The Will o' the Wisp

The densely forested hills gleamed in the ferocity of the sun, which was an irregular visitor to these parts. For once, no wet blanket smote the hillside with its overwhelming greyness. All the trees seized upon this chance to burst forth with their brightest colours, lending the panoply an almost otherworldly aesthetic. An onlooker with an eye for detail could be held, mesmerized, for hours by a view of such splendour.

However, this particular visitor showed no sign or inclination of even noticing his surroundings.

Clad in Asiatic garb, Matthias’ protective equipment consisted solely of a leather vest and a metal-plated shield, announcing a quiet confidence in his own abilities. At his waist sat a sabre, slotted into a sturdy, reinforced metallic sheath. His provisions contained dried meat and a few plucked berries, indicative of a short trip. His step was light, but steady.

His face, beaten down by many suns harsher than this, was coarse, dark, and leathery. Its lower half was covered by a bramble almost as dense as the forest itself. His frame and gait betrayed a life spent in execution of deeds requiring physical prowess and elite athleticism. His eyes, almost entirely obscured by the heavy overgrowth of his eyebrows, sat deep in his face, always glowering with unwarranted levels of intensity.

The region he found himself in was not suited to him or his kind. The locals were a pygmy race, being on average 4.5 to 5 feet tall. More than a foot shorter than he was. Though this did not concern him directly, it did result in the architectural proportions being far too diminutive for his comfort. The stairs he had been climbing for the past four hours (for the paths everywhere in this region were ascending or descending stairways) had steps too shallow for his liking. Furthermore, their dwarfish size did not allow him to place his foot straight on, as he preferred, but forced him to step sideways, wreaking havoc with his rhythm and tiring him to an unusual degree for a mere half a day’s trek.

His beard, matted with sweat and dust, glistened, as he glared at the sun like a reluctant host would greet an unwelcome visitor. The sweat trickling down his legs served as no deterrent to the resolute and ravenous ants. Most that made the assault met a swift end, but, as is the way with ants, the numbers won the day and the itch afflicting Matthias’ legs distracted him from the weariness in his legs.

Curving round a particularly dense patch of shrubbery, he glimpsed a path running off into the forest, diverging from the main stairway. Wishing for some respite from the relentless sun, he decided to take the detour and have his meal at a suitable spot.

The path ran only a short while before it ended abruptly at a weird formation of rocks running up the hillside. The placement of the boulders made Matthias feel uneasy. It seemed symmetrical and deliberate, almost in the way obstacles and challenges were placed in gladiatorial arenas for the entertainment of the audience. Drawing his sabre, he began climbing over the boulders, picking a path across them, trying to see where they led. The going was tough and often treacherous, but a pernicious curiosity almost forced Matthias onward, until he found himself in a spherical hollow carved into the side of the hill.

It seemed almost like a semi-formed cave, sheltered from above by a combination of overhanging rock and an assortment of vines streaming down towards the ground. The entire area was almost exclusively green. Even the rocks, overgrown with moss, showed no hint of their original colour.

As a cool breeze struck the back of Matthias’ neck, he realized that the sun had taken its leave. All about him a gloom resided, and the sky was blotted out by dark, brooding clouds that threatened deluges. The hollow took on an ominous hue, and every warrior’s instinct warned Matthias that the fight he had traveled far and wide to seek had finally come to him.

And just like that, Matthias caught his first glimpse of his adversary.

Standing atop a boulder, was a man similarly built to Matthias, but leaner and more lithesome. He wore a dark cloak around his shoulders and a wide brimmed hat pulled low over his face, so that, though he stood in plain sight, Matthias could guess little as to the manner of his arms and armour.

That is, until Sigil unsheathed his sword with a flourish, casting his shroud aside in the same, fluid motion. The sword was the standard longsword, with a magnificent finish lending it a pristine countenance.

This revealed a garb strange to Matthias’ eyes. Over a coal-black woollen, full-sleeved shirt, he wore chain mail armour, apparently painted over with tar to give it its midnight hue. His wrists bore vambraces of leather reinforced steel, and his legs bore greaves of similar design. Under his hat, he wore the mask of a bird’s beak, obscuring his face, of which Matthias could see naught.

As the first rumblings of thunder began to sound, Matthias drew his sabre, cursing his luck at having used up so much of his energy already. He stood there, still panting from his exertions, as the first droplets began to splash upon him. They were heavy droplets, laden with foreboding and auguries of impending doom.

It did not take long for the rain to begin pouring down with Biblical vehemence, and Mathias’ fatigue-ridden limbs were piled on to by the weight of his water-logged armor. The longer this fight lasted, Matthias realized, the higher were his chances at being vanquished. And so, it fell to him to make his first move.

