Fly On The Wall: Fairy Tales From A Misanthropic Universe, Vol. I (9 page)

Once upon a
time, there was a monk, a very special monk. He knew not where he
had been born or what his name had been. It took months of travel
to reach his destination those many, many years ago. Guided by an
irresistible urge he ventured forth, 60 years to the day he arrived
at the monastery. Then he had been youthful, spry, and excited
about his future. Yet he was so now too. His life work stretched
out before him in the monastery's courtyard. It was the most
beautiful, largest, and most detailed sand mandala ever to have
been witnessed.

For 60 years,
driven by divine urges, he woke faithfully at 4am and worked. For
60 years, day in and day out, he spent every minute by the mandala.
For 60 years all those who passed by could hear a faint musical
ringing around them, the gentle scraping noise which came from his
chak pur. The noise sounded off the courtyard walls with soft
echoes. For 60 years the monk studied, for 60 years he meditated;
how quick those 60 years had gone. The day this story came to be
was unlike any other, for he would be done. Each minute grain of
sand would finally find its perfect resting place. The temple
courtyard was full of brightly colored grains which the monk had
meticulously lain out. It was as though the mandala itself had
brought the peaceful calm over the courtyard, not a single errant
leaf moved on its own. Wind was the scary unknown. With every
misplaced grain, he'd felt trepidation. With every choice of color
he'd worried, but through it all he followed the design
religiously, and today he finishes. His faith guided him to make
the greatest one of all. The monk didn't know how he knew this, but
then he didn't even know what made him start in the first place, or
what made him continue all those long days. He did not know what
had driven to abandon everyone, and everything, all for this single
minded purpose. He did not even know how the design came to his
head. With the last rub of his chak pur, the final few particles
tumbled into place and weakly ringing echo died down.

For a brief
moment, all was right in the world. Wars, fights, death, all
paused. The monk looked upon his mandala, his mind, and his soul,
were then engorged with love, and found peace. For that brief time,
understanding ruled supreme.

All it took
was a gentle gust, a calm calamity.

The day had
been a dark one, gray clouds marred a normally endless blue beauty.
Throngs of people gathered and waited, thousands upon thousands of
people all exercised deep patience; they sang and danced in anxious
jubilation. The hot atmosphere could not, regardless of conditions,
seem oppressive. Not on that day.

The colors of
the plane peeked through the clouds first, a fiery blood red,
precious shining gold, and lush green; raindrops were birthed of
the gestating sky. It was not an unwelcome drizzle, a long drought
had taken its toll, the crops were brown and burnt. The metal bird
burst through the cloud ceiling, parting the gray around it and
revealing blue once more.

The storied
colors and roaring lion spoke to the resolve of the being inside. A
single pair of wings was heard, fluttering above the crowd. A
strangely audible sound in the tumult filled air. Propellers
chopped the air, drums beat out entrancing homoousian rhythms,
horns cried gladly too. But the wingbeats were heard, and so the
people watched the single white dove fly above, heralding his
arrival. After that, the colorfully painted silver bird landed too,
to the roar of the delighted gathering.

When the door
opened the crowd grew louder still. The falling drops which had
seemed so ominous, so wet, and so strong, were now all but gone;
only sand bubbles remained among the parched crowd. A patch of blue
opened above the crowds, but all could see the curtain of water
which fell around their dry parcel. They rushed forth like an ocean
wave, flooding the ground around his plane; hoping to catch a
glimpse of HIM. Countless years of insufferable suffering had
passed until he came, and many years it would be again until he
would come once more. At least it was not all for naught, they knew
well they would achieve that for which they'd fought.

Much to the
crowd's delight he appears at the silver bird's portal. He holds
his hand to the sky to greet, and just then great gestating clouds
roll in. The rain begins to fall, the roar grows too. Down he
comes, and on pure ground he treads, no noble blood-soaked rag for
HIM. To the tricksters he gifted coffins, in them: nails. They
cowered before a righteous, unexpected roar. No matter what they
try, their tricks can not make HIM stop, all their plans are foiled
and flop. All the might and all the dread from that great mountain
can barely break the pace, can only make HIM leave a moment to a
most holy place.

