My Unreal Condition

When I was four they asked me to find the answers to the questions they had been intrigued by. Small as I was, they were pretty confident that if there was a person on Avary who could do it, it was me. I don't exactly remember how or why I bought what they sold me but I am pretty sure that was not something that I was led into for my own good.. Little did I understand then that I was but playing my part as a pawn in their larger scheme of affairs, that their real motive behind bringing me upfront was of destruction and malice, and of saving themselves from the possible blowback of their vile plot. I complied with their plan, nevertheless, I was not completely oblivious of the fact that I was not one of them and that something didn’t fit somewhere into the picture. Peace of mind is not something elusive to an infant but I was an exception to the rule. I sought peace with the acuity of a starved man seeking a morsel of sustenance. As time flew by, the dark clouds of obscurity started to dissolve and rays of knowledge started permeating my mind making some sense at all. Little by little, the truth manifested itself, like a troubadour singing and before the windows of my senses and I started getting the answers to my own questions. And then one day, I ran into the sightless pauper who acquainted me with what I really was and what had been rendered completely latent to my vision. I didn’t believe his words at once but I couldn’t help believe that I was not what I believed I was. It took me twelve years to know and to believe and to convince myself that I didn’t belong there and there was some place elsewhere that required my presence.

This is a work of fiction. It could well have been the prologue of a novel describing the extents to which a child has to go to, to find out his identity. “Avary” is the name of an imaginary island which forms the backdrop of the protagonist’s story.