Book of Tholl

By Garcia Martinez Ruben

Peer into the future. Homo sapien has been extinct for hundreds of thousands of years! Follow the next step in our evolutionary line. Follow Tholl, an ex-saboteur, and discover how far a government will go to protect itself, how far a man will go for redemption, the consequences of our actions today, and how they will affect even those who come after us. Some problems transcend even our species. Explore a new unique Earth from the distant future through three different perspectives, three different ideologies, three different problems, and watch as they intertwine. Philosophy, conspiracy, terrorism. The future is bleak.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Publishdrive
• Release date: Sep 11, 2019

Book preview

R.G.M.

Prologue

HEY, um, what’s, YOUR name again?

Adverdie Cide She sighed. But you can just call me Dee, remember? Dee patted the little boy on his head and returned to the front of her class.

She stood before fifteen eight-year-olds, sitting on cushions, their little eyes glowing with the lights of the tablets they held. They seemed alarmingly eager.

A little girl in the back lifted her hand and waved it. Ms. DEE, um will you be our teacher forever now?

Dee smiled at the little girl. No, I am a, substitute teacher. Sir Fabian is in an important meeting right now and I, as his assistant, have been tasked with teaching you little… She stopped herself and redirected her words. Adorable little angels.

The little boy next to her started speaking, but Dee cut him off.

We need to get back to this lesson, we are only here for one more hour, and we have a lot to cover. She cleared her throat. Geography won’t teach itself.

She turned her attention to the fifty-inch monitor behind her. Displayed on its screen was the world map. She tapped a big island just off the coast of one of the bigger continents.

The island switched from green to red, and next to it was a question mark. Now, who can tell me what this is?

The children all raced to tap their tablets.

The name Ty appeared next to the question mark on the map, and Dee clapped her hands together. Okay! She said excitedly. Ty, you get the first shot at answering the question.

THE HOLY ISLAND! Ty blurted.

She hated children, but watching these little creatures learn was a delight. She clapped her hands. Yes, exactly. The Holy Island, the capital of the Holy Lands and the seat of power for the Holy Kingdom. Our beautiful country. It wasn’t very beautiful, but she had to act a certain way. This was not a time for a black woman to start being controversial.

A little girl in front raised her hand and spoke. My mommy SAID, that, UM, the Holy ISLAND was once, um called Cal the forna.

Dee smiled. Yes! She was impressed. Hundreds of thousands of years ago, this island used to be even bigger, but, She circled the Hot Isles of Tsu-Chankk to the south, "it, along with a place once called Mexico, flooded. Over hundreds of thousands of years, they became a large cluster of Islands.

This area has always been a part of a great empire. This continent, she circled the area, was once called North America. She then circled a smaller section of the continent. And this was once called, The American Empire. California was their most important state."

A little boy to her left shouted, HOW big is the Holy Kingdom?

She circled a large area of the map that included what was called North America and half of what was once called Europe. That big. She smiled.

The children gasped.

She was on a roll and couldn’t stop. The Holy Lands itself was also bigger. She circled two more large areas, one up north, and the other to the east. America’s east coast, and half of what was once called Canada also sank. Dee had apparently gained a new thirst to teach.

It felt too good to be true. Normally, Fabian had to coax these children into paying attention to even the simplest lesson. Dee could not figure out why someone as important as Fabian would even volunteer to teach this class every other morning. Now however, it wasn’t so bad, it seemed like they just wanted to know everything. It felt nice, but it also made her feel like she was some sort of exposition tool.

Wouldn’t that be something. Some writer or creator having her about, a simple tool. All life made up of stories and the people who believed in them. A never-ending loop of life within life, within life, creating a multiverse, it’s atoms the letters that made up the story.

Dee often contemplated the strangest things at the strangest moments.

Another boy in the back raised his hand. What, UM, happened to America?

The American Empire and its downfall were her favorite subjects. Homo sapien had used all of their resources and were addicted to fossil fuels. The repercussions of their reckless use of the planet combined with nuclear warfare ended their species, along with their greatest empire.

Dee tried to simplify her answer. Homo sapien were most likely less intelligent than us, and that meant they didn’t know how to take care of themselves.

