Rapid Glances

Outside, an old man shuffled on the garden walkway carrying a stool. He would stop at every lamppost and illuminate the heart of it. The warm yellow light lit up the cobblestones with gold sheen.

Inside, Colin stared at the old man through the window, and remarked how similar the lighting was inside the opera house. It was rather dim and yellow and aging, and it reflected off the gold and red tints in the wallpaper.

The building was humming with energy, but not the energy of life. The energy of a living death filled everything, because the end was near and everybody was shaking in ecstasy and hope. At approximately 7PM that evening, a multidimensional and multimedia piece of artwork created by the genius artist John Altmueller would premiere, bringing the purpose of humanity to a close and triggering Armageddon. Colin was one of many thousands of people putting the performance into action. He was in charge of hanging up a painting on the right flat for The Sophist’s Monologue, in the 5th act. The painting now was tucked under Colin’s arm, as he stared out the window at the old man.

The lobby was crowded with people, but the conversation was at a rasping whisper. Colin stood with Isaac, a fellow picture hanger, as they standoffishly sipped punch and adjusted their dress clothes. Isaac’s round face was flushed.
"Look", Isaac pointed to an elderly lady in a black satin dress.
"That woman is wearing the same dress as that women."
It was indeed true. Colin sipped his punch, which burned in agony down his throat. He ran a hand through his short, sharp hair, newly cut for the ceremony.
"I’m surprised you recognized that, in your state."
"Don’t you know? Only the most confident of performers get drunk before a show."
There was a loud tocsin, which rang sweetly throughout the lobby.
"A cue, it must be!" Isaac downed his punch and was eaten by the crowd of people.
Before Colin turned to exit the room, he noticed with fascination, a third woman dressed in an identical fashion.

The green room was the size of a football field, and teemed with action. Stage crews managed exquisite props of demi-gods and exotic flowers, and seamstresses traipsed with gold silk and sequins for costumes. Musicians tuned their violins, strummed their guitars, and technicians tested the clavier à lumières on a practice screen. Colin backed away from a Middle Eastern looking man carrying a large fern plant.
"Pardon me," Colin said.
"Are you painting guy?" the olive skinned man replied.
"Yes," Colin said, clutching close to his heart the pictures which gave him his namesake.
The man cocked his head.
"They’re having a prayer near the wall there."
"Your accent," Colin said, "Where are your originally from?"
"Egypt," the man said. "I arrived last night. There’s somebody from every country in the world. Everyone."
As the man walked away with his ostentatious greenery, Colin fell into himself. The event was actually going to happen. This spiritual project, this summary of man’s enlightenment and journey was going to debut tonight, and then there would be no more.
Colin retained a sense of duty and refrained from his boyhood tendencies of hyperactivity and accented emotion. Any sort of excitement would have to be put aside for duty.
Near the western wall, a small group of uniformly dressed people stood solemnly, clutching paintings, posters and wall diagrams. Isaac stood nearby, curling and uncurling his poster of the Enochian angel language. The Wall Hanging Director, an icy Russian man with a sharp chin, stood in centre with a clipboard. He dictated a list of painting holders and paintings.
"Anton Eindhoven. The Nightmare by Henry Fuseli, 16th Act."
A pale, long-faced boy raised his hand.
"Isaac Woodridge, chart of Enochian alphabet, 3rd Act."
Isaac raised his hand with rosy enthusiasm.
"Colin Riddick, Madonna With the Long Neck, Parmigianino, 5th Act."
Colin’s heart stopped in fear. Instead of a Renaissance painting of a deformed Virgin Mary under his arm, there was a picture of a man with a bowler hat, with a green apple obscuring his facial features.
"A small problem," Colin started lamely. The Russian man stared hardily.
"A grand problem actually, what stupidity have you indulged in? Where is your painting?" Flecks of frost flew from the man’s mouth.
"I left it in the prop room. I’m sure of it. One moment." Colin dashed away, and the picture of the man with the apple clattered on the cement ground. Colin’s long legs dodged the raving activity of the greenroom.

