The Journey to Eternity · A serialized book by Nurit Rozenblat
↑ Book index · עברית · ← Chapter Twenty-Six — The First Step Toward Freedom · Chapter Twenty-Eight — What Remains of Eternity →
Chapter Twenty-Seven — The Price of Truth
Three cycles of light had passed since Ila entered the in-between space.
Every time I returned to the observation room, I found her in a different place. Sometimes she stood by the window Sahar had opened for her and gazed at the outside world. Sometimes she spoke with Tama, who remained beyond the door. And at other times she asked that we not speak to her at all.
She was beginning to grow used to the quiet.
In the disconnected space there had been no true quiet. Even when the voices stopped, the feeling remained that someone was too close, that a foreign thought might appear at any moment and merge with her own thoughts.
Here, Ila could be alone.
But it was precisely this new solitude that stirred questions in her.
"How do I know what I truly want," she asked me in one of our conversations, "if for so long all my desires were mixed with the desires of others?"
"Perhaps you do not need to know right away," I replied.
"But I need to choose whether to continue."
"Not today."
She looked at me.
"You always say that I have time."
"Because you do."
"And if time itself changes me?"
I did not know what to answer.
She moved closer to the window.
"I am afraid that by the time I decide who I am, I will already be someone else."
I thought about the things she said even after I left her.
Perhaps her fear was not only of losing her memories.
Perhaps she was afraid of discovering that there was no fixed core within her that could be reached, nothing that would remain exactly as it was, regardless of what she went through.
And that thought was more familiar to me than I wanted to admit.
That day Adara found me in the library.
She held a small recording tablet, far older than the others. The light within it was dim, and fine cracks showed at its edges.
"I need you to come with me," she said.
Something in her voice made me set down at once what I was reading.
"Did something happen to Ila?"
"No. She is stable."
"Then what happened?"
Adara looked at the recording in her hand.
"I found a document I did not know had survived."
"About the passage?"
"About its closing."
I felt the tension return to me.
I thought I had already seen that decision from every side.
The seven consciousnesses who had gathered.
The four voices in favor of closing it, the two voices against, and the one who abstained.
Myself, as I was before my human birth, standing among them and trying to explain why the gate must not be opened without a way to protect those who would pass through it.
"What more is there to know?" I asked.
Adara did not answer at once.
"More than we thought."
She led me to a room I did not know.
It lay beneath the ancient hall of decisions, in a place I had not reached on my earlier visits.
The walls were dark, and on them appeared signs that looked as if they had been carved by an unsteady hand.
At the center of the room stood a flat stone.
Adara placed the tablet on it.
"This document was not part of the official archive of the decisions," she said.
"Then what is it?"
"A personal record of one of the consciousnesses who took part in the debate."
"Whose?"
Adara looked at me.
"Mine."
I was silent.
"Why did you not remember it?"
"Because I did not remember writing it."
She passed her hand over the stone.
The light awakened.
At first, words appeared.
Then voices.
And finally, an image.
I saw the ancient hall again.
It was full of consciousnesses, more than the seven participants I remembered from the earlier record.
Not all of them were permitted to vote.
Some stood in the outer circle, watched the debate, and tried to make their voices heard.
At the center of the hall appeared the figure of Echada.
She looked different from how I had known her in the Valley of Consent. Her form was clearer, her boundaries stable, and her voice sounded like the voice of a single woman.
"The system is falling apart," she said. "If we do not connect the consciousnesses that were harmed to a more stable structure, we will lose them."
Facing her stood a younger Liara.
"Another connection is exactly what caused the harm."
"Not the connection itself," Echada replied. "The way we tried to carry it out."
And then I heard a familiar voice.
My voice.
Not my human voice, but the voice of the consciousness I had been before I was born.
"We must stop the trials until we understand what happened."
Echada turned toward me.
"And if, in the meantime, they go on suffering?"
"They are already suffering."
"So you propose that we leave them there?"
The figure I had been was silent.
Echada came closer.
"I am offering them a possibility of getting out. You are offering them to wait. Which of us is deciding for them?"
The record stopped.
I looked at Adara.
"I did not see this before."
"Because the official record began later, when the proposals had already been brought to a vote."
"And what happened before that?"
Adara lowered her gaze.
"There was another trial."
I felt something contract inside me.
"What trial?"
"An attempt to allow consciousnesses to get out through a temporary connection to a stable consciousness."
"Like what Echada proposed?"
"Yes. But with boundaries defined in advance."
"Who took part in it?"
