Axiom ~ 14!

~ 14 ~

The Elder continued rising from the depths of the small coma he had been trapped within. 

“You win this one as well, shiny sky orb.” The old man kept his eyes closed after stirring from slumber. He had opened them, only to find a ceiling he didn’t often see. A spike of light sunk right into his sight, and the chorus of complaining voices were wholly unfamiliar. He sort of heard most of it, but didn’t pay real attention–he wasn’t able to.

Illusions and ghosts played across his senses, and he instead vividly experienced the memories of past conversations as if hearing them for the first time. He knew all the words of the conversation; he heard the retorts and quips that would lead to some juicy gossip. The giggling of children came and went with the usual swiftness as they swirled across the floor, carried by a haze on an unseen wind. In short, reality fled from his mind. 

The unwelcome was truth pushed aside, and the old man’s mind found nothing but shards with no idea how to put it all back together. Why bother? His imagined conversations of warm nights and welcoming stew were rudely interrupted by words and flashes that suggested that the village burned down. A pang of discomfort struck the inside of his head, and the old man found it best to relieve the pain by remaining still. Swiftly, long-past conversations and warmth returned with the obscuring certainty of steam. The haze lazily veiled over once more, and was welcomed dearly.

“Losses of the village are borderline total.” A hollow distortion of the speaking voice reached him. The pang of discomfort returned with greater strength and the misty haze blew apart as a strong gust sundered it. The laughter in his thoughts wavered, the emotions and ability to express repressed as grief found no foothold on the shattered glass shards in his unwilling mental state. 

No, no, no. He didn’t want to be here. There was just nothing left. 

“The children were taken rather than slaughtered.” These words rang like a gong through the empty halls of his mindscape, painting chaotic color over and over on unseen walls. Hope arrived on screaming wings. The Elder felt overwhelmed. Unreal, ghostly steps approached from the other side of his closed eyelids as again he sunk ever deeper into malaise. A fall ended when you hit the bottom, and for the Elder that was in a space between madness and self-reflection. It was time to save his mind. It was time to give someone else the reins.

Dizziness struck even though his body was unmoving. The Elder’s view altered drastically as he meandered through an imagined hallway of memories. The scenes replayed in sudden flashes, and he fully experienced the images and accompanying scents and tastes. They bombarded against his mind with each additional step. Another step, and another, and one last one was taken before the familiar and comforting rasp of a whetstone reached his ears.

*Scrape*

A large flame was centered in this stable mental space. Moving towards the burning representation of his will to live, the old man that came into view near the fire had a considerably stronger back. A younger back. His back, from many years ago. The large fire licked at the dry wood-shaped memories in the center, burning through everything with all the time in the world; sampling the flavors of ancient happenings soon to be forgotten.

Many more figures surrounded the fire, and they all appeared as younger, more youthful versions of him. All of ‘him’ was obstructed in a partial or complete snowy haze that obscured their individual features. They were the reflections of his old self, the blurring corruption on them a representation of aspects long forgotten and traits willfully abandoned. He wasn’t those people anymore. Those identities. Not completely.

*Scrape*

The whetstone personality paused sharpening its weapon, prompting the Elder to step forth and join the circle. He seated himself on one of the many cut stumps as darkness and blackened doors surrounded him. He recognized the whispers coming from behind those chain-closed barriers. They contained all of his regrets. His many, many regrets. The doors strained and shook inwards, threatening to burst even as he watched. 

“I didn’t expect that I would ever use this philosopher’s trick again.” His wordless voice spoke to nobody in particular. He was talking to himself, after all. There was no need to explain himself. This place was purely to accept that once again, he’d failed. The little crevice in the mind was the best imagined space he could construct to cope and convince himself to try again. You didn’t become a philosopher and not make tricks to protect yourself from infinite existentialism. When you come to the realization that you know nothing, your world has a tendency to fall apart. There had to be stability, even if it was fabricated. 

“I can’t do this anymore.” The current perspective’s hands folded together and tearfully sighed, head dipping low in shame. It took willful effort to right himself again. He turned on his stump, and faced the next empty seat to relinquish more than a mere question. “Can you?” 

Slowly, and with deliberate intent, a copy of his current appearance formed on the stump. An exact replica of his current voice replied in kind. “I believe I can. I can find the way.” 

The original nodded and asked. “Where did I go wrong, old friend?” 

The copy slowly stood, and the perspective shifted. Focus faded from the eyes of the original, and instead saw from the eyes of the new copy. “Nowhere, Elder. You did everything right, and we all know well that you can make no mistakes and still lose. That’s not a weakness, or a failure. That’s just life.” 

The abandoned original remained seated on the stump. His time was over, and his mind needed to go elsewhere to move on. “What will you do?” 

The new perspective folded his hands behind his back, adopting a slightly hunched posture to answer his own question from the version which had passed the torch. “What we chose to do. What we learned over all these years. That we hold to the ideal. That we make the decisions we will not regret. That we always, always hold promises to those dearest to us.” 

He laid a hand on the Elder’s shoulder. “It has been a pleasure, and a privilege to have been you, Elder. I loved the life you gave us, free of what we were used to doing.”

Another door sprung up and immediately revolted as regrets exploded to life behind it, only to be plastered against the darkness and fade into obscurity. “I am no longer an Elder, and I believe I am the first one that will accept the regret. Because in this breaking I’ve realized… grief is the price we pay for love.” 

The Elder nodded at the new perspective, and laid out his last question. He was fading, losing active consciousness as the new mentality gained it. “What will you do?” 

The fresh outlook rolled his shoulders behind him. “I am going to get my children back, if it’s the last thing I do. It is high time we break into the details of an old tidbit we weren't supposed to hear, old friend. We can pretend to not be aware of that conversation out there all we want, but those voices are openly talking about Essence. That means they are cultivators.” 

The new perspective shared a knowing look with the version of himself that had paused using the whetstone. “It is high time we discover how they live so long, and attain that time for ourselves.” 

The whetstone version of himself smiled like a fox, turning the blade over to show regretful carved words etched deeply into the other side. ‘This good man never goes to war again’. This version of him had his mind broken in a desert long ago. His doppelganger put the whetstone down, gave a small salute, and proudly closed his eyes. He fuzzed over, and began to fade. 

The new perspective was adapting, restructuring personality traits and priorities. Major components of the personality of that time were being rejected, obscured, denied. Similar to the personality present from the war, several others became blurry. A few vanished from the bonfire scene altogether as their values and beliefs were fed to the fire; never to be considered in a decision-making process again.

When the new perspective looked back down to the Elder, half of the old man was a sketchy imprint of what it had been. A younger, more vibrant personality had cleared up significantly. His haze near the beginning of the circle was almost fully cleared. It was both necessary, and thrilling, to possess the blind will to go always forward. “I retreat no more. I hide no further.” 

“I’m going to need a new name.” With a powerful movement of the old man’s hand, ‘never’ was blotted out and erased from the blade. The new perspective turned, and with unwavering steps, strode away from the bonfire. His voice trembled, then gained an unyielding quality; the core trait from which the fiber of his being was now constructed. “Again. Again, we go to war. ”