A New Understanding

by Benjamin Steigmann

We are accelerating evolution, I told myself. By putting these vermin to their only decent use, we will break our physical barriers and become as gods.

The full spread of our faith is almost complete. We are weeding out these blasphemers, preventing them from degrading all that we have accomplished. Our pogroms are proving effective, for these false prophets, these corruptors of humanity, are being locked away forever. And we are putting them to the best possible use.

There is an incredible reservoir of energy stored in the human soul. Normally, it serves the function of sustaining us, allowing us to live, breathe, and think as we do. But imagine the power we could harness if another soul was available for harvesting. Now imagine what we could accomplish if we harvested millions upon millions of these.

This is exactly what the Church was having us do. Working with them, our order utilized the pinnacle of human technological development, so that we might enter a time free from this depravity. We were working in bases in some of the most secluded forestry in the world, where our actions would go by unnoticed.

On the first day of the experiment, I decided to lead the tests. I had become an ambitious member of the order’s elite, and I was determined to lead the cleansing. I would obliterate these demons, and with their energy I would lead humanity into Godhood.

Or so I thought.

Test subject #1 came into the room. He was disheveled, beaten, in rags, yet strangely calm. He has no idea what is about to happen, I thought to myself. What a poor man.

My assistants strapped him to a chair directly facing my own. A psychic amplifier was placed directly over his forehead. I sat down, faced him, and started up the

Machines. Yet, as we commenced the experiment, he just became happier and happier, until it looked like he could not contain himself.

“You’re going to have one hell of a time,” he said, laughing.

Then it happened. A rip in the fabric of time. Collapse, everywhere. DEATH. And the faces, echoing, bursting from everything in infinite multitudes. All preying upon me with their SICK RED EYES. The HATE. Echoing everywhere. And the great spiraling circular vortex, spinning, spinning, spinning, spinning, spinning, spspspinning, spspspspinnnniiiiinnngggg. It stole my thoughts from me. Wait, did I say ‘my’ thoughts? Ha! How ridiculous to even imagine an ‘I’ in the midst of all of this.

With all of this pain, all of this fear, I knew I had only one option: Run!

Run away! Run from this madness! Run from this sick place, these sick people, this sick society! Run, and to hell with all else!

What has my life become?

Why did I ever sign up for this? Why did I even think of participating in such depravity? Was the drive towards power so great that I would destroy myself in the process of obtaining it?

What is this? I am surrounded by the most intense greens, blues, and violets bleeding into each other, twisting and turning, with all the surrounding space. And before me is a path that seems to lead to God, but obviously just leads to more confusion. But it is the only way out, and so I walk.

I have been treading in this forest for many hours, and every way before me offers no escape. The blue birds swoop right by me, taunting every one of my efforts. The squirrels race around me and the bees buzz a hideous buzz, all the while driving me out of my mind. The loneliness is beginning to terrify me.

In the midst of all this, an obnoxious little monkey ripped my shirt from me. He then ran as fast as he could, towards a patch of woods in the East. I ran after him, tiring more and more with each step. Soon, the monkey lead me to a circle of sticks. Then, he dropped my shirt, and hastily disappeared. Exhausted, I laid down to rest.

Upon awakening, I encountered the most bizarre man. He had orange hair, a green beard, red eyes, and was wearing a blue cloak. He was holding a five-pointed star in his right hand, and a dagger in his left, and seems to be involving me in some sort of magical ritual.

“Who are you?” I asked.

“Some call me Thoth, in worship. Others exalt me when referring to wisdom. But these names will not help us in our endeavor. For now, just think of me as yourself, trying to reach back to you.”

He joined his left and right hands, and all of a sudden I was unable to move. Then, smiling, he put sticks in a circle around me.

“What are you doing?” I said.

“Freeing you,” he said, with a satisfied smile.

Lighting a torch, the magician faced me, and began chanting:

OOOAFREREEGRGRETGRST RVBTYBRUSBSOULDETETFORA JTYENBHVTYEBUEWVTWCRTGHTGVRBUUBYFDDYCCXEQ

AUM

At once, a blinding blue light eclipsed the forest, and I found myself in a bizarre dimension where my history blended with the histories of everything else, in an infinitely interconnected matrix.

“Whatever you do, do not succumb to astonishment,” he said.

“Where are we?” I asked.

“This is supra-mental space. Here all the events of your life are clearly visible, and we will journey forth in an attempt to re-construct you.”

“Why? Why are you doing this to me?”

“To give you another chance. You have done terrible things, violated Nature’s laws in the worst of ways. You must come with me. You have no choice.”

He clasped his hands, and I was engulfed in world of imagery.

“Remember, always, to keep this oath at the forefront of your mind. Do not allow anything to distract you from it,” said a strangely tall man, masked, ironclad, and wearing black silks.

We are in a lit chamber, and all around me, lay other initiates.

“Are you beginning to remember?” said the magician.

“What is this? How is this in any way significant?”

“I fear we must dig deeper.”

The burning. The burning. It will not stop.

For all these years I have labored to create these masterpieces, and these thugs are destroying them.

And there I stand, impassioned, praying that they will leave.

Then, all of a sudden, one of them drags me by my feet. The others are beating me, till I can barely breathe.

“You will become one of us,” they chant in unison.

“Who is this?” I said.

“That is you, before you changed.”

“I don’t get it. He is not I. I have spent my entire life in service of the faith.”

“Then you will meet him, and we shall see who you really are.”

The magician waved his hand, and all of a sudden this character stood facing me. He was younger, eyes shining with a brilliant radiance. I tried to move, but his gaze held me transfixed.

“What is happening?”

“You’re not going to move. I am going to exorcise you, O Daemon, from that body, and allow it’s true owner to take its place.”

He started to weave a many-layered web from his hands, and from that web arose a serpent, hungrily gazing at me. Instantly I knew what had to be done. I gathered all my strength, broke my gaze, and tackled the magician.

The imagery stopped. We reentered that primordial realm where blue light eclipsed everything. Immediately, the magician broke free, yet before he regained his composure, I snatched his pentacle.

“It was hopeless,” he said. “I tried to help you, tried to reform you, yet here you stand, unchanged.” And he lunged forth with his dagger.

At this moment the power of the pentacle made itself truly apparent. For although the magician could normally overwhelm me, with its assistance, I was able to retard his movements. His dagger then behaved bizarrely, quivering, and emanating streams of light. It fused with the pentacle, and I felt my hand and the magician’s melting into each other. He became such a familiar presence, and soon I could not distinguish myself from him.

Now I stand acutely aware of my actions. I know who I was, and what I have become. I can go back and witness any point of my life, yet I feel strangely detached. I feel incomplete, as if I have lost something. I know who I am, but I am not myself.