The little boy who asked the question responded. They didn’t eat their fruits and vegetables?

Dee laughed. Exactly.

A little girl to her right. What’s a Homo sapthingy?

The little shits were so cute, Dee thought they might be growing on her. Well, on this Planet, Earth, there are two forms of intelligent life. Homo atomos, and Fenine. Fenine evolved from a combination of canine and feline, while Homo Atomos evolved from Homo sapien.

The kids just looked at her confused.

Dee cleared her throat. Homo sapiens are basically us, without our abilities. They also looked different. We Homo atomos have less body and longer limbs, we’re thinner yet our bones and muscles are denser, we’re a little taller in general, smaller heads but better brains, and we aren’t as prone to starvation or obesity. She thought. It was best not to confuse the kids too much.

Oooooh. The kids exclaimed in unison.

Two children in succession.

What’s a Fenine?

How did we get abilities? They asked

Dee waved her hands to stop the onslaught of questions that were sure to come. Okay! Okay, those two are the last questions I will answer and then we have to move on. Okay?

The children nodded.

Dee picked up her long thin silver tablet, and silver pencil-like stylus. She searched for a picture of a Fenine. She found one, clicked on it, and it appeared on the big screen behind her.

Some of the kids gasped, while others didn’t even flinch.

On the screen was a giant beast. It’s body and the way it walked resembled one of those extinct apes, gorillas, but it had feline eyes, feline claws, feline ears, a canine’s snout, and canine fur. They were extra deadly because they were as smart as Homo atomos, but people didn’t like to admit it. The only saving grace for Homo atomos was the Fenin’s inability to control energy.

A full adult is anywhere from six to nine feet tall. She cleared her throat and tried to move on, but the class protested.

You promised about abilities! The kids shouted.

She calmed the children and sighed. Fine! She took a deep breath. There is a sort of electric energy that surrounds us all, Homo atomos and some other wild animals can learn to control this energy to do all sorts of things.

Dee changed the picture to one of Queen Xzula. She was fifty but had the face and curvy body of a young woman in her twenties. Fiery red hair, she had dark, dull grey eyes, as grey as grey could be, she wore a golden flamed crown with a half-closed eye in the middle, red form-fitting battle armor, and a red cape. An absolute titan, she was the ruler of the Holy Kingdom and the most politically powerful person on the planet, as well as one of its greatest warriors.

The Queen has the ability to create and control fire. Just like her family and genetic relatives, it’s her family’s natural response to controlling this energy, this natural gravitation towards fire is also called an affinity. Most affinities are passed down through families, but a child doesn’t always have their family’s affinity.

She tried to move on again, but the little fucks were smarter than Dee gave them credit for.

But, HOW? The kids asked.

Dee didn’t want to answer that; it was a question with a hazy answer. Scientists came up with new theories seemingly daily, but the most probable answer was nuclear power. During Homo sapien’s nuclear war, it was theorized that the electromagnetic sphere that surrounded the universe was somehow opened. New alleles in people’s genetic makeup then caused mutations that not only allowed for more efficient brains to develop, but also allowed energy control. Effectively creating early Homo atomos.

Fenine derived from the union of house cats and dogs and gravitated towards a more physical path, dealing with the harsh radiation that engulfed the world. Homo Atomos on the other hand, had their minds expanded towards controlling the energy whilst finding refuge in the less radiated areas of the world.

The misconception is that Homo atomos directly descended from Homo sapien, and while they do derive from Homo sapien, it’s more akin to the Homo Neanderthal Homo sapien relationship.

Even that answer was something Dee couldn’t tell these children. As mandated by the leader of the church, The Builder, all children must first learn creation theory. Dee would therefore have to answer the question in a religious context, but that felt like a compromise she didn’t want to take.

Homo sapien died as a result of ignorance, and now the Holy Kingdom threatened to follow in that fate. Dee didn’t believe in anything, but the one thing she never wanted to do was acquiesce to the demands of the church and their fairy tales.

The little girl to her right Saved her. It was God, DUH!

Before they could ask her opinion, Dee got a red alert on her tablet, it was an emergency call from Fabian.

