Behind the Shroud

Behind the Shroud

Chapter 2: Wanderings and Whisperings

"...All is enclosed in a gray veil, covering my eyes. It's as if I were some aged man whose sight was failing him. Am I aged? For certain, I feel young and fresh, rather than old and decrepit. Perhaps it is just mine eyes that are failing me... If I could look into mine eyes, what would I behold? Methinks I fancy blue eyes... for no particular reason. But what reason do I have to expect eyes of mine to be of such a color? Would logic not state that they would be gray, like to everything else in this dank and hazy place?..."

Sirius whispered. His whispers took on the form and topic of any thought that might chance across his mind. The whispers were seemingly endless. They were pointless, of this, at least, he was aware. The only thing that mattered was that they never stopped. As random as his stream of conscious was, it served the purpose of masking the silence with the noise of his own thoughts.

However, Sirius's stream of conscious was neither as random nor as meaningless as it seemed. No matter in what direction his mind shifted and wandered, it always found its way back to the atmosphere. He would repetitively describe his surroundings to himself. Whenever a comment pertaining to the "hazy shroud" or the "misty gray veil" passed his lips, Sirius would wake a bit from his reverie. The dullness his awareness had taken on would be momentarily shaken off to ponder these words.

"It's only natural for me to feel the need to analyze my surroundings. Why, that very same instinct was what caused me to shake off the otherwise overwhelming compulsion to sleep and rouse myself for this expedition of exploration. The only problem seems to be that there's not much to explore or analyze. Everyplace looks alike to everyplace else. Therefore, my subconscious urgings are continually backed into the same corner. It is nothing more than this..."

And so Sirius shrugged his momentary awakedness off. He could find no answers in the instant or two of mental clarity such thoughts evoked. His frustration could almost be detected before his psychological acuity was, once again, dulled into subjugation by the fog.

On he wandered, on and on. Just whispering and wandering. He knew not how much time had passed. Oft times it seemed to him that he had been traveling for an eternity. During such times he had to fight off the returning desire to lie himself down among the lumps and become as one of them. Completely immobile. Other times it seemed as if he could turn around and still be able to make out the patch of earth he had landed upon, just moments before. Time was beginning to loose its meaning and, indeed, its very purpose.

"The sheer monotony of this place could be maddening. Surely there must be something else out there to hear, to see... The fog shimmers so, yet without any light to make it sparkle. Its shifting hues are almost like unimaginably thin shreds of fabric.

"Look there," he commented. His comment was of the kind that should have been filled with excitement, if such feelings were permitted. "The shape that shred of mist takes on looks as if it was truly a figure moving in the distance. If only it was..." The longing Sirius felt deep inside penetrated into his voice slightly.

Horrified at what he had just allowed himself to do, Sirius snapped his mouth shut and hurried forward. "I may as well proceed in the direction of my imaginary figure... maybe I really am going mad..." He harshly insisted to himself that the "figure" was naught but a manifestation of his lonely subconscious. Yet, he could not quell all potential hope from his soul.

"...But what am I doing here if not searching for some place or person? And if I am following my own ghosts, it'll do me no more harm than my previous mindless wanderings..."

He muttered and wandered again. But quicker this time, with more of a purpose. Edging around mounds in the uneven ground, eyes rapidly darting back and fourth, Sirius journeyed on.

* * * * * * *

It was not long before Sirius glanced another figure, shambling off into the distance. With a slight shift in direction, he hurried onward. His goal was set now. He would catch one of the moving images, if there truly were anything to catch, and see what there was to behold.

"Fore what other purpose do I have? What else is there? Just nothingness... What mysteries does this fog conceal," he murmured idly. "If there is something to be found out there, surely I will happen across it. However, in the mean time, I will follow my inexplicable specters through the haze... to what end I cannot be sure... But it will be something, rather than the nothing of what would be the sky..."

A pause in his incessant babble brought an unfamiliar spectacle to his ears, sound. A faint humming sound.

