By: Toby Good
The man’s eyes peeled open like a crusty scab. “I cannot wait to show you around,” hissed the mushroom speckled serpent, “there are so many fun things that you can now achieve.” It slithered over to the corner of the room and began to stir a vile of a strange, emerald-colored liquid. The creature bore a worrisome grin, that never quite left its wide set jaws.
“What is that ringing sound?” questioned the young man laying on the floor.
“To be foolish once is to live as a fool,” preached the serpent as it handed the vile off to the man, “but to regress is to please.”
“What do I do with this?”
“You are useless!”, exclaimed the reddish creature, “Obviously you are expected to drink from it!” It saw worry growing on the man’s young face and explained, “Now, now, I didn’t mean that… just trust me, this is paradise after all.” The serpent beamed a hideous, black-toothed grin.
“But I don’t know what’s in there. It could be dangerous.”
The creature let out a slimy cackle as it said, “I don’t think you need to worry much about that dear boy. Just drink, and you will feel a freedom never felt before.”
The man began to question where he was. He examined the small, dimly lit room that he had woken in. He observed the way the walls and floor shifted around him, almost as if he were in water, except the rhythm was one he had never experienced before. He peered out through the windows, but all he saw was infinity.
He was combing through his mind, attempting to pull any memory that explained his situation, when the floor dropped out from beneath him. However, he wasn’t falling. The man sat still as the environment changed around him. He watched the tiny shack he had just sat in, plunge off into the sun. Yet the sun was not actually the sun. The more he began to perceive things, the more they changed. The sun became an eyeball, unblinking and unmoving. Covered in a spectrum of colors from a dingy green to an inky red. The ground beneath him approached as a hollowed out sphere, floating in from a greater plain of existence.
As the man turned to look behind him, an immense, lightning-white flash dazzled him, and a blistering horn began to sound off in the distance. Before he could question any of this however, a divine figure who stood three cubits tall, greeted him. Despite his stature, his wise voice echoed throughout eternity as he spoke. “Young man, how have you arrived at an existence such as this? You could not be more than twenty years old, am I correct in that assumption?”
“Yes, that is true. What is thi-”
“It’s all so very regretful,” the cherub said with a mournful scowl on his face. “But it’s okay boy, none of this lasts very long anyway. Just accept the fate you were given, and ask for the hand of the lord.” “But sir, what is this place? How did I get here?” “Nonsense. Don’t bog yourself down with these sorts of quandaries lad… these are God’s ten holy minutes. His little gift to you. Just enjoy it while it lasts, and await his arrival.”
The man had not even turned his head away, and yet somehow the heavenly figure before him was replaced with a potted rose bush. He attempted to rise, in order to investigate the flower, but he soon discovered that his legs beneath him did not work. There was an immovable force that had cemented him to the ground where he lay.
A car passed by.
By the time the man had decided to quit his useless attempts at movement, the rose bush had grown one hundred feet tall. From each enormous, earth-toned limb hung a lantern of fire. At once all the lanterns dropped and exploded into a fiery rage, dancing along the infinite earth. The bush began to descend as the fire pulled ever more tightly together, in a ballet of flames.
Words didn’t seem necessary in a place like this. The fire had finally begun to cling to the shrub, just as it sunk to the ground. Each glorious, marooned petal, floated softly to the earth as the inferno claimed its victim. All this fire and yet, the bush remained intact; petal-less yes, but still intact indeed. The motionless man marvelled over the smoldering conflagration before him. What was all this for? How did he get here? How does one escape this perpetual fantasy?
He was not truly dreaming, was he? He could not move, for his legs were inanimate. He could not think, for the answers were non-existent. He could not speak, for every time his mouth had opened, the noises that followed were not his own. What was he to do?
A willowy man of mortal descent, who wore a long snowy beard, drew near. His silky facial hair hung all the way between his legs, and his skull was shaped like an oblong melon. He carried no weapons, but something large protruded out of the sack he bore. He sat down on the ground beside the man, and pulled the object out. It was a book. He began to read to the man.
“He was incarnate that we might be made god.”
“What does this mean?”
“In a land of your own, man becomes God. With no morals, with no thoughts, with no boundaries, one begins to feel holy. These are the holy minutes, spend them wisely as they disappear. You have choice here.” explained the bishop.
“Everything here is so cryptic.”
