The Creators Ch. 12

My breaths were labored, my chest was heaving, but no more tears fell from my eyes. My grief was dry now, and only the guilt was there to nurture it. I was not finished with my tale, but already I could feel the remaining columns beginning to fall. One after the other, the spires crumbled, and the ones left groaned under the weight of keeping the realms separate. It did not matter. It was inevitable.

"We did not know that Joy needed to be Hatred on the day of the blood corona sliver. For when the suns moved to part again, she did not have the affinity to keep her tether. The worlds broke, heaven was emptied, and all the souls were lost to oblivion. You have seen the last memory I had with Vitanimus, so I will not recount it. It is mostly true, though my mind has addled it somewhat. I killed him in my grief, and further formed Guilt beneath my very feet. But that was not what solidified my doom. For I went once more to the realm of my daughter, and found it to be a sterile, barren place. What was once a resplendent vision of tropical mountains that bore waterfalls and fjords, had become desolate hellscape of peaks with nothing but flat stone between them."

"You don't have to continue, Petranumen," Diamond whispered, holding me tight. "I can piece-together the rest."

"No," I breathed. "I must tell it."

"You heard a baby's cry," Diamond muttered. I could tell she was grieving by the shudder of her breaths, and that grief gave me strength.

"I heard it on the wind, and my heart filled. I raced through the frozen effigies of her realm, not caring that everything and everyone was gone. She had been reborn. I ran for miles before I remembered who I was, then I moved the astral plane around me until I came to the spot. It was a cave at the base of a mountain. I stepped in, and the last smile of hope I would ever wear faded from my face. The thing that bawled in the center of the cave was grey and dull. It had no color, no life, no soul. It was a mockery of Joy, a retardation of what she had been. It looked at me without compassion, and simply cried because that was what babies were so supposed to do. It was an affectation, for it stood on two feet a second later, and laughed while it cried, experimenting with the emotion to find the most believable result. It did not care for me at all. It walked right past me, and looked from dead eyes at the two suns. They were separate from each other, and the tether that had once held them had turned to frayed ribbons that glinted in the solar light, millions of miles away. The thing looked at the debris of its birth, and giggled. It sounded just like her. I wanted to kill it, Diamond, and I tried. When I heard that giggle, I took the infant by its feet, and I tried to dash its brains against the rocks. Nothing. I tried to throw it from the mountaintops, I tried to bury it beneath the earth, I tried to drown it in the rivers, but it didn't care. It just giggled, and I knew what it would become. A mask of Joy, just like Power, Greed and Corruption.

As great as my grief was, I knew that it was selfish. There were millions of other grievers, and they would look to me for explanation. So, I sat upon the rocks, and I wrote the Maternal Path. It took me one night to write the fiction that would forever slander Vitanimus, and create in me a kindly matriarch for all to remember me by. It would be the last word of the Elementals, and though most would see it as the lie that it was, they would still treasure it, for this book would mark the end of our era. And I knew that as time passed, and the story was told throughout the generations, that the word 'Elemental' would fade from memory, and 'Holy Mother' would grow in the lexicon. With a little time, my lie would become truth.

In my fevered grief, I tried to retain Joy's legacy in my new bible. I added her poetry; at least, that which I could remember. My mind had once been infinite and perfect, but it was becoming dark, and the memories were twisting. I no longer had autonomy over myself, and so the cognizant kingdom I had meticulously created fractured with my grief. My memories fell through the cracks of my psyche, and drained ceaselessly into the depths of Guilt. I was becoming her, so I used an old mask as a stopgap; Corruption. I filtered the trickle of my consciousness through that realm, and its apathy kept me sane enough to finish my book. When I was done, I read the manuscript with grim satisfaction. A little hand touched the final page when I flipped it, and I looked into the lifeless eyes of the thing.

"Mama," It said to me. It knew me, it remembered me, but it was not her. It was a thought left to torment me. Well, I knew how to fix that. I scratched out a few lines of my bible, and printed Hatred's destiny upon them. That thing would not emulate my daughter. I raised a podium in the deepest recesses of its mind, and I placed my lie in its center. Then I walked away as the realm changed; the mountains turning to volcanoes, the rivers turning to magma, and the grey sky turning black and acrid. When I arrived at gate to my realm, it was obstructed. The wrought-iron of Corruption's gate stood before me, and before that, the wispy beginnings of Guilt. I sprinted through it as quickly as I could, and it formed behind me, sealing me within.

