Eloquent Relativity - Wanderlust for the Stars (Chapter 1 & 2)

 

Chapter 1: The Fates

You approach a cave; you have been told that if you wish to change your fate that you must seek out these…creatures.  You wonder to yourself how long the land has stood as it has, it seems ancient almost preternatural. You approach the mouth of this cave and stand in the boundary between light and darkness, though deep in the cave you see a hint of light in the obsidian depths.  You steel yourself and gather your courage now is the time to be sure for you have heard tales of travelers who entered the cave and never returned.  Rumors of grim auguries of all those who enter the cave abound, yet you have also heard of a few travelers who journeyed into the cave and then returned, though changed by the encounter.  It was one such story you heard that finally gave you the strength to make this journey.  If such a person could survive the Fates, then surely you could too. 

You enter the cave and feel the cool chill of the tunnel you now find yourself in, the light of the outside world still vibrant, outside is safety, you can see the world and know this may be your last time glimpsing this vista.  You light your torch and suddenly the warm glow illuminates walls which skitter away, though not close you can see the walls move and suddenly undulate and you know that the walls are coated thick with life, though what kind you are not sure, you pray that it stays on the walls and doesn’t drop down on you and still you press on and you can see the light ahead getting brighter.  Curious, you look behind you and see the mouth of the cave, a circle of light getting smaller in the distance.

You come to a great opening of the cave into a vast cavern with lamps burning oil.  You remember the advice you were given and take the offering of oil and pour it into one of the jars at the entrance to the cavern.  Above you a head looks over a ledge above you, although not a human head it regards you and a chittering voice of several pieces of a mouth moving in a humming cacophony whispers,

“Good, good that you remembered the oil, nothing worse than a guest who doesn’t remember we need light for our work.”

You know what awaits you is not human and climb the stairs to regard the first of the sisters, the greatest of the three, massive Clotho.  As you see more above you as you climb the spiral around this platform her bloated form comes into view.  Her massive arms pulling a thread through a needle, and you see a wonder unlike any before you. For here in this cave Clotho pulls the raw ether of the universe through her massive eye to wind this bright red line onto her sister.  The only hint of her is only the occasional movement of a pair of slender legs pulling more thread with finesse while Clotho employs her enormity to wrestle fate into being.

You compose yourself and regard Clotho as she continues pulling thread with her eight legs each like pillars of some great temple.  She could crush you as easily as you could crush an ant and you finally find your resolve and ask the first sister the first of your questions.  You yell out,

“Great Clotho who pulled my fate into being, can I change my fate?”

Clotho looks at you then rolls her head back and laughs in thunderous clicking gales, at least you think it’s laughter, but this abomination slows its mirth and then chitters her response,

“I pulled you into being from nothing but the gossamer of the very cosmos over eons you can barely imagine, you were put into motion so long ago that you could not in a hundred lifetimes conceive of just what efforts went into making it so that you now stand before me.  Your fate was decided long ago…you cannot change your fate.”

You try to ask Clotho another question, but she has turned back to her labors, and you remember the advice you received, there are three sisters.  Two more remain as do your questions.

You see another set of stairs that lead up and you follow these up to a platform that you now realize was built for the second sister, Lachesis.  Whereas Clotho was brute strength and raw power, her sister is finesse and patience she carefully measures the thread that passes through her hands and marks it with a golden stylus so that the thread begins to float up into the ceiling which you now see above you, an untold number of threads tied together in a great tree that stretches into the roof of the cavern, if there even is a roof as it appears to stretch into an abyss without end.  You see that the threads are tied down to the floor of the cavern through one single thread from which the tree ascends into the sky.  You see it is taught and it seems to hold the entire tree in place.

“Don’t touch that!”

A voice of whistles and clicks hisses at you and you turn back to see Lachesis continuing to swiftly mark threads and you watch as a pair of scissors quickly flies through the air and slices the thread right at the golden mark as the cut thread is ripped out of view from something that seems to move faster than you can comprehend.  Lachesis continues to mark these threads almost as quickly as her sister you now realize cuts them and takes them where they are to go.  She looks at you with one pair of eyes while the other 6 dart from thread to thread as her eight legs work a clockwork symphony of precision and motion.   She stares at you intently with the set of eyes until finally she stops, and all eight eyes focus on you at once.  You begin to wonder what the last thing she ate was…who the last person she ate was.

Laughter fills the room like nails on glass. 