Adara did not answer.
"Adara?"
She looked at me.
"You."
I did not understand at once.
"I was the stable consciousness?"
"Yes."
I looked at the record again.
"But you said I was against connecting consciousnesses."
"After the trial, you were."
The room became very quiet.
"Show me."
Adara hesitated.
"I am not sure you are ready."
I looked at her.
"Do not decide for me."
She closed her eyes for a moment.
And then she activated the record.
I saw a small room.
At its center stood two consciousnesses.
One of them was me.
The other was weak, without a clear form. A thin light flickered around her, and at times it split into parts that seemed to be trying to move away from one another.
I heard her voice.
"I want to get out."
The figure I had been came closer.
"We will try to create a temporary way for you. You will be able to use my boundaries in order to pass, and then we will separate."
"And if I cannot separate?"
"We will stop."
"Do you promise?"
There was a short silence.
And then I heard myself say:
"Yes."
I felt a shiver.
Not because I was seeing the past.
But because I suddenly remembered the confidence that had been in my voice.
I had been certain that I would be able to stop.
The two consciousnesses drew closer.
Between them a line of light formed.
At first it was very thin.
Then it widened.
I saw the weak consciousness steadying.
Her outlines became clearer.
She sounded surprised.
"I can think."
The figure I had been replied:
"You are thinking now as well."
"But now I can hear only myself."
She laughed.
A small laugh, full of relief.
For a moment I felt joy.
Even now, knowing that something had gone wrong, I could understand why we believed the trial was succeeding.
And then a change appeared.
The light between the consciousnesses grew stronger.
The weak consciousness came a little closer.
"I am afraid you will move away," she said.
"I am here."
"I do not want to go back to that place."
"You do not need to go back now."
"Then stay."
The figure I had been tried to draw her boundary back a little.
But the line between them did not weaken.
It grew stronger.
"We need to stop," Adara's voice was heard from the record.
The figure I had been raised her hand.
"One more moment. She is beginning to stabilize."
"The connection is becoming too deep."
"If we sever it now, she may fall apart."
"And if we do not sever it, you will not be able to separate from her."
The figure I had been looked at the weak consciousness.
"Can you hear me?"
"Yes."
"We need to move a little apart."
She was frightened.
"No."
"Only a little."
"You promised you would not send me back."
"I am not sending you back."
"Then why are you leaving?"
The figure I had been was silent.
I saw her trying to separate the connection.
But the other consciousness clung to it.
Not out of a desire to harm.
Out of fear.
And then another voice was heard.
And another.
And another.
The temporary connection touched the shared structure of the disconnected space.
More consciousnesses began to respond.
Lights appeared around the two of them.
The system tried to stabilize all of them by means of that same connection.
"Sever it now!" Adara shouted.
The figure I had been looked at the consciousness before her.
"I am sorry."
And then she severed it.
The light exploded in every direction.
There was no sound.
Only an enormous flash.
When it faded, I saw the weak consciousness falling back into the disconnected space.
But she no longer looked as she had before.
Part of her light remained connected to me.
Another part scattered among the consciousnesses around her.
And she cried out.
"Give me back what you took from me!"
The record ended.
I could not speak.
I stood before the stone, and the last image kept appearing within me.
"What happened to her?" I asked at last.
Adara lowered her gaze.
"We do not know for certain."
"Is she still there?"
"Possibly."
"What is her name?"
Adara was silent.
"You do not know?"
"Her name was lost in the records."
I looked at her.
"But you remember her."
"I remember the trial. Not everything that preceded it."
I felt anger.
"How can one forget such a thing?"
Adara looked at me in pain.
"Because after the breaking apart we tried to save many consciousnesses. Some of our memories were damaged. Others were transferred into systems meant to preserve them."
"And you chose to carry the shared memories."
"Yes."
"Then why was this, of all things, what you did not remember?"
She looked at the stone.
"Perhaps because I was too close to it. And perhaps because someone did not want us to find it again."
I looked at her.
"Someone?"
"I do not know."
"Echada?"
Adara did not answer.
"Do you think your sister hid the record?"
"I think the record was taken out of the official archive. But I do not know who did it."
I moved closer to the stone.
"Why would anyone want to hide it?"
Adara thought.
"Because it shows that not only the great connection failed. A small attempt, made out of a desire to help, also caused harm."
"But that is exactly why it should have been kept."
"I know."
I felt the anger growing.
"If we had seen it earlier, perhaps we would have understood better what might happen to Ila."
Adara nodded.