I was a prisoner inside of Freedom, unable to deliver the Maternal Path to the world. I tried to create a doorway from my realm to earth, but I did not have the power; it was Vitanimus who could create tethers, and with him dead, I had lost my bound power. So I sat in my empty heaven, and I resigned myself to an eternity of introspection. One week of loneliness spurred my flight. I stepped from my realm, clothed myself in the armor of Corruption, then walked into oblivion. It was hell. I saw their grey faces, and I heard their accusing screams. You killed her, you killed her, you killed her. It was my guilt telling me what I knew in my heart to be true. It ravaged me even with Corruption on, and I was near-manic by the time I finally reached the edge of that realm, and found the door that had formed within my newest incarnation of Guilt. And when I opened that door, the astral plane was gone. The ordered, regimented land I had painstakingly constructed was true chaos now. I tucked myself into Corruption, and went to the only place that I knew could get me back to earth.

I created a door into Hatred's realm, and avoided the thing that lived there as well as I could. I created a door into the next realm of her evolution, which was predictably, Greed. Sorrow had not yet been formed, but I could see it on the horizon. Her evolution would be compelled by her host, but it was predestined. Within Greed, I found the broken remnants of the path to earth through Fedar's Gate. They seemed irreparable, but I had time. It was all I had. I fixed it as best I could, but Vitanimus's tether was not something I could duplicate. So, I made a simplified, stupid version. One that required me to leave most of myself behind. I dared not relieve myself of Corruption's armor when I had to pass back through Guilt to get home, so, Corruption was all that I brought with my soul. And from that repaired tether, I emerged into the world as Joy had so many times before; from the water.

I gave my lie to the people, then I faded into shadow. I did not know who I was, or what I was, but I had an inkling. I knew that I was in great pain, and that society and Vitanimus had been the cause of it. But I did not know Vitanimus's name any longer, so he became just 'Satan' to me, and I believed my own lie. I did not know it was me who had told it, for the Holy Mother was someone else.

For millennia I walked the earth as Corruption, a mask of myself, but with my eyes still behind it. I gave my gifts in exchange for power's children, and you can guess the significance of that, I am sure, but I was ignorant as to why I did it. The memories that stabbed me the deepest still echoed within me as Corruption, but instead of playing in my mind as thoughts, they compelled my actions like instincts. Meld with the child of power, love the child of power, destroy power with its own child. Take the pain away. Always take the pain away, for my child should never feel pain. These were the instincts that compelled me, and they would eventually compel me to go back to where I belonged. I would travel through Fedar's gate, not knowing that I had helped build it a thousand, thousand lifetimes ago. Then I would come back, and I would remember. You must know that I was ashamed of what I had done, and you must understand that I tried to stay in exile, but my misery was my only company. Inevitably, it became too much. I would slink back into Corruption, don her armor, endure the prison walls of Guilt, see the mockery of my daughter's consciousness, then slide blissfully into ignorance, and find someone new to love.

Then, they came. They came like comets from the spiritual plane, and pierced this astral world before crashing upon the one below. When I investigated the wreckage, I realized what they were. Elementals of flesh and blood, for they did not manipulate the astral plane as I had done, but pulled through it like a conduit, drawing their power from the spiritual plane, forming it in the astral plane, and then expressing it in the physical plane. They manifested themselves from Vitanimus's descendants, and I thought the world would be inundated with the new gods, as Vitanimus had been prolific, but it was not so. What had once been a constant of old times, was now an anomaly, a happenstance of chance that I do not know the reason of. The only way I can think to explain it, is with the analogy of a broken clock. The second hand belongs to the physical plane, the minute hand belongs to the astral plane, and the hour hand belongs to the spiritual plane. The return of the deities is marked when the hands overlap, but this clock cannot be timed, for the mechanism runs fast and slow, and sometimes in sync. However, there are signs of the Creators return. Moss will grow on the northern face of stones, fire will burn persistently even against the wind, and mountains will groan with accelerated uplift. These things cannot be sensed by short-lived mortals, but I could see them over the precluding centuries. I found it strange that the Heat Bringer came as it did, for it had been no more than a bastardization of a pure Elemental spirit. Why had water not returned? I pondered for an explanation, but I could not find one. Then it came to me, and the realization stuck me to my core. Somewhere in the spiritual cosmos, someone was giving me a second chance. I would not waste the opportunity."

