It was a start. The traveler felt the strain on his body more than he thought he would. “The trip of a thousand kilometers starts with a single step…or something,” he mumbled to himself as he leaned against the sole rock he’d seen in numerous kilometers. This road was bizarre. The locals had told him it would be a desert road that led through dunes, rocks, and a large endless expanse of water with no life in it. Right now, he was getting tired of the lifeless, featureless hills that flanked either side of the road. When he spotted a large rock that was just the right height to lean against, he took advantage of it and took inventory. He only had a rucksack full of water bottles, a large bag of desalinating tablets, and the map he was given by an old man and his apprentice. There was no food to be had in the village, at least, not that they were willing to part with. But he had made it so far, he refused to turn back. He had nothing else to turn back to. The only way was forward as far as he was concerned. He pulled off his sweat stained t-shirt and ran his fingers over the wound on his left shoulder. They were nearly healed now. Only scabs and gnarled scars remained. The rest of his party received worse wounds than he did when those…things…attacked. He glanced down at his abdomen. He was a strong man when he set out, thick with muscle and more fat than he wanted. Now he was a sinewy man, malnourished and gaunt from their travels. His chest hair stopped growing and the hair of his head thinned in strange patches, leaving behind coarse and ashen hair where it still was able to grow. His stomach panged him again. He put his shirt back on and drank two sips of waterThe stone he sat on felt cold. Or was it just cool? It was pleasant anyway. The air here was stagnant. He didn’t know if it was hot or cold. All he knew was the road went on ahead between faceless rocks and the sun… The sun never moved. Was that right? It was always ahead of him. How long had he been walking? It felt like days…or hours…or weeks. The apprentice told him not to take a watch. “The gods have no time. They have no distance either. If you choose to go, you must see as a god sees. You must know the torture of eternity.” The apprentice tended his wounds with rough painted hands. The old man and the apprentice were feared by the village. They claimed to know the last secret of the ancient world. They claimed to speak to gods. The apprentice spoke for the old man often. The old man was mute or insane it seemed. He sat behind the fire staring blankly into the traveler’s eyes. The apprentice rubbed the traveler’s bare chest, smearing black and red paint over it. It started to burn wherever he touched. The apprentice turned the traveler’s face toward his own, his jade eyes dancing in the firelight. “What do you want to seek here? Did you come to find power?”
The traveler shook his head.
“Did you come to find wealth?”
“No.” The traveler’s voice was hoarse and barely made the noise.
“Did you come to find peace?”
The traveler began to weep and shook his head.
“Do you know that the gods will not return your friends to you?”
The traveler nodded and choked back a sob.
“Tell me what you seek!”
“I seek the end!” the traveler screamed.
The apprentice plunged his painted fingers into the traveler’s mouth and pulled them back out, scraping the paint against his tongue and teeth. The apprentice forced his hand over the traveler’s mouth and turned his head to face the old man. The traveler felt the heated breath of the apprentice against his ear as he stared into the blank jade eyes across the fire. “Look,” the apprentice whispered, “look and know that you are doomed.”
Bright flashes of light emanated from the old man’s eyes and all became black to him. His muscles contorted and flailed until he felt trapped in cold stone. He heard close whispers of no language he’d ever heard. Then his hearing abandoned him too.
He did not know how much time had passed when he woke up. He was in the place where he fell. The fire was out and the hut was empty. There was no source of light but he could see everything as it had been before. But it looked stagnant–like an abandoned home. The paint was gone off his chest now, but the medicine the apprentice had applied was still on his shoulder. He could still taste the paint in his mouth. He found his rucksack by the door, picked his shirt up from off the top of it, and put it on. He inspected the hut again. There was a small piece of paper where the old man had sat. He stepped over the cold coals and picked up the paper, turning it over. It was a map, showing a straight road through mountains, desert, and water with a structure at the end. He turned around to face the door.
The door had changed. When he last looked at it, it was night. Now there was a bright light. He picked up his rucksack and stepped out of the hut onto the road flanked by featureless hills. This rock he now sat on was the first thing he’d found along the way. He sat here enjoying the cool of it, but knowing he had to move. He had no way to know how far he needed to go.
He pushed himself up and pulled on his rucksack. He decided to tie his shirt on his head to keep off the sun. He wasn’t sure he needed it, but the cold sweat on his torso made the air feel less stagnant as he started walking again.
The long expanse became apparent. The unmoving sun was blinding, making it impossible to see into the distance ahead. After much time, the hills fell away and he found a vast desert of dune and sandstone. The sun remained above him, but it began to emanate heat now as he trudged through the sand. The road remained straight in front of him, a black path in the sands never shifting or turning. It cut over every dune and through every lifeless field of rock and boulder. He went forward, climbing the dunes and searching the skyline with every peak. He found when he looked back over his shoulder, the hills disappeared from behind him. As the path led on, it passed pieces of carved stone on either side. The traveler examined them as he walked past, never daring to leave the path. The apprentice was very specific about that. “The gods gave us the path to keep us alive in their world. Humans are given to stupidity and needless curiosity in all things. Keep to the path if you wish to find what you seek.”
