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downwiththeficness · 3 years

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In the Bond-Chapter 13

Summary: Lilah often wished she’d never said yes to working with the Gecko brothers—usually while dodging gunfire. At no time was she regretting that decision more than when she’s hanging upside down from the ceiling, staring down a group of hungry culebras and one (1) extremely powerful sun god.

Word Count: ~2,600

Warnings: None

A/N: This is an AU of my Story In the Blood, which can be read here. Basically, this fic explores what would have happened if Lilah had met up with Geckos before she met Brasa.

Taglist: @symbiont13

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Lilah swung the shopping bag in one hand, the other shoving the keys into her pocket. She’d ended out keeping the SUV Brasa had lent her the week previous, claiming that she liked the ‘rental’ so much that she’d made an offer to buy it outright. It was a believable lie, Lilah had a habit of picking up and dropping off cars on a whim. Easier to keep under the radar when no one knew what make and model she drove.

The air conditioning in the bar hit her hard, goosebumps rising along her arms. It was nearly empty, as it usually was mid-afternoon. Too late for the morning crowd to stay, too early for the night crowd to meander in. The room smelled vaguely of liquor and the sun streaming in through the windows cast unfamiliar shadows over the floor.

She noticed that Kate was sitting at the bar, nursing a soda. For once, Richie was nowhere to be seen. Lilah sidled on up to her, dropped the bag on the floor as she took a seat, and signaled to bartender.

“Bourbon and coke.”

Kate smiled at her, “Isn’t it a little early to be drinking?”

This was said with a smile that could potentially be described as sly. Lilah, like Seth, didn’t exactly adhere to a strict schedule when it came to alcohol. Too many nights that turned into days that turned into diving into a bottle to forget.

“It’ll be five o’ clock in...three hours,” Lilah quipped as she took the glass from the bartender, “Close enough.”

Lilah sat with her drink for a while, enjoying the fact that there was little to no activity going on in the bar. Aside from Kate and the bartender, the room was pretty much empty. She realized that she had spent almost all of her awake hours the last few days either catching up on what had happened while she was gone or in some kind of meeting.

Seth had taken a more active role in managing the staff, and he consulted with Lilah daily about one thing or another—usually some sort of internal conflict. She’d taken to writing down some basic policies and procedures for him to reference so that he wasn’t knocking on her door in the middle of the night with questions. Despite having just come back from a three month vacation, Lilah still needed to sleep.

A question floated across that train of thought, “What’s Richie been up to?”

Kate gave a little shrug, “The usual, trying to maintain some sort of order with our nocturnal friends.”

“Oh?”

Nodding, Kate added, “Its not just Brasa’s people that are struggling to adjust. We’ve had some kickback here, too.”

To give herself a moment to think, Lilah took a slow pull from her glass, “And how is that going?”

“Well,” her voice had a soft tone of uncertainty, “They aren’t super happy that we’ve done some population control. Kind of kills the mood when we’re trying to get them to buy in to the new way of doing things.”

“I can imagine.”

Given what Lilah had seen in the cave not a few days before, she had a good idea of what Seth and Richie were facing on the other side of the fence. They offered work and beds to those who could staff the bar, but didn’t have the organization or power that Brasa seemed to have. It was lucky that Richie had such a mind that he could predict attacks with an uncanny accuracy. Otherwise, or both brothers would be dead by now.

Rolling her neck, Kate offered, “But, there are a surprising number that want to assimilate—they miss their old lives, you know?”

Lilah did know. There was still a part of her, slowly dwindling, that wanted to go back to the night she met Seth and tell him to fuck off. Everything would have been a whole lot simpler now, if she had. On the other hand, she wouldn’t have met Brasa. He’d become so critically ingrained in her everyday life that the thought of him not being there felt too strange to contemplate.

“Are you gonna talk about it now?” Kate asked without provocation. She had pushed her soda away and was fixing Lilah with a narrowed look.

Lilah blinked, “What?”

With a sigh borne out of frustration, Kate turned on her stool and faced Lilah head on, “The bond. Are you going to talk about it?”

