaten away. Until it was completely nonexistent. Nothing is proven. We just live on this taut elastic strand of ‘proven theories’ and never deviate away from it. But what if we allow ourselves to deviate from the strand? Why must we exist on one strand? Why would life be one boring strand anyway? It must be more complex than that.

“The unexamined life is not worth living.” - Socrates

3 WEEKS BEFORE THE CRIME SCENE

Aaron strolls back through the halls. Everyone watches him like they just paid good money for front row seats to his cage at the zoo. His face is still somewhat mangled, but that isn’t what everyone is looking at. They are looking at the reason why his face is mangled. The reason danced in his eyes. It danced a dastardly dance, it waltzed with wicked, and it bordered on bad. When Aaron stared back at students, they stepped back with a flick of fear in their chests. Aaron kind of liked this.

Aaron sat in his corner seat in English. Pupils shot into the corners of corneas in order to catch a glimpse of Aaron. They slid back into position, so as not to be seen. But Aaron saw all. He smirked at no one in particular. And then Shawna entered. A few pupils diverted from Aaron and latched onto Shawna’s body as she made her way across the room and sat in her desk in the opposite corner from Aaron. She glanced over at him with a look no one else had given Aaron all day. Sorrow, compassion, understanding. And then she looked away.

And in entered Jeremy, with a bruise on the left side of his face that had turned a nasty puke yellow color. He sat in his seat, two chairs away from Aaron. The English teacher, Mr. Wilkerson, noticed the proximity of the two boys, considered standing up, and then stopped when he realized Jeremy wasn’t even looking at Aaron.

Class droned on and Aaron didn’t listen to any of it. He was fixated on the juggling balls that Jeremy had inexplicably brought into class and sat on his desk. What is this guy a juggler now? Aaron studied them all class. They seemed so fake. As if they weren’t really there. As if life was a canvas that had been set a long time ago, and a new painter came and splashed those onto the scene. The more Aaron stared at the juggling balls, the more they glowed. The red and blue and yellow stripes illuminated. They vibrated and called to Aaron’s eyes. He flexed his hand and felt the cushy feel of the ball rolling on his skin. The ball shone. It glowed more.

Aaron felt Jeremy’s eyes flicker back and forth in his skull. He brought these in to throw at Aaron. He thinks he’s slick. Mr. Wilkerson was still droning on about some poem by some dead guy. It was clear he was about to turn to the chalkboard to write something down. Aaron’s knuckles flexed. He looked to Jeremy’s hands, his knuckles twitched. Aaron looked to Shawna and she must have felt Aaron’s eyes on her. She turned to look at him. He turned away and faced Jeremy.

Mr. Wilkerson spun around towards the chalkboard and Jeremy jumped into action. He grabbed his juggling ball and whipped it at Aaron. Aaron could feel the tiny, multicolored beanbag pressing against his hand the entire time. The ball was never in Jeremy’s control. He theorized that it was.

That’s all life is. Theories. Nothing is proven. The ball glided along an elastic strand, naked to the eye, naked to Aaron’s eye, but wrapped tightly around his index finger. Aaron raised his hand and stopped the ball mid-air. As it froze in its path, it rotated ever so slowly. Shawna and Jeremy and half of the other students saw this and watched with mouths agape. Aaron summoned a heat from his chest through his arm and directed it to his fingertips and launched the ball back at Jeremy’s face. It smashed into his forehead with such force that he fell out of his seat and landed on the floor.

Kids gasped, several of them laughed. Those were the ones that were Aaron’s favorites. Mr. Wilkerson spun around to see Jeremy laying on the floor, juggling ball on his chest, bright red mark on his forehead.

“Jeremy! What happened?!” Mr. Wilkerson was baffled.

“Jeremy. You really shouldn’t be juggling in class!” Aaron quipped. Most of the class laughed. Several students watched Aaron with curiosity, including Shawna, who had watched the whole thing unfurl.

As Aaron quickly walked to his car after school, he could hear Shawna’s quick footsteps behind him. “Aaron, wait up! What was that?!” She called out.

Aaron tried to get into his car, but Shawna caught up with him and placed her hand on his door. Aaron faced her. She had tears welling in the bottoms of her eyes. Aaron opened his mouth, but someone else’s voice sounded into the air.

“We got a fucking freak right here!” It was Nick. And his buddy Jeremy was slinking behind him. Nick and Jeremy closed in on Aaron.

Aaron didn’t have time for this.

“I don’t have time for this.” Aaron said. And then he could hear the ticking. The ticking of a clock, sharply tick, tick, ticked in the center of his head. Every step Nick and Jeremy took towards Aaron was a louder tick, until the sound was ringing in Aaron’s ears.

