Echo, Chapter IV Omega

OMEGA

         The human eye, they say, is like a camera.  Or rather, the design of the camera was based on the human eye.  We view the world through a series of still frames, inverted and colored by electrical impulses in our mind.
         Click.
         The universe is black.
         Click.
         A white speck appears in the upper right corner.
         Click.
         The speck becomes a smear, and starts to move.
         Click.
         The camera man becomes impatient.
         Click.
         Click-click-click.
         The white spiral grows and disappears and it spins at mind numbing speeds; so fast that it appears not to move at all.  One western arm drifts into our view and we dive down, our minds click-clicking away.  The colors diffuse and become separate dots and spots and specks.  They are stars.  Oh don’t try to count them.  We’ll have time for that soon enough . . .
         Click.
         Some of the white blurs are streaked with yellow.  Unlike with snow, it is the yellow streaks that we want.  A little more to the right, now to the left . . . ah, yes, that one.  A small muted yellow spot.
         Click.
         It is a star.
         Click.
         It is, the inhabitants around it like to say, the sun.
         Click.
         The Sun.  Sol.
         Click.  Click.  Click.
         The third blue and green and white marble, oh let’s call it a planet, the third planet is the only one around this particular star that has any forms of life.  This information is very important, something that the “intelligent” life, the scientist types, have been debating for years.  But for the sake of our own sick amusement, I say we keep this to ourselves, yes?
         Click.
         We enter the thick, hot cloud cover.
         Click.
         We skim the wide oceans.  I think it’s important to discuss here that the planet is more than three of four parts water, yet the population seems to enjoy the idea of alien life crash landing on one of the relatively narrow strips of land.  Only one book, called Sphere, ever mentioned the fact that these “aliens” would most likely be human kind returning to Earth, as their planet was called, from the future, and that they would most likely crash land in the middle of the ocean, and drown.  While I personally enjoyed the movie it was made into with Samuel L. Jackson and Dustin Hoffman, I believe that it was a commercial flop . . .
         That just goes to show . . .
         

         Click.


         “Bloody hellfire!”
         “What’s wrong, mate?”
         “Did you...did you see that?”
         “See what?” 
         It was getting quite dark outside, and Ranzou was very uncomfortable.  Leon had promised him that they were only going to search till dark, and he was afraid that Stim might be getting lost.
         “Look mate, there ain’t nothing out here.  Maybe we ought to be getting back home.”
         “Ah bugger, Willow.  You just said you saw something.”
         “Well it’s dark.  I’m probably just seeing things.”
         “Yeah, that can be a bit of a problem.”
         “I mean seeing things that aren’t actually there.”
         “Willow, mate, what did you think you saw?”
         “I don’t know there was . . . ” he hit the dashboard with his flashlight in frustration.  “There was like some light in the sky . . . ”
         “Some light in the sky?”
         “Yeah, like . . . like some flash.  Look Stim, I know I saw something, but . . . ”
         “Make up your mind, won’t you?  Did you see something or not?”
         “I-“ Ranzou didn’t get to finish his sentence because the flash of light from the sky skimmed the road in front of them, throwing off fat, bright sparks.  Stim let out a yell as he swerved the car to the left, and into a ditch.  Ranzou’s head bounced against the side of the car and he saw more flashing lights and then the lights went swimmy.  He saw Stim, his mouth moving, but making no noise.  He saw the trail of fire left by the thing that came crashing down from the sky, saw where it arced and bounced and swerved back around, the firewall growing exponentially at the top of curve, the object coming in closer and closer and-
         “Uh-oh.”
         Suddenly Ranzou was out of the car and standing on the top of the hill. 
         BOOM!  The object hit the car again with an enormous fireball.
“I didn’t know things actually went ‘boom.’  I wonder if Stim mysteriously materialized somewhere nearby.  Maybe I should go find him.  Maybe I should find a way to get off this blasted hill without killing myself.  Maybe I should stop saying all of me thoughts out loud... Maybe I can’t.  Blast.  Maybe I should find a way to get off this hill without- oh... ”  Ranzou looked down at the flaming wreck.  The UFO seemed to have flown off again.  Ranzou looked up and saw a flash in the night sky that marked it’s inevitable return.  He looked back down at the flaming wreck.  The one his body was currently in.  “...Oh that’s not right... ”
         Ranzou turned around and saw a house standing at the top of a hill.
         “But I’m already at the top of the hill.  And why is it daylight?”  He turned to the flaming-
         “Well?”
         Well.  An old-fashioned water well, made from grey stones.  Quite picturesque.  Behind it was a lake thinly veiled by a line of trees.
         “That’s stupid.  Why have a well when you have a lake just twenty yards further on?  Lazy buggers.  Just like me parents...oh...Hah!  I’m just dreaming then.  No problem there, I’ll just pop back in to-“
         POP!
         Ranzou was back in the car again just in time to see the flaming object curving back towards them.
         “Ah bugger.”
         The colors swirled together: orange and pink and green.  Bright flashing colors, flashes of pastels, blinking neon, then black. 
         Click.          