Circling to his left, he sought to test the technique of his adversary, trying to find an opening he could exploit. Crouching into the Posta Breve La Serpentina, Matthias sortied forward with a series of lightning jabs and prods, testing, but was avoided with ease each time. Sigil was evidently well trained in swordsmanship. However, his stance and technique was unfamiliar to Matthias. This made him reconsider, and he decided to switch to a riskier, more unpredictable style to counteract his opponent’s.

With his sabre aimed at the ground at an angle, its point facing Sigil, Matthias feinted left, drawing a defensive swipe from his foe, and immediately spun the other way, bringing down toward Sigil’s left arm. The block came, but almost too late, and the sabre’s curved point sliced into the woollen sleeve.

Matthias smiled. There were holes in this technique.

Gaining confidence from this little victory, Matthias used all his years of experience, unleashing volleys in a flurry of combinations, each one wilier than the last, prodding Sigil into more and more of a defensive stance, and forcing him into positions that never let him take the upper hand. Within ten minutes, Sigil’s armour, formerly pristine, bore scuffs and scars indicative of a losing fight, and his sleeve showed many holes, though Matthias had yet to draw blood. Sigil always seemed to be able to fend off the killing blow at the very last moment.

The rain did not relent, and Matthiass’ stamina began to show its wear. His lunges began to betray a hint of desperation, and his twirls were not so much precise pirouettes as hopeful heaves. He realized, soon, that he had been drawn in to expend as much energy as he could without causing any significant damage to his opponent. Those last second blocks and close shaves were not holes in Sigil’s technique, but lures for unwitting hotheads.

The bile rose in Matthias’ throat. He spat at Sigil’s feet in disgust, though his rage was aimed more at himself. Thirty years of field-tested combat tactics lay at his fingertips, and here he was getting played like an adolescent pretender. Any more of these shenanigans, and his legs would give out and he could retire from this world.

Drawing a deep breath, Matthias collected himself. Switching up his stance, he lunged low, this time, aiming at Sigil’s forward knee. The incoming block brought Sigil’s upper body forward, which Matthias anticipated, and he promptly elbowed Sigil in the face. Though the bird beak protected his face, the blow stunned Sigil nonetheless, staggering him temporarily. Matthias, exploiting this, swung the sabre diagonally upwards from left to right, across Sigil’s body. Meeting Sigil’s broadsword, Matthias faked a spin to the other side, and brought his sabre back down towards the same knee. Once again, Sigil lunged forward to block it, but in a much more unbalanced manner. Matthias reared forward and struck Sigil with a vicious headbutt to the face.

The blow sent Sigil to his left, exposing his right shoulder, at which Matthias aimed a push kick, following the tottering Sigil with a leaping lunge, bringing the sabre down with all his might towards Sigil’s head.

The Sabre went clean through, missing Sigil’s face by inches. Matthias noted with grim satisfaction that he had sliced through Sigil’s wide brimmed hat and lopped off the entire beak, leaving a misshapen wreck of a mask in its place. The face was still not visible, and this irked Matthias. If he could only glimpse the face, he would know his opponent’s frame of mind.

Steam spewed forth from his nose as he panted in the downpour. His legs quivered with fatigue, and his hands gnawed in frozen discomfiture brought on by their long and strenuous ordeal.

One last heave ho, he thought to himself, grimly.

Resuming his initial stance, Matthias inched forward, looking for any sign of nerves at his near miss, but seeing none. Sigil stood unaffected, as he had through most of this fight.

Matthias struck at Sigil’s chest, and the blow was parried. The follow-up counter-swing and the three subsequent attempts were also warded off with ease, until a swift job caused Sigil to turn his outside foot at an angle to allow him to block the strike. This was the opening Matthias was waiting for, and he immediately launched into a roundhouse kick aimed at the back of Sigil’s head. This was anticipated, and Sigil promptly ducked under it. This, however, left his back exposed to Mathias’ downswing, and only a quick evasive roll prevented an abrupt end to the fight. But Matthias, on his last legs, was in no mood to relent, and gave chase.

Sigil’s attempt at getting to his feet was aided by an upward knee to the face courtesy of Matthias’ left leg. A whirling sabre next forged its path towards the right temple of Sigil’s head. The blade was stopped, not by a composed parry or block by Sigil’s sword, but by the greave on Sigil’s right arm that was raised in a desperate ditch attempt at defence. This left his entire body defenceless, with his sword dangling harmlessly behind his head, and Matthias gratefully brought the curved sabre’s thirsty blade and sliced all the way through Sigil’s advanced leg. Just for good measure, he followed this with a hard kick across Sigil’s face, finally knocking the hat and the mask off his face, and swiftly followed that with a sideswing of sabre right across Sigil’s neck.

