by R. E. Vance
Valkyries and bunyips, sara-hebi and banshees … each of them fought for their home.
And still the FrogMen came.
The citizens of Paradise Lot fought with their very souls, their very beings. I doubted a single one of them would have fought harder for the heavens and the hells that were once their homes.
And still the FrogMen came.
We all knew that no matter how hard we fought, we would never truly be able to take down Tiamat. Not until she had destroyed our home. But this was the home we were willing to die for, and so we fought on.
And still more FrogMen came.
↔
I thought it couldn’t get any worse. It did.
A giant tentacle struck the crystal vat and the laptop, destroying both. Without the talisman holding her in place, it was only a matter of moments until she was free to destroy us all.
Not that I could do anything about it. I had my own FrogMen to contend with—hundreds of them. Swing after swing, slash after slash, I took down as many enemies as I could, but I was losing. I wouldn’t be good for much longer. What else was I going to do?
I resolved to fight until I could no longer lift my sword. A FrogMan came up behind me and stabbed its slimy, barnacle-laced sword in my back. I screamed in pain. Medusa rushed to my side, her daggers severing first the FrogMan’s arm from his body and then his head.
“Jean, are you OK?” she asked, and spun her face to the oncoming hordes, flashing her gorgon time. The shoreline lit up. A hundred FrogMen turned to stone as wrinkles lined her once youthful face.
“Stop,” I said. “You’ll run out of time. You’ll die.”
She put a hand over my wound. Her eyes glowed white, and my pain and fatigue left me.
“Stop,” I said. “Please. Don’t waste your time on me.”
Medusa smiled. “Oh, Jean,” she said. “In another life, I would have given you all my time.”
“In another life?” I said.
Medusa nodded. “You know what Chry said to me when he died? My little boy was an old man, still being held by his loving mother who hadn’t aged a day in his whole life. I cried and begged all the forces I knew not to take him from me. You know what he said to me? ‘I spent my time well.’ I think I’d like to do the same.” She smiled, her gorgeous dimples digging into her olive cheeks. “Just promise to bring me flowers. That would make me very happy. Very happy indeed.”
And before I could stop her, she stood. The wondrous, selfless Medusa looked back at me long enough to wink at me before she walked toward her chosen fate. Flash after flash shot forth, each one freezing hundreds upon hundreds of FrogMen. More came from the ocean’s depths, yet as soon as their heads surfaced, Medusa let out another flash and they froze in the water, stone lily pads that would forever be a testament of her sacrifice. And still more came, meeting the same fate until she built a wall of stone FrogMen that blocked their advance.
Singlehandedly Medusa stopped Tiamat’s army.
↔
Medusa, old and feeble, fell to her knees. I came to her side and held her tight. “You shouldn’t have done that.”
“Did I stop them?” she asked.
“Yes,” I said, my tears falling from my cheeks to hers.
“Good,” she said. “Help me up.” I nodded and pulled the Queen of the Gorgons to her feet. “Thank you. I think I have just enough time left.” She closed her eyes. There was a soft white glow beneath her lids. She burned through the last of her time and turned herself young. Not like she was when she came to the GoneGod world, but young like she must have been before there were gorgons and angels, when the world was new and still trying to figure out what it would be. Her snakes left her, slithering down her body as lush black curly hair grew in their place. Her dress was no longer the gown she wore to the gala but a beautiful flowing toga from an era long gone. She looked so young, so vibrant. So hopeful. “Human Jean,” she said, capturing me with deep brown eyes. “I do hope you’ll keep your promise and bring me flowers.”
“I promise,” I said, crying now. “I will.”
“Good,” she smiled, and with an outstretched hand pointing to the sea, she burned the final dregs of her time. There was one last flash, and Medusa’s skin turned hard and solid.
Medusa—the beauty-magazine obsessed, nail-polished happy gorgon with two perfect, smile-induced dimples—turned herself into stone.