It does not
matter though, for as before when the drought is at its worst, he
will come again, and with him comes the rain. The drought which so
affected those crops so many years ago, now affects the soul,
driving us to anger, to hatred, and to tyranny. That rain too which
proceeded HIM will come again, wetting the seeds of love, now so
deeply forgotten within us. Water – life's birthplace – is the most
powerful thing on this planet's face. From the slow moving, quick
carving, glaciers, to those sacred drought ending rains. As before,
so too shall it again be.

It always
started the same way, metal. Everything tasted of metal. Iron.
Other metals had different flavors, but this was unmistakably iron.
He dreaded it. He had been called paranormal, wacky, creepy, scary,
disgusting, and even satanic, by those who claimed to love him
most. Shunning would have been a too lenient trial for him they had
decided, then strangers could still speak to him. It was through
his cursed ailment that he came to be, here where tree trunks
covered all one's vision, far from all. Now it was just him, the
wolves, and bears. He often wondered whether it was any real
improvement, they could, after all, smell it.

He
retched.

The first
time it happened was when he had just come to life. The doctors had
pulled him from his mother and held him up high. He coughed in that
shrill newborn's tone, and blood bubbles sputtered from his lips.
Then he coughed again, and again, and again. Those sputters soon
grew, and from them flowed more fluid – but no yellow phlegm this,
instead scarlet droplets stained the operatory floor. Blood poured
from his tiny mouth onto where so many crimson stains had been
before. This time, it held more than mere small stains though.
Newborn though he was, he vomited with the force of a great man,
his head thrashed, spraying the whole room. The doctors nearly
dropped him on witnessing such an awful sight; they panicked and
yelled at one another, none had seen such horrors before; they
tried to find a way to stem the flow. They failed, and in that
failure failed too to notice his ever more sallow and anemic
mother. The phenomenon had made them lose their senses, had made
them loose attention. She had become paler and paler; her pulse had
weakened, and her movements had quietened: the blood had drained
from her invisibly. A final extended tone indicated her demise. Her
blood, her life force, now pooled on the floor, and stained the
walls, as well the doctors' scrubs. The doctors who had seen and
helped with many horrors, and brought back many from death's honed
edge, were now well and truly traumatized. They performed many a
test throughout his life to try and discover his disease, but all
faltered. They had carried out many treatments, from electric
shocks, to pills, to priests, but none had been
successful.

He coughed, a
small red fleck stained the wooden floor of his forest
hut.

He did not
know if he could live through it again. All who got near, all who
became dear to him. all their blood was inevitably expelled from
his mouth. But none were near now, so whose blood could it be but
his own? Those who tried to help all ran eventually too, for they
perished one by one. Those who sought to weaponize him ran further
than that still, they sustained much bigger casualties still. They
even failed to euthanize the wretched man, for each would be
executioner just dropped, drained. Even hidden expert marksmen just
expired, blown out like candles on a birthday cake. He was happy
that this time at least it would be own demise, he could feel it –
he knew it was. At least it was over, he would not be forced, time
and time again, by some cruel joke of fate, to watch more lives
sucked out.

He coughed
again, blood rushed up his esophaguS, and welled up in his mouth.
The metal taste intensified. That old familiar flavor found his
tastebuds all too well. He wished that he'd had strength to end it
all himself, but the irony was that despite being surrounded by so
much death he could never seek his own, merely await it eagerly.
With a great big gulp, he swallowed the dread liquid once more,
still fearing it might not be his.