And then he stopped.

No blood showed on his sword. No lopped off leg lay convulsing on the floor, No headless body writhed amongst the moss. Sigil stood, composed and serene, faceless, single-legged, armor torn to shreds, sullied by mud, rain and moss. But unchanged.

As Matthias’s legs gave out, he gawked in horror as he realized that where a normal human head resided, Sigil’s was only an ethereal smoke, a mist, a vapour.

Before his eyes, Sigil evaporated, armour, sword and all, into a wispy trail of smoke. Accosting Matthias’ prone body, it hissed at his ears in mocking mirth, clouding his last view of the world before he was taken into the darkness.

Order

“Good morning, ma’am, take a seat.”

“Thank you, Officer.”

“Would you like anything to drink? Tea, coffee, water?”

“No, that’s all right.”

“All right. We just want to get a few things cleared up. So, if you could just answer a few questions, we’ll send you on your way.”

“All right.”

“Just so you know, this conversation is being recorded.”

“That’s fine.” 

“All right, so, am I right in assuming you are a resident of the apartment building where today’s incident took place?”

“Yes.”

“You live on the fourth floor, in the apartment immediately adjacent to the staircase?”

“Yes.”

“So, a person coming up the stairs, who was in need of assistance, would happen upon your apartment first, is that correct?”

“Yes. There is an apartment opposite mine, too, but the door to mine is closer to the stairwell.”

“I see. That would be a reasonable explanation for why the subject chose your door. Because, as I understand it, the two of you did not know each other prior to today?”

“I have never seen her before. I cannot say whether she knew me or not, though it seems unlikely.”

“Yes, certainly looks like happenstance.”

“Yes.”

“Okay, I know you’ve given your statement already, but if you could repeat the sequence of events for us again, it would help put things in perspective.”

“There is nothing more to add to that, really.”

“I understand, ma’am, and I know this may feel redundant to you, but would you mind?”

“Very well.”

“Thank you. Please begin by explaining what you were doing at the time.”

“I was at home. I’m always at home, you see. I much prefer it that way. I was doing a spot of cleaning when the commotion started.”

“Do you work from your residence?”

“I am unemployed.”

“All right. And if you don’t mind me asking, how do you get by?”

“My father left a trust fund in my name. I get a monthly allowance that allows me to live quite comfortably.”

“Okay. How often would you say you leave your home?”

“I don’t.”

“Ever?”

“Ever.”

“Just to clarify, I am asking if you leave your residence for any purpose whatsoever. To meet a friend, to attend social occasions, to pop down to the cafe or drop by the grocery store, to check your mailbox. Absolutely anything.”

“I don’t.”

“Okay. When was the last time you left your residence before today?”

“Eight months ago.”

“Eight months?!”

“Yes. To attend my husband’s funeral.”

“I’m sorry to hear that.”

“Thank you.”

“Okay, so you haven’t left your house in eight months.”

“No.”

“Do you get visitors, often?”

“Only the people who bring me things I need.”

“No friends? Relatives?”

“No.”

“So, just the grocer, then?”

“The grocer boy comes once a week. He also brings me my mail. My accountant visits weekly as well. She pays the bills and takes care of everything that requires travel, and brings me my monthly allowance. A hairdresser comes once a month, she takes care of all my cosmetic needs. Everyone else is discouraged. My doorman is compensated handsomely to ensure that none other than these people are allowed to visit me.”

“Okay. Let’s get back to the sequence of events. You were cleaning, you said? Which room were you in?”

“I was cleaning the bookshelf in the hall.”

“The hall that connects to the corridor through the main door?”

“Yes.”

“So you were near the door when the subject arrived.”

“Yes.”

“Are the walls in your building very thick?”

“I’m sorry?”

“I’m wondering if sounds from outside your apartment make their way in with ease or whether the walls block or muffle them.”

“The walls are not very thick.”

“So, a commotion in the corridor would be reasonably audible to you if you stood in the hall, as you were then?”

“Yes.”

“Okay, please continue.”

“I was cleaning the bookshelf, when I heard footsteps thundering up the stairwell. In short order, someone began to bang on the door and scream.”

“Could you describe the voice as you heard it?”

“It was feminine. Not too old. I would guess she was middle aged. She seemed greatly distressed. I couldn’t always tell what she was saying, but it was clear she needed help.”

“All right. And how did you react to this?”

“I… I didn’t.”

“You didn’t react?”

“Not exactly.”

“Could you elaborate on that, please?”

“I was shocked, unused as I am to have someone call at my house like this. I sort of froze momentarily.”