I was numb. I could not feel Diamond's body pressed to mine, but I knew it was there. I could not hear her soothing whispers, though I know she uttered them. I could not smell her sweat-kissed flesh, nor taste her flavor in my mouth. I could not even see my hand before me. Everything was black, but I was not yet in damnation. I was passing through what was left of Corruption, floating and falling at the same time. I turned to my left, and saw a single spire in the distance. The last support that held the ceiling from the floor, and there were deep fractal cracks lining jaggedly across its surface. A single beam of chromatic light shined through the black above, bathed the spire in whites and greys, then died in the black below. For everything was blackness now. It had overtaken me, but I would finish my tale. Someone needed to tell my truth before the end. I knew I was still in bed with Diamond, and I sensed her agitation. I suspected that she was begging me to come back to her, and that suspicion gave me comfort. It was nice to be wanted. I angled my face over my shoulder, and spoke to the blackness there. I hoped I was connecting eyes with Diamond, but it was more than likely I was staring madly off into space. That idea caused me to smile, and my smile broadened when I thought of Diamond's alarm at seeing my manic grin. Soon, I was giggling like an idiot, and recanting the end of my story.

"I had a great affinity for the Earth Former spirit. If I melded with the Earth Former, and he or she bound with the Life Giver, then that binding would create a tethering of three knots, for I could manipulate the love of my host, and if the Life Giver loved my host back, then that meant he also loved me. From that union of Elemental spirits, another would be created. As had been the genesis of Joy, so would be my rebirth, for I would take power's womb one last time, but not as Corruption. It would be my soul that came forth; wholly me. A new Creator born to the world, but with my infinite mind. I would have the Life Giver lash the Heat Bringer's spirit to the astral suns upon the next blood corona sliver, and create a bridge between planes once again; a permanent bridge, for there would be no question of the Heat Bringer's affinity. I would once again become tethered to the astral plane, and regain my title as caretaker of heaven. I would fix it. I would fix all of it.

But I could only travel to earth as Corruption, and in that form, I was stupid. I forgot my purpose, and acted upon instinct. But I had time. Oh, I had eons and eons of tortuous time to stab blindly into the void until I found her: Flora Autumnsong; a princess of power with the blood of Vitanimus. Serendipity. Through Corruption, I recognized the importance of it, though I did not know why it was important. It did not matter, for once Corruption had her prey, she never let go. I gave Flora the means to bear one child, but only when I wanted her to conceive. I plotted tirelessly, constantly battling my own stupidity, fighting the infernal instincts Corruption had to tear down society and take the pain away. But it worked. I waited the centuries, and when the time was right, I gave Flora her child, the child of power, the Earth Former. My salvation.

I did not anticipate how strong Willowbud would be. She resisted me throughout her childhood, and for years during her banishment. I loved her as I loved all whose minds I touch, and seeing her endure such pain tortured me. You cannot imagine my ecstasy when she finally accepted me into her mind. From there, I was aimless and directionless, without purpose or reason. I was simply Corruption, then, I was not. Willowbud expelled me, and sent me screaming back into the astral plane. I was assaulted nakedly by Guilt, and the exposure was mortal. Corruption began to disintegrate, and the supports I had meticulously created to keep oblivion at bay began to crumble. It was only a matter of time, and I knew it. I knew Willowbud was my last chance, so I charged back into fray, dealing myself incalculable damage in the process. I found Willowbud, and I forced myself back into her. I was stupid and directionless again, solely Corruption once again, but then... then I saw him, and those scars that had become Corruption's instincts compelled her to act for my purpose. My hate and love for Vitanimus filtered into Corruption, but Willowbud's attraction to Brandon made the former predominant. She fell in love with him; I had succeeded. After epochs of waiting, failing and suffering, I had done it. It would only be a matter of time before Brandon felt for Willowbud what she felt for him, and I would be reborn. Then you and your mother came, and it all was for naught. So many years and so many lives, all wasted. But it does not matter. None of it ever has."