Stunned, Lilah felt her jaw unhinge as she stared at Kate in shock. She went over her recent memories to double check that she hadn’t given it away. Lilah had kept it hidden, she was sure of it.

Kate laughed, a high, clear sound that made Lilah flinch, “Richie told me about it months ago. You can’t hide that kind of thing from other culebras. Its supposed to be obvious, for safety’s sake. Keeps them from crossing boundaries accidentally.”

Lilah continued to stare, her chest tightening as she slowly began to panic. She’d ask Brasa about how it was ‘obvious’ later, when her mind had stopped spinning. For now, she had no lie to put things to right again.

Kate noted her stricken expression and laid a gentle hand on her arm, “Its okay. I won’t tell. I just thought you might need someone to talk to. I know I did.”

Dear holy fuck, but Lilah really needed someone to talk to. All of these months and months of keeping her mouth shut had built up in a way that took an immense effort to subsume.

After another moment’s pause, Lilah blurted, “I don’t know how to handle it. Its everywhere, all the time. And… the worst part is that I don’t care. I’m still struggling to accept it, but I want to keep it.”

The dichotomy of being both ashamed and deeply satisfied by her relationship with Brasa was the thing that kept her chest tight, her shoulders hunched. It sat next to her as she tried to sleep at night. It needled her in the quiet moments between tasks. Lilah rubbed at her forehead, feeling a headache coming on.

Kate’s smile was serene, “That’s good, because if Richie’s anything to go by, Brasa wouldn’t allow you to break the bond, even if you wanted to. He’d die to keep it intact.”

Lilah’s brows came together, “What does that mean?”

“Exactly what I said. He’d do anything to keep you with him. He kind of has to, anyways.”

“What does that mean?”

Kate lifted her hand to signal the bartender, “Two of what she’s having.” Then, she turned back to Lilah, “Listen, I don’t know if its matches up exactly with how my bond with Richie is, but Brasa is the one bonded to you, not the other way around.”

Lilah looked at her blank faced. The book had definitely not put it that way. Brasa had said he was the elder, he had said that he would be expected to lead.

The bartender brought their drinks and Kate fiddled with the little straw, stirring the ice around, “You’re weaker than he is.”

Lilah sneered, “Is it that obvious?”

Kate rolled her eyes, pushing Lilah’s glass at her, “Its always the strong party’s responsibility to protect and serve the weaker. Evens the playing field when—is it fate? Whenever whatever that decides these things steps in.”

“I don’t get it,” Lilah said blandly.

Honestly, she was getting tired of feeling confused. All these shifting realities were difficult enough to track and follow. She didn’t need to feel stupid on top of it.

Giving another little shrug, Kate took their drinks from the bartender, setting one in front of Lilah, “He’s like a billion years old and a literal demigod. The bond would weaken him long term, if he didn’t build you up, if he didn’t lend you some of his power.”

This rang of familiarity, and it made Lilah’s skin tighten with awareness of how she had never put two and two together. Still, the pieces weren’t locking into place cleanly enough for her to feel like she was on steady ground.

“What the fuck does that mean?”

Swirling the amber liquid in her glass, Kate fixed her with a coy smile, “It means that a large part of his life will be spent listening to and anticipating your needs. In return, your blood will make him stronger than he ever was, or ever could be without it.”

“That doesn’t make any sense.”

“Welcome to supernatural mating practices,” Kate deadpanned. “None of it really makes any sense.”

Lilah turned the whole thing around in her mind, “So, he has to do what I say?”

“He is inclined to do as you ask, but your safety and protection is his priority, above all.”

There was something in the statement that didn’t sit well with Lilah. She was used to commanding some sense of obedience during jobs, but this was far more intimate. It felt wrong to know that she could just...ask for something, and he would do it without question.

“But,” Lilah continued, “I don’t want to order him around.”

Kate set her glass down, “I don’t doubt it. I’ve had to learn to watch my words around Richie. If I even look at something in store for more than five seconds, It’ll be waiting for me when we get home.”

Lilah thought about it. Brasa hadn’t bought her anything, that she could tell, but he had given in to her will on numerous occasions. She couldn’t believe that she hadn’t figured it out yet.