         “Ah, me head...”
         Ranzou shook his head gently.
         “That doesn’t hurt too bad.”
         “Relax Mr. Willow.  Nothing can hurt you now.”  The voice was soft and soothing, but not a familiar voice.  Ranzou rubbed his eyes slowly as he answered the voice, “Oi, mate...you sound a bit like Christopher Lee, did you know that?”
         “So I’ve been told...perhaps that image will make you more comfortable?”  When Ranzou opened his eyes he was laying on a large soft bed, wrapped in thick sheets of red and gold.  He looked down at himself and saw that he was wearing silk bed clothes of matching colors.  Everything else beyond the bed was erased by a thick cloud cover.
         “Wha...who...huh?”
         “One question at a time Mr. Willow.”  The nearest cloud slowly rose into a pillar, and then poofed away to reveal an older gentlemen, wearing plain white slacks and a black button-up shirt.  He had a long face that ended in a short white goatee.  The man was mostly bald, and had thin spectacles perched on the end of his long nose.
         “Tinkering crumpets!  You really are Christopher Lee!”  Ranzou’s eyes narrowed slightly as he looked closer at the man’s appearance.  “Say . . . you’re not a doctor are you?”  He looked around, but could not see anything other than a blanket of fluffy white clouds.
         “No, no,” said pseudo-Lee.  “Think of me more as . . . your . . . nurse.”
         “Nurse?”  Ranzou wrinkled his nose.
         “Ah . . . fine.  Perhaps this will make you more comfortable.”  The man suddenly grew shorter, became thinner, and lost his beard.  His face changed into that of a beautiful young woman’s, with a pointed chin, large doe eyes, and bouncy auburn hair.  Her hips widened and her shirt came halfway undone.
         “Honestly, I don’t understand why everyone comes up here expecting-“
         ”Um . . . excuse me, but this doesn’t really work with . . . y’know you still sounding a bit like a man and all.  It’s actually all a bit disturbing really.”
         “Hm?  Oh!  Fine, well, I never was very comfortable as a woman at any rate.”  As the man shook himself back into a man, Ranzou sat up in bed and looked around.
         “Look mate, is this . . . um, is this Heaven?”
         “Oh, goodness no!  This isn’t Heaven!  You can’t get into Heaven from here, Mr. Willow.”
         “I can’t?  I-oh . . . ”  Ranzou buried his head in his hands.  “I always thought I would be going to Heaven.  I mean, I suppose I could have tried a bit harder, but that would be defeating the point, wouldn’t it?  I mean, if I had to really work at being a good person, then maybe I really wasn’t-“
         ”There are certain stipulations for getting into Heaven, Mr. Willow.”
         “I know, I know.  I thought I met them, y’know?”
         “Being dead is one of them.”
         “I- what?  I ain’t dead?”
         “No, no Mr. Willow- you are not ready to die.”
         “No question about that, mate, but . . . well, this does raise a few more questions than it answers, doesn’t it?  As like, where am I?”
         “This is Limbo, Mr. Willow.  A...small break in the hectic hullabaloo of life.  I am the angel Gabriel.  You may call me Gabe, if you like.”
         “Gabriel?  What about Saint Peter?”
         “We are angels, Mr. Willow, not Catholics.  We don’t believe in saints.”
         “And all that business with the Pearly Gates?”
         “A mere monument.  Something pretty that most mortals seem to expect.  I assure you that non of them are disappointed when they learn that the nonsensical rules of their old lives are indeed left behind.”
         “Ah, right.  I have to say that I always found the idea of gates in Heaven a tad...well, just what kind of neighborhood would Heaven have to be in for it to need gates, right?  A bit, uh... hypocritical, yeah?”
         “I quite agree, Mr. Willow.  Now, if you will follow me.”  A thin trail of clouds rose slightly from the floor, then turned to vapors, as a golden brick road appeared, trailing off into the distance.
         “Now that’s cool,” Ranzou said.  “But a tad cliché, I should think.”
         “Should you?” asked Gabriel.  “Come along.  I’m to give you a tour.”
         Ranzou hopped out of bed and followed Gabriel.  “Tour of what, exactly?  Other almost dead people?”
         “A tour, Mr. Willow, of Eternity.”
         “Sounds boring.”  Gabriel stopped dead in his tracks.  Slowly he pivoted on his heel, and looked Ranzou straight in the eye.  When he next spoke, he was snarling through his teeth.
         “You have no idea.”