“I won’t eat you…yet, ask your question, the work never stops.”

With that she resumes her labors, and you ask yourself if all of this was really a good idea.  You determine you will find the answers to your questions, no matter what.  So you ask this creature.

“Cunning Lachesis who sees what I will do, can I change my destiny?”

Lachesis shakes her head knowingly and regards you with cold demeanor and says,

“You know not your choices you will make, but I do, every noble deed, every ignominious act, every depravity, every exultation, every joy, every sorrow; I have seen them all and I know your end, that I have seen it come to pass before it has should not trouble you.  What would your destiny be if it were not what you were to do?  Would you like me to tell you what you won’t do?  You cannot change your destiny any more than you can change your past.”

There is but one sister left, and she moves so fast that you have still not been able to catch a glimpse of this creature as it scuttles around this great tree of threads.  You study the tree more and notice that some threads are tied together and then branch threads that branch into other threads in a great profusion into the aerie above.  Suddenly you see her for the first time on the roof of the cavern, and she sees you. She scuttles into the darkness but reemerges with a thread that she jumps to the ground with.  Your intuition tells you this thread should be pulling on the tree for none of the threads are that long, but this frenetic ball of motion in front of you is clutching this wriggling thread that seems to be in pain from this thing’s touch. 

Twitching in jerks and spasms that seem to cry out for this thing is that she cannot sit still.  That she has taken time to stand before you fills you with dread.  For if Clotho was brutality and Lachesis finesse; Atropos is madness incarnate.  A horrifying scream fills the cavern.

“Speak mortal for my time is short, my work unending, so say your peace and know my words.”

You stare at Atropos, your last question at your ready.

“Swift Atropos, Can I change my future.”

Atropos’s face contorts into a rictus of pure insanity as she revels in your question as her choked laughter fills the cavern echoing over and over again.  She grins and smiles wickedly and grabs her scissors and holds them up snipping menacingly at the air towards you as with each word a snip echoes out.

“Any…time…you…wish!”

She laughs again and lets go of what you now realize was your thread and scuttles back to her work.  The Fates have told you plainly.  You cannot change your fate as it was written, you cannot change your destiny, you will do what you will do.  Finally, Atropos lets you know that your thread can be cut short at any moment, there are no guarantees. 

You climb down from the cavern and marvel at each of these creatures one last time before you get to the tunnel.  Your torch is nearly through, but it should be enough to see you back to the world.  The world that you can see is a blinding circle of light and you reflect on what was said and begin to think of what you will make of your life.  Most travelers learned something of their future, but have you?  The fates tell you what you seek is impossible, no man can defy the Fates.

But I say fuck all that.

I will tell you what I have learned from the Fates.  They may have written my story into being, but I make my own choices, damn it.  I do not care what was fated, I do not need to know my destiny.  I know my future, and my future is what I choose, not what some barely human monsters foresaw eons ago. 

I tell you this, I will see Clotho unraveled, Lachesis beyond a measure of sanity and mad Atropos chasing my thread into Eternity.

Chapter 2: The Replacement

                One of humanity’s oldest stories is about the quest for immortality.  It is about the fifth King of Uruk setting out on a journey, he befriends a beast man named Enkidu who was tasked by the gods to destroy Gilgamesh. The two go on many adventures tragically in one Enkidu dies.  After the death of Enkidu, Gilgamesh was inconsolable, so much so that he journeyed to the Netherworld.  There Gilgamesh encountered the shade of Enkidu who related the bleak conditions of his existence.  If memory serves Enkidu spoke of the Abyssian Plains and its solitary angel who presides over the land reducing all to soul ash in time.  Now Gilgamesh knew what awaited him after his death, he would one day join his friend and have his deeds be all that was left of him.  Gilgamesh sought out wisdom from a sage who had survived the last great act of the gods that had submerged the world.  From Utnapishtim, Gilgamesh learns of a chance to obtain immortality and eternal youth.  Gilgamesh ultimately did not succeed in either account though he briefly held eternal youth. 

                Samael, this man in this world isn’t searching for immortality or eternal youth.   He is after something far older, and something far more precious.  He simply has no idea how his story will play out, but soon he will find out what he really wants in life. He thinks he knows what that is, he’ll find out it’s not.