“And then?”

“Then… I resumed cleaning.”

“Excuse me?”

“I resumed cleaning the bookshelf.”

“I’m sorry, this is a bit confusing to me. How long would you say the woman was at your door?”

“About two minutes, at first, I’d suppose.”

“What do you mean, ‘At first’?”

“She came to my door twice.”

“So, after her initial plea for help, she left and then returned once again?”

“She did not leave the building. She tried knocking on the other doors. I do not think she got a response. She returned to my door and tried once again before…”

“Okay. So, the first time around, she came to your door and banged on it while screaming for help. Then she tried the doors of other apartments. None of them were occupied at the time, so naturally, she did not receive a response. She then returned to yours, drawn, possibly by the lights that were on in your apartment. And presumably, her killer arrived shortly after. At what point during these proceedings did you resume cleaning?”

“Does that matter?”

“It could.”

“Am I a suspect?”

“Please answer the question. At what point in the sequence of events did you resume cleaning.”

“During the first attempt.”

“You resumed cleaning while she was still begging you for help?”

“Yes.”

“You did not consider opening the door for her?”

“I did.”

“But you decided against it.”

“Yes.”

“May I ask your reasoning for this decision?”

“I…”

“Well?”

“I was cleaning.”

“And that forced you to abandon this woman’s plea for help?”

“Yes.”

“Was it because you thought that you would endanger yourself by admitting her?”

“No.”

“Did you think she was putting on an act to trick you into letting her in?”

“No.”

“So you didn’t make this decision out of concern for your safety?”

“I am not a coward!”

“I see. But you were cleaning, and so did not open the door.”

“Yes.”

“Do you see why this fails to register as an acceptable excuse?”

“It is not an excuse!”

“Do you think what you did was right?”

“I think what I did was necessary.”

“Cleaning your bookshelf was more necessary than helping save someone’s life?”

“You are oversimplifying the matter.”

“It seems pretty straight-forward to me.”

“I did not come here to be insulted. If I am not a suspect, I would like to go home.”

“You may go as soon as you can tell me why you felt your bookshelf warranted more attention than a human life.”

“You want to know why it was necessary?”

“Yes.”

“Very well. This is my account, in its entirety. You may think of it what you please. And this will be the end of my testimony unless I receive an official summons from a court of law.”

“That’s well and good.”

“All right.

I was born into money. Ridiculous amounts of money. Enough to ensure that I could live a lifetime without knowing what financial worries felt like. My parents knew this, and proceeded to raise me in a way that left me absolutely unable to cope with any problems on my own. I was left toothless and clawless in this most chaotic of worlds. The first inkling I had that all may not be well, was when my mother died. Suddenly, the shadows of lurking worries that had been banished all my life by the light of our fortune began to dance before my eyes. Our household was not what it used to be. Everything got shoddy and messy and spiralled more and more out of control.

I got married off to a man just as blessed in the material sense. Daddy passed soon after, leaving me to my husband’s care. Lacking any other family, I made him my world. I spent eleven years with him, devoting every waking hour to arranging our life so that we could live a long, comfortable life together. And then, just like that, he was gone. All my plans and dreams and arrangements were for nothing. My life lay in ruins.

I came to the realization that every period of perfect serenity in my life had been disturbed by someone else. People were too unpredictable. Things have a wonderfully compliant manner of letting themselves be arranged into neat little categories. People, on the other hand, are chaotic. You cannot plan for people. And so, eight months ago, I made a decision.

I would no longer allow people into my life. If I had to confine myself, I would, but I would surround myself with things under my control. I would surround myself with order. No speck of dust can rear its head in my apartment without my knowing it. In my house there is no compromise, no half measure. Everything has its place and its aesthetic.

In the last eight months, the greatest crisis I have had to face is a temporary shortage in my preferred brand of soap. Many people would kill for such serenity. And I, the same toothless, clawless worm who had changed hands like some family heirloom, had achieved this all on my own.

And then, this woman… This freak comes, shrieking like a banshee, piercing my heart with the ugliness of her screeches, chilling me to the bone. She was no victim. She was the disturbance!

What good would have come of me opening the door? How was I to explain to a hysterical woman how to acceptably sit on a diwan so as not to overly crumple my sheets? Would someone afraid for their life pause to consider the state of their footwear before traipsing their filth all over my carpets? Could I, having been let down at every turn by this most horrid of races, have been expected to be accepting of this most unwelcome intrusion into my sanctity? Am I not right in protecting myself?

Tell me, Officer, having been through what I have been, was my decision not one of necessity, rather than of cowardice?”

The officer stared at her, speechless, as he let her words sink in. Nothing more was said for a long moment.

