THE SHADOW KING

It is a name not uttered carelessly, or unless absolutely necessary. Very few people know of it. Even fewer know the true meaning of it, and a bare dozens, across over a millennia, have actually had the opportunity, to directly interact with him.

Since a thousand years, the Shadow King has been the world’s greatest secret. A man so powerful, yet so mysterious and obscure, that not even countries dare challenge him. Leaders of nations and kingdoms throughout centuries -or at least, those deemed important to be aware of him - have fallen prostrate at the feet of his mere representatives.When his favored warriors - the Knights Templar -were betrayed, ambushed and unjustly massacred, the consequences of his displeasure made an inkling of his powers known to all major political players -within a year, Philip IV of France succumbed to a sudden “stroke”. While the public in general saw this as normal, and some made allusion to the supernatural, the leaders of the states knew that the nightmare was truer fiction.

“He sees all, he hears all, he knows all!” -the dying words of Pope Clement V, who had unwisely conspired with Philip of France to end the Templars, having earlier refused to believe the Shadow King as anything more than a mere rumor.

Years passed, then decades, then centuries. But the Shadow King remained. Those who served him directly, were often baffled by the directions and orders issued - but even more stunned at the results that would be achieved.

Even among his servants, very few saw him. Most answered or spoke with his immediate Right Hand - a male from the Familie de Boutillier. He was the regent to the King in Darkness, and his words were followed without question. Such a reputation grew up around him that even the name of the Family would trigger fear and dread.

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The Renaissance came. New kings, new leaders, new politics. But the King remained on his Throne, his power absolute, feared and unchallenged. For the most part, he was a good king. He let the leaders of the world work as they sought - with the condition being that if their actions should cause the Invisible Monarch any inconvenience, only one warning will be issued.

Then, he began the Industrial Revolution. Just as starving artists throughout the Renaissance era were secretly showered with sudden funds, so was the same for innovators and inventors. Not all his ventures were limited to works of altruism, however. As many were there whom he sought to create, others he destroyed. One of the least known developments was the single time when he was unable to save the work of a scientist - a man by the name of Nikola Tesla - from an American rival.

Then came the World War One. As the world burned, he watched, waited and began preparing. Barely two decades later, the second one began. He stood and watched. And, in a rare event, he acted. On his mountaintop resort one summer morning, der Fuhrer von Deutchland was rudely awakened to find a man, in nondescript clothing, sitting on his favorite armchair. Despite his shouts, no guards came to attend to Hitler. He then noticed a plate of peculiar looking scones, with a dagger pinned to them.

The uninvited guest spoke, overriding the Fuhrer every time he attempted to speak. Words weren’t exchanged as much as “polite requests” were made; in a fashion this discourse was conducted that Hitler had no doubts as to the identity of the stranger - young, 20s, brown skinned - and was consequently left sweating for the duration of the day, despite the cold air blowing in from open window left behind by the guest.

The fact that Hitler later ventured out of his bed chamber to find all of his guards and officers dead, only added to his paranoia.

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With the end of the World Wars, came his absolute disappearance.

But of course, it did not cease his activity. He couldn’t afford that. The world history needed to go as planned, even though I had long realized that changing the timeline is impossible. All the same, I didn’t wish to risk anything.

I kept my eyes on geopolitics. And local ones. I restrained myself from intervening, when crimes went unpunished. After a 1000 years, not very difficult. As the tech age dawned, several investments were made. No one knew who I was, but Silicon Valley was my creation.

In the 90s, I bought a secret private paramilitary company. The purchase was kept secret, and their operations kept running as usual. Slowly, their prominence in news and media vanished, and people forgot about them. Just as I had desired.Starting 1993, Operation Rebirth was born. Highly trained former military specialists and soldiers were brought together. To prepare for a critical mission in the distant future. Their payment and professionalism meant they listened and obeyed.

In the meantime, I turned my attention to a city in India. A young couple move to a small rented house, with their three year old son. His eyes shine with optimism and excitement at the prospect of growing up and being great. Foolish notions, but innocent.

Four years later, another child is born. A sickly sibling, who resembles the older brother only by face. The parents and progeny now begin their journey as a complete family. As they change places of residence over the years, I quietly initiate the purchase of a property, and charge the best people in the city into building a residence for my private usage.