And as life left her, I became consumed with a misery I had felt only once before. A sadness that I vowed, then and there, to never feel again.
I got to my feet, leaving my sword by Medusa’s stone body, and walked over to Tiamat. I didn’t care if the FrogMen attacked … by the GoneGods, I wished they would. I wished they would end my pain … I didn’t care if one of the beast’s tentacles crushed me. I just didn’t care. Not anymore.
I was done. This was it. I was ready to die.
Yet even in my misery, I knew I couldn’t just let Paradise Lot fall. There were too many left. Penemue, EightBall, Miral … Astarte, TinkerBelle, CaCa … hell, even Judith. There was one last thing to try, one last attempt—with it, I would have my wish for death granted.
I approached Tiamat and cried out the one word I heard Enkidu cry out when Astarte shared her memories with me with that kiss. The word he used when he begged the Bull of Heaven not to destroy all he loved: Enough.
Enough, enough …
“ENOUGH!”
Worst … Day … Ever
“Enough!” I screamed. I wasn’t just screaming the word, I was screaming my anguish. “Enough!” I cried out again and again. Each time I uttered the word I released pieces of me that were overflowing with grief and misery. This wasn’t the fleeting misery that sometimes strikes the heart, only to be lessened in the morning. This was the misery that would stay with me for the rest of my days, never dulling, never subsiding, never diminishing. My soul was crying, and it would cry for as long as I drew breath. Of that I was sure. And now—all these years later—I can say that I was right.
I walked toward Tiamat, who had freed another tentacle from The BisMark’s spell. I figured that I was worthy enough to beg for her to stop. After all, I had fought with Astarte, and I had defended Atargatis—according to Other law, that made me their Champion. And using Astarte’s memories from her kiss, I knew that Champions were allowed to sacrifice themselves for their masters. Atargatis may have been out of the running, but Paradise Lot and all the mythical creatures that lived within its limits were not. There may not have been one creature powerful enough to send Tiamat back, but the Champion of hundreds of them … that was another story.
And judging from how her loose limbs no longer attacked the beach, I knew I had figured right. “Take me,” I said. Tiamat’s free tentacles recoiled and then stretched out, like she was considering my sacrifice. She struck the beach with each arm. Thuwamp! Thuwamp! Thuwamp! Each strike sent sand up into the air. I walked through the haze of beach and stood underneath one of her arms. It was about to fall on the earth and with its mighty sweep crush me to nothing. It swung down, and I cried out, “Can’t you hear me? Enough! Take me!” The tentacle froze inches from my face, hovering in the air as if deliberating whether to kill the puny human or accept the offering.
Astarte came up behind me, Enkidu by her side. “Jean, what are you doing?” Her words were heavy with anguish. “She consumes you and you’ll stay within her, never dying, never aging—alone forever.”
Enkidu looked from Astarte to me and then back to Astarte, and as he did, he wore a look of confusion. It seemed to me that he didn’t comprehend what I was doing, but he was more confused by why Astarte cared.
“I know,” I said. I pointed at Tiamat. “She understands that I accept all this. I am sacrificing myself … fully, completely. I am going to end all this now.”
“No,” Astarte said. “We need you.”
“You don’t. Not anymore. And what’s more, I want to,” I said. I was surprised at how calm I was … how certain. I wanted this t
o end. But moreover, I wanted to end.
“But—”
I put a hand on Astarte’s cheek and let hot tears run over my fingers. “I can’t do this anymore. Don’t you see? I just can’t.” I looked up at Tiamat and cried out, “Come on … take me.”
The FrogMen, who still numbered in the thousands, stopped climbing over Medusa’s wall, watching the deliberation. Tiamat’s tentacle hovered until it eventually lowered next to me, finally resting on the beach with a heavy thump. I hoisted myself up and onto the tentacle and waited for it to carry me to Tiamat’s mouth for an eternity of suffering.
