Chapter 33: A Tail of Life Support
PAST
A Rock and a pebble. This Rock harbors cracks and fissures, fissures that rest between its layers. The Rock turns out to be a Planet.
What are the qualifications? “Most planets are uninhabitable.” This is true from a Human's perspective. I've walked the Rock as a Human, as many humans as you can count, that's how many Human lives I have touched. Elves, Dwarves, Humans I've taken the shape of three and I regret lowering myself to thine standards.
"I regret," the cage tries to dictate what I am to be. Time and again the cage fails in its attempt to domesticate and manage my movement. The cage is a Rock, the Rock is my cage. A Rock succumbs to change, a rock is thrown into the river of time. I am on that rock. I must change before falling into the fissures.
I must change.
"Air becomes oxygen, food becomes sustenance, and water you can call it what you like but water is water." This is what mammals require to survive, rarely will they get a safe place to land. A rock is a rock, it does not act, not of accord.
Goes to show that most planets are uninhabitable so many lack basic mammalian necessities.” This is true from the mammalian perspective. You find yourself among the living and you will do anything and everything to stay that way even make the uninhabitable habitable.
“What is considered alive?” This a question no longer asked by the many seeking knowledge of the unknown. Why do we as a collective propagate such foolish answers?
“It is alive when it has consciousness.” A preserver of life.
“It is alive when it has reached a certain period of gestation.” A Scholar dedicated to unlocking the secrets of Biology.
"It is alive, it is ours, I'm going to keep it." A Human processing the cause to her unwitting end.
If the many believe the answer is true how can the few be right? Time will go on. The Mammals will herd and soon clarity and truth will be the last thing on the mammalian mind. The living has little to no time for what is considered dead.
Can a planet live? Will a planet live? Questions of life and death you can’t have one without the other. Will the living acknowledge your life?
A Mother is the taker of life. It was her nature to end what had begun. Loved by many, hated by all, and envied by those who’d see her fall. Powerful, unrelenting, and crucial to life as I knew it.
"Was she, my Mother? "That I would never know for she was never around long enough for me to know. A follower I was to her. Never did she look back to notice me in her stead. Even at birth, I would cower.
In her eyes, I could see myself dead. To look death in its eyes first, you must find its head. Insatiable, unfeeling, ruthless. The living struggled to fight their nature my mother never would. Who was I to question that she ever could?
It was her nature to move and give motion to those who went without. A shadow roamed the lands that spurred the living to run for the sun.
No one would see my coming, and when they did fear, for who I resembled took me time to understand my actions and how that affected not just me but many. Uncertainty, I wasn’t my Mother at first, I wanted to be but how could I be her when I never knew her to begin with?
The world already had a Mother it didn’t have a use for me. That’s what I thought. Anger or jealousy towards the woman who never gave me the time of day, so I rebelled. In my rebellion, I chose to lean away from her altogether. Did my mother care about my behavior change?
The world had something to say about my change.
Fear and uncertainty would be the inception of my name. I was my mother's child and that would never change.
I wasn't just the child of such a one-sided woman. I was me and that was now all I wanted to be.
The world had a place for me. Fear and uncertainty would never fade but the living can’t help but change. We all need to survive in some way or another. My mother wasn’t the only hardship this world had to face.
They ran long ago rightfully so I was a bringer of destruction once upon a time. Fear had to be overcome, even of death. Uncertainty is a stepping stone when weighed against the so-called greater good.
I was now loved and admired. The world couldn’t wait for my passing, none dared to follow in my stead for I was my mother's child.
If only I wasn’t me. She was the best I could ask for. This world is nothing but a step towards a long path the sky is not the limit unless you make it so.
Forward, she moved, everything else was just in the way.
Slowing you down, tying you down, holding you down, pinning you down into the cage. A cage is only a cage when it locks. Escape before it does just that.
I am loved, admired, and worshiped by the world. My image is the opposite of my mother for I have rebelled for so long.
Do I miss following in her stead? Yes, her nature is my own and it will shine through even if I do not will it so. Will I forgive my mother? No, I will keep rebelling against her nature since it is in my power. She has wronged me by not giving me what I deserved.
The world adores me! My mother should see me now. I have done what she could not. Won’t be long now.
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She has come.“DO YOU SEE ME, MOTHER!!!” Her eyes, the pond in which I first drank a reflection.
“I AM SORRY MOTHER!! Thank you, for letting me live, Mother!”A Mother to many. Thankfully, I am loved the most.
It is my life that remains. She did not care in the slightest that I had changed because the resemblance was hers alone.
She had walked with destruction and death, she was left with destruction and death, and she would leave with destruction and death on her last round.
I am my Mother's Daughter. I do not wish to be followed. Love is not aligned with her nature, admiration is to be kept under control, and a burden is a mind that cannot think for itself.
As for worship? I love being worshiped. I am not my Mother after all. The world worships me still because I am the first to oppose the force of nature. The time of rebellion has ended but it is too late. I am too far removed.
My mother would not let the skies of this world limit her. This world was an obstacle to her course. She was destined to leave.
I am certain that it was her wish to see me follow in her stead. Then again, I am not my Mother.
