Prologue

He was trying to decide if he was dreaming or not.

Since he was obviously not awake, he must be asleep. Therefore he must be dreaming.

But it did not feel like dreaming, nor like sleep. No, this felt entirely different.
There had been pain, he remembered that. A great deal of pain, even if it had come upon him suddenly. Then blackness. And now, this strange state—not dreaming, not awake. Not alive, nor dead either? He couldn’t be sure.

Then, starting at the very edge of what passed for his consciousness, it began. He barely noticed it at first; it was like a whisper heard from a distance. But his attention was drawn to it, and he listened intently, until the voice was clear and accompanied by flashing images, startling in their vibrancy, surprising in their content… and in their implications, nothing short of astonishing.

It was then he realized that he was having a vision.

The vision finished imparting its secrets and then ended. Blackness again overwhelmed him. But then he began a slow climb out of the darkness, as though he were swimming upwards from the bottom of a lake, towards consciousness, towards light and life, towards joy and pain. And he remembered everything, and as a result, knew that the vision--and what it had imparted--was true.