Epilogue: The Pilgrim at Tinker Creek

Annie Dillard's watchful analysis of what has become of the Franken clan.

It is impossible to know Tinker Creek without knowing them. The reborn children, the Frankens, as they call themselves after years of garbled translation, language to language, Swiss to German to French to English to American. They are the kind that can defy life and death; just by them perching on the mountain it becomes a molehill. They live forever and die shortly, though they cannot reanimate the reanimated. It’s a big deal when one of them dies, as they like to make sure they get every piece back to their “creators.”

Those creations, it’s impossible for them to be alive. How do they do it? How is the oldest of them a witch of a being, a hag gentle and disgusting, but the youngest only subtly pretty, only a bit more light and graceful? Can nothing beautiful come from those creatures?

I cannot say no. I saw a young Franken in the forest the other day; she has the same habits as me, the same way of wait-and-watch. I caught sight of her down the stream, as she was standing still and silent, her cloudy gray shawl draped around her, perched at the edge of the water, pink eyes staring, unblinking, into the current. In a second she crouched, and in another she sunk her hand in the water, eyes wide, burning, and pulled up a fish. I was astonished. On the rock beside her was laid out a piece of cloth and a tin bowl; she threw the fish into the bowl, standing back up. She continued to do this for an hour, amassing a good two dozen fish.

I found myself unable to tear my eyes away from her. She was an anomaly, and I observed her like any other animal, my breathing low and body held to the ground. Her hair was a dark gray-brown, her bangs straight, surrounding her face, with a short braid in the back. Unusual for even the most crude of Frankens, she had a stitched scar running right across her face, meeting with another on her left cheek. And she was silent. I heard not one note of her voice, as she fished like all the squirming animals would return her stolen voice. If only.

The whole time I had the feeling like she knew I was there. Like she and I were the weasels, sharing an hive-mind-like instinct, a subconscious interaction, our minds’ eyes locked in mortal combat. Watch, crouch, dive, grab, stand. Dump the fish, squirming uselessly like the worm that could’ve been used to catch it, if this girl were at all the way a living, thinking being should be. Repeat. For hours. An hour, I mean. However long, she never faltered, never failed. And, as she folded the cloth over the pot of air-drowned fish, as I watched her leave, her back to me, braid swaying, I realized I saw the only beautiful Franken. I realized she was well-proportioned and lovely, unlike the seven-foot-tall brutes who waltzed the town, their skin suspended in a half-rotted portion of time, so that they are neither live enough to be beautiful nor dead enough to be buried, revulsion and all. So.

I went into town and inquired about her. It turns out she’s Elliot’s daughter, who’s Alphonse’s son, who’s Victor’s son, who’s Felix’s, the original Franken’s, son, who’s Victor Frankenstein’s, the original creator’s, son. To be a direct descendent of one of the most influential scientists in the world, and fishing with her hands in Tinker Creek? Why? And why could I find her lineage, but not her name?

I went back the next day. Like the day on the hill, watching the praying mantis lay eggs right before my eyes, yesterday was once in a lifetime. I will never see her again, I feel, so strongly that I can crash into the separation like a wall, made of solid titanium. A wall made to keep a certain future out.

That future stays out, only to repeat itself, like the tom-cat’s daily sacrifices, in the form of an unusually young looking Franken. With cloudy gray eyes. Spearing the fish in Tinker Creek. She lets their blood out into the water, those eyes scanning every single portion. The shine of scales against the muddy, dim red. Watch, crouch, stab, stand, remove. Repeat. Like history, like the future, like the beautiful being with pink eyes, in the beautiful monster with gray eyes.

Author's Note

The end~ This final chapter is based on the "Pilgrim at Tinker Creek" by Annie Dillard if it took place in the same universe as my alternate universe Frankenstein fanfic. I hope you enjoyed the short ride!