Iwaku: Dark Reign

[Asmodeus]

Grant

It was a story that brought you and I together, told by the dying captain of a ship that had crossed the heavens. At times I imagine the Legacy as Lamord described it, bright with elaboration or dark with despair, sailing with lost names and crashing betwixt heavens and hells. So like the cities we have built in Iwaku; the wars we have waged. And I remember the story of you, the trembling doctor plucked from his world and hardened in the torments of adventure. How far you have come, Grant. You have seen the births and deaths of ages. It was you who had the answer to Medusa all along; your voice that bade the Saviour's Page be written. And where you found that answer is for Mentors to know and none to find out. They say your kind are failed heroes, yet failure and heroism were never your kin. You have gone beyond, on stranger sands. So all I can say is thank you, Grant, my Knight and my Healer. Thank you for caring for me and for showing me the way. I hope in time to follow where you have led.​

Porg

Had I the means to become your sentiment, to possess myself of that wonder you showed when you said goodbye, I would find a perfect peace. Yes, my friend, I remember all those times. It is my curse and my companion, as it is yours. All I wanted - all I have ever wanted - is to hold that moment, that smile between the tears when one remembers. No matter how your blade is sundered, Porg, you remain the soul and that is everything we must cherish and fight for. Whatever disdain I showed you was but the pain of knowing that those smiles cannot be held. And yet you fought it, at once the doubt and the hope: that smiles will yet endure. You always said you were outside the Cycle, but perhaps the thing which could not see you was the stoic's nutshell, the darker core we made without you. For the world you were building was always brighter. You gave your life to hold Medusa in place, stopping what no other could, and I dare you further now, my friend: to stop tears and time in the meadows of memory.​

Archy

Was it you who whispered that song? Was it you who waved, a fading blur in sun-lit trees, a dot within a circle? I think it was. For after all, you were only passing through, weren't you? Even at the dying of the light. You were the trickster at the threshold who took none of this to heart, and I think in that you saved us, Archy. We might have drowned had you not reminded us how fleeting all this was. For sure you saved me: at the Bread Temple, in the Zirkus crowd, in the Convent siege, the Markov feast and the great car chase, those glowing fists like jester sticks. And wherever you go now I hope you will impress the same: that life is all unknown and punchlines wait, unseen, beneath illusions. I wonder if you are lonely. I wonder so many things about you, yet know it is my place to do so. I wish you well, my realm-hopping friend. May you never grow tired or lose your mystery, or refrain from punching monsters on your path. Though you died before the Page was written, you were the very element of the writing, the very act of letting go.​

Kitti

Of all goodbyes it was yours that did not linger. So brief, so effortless. We were the first to meet in the Dark Reign, fellow angels on the bloodshot streets, and in adventure shared a sometime desire. Yet now you go, and barely look at me? I should feel betrayed, and perhaps there was anger as you walked away. And yet... and yet such things we have learned, my dearest Kitti. You are the feminine that looks beyond the singular to the greater totalities, finding grace as men rage and whirl. So I know it was not tree or sunset, mountain or sky that distracted you by that car. For you were beholding all, and in beholding all seeing each of us. Rory taught you so very well. He saw the things you would become. And when you gripped Medusa by the throat you showed the truth of the Saviour's Page: that a woman is all that is unexpected. Thank you, Kitti. Thank you for surprising me. May the Goddess walk with you, your friend and lover, your mother and child, your beginning and your end, in all that you do.​

Jack

I know now what it is to have a son: to feel that a thousand cycles of narrative can not encompass all I have to say to you. Perhaps this Mythos, from start to finish, was but a dialogue between you and I, between the man losing the child and the child becoming the man. We were each other's voice, speaking unbidden in the shadow of our deeds. Rory, Ozryel and Azazel were the Three Kings to your birth, and foretold in you how all lessons must return to their creator. You were the proof of my errors, made flesh in Artemis, and returned to me, blind and embittered. Such language we have wrought, as if words themselves were too dull, too unyielding for the fury of our message. And even now, I cannot say goodbye. I cannot frame the fire, even as it burns out. You were the Purger and from me you have taken all selfishness. There cannot be Iwaku without you, and I despair to outlive you, I despair to see you go. I am fraught with worry for your hopes and dreams. I am a father, through and through, and in helplessness I love you.​

Feral

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One more story before lights out...