“I think, if there is nothing more, that I shall be making my way home.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Goodbye.”

“Goodbye.”

The Forgotten Kiss

I am Time. I am Fury. I am Hate.

I was nothing. And then, all at once, I was. Nothing exists that can encapsulate what that initial explosion is like. There is no method of depiction, no language, no concept that can begin to approach the expression of its expanse.

I was overcome, almost instantaneously, by an utter and absolute burning. A conflagration of matter and emotion in perpetual and simultaneous combustion. My first memories are of wrath at having been brought to be. Whether this was happenstance or by design did not matter. Whether there were others or I was to be a singularity did not matter. I found myself created without consent and without an escape. I had been set alight without the instructions to extinguish the flame. I was bound by the cruel chains of my own energy.

All about me, I found the universe in chaos. Lifeless objects flew pell-mell, without dignity or decorum. None asserted their will. Those within my reach I wrenched from their predestined paths, tearing them asunder, consigning them to powdered oblivion. Others, more distant and immune to my rage, I nudged, seducing them, coaxing them, convincing them to smash into their brethren. The black nothing of space was set aflame with a splendid canopy of fireworks that lasted eons. Countless ages passed before the void was allowed back into my domain.

At periodic intervals, my bile overflowed, and I spewed forth infernal fountains in every direction. Anything that lay in its path was obliterated, an illusory, particulate mist the only remaining evidence of its brief existence.

None can know how long I wrought this carnage. Time had little meaning while my fury was fresh. 
But, inevitably, after many thousands, or millions or billions of years, I felt my powers abate. Void, ever-present and opportunistic, took its chance and re-entered my realm. And though I warded off its many pronged attacks with desperate force, I could feel my flames ebb into insignificance. Void encroached, bit by bit, cooling magma here, solidifying rocks there. My world, which had once allowed only fire and fury, began to be overrun by a pestilence of cold, lifeless blobs.

In time, the rocks congealed and grouped together, coagulating to form a vast army of eyesores, circling round me, making a mockery of my rage. Those that strayed too close, I reduced to blessed nothingness. But most stayed well out of my reach, having been trained in the art of deceit and survival by the cunning void.

It became clear to me, by now, that the battle was lost. To fight meant to expend energy, and Void thrived where energy perished. I was fuelling my opponent with every sally. And so, though I felt myself still capable of many terrible deeds, I simmered.

It was during this ceasefire that I first noticed my greatest indignity. Hidden away in the crevices of one of the more insignificant clump of rocks, tiny, abortive aberrations of carbon began to replicate. Against all odds, overcoming incredible obstacles and catastrophic setbacks, they kept at their task. They appeared to have no aim, no higher purpose. They existed merely to proliferate. 
Time (at once me and my greatest enemy) allowed them the luxury of becoming more complex. Those infinitesimal blemishes spread like a ghastly miasma all over the rock, altering themselves, adapting unabashedly to whatever new environment they encountered. I watched, aghast at their impertinence, as they grew into a diverse multitude of machines, blindly consuming matter and spouting forth more copies of themselves.

This show of vulgar ambition in the very midst of my sphere of influence, appalling in its brazenness, decided my course of action for me. I may not be able to stave off the relentless probes of the void, but I would avenge this insult, no matter the cost.

The copy machines, meanwhile, produced ever larger and more abhorrent versions of themselves, replete with flaws and fatal inefficiencies. The entire phenomenon was one of stunning incompetence achieving unrivalled success. Unbelievably, one frail and improbable species rose above all others, dominating life despite themselves. They warred against their own instincts, they warred amidst their own species, and they warred with the very environment that provided them shelter.

In time, Fortune showering them with her favour for an inexplicably long period, they flourished. The entire rock was overrun by them and their creations. They erected what were, to their eyes, monumental edifices. They developed ever more complex and bizarrely convoluted means of communicating with each other. They buried their existence under so much self-made rubble, that, for the most part, they forgot that a universe existed outside their rock. Their primitive minds worried and panicked and fixated and ideated upon the various measly issues that threatened their existence. Those touted as the best amongst them formulated wonderfully absurd solutions to these issues and watched as every one of these attempts failed spectacularly, leaving them exactly where they began: teetering on the brink of extinction, surviving on pure, blind luck.

But all this wasn’t to last. Not on my watch.

———————————————————————————

C-12 lay on his bed, the laptop’s keys clacking obediently to his digital commands. His wife lay at his side, snoring softly, grinding her teeth, chewing at some imaginary bit in her dreams. The cats curled around her legs, ignoring him.

He glanced out of the window at the roads, deserted except for a pack of stray dogs doing their nightly rounds.

He glanced at the clock. 1:58 a.m. He had to wake up for work in four hours.

