Horace of the Horizon-Part 2

The letter would have to wait as I very much needed to catch some sleep before getting up for my job, filling up the newspaper boxes with the day’s morning edition of the Sun. I drove a clunky battered red GMC Econoline van that rather famously had a big nasty dent in one side where it had been sideswiped by the chauffeured car of some big executive or dignitary or politician. The story changed depending on who was telling it. I had long grown tired of it and was pretty sure every version was equally bullshit.

I stood over the cracked green sink in my narrow little bathroom, with the door open and washed my face, coaxing what lather I could from the tiny teardrop of glycerin soap that I had left.

A coughing fit made me stop and double over, red faced and red eyed. This was followed by another round of nose blowing. When I was finally satisfied that it had stopped I climbed into bed and pulled the covers around me like a cocoon.

The moon and the street lights shone brightly through my window. “Fuck!” I hissed at myself, frustrated by my restlessness and filled with anxiety that I would never get to sleep until it was time to get up.

It was then I heard a voice call my name. Then it was two voices. “Horace!” said the first voice. “Wake up!” urged the second.

I pulled myself up to a sitting position and flipped on the light beside my bed.

My two budgerigars Raziel and Zaphekiel were both sitting on top of my computer monitor and puffing up and flapping excitedly.

“Horace!!” cried Zaph “Horace!!!!!”

“Go to the window!” Hissed Raz.

I rubbed my eyes.

“You guys don’t know how to talk” I vaguely protested as I made my way to my window. I looked out and there down on the grass, was a large, and as far as I could tell, living baboon. It was motionless save for the feather it held in its hand that waved slightly in the breeze.

I was transfixed by both how unreal, how so not belonging to this world everything was that was happening, but also by how crisp, how complete, how real it all seemed. It was a dream. (Surely it was!) But in my own mind I was unable to tell myself, to recognize that fact.

I stared down through the window. Down at the baboon. Motionless. Waiting.

I looked back over my shoulder at the budgerigars who had started flying in a small, unnaturally slow circle. “Guys, why does this dream feel so real?”

“I am afraid that it is not your dream at all” the birds now spoke with one voice that seemed to emanate from them like they were broadcasting a faint radio signal. “You are a part of the shamanic vision I am having, a journey that has decidedly taken a horrible turn for the worse” the voice, then added “My name is Graham Hancock”

“Who ?”

“I am known to most people as an author who writes books about the mysteries of human history in its earliest antiquity,”

“I thought that was Robert Buval?”

For several seconds the budgerigars rotated in silence and then the voice spoke again.

“Please, that is not important right now, I do not have much time and much risk has been taken to reach you. You must go down!”

I felt a wave of panic at what this voice, this ‘Graham Hancock’ was suggesting. “Down?” my voice trailed “Down with…”

“Yes before it is too late” the voice urged “You must appear before Thoth”

Then my eyes clouded with a black inky darkness and I felt my chest tighten, almost as if something had physically coiled itself around my heart and had started constricting it.

I stumbled, blinded and with my head reeling my chest growing tighter and tighter as panic began to well in me and then it was over, just as quickly as it had happened.

Trembling, with my skin cold and clammy with fear I walked in the moonlit path through my apartment.

When I finally got downstairs and outside I felt as if I could breathe again, and the baboon that had once unnerved me was now a source of relief.

I walked up to the baboon Thoth and stood in front of it. Now that I was closer I could see the creature’s eyes were closed. Was it asleep? Was it even alive?

“And who is before Thoth” the baboon spoke; its eyes still closed shut.

“I am Horace” I replied.

“What is this place where that you live?”

“The Horizon Apartments”

“Indeed, Horace of the Horizon, step closer. Thoth commands it. “

I stepped closer.

And then its eyes opened and I cannot explain what I saw as I cannot explain what I cannot fathom, like being plunged headlong into a reality where three dimensions gave way to a seeming infinity The baboon then let out an ape like shriek, baring its vicious looking teeth and grabbing hold of me with savage speed and fury, knocking me on to my back.

How could I have been so wrong?

Surely the beast meant to kill me.

I punched back at it, feebly, ineptly. The baboon over top of me now and hooting loudly and it wrapped it’s powerful hands around my face and began to force it’s thumb between my eyes.

I screamed out wildly as I could feel my skull being opened up, and then a sharp stabbing pain as the baboon Thoth shoved the feather it had been holding through the hole it had made in my skull, deep into my brain.

I soiled myself and cried disgracefully as I writhed and spasmed and my head became filled with an image of a spectacled man of middle age who seemed both studious and robust and brimmed with curiosity and I knew that he was in possession of secret and sacred knowledge and that he was an incarnation of and standard bearer of an ancient spirit and an ancient almost timeless trust as protector of the Earth and of mankind.

He was Graham Hancock, journalist, author, explorer and shamanic guardian.

He was trapped, I know not where, somewhere in a void of black nothing.

Was I meant to somehow rescue him?

Then I saw a flash of an image of a man I did not recognize but felt an immediate revulsion to , and then the flood of information and pain sent me reeling into oblivion.

When I next opened my eyes I was lying in my bed. I didn't remember a thing. Just that I had to get to work.

Somewhere out there in the night I could hear the squeal of tires of a Dodge Viper speeding away.

Horace of the Horizon is intended to be an ongoing story that will unfold right here on Hub Pages in installments.

I will try to get new installments out as quickly as possible, but I do keep a very busy schedule.

Hopefully it wont be more than a few weeks between each episode, but the best way to make sure you never miss an episode is to subscribe to me here, but also check out and bookmark my Blog: The Best Lack All Conviction. You can read all of my articles there as well!

I am far from being any kind of professional writer, but it is something I enjoy doing. I hope you will enjoy it too and enjoy coming along for the ride!

See you next episode!

-Dave

See you next episode!

-Dave