The years pass. I kept my focus on both training for the mission, and a particular young woman. I kept tabs on her as she matured and developed an unhealthy obsession with the occult. I observed through a camera as I see her cast her first spell, then later use magic to kill a cat. Then her first human.

Eventually, the day comes. I, from afar, witness her murder a man in the darkness of the night. His screams echo within my head. His face, was all too familiar: one of the few people I called a friend.

A week before the event, I arrived in India. I was flown to my hometown immediately, and once there taken to my residence. The basement of my residence had been turned into a makeshift mobile operating command center. In accordance to prior instructions, cameras have been installed -along with bright lights -in the area of the prophesied encounter.

Then the fateful day arrived. I am ready. A strike team waited outside the location, their instructions clear. 24 highly trained operatives, each with extensive military experience, trained for the past year for this one mission.

They wait for the team leader’s go.

The team leader waits for the coordinator’s go.

The coordinator sits alongside me, in my study, waiting for my assent.

As the camera shows the events, inside and outside the building, I pull out a broken old watch.

The same one that the man in the video - young, 20s, brown skin - wears, but his is working and ticking. In a matter of minutes, his watch will break, and die. Its hands will be frozen, showing the time of its death for the next millennia. I wait, as the screen’s video feed shows the witch ambush me...

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And then the moment comes: I see the witch cast the spell. I see my past self -looking exactly as I do even today -have a seizure and fall unconscious as her spell seemingly courses through every atom of my body. My writing wrist hits the stone ground hard, and I hear the sound of smashing glass as my watch breaks.

Then, I see her open a portal - a rip through Space and Time - and magically fling me through the vortex. A way for her to dispose a body - to send it back in time by a 1000 years. I see her laugh, as she closes the portal, and an unbidden smile creeps into my lips. She had thought me dead, and now this assumption will cost her everything.

“Now,” I say, in a barely audible whisper. The man next to me picks it up, and repeats it - louder - to the strike team’s leader outside the building. The operatives move out. Four whole teams of a six man squad each. Each of them have been trained for weeks for this very operation: to capture the witch, alive.

Gunfire and blood splatters as the witch fights back. I grimace - this was not unexpected. She had been a formidable foe, and she still was. But the operatives were trained for this. As she used magic to shield herself from the automatic guns blazing, the trap was being laid; the last team, armed with weapons created from a blend of magic and technology, took a more stealthy approach. Then, as the opening provided itself, they dropped a golden net.

I relished in silent glory as I beheld the witch look up. I saw her eyes in shock and horror as the net, weighed down at the edges with balls made of depleted uranium, landed on her. Immediately the spark of magic from her fingers vanished. Her shield gone, she was immediately hit in the chest by dozens of projectiles. She looked down at them, suddenly feeling woozy. Not bullets. Tranquilizer darts. She falls unconscious. The mission was a success, albeit with three casualties. And one temporally displaced immortal man.

As the operatives move in to bring her sedated self to me, I whisper “well done”, to the coordinator, and then leave the conference hall. Not that I needed to. He, and all of the soldiers involved, will now retire richer than many kings. My plans now are simple. I know I will stay immortal, but there is still a possibility one day I may grow sick of immortality. So, I prepared accordingly. The witch is now held at a particular facility that I control. It consists of both healers and killers. A torture facility, if you like, to extract information and force compliance from the defiant. Their objective is simple: to understand the exact nature of the immortality spell, and to convince the witch to create a spell, or some other means, to counter the immortality.

Once they have the acquired - and verified - their needs, she will be stripped of her magical potential, and her memory. A mercy, in my opinion. She doesn’t know who is responsible for her current state of incarceration. And she never will.

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Very, very few people know of the Shadow King. Even fewer have seen his face. And none who know of him, will ever speak to another. As my car makes its way from the airport to the place I called home a 1019 years ago, my assistant - sitting in the front beside the driver - opens up a briefcase and offers me three packages. The first, biggest one, I find shoes of the same make and color as the one my past self had worn hours previously. The second one holds clothes: a faded, stretched T-shirt, and a pair of formal pants. I never liked jeans. Still don’t. The last packet is the smallest. I open it, and let the content fall to my hand. A black smartphone, the cheapest one in the market currently. My old phone, with my old number.