He remembered
the last time it happened. He knew not how long it had been for
such singular existence has no clock. He thought only a few seasons
had passed since then but was not sure. He could remember the event
with startling precision. There he'd sat, on an empty park bench,
tormented by the loneliness which had always been the order of the
day, at least until she'd walked by. He jumped form his seat and
rushed to woo her with a cheesy pickup line. Luckily she didn't
mind the cheesiness, all she had ever wanted to do was help, not
just him either, but everyone. She was kind, and that was all that
mattered to one as accursed as he'd been. He thought her love had
cured his malady. First, he'd stayed quite far from her, in fear of
himself, but when it didn’t happen for a few years, he began to
doubt. Each time the man descended to the city he saw her, catching
glimpses of her reflected off busy window-panes whose lifeless,
posed mannequins mocked him with their hollow immortality. He
became convinced that they were meant to be. That she was his one,
that she was his cure. Those seasons ago he had arranged everything
just so, and waited, almost trembling with the anticipation at the
thought of her arrival. He barely hid his childlike joy at the
thought of surprising her.

It was
coming, he could feel the nausea.

She had been
shocked indeed, her eyes grew wide and her lips parted. The twinkle
within the glassy green seas danced joyously, and she smiled with
love and pity in equal measure. Tears welled up in her eyes when
he'd proposed. Excessive conflicting emotions got all entangled in
her heart. She hoped that he would be ok, that they would be ok.
She had watched him kneel down knowing what was to happen, and
hadn't said a word, not until he'd finished his, and even then just
one: No.

He remembered
how she stared at him, how she smiled, like Jesus to a child. He
wanted her, he needed her, he prayed to be cured, and so, to
convince her he wept too. Dollops of tears he'd forced to gather as
one moistened his cold-blooded face, and he bore his many teeth
like a Caiman's spiky smile. She swayed and felt lightheaded. As
soon as she opened her mouth to say “Yes,”, it began. She suddenly
lacked energy; she could feel it happen. He had told her what he
could, indeed, he had told her it probably would, but she hadn't
given his mad ramblings any thought. With terror in her eyes and
horror in her heart, she'd looked down to her ever paler arms as he
gurgled. Soon she too was as dry as the Mojave, and like the many
floors which he had stained before he would stain that asphalt
street too. And soon, he would run away again, chased and branded
as “witch”, each time his life considered forfeit by the tyranny of
frightened masses.

He smiled one
last smile before it began. This time it was different, he could
feel it, this time, he would be free, unencumbered by accursed
life, by its horrid pain. Finally, he could be with her.

He began
vomiting, covering yet another floor in a thin, red, life-granting
glaze. Outside his cabin, a bear began to lose its
balance.

He chortles as
they descend, drawing raised eyebrows from Hugo. It's finally
happening, they'll soon reach the centre – the hot, molten, core of
earth. Moths had passed and many had toiled to make this all
happen. The journey they took now has been mocked by all, but
they'd persevered, and now they'll soon be there.

From the third
grade, he had always wished to find what lay there, such a journey
in those days was thought absurd. The pressure and heat were far
too great, and it was no wise idea to tempt fate for a number of
other explorers had died upon that same route. But he heeded not,
and instead he did as his dreams implored, he did as he thought. He
pursued what he would to make his dreams come true. He fought long
through much ridicule and adversity until bold new materials,
invented just for him, awaited his daring use. He did not expect to
find anything beyond hot molten rock, but that itself was quite
sufficient. Just so long as he was first, and so long as his
knowledge could be advanced.

If they were
right – if he was right – it meant a new era, one of unlimited
geothermal power; one of no hunger. At the very least he will at
least have achieved his dreams, one of the few people to ever do
so. Like Armstrong, he'll be the first, but like Cernan he will
likely also be the last. He will be remembered through all history,
his name known instantly. Benjamin sighs, that's all true enough,
but it's such a shame that they don't have a view. Of course, no
transparent material can yet withstand such stresses (and he dared
wait no longer), but even so he wonders what hides on the other
side of his protective metal shell.