“Have you had the dreams yet?”

Lilah snapped back to attention, “Dreams?”

“Yeah,” Kate prompted, her expression taking on a little excitement, “Where you’re sharing them?”

“Uh,” Lilah drawled, embarrassed, “A little.”

Kate nodded sagely, “If the bond is stressed, you’ll have more of them.”

“Why?”

“No idea,” Kate said as she fiddled with her glass.

There was a long silence, both of them lost in their thoughts. Lilah considered how far she’d come in her bond with Brasa, and how far she still needed to go. There were so many unknowns, and she feared that her reticence would eventually lead to him leaving her. And yet...Kate had said that he couldn’t—that would lead to worse things. Lilah could handle rejection, but eternal resentment was not something she was prepared to deal with.

“What’s he like?”

Lilah looked up at the question, her brows rising, “Who?”

Kate shot her a knowing look, “Brasa.”

Lilah considered the question, her breath flowing out of her lungs in a soft sigh, “He’s accommodating.”

“And?”

Lilah felt another little wave of embarrassment well up. She wasn’t used to disclosing this kind of information, and the thought of gushing to a girlfriend about a lover made her cringe. Still, this was likely the only person in the world who could really understand what she was going through, who could put things into perspective and help her make good decisions.

“He’s...smart. So smart. Every time we talk about the business, I feel like I’m taking a master class. And, he really listens to me, wants to know my opinion on things.”

“And?”

She thought further, “He’s attractive. Sometimes I look at him and I just…”

As she trailed off, Kate nudged her, “Have you had sex yet?”

“No,” Lilah admitted, “Although we’ve made out a few times—fuck, that makes me sound like a teenager.”

Kate chuckled, lifting her glass to her mouth, “That’s what I felt like, too. Although, I was actually, like, seventeen when Richie and I met.”

This was a story that Lilah had been waiting to hear. The two of them were so diametrically opposed in personality that the match seemed unlikely. She had asked Richie just the one time about how they got together, before Kate had been rescued from Amaru. His only answer was that he ‘kidnapped her.’

“Yeah?” Lilah prodded lightly.

“Yep,” she sat the glass down, “I don’t think either of us knew what was going on. Not until much later.”

“When did you finally figure it out?”

Kate pushed her dark hair from her face, her gaze contemplative, “After Amaru—in Xibalba, actually. We had a little time to talk when we were traveling between worlds. Richie had learned a lot while we were separated.” She paused, a smile forming on her lips, “He had to do a lot of convincing, but what Amaru knew, I knew. And, she knew about bonding. Even though I put it off for a bit, I knew eventually I would have to come to terms with it.”

Lilah felt the question she wanted to ask rise, and she almost tamped it down, but her lesser instincts kicked in, “Do you regret it?”

Kate shook her head, “Richie can be a real asshole, but he loves me. And all the other things that he is, all the things that make up our relationship, they satisfy me in ways I can’t describe.”

And that was exactly how Lilah felt, when she took the time to examine the bond more closely. All the restlessness of her life settled into a soothing, temperate pace when she was with him. Her eager ideas gained focus and precision, her impulsivity checked.

“You’ve given me a lot to think about,” Lilah said as she slumped in her chair.

Kate gave her sympathetic look, “I was trying to help you unload a bit of what you’ve been carrying around.”

To be fair, Lilah did feel lighter. There was still the issue of dealing with Seth and his temper when he found out, but she found that she liked having a secret ally in all of this. It lent her a small bit of safety that she appreciated.

Lilah glanced at her, “Does anyone else know?”

Shaking her head, Kate put her finger to her lips, “Its our secret, for now. But, it’ll come out eventually. Like I said, you can’t hide this kind of thing for long.”

“I know,” Lilah admitted, “Brasa is willing to keep this under wraps for the moment, but I can tell he’s frustrated by it.”

Kate watched her absorb that for a moment, then added, “Pro tip: Sleep with him.”

Lilah said her name in almost a yelp, shocked by the directive.

“I’m not kidding,” Kate said on a laugh, “Sex and blood are cornerstones of their relationships. They’re what bind them together, like it or not. Give him those things, and he’ll settle down enough so that you can figure this out.”