"True."
"So someone decided that we would not know."
She was silent.
"And you still do not know who."
"No."
I left the room.
I did not want Adara to follow me.
I needed to be alone.
I passed through the corridors of the library, between halls filled with memories of worlds that no longer exist.
Suddenly all the records looked different to me.
Until now I had seen them as a way of reaching the truth.
But who chooses what will be preserved?
Who decides which event will be considered important?
And who determines where the story begins?
The official record showed the vote.
It showed the fear.
The debate.
The decision to close.
But it did not show the trial in which I had taken part.
It did not show the promise I had given.
And it did not show the moment when I broke it.
They had not necessarily lied to me.
They had simply shown me only part of the truth.
And the missing part changed the meaning of everything I had seen.
I found Eliya in the room with the two windows.
The silver leaf still lay on the table.
She stood by the window that faced the dark sea.
When she saw me, she understood at once that something had happened.
"What did you discover?" she asked.
I told her.
Slowly.
Without skipping a thing.
When I reached the moment when I severed the connection, my voice weakened.
"I promised her I would stop if there was a need," I said. "But when the moment came, I did not know how to do it without harming her."
Eliya listened.
"Do you remember the trial?" she asked.
"I saw it."
"That is not the same thing."
I looked at her.
"What do you mean?"
"Do you remember what you felt at that moment, or are you inferring it from what you saw?"
I thought.
"I remember my confidence. The thought that I would succeed. But not everything that happened."
Eliya nodded.
"Then there are still things you do not know."
"But I know that I promised something I could not keep."
"Yes."
She did not try to comfort me.
And I was grateful to her for that.
I sat down by the table.
"Did you know?" I asked.
Eliya was silent.
"Did you know about the trial?"
She came closer and sat down facing me.
"I knew there had been a connection attempt before the door was closed."
I felt pain.
"And you did not tell me?"
"I did not know that you were the consciousness who took part in it."
"But you knew there had been a trial."
"Yes."
I looked at her.
"Why did you not tell me?"
Eliya breathed a slow breath, though she had no need of air.
"Because I thought you already knew."
"I did not know."
"I understand now."
I felt the anger mingling with disappointment.
"Everyone knows parts of my past, and only I have to gather them."
Eliya lowered her gaze.
"You are right to be angry."
I was silent.
She continued:
"But I want you to remember that we, too, do not hold a complete story. Each of us remembers different parts, and sometimes we do not even know that those parts are missing for someone else."
I looked at her.
"Then how can we know what really happened?"
"Perhaps we will need to listen also to those who were harmed."
Her words stayed with me.
Until now we had searched for the truth in the records.
With Adara.
With Liara.
With Echada.
With those who had been involved in the decisions.
But we had hardly asked those who were on the other side of the trial.
Perhaps because we did not know how to reach them.
And perhaps because we were afraid to hear.
"I want to speak with Echada," I said.
Eliya looked at me.
"Now?"
"Yes."
"You are angry."
"True."
"And do you think you will be able to listen to her?"
I thought for a moment.
"I do not know."
Eliya rose.
"Then I will come with you."
The way to the Valley of Consent was familiar to me.
But this time I did not feel the curiosity that had accompanied me on my first visit.
I felt as if I were going to meet someone who had hidden something important from me.
The valley looked quiet.
The lights moved among the trees.
Near the pool stood several consciousnesses, talking among themselves.
Tamira noticed us and came closer.
"You have returned."
"We are looking for Echada," I said.
She looked at me.
"She will know that you are here."
"I want to speak with her now."
Tamira regarded me for a short while.
"You sound as if you already know what you will ask."
"I do."
"And are you ready to hear an answer you will not like?"
I did not answer.
She nodded.
"Then perhaps you should wait a moment before you ask."
I wanted to argue.
But Eliya placed her hand near mine, without touching.
I looked at the pool.
The water was still.
And then the figure of Echada appeared in it.
"You found the record," she said.
I felt the anger rising.
"You knew it existed?"
"Yes."
"You knew I took part in the trial?"
"Yes."
"And you did not tell me."
Echada looked at me.
"You did not ask."
I felt the words like a blow.
"That is your answer?"
"It is a fact."
"You knew I was trying to understand what happened. You knew I was trying to repair what we did."
"Yes."
"Then why did you not say so?"
Echada was silent.
For the first time I saw hesitation in her.
"Because I wanted you to reach certain conclusions on your own."
I looked at her.
"Which conclusions?"