He glanced longingly at his X-box, considering whether another game was worth the lost sleep. Reluctantly, he decided against it.

With a sigh, he turned to his wife, leaning in to kiss her goodnight. Before his lips touched hers, the insignificant clump of rocks he called his world burst into flames.

MISOPHONIA

I do not know tranquility, for even at its quietest, when the world abandons its chaotic refrain for an infinitesimal moment, I am subjected to the sound of life.

My ragged breath, infected with tar and cholesterol, struggling forth from my coal black lungs, falls limply out of my mouth and nose, defeated by its gruesome origin. It meets the fresh, incoming horde that is all a-bustle with zest and enthusiasm. It infects them with its disillusionment so that, even as the horde enters my person, it is already a minion of despair.

This arrhythmic phenomenon plays out over and over, keeping time for decay and degradation, flooding the universe with discordant malaise.

It is a constant reminder to me of my frailty, of my insignificance, of my helplessness.

And yet, I do not begrudge it its existence, for even the botched may demand its right to exist. What I object to is its extortion. I partake of its abortive existence without consent. I was not consulted when this commingling took birth. I am a bonded labourer, forced to participate in this parasitical endeavour.

For it is a parasite, and nothing more. Always begging the Universe for life, and returning only fumes. A grey, stolid edifice that spews forth toxicity. I did not wish my body to be an imitation of the pollutive industrial revolution. They, at least, had the excuse of facilitating progress. I consume only to prolong this downward spiral.

And yet, I am not allowed an option to extricate myself. The contract is absolute. Where the parasite wishes to go, I must carry it. I am a powerless vessel, given illusory rights and meaningless titles, but in the end, a glorified slave.

And so, though my soul craves tranquility, yearns for solace and solitude and pleads for stillness, I run headlong into cacophony, submerging myself in the brash and the loud, surrounding myself with chaos and pandemonium. Anything to distract from this endless, gangrenous hiss. Anything to drown out the festering rattle of half-life.

I live in fear of the calm. I go to bed with the frenetic, trusting in its incessantness to be my guardian through the perilous, mute nights.

One day, when I have fulfilled my obligations to this pitiless tyrant, and my body has broken beyond repair, I will be set free and embrace, unbreathing, the silent void. And only then will my soul know tranquility.

The Unwanted Tenant

I do not know much about my past. It seems all aswirl with vague wisps of sounds and urges. It is far too liquid for my simple brain to grasp, to come to terms with, to claim.

My first memory is of a beautiful visual. To those who have lived and remembered long, it may not seem all that wondrous, but to me at the time, with my near non-existent body of experience, it was breathtaking.

It was, for lack of a better word, a box. Not a dead, drab box of cardboard and creases, but a living, throbbing, all-encompassing box. It was my universe and I had no trouble believing in its infiniteness.

It seemed to be saturated with the stuff of life, and I unabashedly nourished myself at its expense. The ectoplasmic texture did not repulse me, I felt one with it. I did not feel like a consumer, but a fellow amoeboid, at once imbuing and being imbued.

And I grew.

There are various forms of power that sentient beings seek to manifest in their lives, many that have been studied, written about and analyzed ad nauseum. But there is none that approaches the sheer euphoric experience of pure expansion. There are its subsidiary forms that man and beast have practiced, i.e. territorial expansion, expansion of the phallic member, so-called expansion of the mind. Each of these has enthralled man from the beginning of time, and yet how hollow, how frail they seem in comparison to true expansion.

I grew at a disconcerting rate, my infantile mind was not equipped to coordinate such vast entities. I flailed uncontrollably, and my malleable shoebox universe contorted itself to accommodate me.
And as I grew, I became cognizant of the first stirrings of my bane.

It grew from within, an unrelenting volcanic urge, the ferocity of which overwhelmed me. No longer did I feel the oneness, the merging of two homogenic entities. All I felt now was a yearning, a deep, wild lust for possession, for absolute domination.

And as this seething, animalistic urge reached its zenith, disaster struck. Suddenly, my safe, secure existence was assaulted with the cold winds of reality. My liquid life-stuff drained away, baring my just formed skin to the rough, vulgar kiss of the ragged air.

My universe began to convulse, tossing me hither and thither with gay abandon, bending me to its will. Gone was the accommodating, nourishing love. And, for the first time in my fledgling life, I felt fear.

This was not a passing mood. This was a brutal spurning, a message sent in the clearest terms. My advances had been rejected absolutely and I was no longer welcome.

