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Sebastian regains consciousness. He’s in the dark behind the couch terrified. No memory of what happened. He gets to his knees, stays behind the couch and crawls to peek around its side.

There’s a man sleeping on the floor drenched in ketchup. Sebastian’s worried the man’s mom will get furious at the mess he’s made, but he isn’t allowed to speak to strangers. This man is on his own.

The room lights yellow and Sebastian steps out from behind the couch thinking his mother or father flicked the light switch. No one was there when he checked and the switch was still down. Even the light it’s allegedly there to turn on is off.

Sebastian’s skin. “I’m glowing like a lamp!” he says unaware of the oddity occurring. The room fuzzes out and Sebastian topples over. His head slams into the floor and he immediately begins to seize. His body shakes and rattles. His eyes are focused on the brightly lit wall before him.

He feels trapped inside his head, unable to move or speak. Unable to anything.

And then it stops.
And the wall comes into focus.

“What just happened?” he asks, checking his arms and hands. He’s not glowing anymore. And he sort of remembers a man forcing him to eat a fruit before passing out. And the man on the floor.

Sebastian turns to the man, startled he backs into a wall and just stares.

There’s a hole in the man’s chest. He’s covered in blood. He’s dead.

“Wh- wh- what’s going on….?” he asks. He’s in shock. Frozen. Confused.

A flashback of a moment that’s never occurred breaks into his memory banks and plays.

It’s a garden. A nude man and woman are approached by a snake. They’re fearless. Unconcerned by this fascinating creature.

“You must listen to me,” it tells them. “The fruit, you must eat from it,” it says.

“But the Celestials have told us it is forbidden,” the man tells the snake.

“This is why you must. Because they lie!” the snake responds.

Another event plays.

Both the man and woman are in the garden serving winged people with bright glowing beautiful energy. They’re all peaceful and welcoming. The man and woman feed them and massage these perfect beings.

It flashes further ahead.

The same woman is taking a fruit from one of two trees. She takes a bite. Then the man. Shortly after, they both blackout.

Then they’re waking up surrounded by creatures with evil energy. They appear to be the same winged people from before but somehow different. The man and woman are horrified. Scared.

Sebastian snaps out of the flashback. He’s still staring at the body, but his fears are gone. “Did a Celestial do this?” The clarity of his thoughts startle him. His capacity expanded as though the time it took him to run the flashback was enough to mentally age five years and it’ll continue until he awakens.

Sebastian hears his name called from nowhere. “Sebastian,” it repeats.

“Who’s there?” Sebastian asks.

“If I could say, I would. But I can’t,” the voice says.

“Why? Why can’t you tell me?” Sebastian asks, back still to the wall.

“If I say my name or attempt to spell it, you’d hear nothing,” it responds. “But it does not matter. They call me many things. My name is trivial. Just refer to me as Ref for now.”

“Where are you?” Sebastian asks.

“In a different dimension,” Ref replies. “I want to help you,” he says.

“How? Why? Help me how?” Sebastian, like a seven year old mature adult questions the motives of generosity.

“I want to help you defend yourself against the celestials. The man before you has given you the gift of information,” Ref says referring to Finn, dead on the floor. “He fed you a piece of the apple from the tree of knowledge. This means you’ll always be able to tell the difference between good and evil. And until you’ve learn what I offer, it’ll also afford me the ability to speak to you through dimensions. To help you and guide you.”

“So what do I do?” Sebastian asks.

“Do you understand what’s happened to your family, yet?” Ref asks.

“Sort of. Based on what’s going on here I can assume they’re not alive. And the source also caused this man’s death,” Sebastian says.

“Good. He’s given you enough fruit to make the process quick,” Ref says. “Leave the house. We must act fast.”

Sebastian makes his way out of the house, carefully stepping over the dead body. “Enough for what process?” he asks.

“The process of enlightenment,” Ref explains. “You’ve eaten the fruit of knowledge. You are an apostle, Sebastian. Your destiny is to defend the innocent from the corrupt.”

“Why me?”

“We don’t question the designer,” Ref answer.

“Who’s the designer?”

“I don’t know,” Ref says. “Fall to your knees, and prepare yourself to pray.”

As if the order was given by his mother the way she did every night, Sebastian dropped to his knees and laced his fingers together.

“And repeat after me.”

“Okay,” Sebastian relaxes and closes his eyes.

“Holy Energy.”

“Holy Energy.”

“Knowledge and Life.”

“Knowledge and Life.”

“Subtract me to fire.”

“Subtract me to fire.”

One moment Sebastian in front of the house, the next, no one is there. He’s gone. Vanished to thin air with no trace as to his whereabouts.