Lilah thought about it, then said the thing that had kept her hiding this secret for longer than she would like, “Seth is going to hate me.”

Kate acknowledged the statement with a salute of her drink, “He might not like it. He might mope around for a few months—hell, he might take off entirely. But, he’ll be back. He just has to have his tantrum first.”

“You think so?”

“I know so.”

“How?”

Kate lifted a shoulder, “He did the same thing with Richie when he was turned. Ran off for a bit. He’ll come around. Once he realizes that being a big baby about it means that you won’t be in his life anymore.” She paused a second, then, “We’re a family, you know? All of us. And, the most important thing to Seth is family.”

“You think so?” Lilah echoed.

Kate smiled warmly, “I know so.”

#from dusk til dawn #from dusk til dawn: the series #Brasa #In the Bond

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sadoeuphemist · 4 years

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Brief thoughts on Doki Doki Literature Club. Spoilers to follow, content warnings for suicide, depression, self-harm, etc.

Obvious criticism of the game is that the themes of suicide, self-harm, etc, are ultimately trivialized by the fourth wall breaking shenanigans of the ‘this video game is alive and talking to you’ plot. The metanarrative is poorly equipped to deal with such serious topics; their inclusion literally does not make sense (where did these alternate art assets even come from?? Did Monika draw them???). What’s the point of realistically depicting depression when the big reveal is that they aren’t real - they only act like that because a malfunctioning bit of the program set their ‘depression’ stat to max.

But at its core the story of ddlc is this: the protagonist starts out on a dating sim only to discover that his best friend Sayori has been quietly suffering from depression all her life. He tries to reassure her, and no matter what he does, it is the wrong thing. She kills herself, and her death becomes both unreal and indelible - there is nothing that can undo this. He must live with the guilt for the rest of his life.

That’s it. The End. That’s the entire story. Everything else is non-canonical. Everything else is a corruption of the text.

---

The true horror of Doki Doki Literature Club is having to read other people’s poetry. Why are they showing this to you? Are they trying to tell you something? Should you be worried? When someone writes ‘I slice the bread, fresh and soft. The racoon becomes excited. / or perhaps I’m merely projecting my emotions on the newly-satisfied animal’, how the fuck are you supposed to respond to that?

Of course, you know - you suspect - that a line like that is a little too off-kilter not to be relevant, that it’s almost certainly foreshadowing for some horror down the line. But what good does that do anyone? What are you supposed to do, pathologize their poetry? Pretend that every allusion to self-harm demands an intervention? This is Literature Club. Instead, you make fumbling attempts at critique of each other’s work, trying not to overstep anyone’s boundaries, every interaction further complicated by the presupposition that you’re trying to romance these girls (or conversely, that you’re not romantically interested in them at all, sorry). It’s a morass! It’s insoluble. There’s nothing you could have said that would have been correct.

The paradox of art is that it’s supposedly both a pure expression of the self, and yet at the same time an utter contrivance. How can you let out a primal scream while worrying about theme and technique and word choice? We have to believe that there’s this self-awareness or even ironic distance separating an author from their work; that on some level, they don’t mean it. How else to write about suffering or despair or even uncontrollable animal satisfaction? How else to expose ourselves to someone else without them recoiling back?

So, Sayori kills herself. You should have seen it coming (you did! you did see it coming!) but there’s nothing you could have done to save her. You cannot understand what anyone else is going through. No. No. Not even then.

---

Monika is the fantasy of authorial intent. Monika is the fantasy of communication. The meaning is there, right in the text, and it’s talking to you - you, personally! You can interface with it, move past all the contrivances and have it speak frankly to you; you can understand all its needs and motivations, all in there, clear as day. Okay, so maybe the unfiltered perspective of another consciousness is monstrous in its obsessive sociopathic neediness, but at least you can see it as what it is now.

At least it finally makes sense.

After the game ends, it starts over. You go back to school, back to the literature club, compulsively replaying everything that happened over the past few days. Everything is as it was, except Sayori no longer exists, of course. The poetry is morbid now; you see a brittle dysfunction underlying everything. The world veers out of control and becomes unreal.