She tapped her tablet. I just sent you all a study sheet. You will have a quiz tomorrow, study QUIETLY.

The kids nodded.

Dee walked to her desk, brushed her big curly hair out of her face, adjusted her small thin glasses, put one earphone in, and answered the call.

On the tablet screen appeared Fabian’s round face. He looked worried. Dee do not alarm the children. His usual bubbly personality was replaced by a hurried disgruntled one. The Queen and Builder were both found dead in their offices this morning. Just thought you should know. Maybe prepare the kids for the hysteria about to happen. He hung up.

She was glad to hear of Builder James’s death, but she expected to feel some sort of pity for the Queen. She expected to feel for the falling of such a titan of female power, but she didn’t.

Dee couldn’t explain the feeling, perhaps the best word was, opportunistic. Chaos is merely opportunity in disguise, and no matter what you did, the best opportunities were a result of random chance.

She turned off the tablet screen and saw herself in the black mirror. Dee was smiling.

Chapter 1:

Tholl

Out of the Darkness

Darkness, the true state of the universe. It’s not darkness that creeps and crawls and penetrates. Those are actions of the light, and yet, it is the darkness we fear. Perhaps it is the same with people. Perhaps the natural state of man is darkness. The rarity of brightness giving light its immense value. Afraid of a world without light, man grows to covet light as greedily as man covets gold. He thought to himself.

He would know, it seemed he was an expert in coveting life’s simple treasures. He was once a man named Tholl, a great saboteur for the Holy Army. Now, he didn’t know what he was. Just a man drowning, wallowing in darkness, coveting everything, but above all else, sunlight.

The only sources of light he had were artificial. Mainly there was a beam of light at the bottom of the door, but only when the flap opened.

Artificial, something unnatural made by man to simulate something that was natural. Men love artificial things. Artificial light, food, and above all else, artificial justice. Natural justice was natural selection. Artificial justice was based off morality. Something that doesn’t even exist, but that is the power of the human mind. To believe in things that don’t exist, until they do.

There were other sources of light, but he wasn’t sure if they were real, and he tried to not give credence to things that didn’t exist. He didn’t know what they were there for, but they were little balls of white light that appeared and disappeared, seemingly at random.

Sometimes an absurd amount of little white lights would appear frequently, and then so much time would pass before he saw them again that he would begin doubting their existence, but eventually they always returned. There didn’t seem to be any kind of pattern to them, but, if they appeared in large enough numbers, he could hear whispers.

Tholl eventually chalked them up to his growing insanity. One day, after a particularly frightening amount had appeared, and the tickle of their whispers made his ears bleed, he finally broke. He yelled over and over again at the guards, asking them what the lights were for.

The guards grew tired of the yelling. Tholl’s cuffs activated and shocked him into paralysis. The guards entered and kicked him, calling him crazy and laughing. Apparently, there were no lights. Was driving him insane a part of his prison sentence? He didn’t know if they were lying or not, but he was too afraid of the helplessness of paralysis to ask again. It was on that day he finally named them something worthy of the pain they would continuously cause him. Blights.

The little blights were everywhere. He could hear them whispering, but he did his best to keep whatever sanity he had left. There was nothing to do but sit patiently and wait for the guards outside to get bored and start talking to each other. Maybe one of them would have something interesting to say. Take his mind away from the pestering blights.

In the past, Tholl had tried to talk to the guards, but they just ignored him and would go silent, so eavesdropping was his only option. What felt like hours passed before one of the guards broke the artificial silence.

Carl, did you hear the news? That was the guard John, he and Carl were regulars, and they were some of the chattiest people Tholl had ever heard.

Of course, boy, who hasn’t heard! Carl was the older of the two, his tone and old raspy voice annoyed by John’s stupid conversation starter.

It’s just insane! The great Queen Xzula and the Builder both assassinated in the dead of night! John was trying to sound sympathetic, but his voice betrayed him, his intrigue was evident. Do you think it was him?

Carl made an exasperated sound at this question. Who, you idiot boy!? Him could mean anyone!

John Chuckled. The Holy Spear is who I’m talkin about. Think about it, who else has the ability to kill Queen Xzula and Builder James one after the other, and has the stealth to pull it off, and the positioning to do it in the first place!