My car stops, as per prior orders, at the mouth of the street down where the destination lay. Once I exited, the driver, as he was told, drove off to the garage of my own residence in the city, where he will await further orders. For the time being, my interests elsewhere were under the supervision of my trusted Regents. I walk down the broken path. It is evening in the winter. The gate to the building - a block of residential apartments -is open. The caretaker and gatekeeper greets me casually, as if I was the same person who had left hours previously. I don’t respond, too distracted by everything. The same old lift with the annoying automated voice carries me up to the floor. I look at myself in the mirrored wall as the elevator ascends. A young man, in his 20s, stares back. My eyes appear exhausted. I look as before. I exit and shut the lift doors.The doors to this particular apartment is brown. An ornately designed handle beckons to me. I twist it and enter.

“Leave your shoes outside, you idiot!”

I jump back faster than any panther had in my history of hunting them. I had forgotten, and my absence from my country for such a long time had not helped. In my defense, it had been a 1019 years. Neither have I been called an idiot in over a millennia, nor ever addressed to in that tone by anyone for that duration.

I take off my shoes, and put them in the rack outside, and then make my way indoors. The man seated in the living room - in his 60s, balding hair, mustache - looks up from the newspaper for a moment. “Arrived?” he offers as welcome, returning to the papers.

The woman is more vocal. “Too much internet has robbed him of his brain. Now he forgets to remove his shoes before entering the house. In the name of the gods, I just had the floor wiped. Great!” She stomps off to get the mop. At the back, I see a young boy, 17, chewing cornflakes.

I stay stationary for a moment. I had dreamed and remembered this place for over a millennia. I had dreamed of this moment. I had thought up ways on how I would express myself, to lay salve to the agonizing moments when I had missed them.

As the lady returns and makes me move to one side -constantly muttering in irritation - and begins gathering the minuscule amount of dirt, I flash back to that one time in Italy, during the annual Carnival. I had been drinking for days, and as a consequence a terrible paranoia took hold. Among other fears, I had been so scared of forgetting forgetting their faces. So ready I was to forget my own face than theirs, that I summoned the best painter in Venice -plenty of them back in the 1400s - and commissioned him to make a painting of the three people. It took him three years, but he did deliver it.It is one of the most secret artworks ever made. Although displayed in the shadowy Hermetian Gallery - one that caters to the most elite of society - it is still privately owned.

The painter from Vinci was paid 3000 florins. A fortune at the time. I would have paid a hundred times that had he been able to make me a photo. Now, I but forget that the painting would probably sell for millions of dollars.

Who cares? I see the real people in front of me.

My family. I had missed them. So much.

“What are you standing there like a specter for?”

My mom’s voice snaps me back. And suddenly I remember the irritation I felt at her voice. A grin pulls at my lips at the memory’s irony.As usual, Ma notices the grin.

“Hao! What’s happened to this idiot? And why are you so late? Your lunch got cold. Eat it or not, I’m not washing those dishes today.”

True enough, a plate stays covered by the kitchen counter. I muster the will to speak.“I need a bath.” I hope it’s the same voice, and I hope they didn’t notice it crack towards the end.

They didn’t. I make my way to my room. My brother doesn’t look up from his bowl of cereals. Sigh, so many amends to make...

“Let the geyser heat for 10 minutes. Don’t use cold water,” Ma said, her voice now low, bereft of irritation.

“Give it a rest, please, he can manage!” my dad retorted, annoyed.

Ma rolled her eyes. “If only it was so easy...” she muttered, before leaving the room.

I close the door to my room, before realizing I had also simultaneously bolted it with the hoop. It had been 1019 years since I was in my room, but my slumbering habit did not take long to awaken.

I turn on the lights and the fan. My laptop sits atop the drum I used as a makeshift table top. My bed was the same mess my past self had left it in the morning -the headphone here, a sleeping mask there, the towel balled up, a few books and a few pens.

Instead of going to the bathroom, I sit down on the bed. The mattress was the same as I faintly remembered - neither too hard, nor soft. The white ceiling stares back at me.

I don’t cry. I lost the ability to shed tears of sorrow some centuries previously.

I close my eyes instead. Enough thinking. A time to be blank for now.