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...Since childhood I had strange and terrifying dreams. These dreams were of earthquakes and titanic upheavals that would effect the entire world. It was more than a dream, it was a knowing, and it produced a fantastic feeling of euphoria as I remembered these things, so much raced through my mind. It was like a snake shedding its skin, this remembering. The meaning of my name, my childhood dreams, the strange ancestral connection with the famous Saint Francois de Sales who lived in the sixteenth century. These thoughts held no unity on one level of understanding but on higher levels they became clear. It was as if you had a puzzle before you, with hundreds of disconnected but somehow interconnected pieces, and in a flash those pieces came together. In an intuitive instant you saw the puzzle as a whole, then, afterwards, each piece, a dream, a name, a strange occurrence took on meaning.
I was high on these realizations--they came over me wave after wave. I could hardly walk because of this feeling of exhilaration, and these emotions grew stronger with each passing minute. Inner possibilities were awakened in my mind. I was now walking on one of Mexico City's broad thoroughfares with huge shade trees. I remembered Philip had said the Mixtecs believed they were descended from trees. There was so much to know, to find out--my brain raced.
I knew it was connected with the 360 degrees in a circle. A circle was much more than just a drawing, it was a whole mode of power--of thought power. With each minute of experience this new insight increased in power. I was hooked in some mysterious way, and that six hours was its duration. Somehow it had begun in the church. I did not understand any of it, though I felt enormous changes within me. All I knew, was that it was happening incredibly fast, that my whole being as I walked was undergoing a mutation. Josh and Philip had spoken about the appearances of mutants, that it was something that was taking place all over the world, people were being born that were totally different in feeling and perception. They were far stronger mentally than their parents...but what was I meant to do?
I asked for a sign, a sign from where these forces came. I felt a magnet inside draw me on, but I needed a voice to confirm the connection. Before I got an answer, I had to choose between light and darkness, whether I would use this energy for my own purpose or for others, the most simple choice but one that would cause a thousand different things to happen. Suddenly I saw the image of Saint Francois. He seemed to be directing me from some vast distance, yet he was at the same time very near. There was only one choice, that of light. It seemed no matter what we did, all of us were drawn together for its purpose in Mexico City.
--Aymon de Roussy de Sales
From "The Fifth Sun"
Borderlands, Third Quarter Issue, 1994