“Ah yes. Indeed it is. For none of this is reality. Look around you. Have you been able to truly view one thing in this entire galaxy of nonsense? Or has everything just flown by in an infinite whirl? The clock is ticking. Do not waste your time on questions, or anecdotes, or material items. Feel, love, admire. Cherish, adore, accept.”
“But what if I need more time? I just got here. Can’t you help me?”
“Ah lad. I’m sorry. But nothing here is tangible. Not even I. As I said before, you are God here. In these holy moments, before the fade to black. You may see an eye in the sky, or a floating cloud of dust, and think, ‘This is an odd place’, but this is all because of you dear boy. If you want mountains, or skies, or trees; lakes, or rivers, or streams; valleys, or canyons, or craters… all you have to do is such. I know you won’t understand, and that’s the dreadful curse of this all; time always expires before you truly understand how to exist… but it’s okay… you’ll be okay boy.”
“But-”
“Hush now. Let me read a different passage to you.”
The bishop read aloud, “Dreams, dreams, an awful fright; they’ll hold you close til the end of night; and when at last the morning comes; you’ve lost control, and the locust hums.”
It all began to fade away, not to black, but to a bright white. No more bishops, or books, or eyes… just white. The man looked for something to hook his eyes to, but there was nothing. A sea of unending tranquility. A monotonous drone of emptiness.
Until the sky zipped open.
He laid facing upward, as a human face, covered in a large pair of spectacles, appeared above him. The woman had a mask that covered the lower part of her face, and a bouffant cap on top of her head. She spoke not to the man, but of him. “He’s just not responding. I have to call it.”, she announced with a most remorseful look on her pale and delicate face. Just as fast as the sky had opened, it sealed. The man was now alone, floating in a vast array of continued nothingness.
Except for a sound. A ticking sound. A sound that bounced around the walls of infinity and all throughout the man's head.
Something was floating toward him in the distance. He could not make it out until it was directly in front of his face.
It was a clock. This was where the ticking sound had originated. He attempted to read the clock, but it was all so blurry. All he knew was the ticking. This all had to mean something; the clock, the doctor, the visits from these fantastical figures… what did it all mean? How much time did he have left? What was it all counting down towards? In his mind he prayed for one more visit, one more explanation as to what it all meant.
His prayer was answered.
Out of the void grew a tree. A wearisome tree with hardly enough leaves to obscure its decaying limbs from any prying eyes. Its bark had splintered, and blistered many moons ago. Trees were not meant to exist for as long as this one had. From out of its belly it spoke. “Existence is a curse. None of this is built to last, especially you. I held the forbidden fruit in my palms, and I watched it defile you. You wish for the answers to this existence? Is this not what dismantled the last life you were given?”
“I believe you, I swear I do! I do not desire knowledge that is not mine, I only hope to find a way out of here.”
“A way out? There is no way out. This is it. You had your chance for the past millennia. You all burned the bridge with your absurd desire for enlightenment. My gardener, in his infinite wisdom, left when the bite was taken from that sacred apple. You are all alone.”
“But I-”
“No. I tell you the truth, and that is all you asked. If you desire a conversation, you may have it with whatever false idol you wish, but I simply cannot bear your existence.” The tree rotted back into the same cavity it materialized from.
And they arrived.
Before him now, stood all three figures previously met throughout his journey; The Serpent, The Cherub, and The Bishop. They stood still in their positions, waiting first for the man to speak.
He still lay fastened to the ground before them, looking upward. “Please,” he begged, “teach me what all of this means. I know my time is running short, but you have to show me. I don’t want to leave. I don’t want to.”
The Cherub spoke first, “The most important thing to remember is that your beliefs here matter. No matter what else you may have heard. You are here to ponder, you are here to wait. A sign will appear, even if you cannot comprehend it. Many cannot fathom an existence beyond logic and reasoning, and that is why these moments become so heartbreaking to watch. You are simply squirming in the dirt like a helpless insect.”
The Bishop retorted, “Now now, let’s be gentle with the lad. He’s not an imbecile, he just expects an explanation of an illogical world.” He turned his attention to the man. “You see, your ears are open but you are not truly listening. This is all so incomprehensible for a mortal being, so simply listen to what I say, and just do exactly that. You have less than five minutes left before all of this is for naught. In this moment, you are holy. You are free of existence, and therefore free of sin. I suggest that you use these last moments for pleasure. Not a sinful pleasure mind you, but you may now manufacture a sense of tranquility, of contentment, of joy. Do just that, use these final minutes to accept your circumstance, and experience this moment, for you are now one with the divine.”