Very far away down a deserted hallway, Colin came across the darkened prop room. Along the way, he had discovered another elderly woman wearing a strangely familiar black satin dress.
"God," Colin whispered. "It must be in fashion or something."
The prop room was dusty and stuffed with stale and purposeless items. Distressed owners, to be used in the name of theatre instead, had deposited gaudy jewellery and shockingly bad clothing. In a blind mad panic, Colin threw himself on the ground and searched in the dark and dust for the correct painting. Dirt and fluff mercilessly caked his black pants and flew into his eyes and nostrils. After a cough of utter defeat, Colin discovered the painting sitting idly on a plastic chair. He grabbed it in a disciplinary manner, and gave a glare to the prop room. Colin came out of the prop room dishevelled, and began bounding down the dark velvet carpet back to the green room.

Then the world decided to cease offering light.

There was a collective gasp, the silence of darkness. All the lights in the entire building had been vanquished. Outside, the streetlights that the old man had lit were gone as well. No, the entire earth was silent in the dark. Colin froze in wonder in the hallway. He breathed in the darkness and the stillness. With an anaemic flicker, the lights returned half-heartedly. Several lights in the hallway were still out, and those who were illuminated flickered sickly. Colin felt a sudden unearthly loneliness, as he stood in the hallway.

In the lobby, people were gone. Had the performance begun already? Was everyone in the concert hall? A door creaked open, lit up by the skeletal light in the lobby. Isaac stumbled out of it. His painting was gone and his face was still red in the dim lighting.
"Colin, what’s going on? The green room’s empty. Has it started already?"
Colin shook his head slowly.
"That would be impossible."

The double-doors to the concert hall swung open. Four austere elderly woman filed into the lobby. They all wore black satin dresses, with pearls like eyes around their necks. Their faces were of solemn, hardened discipline.
"To the sinks we go, boys!" The woman spoke with a ferocious fire. These women possessed no feebleness or elderly kindness. They strode with iron will towards the two boys. Colin recoiled at the thought of the women touching him, grabbing his ears and twisting his arms.
"Why hello, are you ushers?"
Isaac’s words were lost in a choke as one iron lady grabbed him by the ear. Without hesitation, and with the grace of a Roman phalanx, they began strolling harshly towards Colin. There was generally no escape as they closed in, backing Colin into a wall. With desperation Colin lunged towards the exit door, but it had been locked and frozen shut.
In a state of pacifistic resistance, Colin dropped himself into a foetal position, but the leader of the elderly troupe seized him by the ear and placed a cold finger on a sensitive nerve on his arm. Bent at their mercy, Isaac and Colin were led silently through eloquent twilit hallways. The only sound was the pressing bull-like breathing from the women as they strode past doors and hallways. It was a death-like silence, and Isaac and Colin stared in helplessness at one another. The company of elderly women halted in front of the bathroom in a foyer. A large puddle of bathroom water had overflowed from the toilets and was collecting in front of the doorway.
"Go, wash up!" Each woman released their catch and pushed them violently in the direction of the bathroom. Colin slipped comically on the puddle of water.

In the bathroom, Colin whispered fearfully to Isaac.
"What the hell is going on? Is the show going on? What happened to the lights?"
Isaac shook his head, and wiped the sweat collecting in his curly hair.
" I wish I knew. I followed you to help you find your painting. Then the lights went out. When I looked back in the green room, everyone had gone."
"Gone? What do you mean?"
Isaac waved his arms in erratic futility.
"I don’t know. All I know is that we’re going to die, Colin. Die horribly."
"Shut up."
In meek obedience, Colin turned on the tap at the porcelain sink and methodically washed his hands. Isaac looked wildly around the bathroom.
"Who are those…?"
"Just do what they say, they might be listening."
The spine on the bathroom door split in half with a horrible crack. Four of the black velvet women stormed in. Their shoes squeaked on the wet floor. Isaac let out a howl.
"Not washing up properly at all! Serious action must be taken!"
Two women grabbed Colin, and he bent like a rag-doll. One filled up the sink, and another seized Colin’s arms and ducked him into the water. Colin’s universe was awash in confusion as the women submerged him, rubbed soap over his face and hair and into his eyes.
"Perfect!" The woman cried triumphantly.
Colin straightened himself and peered into the bathroom mirror. His face was inflamed with the soap and his shirt was cold and wet.
"Onward, ladies!" The women once again grabbed Colin, and pushed him forward out of the bathroom. Colin’s leg buckled underneath him.
"Agh," he said. He fell further, and smacked his head quite hard on the marble floor of the foyer.

