And then the Maestro was afraid. There in the middle of the darkness, blinded by a light that couldn’t compare to the Sun’s, that began to drown her mind. The wilderness was drenched in the color of the squid’s ink, but her eyes gazed upon light.
An agonizing pain rained throughout her chest, greeted by short breath, and teary ducts. She trembled. Her heart seemed to sweat light beams, and the glow could be seen through the three layers of the chest.
This was the power of Realization.
  A genderless creature who crawled through the back of the mind, toying with the marionette strings that belonged to Conscience and it played in the puddy of Guilt. It convinced Disdain to befriend Loneliness, to chain her to his side, where he  tousled  her hair and held her hand tightly. It even taught Shame the art of hibernation. Without Shame each of the beasts could frolic without Worry to ward them. Lust nustled closely to Excitement, and Empathy lie with her head in the lap of Lust, staring him in the eyes. And then Ambivalence took hold of the entire mind. Loneliness ached for Intimacy, for Fondness,  for Tenderness and Infatuation, all whom had left with a man whose eyes were flecked with the colors of embers and blades of grass but Gullible still had the means to contact them, he’d also come to hold Happiness captive for an eternity.
Oh yes, Realization had watched it all. A humble spectator to a slaughter it had arranged. Fright and Abandonment suspected it all, and often spoke with Worry, but the words always came to a silence, or they became soft brushstrokes of air by the time they would reach Shame, or Reason. Reason seemed to have nothing to do with anything, did he do it for Love? For his children Intimacy, Fondness, Tenderness, and Infatuation? Or would he wake Worry to segregate the entire breed that heavily populated the mind that had once remained an ocean of blue?
Reason’s cause had always been Happiness behind the closed doors, without her he had no grounds, no compass to lead him in the correct direction. Happiness became exhausted though, she knew all too well about famine, for hunger in the need of Reason even if he’d seen Love as his true companion. It became a constant battle for Happiness to manifest herself back into his view. She’d given herself to so many others, trying to build up egos that belonged to people whom her Maestro’s heart, and mind devoted themselves to.
  The Maestro should have been given a carapace for her heart, one made of titanium. With each conflict in the mind, the heart bled more light. A light that changed color based on the severity of its injuries. When Shame visited, it oozed a byzantium shade. When Fright visited, which he  often did, it would illuminate with a color of teal. And when Happiness visited the heart, it would gleam fuscia. But now, the heart was leaking a light of white and it had infected the mind as well. The heart had never done this before. And it all had been the work of Realization.
You see, when the heart began to radiate the light, it was to mark the detonation of the war that had began in the mind. Realization had finally began to strike, its plan falling into place. The Maestro’s lover had taken her body and left traces along her skin. Dots of purple and blue manifested along her wrists, her neck, and her thighs. Lust and Fondness gleamed when the man with ember eyes returned, and Love had appeared again. The ember eyes lunged into the mind and stared each creature in their own eyes, he studied each of them closely and learned their weaknesses. He conjured them up, made them illuminate and then vanished. Without a trace. He left the Maestro’s body to lie in silk sheets the color of lavender, full of anticipation. But the ember eyes didn’t return to the room. The Maestro began to ache again, her heart ached, her stomach ached, her skin tingled where he’d touched her. Each creature that roamed through the mind took the throat of the other. Lust murdered Excitement, and he hunted for Happiness, taking her into his talons and doing his worse. The mind became a chaotic battleground, the colors of each creature painted the walls of the hollowed out cavern. The walls that had once been limestone turned into sedimentary and blew away with the wind as each bead of color tore into it. Thousands were lost to the wrongfulness, 7,000 separate combinations lie across the ground, limp. Frankenthaler’s work couldn’t compare to the grand piece that lie for all to see, the stars of the mind shut their eyes, they refused to witness such genocide. It all seemed so vicious, so ilict to such docile creatures. When all was done, the only wretches to lie with air in their lungs were Guilt, Agony, Shame, Reason, and Fright. Each of them muddled by the experience. Lacerations riddled their frames, a horrific scene. And the only creature to stand was Realization, and stood proud it did. It grinned, satisfied with the disarray. It prowled along the aftermath with its chest puffed outward, like a proud peacock showing its colors after a triumph. All of this was Realization’s culpability.
Shame began to vomit, Guilt followed his lead. Agony jolted forward, and ran for the heart, which seemed to be the only safe place. Realization tripped him and chuckled. Without thinking twice Agony was up and running again, he ran for the deep rivers, and dove into them, swimming as hard as he could, losing his breath in the red water, his face turning blue. When he got to the heart he clambered inward, digging through the wires that fueled the heart. He could be felt all throughout the head, the heart, the spine. He burrowed into the muscle that lie as a warm, inviting nest of protection. And he pulled at spare wires, giving himself cover, and closing in the warmth of his new bunker. He wove his own web, capturing nothing but himself.The Maestro screamed and tears streamed from her eyes. Her body curled itself up and she held her chest, gasping for air as Agony panicked and ripped through the heart carelessly. Fright began to run in circles, each time the Maestro opened her eyes he could be seen behind the the small window if you looked closely. He threw his fists at the walls, covering his knuckles with the colors of the dead. He was quite upset, so Guilt wrapped his arms around him in an attempt to coax him into being calm but Guilt only made Fright ill. Fright clung to him despite the fact he was vomiting.