Everywhere, the walls squeezed at me, pressuring me towards the harsh and ugly light. I thrashed in desperation, but one cannot outmuscle one’s creator. I found myself gasping, when I had never needed to breathe before. I felt pain, a sensation I could not have imagined in my darkest dreams. But, over and above the entire miasma, the scalding spear that pierced to my very core, was my unsatiated lust. It grew too strong within me for it to be denied an object. Rejection was not acceptable. It gnawed at my insides, ravaging all in its wrath, and in excruciation, I shrieked.

As my primal wail reverberated through space and time, my universe contorted itself one last time, pressing me through a gap that seemed to small to allow me through, as if it was not meant for me, but for some less significant creature. I felt the indignity of this forced departure severely, and yet I had no time to wallow in my grief. For, with jarring suddenness, I was introduced to my new universe.

Many words and emotions flitted through my head as I took in my new world. Its vastness seemed unfathomable, and yet it was not awe that overcame me, it was disgust.

While my shoebox had throbbed and hummed and moved to its own symphony, maintaining a melodic oneness with its inhabitants, this new world was all brash cacophony and discordant din.

And the ugliness.

Vulgar and depraved colors struck my eyes, causing me anguish beyond cognition. Warped and deformed beings in strange skins surrounded me, jabbering at me in barbaric tongues. Why was this universe allowed to exist? Where was its melody? Where was the unity?

The sensations overwhelmed me, I felt putrid hate rise up within me and it spewed out the orifice in my face. I felt the world around me darken, as my eyes refused to open again, and my heart, in protest, stood still.

The Birth of Impurity

Tiny hovels, hidden away in remote corners of faraway nations, often conceal the essence of an army of spirits, the strength of which, in more fortunate universes, may have steered the course of life towards a more meaningful end. Many a potential revolutionary died in obscurity, having drained their life-force battling the elements of nature, trying to coax a good yield out of the earth so their families could eat. The human mind does not allow for ambition before it is paid its due.



The particular spirit that inhabits this story was only slightly more fortunate, in that her life was not frittered away in the mere pursuit of fuel. Born not into abject poverty, her family was, nevertheless, far from affluent. Their lot was not to starve for food, but for experiences that were denied to those without cash to burn. And thus, her spirit stewed for two decades, assured of life, but denied living.



And her life would have continued these meandering, meaningless wanderings, eventually merging with the universe and dissolving into nothingness, had it not been for a chance encounter with another spirit that muddled the entire course that had been charted out for her, and left it in tatters.

The assailing spirit belonged to her antithesis. It seemed to exist merely to accentuate its contrast to her in every way, calculable or incalculable.

She was light, he was the void. She was kindness, he was cynicism. She was temperance and moderation, he was excess and vulgarity. She was conscience, he was instinct. She was tradition, he was atavism.



She was civilisation, he was the wilderness.



Love, up to its old, mean-spirited tricks, wove her into his web, setting into motion the spiral that so many have been lost to. As the indecipherable chasm that was his being gaped open, her spirit flew headlong into it, determined to illumine it, and in doing so, become illumined herself (for light is often blind to itself).  



She was a woman of defined goals and a disposition towards stagnation. She had learnt early what she desired, and stuck to those dreams for most of her life, perfectly content to let them remain dreams without aspiring to any action that would help realise them. She wanted the simple life: a warm hearth, general good cheer, marriage, kids, and all the frills that come with it. She was possessed of a not insignificant amount of latent talent, but its latency caused her no chagrin. She was content to be a homemaker and devote her life to mediocrity. 



The Assailant changed all that, for he was a man of restlessness and action. His personality was akin to a river that did not acknowledge banks or dams, and overflowing its bounds with gay abandon, wreaked havoc wherever it went, leaving everything it touched a congealed, rotting mass. 



The courtship was swift and fatal. His skill lay in eloquence, her ruling trait was empathy, and this deadly concoction sealed her fate. He weeded out and laid waste to every opinion, every aspiration, every harmless belief she held dear. All the inconsequential little nothings that piece together to form a whole soul were hunted down and destroyed with a ferocity that left her defenceless. A few whirlwind months into the relationship, she stood no longer on stable ground, but floundered in a current characterised by torment and tumult, dragging her down to the composed wrath of the deep sea. 



Every flicker of humanity that unwittingly escaped her in her unguarded moments, whether it was a display of genuine sympathy to the downtrodden or a moment of private mourning for some public tragedy, was immediately extinguished by a flood of polemic. He had immense resources to draw upon, a library full of authors provided him with all the ammunition he needed, for artists are a bitter lot and contain within themselves a heavy tendency towards cynicism. 



Her repartees were confined to ethereal nothings and prettily phrased wisps of smoke. Her flower petals wilted, toothless and impotent before his steel and fire. Her flickering candle could not melt his age-accumulated, hardened slabs of ice. The battleground was rigged heavily in his favour, and there was only one winner in this non-contest.