↔
I thought Tiamat would toss me into her mouth like one might a peanut. Instead, the creature—the world-breaker, the ender of all—lifted me to her eye and looked at me, her black pupil larger than a hot air balloon. If it weren’t for the hard shell of cornea over her eye, I might have been able to walk into that dark tunnel.
She stared at me, and I at her. What is the expression about the eye again? The window to the soul. I cannot tell you how or why, but I did see into Tiamat’s soul. Of that much I’m sure. Looking into the essence of her being, I saw confusion—just like in so many Others and humans. She was confused by the gods’ reckless abandonment of their children. I also saw duty to fulfill certain promises, even if those promises were made before the world had fully formed.
And I saw remorse.
“It’s OK,” I said. “I’m ready.”
Tiamat seemed to hesitate at my admission to being ready to die. How could anyone ever be ready for that?
“Come on,” I said impatiently. “Enough stalling. Let’s do this.”
Again, she didn’t move. In anger and fear, I cried out, “What are you waiting for? Come on! What do you want? A confession? Fine! My name is Jean-Luc Matthias, and here is my confession. I could’ve saved her. If only I’d been faster, smarter, better, I could’ve saved her.” I pointed at Medusa and at the sky. “I could’ve saved them both. But I wasn’t good enough. And because of me, the world suffers for their loss.”
I looked down at the denizens of Paradise Lot and the city that lay beyond. A city that was a paltry excuse for paradise, but it was all we had.
My eyes swept over the creatures who fought for this land. I saw Miral and Penemue, EightBall and Michael, the Yara-Ma-Yha-Who and The BisMark. And Medusa, her lifeless stone figure standing proudly on the sandy beach, one hand outstretched. Medusa, who sacrificed herself to save me. All I could think of was that there was more blood on my hands, more death for which I was responsible.
“Even if I’m wrong, even if Bella was here instead of me, and her presence didn’t change much, it would’ve changed one thing—Medusa would’ve never died trying to save me. It might seem like a little thing to you, but that’s everything to me. She’d be alive. But because of me, she’s dead.”
The tentacle moved toward Tiamat’s mouth, and what met me was an open maw that looked more like a tunnel than a throat. In the early dawn, only the first three steps were illuminated. I stepped in, expecting a hard surface, but under my weight my foot sunk down a few inches and it drove home this was no tunnel, no cave, but the soft insides of a monster that planned on digesting me for an eternity.
I took a step inside, feeling the slime and mucus from Tiamat’s mouth seep through my shoes. From what little light lit my way, I knew I only needed to take another few steps before the slope of her throat would grow too steep and I’d slide in—the worst water slide imaginable.
From the beach I heard Astarte’s voice cry out, “Stop!” At first, I assumed that she meant for me to stop. But when powerful hands pulled me out of the monster’s mouth and back into the light, I knew I was wrong.
Enkidu had somehow clambered up Tiamat’s body to get to me before I could be swallowed. The speed with which he had reached me was unnatural. Impossible, even. He grabbed me and threw me out of Tiamat and to the earth several hundred feet below, thus trading one form of death for another.
Except death from falling would not come, because angelic arms caught me as I fell. Miral had saved me.
“No,” I said. “Let me go.” I scrambled back toward Tiamat, back toward Enkidu, back toward the Champion who sacrificed himself not once, but twice. I was determined to save him. I was determined to meet my end. But how could I do either when I had no magic to burn, no time to spare? I possessed neither wings to carry me nor legs powerful enough for me to leap up and do what I intended.
All I could do was stare helplessly at Enkidu, who sat crouched on the lips of Tiamat. He gave me that wild grin of his. I cried out, “What you are doing? This was my choice. You have no right to—”
But it was too late. Without hesitation or fear, Enkidu jumped into Tiamat, and into whatever fate which would meet him beyond.
