Jarvis
Huge avalanches of snow and ice cascaded down the mountains. Then came the roar of ancient volcanoes that erupted for the last time, spewing spumes of smoke and molten rock into the atmosphere. Rising columns of black ash divided the fiery red sky, and the icy wind was now laden with pockets of volcanic heat, penetrating every inch of exposed skin and sucking oxygen out of the air, leaving us struggling for every breath.
Only Sol was immune, but I could not imagine the terror that Steven must be feeling, trapped inside the metal hulk like a sailor trapped in a submarine, and he would hear the equivalent of depth charges exploding all around him, unseen but deadly. Breathing became even more laborious and painful, and as my last breath approached, I thought of my other self and where I might be; it seemed impossible that the memory of this conflagration would not survive.
The ash fell like dirty snow, clogging up my nose and mouth, getting behind my goggles, and stinging my eyes. It was hard to see in the murk, but stretching out blindly in the dark, I encountered the horny hand of McCloud. Like me, he must have taken his glove off to try and clear the ash from his mouth. We clasped hands like children and pulled ourselves closer together with our faces parallel to the ground so that we could speak.
"Rogers?" I asked.
McCloud pointed back the way he had come. "A fissure opened up," he said.
McCloud began to cough uncontrollably, and unable to talk, he drew his hand across his throat to indicate that Rogers was dead.
"Sol?"
Again, the cutthroat gesture. Sol must have gone down with Rogers.
The mountain disintegrated around us, the ground was slipping away beneath my feet, and I felt McCloud clutch my hand.
So, this is what death feels like.
Zhuangzi saw death as a process of transformation; as one form of existence ends, another begins, and death could be a graduation to a better life. There is nothing for us to fear in death. Life and death are integral parts of the cosmic order, and our perception of death as a tragedy is wrong; individual existence is highly overvalued. We know nothing of the truth and should accept the mystery of life and death without the need to construct religions based on arbitrary beliefs.
We know nothing; have I already said that?
Zhuangzi argues for the pointlessness of clinging to life, and I agree, but here I am fighting for every breath without knowing why. Our unconditional love of life is a delusion, yet I cower in this cave, reluctant to surrender what was never mine to keep.
I felt McCloud's grip on my hand fall away. His body had collapsed to the floor, and he was quite dead. I struggled to stretch him out so that he lay in a decent position, pushing his open jaws shut and carefully crossing his hands across his chest. My turn next, and I lay down beside McCloud, but the jagged rock beneath dug into my back, and I turned on my side.
Another Earth tremor, and the overhanging rock came crashing down outside to seal the exit. All the good air was gone anyway, and using my arm as a pillow, I laid down my head and went to sleep.
I awoke with my back resting against the slim trunk of a silver birch, its gleaming white bark pierced with diamond-shaped fissures of deep ebony. My mind was wonderfully cleared of the debris of my earthly existence, or so it seemed; my awareness was on another level, and I was possessed of new knowledge. Not only was the tree the original form of the silver birch, but it was also the living template for every silver birch that ever existed.
Dressed in a simple toga with a cool breeze playing about my bare legs, I was home, resting in the foothills of a steep mountain, part of a range of glorious peaks resembling a pantheon of Greek gods gazing down on the world beneath.
The light was of such clarity that I could see the smallest detail in all that surrounded me; even the grass beneath my feet was the miracle of complexity and colour I first saw as a copy in an illusion.
Hearing a cry above me, I stood to watch a convocation of eagles of the original creation soaring across the blue sky. Effortlessly riding the rising currents of warm air, their bills were like beaten gold, and feathers were fringed with vanes of barbs.
The summits of the mountain range, thousands of feet high, were unsullied with snow or ice and home to grass pastures and dense forests. In the lower reaches were the original templates of pine and spruce, and the grass that covered the slopes was more verdant than any other, though I still remember a cultivation of almost equal perfection in the Arcadian splendour of The Grove.
Cutting through these green prairies were scarlet dream rivers, great swathes of red corn poppies that bordered the path to the summit. In the heat of the sun, the abundant milky sap of these luscious red plants exudes a natural intoxicant, and I breathed in the fragrance. Climbing the steep path without effort, I come to a horizontal plateau, like a rampart, jutting out from the mountainside. Rooted in the loamy earth of this living bulwark were seven magnificent oak trees with bark like weathered ivory and a troop of watchful knights, ever vigilant against the return of the outcasts.
The great variety of birds that flew close by were of gorgeous plumage and supremely graceful in flight. Some smaller birds 'resembled grand versions of the common sparrow. No longer the brown and bedraggled street urchins, denizens of the smoky cities of Earth, the birds were clad in coats of gleaming bronze and flew through the tall trees of wild and uncultivated forests as defenders of the realm, wings shining like burnished shields in the dazzling sunlight.
A train of brightly hued canaries skimmed across the blue sky behind them, leaving slipstreams of brilliant yellow to mark their passage. But all was not motion, and down below, smugly complacent green and blue budgerigars sat like lines of festive bunting on the skeletal branches of thin and angular trees.
The perfect geometric symmetry of these silver sculptures were cast by a hand well versed in eternal mathematical laws. The hybrid forms that bridged the gap between the inanimate were a tribute to the elegance of an ordered governance that allowed not only the creation of stars but also the emergence of conscious observers to wonder at their glow.
Tired now, I rested my body at the foot of the tree whilst my unfettered mind galloped exuberantly on like a colt brimming over with joy at its first sight of a meadow of spring flowers. When I awaken, a voice bids me rise to my feet, and I do so.
Even though I have little curiosity about the past, I am told that the full account of my journey must be heard before I become as one with the eternal present of the transcendent realm. Seeing little point, now that my journey is complete, I am promised that the telling will soon be done.
"You are safe now, Steven; rest with us. All will soon become clear; calm your mind and listen. When the truth is revealed, you may choose to stay."