Enlightenment of Enigmas

Nalsar recently held a Literary Fest, giving me the opportunity to send in a creative work as part of the writing competition. I poured my whole heart into writing a story; did so with meraki. It was a 'Miss India' moment when I found out my story won me the first prize. As an aspiring writer, it was sweet reassurance. Here is the story,'Enlightenment of Enigmas' based on the theme of 'Boundaries':

Yugen truly understood his name as he watched the stars. It was a Japanese word, capturing a profound sense of the universe in its meaning.

“A sight like this really stirs your thoughts”, he said out loud to himself.

Small baskets of plants dangled from the balcony ceiling, underneath which he stood. Vines were intertwined with its curved railing. Fresh raindrops awoke their green scent.

He was intrigued by how a mere look at the marvels of nature made us question so much. The indescribable feeling a clear night sky could trigger or the grand aura that accompanied snow-capped mountains. They were sounds of connection that we have with the universe. But they’re faint behind the thick walls of human ego.

“Come inside, Yugen. You need to study before sleeping. The exams aren’t going to write themselves”, his mom called out.

His tan face hung low, reminded of reality. Being a student in high school was irksome. He dreaded the journey through the one horse town of going to school, leaving for college and then finding a job. It’s an efficient system, sure. But certainly not the only possible way of creating prosperous living. He had no complaints against working hard either. Instead, it was the mechanical approach he disliked. He’d rather see more heart put into the process where people could thrive with subjects they resonated with. But the world has caged itself within the three step program and stepping outside is a silly risk. He sighed. 

“There’s got to be more to life than this. It would feel like miracles gone to waste if it weren’t so…”

“Yugen! Dinner’s ready!” 

He decided to go inside immediately as though the mention of food was a summoning charm.

He walked right into a flower pot on his way back. “Why are we limited to physical bodies that feel pain?”, he whined, hopping on one foot.

“The room is…blue?”, Yugen’s drowsy mind wondered first thing next morning. Specs of dust bounced about, visible from the aqua rays being shed from the windows. Dazed, he walked out to the balcony, finding a sphere of sapphire in place of a warm sun!

“Well, you’d only see that once in a blue moon…”, he said, too sleepy to process this unnatural phenomenon yet.

He got ready for school, putting on a white shirt and his only pair of jeans. He began wandering about the ocean tinted house to ask his parents if they knew what was going on.

“Dad, the sun is blue!”

“And the trees are green. What’s your point?”

“Why are you acting like this is normal?”

“Too much math has gotten to your head. Now get walking to school, son. You’re already late.”

He reluctantly dragged his lanky self onto the cobblestone path of Loumerry, a French town. They were a lower middle-class family with just enough to survive life. His parents were simple and sweet people and he had inherited their good hearts.

He was disturbed all day at school for his two pals thought he was being bizarre too. 

“I’m telling you. It isn’t supposed to be this way”, he insisted. 

Amelie knocked on his forehead to suggest an empty chamber up there.

Philip was of no help either. “Were you reading those ridiculous conspiracy theories again? You’re so gullible, Yugen. I’m afraid of the day you accuse your neighbor of being alien because you mistook their drone for a UFO”, he’d said.

But Yugen was secretly enjoying the thrill of the situation. This was a mysterious glitch in reality, one only he was experiencing. Being open minded, he thought of the possibility that he had slipped into another dimension. Everything was the same except the colour of the sun. Some kind of new science was at work.

He walked back home, squinting in the turquoise shade the afternoon had transitioned into. His forest green eyes struggled to adjust to the new lighting. A crisp smell of sour dough bread was calling to him as he walked past the busy market. It lured him towards the baked goods, piled up on a stall.

“Hello there. I’m Guido”, a jolly looking baker appeared.

“Hi. Where’s Preston? Isn’t it supposed to be his shift?”, he asked. Maybe this was another change in this alternate reality.

Guido gave him a knowing smile. “Ah. But I’m here for a special purpose you see. One that naive Preston can’t help you with.” He spoke in a singsong fashion.

“Okay…”, Yugen trailed off.

He had pulled out a note pad and a pen and was staring down at the boy inquisitively. “Now then. Let me begin with some questions.” 

Many strange queries later, a relevant one arrived. “Do you find any unusual changes in the present?”