He reached out to the sound with both hands, and the reverberations of it echoed into the palms of his hands. Tick. Tick. He bent his knuckles. Tick. Tick. And snatch! He grabbed it. Aaron didn’t know what he grabbed, but he grabbed something. And everyone around him froze. He felt a cool, steel presence in the palms of his hands. He kept it in his palms while he entered into his car. Everyone stayed frozen. He sat in the driver’s seat, started the car. No one moved.

Aaron had complete control over them. And why not? Who were they to him? Nothing. They viewed life as everything that had been told to them and that was it. Aaron viewed life as so much more than that. So much in the atmosphere to interact with that we normally ignore. And it is all right there.

Aaron let go of the cold steel and suddenly everyone could move, but shock rang through everybody. Jeremy, Nick, Shawna, all with surprise as Aaron sat in the driver’s seat of his car and peeled out, kicking dirt up every which way.

Jeremy was in awe. “How did he do that?”

“If you would be a real seeker after truth, it is necessary that at least once in your life you doubt, as far as possible, all things.” – René Descartes

TWO WEEKS BEFORE THE CRIME SCENE

Aaron entered the school with a backpack full of books. None of these books were textbooks for any of his classes. Aaron no longer saw the importance of Health class. That textbook was in a trash can somewhere. Math and Science textbooks had their pages ripped entirely from them and were lining the crate of a dog somewhere.

Aaron sat in his History class, books out on his desk, perusing through literature from authors unknown to everyone else in the school. Students viewed him through side glances and from a distance. No one had courage enough to go near him. Except Ethan.

Ethan treaded carefully as he approached his buddy and sat next to him.

“A lot of interesting books you got there. Any of them for History?”

Aaron chuckled. “I’m not worried about how things once were. I want to know how things are.”

“What do you mean?” Ethan was aware as he spoke with Aaron, most of the kids in class were watching them.

“I want to know how life works.” Aaron flipped through the pages of one book. “Simple as that. We’re on this journey and it is all we know. I want to know how it all works. I want to know it inside and out. Once you know something from top to bottom, you can then manipulate it to your will.”

“You know, I get scared when I fly,” Ethan responded. “But I always comfort myself before the plane takes off. Not because I know how a plane works or because I understand the concept of flying. But because I don’t. I wouldn’t ever want to know how a plane works and how flying works, because I’m no genius. And so, if I understand something, it must not be so complex. But if I don’t understand it, then it must be complex. And something that is complex, and unknown has less of a chance of crashing and burning than something that is so simple that you can figure it out with ease. Does that make sense?”

“Maybe for you Ethan.” Aaron laughs. He notices a man standing in the doorway of his class. Jeremy is by the man’s side, and he points to Aaron.

“That’s him, Detective.”

The detective enters the class and approaches Aaron. “Aaron, I’m Detective Garcia. Mind talking with me for a minute?”

Aaron is in the principal’s office. He, the Principal, Detective Garcia and Jeremy all stand together watching security footage of Aaron in the parking lot from last week. Shawna stands next to him, Jeremy and Nick approach Aaron, and suddenly Aaron is inside the car, peeling out. Detective Garcia stops the footage.

“Alright,” Detective Garcia is careful. “How did that happen?”

“I don’t know. School need’s better equipment.” Aaron smirks at Jeremy who subtly steps back an inch. “Totally just skipped a few seconds there.”

“Why did no one else in the footage move like you did, Aaron?” Detective Garcia’s voice becomes more stern.

“We saw you all just… just transport into the car!” Jeremy explodes. “There’s something going on with you!”

“Aaron,” The Principal speaks up. “I’m afraid we’re going to have to suspend you again. This time for a longer period of time.”

“Why?” Aaron takes a serious tone. “Because you guys have shitty security cameras? What’s that got to do with me?”

“Aaron.” Detective Garcia puts his hand on Aaron’s shoulder. “Come on. The decision has been made.”

The Principal walks over to his desk and picks up a sandwich and takes a bite. He truly enjoys it as he chews and smirks at Aaron. Why has this asshole always hated Aaron? Aaron didn’t approve of what was happening. Let’s try this again.

The Principal puts the half-eaten sandwich back to his mouth, the chewed food in his mouth becomes unchewed and reattaches itself to the sandwich, fully formed. The sandwich is brand new again, untouched. The Principal stands dumbly for a moment, and then he returns the sandwich back to his mouth for his ‘first bite.’ He sinks his teeth into the sandwich and yelps as he pulls his mouth back. He clutches his jaw as his mouth slightly opens and a few ounces of sand pours out of his lips onto the floor. His eyes shoot open. Everyone stares at Aaron.