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Seems I was wrong. Not everything's asleep in this city. At the corner of an unnamed street and a fog-drenched boulevard I find a little place that's open. It's a bar where the nighthawks go, those special kinda guys and dames with nowhere to be at four in the morning. The barman tells me it's called the Cbox, but some kids have messed with the metal sign over the doorway and rearranged the letters. The 'b' is all bent outta shape and the 'x' split in half. There's some real jokers out there.

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So this is where I sit with a glass of goldenrod and think about you all. Like some petty crook, remembering the jewels he stole. Cos that's all I got, in the end. Those faces in my head were just passing through and I snatched them awhile and made them smile and bleed. I guess that's all you do in life.

There's some others here in the Cbox: a couple, a washed-up loner, a blind man and his dog. They give me no trouble. They've got their own sagas to think about. And I reckon they're just as mighty as mine. Sure, I fell from heaven, built an empire, died twice and lived through Armageddon. But so does everyone, in their way. It took me this long to figure that out. We've all got Saviour's Pages to write, from medusas to alley-cats.

Hmm...

So here we are with one last theme, ladies and gents. Cos in the end you have to end, and that's not about letting anything go. It's about knowing that stories don't belong to you. They never did. And if you don't step from the river you're nothing but a rock in its way.

I think Porg knew that. That's why he left the blade in the trunk. I found it when I was packing up and heading for the city. A small knife in a thick leather sheathe, the handle wood and polished antler. The blade glows subtle green as I pull it from the sheath; green like the heart of Iwaku, when Paorou pierced the core.

All this talk of swords...

It's not about what I deserve. Those thoughts are long gone. I've wronged as many people as I've saved, and that leaves me at dead zero. There's just a voice louder than any story. It's echoed in goddesses and cradled in the dark between sleeping lovers. And it's a voice that calls you away and tells you that your time is done.

I hold the blade beneath the table, and point the tip up at my heart. One last thrust, and I am gone.





Goodbye.





THUNK!

"Here you go, Mister Man. Dragon Tear. On the house." A voice fills the held-breath silence. I open my eyes and see the barman at my table. He's put a drink in front of me - some dull-looking cocktail with an umbrella and a straw in it. He's a strange sight: skinny with glasses and an old t-shirt with SMITTY written on it. But his name-badge says Gabe. He's waiting for me to try the damn drink.

I put the knife on my lap and suck on the straw. It's not half bad - sweetness with a kick. The guy's got some skill.

"You're alright, Gabe," I say to him, and accept the drink with a smile.

"We all do our best," he replies. "You look like a guy who could use a pick-me-up."

The blade returns to its sheath. I sit back and sigh with a glance around the bar, then nod to the doorway. "Shame about the sign."

"Yeah," Gabe shakes his head. "Dumb kids. I'm not too broke up about it though. I was thinking of moving into cocktails anyway. Maybe I'll rename the place." He moves on to the next table, thinking out loud. "Something like Iwaku Beach. I dunno..."


He sees to the other customers, and I'm left there twirling the little cocktail umbrella. Now there's a memory. I'd almost forgotten... what she said to me... after that night... that one night where I felt like someone else.

I could spend a lifetime thinking how unfair it was: how Archy was brought back but not her. Tegan defied all narrative right to the end. And God... Goddess... how I miss her. They say love breaks all conventions, well... by that I loved her, in that brevity, in that fragment of a scene, in that jarring implausibility. The only one I had no conclusion with: no great epic, no final dance.

She was the card dealt. And I only won a moment. Fade to black.



So now I'll sit awhile, drink in my left hand, blade in my right, and before I end it all I'll think of her. To Tegan I give my last thoughts and closing sentence.

Her tango motion... her star-spun eyes... the way she walked on the tips of her toes....







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Damn!






I rest my head on the table, not sure whether to laugh or cry. The realization is not a heartache crack but something warm and undoing, spreading like a book inside my chest. Why not smile, Asmo?, I think to myself. Why not dare to dream that she remains, that she and I can make it, that there are time and travels to heal the wounds we dealt? It's as crazy as Bread Cults and playing pretend.


Why not try for stories greater than Iwaku?









The door opens.


I look up.

THE END​