“You see it too! I woke up this morning to a blue sun in the sky. What’s that about, huh?”, he said, adjusting his school bag slipping off his shoulders.

“Alright. And what colour is it normally?”, he asked, jotting down points in his little book.

“It’s yellow”, he replied with his face twisted in confusion.

“I see, I see.”, he said musically, his head dipping up and down causing his golden curls to do a little dance. And he ended the interview abruptly when he walked off into the neighboring flower shop.

“What’s going on? Aren’t you going to tell me?”, he called out after the man.

A small jingle announced his arrival into the store. Guido stood by the lilies, gesturing towards him.

“Go ahead. Hold this vase in your hands”

Finding it odd yet harmless, he obliged. The place immediately began to distort. Petals and leaves were melting into blotches of colour. The door and the counter along with an old lady behind it dissipated.

It morphed into a large, dark space. Yugen looked around, panic stricken. He realised it was a tunnel like structure. Five seats were aligned before him, filled by people in formal attires. They had a peculiar glow about them.

Guido took off his chef’s hat, grinning at Yugen cheekily.

“Welcome to Interdimensional travels”, the woman in the very center announced, “How may we assist you? I hope our secretary was of good help.” 

Normally he’d believe something this but now that it was so real and raw before him, his skeptical side sprang up.

“Is this a joke? Or one of those crazy internet pranks? Turn the lights back on, please. I’m not falling for this”, he shook his head, reaching out for a door in the dark.

“Oh no, he’s one of those dubious ones…”, a stocky man murmured in the lady’s left ear. “My apologies, Mr. …?”, he turned to him.

“It’s Yugen”

                                                                                                                                    

“Mr. Yugen. I believe we owe you an explanation. As Esther said, we are here to provide services for those looking to travel through realities. There are infinite options and it could get complicated. Hence, the headquarters were put in place”, he told. “Things got messy before, trust me”, he added in a whisper.

His pleasant face and sincere tone made it more believable.

“Guido, do you possess the information?”, a sophisticated woman on the right demanded. Her symmetrical features were shaded with dark make up.

“Oh, yes. So sorry, Madam Nenet. It slipped my mind”, he shuffled to her with the note pad.

Her eyebrows lowered as she read it. “You are a resident of Earth from the Milky way galaxy and your Planet system is bound by a yellow star, correct?”

“Yes. We call it the Solar system. I somehow ended up in the same place but the core star was a blue one. Can you send me back home? I miss the golden light.”

“We sure can, Yugen”, Esther said, blinking her soft brown eyes. “Excuse us for a second. We need to track down your exact location and examine some details before we can proceed.” The group buried their heads behind gadgets. 

Whilst he waited, something struck him. This was an incredible opportunity. He could finally soothe his maddening curiosity about how the universe worked. These people seemed to know a thing or two.

He politely raised his hand to get their attention. Guido cleared his throat in an attempt to help.

“Yes, dear?”

“Before I leave, could you answer some of my questions?” 

“To be honest, we were so glad to get an alert about your situation. We don’t get much work these days. So you might as well ask us. Gives us something to do”, she chuckled.

“What is reality, exactly? And how many dimensions are there? Oh, and could you tell me what happens after we die?”, he jumped, his excitement intensifying with every question. 

“Slow down, kid”, one of the goofy looking male members on the right answered. “Your first two enquiries share an answer. Reality is infinity and so there are infinite dimensions. Let us simplify it for someone like yourself”, he said when Yugen looked puzzled.  

And one by one, each member stood up under a floating spotlight, reciting small poems.

“Humans are born with pesky egos

Worldly attachments being their foes

Disabling them from swallowing the truth

And leaving them stuck in a phony booth”

“For physical bodies aren’t real

Energies are the actual deal

Universes expand endlessly

Boundaries are broken relentlessly”

“Some realities are identical twins

Others are sheer sisters

There also exist distant relatives

Within these complex networks”

“Your world may have an Earth with life

Another has it burnt under strife”

“Interdimensional travel is common

The minor differences disguise this fact

Thoughts and choices fuel this excursion

But vast changes reveal its tact”

“And I thought trigonometry was impossible to understand” 

“That didn’t clear it up for you?”, Nenet asked patronizingly.

