Part 9: Revelation
Odd, I don't remember seeing this hallway before, Seth thought as he walked
through the long, meandering, doorless passage. The walls looked familiar.
He looked up to see the roof had lost most of its tiles, letting intermittent
spots of grey sunlight through. There were traces of chalk, on the wall,
as though carelessly scribbled and written on by wayward children of long
ago. The chalks seemed to organise themselves as he went along, into crude
drawings, and pictographs, Japanese calligraphy. He recognised a word: SHI.
Four.
Four... what?
He squinted hard, and picked out each word, putting them together in a logical
sequence in his mind.
Four, we are.
We are four.
Or... his heart skipped a beat.
We are death.
SHI.
Death.
His neck prickled in a sudden shreck, and he spun, but there was nothing,
except the long stretches of hallway in either direction. He heard a tiny
voice whisper in his ear.
I am Death.
"Who is it," Seth cried out, staring fearfully at the crumbling ceiling.
Silence.
Not knowing what else to do, he continued down the hall, feeling a rising
sense of panic when he saw it had no end. He kept seeing the same grafitti
on the subway walls...
Grafitti? Subway walls?
Grey tiles. He swiped a finger across them, to reveal the gleam of white
ceramic. He began to write, his hand seeming to move on its own.
MENE, MENE...
Wait a second, this is Hebrew, or something. What did it mean again, woe?
Doom?
Again, a sound like breathing in his ear. Startled, he turned, and narrowly
missed falling into a gaping crevasse, its bottom unseen in the darkness.
Far, far across the gulf, he could barely make out a figure standing on the
other side, seeming to be a hundred- Miles? Yards? Inches? away. A figure,
wrapped in pale, flowing robes...
"Father?"
Father? The canyon mocked Seth's tentative call. Father? Father? Father?
The cowl dropped, revealing a tiny, hairless, human head, its white face
nearly devoid of flesh.
Yahhahh, said the lipless teeth. Come, little Sun Child, let us play
together.
"Who are you," Seth said aloud.
Who are you? Who are you? Who are you? Who are you?
Seth clamped his hands over his ears. He watched the figure as it went into
a complex dance, head bobbling like a puppet's, mouth gaping in a maniacal
grin.
Oh, come and plaaaaaay, the puppet laughed.
No, Seth said in his head.
The dance ended suddenly, and the lidless eyes rolled at him like a nervous
horse. The grin never stopped.
No?
Seth frowned in response.
Do you not know who I am?
Must I, Seth said, and sighed aloud. All I want is to find a way out of
here.
Do you not know who I am?
Nope, sorry.
Did your father not TELL you who I am?
Nope.
Still grinning, the figure held its sticklike hands out to Seth, bony fingers
slowly uncurling to reveal an object held in them.
Look at these, it said.
Seth stared at the fingers, which at first seemed completely skeletal, but
then he realized they were thinly covered with a parchmentlike layer of skin.
In its hand lay the tiny skeleton of a rodentlike creature, probably a mouse.
Seth recoiled in horror as the memory struck him.
Father's self portrait. The fingerlike roots, the tiny remains...
The figure threw back its head and laughed a shrill, breathing laugh. At
the back of its mouth, Seth could see the outline of its neck bones.
Who ARE you? Answer me directly, Seth silently demanded.
It stretched out its arms and gleefully hugged the darkness above, seeming
to relish Seth's fearful question.
I killed your father, it finally replied.
How could you, he isn't dead, Seth returned.
The skull yawned in mirth. Oh, but he is, he IS. He's quite... DEAD.
Looks to me that you have things a bit mixed up, Seth said, trying to suppress
a shudder. I will go so far as to assume that HE killed YOU. Am I correct?
The thing sighed in a long, liquid, bubbling wheeze. Clever little Sun Child,
you have the gift... and that is why I chose you.
Seth shook himself. What did it mean? Was it being sarcastic? What gift?
As it went into another series of complex, gesturing movements, Seth noticed
the familiar patterns. It was doing the same sword katas that Leo had shown
him, only, this creature carried no swords.