And thus it was that the Assailant drew her light so far into the nothingness that he concealed within, that her illumination, although inextinguishable as all light is, was lost to the world. It was dispersed and entangled and entrapped under loathsome blankets of vitriolic bile, an unending fount of which seemed to spring forth from him at every opportunity.



Her pure flow of simple thought and genuine emotion was befouled by cold, impersonal statistics and stolid facts derived from sources that viewed humanity not as a living, breathing and evolving entity, but as a rotting corpse fit only for a post mortem conducted to sate mild, whimsical curiosity. Her waters turned slowly putrid, frothing over, saturated as it was with his toxic refuse.


The Spirit, once pure and radiant, of fair and elegant countenance, now found in her reflection a bruised, battered and broken face. The eyes still bore the twinkle of innocence, for the damage was all external, but lost amidst the scabs and swellings surrounding it, that twinkle suffered the familiar fate of death in obscurity.



Long after the Spirit had become one with the Eternal, and left behind her fragmented husk, passersby would remark on its depravity and ponder the circumstances that allowed such filth to fester. 

And somewhere within that decomposing husk, Innocence would cry out, unheard, pleading its case to Nothingness.

YOUR WORLD IS ENDING

The world is ending. The world is ending.

They pay no heed to me. I am an abstract concept, they say. But I will send them their doom and will still be here long after they aren’t.

They know much about me. Many careers were built studying me, many households ran on the earnings from said careers. But they still do not quite grasp it. They know all the little details, but they do not see the bigger picture. They never have, and now they cannot, for their time is up.



The world is ending. Yet I see little people making little plans, oblivious to their fate:

A mother, daydreaming, fantasizing about her son’s upcoming wedding, hoping it will bring an oft aloof family closer. Dreaming her dreams of lavish ceremonies and the distant, gurgling laugh of future grandchildren.

A couple, struggling for three years through misery, tears and sacrifice to build a relationship that will stand the test of time. That endeavour may just be successful, for Time itself is not long for this world.

A rural settlement, situated at a location which was once dictated by economics and convenience, is now annually threatened by deluges. But they do not move, for they are significantly more averse to migration now than they were in their early years. They cry when their clutter is washed away. They gnash their teeth and beat their chests. But once the waters have died down, they start collecting their little fragments and putting them together again. They know not that every brick they lay serves only to strike all the harder at the next house when the time comes.

Sometimes, they raise a great hue and cry at some events, naming them disasters and pulling together momentarily to control the extent of its damage. But at other times, when the ones affected are far away or not so high-born, they turn a blind eye and continue to live their lives.

The noble ones sit around tables, sheltered away from the world, making plans that span centuries.
“We shall save the world,” they say, but they mean to save only themselves.

The greedy ones care not, and frolick with abandon. One could ascribe wisdom to their behaviour, but there is no depth to their activity. They are compelled by nature and a lack of cognition to behave that way, and so blundering, just happened upon the optimal path.

“The world could end at any time,” say the experts, and list out all the different ways they could die in a neat little well-edited YouTube video. And the masses gasp and shake their heads and then make their way to the kitchen to cook their next meal.



The world is ending, and yet order is what everyone seeks. Whole millenia of “progress” has strived towards this goal. Establishing stability, predictability, and, above all, control. However, the entire structure is contructed on the frailest and ficklest base. One flinch, and all is lost.

Save money.

Make the world a better place for your children.

Do not litter.

Protect the environment.


All these little manifestations of denial infest their kind, and any who do not heed these dictums are dismissed as immature.

“Cynicism gets you nowhere,” say the civilization, sitting atop a teetering tower.

“If you aren’t helping fix the problem, then you are a part of it,” moralizes one krill to the other, as the both of them and everyone around them gets swallowed up by a blue whale.

“Plan ahead and you shall be successful,” says the bishop to the rook, while the chessboard itself prepares to crumble.

“Pandas are no longer endangered,” says a man, pride in his eyes, as he rests in his house built on fault-lines that could submerge entire countries with one little slip.


The world is ending, and yet they wish to meet their end, squabbling about gender pronouns and pay-to-win mobile games.


I could end them with a prolonged siege, sending forth my liquid host, piecemeal. But I, unlike them, have a sense of style. The end of a being, no matter how insignificant, should be a cataclysmic event, not a gradual fading.

No, theirs shall be an end by earth, wind, ice and fire. The hordes shall not die meaninglessly, like nameless soldiers vaporized in an accidental blast, but shall enjoy the honor of variegated inflictions.

They, who did nothing of any value in all their lives, will achieve sublimity in their annihilation.