“The dramatic performances were a little distracting…”

She rolled her eyes, questioned his sense of fun and then began with the juicy details.

“Listen, boy. You may think you are awake and aware. But you are all mindless drones, chasing thing after thing in low consciousness. You earthlings possess certain powers -they’re just buried deep within. The love for materialistic things and obsession with technology is only boosting the disconnection with your potential. Adrian, can you take over?”, she asked breathlessly.

His muscular frame bolted upright. “Yes, the wild usage of technology is jeopardizing those already hidden powers. This particular science, though incredible, is messing up the magic within. You’re special, Yugen. You’re closer to utilizing your powers than most people. And do you know why?”, he leaned forward.

“Why?”, he asked, mesmerized by the flow of their ideas.

“Simply because you are open to possibilities. It says here, on our tracking device, that you go into a brooding zone on viewing nature. It conveys to you that if a wonder like itself is possible, then anything is.”

“A tracking device, huh? A little hypocritical, don’t you think?”

The man on the right corner chimed in, “We never meant that technology shouldn’t be used. Our emphasis lies in using it as necessary”, he stated, sounding offended. “Besides, our internet works on a much broader scale, branching out to sources so far away, eternity would cease to exist by the time I finished telling you the distance. So you may gather that it is quite useful for our job.” The man’s silly facial features were misleading, Yugen realised.

“Please be easy on the tone, Zane”, Esther said politely. “Getting to the crux of it”, she continued, “The problem is in the self-limiting theme that is playing out. On a community level, the media on your specific dimension is perpetuating unrealistic standards. That creates a discouraging environment because when people find that they don’t fit into them, they feel unaccepted.  We saw reports of little children finding themselves not good enough during our research. The society has cast a net, and people are caught up in it. What else did we find, Zane?” 

“We also saw glorification of trivial matters. There’s discrimination purely because someone looks a certain way or is part of a particular unit? People are judged on the basis of their physical appearance?! That’s really low. Its creating more restrictions to your growth as a group.” 

Yugen agreed strongly. Some behaviors of his society were beyond him too. 

“And it’s pretty senseless since these bodies are temporary shells that will be crushed once you’ve earned the truth, after which you can break free”, he went on, matter-of-factly.

“Sorry? Didn’t quite grasp that.”

“How about we show the kid?”, the man seated next to Adrian suggested. He had a sunken face and a mysterious vibe. “Could you arrange that, Nenet?”

“I’m not in charge of the Out of Body Department for nothing”

“Wait…I didn’t sign up for this”, the boy hesitated.

A villainous smiled stretched over her wine stained lips. “It has been awfully long since I performed the trick…”, she purred. Yugen was frantically looking around for an escape. But she had already fixated her eyes on him.

She lifted her hands upward, fluttering her fingers. She’d put on quite a show, spewing mumbo jumbo that Yugen doubted was necessary.

But it was working. His sense of being was getting vacuumed out of him. He looked down and found his own body, crumpled on the ground.

Time moved at a turtle’s pace. He was breathing in the calm that came over him. He was simply existing. All thoughts were forgotten, and it was purely experienced. It was the most blissful feeling. 

Unfortunately, she pulled him back down, so that he now found himself lying on the floor. It was momentarily suffocating to be in a physical casing again. For now, he knew what it felt like to break free.

“Anyways, on an individual aspect, we’ve noticed a narcissistic pattern that your species shows”, Adrian said, casually playing with his thin black hair.

Although still shook, he listened on. 

“It’s ironic, actually. While the community blocks development through destruction of self-esteem, each member self-destructs because of a false belief that they know it all. It’ because they’ve bound themselves by this thought that they are unable to truly do so.  What’s so funny, Zane?”, he asked when he heard spurts of laughter.

“I just remembered”, he said snickering, “that they thought Copernicus was cuckoo for pointing out that the sun was their center”

“I find it amusing that they all brush off the true reality as fiction whilst brewing up phantom concepts, calling them real life instead”, Esther added.

“Basically, each one of you is a brick, the society the cement and together you’ve built a boundary between yourselves and the truth”, Nenet concluded curtly.

“Peppermint tea, anyone?”, Gaido showed up with a tray. “The conversation was getting so heavy, I thought I’d lighten up the mood with a snack break. I’ve got some croissants that I stole from Preston’s bakery, too”, he said with glee.