"That even one who opposes the connection of consciousnesses out of a desire to protect them may harm them."
"So you decided to hide information from me so that I would learn a lesson?"
Echada did not answer at once.
"I thought that if I showed you the record too early, you would see in it only further proof that connection is dangerous."
I felt the anger sharpening.
"In other words, you decided for me what I am capable of understanding."
She was silent.
"Exactly as I decided for the consciousnesses who remained behind the door."
Echada looked at me for a long time.
"Yes," she said at last.
A silence fell.
I had not expected her to admit it.
"Do you understand what you did?" I asked.
"Yes."
"Then why did you do it?"
Echada gazed into the water.
"Because I, too, am afraid."
I looked at her.
"Of what?"
"That if you open the passage and allow the consciousnesses to get out, some of them will lose the connections that hold them."
"And you think the solution is to leave them connected?"
"I think connection can be a way of living. Not only a prison."
"But not all of them chose it."
"I know."
She paused.
"And I also know that some of those who are with me today do not want to leave."
"Then they do not have to."
"You say that now. But what will happen if you discover that their connection prevents others from getting out?"
I looked at her.
It was a question I had not thought of.
"What do you mean?"
Echada came closer to the surface of the water.
"The ancient system was not built of separate consciousnesses lying side by side. It was built of connections. Some of those connections became, over time, structures that hold other consciousnesses."
"So if we separate one, others may be harmed."
"Yes."
I felt the meaning of it.
The freedom of one could be bound up with the safety of another.
Not because anyone had decided that it should be so.
But because the system itself was built in a flawed way.
"Why did you not tell us this before?" I asked.
Echada looked at me.
"Because I was not certain that you were ready to hear it."
"Again you are deciding for us."
She was silent.
And then she said:
"True."
I was surprised.
"You agree with me?"
"I am beginning to understand that my fear makes me do the very thing I accuse you of."
I looked at her.
For a moment I did not see an adversary before me.
I saw an ancient consciousness that had long carried responsibility for a system she did not know how to repair.
"Can you help us?" I asked.
Echada looked at me.
"Perhaps."
"We need to understand which connections hold the system and which connections can be separated without harming others."
She was silent.
"I have access to part of the structure," she said at last. "But not to all of it."
"Why?"
"Because part of the system is no longer under my control."
I felt tension.
"Who controls it?"
Echada looked into the water.
"No one."
I did not understand.
"What do you mean, no one?"
"The system went on changing even after we closed the door. The connections between the consciousnesses created new patterns. Some of them became so stable that they go on operating even without anyone choosing them."
I thought of a human body.
Of the heart that beats without our deciding at every moment to activate it.
Of habits that form over years.
Of whole systems that go on existing even when no one remembers who created them.
"In other words, there are automatic processes in the system."
"Yes."
"And they affect the consciousnesses."
"Greatly."
I looked at her.
"So we are not only trying to open a door. We are trying to change an entire system."
Echada nodded.
"Exactly."
Eliya came closer.
"Is there something else we need to know?" she asked.
Echada looked at her.
"Yes."
I felt the tension return.
"What?"
"The consciousness who took part in the trial with your friend still exists."
For a moment I could not understand.
"Do you know who she is?" I asked.
"Yes."
"Where is she?"
Echada looked at me.
"In the disconnected space."
"What is her name?"
She was silent.
"Echada."
"She no longer uses her old name."
"Then what is she called now?"
Echada looked at me for a long time.
"She is the one who spoke with you when you reached the door the first time."
I felt as if the space around me had stopped.
The voice.
The consciousness who had accused me of promising to return and not returning.
The one who said that the hardest thing was knowing that I could hear her, and yet I had not helped.
The one who asked to know the risks before she chose.
The one who said she would choose a name for herself.
"That was her?" I asked.
"Yes."
I did not know what to say.
Suddenly I understood why her voice had sounded so full of personal pain.
Not only because I had been one of those who made the decision.
I was also the one who had tried to get her out.
The one who had promised.
And the one who had severed the connection.
"Does she remember me?" I asked.
Echada replied:
"Partially."
"Does she know about the trial?"
"She remembers that she was connected to someone. She remembers that the connection was cut off. But some of her memories scattered among other consciousnesses."
I felt pain.
"So when she spoke with me, she did not know everything that had happened."
"True."
"And you knew."
Echada lowered her gaze.
"Yes."
I wanted to be angry at her again.
But the anger was no longer the strongest thing I felt.
There was another feeling in me.
Responsibility.
Not the great, vague responsibility of one who tries to repair an entire world.