Except Monika is there. She explains why everything happened. You can’t fix things - no, this is irrevocable, the chance for that is over; even if you delete Monika her perspective persists and inevitably subsumes everything, this is why Sayori has to die - but at least you can reach in and change the narrative yourself.

---

The ‘good ending’ of ddlc is that Sayori kills herself again - but this time, you understand why she did it. She was happy. You made her happy, for the time you had together. You were there for her, you were a comfort to her while she was alive; you were there for everyone. That’s why she deletes the game and herself along with it - because it’s the end, it’s all over; she lived as full an existence as she possibly could and there was nothing more to experience.

She really was happy, at the end.

You know that, right?

#ddlc #doki doki literature club #video games #suicide #self-harm #depression

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dear-saxifrage · 5 years

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long overdue post

i’ve been purposefully avoiding the topic for some time now, i suppose. and even as i write this, i’m avoiding it. i’m going for a run in just a few short minutes, and perhaps it’ll provide the mental clarity that i haven’t been able to gain since february.

i knew that it would fuck me up. i knew that kh3 would have drastic effects on me. but like all forms of grief and trauma, it’s often imperceptible how those two will manifest and unfold in one’s life. so, where to start? i don’t know. what do you even say? my best friend died. is that an overstatement? i don’t think so. in kh3, sora dies and dies away. canonically, he does not exist. has sacrificed himself. and sleeping realm theory aside, we work with what we have, which is the canon that he is dead. i am in so much pain i don’t know how to handle knowing that he is dead -- more than this, i don’t know how to handle my feelings of intense grief for some 1080i-resolution character. i don’t know how to express my feelings of grief paired with my absolute embarrassment; i know that this is silly. i know it’s perceived as silly, but i also know that the immaterial realm has huge effects. i fucking study divinity and theology, two of the most immaterial and thus spiritual things in life.

i am between two paths: one that is intensely mourning and another that is flagellating herself for mourning a video game character.

sora, obviously, symbolizes much more than this. it symbolizes my worst fears, likely, which is, what? i said last month that i don’t fear anything. and it’s true. i don’t. it’s probably because i have already moved past my worst fears by experience, which is in dealing with my friend being dead. sora took up real mental space in my head. he and i traveled together on adventures through different disney worlds when i was seven, and his motivational little quips got me through some trying times in adolescence. i remember fondly my childhood and the role that he and others played in it. my brain can’t physically register the difference between a ‘real’ human friend and a friend i made in the virtual world. i wonder what science there is behind that.

and here is where we arrive at the main point. i wrote a story. ‘a game of chess.’ it’s on archive of our own, check it out or not. when i first saw sora die in front of my eyes, i wrote a story about him and riku being beaten to death in queens for being gay. i thought that was my story of grief. and perhaps parts of it were. but a few weeks later, i was haunted by a piece: a piece on fake realities, of a thought and a shadow. i kept reliving that moment that he disappeared. i dreamt about what it must’ve been like, to know that you would die by helping another person resuscitate. i started writing a story about riku and a virtual reality game in which he designs his world and makes sora and kingdom hearts. then it blurs the lines of reality, of love and life, memory and desire. it ends up with riku’s ‘real’ world disappearing and him being subsumed into kingdom hearts virtual reality. sora still dies in the end and riku remembers every iteration of life he’s ever lived, and he collapses from the grief, especially because despite all of the timelines he’s ever lived, he was always meant to see the moment that sora would die.

i haven’t written anything of value since this story. it’s haunting me though. i can’t escape it myself. i wake up and there are lines of the story floating in my mind. “human consciousness is not enough. (nothing is enough.).” i am becoming more of riku from this story every day, and i’m a bit frightened. my whole body is churning. i’m still mourning and feeling a great overwhelming sadness, and why? BECAUSE NOTHING IS ENOUGH. nothing will ever be enough, i’m afraid, and i don’t want to be satisfied. my best friend has died. why should anything satisfy?