         “Gabe!  Long time, no see, good friend.”
         “Mike.  How’s the weather?”
         “Winter in the northern hemisphere.  I’m thinking that a blizzard ought to hit Cleveland in the next week or so.”
         “Any chance of destroying it?”
         Mike slapped Gabriel on the back.  “Good ole Gabe.  If only it was that easy.”
         “Um excuse me.  I hate to interrupt,” Ranzou interrupted.  “But- Mike?  As in the angel Michael?”
         “Yep, that’s me.”
         “You control the weather?  What happened to championing God’s armies?”
         “Off season, lad.  Usually I control the weather.  Or rather,” he added with a wicked grin.  “Keep it from being controllable.”
         Ranzou rubbed his neck uncomfortably.  “The dead sure do have a strange sense of humor. . . ”
         “I ain’t dead, boy-o.  I’m an angel.  The Angel of War, the Keeper of the Clouds-“
         ”And the best damn barkeep this side of Hades!”  rang out a voice from the back.
         “Ah, yes . . . I was wondering about that . . . ”
         Ranzou had followed Gabe down the brick road to a small village.  A very small village, to be exact.  It was rather unimpressive.  Everything seemed to be made of the same gold brick, but very old gold.  Ranzou had always assumed (because he’s never actually seen gold before) that gold should be shiny.  It didn’t shine.  It smelled.  It smelled like wet copper, actually.  Maybe it wasn’t really gold, but it is supposed to be heaven, right?  Ranzou remembered when he was a small boy, he had once put a penny in his mouth.  No real reason, but it’s what young boys do.  An initiation, I suppose.  To graduate, you probably have to swallow the penny and be rushed to the hospital in order to- but I digress.
         The streets weren’t exactly empty, but they weren’t exactly busy.  For such a small village it took quite a blasted long time to walk through it.  Ranzou almost thought that Gabe was walking him around in circles.  He wouldn’t really put it past him... 
         Every now and then someone would rush by.  Sometimes they traveled individually, sometimes in groups, but always in a hurry.  Every now and then a face would appear from a window, or an alley, then disappear again.  Ranzou could assume that the people were rushing by because they were in a great hurry.  Either to die or to come back from the dead, Ranzou didn’t know, but it didn’t bother him that much to want to find out.  Ranzou could also assume that everything smelled so bad because all this gold was sitting on top of evaporated moisture.  He remembered that blood also smelled a bit coppery, but he was sure that ghosts got cleaned up before they were sent Beyond.  Granted, all the books and movies showed ghosts as carrying the chains and gore from their dying days, but how well can you trust books and movies anyways?  Despite everything Ranzou did to reassure himself, he still couldn’t shake one fact: every eleven minutes, like clockwork, a watermelon would fall from the sky.  Ranzou wasn’t quite sure what it was at first.  All he knew was that holes would appear in the clouds where there were no bricks.  After it happened the third time, he made the mistake of looking up.
         You’d be surprised that no one has ever written about a kingdom in the sky has having a sky.  What is there to look up to?  You’re walking on the clouds.  Ranzou looked up, and screamed.
         And screamed.
         And screamed.
         Deep breathe.
         More screaming.
         “What is the matter, Mr. Willow?”
         “Aagh . . . mwauh . . . uh . . . sk- sk-sk . . . sky!”
         “Yes?”
         “Where’s the bloody sky!?”
         “You are standing on it, Mr. Willow.”
         “Ack.”
         “Indeed.”
         “There!  Up there!  Where’s the bleedin’ sky?  There’s no bloody sky!  Where’s the bloody-“
         ”Do try to hold yourself together, Mr. Willow.  There is no need to shout.”
         “There’s no bloody-“
         “There is no-”
         “There is no bleedin’ sky!”
         “Ugh . . . fine Mr. Willow, have it your way.”  Gabriel walked off leaving Ranzou gibbering up at the inky blankness.
         It was blankness, not blackness, that Ranzou saw.  When he regained some of his senses, he realized that he was surprised that there were no stars.  There was no color.  It was not white.  It was not black.  But it was scary as hell.
         Gabe lead Ranzou up a short flight of steps to a door with a large robin egg painted above an intricately carved doorknocker.  What exactly the doorknocker was supposed to be, Ranzou could not guess.  It was like an angelic dragon, very beautiful, but incredibly frightening.  A sign was nailed to the wall to the right of the door:

~Baba Ram Dass~

owner, entrepreneur, adroit

(BAR & WICKET TEMPLET)

open for eternity

please no IOU’s

         Ranzou opened his mouth to ask Gabriel what the sign meant, when another watermelon fell from the sk- fell and hit Gabe right on the head.  There was not a lot of maneuvering room at the top of the steps, and if it didn’t hit Gabe it would have hit Ranzou.  Except that it didn’t actually hit Gabriel.  It just passed right through him.  Gabe must have noticed though, because he turned to Ranzou with an eerie and inquisitive look.
         Ranzou was going to ask Gabe what had just happened when another damn watermelon fell on top of him.  This time Ranzou saw the melon as it passed through the top if his head, under his face, and through his body.  Gabriel shimmered, not like smoke, but like water.  Like the way a pond ripples when you throw a rock into it.
         Ranzou was tempted to ask Gabriel just what the hell was going on, but he didn’t seem very talkative after that.  He just opened the door and barged right in, muttering darkly. 
         Besides, Ranzou was sure there was a perfectly reasonable explanation why this almost-Heaven gave him the willies. 
         There must be . . .
         ”And the best damn barkeep this side of Hades!”  rang out a voice from the back.
         “Ah, yes . . . I was wondering about that . . . ”
         “Wonderin’ why there was a bar in Heaven? Oi ve, boy-o!  You are new!” A voice from the smoky backroom laughed at Mike’s exclamation.  The laugh quickly turned into a watery cough, and cut off alarmingly.  “Think about it, boy-o.  Who needs a bar more than these bunch?”  And his words, the smoke seemed to clear a little, and Ranzou could see some of the...inhabitants of the barroom.  They were not pretty.
         There were three tables in the middle of the room, and four booths along the wall opposite of the bar.  There also was a stage adjacent to the bar that looked like it had not been used in ages.  There was a thick cover of dust and grime over the floor and walls, and the stage’s thick red and green velvet curtains appeared to be home to a variety of nasty, not-quite-heavenly creatures.
         Two of the booths were empty.  The booth farthest from the stage held a couple of grey haired ladies, and a young broad-shouldered man in a tattered black suit.  The two ladies held their heads close together, whispering and giggling, occasionally looking up at the young man sitting across from the them.  He would smile in a small, embarrassed way, and the two old women would continue their whispering with just a bit more giggling.
         The two tables in front of the stage both had some sort of card game going.  Soldiers, Ranzou guessed.  One table appeared to be full of Eighteenth Century pirates, the other modern-day American soldiers.  Ranzou guessed that they were competing with each other to see who could be the loudest and most drunken and disorderly.
         The Americans were winning.
         The other table had just two old men, and a third face down on the table snoring loudly.  It was one of these old men that had praised the angel Michael on his exceptional bar keeping abilities.  The other man smiled at Ranzou, and Ranzou was impressed.  He had never seen someone give him a toothy grin who did not, in fact, have any teeth.
         Everyone in the bar looked worn and tattered, except the man in the booth right next to the stage.  He appeared to be reading a small book when he looked up and over at Ranzou and Gabe.  He stood up and stuck the book inside his black leather overcoat.  Ranzou could see that pretty much everything this guy wore was black, and probably leather.  Big shiny black army boots.  Black leather pants.  Ranzou thought they looked greasy, and they squeaked when he walked.  If anything was stranger than the guy’s clothing, it was his hair.  His hair was perfectly white, and tied back into a long bushy ponytail, but he had two long bangs on either side of his face, dyed a brilliant blood red.