Realization left them to wallow. It slithered through the corridors, his head swaying his body along the channels. It spun and swung from ligaments. The body had become its playground, the other creatures had become its dolls. His playthings. What a puppeteer it  had become through the entire endevour. Years of sharpening its teeth, only to use its tongue. A shame, but the beast wasn’t offended. It’s ego had been fondled, and now his eyes sparkled. What fun it was to have its paws on the switchboard, to finally have Reason in his claws.
Reason.
The name stung the beast's tongue like a hornet, and left an unpleasant taste in its mouth. Reason was the only thing that could keep Realization from the switchboard. Reason could open the gates for Hope, or worse... Happiness! The beast gagged at the mere thought of such an unlikely proposal and continued to paddle through the corridors with its large paws. It followed the same path as Agony had, surveying the destruction that his desperation had created.
The creature was on the hunt, its nose twitched with anticipation, and its fur rose and fell again moving with the current of the red water it was engulfed in.          
Agony was the child of Regret, a bastard child, made with the colors of two creatures that had no grounds to create such a being. But Regret had fallen in love with a creature called Anxiety, and the two of them danced in the tall grass of the mind to music that seemed to play only in their heads, but they both heard the tune. They’d had to be careful though, their love was forbidden by nature, even if the two of them blended so well. Realization was supposed to be the peacekeeper, the mentor that motioned all of the creatures into harmony, but we all know power can go to any head, an ego can poison any object it touches. And sadly, Agony was at its mercy. Defenseless, and protected only by heartstrings, Agony closed his eyes to rest, unaware his hunter was coming to make certain that they wouldn’t open.
When the genderless beast reached the heart it was greeted by the hearts white light, bright enough to blind any other creature if looked at for too long, the sly being used its claws to snip each thread, waking Agony. Frantically, Agony dug deeper into the heart, his eyes wide, and illuminating the same color as the heart had since the beginning of the great battle. Realization still pushed on, each heart string sending a twang through the air as it snapped, the sound resembled something of a demonic lullaby. This was become the beasts etude, it was merely improving his technique.
What a fun game target practice can come to be when the target is so electrified.
Agony tore through ventricles and auricles to escape, suffocating the Maestro. The two of them ran in circles through the heart, whirlpooling the red river waters the Maestro was at her knees, mouth ajar, yet no sound came from her. Realization had snipped those chords as well. Her lungs filled with the river water and she began to choke. And in that moment Realization had reached Agony, and taken him by the throat. The helpless creature screeched like a harpy, for mercy, for life, for air. Agony had only wanted to continue to exist in the mind just as the beast had for decades. But it couldn’t be. The narcissist had made up its mind and took the life of Agony in an instant, it seemed it had taken the life of the Maestro as well. It tore through the chest of the Maestro, her heart in his fangs, and it ran for the next sad soul.
This isn’t where our story ends though, it’s the new beginning.
Spiritual reincarnation and growth are among many of the magical things this world has to offer.
Even though the Maestro lie near death, body torn to shreds, Happiness frantically tore through the mind. Set free from captivity, she sifted through the bodies looking for Reason. She threw bodies to each side of her, the colors of the dead covering her paws. Once she found the battered creature she held him close, she knew that this was indeed how Nature intended this to be. Reason and Happiness were two creatures who blended in the most exemplary way.  Both creature had its own sense of enchantment to exhibit for the world to see and in a partnership the two of them could turn the mind into something like the Louvre, or the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
And now it made perfect sense to the Maestro. She’d avoided the sorcery for far too long. She knew now that the witchcraft had always been in mind, in the empty cavern she often tried to fill with thoughts of lovers, and potions with portions of fermented virtue. Happiness, pure happiness of the soul was what she was to strive for.
And it was then that the Maestro felt relief. She was able to pull air back into her lungs once again, and she felt her muscles willing to work like desperate horses kept too long in a stable, and her eyes opened. Glazed over like gorgeous spheres of marble and ice she looked into the world expecting to see darkness… But she saw the sky.
She Maestro saw the beautiful sky again. For the first time in nearly a decade she saw the blue, and the cotton colored clouds, and she saw the tree tops.
Bringing herself up, she took in her hand a needle and a thread along with a piece of black velvet fabric to patch the wound that Realization had torn in her chest when escaping. She began mending herself, back to the little girl she’d once been when magic twinkled in her glossy eyes.
Back to when Happiness, was the only creature that roamed the mind.