“What did we say about stealing, Gaido?”, Adrian asked while helping himself to a Nutella filled pastry.

“Why did I arrive in a different reality?”, Yugen asked, this obvious question dawning on him.

“Like I said, you’re the rare person who is willing to know what’s out there. You actively question the systems your world has created instead of accepting them blindly. Thoughts are a tool in shifting dimensions. More importantly, you respond to one of the biggest transmission towers, nature.”

“I knew I had a connection with nature!”, he exclaimed.

“There’s your egotistical side. Everyone has a connection with nature, dear. Your just mildly aware of it while most ignore its wavelengths”, Esther joined in.

“How so?”

“Nature has the power to break the boundary wall. You dwelled on it and attracted another dimension to merge with yours. Since it wasn’t intentional, the shift was random and not too far off. Would you like to go on, Nenet?”, she sipped on her tea.

“Yes. Moving onto how it works. You see you don’t realise, but this is not the first time you’ve travelled like this. This is a multiple occurrence. Everyone wakes up in different realities now and again. In fact, people are always shuffling within these realms. There’re infinite number of them, each neighboring one only slightly different from the other. So, people don’t recognize that they have shifted. There’s only so far they can go unintentionally.”

“Are you saying that all possibilities exist?”

“Your reality is a miniscule, tiny sliver of the whole system”, she confirmed.

“This is amazing. So what sorts of universes are out there?”

“Off the top of my head, there’s one Universe entirely made of fairy floss. It’s a tourist favourite among children; their head is in the cotton candy clouds so often, they are bound to pay accidental visits.”  

“What a treat that place is”, Guido said dreamily. “I’ll never forget my mission there. Although if one thing is impossible, it is controlling those little ones. They turn into rockets after all that sugar rush”

“I can’t believe I’m even considering this, but could I get a quick peek into one of these places?”

“Why not?”, Esther perked up. “Let me retrieve my transporters. They’ve been collecting dust all this while…”, she bent down to open a secret panel on the floor. She had pulled out a tangled mess of small machines and began flipping through them.

“Depths of hell”, she read one of their names out loud. “You don’t want to go there, buddy”, she warned.

“’Torture chambers’. This is no walk in the park either.”, she shook her head disapprovingly.

Being an optimist, he had forgotten that every rose has its thorn. Infinite possibilities meant negative things too. This realization dampened the joy of his discoveries. 

Esther was in deep focus, the tip of her tongue sticking out from the corner of her mouth. She clumsily kept dropping items while Gaido wobbled back and forth, torn between wanting to help her yet afraid of breaking her concentration.

“Ah-ha!”, she exclaimed on finally finding success. ‘The fun zones’. A great beginner package.”

It was a dense remote control, with the labels ‘Treehouse tours’ and ‘Waterslide vacations’ being the only ones he could make sense of.

“Let’s give you the best of both worlds. I’m booking you for our recently opened up Ball-Poolverse so you can have your fun. And I’ll combine that with a visit to the land of Spiritual Guides so you can end on a serious note. Sound good?”

“I guess”

“You’ve got to give him a bonus round too”, the secretive looking one from the corner said. 

She pushed a tuft of her short bob behind her ear, mulling over the idea. Yugen wondered what he was getting himself into. Finally considering it, she spun around in her chair to face the other way.

She lazily dragged open a curtain with her leg, revealing a massive screen. This set up had been in the background this whole time, only camouflaged. These headquarters were a deceiving space, for although it seemed empty, it had hidden nooks like this everywhere. 

He was asked to stand in front of it. A laser beam scanned him, made a beep noise and the screen came to life. It had millions of tiny divisions spread across, each playing out scenes. 

“This, Yugen, is your Coexistence Board. Each part is a window into versions of you residing in different realities.” 

“It’s like I have my own television shows!”, he exclaimed as he closely walked by the screen.

“Pick your poison”, mystery man wheezed. 

“Find the version you like and let us know so we can add it to your package is what he means”, Nenet said, throwing the man a frown.

 Yugen smiled brightly upon hearing this. 

“This one is labelled ‘Celebrity life’”, he paused before one of the options. I’ve always wanted to have the privilege of fame and wealth…I choose this one.”