“Seeing is not believing, for the blind have beliefs. Sight impedes our ability to believe. Sight is a blanket, hiding the truth.” - Unknown

1 WEEK BEFORE THE CRIME SCENE

Aaron sits in his room reading. His Mom hesitantly opens his door.

“Heading to the store. Need anything?”

Aaron responds only with a shake of the head. She shuffles backwards away from his door and leaves. Aaron feels a little badly. Perhaps he should be more kind to his Mom. But he is busy.

He stands up, book in hand. He walks over to his window and tosses the book out the window. He steps back and moves to the far wall. He places his fingertips on the flat surface of the wall and begins tugging. Particles are being pulled from the wall, he grips them, tugs, pulls and pulls. The wall is stretching out towards Aaron’s hands as he fabricates particles into paper, he fabricates paper into fully formed pages. He pulls and pulls, the wall surrendering paper where there was none. More and more paper being ripped from the wall and forming into a mass in Aaron’s hands, bits of it hardening, solidifying, until… Aaron stands with the book he just threw out the window sitting plainly in his hands.

He skims the pages. The very same book. He smiles.

“He who is unable to live in society, or who has no need because he is sufficient for himself, must be either a beast or a god.” - Aristotle

6 DAYS BEFORE THE CRIME SCENE

Aaron drives along the back road, following the black pickup truck. The dark road is lit up only by the occasional streetlight and the bright full moon. The truck rolls along towards the four-way intersection and turns left into the parking lot. Aaron drives past the intersection and watches the truck drive down to the grocery store. He pulls to the side of the road and watches on. The truck parks and Jeremy and Nick get out and head into the store. Aaron drives off.

5 DAYS BEFORE THE CRIME SCENE

The black pickup truck takes the same route to the same grocery store at the same time. Aaron follows along, stopping in his same spot as the truck parks in its same spot. Jeremy and Nick stroll up to the grocery store as Aaron plays with the cigarette lighter in his car. He flicks it a couple times, sparks flip into the air and disappear. Aaron flicks his fingers on his other hand as it rests on the steering wheel, sparks emerging from the tips of his fingers momentarily. He chuckles, removes his foot from the brake pedal and drives off.

4 DAYS BEFORE THE CRIME SCENE

Ethan sits with Aaron in his bedroom. Ethan examines all the books strewn about. He looks at the several bottles of various liquids on top of Aaron’s dresser.

“I just want to make sure you’re doing alright.” Ethan’s voice trembles.

“I’m perfectly fine,” Aaron responds, nose still in a book. “In fact, I’m better than fine.”

“People are just worried. You know, if you’re having trouble with—a lot of the students at school miss—”

“They miss their favorite teacher!” Aaron snaps. “No one misses me! They don’t care.”

“I’m just confused as to what is going on with you, Aaron.” Ethan’s eyes are filled with worry.

“You’re confused because you don’t want to know how the plane works.” Aaron says rudely. “I don’t have time for someone who is absolutely fine flying with blinders on.”

Ethan knows he isn’t wanted. He knows he can’t say anything more. He gets up and leaves. Aaron hardly misses a beat and returns to his book.

3 DAYS BEFORE THE CRIME SCENE

Aaron sits in his car, watching Jeremy and Nick in the grocery store parking lot, tossing a football back and forth as they usually do. Perfectly content to engage in this activity, perfectly fine to allow themselves to believe that the football needs to travel through the air from one to the other. Unaware that the football they believe to be real, the force that propels the football, the air the football travels through, there is no proof that it is real. They are bending to the will of things that they are just being led to believe exist.

A cop car rolls up next to Aaron. Inside is Detective Garcia. He rolls his window down. Aaron does the same.

“You sure enjoy watching them every night, huh?” Detective Garcia smiles a fake smile.

“I’m more of a football fan than a football player.” Aaron delivers a fake smile right back.

“Watch yourself.” Garcia’s tone stern now. “I coached Nick and Jeremy in Pee Wee football. I’ve known them awhile. They’re good kids.”

“It’s a crime to just watch people now?” Aaron shifts his car into drive and rolls off.

2 DAYS BEFORE THE CRIME SCENE

Aaron glides through an aisle in the grocery store. The store is fairly empty late this evening. His eyes dart around, scoping out security cameras. Logging them in his mind.

Suddenly, Shawna comes around a corner and they notice each other.

“Aaron!” She is surprised to see him. She has a pint of ice cream in her hand. “How—how are you?”

“I’m great.” Aaron says dryly.

“You know, everyone at school is broken up over Mr. Davidson… your dad, I mean.”

“I can tell.” Aaron glides his hand along the shelf near him, letting his fingers trace over the silverware and baking tools there.