One stone to his right towered like an ancient siege engine. He couldn’t see it well, but far above his head it looked like a carved symbol, worn by weather and time. It reminded him of Viking runes, but his heart said that it was much older—that it was long forgotten by man. Along the desert road, these structures became more and more common. One stretch was between two impossibly tall walls that were covered in carved images so bizarre, the traveler had never seen any like them. One showed what appeared to be a woman drowning her children in a river followed by a panel of a light from heaven sending her down a fiery crown. Another panel showed an ancient deity holding a flailing man in one hand and what appeared to be a trowel in the other. This ancient god had a form that was hideous and graceful. The two suns above its head almost seemed to glow. The traveler rubbed his eyes and looked again. They were not glowing, but the man and the trowel were gone. The deity held a box in his hands now. The traveler became fearful and ran farther down the path, past the two high walls and into an open expanse. Ahead, on the right, was a stone similar to the one he found amongst the hills. He walked to it and sat on it like before.
He pulled off his rucksack and took inventory again. He hadn’t touched his water in the dessert and this bothered him. Why hadn’t he drunk any of it? Shouldn’t he have? He’d been walking for days…or was it hours? Had it been a week already? He didn’t know. But he noticed something he had never noticed before. He didn’t feel thirsty. Why didn’t he feel thirsty? The apprentice said he would not know his own strength until it was tested. Was this some sort of test? Perhaps the gods, whoever they were, wanted to see if he was too stupid to drink just because he was thirsty. Or perhaps it was to see if he would notice that he didn’t need to drink at all. But if that last one was true, why wouldn’t he need to drink? Was this place not real? Maybe it was some sort of hallucination. “A damned real one.” He mumbled to himself. This was the first he remembered speaking since the last rock. That had been so long ago and only a moment ago. He reached into his pack and pulled out a water. He found he could not open it. “What the…” He tried another one. He tried two more. He tried to bite through the plastic with his teeth. He banged it against the rock. Then ripped at it with his bare hands and nails. He could not reach the water inside. After several minutes of this, he felt something he hadn’t felt before. He felt thirsty. His throat was so dry and covered in sand. It was raw and bloody tasting. He tried desperately for even a drop of water. Furiously clawing and hitting each bottle against the rock. In his frustration, he pulled out all the bottles and threw them as hard as he could.
They landed off the path. He knew not to stray off the path. “No. No. No. NO!” he screamed hoarsely. He panicked for a moment, hyperventilating and barely keeping conscious. His throat hurt so much. His lips crinkled as they rubbed against each other. A wind blew hard for the first time. It knocked his rucksack over, spilling out the desalination tablets and the map. He looked at it suspiciously. The stagnant air had never moved and there was suddenly wind. He felt cold and naked. He felt unseen eyes staring at him. He pulled the shirt off his head and put it back on his emaciated torso. The stagnance of the air returned but the feeling of eyes never left him as he gathered up what was left of his belongings and moved on.
He trekked onward toward the unmoving sun. He stared blankly at it for a moment and he stumbled forward. It didn’t hurt to look at. Was this the same sun on earth? Was he even on earth? The hut had been in the middle of dense jungle when he found it. When he left it, it was at one end of this road. He did not question how it was possible. He only knew it was happening.
After an unknown time of walking, the sand fell away beneath his feet. The road now ran through an endless placid lake. He turned around. The desert was gone. The sand dunes had vanished. All that he could see now was the road that sat level with the undisturbed waters all around him. The sun remained unchanged in its spot, but the sky became overcast, giving the water an electric blue tinge. It was endless in every direction with no shore to be seen. “Wish I could swim,” he mumbled as he continued to walk.
The change in scenery distracted him from his extreme thirst for a while. But this didn’t last long. At least the desert had things to look at. This was like living on a plant where there was nothing but water. There were no islands. There were no rocks. There were no fish in the crystal blue below. When he stared into the water, only a bottomless darkness looked back at him. The sole feature was the road on which the traveler walked. After some time, his thirst returned to him again and pondered if he should drink the water. He still had the desalinating tablets. Even if it were salt water, he would be able to drink it. And if it made him sick, he thought himself soon to die anyway. It wouldn’t matter. He pulled off his rucksack and pulled out the desalinating tablets. Each one had its own small bag to put water in. He dipped a bag into the water, sending out ripples that drowned into the far distance, destroying the illusion he was surrounded by glass. He placed the tablet in the bag and tumbled it. He opened it and poured the contents into his mouth. It was the best water he had ever tasted, silken and cold. His throat returned to normal and his lips became moist again. The thirst went away entirely.