i can’t believe how affected by everything i am. i didn’t know that my heart would shatter. i didn’t know that i had hallowed out a space for sora in my head such that my body would respond in an intense, psychologically ill way. and fuck, i know this all sounds so fucking silly. but i’m affected, and i need to speak about this. akuroku didn’t do this to me.

in february, i became overwhelmingly ill. i was also working on the world premiere of a renowned composer’s secular requiem, which obviously spoke on death and how to go on. i sang it every day for months. i embodied and thought on sora, and thought about how i need to let go the love i feel for someone who’s probably toxic. (but i’m so, so in love with him.) i can’t tell if i’m damaging myself. i probably am, but isn’t love about courage? i’m not being harmed, but it is painful still. it’s all so painful. i don’t know what’s happening in my brain. so anyway, i was dealing with: sora’s death, a secular requiem on death, and me distinguishing love and toxicity. one day, during all of this, i finally let it go. it was a sigh, and i remember it clearly. it was a tense rehearsal, but not too tense, and it just exited my body. like a ghost. and i went home after the concert and got so, so, so sick. looking back, it all makes so much sense. i’ve been avoiding this question for so long, sadly because i knew why my body had such a horrible response to all of this:

i let it go. (all of it.)

i let go of sora, of my childhood longing, of someone i love, of the musician, of my life in berkeley. of my friends in 2017. i let it go and became a vessel. it was so... odd.

in less than a week, i contracted pink eye, tonsilitis, a low-grade fever, a yeast infection, and hemorrhoids. i was out of commission february 14 to march 29.

i want to understand more deeply how we perceive things and why we perceive them. i need to understand my own psychology with myself. am i injuring myself? who can really know? i would also be injured if i stopped doing the things that hurt me -- i would rather die than be a coward, afraid to live life. in the meantime though, how will i be hurt? it’s been so much. it’s a game of chess. i’ve been reading a lot. traveling and having great luck with friends. i haven’t had sex with a new partner in two months, and that’s very odd for me. i hate that i’m so injured. i hate that i am tormented by this death, and by my own writing. i’ve never been truly haunted by myself except for now. i can’t stop thinking about riku’s experience and how my own reflects it so much. i hate that sex is both easy and hard for me right now. i hate that it’s not other people who make me want to cloister up -- it’s me. i... have to psychically heal myself. i’ve been injured. my best friend died. what do i do now. certainly, i can’t have sex.

sora, i’m so sorry i couldn’t have been there for you like you were for me. sora, i know there’s nothing that could’ve been done. i’m not a game maker. but like in ‘game of chess,’ even if i could have made you an entire world, you still would have died.

(jesus.)

#personal

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fear-god-shun-evil · 5 years

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She Finds Why She Stray From God for Busy Work

One afternoon, Xiao Han dragged her weary body home. Her nine-year-old son ran up to her elatedly, grabbed her hand and said: “Mom, can you take me out to play tonight?” Xiao Han sighed, “Well, I’m very tired. Can we change it to another day?” Her son pouted in unhappiness and said: “You always lie! You are always busy with work, when will you have the time to play with me?” Looking at her angry son, Xiao Han stroked his head, feeling helpless and said: “If I don’t go to work, we will have no money!” Her son said angrily: “You always talk about money, money, money! You also don’t attend meetings anymore. Yesterday, an auntie came to find you and told you to attend a meeting tomorrow.” After listening to what he had said, Xiao Han patted her head and realized there was a meeting tomorrow. She had been so busy with work that she forgot about meetings, and worked tirelessly for money that she even forgot about believing in God. Xiao Han recalled the time when she attended meetings often, she felt steadfast in her heart. Although she did not live a luxurious life, she had no stress and lived happily. Now, for an unknown reason, she was so busy with work every day that she had no time to attend meetings. Though she earned some money, she felt empty in her spirit, pained and helpless in her heart and strayed further and further away from God. Xiao Han wondered why she felt pressed for time and why she was getting more stressful. The difficulties in life almost overwhelmed her.

One Sunday morning, Xiao Han and a church member, Xiao Yang were having a chat. Xiao Han told Xiao Yang all her pain in her heart, Xiao Yang said: “I once had the same pain as yours. I did not know what I was busy with every day, I made myself very exhausted and even began to pray perfunctorily. Afterward, a friend showed me a short video clip and I found the root of my problem.” Xiao Yang clicked open the video as he said, “Come on, Xiao Han. Let’s watch it together!” Then, they watched it attentively.

