568. Beyond good & evil, 7
A few days went by on this beach, with us barely moving.
I just listened to the sea, watched the clouds, and tried not to get overwhelmed by the lingering smells of corpses as they decomposed.
Around us, I sometimes observed a few critters playing around. Three of the creatures I created during that time somehow survived. They’re like small and dark red chicks, or very small puppies.
The first lifeforms I created, in the angry spur of the moment, thoughtless. Without thinking.
B - Part of being a god like us is in this.
R - I never realised I could. At the time, it was more nightmare speaking through me than myself...
The small beasts play around like nestling. The meaning of their existence is in the past. I’m wondering.
R - Could they grow to become monsters?
B - They don’t even have digestive systems...
They were not meant to live long.
What time they have left is theirs to enjoy.
Blume is breaking open the egg.
The time for a more well thought life to awaken is coming. Labour begins.
~
I checked the helicopter that still lied properly stopped, a good distance from Blume along the beach.
I passed the various scenes of massacres.
I can remember most of the wounds that hit me, including the bullet through the back and chest in the beginning.
But my flesh and skin now only have scars about them as if they were very old memories. The only wound that aches today, is my amputated pinkie my sister took in her parting anger.
Had she remained in the vicinity, dreadful nightmares would have followed for me, but I’ve slept rather fine. So she’s already too far away. I miss her.
I still need to burn all the cadavers that are decomposing.
But first I wanted to check the helicopter.
I think it’s still functional, but it’s obviously too complex to pilot without training. It’s not just a wheel, a break and an accelerator like in cars or a sail on boats. Such a shame...
Although there may still be a way to make this wish come true.
~
I return to Blume, whom is in the work of releasing the child new-born. I dragged two corpses to her.
My body aches horribly. All my bones hurt. My muscles, my tendons, my ligaments and articulations, they’re all there and hurting.
It all feels like bark with nerves and rusty mechanics, with nerves.
I heard of women one day seeing their mother’s face in their stead when looking at themselves in the mirror.
My mother was still fair in her last days. I’m still a few years younger than she was when she died, but I look far older.
The one my reflection in polished glass and metals reminds me more is Licht.
Which is neither a good nor a bad omen. It’s a little bit of both.
Licht Trägerin was a bolt of lightning striking my history and existence. Sudden, unexpected, bright, powerful, inspiring. Rapidly gone, but leaving a strong and lasting marks on everything she touched.
Someone who wasn’t there for long, but left a stupidly strong impression.
B - Licht was insane and dangerous, to all.
R - Hm...
She’s not the only one to think that. Licht ignited dangerous fires that still have consequences.
B - But she was also like you. Someone with an ideal, a moral ideal to burn for...
R - We sure burn a lot... Anyway... Could you learn to pilot the helicopter you think?
The two cadavers I dragged, I believe they knew how to. How grimly pragmatic I’ve become.
B - Given how far you’ve come into becoming one of us already, are you sure you wouldn’t want to do it yourself?
R - Ouch, Blume... That’s mean. I would rather not make that step of eating human brains just yet no. I’m not ready to do such a thing...
She chuckles. Thank goodness she was only mocking me. Although she’s right in stating that I’ve made a few large steps lately, away from humanity and toward daiûas like her.
I don’t want to abandon my humanity, for whatever meaning it still has.
Blume vines and roots stretch toward the dead peoples. I let her eat and read while I wander away.
~
I proceeded burning all the bodies, humans and monster alike.
Some of them had begun incubating strange things already.
Maybe they were the last humans on Earth...
And partially because of me, now it’s all over.
My nickname of godslayer might be amended someday by those who survived.
I’m just a killer now...
The flames turn slowly the flesh and clothes into coal and ashes.
Blume wouldn’t care much about how society would judge me. I still feel pain, guilt and regrets.
Though time and survival prime them all.
Soldiers and heroes fight and kill for a cause. I’ve killed gods for such. Humans, mostly for the survival of my kin. Not a better cause. My conatus she called it. The costs are irrelevant when your will is to live on.
I don’t want to think about what he would have thought. Also I promised myself to move on from imaginary father’s approval.
But it’s true I’ve become closer in essence to a daiûa in more ways than expected.
Good or bad, when I couldn’t control the situation any longer, at least I survived.
~
At least the child of Night’s survived.
The body has come out of the soft fleshy egg. The remaining liquids from the placenta are pooling toward the ocean, floating there in an oily layer. The colours are iridescent.
I step on some of the now dried small roses I bled before. They’re part of the sand like dry leaves now. It’s a part of Blume in me that does things like that.
The body of the child that will now be mine begins to move.
The shape looks mostly human, and adult in size though. Tall even.
It’s still buried below layers of oil and sheets of jellified flesh, proteins and whatnot.
I begin digging the gross cake of flesh, like a giant warm pudding, knee deep in this warmth, to release the child from its womb.
Blume meanwhile tells me she found the knowledge I thought regarding the helicopter. Good girl. Well... Good plant demon, daiûa closest to my heart.
B - What name will you give her?
R - Hm... So it’s a she...
I’ll have to think about it, and her.
~