Esther prepared a custom controller for him. It had three buttons to help him navigate through each respective universe and a fourth one that was to be pressed when he wished for return. 

“I’ll keep the adventure quick”, he told them.

“Time doesn’t exist, my dear. It’s yet another limit your world has created.”

“Can Guido come with me?” The jelly-bellied man made Yugen feel safe somehow. His trustworthy nature must’ve been the reason he landed this job. Plus, the fun zones sounded like his hometown.

Permission was given, kick starting their trip. A smaller tunnel branched out beside the screen. Guido walked with him towards the opening. Yugen took a cautious step forward but fell through it instead.

Before he could scream, he found himself in a child’s dreamland. It was a gigantic ball pit everywhere he looked. There were soft globes in colours he’d never even seen before. They were made of another worldly material that seemed to be kissing him with comfort.

 “Is this a planet, Guido?”, he asked, rolling in the bouncy pool. 

“It’s a whole universe. You’ve got children to thank for its existence. Their sincere wishes for a world like this was implanted to the domain of reality”, he said whilst swishing his hands and legs to make an angel.

“But how does it sustain life? This is all there is, I don’t see any water or nature…”

“Who says those things are needed for life?”

He was catching on now. Science wasn’t just limited to concepts like atoms and metaphysics. In fact, it expanded to sizes beyond understanding and had innumerable forms. This meant that we had been confining ourselves to study it within fixed laws when actually, they were loose, shapeless notions.

After some swimming contests and a few hilarious rounds of hide and seek, Yugen felt ready to enjoy fame. Gaido, however, wasn’t as keen and left for the last destination directly.

“Don’t worry, I’ll meet you there.”, he reassured him before sinking into the billowy floor. His job had made him so familiar with the maze of tunnels that he could find his way through the entire system. 

It was obvious at this point; everyone Yugen had met today were foreign beings; they were aliens. He wished Philip was here to see for himself because he wouldn’t believe him otherwise. This had been a crazy day. Needing time to reflect, he took a nap before leaving.

When he teleported to the celebrity world, he found himself in his own house, standing in the living room. Except, the mediocre furniture now had lavish touches. Rustic decorations and royal fabrics cluttered the space. The renovation had taken away its homely feel, he felt. The balcony, his favourite spot, was the only place that remained the same. 

“Mom? Dad?”, he searched. Silence replied.

He planned on walking outside, picturing a crowd flocking towards him, asking for autographs. But he suddenly remembered the erratic behaviour of public around well-known figures. He wasn’t prepared for that. So, he walked around the house to gather information instead.

A compact, spiral staircase had been built through the center, connecting the three storeys of his building. He must’ve bought the entire place. 

The framed pictures and shelves of awards told him he was an actor. His fridge was covered in sticky notes, listing out strict diet plans for a ‘desirable’ body. His phone buzzed incessantly, his busy schedule becoming apparent. Texts from his mom indicated that his parents were on a vacation in Hawaii. He was glad that his wealth had given them a well-deserved break, something they couldn’t afford in his original reality.

Just as he was about to explore the third floor, a rattling noise brought a close to his investigation session. He saw a sudden flash and heard the click of a camera coming from above. It was the paparazzi which had broken into his house. They hopped down the stairs in a line as though his fear had been a welcoming sign.

His face widened in terror and before he knew it, he was attacked by the mob.

“Mr. Yugen, is it true that your family left you?”

“Mr. Yugen what do you have to say on your last film being a flop?”

“Would you say that your parents leaving you has affected your performance?”

Overwhelmed, he darted to his balcony. They cornered him, barking questions at him and blinding him with the camera glares. Not knowing what to do, he untangled the vines from the railing in one swift motion and climbed down. 

His head was very muddled and he felt violated. How could they disregard his privacy? They treated him as though he was nothing more than a source for a scandalous headline. He saw the hardships celebrities had to go through and realised it wasn’t just a bed of roses. 

Remembering a better escape option, he pressed the button labelled ‘Spiritual Guides’. While he diverged from this version of himself, the celebrity Yugen had to hear an earful from his publicist later.

All trauma left him once he arrived in the gorgeous scenery of his last destination.

A little waterfall was pouring into a river, filling the air with the song of nature. The area around was open with a grass floor specked with dandelions. He inhaled deeply and looked around.