As Seth watched its morbid dance, the knot of fear in his stomach grew, until
his breath caught in his throat. The puppet corpse's dance increased in tempo,
until its frail body wheeled, its robe fanning out like a whirling dervish
as it rose into the air. The pitch of its laugh rose in a hysterical screech
that reverbrated inside Seth's head, like a dentist's drill. Creatures
materialized out of the darkness, crawling, flying, floating... deformed,
filmy, emaciated insects, gibbering and whispering softly in Seth's ears
as they brushed by, light as moth's wings, leaving slimy trails across his
bare skin. Seth threw his hands out in front of him, in a self-protective
reflex, as he struggled to inhale.
"GET THEE HENCE, SATAAAAAN!"
Deargodhelpmeinmytimeofneed, Seth's fevered thoughts rushed through the prayer.
DearGODdearGODdearGODdearGOD... panic stricken, he looked up in time to see
the flashing blade of a sword descending, and felt the cold steel sever the
vertabrae in his neck. Pain! And then...
Seth sucked in his breath in a loud gasp, not daring to move, at first. His
heart thudded nearly through his chest, as his eyes rolled around the room.
His room. He slowly, carefully reached up, and felt his head and throat.
It was still attached to him, after all. A dream?
"A dream," Leo said, later that morning. "Or, perhaps an out of body
experience?"
"No way," Seth muttered. "It HAD to be a dream."
Leo raised his head, and looked down at him. "Hmm hm," he said, almost laughing.
"Can dreams be shared?"
"Why do you ask that," Seth said, feeling the knot of fear forming, because
somehow, he knew what Leo was going to say.
"Seth," Leo said, very quietly, as he ran a hand affectionately along the
underside of Seth's jaw. "Of all people, I can trust YOU. Only... I had to
test you first. To see if you were ready."
Seth stared at Leo. "You shared your dream with me?"
Leo returned his stare with a slow, languid smile. "It's entirely possible.
I did."
"Ye gods in a haystack... no wonder you're crazy," Seth breathed. "I mean-
I meant, if you can DO things like that. I'd say it's a bit of a mental drain,
isn't it?"
"I'd say it was, at first," Leo said calmly, ignoring Seth's epithet. "But,
as in all things, it gets easier with practice."
"Practice..." Seth snorted softly. "As if you do anything else."
"Not any more."
"Maybe you should."
Leo frowned a little. "Why do you say that?"
"Well, it's like this. Seems to me your mind is conditioned to a lifetime
of constant upgrading: Learn something, and practice it... learn something
else, and practice that. But when's the last time you've had any sort of
NEW challenge?"
Leo lowered his head, as he gazed steadily at Seth. "When is the last time
I have not?"
"I don't understand. You're still being too cryptic."
In the silence that followed, Seth tried to sort out his thoughts, but they
would not assimilate into anything that he could draw any conclusions from.
As he looked up at his father, who seemed to have withdrawn into his own
thoughts, he realized he was no intellectual match for him, and was only
going to exhaust himself in the process.
"I'm a simple person," Seth said, sighing gustily. "I have given it my best
shot, and I simply cannot grasp what you are trying to do with, to, or for,
me. You gave me a dream, and I have learned nothing from it, except fear."
Leo didn't seem to be listening.
"I cannot be relied upon to do anything about this problem, father. I'm not
a god, I'm flesh and blood. This Sun Child business is nonsense, there's
nothing special about me. Other than a few physical differences, there's
not much else."
Leo said nothing.
"Are you disappointed in me?"
After a pause, Leo looked up at him, and absently shook his head.
"Then why do you look so sad?"
"That's a very good question, Seth-"
"Ah, COME on! Cut the crap, willya? Geez, between you and Saki, it'll take
me a hundred years to... figure..." Seth's words faltered, when he realized
what he'd said.
Leo was grinning, now. "Who?"
Seth frowned and shook his head a little in bewilderment. "Uh, I said...
Saki. I think."
Leo laid a forefinger lightly on his upper lip as he gazed at his son a moment.
"Saki," he said at length.
"The uh, puppet, I mean, the ghost, or kami, or whatever you call it."
"I'd say kami."
"Do you know him, or... it?"
"Ah..." Leo sat back against the wall in a curiously relaxed position. "You
realize my telling you the story will be the final seal upon your fate."
Seth sat up on his knees and let his breath slowly out, to ease the knot
in his middle. "I believe my fate was sealed since day one, father. Only
God knows the outcome. But whatever the outcome, I will emerge victorious
in the end, because I know Whom I have believed..."
Leo nodded slowly. "It's just as well you believe that, as you will need
all the help you can get."