Responsibility toward a single consciousness.
Someone to whom I had given a promise.
Someone I had harmed.
Someone who is still beyond the door.
"I want to speak with her," I said.
Echada looked at me.
"She will not necessarily want to hear you."
"I know."
"And she may be angry."
"She has reason to be."
"And perhaps she will not forgive you."
I looked at her.
"I am not asking her forgiveness in order to feel better. I want her to know what we found."
Echada was silent.
And then she said:
"I will help you make contact."
When we returned to the city, I no longer felt as I had felt when I left it.
I thought of all the times I had wanted to know the truth.
I had imagined it as something clear.
Something that could be discovered, understood, and put in its place.
But the truth I found was not orderly.
It did not divide the world into good and evil.
It did not allow me to say that everything I had done was right, nor that everything I had done was wrong.
It showed me that I had acted out of a desire to help, but also out of too great a confidence in my own ability.
That I had tried to protect, but sometimes I had prevented others from choosing.
That I had feared losing control, and in the name of that fear I had taken control that was not mine.
In the passage room, Adara was waiting for me.
She looked at my face.
"Did you speak with Echada?"
"Yes."
"And what did you discover?"
I told her.
About the consciousness from the trial.
About the connections that hold the system.
About the fact that Echada herself does not control everything that was created.
Adara listened.
When I finished, she sat down.
"Then we will have to change the plan."
"Yes."
"We will not be able to open the passage to many consciousnesses before we understand how the connections between them affect one another."
"True."
She looked at me.
"Are you disappointed?"
I thought for a moment.
"I am sad."
"Why?"
"Because every time we come closer to a solution, we discover another layer of harm."
Adara nodded.
"Sometimes that is what working on a system built over a long time looks like."
I moved closer to the first circle.
The light within it was weak.
"I want to speak with her," I said.
Adara activated the connection.
We waited.
A long time passed.
And then a voice was heard.
Deep.
Quiet.
Familiar.
"You have returned."
I felt the words.
"Yes."
"This time, do you know how?"
I thought of the question she had asked me the previous time.
Of the promises.
Of the door.
Of everything I had discovered.
"Not entirely yet," I said.
A silence fell.
"Then why did you return?"
I looked at the light.
"Because I found something about our past."
The voice was silent.
"Ours?"
"Yes."
"What did you find?"
It took me time to answer.
"Before we closed the door, we tried to help you get out. I was the consciousness who connected to you."
A silence fell so long that I thought the connection had been cut off.
And then I heard her.
"I remember light."
I felt the pain.
"Yes."
"I remember that I was less alone."
"Yes."
"And then everything tore apart."
I closed my eyes.
"I know."
The voice trembled.
"That was you?"
"Yes."
I did not try to explain at once.
I did not tell her about the danger.
I did not say that I had acted out of good intention.
I waited.
At last she asked:
"Why did you leave me?"
I felt that there was no answer that could erase what had happened.
"Because the connection began to draw other consciousnesses toward it, and I was afraid that if I did not sever it, we would all lose our boundaries."
"And did you know what would happen to me?"
"No."
"So you chose for me."
"Yes."
A silence fell.
"And after that you closed the door."
"Yes."
"And you left me here."
"Yes."
She was silent.
And then she asked:
"Are you sorry?"
I looked at the light.
"Yes."
"For what?"
I thought for a moment.
"For promising you a safety I did not know how to give. For not telling you how much we did not know. And for not finding a way, after you were harmed, to stay in contact with you."
The voice was silent.
"And are you sorry that you severed it?"
That was a harder question.
I thought of the record.
Of the other consciousnesses that had been drawn to the connection.
Of the danger.
"I do not know if I had another way at that moment," I said. "But I am sorry that we reached a state in which I was forced to choose without understanding the price."
She was silent.
"At least this time you are not saying that it was all for my own good."
"Because I do not know that it is true."
The connection remained open.
We did not speak for a while.
And then she asked:
"Do you know what is hardest for me?"
"What?"
"That I no longer remember who I was before the trial."
I felt the pain.
"I know that I lived. I know that I loved. I know that there were things I wanted to do. But when I try to remember, I find only fragments."
She paused.
"And I do not know which fragments are truly mine."
I thought of Ila.
Of the memories that had separated from her in the in-between space.
Of Tama.
Of everything we had discovered.
"We found a new way to examine memories without forcing them into a consciousness," I said.
The voice sounded tense.
"Can you give me back mine?"
