An Echo

“What is it you see, Arjuna?” asked Drona.

“I see…” Arjuna paused, “I see a single eye peering directly at me.” he finished.

And it was true. To Arjuna the bird was watching him intently, as if the little wooden bird was seeing something unseen, deep within him. Arjuna confidently met its gaze. But the longer Arjuna scrutinized the bird, the more intensely the bird appeared to return his gaze. It was as if the bird had come alive.

Arjuna looked into the bird’s eyes for what felt like an eternity. The bird was saying something. It was faint and you almost couldn’t hear it at first. It was quiet but soon the sound quickly had became unmistakable. The bird saying something. The bird was telling Arjuna something.

Suddenly the sky turned dark and the ground buckled and twisted all around Ajuna. The wind howled and earth shattered. Eruptions boomed forth as mighty earthquakes shifted the lands and tossed the seas. The darkened sky hissed and the heavens screamed. The world was collapsing. Light itself had ignited and whipped itself into a tremendous frenzy. Together, the light began to form thin strips that whizzed by Arjuna with astonishing speed. Gradually, yet suddenly, the lights started to shift in place as if they were working themselves into an elegant dance. They moved every which way, sometimes in tandem and sometimes with no known purpose. After a time, they began to coalesce and they morphed into projections of things. People, events, items, place. The lights swirled around to form all manner of things. These were things that had passed and things yet to come.

Arjuna’s focus never diminished. His eyes never wavered. The failing world washed over him and yet his concentration was infinite. Nothing could remove him from his moment. The more he peered into the eyes of the bird the more the little bird retaliated with its own ferocious eyesight.

The bird wasn’t alive. The bird couldn’t be alive. The bird was a reflection. His reflection. The intensity of what he saw was the intensity of himself. It was his sheer will he was combating. It was his sheer focus.

And just as quickly as the moment had begun, it was all over. The birds chirped and the air wafted lazily. The world was still.

Arjuna and the wooden bird sat across from each other. Only now, Arjuna had bow drawn and arrow pointed. It was held calmly and steadily, precisely aimed at the eye of the bird before him.

“What is it you see, Arjuna?” asked Drona.

“I see….the eye of a bird peering back at me,” replied Arjuna.

“Ah,” grinned Drona. “Yes, the path is clear before you.”

Author’s Note.

When I read through this point in the story, I thought it was a nice theme that played off Arjuna and I found myself delving into a bit more in this portion of the story. I read several other renditions and perspectives and enjoyed several options. Ultimately, I decided at one point I would provide another interpretation that hopefully stayed within the lines of the story.

I got the idea from a memory I have of watching a movie and then reading its books thereafter. Now it's important to note that the movie came before the book and thus the book was essentially supplementation. As I read the book I began to understand the events of the book much more completely. It was not due to the lack of the movie development, but rather because the book can give something that's very difficult to produce on screen: emotion and thought. By being able to read the world through the perspective of the characters, I was better able to understand more of the circumstances that developed the story, and it made the tale much more intense. As such, I decided to take that developmental route when my writing this scene. I felt that in some way that I could provide a bit more elaboration and intensity by cultivating an important moment. Thus increasing its significance and augmenting the themes.

Bibliography: Indian Heroes by C.A. Kincaid.