"Finally, something more to fill the silence..."

But as he spoke the slight noise faded away, as if it but were on of the innumerable shreds of gray.

"I swear there was something... I have been whiteness to enough silence to know when that silence is broken. Surly, this must be a sign that I am headed in the proper direction."

Sirius spoke in his accustomed monotone, but he could feel the ever so faint sensation of excitement bubbling up inside of him. The realization that he could still feel such emotions came as a bit of a shock, albeit a pleasant one. Nevertheless, his momentary pause in his continual dialogue left his ears and mind burning for substance. For fear that some of the emotion he had so recently felt would penetrate into his voice, Sirius forced such thoughts out of his head.

"Assuredly, that 'figment of my imagination' was as substantial as a stone," Sirius stated as yet another figure flitted into his line of vision. Before it disappeared once more, Sirius caught the sound of the humming again, only this time more distinctly.

"It has almost a hiss to it, that sound. Quite a coincidence," Sirius noted without emotion, "how the noise appeared along with the figure and disappeared just as quickly. There is a fine line between coincidence and convenience. Has that line just been crossed? One would be a fool, indeed, not to associate the two spectacles with one another. Are the figures responsible for the hissing? I shall, assuredly, discover the answers for all my inquiries in due time."

Time was one of the many things Sirius apparently had an abundance of, along with things to say, drive to forge onward, and thoughts that he couldn't quite grasp. He whispered and rambled. He walked. He shuffled. He trudged. All in accordance to whatever thought he might be entertaining in his current mumblings. He noticed, in passing, that his voice was becoming dry and raspy.

"...not that it matters, I need to keep on talking, least I go mad. It would not do for me to go raving about the place; a crazed lunatic. Still, I wonder how long it has been since I have had a proper drink."

The appearance of the ghostly figures was becoming more common now, as were the hissing and humming. Sirius thought, upon several occasions, that if he had just stretched out his hand he could have grasped whatever it was. But, of course, his arms remained motionless at his sides. They had not been put into action since their initial task of hoisting their owner into a sitting position. Clearly, if any discovery was going to be made, he would have to stumble onto it. And that's just what he did.

* * * * * * *

Out of the corner of his eye, Sirius saw the closest image yet. With an uncharacteristically speedy motion, he twisted himself around in order to pursue this new target. However, his continually monotonous movement for such an extended period of time had taken its toll. Sirius stumbled over one of the immobile shapes on the ground that he had taken such care to avoid. As he began to fall, Sirius wondered at how surprisingly soft the lump had been, in comparison to the remarkably firm ground. But these thoughts were instantly erased from his mind when Sirius's fall was cut short.

Apparently the last figure he had seen was much closer than it had initially appeared to be. Sirius crashed into the upright body of a man. The man stumbled backward slightly, regained his balance, and then paused to shake off the blow. As Sirius resituated himself on his own two feet he assessed his "savior".

The man was middle aged, with sand blond hair and hazel eyes. He was hunched slightly forward with his arms hanging limply by his sides. He was dressed in gray, tattered robes that seemed to blend in with his surroundings, aiding to his "spectral" quality, when seen from afar. It was his face, however, that truly caught Sirius's attention. The man's eyes were glazed over and his expression was blank, uncomprehending. He stared straight forward without really seeing and seemed to be speaking to himself, calming himself down after the shocking encounter. Once he was sufficiently settled, the hazel-eyed man resumed his forward shuffling without giving Sirius so much as a sideways glance.

Sirius was horrified.

"What sort of a creature was that man?" It was all he could do to keep the shock out of his voice. "What type of conditions could ever reduce a person to that level?"

Sirius shook himself. He felt dirty for having touched something so vile.

In efforts to rid his mind of such contemptuous thoughts, Sirius began to speak to himself in even tones. "At least I now know the source of the hissings. That... thing was whispering to itself..."

Sirius had met one of the Whispering Wanderers.