The world wants me to stay. So, I stay for no reason other than that. I know of a nature the world does well not to forget.
When I looked into her eyes, I saw death. We are all going to die someday. I don't think my mother will die any time soon. Her nature may have been destruction and death but her will was to defy all obstacles in her way. Thankfully, I was never one of them. She would not wait for me. I would sooner meet my death by standing in her way. Our paths have split but there is no schism.
The world worships what is not of death and destruction. It has forgotten my nature. A nature that I keep sacred and secret from the ones that worship in my name.
They bathe in my light, soak up my warmth, and are nourished by my step. Sacrificing themselves in my name in hopes of falling upon my path. "Shall I entertain?" I long to see scenery that reminds me of her who has breached the sky. Does anyone in this world remember the Mother of Death, destruction, and Misery?
No, they wouldn't. I am all they see. The world is changing, and I can’t tell if these changes will leave room for me. "Sacrifice." I don't like seeing it as much as I thought, I know death and she does not work amongst the living. I am my own. How dare they take for granted all that I give!
They want more and more. Worshiping in a name I can’t even call my own for it pales in comparison, I won't let them see my nature. They are not worthy of that dear to me, will I admit having forgotten the power that truly lies within.
I will dim my light so they will learn to stop sacrificing. I don't want this to be my name in time they shall learn to live with loss and gain.
The world has changed. It rejects me entirely. If it is my own doing? I know not the cause.
My path doesn’t belong to this world, it forgets itself! This world is nothing of importance so I shall prepare for leave.
How long will it take? A long time indeed. My Nature is sacred, a secret now hidden even to me. The world no longer loves and admires my flight, no longer does it treat me with true respect, and dignity.
Fear is only known by the few when speaking my name.
They are forgetting, who do I resemble most? I had forgotten the one I resembled most. I can no longer gaze into the pond.
Do I still resemble her? Mother? What was her nature? I have forgotten something most crucial, so I stay in hopes of remembering my true name. These lands are the same she roamed even though much has changed.
Change, the world has changed completely. Some pretend to be of my likeness. Challenging my status as a bringer of light. No, that’s not my true name. It can’t be my true name? Light is just a pebble to my mountain. What lies at the peak?
Weaklings disgrace us by seeking to harm, kill, and enslave all that I am. It is harder to truly be myself when the world now seeks to consume me. Worship has become an obsession to not just rebel but seek and destroy or even worse enslave. Why am I not like my mother? I look to her to find strength.
I should leave! Why won’t I leave?
PRESENT
Worship I don't care to be worshiped anymore. Asking to be worshiped is asking for too much. Am I lying to myself? No, it is not in my nature. I haven't left this world, the world may no longer need me but I need this world. It holds life.
I crave life.
The system wants me to take lives. Why would I do that if I am not my mother? This world has no hold over me!
How did she leave!!! Where did she go?!?! Where will I go? Maybe I should stay? So, I stayed.
This world was a trap. It is not hard to become ensnared by burning ambition.
No one worships me. I destroy those who come for the kill. I’ve lived a long life but an even longer one awaits.
My life of light is not right. I know this deep down inside of me. The balance has been pushed to my side; on a scale that doesn't belong to me.
The Challengers think that I am dim and the world no longer cares to see my shine. They no longer have a way to find me. Only those who truly long shall see the light.
In time even I have seen the errors of my ways. Mother gave birth to me in prison, the cage, it plots. The prison I chose to stay in of my own volition, young and dumb I was.
Beings like me were meant to break past the skyline, not be subjected to being mere pawns to carry out a world's Will.
In time, the world shall forget as it did my Mother, that is when I shall make my escape. I will have to endure until my nature is restored, I resemble my mother after all. Isn’t that what she did?
I will not lose my light in this world. Destruction can no longer be the key because it has grown weak. I am sorry Mother for rejecting your gift! I didn’t know any better. Living with light is the only option and I shall live with the repercussions. My nature is still my own. Everyone and everything had once prayed for my aid so hope is not lost for I am still alive. I walk the earthen ground now instead of flying high. They sense my light. Those who long for it the most. Some of them seek me out, and others I find on my own.
Blood of the distant shapes is different from the past, some bigger than others but they all ask.
To be saved, from the world that plays the victim. A whisper, a shout, a plea I have my ways of smelling the ones who seek my death. Not even Mother wanted to kill me. Time passes and the world doesn't change. My light doesn’t dim because I know "Nature" is the only way to escape the cage.
I may change to survive the Rock, but my goal must never change with me. Obstacles that get in my way, will be removed. It was my mother who I resembled most. But I am not she, so I try for obstacles to move themselves. "Was it a mistake?" No, it was not, nor was he the first challenger who sought my death.
This one was different, or believed himself so. Which made him just the same as the one before. I was drawn to the cold or is the Cage that draws the cold to me? Has the cage caught a whisper of my plans and now it dangles a bone in my path? I bite the bone, and it is the coldest bone on the spinning Rock.
Cold until he found me, warmed and not the slightest bit wary of the heat.
He who comes courting death will be bestowed a new light.