"I do not know. But perhaps we can find some of them."
"And if they are not mine?"
"Then we will not force you to accept them."
She was silent.
"I want to try."
I felt excitement, but I did not hurry to answer.
"We will first examine what the risks are."
"I know."
She paused.
"But this time I want to be part of the decisions."
"You will be."
Before we finished, I asked her:
"Have you chosen a name for yourself?"
A silence fell.
And then she replied:
"Yes."
"Do you want to tell me?"
"I call myself Nura."
I repeated the name quietly.
"Nura."
"Yes."
"Why did you choose it?"
She was silent for a moment.
"Because I remember light."
I felt something open within me.
"It is a beautiful name."
"I know," she replied.
And for the first time I heard in her voice something that was not only pain.
Something that was hers.
When the connection ended, I remained facing the circle.
I thought of Nura.
Of Ila.
Of Tama.
Of Echada.
Of Adara.
Of all those who had tried to help, erred, feared, concealed, loved, and went on searching.
I understood that the truth is not always something that grants us relief.
Sometimes it obliges us to give up the story we told ourselves.
The image of ourselves as people who always acted rightly.
The belief that our intentions are enough to justify the outcomes.
But it also allows us to change.
Not to erase what was.
Not to pretend that we did not harm.
But to see things as they were, as far as we are able, and to choose how to act from now on.
Eliya entered the room.
She stood beside me.
"Did you speak with her?"
"Yes."
"How was it?"
I thought for a moment.
"Hard."
She nodded.
"But important."
"Very."
We stood in silence.
And then I said:
"I think I have begun to understand why I was so afraid of the truth."
"Why?"
"Because I thought that if I discovered I had been wrong, I would no longer be able to see myself as a good person."
Eliya looked at me.
"And what do you think now?"
I thought of Nura.
Of the name she had chosen.
Of the light she remembered.
"That being good does not mean I never caused harm."
She waited.
"It means that I am willing to see the harm, take responsibility for it, and do what I can so that it will not happen again."
Eliya smiled gently.
"That is a beginning."
I went out to the garden.
The sky above the city was full of small lights.
I thought of the question I had asked Eren in the Archive of First Possibilities.
If there is a creator, must he be good?
Now the question looked different to me.
Not because I had found an answer about creation.
But because I had begun to understand how easy it is to create something out of good intention, and how hard it is to bear responsibility for what it becomes.
We created a system to help consciousnesses that were suffering.
Then we feared it.
We closed it.
We left inside it those we did not know how to free.
And for a long time we went on living as if the decision itself were the end of our responsibility.
But no decision ends the responsibility for its consequences.
I thought of my human life.
Of the children I had raised.
Of the things I had said to them out of love.
Of decisions I had made out of a desire to protect.
How many of them had been right?
How many of them had also been influenced by my fears?
And had I always known how to distinguish between the two?
No.
Perhaps no parent always knows.
But I could learn.
Even now.
Even after I had left the human world.
The wind moved the branches of the trees.
I stood there for a long time.
I did not feel that I had resolved the past.
I did not feel that I had won forgiveness.
Nura had not forgiven me, and I had not asked her to do so.
But she had agreed to speak with me.
She had chosen a name for herself.
And she had asked to take part in the decisions that would determine her future.
I thought that was a great thing.
Not because it erases what I did.
But because it allows us to begin something else.
I looked at the lights of the city.
I knew the road ahead was still long.
We would need to understand the connections that hold the system.
We would need to find a way to return memories without forcing them.
We would need to face the possibility that not every consciousness will be able to get out, and that not everyone who gets out will want to stay outside.
But this time I did not want to reach the end of the road only so we could say we had succeeded.
I wanted to know that along the way we had not again taken from others the very thing we were trying to give back to them.
The possibility of choosing.
Before I returned to the library, I looked once more at the sky.
I thought of all the years in which I had believed that the truth was in a distant place.
Beyond the universe.
Beyond time.
Beyond life and death.
And now I discovered that one of the hardest truths had been waiting for me precisely in my own past.
In the place where I had been certain I had acted rightly.
I did not know if I would ever manage to understand everything that had happened.
But I knew that I no longer wanted to hide behind what I did not remember.
Because sometimes the greatest price of truth is not the pain of discovering it, but the need to give up who we thought we were — so that we can choose who we will be from now on.
End of Chapter Twenty-Seven
↑ Book index · עברית · ← Chapter Twenty-Six — The First Step Toward Freedom · Chapter Twenty-Eight — What Remains of Eternity →