After the video, Xiao Yang said to Xiao Han, “Xiao Han, after watching this video, we understand that the reason why we are exhausted by all sorts of stress is because Satan used money, fame and material enjoyments to occupy our hearts, causing us to sever our relationship with God.”

Xiao Han listened and suddenly realized: This busy world makes people from all walks of life out of breath and this is Satan’s deceitful schemes. Satan makes us work day and night for trivial matters of life, spend most of our time and energy pursuing material enjoyments, thus severing our relationship with God. Xiao Han recalled her past spontaneously: When she was contented with sufficient essentials of life, she lived freely, relaxed and without stress; she would not compare herself with others and could serve God wholeheartedly. But what happened to her now? For various reasons she lost her faith in God and gradually was drawn into the social trends. Ever since Xiao Han got this job, the only thing on her mind was money. She felt that nothing could be done without money. She needs money for family expenses. She needs money for her children’s school fees. She needs money for social relationships and treating superiors dinners and buying them gifts, etc. The pressures in life made her feel more and more inseparable from money, causing her to stray away from God. These were all the shackles Satan bound her with.

At this moment, Xiao Han sighed, “So, this is how Satan draws me to him with material things and makes me stray away from God. In order to live the life better than others, I worked hard to earn money. As a result, I even had no time with my children and for meetings and lived in pain and darkness every day. I have forgotten about God’s words as well.” Xiao Yang said: “You are right. That we strayed away from God, lost the care and protection from Him, lived in pain and without help were all because of Satan.” With this, Xiao Yang took out a notebook from her bag, and showed Xiao Han two passages of God’s words she had copied down, “Satan uses these social trends to lure people one step at a time into a nest of devils, so that people caught up in social trends unknowingly advocate money and material desires, as well as advocate wickedness and violence. Once these things have entered man’s heart, what then does man become? Man becomes the devil Satan! This is because of what psychological leaning in the heart of man? What does man advocate? Man begins to like wickedness and violence. They do not like beauty or goodness, much less peace. People are not willing to live the simple life of normal humanity, but instead wish to enjoy high status and great wealth, to revel in the pleasures of the flesh, sparing no effort to satisfy their own flesh, with no restrictions, no bonds to hold them back, in other words doing whatever they desire” (God Himself, the Unique V). “Fame and fortune one gains in the material world give one temporary satisfaction, passing pleasure, a false sense of ease, and make one lose one’s way. And so people, as they thrash about in the vast sea of humanity, craving peace, comfort, and tranquility of heart, are subsumed again and again beneath the waves. When people have yet to figure out the questions that it is most crucial to understand—where they come from, why they are alive, where they are going, and so forth—they are seduced by fame and fortune, misled, controlled by them, irrevocably lost. Time flies; years pass in an eyeblink; before one realizes it, one has bid farewell to the best years of one’s life” (God Himself, the Unique III).

Xiao Yang fellowshiped to Xiao Han, “You see, people are living in this evil material world, everyone has been pursuing material comforts, has eyes only for fame and gain and works as hard as we can for money in order to get them. When we got them, we only have a sense of ease and satisfaction on the outside, but those material things cannot fill the emptiness of our hearts, it can only make us more tired and stressful. This is the Satan’s contemptible purpose of using fame and gain to corrupt and control us.

After listening to Xiao Yang’s fellowship, Xiao Han was suddenly enlightened, and she felt those God’s words are very practical and had thoroughly revealed the facts of humankind, and that the state of her current life was exactly how it was revealed in those words. In the past, she never competed with anyone and was contented with whatever she had. However, now she was also carried away by the evil social trends, especially when she saw others with fancy cars, big houses and enjoying their life, she also pursued the goals others did; seeing other people’s children all went to expensive private schools, she also did not want her kid to be lagging behind; seeing others buying gifts and treating dinners on festivals to build relationships, she also wanted to follow this social trend, etc. As a result, she became distant from God and all sorts of pressure and troubles in life came to her.

