Sky Line

A young man in a cathedral that houses the dead of war. The war itself continues, despite the rest of the world having become a memory.

 

“ You won't again!”

“ That's what you said last time!”

“ Well, this time it'll be true!”

“ But didn't you just lose this time!”

“ Well then next time!”

“ Sure, but only if you can somehow manage to reach me! Bet you can't even do that!”

“ You're gonna eat those words!”

“ Make me!”

 

The words echo inside my head as if they're real, but they only were at the time in which they were spoken, a very long time ago.

I can't imagine it anymore, a carefree life in a town gold as honey and tinted with rose at sunset, the streets always sloping, curving, and rising in steps, one particular set of stairs leading to the only train in town, and it goes nowhere but to other sections of that very town. It is a place that's far away in my memory, yet I still see it, two boys running along a black iron railing, ignorant to the fact that if they fall, and they do fall three town levels down. They leap; they rise so sigh that they see nothing but rooftops and the sun.

 

Somehow they land safely, stumbling but safely, and continue to fly along a sidewalk curb, where adults watch and shake their heads, smiling, and a few other children impulsively join in the reckless run. They run and they run and they run, until suddenly they reach the endless green plain that surrounds the town and plunges out of sight into the grass, exhausted. The children roll over onto their backs and stare at the sky until the lost energy returns.

 

I can see it but I can't imagine it, that old life of mine. I don't recall what it means to be a young boy, to be reckless and exhilarated, much less in days spent impulsively and nights spent peacefully. What did I do other than run? All I do now is sit here in this chair, one leg crossed over the other to be comfortable, and my face leaning against one hand in case I fall asleep before the next battle comes. How long has it been? I'm still young, it's obvious enough from the lack of wrinkles, but I'm not sure if I'm taller or if I look older, or I have even aged at all beyond a certain point. There are no details anymore except one.

 

I open my eyes but one is kept in darkness by a piece of black cloth. Rising up from the chair my body is silent even as I walk across the smoky marble floor, taking no care as to sound. I'm not aware of a door as I pass through to the next chamber, where squares of glass are embedded into the marble. Am I a ghost? No. A ghost would not bleed or bruise, or feel something, a slight rise under the skin, as he treads on top of the squares and the names carved upon them. There are many squares and many names, enough to cover all three floors of the immense cathedral. One room alone is so vast, if I were to make a soft sound it would explode and shake the very walls like thunder.

 

PENNY

THEO

STELLA

CORY

NUE

 

I know the names are there, but I no longer know where they are, or to whom they belong. Not that I visit them anymore, because the battles have become more frequent and I need my rest in between. But I know they all wished for the end of this war, and I will do that. There is only me against the monsters that come clad and disguised in soldiers' armor. There are endless numbers of them because of what they are, but I will do as the names on the squares have long wished.

 

Even when I can no longer feel the determination and the sorrow.

 

Two doors loom before me, so large that most of my vision is taken up by the rusted silver handles alone. They're actually positioned at the outer corners of my eyes, or rather, they were wrenched apart so that it appears that way. This I can remember. It was the last time someone other than myself was alive, and the last time I felt my heart give rise to an emotion. It was...a friend that had died. Or maybe just someone I'd known for a long time. I'm not sure. That too has become a vague haze. Sometimes, like now, I can remember that this person who was the last to die should have had a square carved out in the floor, neat and embossed like the rest, with his name etched in the center and perhaps a sentimental phrase as well.

 

CIEL

 

The letters are crooked and ugly, half scratched into the steel, half hacked on top of the original frayed lines. Who was this person to me? I remember nothing, not a hand, not a word, not a face. Inside my head I can see the mouth of my younger self opening. Is it to scream, to wail, or to shout? There is a figure with both hands slumped against the doors, the back hunched so that it blocks the sight of a hanging head. Is it me? That hair, that back, I recognize it as mine from the old days, but I don't feel anything from it.

 

Pressing my hands against the name, I push open the doors slowly and they groan in protest. Sunlight comes in, yellow and filled with dust. A steep staircase sprawls out at the foot of the landing, vanishing into the desert that stretches on forever, literally forever.

 

Back then, if we had been suspicious or at least curious about what lay beyond the green plains around the town, would the sky have been unchanged? If we had known that there was nothing but green plains, would the Falls have failed to appear? Nothing will be affected by asking such questions, but sometimes I find that I do anyway. What if, what if, what if. What if that pale gold mist of a cloud on the horizon was not an army coming forth again to destroy this cathedral and make vanish the last that came from there?

 

I reached up to the eye patch, closing my eyes. In one smooth motion the eye patch is shifted to cover my right eye. My left opens. The iris there is a pale blue-green, luminous even in broad daylight, quite unlike the yellow-brown of my right eye. Whenever I do this, that name reappears in my head.

 

CIEL

 

I'm just in time. Without warning the sky drops the bright pale blue of day and lets fall the darkness of night. A blade materializes in my left hand. It is a dark and sober thing.

 

Let the armies come. I'm waiting. Even if all else has been forgotten.