 

                The day started much the same as the day before it.  Time seemed to stand still in the tiny apartment that was home in that nothing much changed.  The last major change had been the thing that had shown up on Samael’s door ten years ago; the first step in his plan as he saw it.  Now almost like clockwork this thing had finally awoken after watching Sam for a decade, observing him modeling his behavior over the years he had noticed it moved the same way he did and had similar nervous ticks just like he did.  Periodically he would watch it motoring its foot on the floor in a spring of motion that just wouldn’t stop, until it abruptly halted for some unknown reason; at which point the thing regarded his expression as if trying to divine what Sam was thinking at that exact moment. The first thing he had taught it was how to cook and over the years it had gotten quite good at it, so much so that it prepared his meals for him, and Sam honestly knew it was a better cook than him. 

                Today his Executor greeted him with a cool dispassion yet friendly tone.

                “Good morning, Sam.”

                Sam looked up as he slowly roused, standing over him was his uncanny likeness of him.  It had finally happened; his Executor had awoken.  As his eyes focused clearly on his companion, he realized that its skin had similar imperfections to him, not exactly the same but so close that no one would be able to tell the difference without careful inspection. 

                “Good morning…S”

                For a second it froze in place and a distinct noise could be heard emanating from inside it.  Then after a few blinks it began again.

                “S…alright Sam, do you want me to make breakfast for you?”

                Sam looked at S and decided right then and there that he had to set the boundaries now.

                “Stop being so polite.”

                It froze and a confused look filled its face.

                “I beg your pardon?”

                “That, exactly that, stop doing that, you’re supposed to be a copy of me, do you really want to make me breakfast?”

Sam stared at it as it furrowed its brow and then almost as if a switch had been flipped the entire posture of S changed. As he relaxed, he looked at Sam with a cool composure that he recognized only too well.

“Frankly no, I’d rather we get to work early to be honest.”

Sam looked at S, ‘Now we’re getting somewhere.’ He thought to himself.

“And why is that?”

Now S shot back a look of pained aggravation as if Sam was asking the most unnecessary question to have ever been posed by a person. He squared himself regained some of his former posture and clearly stated matter-of-factly.

“You’ve had this plan for 20 years, and now today, you can finally pull the trigger, what are we waiting for, you can get something to eat on the way to work.”

At that moment Sam knew that all of the years he had spent working plotting trips for the wealthy might actually pay off.  He might be able book passage and if he was lucky…

“Before we head out I think we should have a talk, I have an idea I’d like to discuss with you.”

Sam got up and showered and dressed for another day of work but before he left he told his companion his plan.

“You’re out of your god damn mind!”

Sam had expected S to have an opinion on the idea but he wasn’t expecting it to be so hostile to what he was proposing.  He thought it was a good idea and that it would be like a going away present.

“You think that anyone is going to go for this idea Sam, you’re wrong.  Who would give up an employee for 10 years just so that they can take their replacement on vacation too.  I realize it’s only like 3 weeks that we’d be gone, but when we get back it would be a decade.”

“8.9 years actually.”

Sam was greeted by a thoroughly disgusted look that he had some idea meant S did not appreciate his addition to the discussion.  His doppelganger tapped his foot as if to emphasize just how little he thought of what Sam had to say.

“So how are you going to sell this, because I know that you aren’t suggesting this on a lark.”

Sam looked at S and realized just maybe he could convince himself of this after all.

“What’s the one thing we don’t know about our business?”

“One thing?” S wryly opined.

“Neither of us have ever been off world, we’ve never been to the places we book people to visit all the time, just imagine how much better we could sell the trips with a bit more insight into the products.”

S studied Sam and then the words came out that Sam had said hundreds of times.

“I hear it’s dark in winter in Antarctica for a month, but I’ve never been.”

Sam smiled and knew S understood his plan as he had put it together and finally could see the value in his idea.

“Okay assuming that you can convince anyone else that this is a good idea, and I get that it will make me a better salesman, why are you doing this?”

Sam looked at S and relented,

“I know you have memories of me, but I want you to have memories of me really living, not just spending my days slowly accumulating wealth to do this, I want you to see the payoff too.”

S sat back and stared coolly at Sam, shook his head, smiled and then began,

“You think I don’t know you, that I haven’t seen your life, watched your ambitions, seen your tragedies and triumphs, been there for your highs, and your lows.  These ten years I have been dedicated to becoming a version of you, knowing how you tick, what makes you, you.  In all that time you have been my focus, the lens through which I see the world.  What don’t you think I haven’t seen?”

Sam looked S squarely in the eye grabbed him by the shoulder and casually tossed out,

“You ain’t seen nothing yet.”