Things went dark for a while.

Colin had a vision where the roof of the opera house was torn off. All the lights in the entire world had been devoured by the quiet and sudden darkness. The stars burned in their places in the sky, and there was a bright moon. High above him, Colin could point out a lumpy object, like the moon. This object was brown, not the ghostly grey of the moon. It wasn’t moving, more like magnifying in size. It got closer and closer to him, and it seemed to be directly focused on crushing just him with its immense size. At a sudden interval in time, the massive object took a veering course northward. Colin watched it as its flame body came closer to the horizon. Colin yelled and covered his eyes. When he opened his eyes again, he was very tall. A large, desolate and lunar city spread like a cancer on the ground around him. He took a step, and he saw that he could step over whole apartments. Everything was dead and ashen. There were no warm lights, just the bone colour of the moon over the dead city. Far, eternally far away despite Colin’s massive size, sat a castle. Its silver spires and towers glinted on the horizon. Colin saw how strange and fantastical the tower was, and set his sights on it. He began setting a foot forward, over one block of buildings and another. He was going to get to that castle, and then he did not know. Tragically, Colin once again got dizzy and collapsed, ruining four skyscrapers as he fell.

Colin’s mind was split in two by a high feminine scream.
He was still on the ground in the foyer, and he could not get up. The lights were completely out, and the moon shone brightly through an arched window. There was another scream, and Colin realized this was the reality he was being attached to. To his right, a figure was standing in the darkness.

"Oh, I’m sorry, I saw you, and I screamed. It was the way you looked, I wasn’t sure if you were dead."
Colin peeled his body off the ground, and stood up. There was no sign of the women or Isaac. There was only some girl. Her hair was very black, and she looked wide-eyed and monochromatic in the darkness.
"Who are you?"
"Elizabeth," the girl said. Her voice was still breathy from fear.
"I worked in the costume department, I help the Chorus of Faeries with their costume change in the 21st act."
"Colin," he said. Blood rushed to his head and the pain blossomed.
"The old women here are insane."
Elizabeth clasped her hands, shook her head.
"No, no, I don’t want them coming back! I barely got away last time!"
"Are they everywhere?" Colin asked.
She nodded and whispered closely.
"I’ve been running forever. They grab people and take them away. I’ve been all around and as it goes on, I see less and less people."
"What do they want?" Colin asked. He looked up briefly. The roof was there.
She spoke even softer.
"They didn’t want the world to end."
Colin’s head reeled, not merely from pain. Who would have the audacity to cease the world from reaching perfection and destruction?
"What now?" Elizabeth asked.
Colin was silent. Each shadow quivered and held a dangerous secret. Fear was taking hold at last.
"Can you walk?" The girl said.
"Yes, just a bit dizzy."
"Good, put on this disguise." Elizabeth tossed a dress at Colin, who barely withheld a yell of surprise.
"I’m not wearing this."
"It’s the only way!"
"Are you insane? The only way is to run away, dresses won’t help!"
Elizabeth walked towards Colin, and began pushing him into the bathroom.
"Don’t push!" Colin whispered ferociously.
"Fine, just get in the bathroom and change!"