Xiao Yang fellowshiped again: “Look back to the time when Moses led the Israelites out of Egypt: They had no food to eat in the wild; God sent manna from heaven to feed them and did not allow them to keep the manna to the next day; some of them picked up extra manna and kept them for back-up, and however, the next day the manna had gone bad. Through their actions we can see the greediness of human and our little faith in God. God actually prepared enough for us to enjoy, He hopes that we can believe in Him, worship Him with our hearts and honesty, entrust everything to Him and not plan for our own future and a way back. Just like those animals created by God, they do not farm and harvest, but they have things to eat, because God has ordained their path to survival. But what about us humans? We are always busy working and planning for our tomorrow. As a result, our ambitions and desires become stronger and we become more selfish, it seems that nothing is able to satisfy us. If we are very wealthy and have everything, by right we should be peaceful in our hearts and living in joy. But on the contrary, we are not happy but feel even more empty in our hearts, with our hearts full of uneasiness and fear. Many people cannot stand the pain and the blow, so they chose to commit suicide. Furthermore, for those who did not get what they wanted, they felt hopeless and also chose to commit suicide to escape from reality. We can see that no matter whether we are poor or rich, the emptiness in our hearts and the pressure in life will only increase. Being pathetic and foolish, we are always led by the nose by Satan’s use of fame and gain, so that we feel exhausted. If we cannot see clearly how Satan abuses us, we will be devoured by Satan.”

Through Xiao Yang’s fellowship, Xiao Han knew her pain was caused by Satan, she began to hate Satan and at the same time she was full of emotional thoughts. She said to Xiao Yang: “Today, God arranged for you to fellowship His words to me, so I’m not so confused and depressed anymore. I really benefit a lot from it! I also understand that if we want to live a good life, we must see through Satan’s methods of corrupting us. We should no longer pursue fame and fortune, instead, we should accept and submit to God’s sovereignty and arrangements. Only by doing so, can we live in God’s care and protection and live happily and freely.”

Xiao Yang said: “Exactly! Just like what it is stated in the Bible: ‘So likewise, whoever he be of you that forsakes not all that he has, he cannot be my disciple’ (Luke 14:33). ‘For what is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?’ (Matthew 16:26) Also in Matthew 6:19-20, ‘Lay not up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust does corrupt, and where thieves break through and steal: But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust does corrupt, and where thieves do not break through nor steal.’ In fact, the Lord had told us long ago, but we did not obey His words, instead put His teachings to the back of our minds. We really don’t love the truth!”

After Xiao Yang’s fellowship, Xiao Han did not feel confused and look so dull. She stood up and breathed a sigh of relief, and she felt relaxed and released a lot, all her distress in her heart and stress of life disappearing. Xiao Yang also felt happy looking at her, so she sang a hymn to Xiao Han.

Time Lost Will Never Come Again

1. Awaken, brothers! Awaken, sisters! God’s day will not be delayed; time is life, and to seize time is to save life! The time is not far off! If you take exams for entrance into college and you do not pass, you can try again and cram for the test. However, God’s day will have no such delay. Remember! Remember! God urges you with these good words. The end of the world unfolds before your very eyes, great disasters rapidly draw near; is your life important or is your sleeping, eating, and clothing important? The time has come for you to weigh these things.

2. How pitiful! How poor! How blind! How cruel mankind is! You actually turn a deaf ear to God’s word, perhaps God is speaking to you in vain? You are still so remiss, why? Why is that? Have you never thought about that before? For whom does God say these things? Believe in God! God is your Savior! God is your Almighty! Keep watch! Keep watch! Time lost will never come again, remember this! There is nowhere on earth where you can buy medicine that will soothe regret! So how shall God say this to you? Is God’s word not worthy of your careful consideration and repeated ponderation? (Follow the Lamb and Sing New Songs)

Xiao Yang and Xiao Han sang it again and again. As they sang, Xiao Han realized the urgency of times, so she resolved silently to take back all her time stolen by Satan and use them to worship God. Two of them sang and smiled to each other …

Read more on our Christian Testimonies page.

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