         The man stuck his hand out to Gabe.  On the back of his hand was a tattoo of an eight ball.  Gabe shook his hand, then Michael.  The man lowered his hand and looked at Ranzou. Mike coughed nervously and introduced them.
         “Um...look, this is Ranzou Willow.”  He motioned at Ranzou with his hands.  “Ranzou, this is Night.  Night is, uh...a permanent resident of Limbo.”
         “Permanent resident?  Is that...possible?”
         “Willow?”  The man Ranzou thought was sleeping at the table sat up.  He seemed to be almost ten years older than Ranzou (who was twenty-six), and had a crop of dirty blonde that was just a shade darker than his scruffy beard.  He wore a simple black shirt and dirty denim jacket.  His blue eyes warily darted over Ranzou’s face, and then quickly scoped him from top to bottom.  Ranzou’s khaki pants, loafers, and Daft Punk tee probably didn’t sit well with the tattered oldness of the bar.
           “Willow, eh?  So you’re the famous Ranzou Willow...”
         Ranzou chuckled nervously.  “Well, I wouldn’t exactly say famous...”
         “I would.”  The man stood erect.  Despite his otherwise slightly inebriated appearance, he stood tall and steady.  The hand Ranzou shook was strong and rough.  “Names England.  Richter England.  I’ll be your field leader.”  Richter jerked his thumb at Night.  “This guy isn’t really the leader type.  He’s more of the lopping off heads in the heat of battle type.”  He looked sideways at Night.  Ranzou got the impression that they didn’t like each other much, but Night remained impassive.
         “Head lopping happen a lot in Heaven, does it?”  Ranzou tried chuckling again, but he suddenly felt very dry.  Something Richter said didn’t make much sense, but he couldn’t say exactly what it was.
         “As I have tried explaining numerous times before, Mr. Willow, this is not, in fact, Heaven.  Limbo is a state not of Death, but of the undead.”  Gabe sighed wearily.  “Do try to keep up, Mr. Willow.  You’ll find all the information you’re about to receive will come in handy in the near...future.”  At the word ‘future’, the whole room became deathly quiet.  Ranzou thought about how the room became deathly quiet, and almost laughed at the irony.  And then Ranzou thought about himself being the center of attention in a dirty bar just south of Heaven, and the irony made him want to break down and cry.  Then one of the old women in the corner let out a hideously cheesy cackle and the pirates all stood up and started walking toward Ranzou and the group.
         There were six pirates, Ranzou saw.  From left to right, there was a large black pirate, a slightly less large black pirate, an Asian pirate with blue hair, Stim, and two white pirates.  The biggest of the black-
         Stim?
         “Whack my grandmum, Stim, is that you?”
         Stim rolled his eyes.  “Yeah, mate, it’s me.  What took you so bloody long?”
         “I’ve been dead, mate!  This place is hell...o anyways.  It’s good to see you.”  Ranzou looked him up and down.  The pirates all pretty much were wearing the same, maroon/brown boots, baggy black pants, yellowed silk shirts, and black fingerless gloves.  “Why the costumes?”
         “First,” Mike said, “quick introductions.  These,” he indicated the two large black men. “Are the Tako brothers.  Jonathan,” the smaller, “and Syle.  And this,” he waved his hand at the Asian man with the blue spiky hair. “This is Kein Yattrod.”  Kein smiled smugly and waved a hand lazily.  “This is Adarvis Garflyvild and Hillel Slovak.”  With his broad shoulders and wild red beard, Adarvis looked almost like a Viking.  Ranzou noticed that he was the only one who had a weapon.  A broad leather belt sheathed a short, flat dirk and a broad ivory tomahawk.  Hillel was thin, but muscular.  He scratched the top of his head, and gave Ranzou an awkward smile.
         “Come on.”  Richter started toward a door near the stage.  “We’ll explain it all in the Equus Room.”
         “Equus?”  Ranzou had no idea what that meant.
         “As in Equus Asinus.”  Mike pushed him from behind.  “Come along, boy-o.  I don’t think you’re going to like this.  I really don’t...”
         Click.