Colin had finally accepted his utter dislike of the girl, despite her attractive appearance.
Reluctantly, he entered the bathroom again. He unbuttoned his dress shirt, and pulled over the dark red satin dress. His pants would remain, he decided.
Outside, Elizabeth was standing in a strand of moonlight, looking utterly sinister.
"Oh good, it looks marvellous with your hair, I was hoping so!"
Colin’s patience had been drained at a faster rate than usual due to his throbbing head.
"Let’s go now."
"Oh, no. I have several other dresses for you to try on. Actually, these are all horrid." She let out a small laugh. "I wish I had more."
"I have more." Somebody spoke from out of a dark hallway behind Elizabeth. Coalescing from out of the shadows was an imperial looking elderly woman, dressed impeccably in a navy satin gown. Her hair was curled softly and had a natural looking brown shade. She smiled at Elizabeth, and Colin stared in horror.
"Why in fact, the dresses are just in the next room over there! Why don’t you take a peek?" The woman pointed down a darkened hallway and at a closed door.
Elizabeth bounded without hesitation down the hallway, her black hair flouncing behind her. The woman smiled at Colin, her one eye twitching.
"Perhaps you would also like to try on some dresses, son?"
"No, not really." The woman’s smile did not diminish from Colin’s impertinence.
"Well then," the woman said, "You can either come back down this hallway with me, or head down there, where your darling is."

One of the hallways was black, absolutely terrifying to behold from the lack of light. Very faintly, the hallway that Elizabeth had wandered down glowed slightly with warmness. Colin sat passively on the marble and crossed his legs.
"I don’t plan to move anywhere right now. I’m staying here all night, and I don’t care what you say."
The woman let out a shrug, and backed into the black hallway from whence she emerged.

And then there was silence and darkness. Colin sat in a piece of moonlight on the marble floor. Ahead of him, the black hallway where the woman had departed stood like a gaping mouth. To his right, beside the bathroom, was the other hallway, now glowing faintly with rose light.
"This is probably the worst trick I’ve ever seen," Colin spoke out loud, if the woman was listening in the shadows. "Obviously there are horrible things down the lit up hallway. The darkened hallway must be an escape of some sort."
There was no answer.
"Really though, do I have the courage to even go down that darkened hallway? It looks evil. Of course, they could both be traps. I might be the last one left."
Things got worse. Red, demonic eyes began appearing in the dark left hallway, and when Colin strained his eyes to look closer, they would vanish. Friendly muffled voices began ringing down the right hallway, along with pleasant aromas of a cooked meal.

Colin split himself into two halves. The first half began to journey down the left hallway, full of red eyes and darkness. In a burst of courage, he bounded down the dark hallway. Suddenly the floor vanished from beneath his feet. He was tumbling down a flight of stairs in the darkness. Pain vanished in the name of fear, and then he was dead. There was a field of erect knives waiting at the bottom of the stairs.

The second half headed down the right hallway, lit with hazy romantic lanterns. Colin opened a door, and light and scent rushed to meet him. The entire backstage crew was socializing in a large banquet hall. Immaculately dressed waiters were lying turkey dinners on long tables. Colin smiled widely as Isaac approached him, patted him on the shoulder, and handed him a glass of punch.

Colin stood up from his place on the floor, and tore away the red dress he was wearing. His body shivered under the thin fabric of his undershirt.
"That’s enough of this." He began striding towards the right hallway. Unlike the cold and austere foyer, the hallway was laden with dark velvet carpet and warm floral wallpaper. Colin stopped at the door Elizabeth had entered minutes ago. He bent over and attempted to view under door. There was silence, and no movement on the other side of the room. Colin tested the doorknob. It was unlocked. He twisted it and very slowly opened the door.

Inside was a wide, simple looking room. It had an industrial air to it, with pipes hanging out of walls and the reek of oil in the air. Someone had managed to place thin carpeting on the concrete floor, and a radiator hummed in the corner. There was a strange combination of warm homeliness and relaxation, combined with the stark and restless air of a workshop. To Colin’s right was a flimsy dinner table with chairs, and a microwave plugged into the wall. To Colin’s left, a couch sat. Video game controllers were snaked on the carpet, and a rather large television set glared from an island in the middle of the room. The room was filled with a quiet working buzz, yet nobody appeared to be occupying the room. Colin turned around to exit, and yelled in surprise. The horrid woman was standing directly behind him. She seized the knob of the door and began swinging it shut. Colin grabbed the edge of the door and attempted to force his way back into the hallway. The woman placed her foot with kangaroo accuracy against Colin’s chest and gave a sharp jab. Colin fell backwards in pain on the coarse carpet. The door slammed shut, and a locking noise was heard.