Footsteps came up behind him. He whirled and nearly fell into the water. Nothing was there. He heard a moaning creak above his head. He thought it sounded like a whale call, but more sorrowful and destructive. He looked into the water and saw his own reflection. Its eyes glowed jade and it moved independently of himself. It stared at him, shaking his head back and forth. He pulled his rucksack back on and walked forward. This had to be a trick or trial or something. It followed him, taking larger strides than him. It never stopped staring at him. It waved at him. It made rude gestures at him. Its jade eyes wouldn’t stop staring. The traveler looked forward, trying to ignore it. The glow in its eyes in his peripheral vision unsettling him deeply.
The traveler finally stopped. He didn’t look at it at first. He looked to the other side of the road. His reflection there was normal. It moved when he moved. The eyes were his own. When he turned back to his other reflection, it stood staring at him from the surface of the water. His jade eyes burning as his head moved back and forth slowly.
“What do you want?” The traveler finally broke the silence. He barely heard himself as his voice was carried out across the water.
The reflection stopped shaking his head. He pointed back the way the traveler had come from.
“No. I have nowhere else to go. This is the end. I will make it to the end.” His voice was hoarse and distant. He was desperate to believe what he said was right.
The reflection disappeared as suddenly as he had appeared. His old reflection was back. His gaunt features and limbs moved when his did. His eyes were no longer jade. He moved on.
The placid lake fell away after many months of walking. The desert returned around him. But now, the road was shorter. He could see the end. It led to the steps of an ancient temple carved in stone covered in symbols no living person recalls. Surrounding the mighty temple lay a city just as ancient with stone dwellings and streets. He passed through it, still never straying from the path. Every house he could see into was empty. There were no bones, textiles, or any trace of life. The air remained stagnant. The silence of the place made his ears ring as they strained to hear any noise at all. He felt the eyes again. But this time, it felt like thousands of them. It felt like he was being watched by a large crowd and the audience was screaming at him to turn back. But he didn’t listen to the silent voices. He never heard anything to listen to. He looked around him.
The dwellings were small with one room, an entrance, and a front facing window. There was no glass, wood, doors, or anything to block out the stagnance and the sand. They appeared to wrap around in a circle facing out from the temple in the center of the village. The outward wall had crumbled long ago. Each house was connected to all the others by deep grooves in the stone pavement. Along these grooves were symbols that felt even more ancient than the ones he saw on the stone siege engines. The entire city looked like it was carved from the same stone with no cracks or breaks. This place was created with much power and skill. It was created in ways no man remembers.
He approached the temple. It towered above the village on a high stone hill that sloped on all sides. The front of the hill contained a set of steps leading to the temple. The path finally ended at the base of these steps. The design of the temple was grotesque in its geometry and graceful in its execution. It was a perversion of the eye to look at it. The stone was smooth and appeared to be carved from the same monolith as the rest of the city. Even massive doors on the front seemed to be of one solid piece.
The traveler approached the end of the path. He stopped and waited, staring up at the stone doors above him. He knew never to stray off the path. He slid off his rucksack and pulled out the map. He looked at the structure on the map and back at the temple. He looked over the path on the paper. This was the end. He told the apprentice he sought the end. Was this was he meant? He wasn’t sure if he truly wanted this now. He had nowhere else to go. Something in the back of his mind said that the way back out of the village was certain death. The only way forward was to end his journey as best he could. What had he and his friends came looking for in this jungle? Was it adventure, fame, treasure? He honestly could not recall. The journey had left him hollow and stagnant. He felt so little now. He looked up at the solid stone doors and waited. He waited for the torture of eternity to drive him mad. The sun never moved. He had no clock. He had no time or distance. He only had eternity. This was what the apprentice spoke of, the traveler assumed. If a creature of ancient power has no end—has no death—how does it stay sane? Does it sleep and rest? Does it want to? Is everything to it one long day with an unmoving sun? Eternity wrapped itself around his mind and spun.
He stared at the doors.
He stared at the doors.
He stared at the doors.
And when his mind stopped moving, the sun blacked out.
Total darkness surrounded him. It was silent as it had been. The air refused to move. Another eternity passed.
The road beneath him glowed softly jade. It spread through the grooves of the stone city, reaching out like an energy from a single source. It creeped from house to house, illuminating the symbols along the grooves. When the jade light reached the hill, it crept up the sides, filling patterns and pictures of ancient deities and stories like he had seen on the impossibly high walls in the desert. The energy reached the doors, showing the final image in blindingly jade light. It was the box the deity held in the desert image. From this came down two paths of light through each door that lit a path down the stairs. It connected with the path he stood on. He knew never to stray from the path, but the path now grew forward. He mounted the first step warily. He took another and another until he reached the top. He looked up at the towering doors and awed at them.
A loud crack sounded above him. The doors of this ancient temple began to open. He stared through the crack and his face filled with terror as he found what had been hidden by the gods. The door continued to open. He turned to run, but the path had disappeared, replaced by only darkness. He turned back to face the doors. He screamed, frozen where he stood. He found what he came looking for.
He found the end.
Uncertain 