Heart of the Void
Absolute darkness. I float in the black Void, seated upon a steel throne carved by single thoughts from uncertainty, shining with the immutable colors of serenity. From the very heart of the Void comes the divine voice of silence. The voice is beautiful, unimaginably beautiful. It is so beautiful that thoughts fall silent and freeze with horror in their hearts; cast from silver. They froze so as not to disturb its pace.
My being is motionless, my mind shrouded in nobility; absolute serenity. I am calm...
Eternity, alone with Eternity, cold and ruthless. You—the fear of the ignorant, the burden of the wise, my companion. Reveal yourself to me, walk with me, sing with me, be silent with me, you—gloomy beauty, fragile hope, insurmountable mystery, terrifying unthinkable.
You are my Empress, I am your Emperor, She is our Empire. Lowly and majestic, endless and insignificant, absent and existing. She is the fortress of our union.
The aria of silence is broken. Heavy wings. Black wings in the void. My eyelids lift, striking hot sparks that hang in space. Now, they are my stars, illuminating my nonexistence. Wings, close by. An intruder. A feathered intruder is already here. A Raven. He perched on my hand, pressing it into the steel. A particle of uncertainty bent, its colors faded from pain and wept under the weight of the Observer. The heaviness shatters the quiet shackles of fear, leaving a glow of nobility. An eye. A human eye in the Raven's beak. He placed it in my rough palm and dissolved into the void. The eye is still warm...
The throne floats. It floats carefully, sweetly cutting through Her fragile locks. A radiance, light from nowhere. It approaches me; I hear its voice. It speaks to me, whispers to me, calls me; I shall follow it.
A stone island—a fragment of Eternity, sanctified by a prison of radiance hanging in the void. It wants to break free and speak, to whisper with Eternity and the Void; it is talkative and willful.
The throne slowly and warily descends onto the island. Before its paws, cowardly particles of gray dust scatter and jump aside. They part before my step as well, allowing the strong stone to bear the burden of my feet. Heavy wings. The Raven, he preaches a path I have not walked before. Before? What does this "before" mean? It only evokes the laughter of Eternity, the sincere laughter of the daughter of the Empire. His beak is motionless, but I hear his golden nobility; He leads me to the axis of Her child.
A giant black Tree. Its powerful branches, intertwining with one another, playing and laughing, spread wide and reach upward into the Void. From its bark, cracked with patterns of Eternity, a malicious, barking, snarling, black, viscous liquid sluggishly flows, and thousands of human eyes hang from the branches; hundreds of thousands; millions; billions, an uncountable multitude. The branches toy with the eyes of uninvited guests. Their beautiful smiles lure me into their game, beckoning with same-carefreeness. Carefreeness?
A breath, burdensome and deep—the tree breathes; and it watches, watches Me. With a creak and a crack, one of the branches reaches for me and asks, demands, insists that I return the eye clenched in my palm; it is still warm...
Void