Now how many days have we stood here while you’ve gossiped about The Holy Spear fucking the Queen, and now all of a sudden the Spear boy is killing the pussy you claimed he loves so much! You need to stick to a single conspiracy, or people will smell your bullshit.

John chuckled again. You’re right! Maybe it was Brandon the great healer, what do the girls call him, The Angel! Perhaps, in a fit of rage and jealousy the pacifist finally turned and killed the Queen!

Jealous of what? What absurd thing would the healer boy be jealous of?

Of the Spear and the Queen! Oh, come on Carl. Don’t give me that look, we’ve all seen how close His Spearyness and The Angel have become. It’s the talk of the town! Partners! Warrior lovers!

First of all, you idiot boy, I refuse to believe that a man who could rip the heart out of another man with his bare fist could be one of those weird homos, no, not the Holy Spear! Second, even if he was, and it was Brandon who did it, why then would the healer boy go on to kill the Builder?

I don’t know old man C, you know what they say. The queer do queer things.

They both laughed. That they do, that they do!

The Queen is dead? The Builder as well? Unbelievable. He never liked Builder James, the old fraud, but Queen Xzula was the reason he was in prison. He despised her. She had used him and spit him out.

No matter how many people a soldier kills for their country, they were still nothing but tools. A lesson his master tried to impart to him before it was too late. Unfortunately, Tholl didn’t learn this quick enough and in a fit of vengeance he tried assassinating her.

Tholl both doubted and believed that Avicio would kill them. Avicio the Holy Spear. The most renown and deadliest warrior on the planet. He had many nicknames, but the most apt one was War Ender. He had single handedly ended three different wars.

A product of Tholl’s own creation, it was Tholl who found him, trained him, and made him into the national treasure he was. The Holy Spear had been Queen Xzula’s greatest weapon, and yet, she rewarded me by damming me to this dark hell.

Avicio had been a sixteen-year-old boy, with only two wars under his belt, when Tholl was imprisoned. Some time back he overheard the guards mention Avicio had ended a war against the south. The boy was so loyal, but was the man? Tholl knew firsthand what time and tragedy could do to loyalty. Had the same happened to Avicio? Had the horrors of this last war finally taken its toll?

He had trained three child prodigies. Avicio the Holy Spear, Brandon the Angel, and Krista Shadow of God. Silly names, but that’s what the people liked to call them. They spent years completing missions for the Holy Kingdom. Team Prodigy, maybe the thing that he will be remembered for most.

As far as he knew, they were all alive. He already cared for them like his own children, but after The Queen had made his mortality so clear, they took on a deeper meaning. His own family was dead, but at least those children would be his legacy.

The guards went quiet. This meant he was alone with his thoughts, alone with the blights, alone with their whispers, alone with the feeling of being watched intently. The whispers were nonsensical.

Do it now.

Take out the garbage.

Today.

In the background of the whispers he could hear all sorts of noises: trains, cars, music! The whispers were too much, the sounds were getting louder. Tholl was on the brink of yelling, but slowly, the blights started whispering the same words in unison. One by one, all the same. They sounded like millions of voices whispering at once.

Do it, do it, do it, now, do it now.

Tholl dared to whisper back. Do what? What is it that you want me to do so badly?

They answered. Leave.

Tholl was startled by a louder voice.

What time were those idiots supposed to be here? It was Carl.

Oh, let’s see. John answered. Thirty minutes ago!

I’ll go find them, kick their asses into gear, I have things to do! Those idiots.

He heard Carl walk across the room and open a large screeching metal door and then close it. After that, more silence. But this time, true silence. Even the blights were quiet. Counting the seconds, it must have been thirty minutes or so before John finally checked the radio.

Carl, where you at buddy? I got to go home and please my wife, you know how she gets. Horny as a little bunny. No response. Car…

He heard the big loud door fly open as John was talking, then a small thud, followed by a bigger one. Unmistakably, the sound of someone being beheaded.

A knock on his metal cell door. Hello, I’m looking for a man named Tholl, could you… No… Non-threatening, soft spoken, melodic, a hint