The Figure: In the Shade of a God

I stepped from the portal to a sight that will live forever in my mind, a face staring back at me. And despite its distance the size was unfathomable. Something that would make even the colossi of the stories seem pitifully small. It laid motionless on the ground. Spreading out to the horizon farther than I could see with my naked eye. Its body desiccated, skin pulled tight to the skull, lips pulled back revealing teeth the size of houses in a slack open jaw. Eyes frozen open, wide and glassy. A look that told me it had died suddenly and violently. The titanic humanoid’s arm stretched out at a painful angle, its elbow pointing upward as if it was attempting to leverage itself to rise from the ground before it realized it was dead. Still gripping its sword. A blade so large you could place the largest buildings including the palace in the old city of Opra Dale and still not fill it, and that was the part not buried in the earth where it had fallen and used the blade to slow itself to the ground. Its hilt was thicker and taller than even the largest Great Sequoia in the heart of the Skeldergate. The pommel if it had one rose out of sight above the clouds. Swinging this thing alone would probably change the weather hundreds of miles away. On its hands were rings of what looked to be some kind of gold, each wider around than wizard’s towers, gemstones like the tips of icebergs. So massive was this being that I couldn’t even look in both its eyes at the same time. I felt like a spec of nothing, a grain of sand, dust, a flake of a flake. I could have a thousand years to plan, to gather power, and be ready and nothing I could even imagine would be powerful enough to scratch something like this, let alone kill it. If it hadn’t died by natural means, or illness, or poor luck…something big enough to kill this thing…I shutter to imagine something larger existing in this world. Even letting that thought cross my mind caused me to take my eyes off the thing dead in front of me. Even as foolish as the gesture was, the thing was long dead, mummified. But still I took in the horizon, the surroundings everywhere my eyes could see. Searching for something that could have done this. The only thing I saw move was the clouds, and small shapes too far to see, but they appeared to be birds or whatever in this world pass for an approximation to birds in my own world. But that did raise a question. Why did nothing eat the dead thing’s body? Was it that it was so massive that the desiccation process happened faster than anything that could have done something to break down the body? Was the body toxic in some way? Or did the things here know better to not eat this thing’s flesh? A scary thought that the world itself, down to the smallest creature would know not to consume it. The feeling of being a speck returned…Was I looking into the eyes of a god? A dead god, left to fester stretched out over the landscape like some rubbish on the street. I had seen angels, I had seen devils, and if the stories were to be true had seen gods, but nothing like this god. Had it fallen from the sky and landed here? Had it roamed the land in long strides? Did it fly? Questions I could never hope to answer. Despite seeing things far more monstrous and imposingly grotesque, this ‘god’ caused me the greatest fear, not fear of flight, I didn’t want to run. It was a fear more primal, deep, and vast. Like the night sky, or the world outside the protective dome. Endless, or seemingly so. The concept that something this magnificently powerful could be fell like a sapling. That knowledge made me fear that I was less than small. That no matter the power I accrued I would still fall. No…I would not allow myself to think like that. I might not be a god, but I am no failure. But…still, I would even if I got what I wanted, and saved Theodosia I myself likely wouldn’t live long after. And could she still love me? The man she’d fallen in love with died long ago. Both physically and metaphorically. Shared memories, a shared appearance, memories of the deaths. But was I really even the same person, would she be able to tell the difference, and if she could, would she be able to see past that and still love me as the man I was, and not the man I am. Would we leave that place, bury the memory of it, stay and try to reclaim what time was lost and discover all the secrets it holds, or part ways and start our lives new and fresh. To suffer that change would likely break me, but if it would make her happy, after all I’ve done, all the pain I caused her, and keep causing her trying to fix her, to save her, I’d let her go. She deserved to at least be happy, after all this time she needed that. Even if it meant running as far and as fast from me as she could. I don’t know how long I’d been lost in thought and staring into the eyes of the dead god I felt a rumble. Not of movement, not of an earthquake. But like a dominating voice, something commanding.

“You are right to fear me…” the words came slow, bassy, something I could feel in my chest despite the mouth not moving. “You…” Their eyes rolled in the dead thing’s skull, their milky pupils locking onto me. “Parasite…” it spoke into my head and chest, “Failure…” “Pathetic…” “Insignificant…” “Coward…” “Sadist…” “Egotist…” “Fear…” “Run…” on its last word the mouth did move, its teeth gnashing, making a thunderous clack, as its fingers flexed around the sword, shifting its grip, as the bony arm seemed to try to be pushing it from its resting place using the massive blade as leverage.

I scrambled, pulling the chalk and tuning fork from my pocket, making a hasty chalk circle with sloppy runes. If I feel a few feet so be it. Tapping the tuning fork on my helmet it rang with a low hum, and I touched it to the circle and dropped through the ground, feeling the ground not below my feet, catching the sight of the ‘god’ for one last moment. Seeing only its legs to its waist, the rest towered above the clouds and out of sight. I’d have to destroy this tuning fork. That world was exiled. Like many other of those lost worlds, angry gods were all that remained. And fury for ‘infections’ treading on the grave of their worlds.