What was he doing? He would rather be in this stable environment than out there with the monstrous woman. Colin stood up. He was in his undershirt and a filthy pair of black dress pants. Colin viewed lustily at the empty couch, for his head was spinning and his limbs were tired with exhaustion. As soon as he was about to lay down on the dusty piece of furniture, Colin spotted bodies moving about in a room off to the side of the wider room. Colin approached the room with caution.
"Elizabeth? Where are you, you weirdo?"

As Colin took in the sights of the new room, he concluded that he had entered some sort of classroom. A hunched, bearded man was surveying the classroom, looking over the shoulders of several students who were casually reading and studying. He recognized nobody in the desks, but the bearded man was frighteningly familiar.
"You!" Colin let out a interjection. The bearded man looked up, in mock surprise. It appeared he had been expecting this reaction.
"Why yes, it is I. How on earth did you draw that conclusion?"
"I knew you were behind this, you…" Colin trailed off. The bearded man smiled lasciviously.
"You are right. I am behind this, this entire fiasco. Who knew that your 5th grade teacher, Mr. Granfalloon, is the source of all evil on earth?"
"I could feel that you were doing it. All the lights going out, everyone disappearing, those insane women. Only your evil mind was capable of that!" Colin shivered suddenly. A chill had taken him. Mr. Granfalloon raised a finger to his hairy lips.
"Shh, be discrete. Most of my students are not aware of my evil duties. I’d like to keep my two lives separate."
"I’m getting out of here, as fast as I can." Colin bolted out the doorway.
"Wait." There was a tinge of desperation in Mr. Granfalloon’s voice.
"What."
"The world is being destroyed." Mr. Granfalloon said.
"What do you mean?" The old man knitted his eyebrows.
"The asteroid, of course. Did you get the vision I sent you?"
Colin nodded.
"We are safe in here, in the Living Room. It is not much, but I think it will suffice for the duration of our lives. We have video games and plenty of educational material, plus a microwave. Food will be a cinch. We’ll bring out carpets and pillows for the nighttime, and you can have a game amongst yourselves to decide who gets the couch. When you’re old enough, you can marry one of your fine young colleagues. No reproducing, I’m afraid. I don’t believe I have enough food stored up for two generations of us."
Colin nodded again. Mr. Granfalloon let out a very crinkly smile. A bell rang suddenly in the classroom, startling Colin. Several students got out of their desk and paraded into the main room.

"Now if you please, rest yourself. You look frightfully tired. Why don’t you go sit down on the couch, and play some video games?"
Colin cringed. His mind was being distorted.
"No, I have things to do. I have things to figure out."
"Stupid boy, get yourself some sleep. Know what’s best for you!"
With a harsh yet gentle push of his hairy arm, Mr. Granfalloon beckoned Colin towards the couch in the main room. Colin drifted wearily towards it. There were two boys on the couch, staring listlessly at the television screen. He plopped down on the third and final cushion of the couch. In truthfulness, Colin was very tired. The two boys looked inquisitively at Colin, then turned back to the game. They were bright and sprightly. They were also twins. Colin grew slightly nervous; he didn’t like twins because he was terrified of calling one of them by the wrong name.

"Pardon me," Colin asked, "What are your names?"
The boy closest to Colin spoke.
"I’m Ryan, he’s Joseph."
Colin leaned further back into the couch. He smiled groggily.
"Great. What’s the easiest way to tell you apart?" Joseph bobbed a bit in his seat.
"I’m sexually active, Ryan’s not." Joseph smiled a big grin and Ryan grimaced sort of shyly.
"Fascinating." Colin attempted to move himself into a comfortable resting position, but everything was sup-par.

The game they were playing was ridiculous. It was a fishing game, but it seemed impossible to win. Joseph would catch fishes, large ones, and then bring them to a large breasted bikini-clad woman. The woman would scream with delight. She would then ask the player for money in exchange for the fish. There was never any money, and the woman would scream at the player, and the cycle would continue.
"A thought," Colin said. "Is there any way out of here?"
Both Ryan and Joseph shook their heads. Colin knitted his eyebrows.

"I’m not sure I’m comfortable with that."
Colin leaned back and waited for time.