“Stop your foolishness.” retaliated The Cherub. “He is not some deity. He is merely being tested by one. If he listens to you, he’ll end up with the rest of the sinners. You know not of what you speak.”
“Is God not within all we see?” questioned The Bishop.
“Yes, but not everything is God. God is everything, but not everything is God.” replied The Cherub. “The boy is not divine, plain and simple. This is his test, and he must pass.” The Cherub turned to the man, “You say you do not want to leave, this is achievable as all things are, through him. This fool tells you that you control this world, but you do not. You will see. He will present you with a message, and you must reach to his outstretched arms and say ‘Yes dear God. Please, take me with you.’”
The Bishop grew more furious as the seconds passed. With a fiery intensity he growled, “You act as if I claim God is dead. He is not dead. He is alive in this moment. This is the very moment that people wait their entire lives for. When heaven and man meet. It is so very beautiful, and yet you want the poor boy to waste it on some moment that will never arrive.”
Seeing a perfect opportunity to strike, The Serpent finally entered the conversation. “Don’t you see how silly these fools are? Their arguments about who is right, and who is wrong, are wasting your few precious moments. Listen to me”, it encouraged, as a smirk spread across its lips. “This rancid, hairy man is right when he says that you have power here. Unimaginable power. Think about all of the things you can do here, that you couldn’t do on Earth. All the pleasures of an infinite power, not resisted by any man or being.”
“Stop it right there.” retorted The Cherub. “I may not agree with either of these buffoons, but I certainly do not want you to fall into the hands of a heathen. It would like to watch the entire cosmos burst into flames.”
“Yes please son, whatever it is that you choose, do not follow this repugnant creature. It will only lead you through a path of destruction.” agreed The Bishop.
“They only envy me.” hissed The Serpent. “They wish they had the capacity to live in this hellish purgatory as gloriously as I do. Follow me, and you too may have all you ever wanted.”
“You can’t be serious!”
“Your self-righteous charade never fooled anyone.”
“I should banish you throughout an eternity of realms.”
“You don’t have the power!”
“Through God, we all h-”
“ENOUGH.” The Man bellowed with the power of a thousand stars. “I requested guidance and yet you all purposefully misdirect me. As time goes on, I gain more of my own consciousness. This is no different than Earth. You have wasted my breath. I want you all banished from my presence.” The Man proclaimed with an indisputable authority.
And just like that, they dissolved.
The Man was alone once again, but this time with a sense of consciousness. He felt finally awake. He began to consider the options presented to him.
The Serpent: Sin is inconsequential in a realm such as this, and therefore, The Man should live his last moments in a state of luxury not present in any real existence. If he is to accept the untold dusk ahead of him, he must first experience sin.
The Cherub: God is real. He is the only way out of this situation that doesn’t end in an inescapable darkness. The Man enjoyed the sound of a life after this life, but he could not perceive a reality in which this was realistic. He decided he would look for the sign of God as his time expired, but he did not expect one to come.
The Bishop: Man is man, until man joins the divine. He says that in these “moments of holiness”, man becomes God, just as God became man through Jesus. To him, this is Heaven. This is a kingdom in which man can finally will his own being into existence.
The Tree of Knowledge: Man created sin. God left because man disappointed him so. None of this has meaning, just as life no longer has meaning. An oblivion of options, and an absence of time. And so, The Man realized that through all of his questioning, and discussion, he had wasted his last few moments of existence. He had repeated the same mistake all humans make in their lives on Earth.
He turned his neck upward. A rain cloud had formed above him, and only above him. The precipitation wet his face with a cold, dense flood.
The ticking had started again, but this time it was much faster.
He had accepted the fact that all of this was over, he had only wished that he had a chance to do it again, so that he could make the correct decision this time.
He smelled something.
He looked off into the distance. He saw a mountain. He saw smoke.
Was this a sign, or had he created this of his own will?
He lay still on the ground, eternally immobile.
He howled in remorse, but it was merely a whimper in the infinite sea of darkness approaching him.
Fade to black.
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