The Son

The Son

He felt the vision fill his heady eyes once again as he fell into the depths of sleep. This time, however, he was met not by a clear vision of his forefathers, those men who shaped the world, but instead with something inconceivable. He found himself increasingly aware of his own independence in his vision, and realised that this body was not his own. Rhickall, I am Rhickall. And yet outside this world I am not. He treaded carefully across a plain of bright darkness, still yet flowing, rising and falling. It seemed to him as if time itself spun round, its cavernous jaw in search of its own tail, striking onwards in search of something he simply couldn't imagine. He wanted to scream, to shout, to break the fabric of this accursed place and reach his home. Home... home... where is my home? Who am I? Rhickall - what is Rhickall? Present yet absent, strong yet weak, nothing more than an idea, a hope, and yet I can still feel him - I can still feel myself. I am not Rhickall, and yet I have never been anything else. This is my home, and yet I do not belong here.


"Do you see, my son?" a voice beckoned from beyond the veil. "Do you see it?"


The voice sounded so familiar, and yet he could not remember who bore it. "See what? What am I looking for?"


"Nature. Time. Our foe." it replied, sullen.


"I don't understand." he said, striding towards the circle of time, which reeled backward with his every move, spinning around him, taunting him.


"I told you everything I knew before you crossed the barrier, and yet you forget everything, again." the voice sighed. "Try to reach out before you, try to grasp the void."


Again? He felt a twitch of familiarity, an inkling of a time aeons ago, when he was the same man, yet one he could never recognise. "I feel nothing."


"I need you to make this work." the voice told him, sounding as if it were on the brink of defeat. "Reach out. Grab it."


He clenched his grip firmly around the great nothing that surrounded him. Nothing. There is nothing. "What kind of sick joke is this? Let me out!" he screamed.


A wretched shriek rang throughout his ears, and he saw the great fabric of nothing that surrounded him tear for a brief moment, as a spindly, scaly, bluish-grey figure emerged, clad in baggy robes that draped across the platform of void on which they stood. It appeared so alien, and yet so familiar. I want to love them, and I want to rip them to shreds. What is this feeling? They collapsed to the ground, wheezing and sputtering as he rushed to pick them up, wrapping his arms around them as if he were consoling his dying parent. They shakily rose to their feet, towering over him as they looked down upon him with their burning orange eyes.


"I've never done this before." they said, uncharacteristically confused, with a hint of fear. They put their four-fingered hands on his shoulders, and locked eyes with him. "My child, time is indeed our greatest foe. No matter our personal animosities, it is time that kills us all, that makes us its playthings, all in the name of consuming as much as possible." They gestured outward, unveiling the great plain before them. "See for yourself."


The curtain of the void drew back below him, revealing a great flood of colour. Humans broke their chains, roaring at him as they cried freedom. He watched as they seized destiny itself, pouncing on their Overlords, who lounged in decadence. They all fled in terror, sprawling to find new ways to defend themselves as the humans created dread weapons of war, but it was no use. In droves the Overlords, the Rakan, my home, were slaughtered. However, the blood of the slain wept for its loss, and raged against its murderers. The Rakan drew power from their blood, and brought great disease and suffering on the humans, who dropped dead, their weapons slipping from their hands. At last, a great battle unfolded, and the blood of the slain, human and Rakan, raged against its fate. The world was at last set ablaze. Mortals, humans and Rakan, and all of their allies and rivals, quietly returned to the folds of time. The gods were more stubborn. Great spawns of unfathomable power that once fed on the blood of their followers grew famished, their great powers sweeping away less and less of the flame with each strike. With one final great shriek the gods collapsed, and the world withdrew. Why is it that I feel no surprise?


At once a new world appeared, the Rakan discovered the humans once again, and humanity fell into chains. Is our fate to be in chains, or to break them? I can hardly tell. He turned to his parent. "Time feeds on our blood, on our destruction."


"Indeed it does, my son. You and I may see each other as the great evil, the final foe to either be exploited for labour or burned in great pyres, but a greater evil feeds on us all." They turned to face him. "Reach out, child."


He reached out into the void, and felt it against his fingers. He grabbed it, tore at it, and used all the force he could muster. Out came a great hammer, glistening yet dull, heavy yet light, and with a power he had never witnessed before. He held it in his hands, feeling as if he could shatter the world with a single blow. He turned once again to the Rakan, who was clutching their belly and wincing in agony, but once they saw his great hammer, they began to smile, then laugh.


"You, my child, are not destined to defeat our foe. You have the forces of time and fate working against you, and yet now you have fought back against them. This is your tool. You may only have this one chance to save humanity, to save your people against not only my own, but against the tyranny of time itself. Through your own free will must you swing the balance."


He frowned, looking around. "I've never done this before. How am I supposed to defeat this?"


They smiled softly. "You've tried before, my son."


"Then how can I know I won't fail again?" he asked, watching as the curtains of the void covered the scene below him once again.


"You don't." they replied, using the last of their strange to hold his head in their hands. "If you fail, however, you may simply try again."


"What if I succeed?"


"All I know is that we shall never see each other again. Perhaps a new cycle will begin, perhaps the world itself will disappear. No matter what happens, the tyranny of death will escape us, at last. Good luck Rhickall, my son."


Before he could utter another word they withdrew into the folds of time, meekly collapsing into nothingness. Rhickall tried to reach out, and yet this time he was once again met with nothing. In his rage he gripped his hammer once again, and swung with all his might. The beast crashed against the veil, creating a thunderous roar that swam across time. He felt himself slip, and then fall, fleeing through the great gaping hole he smashed through the veil. Humans and Rakan bled each other dry, then caught aflame, over and over, while their gods died weeping, wailing for their lost domination. The loop sped up, reaching a state of hunger so great it seemed as if it would at last devour itself whole.


Instead, Rhickall found himself standing in front of a host of an untold number of humans, men and women, clad in shining armour with their dread weapons of war. They looked at him expectantly, with a glimmer of hope in their eyes. He took a moment to steel himself, fix his sight to the horizon, and remembered the words of his parent and mentor. Through your own free will must you swing the balance. He gripped his hammer once more, and raised it to the sky, opening his mouth to scream.


"War!"


And so it was, with time itself hanging in the balance, dancing to and fro in an orgy of blood, and yet for the first time, unsteady in its path, slithering frantically as if its tail grew further and further from its reach. Rhickall swung towards its jaw, ready to strike a final blow.

***

He awoke, screaming. What the fuck is going on?