“Can I ask? How come you didn’t go up to your Dad’s casket at his funeral?” Shawna asks. “All his students did. It seemed kind of weird.”

“Listen Shawna, you’re nice. But let me tell you something. I have always loved my Dad. And I always talked with him when he was alive. We had great conversations. He knew exactly how I felt about him. But I would gain nothing by going up to his dead body at a funeral service in front of a bunch of people who don’t know him as well as I do.”

“But it’s just—” Shawna can hardly get any words out.

“We don’t know how life works!” Aaron erupts. “We don’t know how death works! I don’t know if my Dad is still somewhere around here, in the atmosphere, in this reality, or if he is in an alternate one, or if he is in some state that our minds can’t comprehend. But he was not in that body there! It is a waste of time to talk to the body he once inhabited. I want to find where he is now. Because the universe is unlimited. And he is somewhere out there in the universe. But I need to unlock its secrets before I can navigate it. It isn’t what it seems. It isn’t everything we’ve been told. It has been beyond our understanding for so long now. So, I need to understand it and crack it and manipulate it. Does that make sense?”

Shawna is baffled. Her eyes open even wider when she realizes Aaron’s hand has found a chef’s knife on the shelf. She exchanges a soft goodbye and leaves the aisle.

“I think therefore I am.” – René Descartes

“If I think not… am I not?”

1 DAY BEFORE THE CRIME SCENE

Aaron drives to the grocery store, same time as always. And there is the black truck, Jeremy and Nick standing outside of it, same as always. He watches them. Tossing the football back and forth. The football glides back and forth on a glowing, blue strand. Aaron can see it clear as day. Another strand extends away from them and up the road behind him. He turns back to see Detective Garcia’s car moving along that strand and approaching him.

He rolls by slowly and eyes Aaron. Aaron looks back at him and even though he feels the force of Garcia’s foot on his own brake pedal, Aaron can feel Garcia’s gas pedal under his own foot. He presses his foot down, and Garcia’s car rolls on beyond his control. Aaron can feel the football grazing his fingertips. And at the same time, the grip of Garcia’s steering wheel. Aaron feels a jacket he is not wearing hugging his body. He smells bread baking and pasta sauce cooking. He tastes chocolate… and nothing is in his mouth. He can feel it all.

He takes one last look at Jeremy and Nick and drives off.

Aaron stands in his kitchen. It’s midnight. He realizes he can feel it all, he can control it all. It’s not as if he tapped into the secrets of the universe… it’ as if the universe has been his all along. It all makes perfect sense as he views it all. This is all his. This is all to his liking, created in the way he prefers.

So, the universe isn’t that complex at all. It’s quite simple. He understands every corner, every crevice, ever nook and cranny. He can see every inch of existence. There is no great mystery. There is no origin to life, no end in sight, no pathway. Everything is nothing. All a façade. That’s the secret to the universe. There is no secret. Nothing actually exists.

And that’s when the nothingness approaches.

A slow, devouring blackness creeping up on Aaron. He sees it making its way towards him. It eats through his kitchen wall and rolls across the kitchen floor. The blackness latches onto Aaron’s ankle and eats away at it. A cold fire rips at his tendons and explodes the atoms of his foot and desecrates them into non-existent rubble. He gasps and searches for breath, but he has none. He pulls himself away from the blackness, his foot falls from his leg and he stumbles forward for the counter, grabbing on, holding on for dear life. For dear… something.

Aaron realizes, the universe never existed. That was its biggest secret. And now that he has figured it out… it’s ceasing to even pretend to exist. Everything is slowly ending, because he had to go and figure this out. The blackness rolls along his kitchen floor towards him. It eats away the floor, it east away sound, it demolishes the scent in the kitchen, it devours hope.

This is only happening because Aaron has figured it out.

That’s it! This is only happening because Aaron knows. And he is the only one who knows. It would stop if he didn’t know this truth. Or if the truth died with him, before the blackness killed everything else.

Aaron slides his hand across the counter and grabs the chef’s knife. He glances back once more at the blackness rolling towards him. It rolls on. His poor mother… lost her husband… about to lose her only son. But the alternative is she loses her life and everyone else loses their everything. This is the better alternative. No matter how horrid it is.

Aaron puts the knife where it needs to go. No blood comes out of Aaron’s chest. It’s actually peaceful. It isn’t messy. He puts the knife on the floor as he lays down next to it. Well, he had to go and figure out the truth. And he got it.

Aaron watches the blackness stop. It doesn’t retreat, it doesn’t roll away. But the blackness, which was ceasing all that exists from existing… ceases to exist itself. And it is gone. As the blackness surrounds Aaron’s mind slowly.

We’re not supposed to know how the planes work.