Miral lowered us to the beach, where we watched Tiamat reel back in pain—the Earth-ending monster shook and twisted, cried and roared, and although I didn’t understand what was happening at the time, Atargatis would tell me later that, just as the Children of Assyria were forbidden to hurt their deities, so too was Tiamat forbidden to hurt one of Chaos’s avatars. And Enkidu was exactly that—an avatar of Chaos who was once-upon-a-time sent to kill a king who chose reason and science over miracles and curses. To do so was an offense that was punishable by death. Except, what could kill Tiamat but Tiamat? Such was the battle that took place, a near-invincible creature trying to kill itself. It could not. Tiamat pulled back into the ocean, struggling with what she had consumed, and sunk underwater in a rush of waves and bubbles and whirlpools that gradually dissipated.
Astarte and Atargatis watched Tiamat submerge, united in their grief for losing someone they loved—they just weren’t crying for the same creature.
“What happened?” I asked.
Astarte wrapped her arms around herself. “Enkidu chose.”
↔↔
With their mother gone, the army of FrogMen retreated to the depths below water. The apocalypse retreated, the End of Days was not to be. We won, and I couldn’t have been more miserable.
I trudged to where The BisMark stood over the head of Stewart. Apparently being smashed into a thousand pieces did not kill a gargoyle.
Stewart’s eyes followed my approach. “I was promised,” Stewart’s head said as soon as I was close.
“What?” I said. “What were you promised? Who promised you?”
“Free the Tiamat and dream …” he said, his diamond eyes distant.
“Who promised you?” I asked. “Pan?”
Stewart scoffed, displaying more emotion than I had seen him do the entire evening. “Pan is but a pawn.”
“Then who? Who promised you? Chaos? Is it trying to return?” The BisMark asked, his voice filled with the first sign of fear since I’d known him.
Diamond eyes trained on me, and a devilish smile crossed Stewart’s face. “Chaos is a concept no more interested in power than a star is interested in shining. It is what it is. No, he’s not Chaos. He’s so much more …” His voice trailed off and he turned solid. Whatever little life animating Stewart left him, and he became what I always believed him to be—a statue, and nothing more. Well, the head of a statue, at least.
I picked up Stewart’s head. “Is he dead?”
“In a way … He has turned himself from a being into a non-being,” The BisMark said.
“So that’s it. A cryptic message about impending doom, and we’re done? No more questioning him about what happened and why?”
“We can try—but my experience with gargoyles is that once they turn solid, they can only wake if they want to wake. After all, how do you torture a statue?” The BisMark said, with far too much cheer than the situation warranted. He pointed at the cameras and bowed. “Come. Stand tall. We are heroes, now, and the world needs us to be strong. If you are broken, be so in private. But here and now, be the Champion this world so desperately needs—”
“No.”
“Be the hero you are meant to be.
”
“No,” I said again, turning my back on the cameras—not that it mattered. I was seen, and there was no way around that now. “I am no hero. No ‘Champion.’ And if you think the world will see us as heroes after all this, then you’re a fool. There will be repercussions. Life will get much harder for Others.”
The BisMark nodded in understanding. But if he understood my point about life getting more difficult or how I was no hero, he didn’t let on. “Perhaps. But we’re at the point of crisis. History has taught us that true change can only be affected when the world is in chaos. Whether it shall be for better or worse remains to be seen.”
“If you believe that this could lead to something better, then you’re definitely a fool. Life was hard enough without—”
But before I could finish my sentence, Astarte ran up to The BisMark with supernatural speed and slapped him across the face. “You bastard!” she cried. “Twice you’ve hurt me. Twice.” She sought to strike him again, but Atargatis came to her sister’s side, pulling her away from the peacock-suited being.
The BisMark dabbed at a droplet of blood beading in the corner of his lips.
“I thought you said nothing could hurt you,” I said.
“No … I said I’d never allow anything to hurt me.” He nodded at Astarte. “She was destined to be a goddess, but sacrificed her position for something—or rather, someone—she believed in. And now she has sacrificed again. Just as you have sacrificed again. Take care of her, Jean. She’ll need you in the days to come, and you’ll need her for what’s coming. Before all this is over, you’ll both sacrifice once more.”