Story (c) Midnight 2004

The cold, loneliness, of the single grey path kept beating down on my mind. "Where am I going?" the thought passed quickly. Looking down the path it's sides slid to darker shades of grey getting cut off by the almost solid white horizon. "What time is it?" I glanced down at my watch. It read as 4:42 P.M. but it felt like more time has gone past.

After what seemed like hours of walking along the path I began to notice a slight change in the surroundings. The path was growing smaller, the grey edges were getting darker the further I walked. I knelt down an stuck my paw close to the edge of the greyness. My fur seemed so odd on a grey background. Purple and black spots with some blue fur on the underside of paws and arm. I stuck my paw into dark greyness which it felt of a cold liquid. "What is this? Water?" I said aloud, echoing for a long time.

"No, it's liquid ice." A voice echoed down from further ahead. I looked up from the water. "Who said that? Where are you?" I called out. "I'm further down the road, just walk." I stood up and started running down the pathway. after a few minutes of running the path was no bigger then a 1ft wide. There was a small island connected to the path. Upon getting closer there was a figure sitting in the middle of it.

"Hello," I knelt down next to figure and place a paw on it's shoulder. "Who're you?" the figure turned around and looked at me. It was a girl, a human girl. She was slender, her hair was a pale shade of grey. Her eyes, robe, and even her lips were the same shade of grey. "I am Apathy..." she answered quietly in a semi-monotone voice. "Apathy?" I thought, "Isn't that an emotion?"

"Let us leave here..." she stood up and me with her. I started to turn around but she stopped me before I could even bend my torso. "Do not turn around... or the path will disappear." I blinked, staring at her in disbelief. "Why? How?" I asked. "Oh, how a plain minded cheetah you are. That's just the way it is around here." her voice echo. She clung onto my arm and started walking us back with me backwards. " That's how I was stuck on that island." I just made a light sound to let her know I was listening. "When you turn around the land or path behind you disappears, then the path in front goes as well." I just registered it in my head as I kept walking backward. "Then, how can you walk forward?" I asked still trying to understand what she meant. "This is your pathway, not mine. If you turn around we would end up just as you found me."

It's been hours since she told me that. It was getting tiring walking backwards. "We're almost there, I can see more land." I sighed when she said this. "Finally," I said, "It's strange, I don't even remember walking down this pathway in the first place." I looked up to the sky as it started to gently snow. She quickly spun me around as we reached the land she was talking about. The ground was a giant white hexagon with six small black holes. The surroundings were colorful. Every side of the hexagon was a different place. One was bright, full of trees, another was full of lava and small volcanoes. Black skies full of lightning and dead trees, and ocean filled with icebergs, and a field full of a huge variety of flowers. Apathy walked to the center of the hexagon and pulled a staff out from inside her robe. The staff was plain wood that was rounded of at the bottom with a semi-round orb on the top of it. She lifted the staff above her head and slammed the end down into the hole, making a clicking sound. She knelt down on before knees, glanced at me, then just looked at the staff...

To Be Continued...