I stared sightlessly into the black, and it stared back. It whispered of my regrets, and I felt the memories come back to me, unbidden, unchained, here to torture my mind until I finally lost it. All those people I had made betray themselves, all those lives I had ruined, all the pain I caused in attempt to numb it. Willowbud was just the last in a long line that stretched back before history, and before that, there was Vitanimus and Joy.

"Before the astral plane separated, we did not fear death," I whispered. "For we knew the mind would carry our soul on forever, to exist in harmony with those still living. Why do we fear it now, Diamond? Is it because of the uncertainty? I think not. I think it is the opposite. I think that deep down, we all know that the death of our minds is the end of us. There is nothing after the end of cognizance, for the spirits we carry are not us. We are just the vessels of their experience, meant to be cast aside like the masks I once wore, meant to be discarded like we discard our dying flesh when the mind leaves the body. We are as lifeless to them as Sentients! Where do they go? Why do they go? The question ravaged Vitanimus unto his dying breath, but I know the answer! They abandon us, Diamond, because we are not worth saving!"

I raged against my coming doom, exalting in the final catharsis before I forever became my darkness. Maybe I had always been it. Maybe I was just coming home. But I knew that was not so, for I had tasted this destiny through the filter of Corruption, and even wearing the embodiment of apathy, it was hell. No hope, no salvation, no purpose. Only regrets and the knowledge of what could have been. But what could have been was never to be, not for me. Never for me.

I did not accept my fate, but surrendered to it. Every heartbeat was an eternity, every breath was an ocean. These were my last moments as me, and I wished I could say I took them with dignity, but I did not. My eyes widened horror, my mouth went dry, my belly sank as my heart rose. My throat closed around the scream I wanted to utter, and I flailed in the void, desperate, panicked, mindless.

Part Five: Fly Away

BRANDON

The great mushroom cloud lit like the sun was beneath it, the column head darkening in the relative luminance of its base.

"Julia," I muttered.

"Aye," Arby concurred stepping beside me. The sapphire light illuminated the entire horizon. It faded, then showed again, only this time the horizon had been cut sharply in half by an immense shadow.

"Willowbud," I whispered. She was alive. A wave of relief washed over me, then the tide receded with the realization of what was happening.

"Aye," Arby concurred again, smoking his pipe. The citizens of Towerhead quickly lost their interest in me, and rushed over to the hilltop to watch the distant battle of gods. From our vantage point, it looked more like a conflict of the elements than of two teenage girls.

"I hope you're not planning on charging in there," Arby said, looking up at me.

"I need to do something!" I insisted.

"Like...?" Arby scoffed. "You can't stop them, Brandon. The best thing that can happen now is for them to kill each other."

Flashes of sapphire met geometric shadows. The blue melted into the black, then the black rapidly changed shape, adjusting every-which way to defend against the onslaught. Even from this great distance, I could tell Willowbud didn't have a chance.

"We have to stop this!" I said to the dwarf, my voice a little too high for my liking. "You have to help me!"

"I don't have to do a damn thing," Arby replied easily.

"This as much your fault as it is mine!" I growled.

"And I accept my share of the blame."

"I guess melting cities isn't anything new to you!" I snapped. He smiled mildly up at me.

"Cities come and go, but Sentients never die. I would sacrifice entire kingdoms to end Corruption," Arby replied. "One Earth Former isn't even a consideration in the grand scheme of things."

"You're a piece of shit."

"People are always so quick to admonish me," Arby chuckled around his pipe. "They call me a monster, a murderer, and a genocidal maniac, but where did Julia's mercy get her?"

"I don't need you, old man, and you can't stop me!" I said, but my feet stayed planted. What could I do? What could I possibly say to Julia that would stop her? So, I know Willowbud killed the love of your life, and I know you just blew up a whole city in your grief, but could you, you know... let bygones be bygones? She was more likely to kill me in her rage than listen to a word I had to say. I could feel the limitless power running through my veins, but it was the power to create, and she was the antithesis of that. But... I couldn't just let Willowbud die, could I? Shouldn't I be compelled into action without hesitation? Isn't that what gods did? Light clashed with dark again and again, the blue fire melting through the shadows, the thunder rolling across the hills with each collision of the elements. The shadows were getting smaller, melting faster, losing their rigidity. I just stood and watched. Arby studied me for a moment, then shook his head, and put a hand on my shoulder.