Cloning

It was all to do with the clone. I was obsessed. I was no longer myself. It was almost as if this clone of me was slowly, sneakily, greadily sucking my soul out of me. I was a crumbling ruin falling to knee at this great new wonder. It brought me to tears, almost.

And that was just its picture.

I had a huge poster of my creation hung up on my wall. It still smelt print fresh. It really shouldn't have been that impressive. It was just some baby.

But that was it. It wasn't. It was me. My creation and work and effort brought to the fort and i still couldn't comprehend it.

I had given science my life, but i knew i could never ever return to that wonderful place of discovery again. Now this had happened, what else might i discover?

I quickly put on some boots. Hurrying out the door, i thrilled at the cold bleak world presented to me on a platter of redemtion. It was time to cover my tracks back. Looking into a window, i saw a christmas tree. As i saw it covered in all the colours of the rainbow, my mind turned automatically towards refraction, the spectrum. Angry, i banished this curse from me. No more knowing. No more explaining.

"Pretty colours, eh?" I looked to see a man dressed in a black gown beside me. He could have been any age behind his friendly beard but his voice reminded me of my father's. My father. I felt a bit sick still when i thought of him. I had given him up for science and he in turn had given his life up, retracting deep into the hills and glades, outside of town, to devote himself to religion. He had ignored the outside world to the utmost, ignoring his wife's death, his son's achievements. Maybe hed didn't even know what i had just achieved now.
"Yes they are...they are," i couldn't find the right words. Who was this man? Was his presense that had caused me to think of my father, turn over these painful memories in my mind.

He took my hand, but i didn't mind. Carefully, he stepped me away from the warm scene. "Don't want to stare in at people too much, eh?" I gripped his hand harder.
He took me down the street. Christmas, i thought. What would i usually be doing? I certainly wouldn't be celebrating. What had i become?

Our boots crunched one the thin layer of fine snow. I looked down. His boots were ripped and torn. They looked to have seen many years of use. There might have even been a hole. I just couldn't be sure about anything anymore.

As we rounded the corner, i noticed what i had not before. The small, meek church tucked inbetween rows of ordinary houses. I must have passed this hundreds of times. I supposed i must have always been busy. Maybe i just ignored it because it reminded my of my past.

We entered through the mighty proud door. Him, just one time of many. Me, the first time in my life. It may not have been much of a church, nothing compared to some famous ones. But it was all that i needed. I sank down in front of the statue of that one great figure. I understood the songs, the hymns, the devotion. I put myself down for him, i didn't care what happened now. All that mattered was that i had left behind what i had thought was right for me. I had finally seen the true way.

The man came beside me, putting his hand on my shoulder. He must have felt my shaking because he said "Calm now, shush." I started to cry without meaning to. I supposed most people cried without meaning to. It was one of the most innocent and pure acts in the world. My tears washed the dirt from Jesus's feet.
"I know what you must do." I looked up at the man, who i knew now was a priest. He wasn't looking at me; he staring directly into the face of the saviour. "To redeem yourself, you must seek forgiveness. I know what you have done. I know your sins, they are great and many. Perhaps the greatest of them all has driven you - almost to madness. I suppose i was lucky to have found you. Who knows what you were capable of in that state?"
"Wh- what do you mean?" i snivelled.
"Well, you were in a state induced by the Father himself. You had performed one too many acts of stupidity and treason, in his eyes. The only solution was to completely redeem you. One fresh start to make you whole again. Like restarting a computer." He smiled down at me. "He did it because he loves you. I'm not saying what you did wasn't wrong in the strongest sense, but it is forgivable. Go now."
"Go where?"
"I think you know the answer to that question already, Jakob Straussmann."
"To my father?"
"If that is what you say, so be it. If that is what you believe in, then so be it. If that what you were thinking of, outside, by the window, the so be it. Go on now, hurry - to your father. To the Father! You realise that in your life he is your Father figure. Everyone has one. You must reach him before he dies."

I started towards the door. "Wait!" He handed me a coat to wear, gave me a stick, a cross. He wetted his hands and rubbed some water on my forehead. Holy Water. "May the Lord be with you."
I turned and opened the door. Looknig round, he was gone. I waved to the emptiness. I ran out. I sped onwards, clutching the cross to my heart. The town, its dirtying streets and houses like keeps, was my prison. Its businessmen, bankers, brokers the prison gaurds. Science the torture this whole place had assigned to me. I had been made blind to the fact that i had been slowly worn away, my soul, my spirit. I clutched the last fragments of myself close as i headed for the hills.

The hills and glades, where the Father,waited for me.