It was brimming with life, for people lived here. Some lay in the grass; others took flight across the sky. 

A girl sat by the brook, engaged in a drawing. It was as though she was a personification of the place, her wavy hair being the flowing water and her freckled face embodying the dandelions.

The place was tranquil, letting him float about its rolling hills. He felt content and the word worries had been wiped away from his vocabulary.

A Japanese tree caught his eye. He spotted a woman under it, smiling at him tenderly. Her warmth was contagious, filling him with fondness. As he was walking towards her, he felt more and more complete somehow, like pieces of a jigsaw puzzle coming together. 

“Come here, love”, she spoke with a wind chime like ring. That’s when he knew. She was his Spiritual Guide, a being woven from love.

It had been her voice in his head that uplifted him when he was down. She was the source of his intuition. Immense gratitude washed over him.

He fell on his knees so as to worship her, his eyes welling up with tears. This tickled her funny bone. Her laughter was like melted chocolate, delightful and hearty. She lifted him up and her arms wrapped him in a healing embrace.

“I would like to bless you with a gift.”, she said. “You are now tuned to be mindful of the present. It will help you attain enlightenment and when that happens, we will become one.” 

They sat in silence, cherry blossoms snowing on them. He was clueless if it had been a second, a day or 20 years. But his gut feeling told him he had to leave now. And so, they parted ways with the promise to meet again.

He found Gaido in an animated conversation with a girl named Sarah about Crème Brûlée and what it signified in his life.

 “Sorry to disturb this highly intellectual talk but can we please return?”, he asked sarcastically. He felt the need to be playful in order to balance out the deeply emotional feelings. 

“How did it go?”, Zane asked when they were surrounded by the headquarters once again.

“Let’s just say that if your agency was from my home planet, you would get great reviews on yelp”

This entire experience had completely transformed him. 

He saw the role boundaries played in various layers. They are devious when they block us from growth and knowledge. But they are also fences, keeping us safe from the worlds of agony. They could be stubborn in their structure yet can have a flexible nature, allowing us to cross over.

His curiosities had settled down and he was more open to awareness instead of overthinking. A lot of these answers would’ve come to him automatically if he listened to his surroundings more.

He had a fierce desire to change his society’s perceptions. The out of body experience was eye opening because it decreased his attachment to his physical being. He was inspired by children’s approach to life. They let their imaginations flow, never imprisoning themselves to rules. A new found respect for celebrities was engrained in him too.

Now that he was filled with new knowledge, he couldn’t wait to apply it. He had already resolved to disconnect from the social media world and think happier thoughts. The wonder that he had the power to teleport through worlds with his mind elated him. 

The news that there was much more to reality restored his zest for life.

And the last visit attuned his spiritual mind, pushing him to connect with his higher self and strengthening his intuition. 

“One last question”

“Shoot.”

“You all kept saying the ‘truth’. What is the ‘truth’?”

Zane exhaled as if to gather patience. “We were hoping to distract you away from that. The thing is kiddo, that you must experience it for yourself to even begin to understand it. We could tell you, sure. But you wouldn’t believe it.”

“Tell me.”

“Alright. But don’t expect to comprehend it. YOU are the truth. The infinity that stretches forever and holds absolutely everything? It’s you. You are it.”

Yugen stood there, drinking in all of it. “Well you did warn me that it would fly past my head.”

There was an awkward pause as he blinked back at Zane blankly.

“Anyways, this has been grand. I’m going to be a hit storyteller among my friends.  Thank you for sharing so much with me.”

“No problem”, Adrian said while others smiled in a friendly manner.

“Let’s send you home then. You live in France, right? What’s the national flower?”

“It’s lilies, madam”, Guido piped up. 

“Could you procure some for us from the flower pantry, please?”

He disappeared in a corner before showing up with a bouquet of the delicate white flowers.

“We use the national flowers of places for mapping regions”, Esther explained. 

Guido gifted him the ‘Fun Zones’ transporter so he could explore more places whenever he pleased. Adrian, Esther, Nenet and Zane waved goodbye. Just as he was holding the flowers, the man in the right most corner said, “Yugen, we left one question unanswered. The Interdimensional travel team is dead.”

He watched the space evaporate, his eyes relieved to see a warmly lit flower shop.