Page 82 of Immortal Sun

Iwait until she’s back in the warehouse, and then I slam my hand against the tree again and again.

Bark goes flying across the ground with each strike. My palm stings as I imagine its roots are too strong to break. I couldn’t even burn it down if I wanted to. Then again, can you really burn down the source of everything? I keep telling myself I have choices in this scenario but every time I think of it, I become more dead inside.

I’m just like the tree.

A vessel.

I look over my shoulder at the island; the waters have receded faster this time, maybe it’s because they too can sense that we’re moving up the timetable. Normally, the sacrificed find out the day before, but she’ll know longer. Her anxiety will mix with the thick sea air, and even the animals will be aware that things are earlier for the final sacrifice. At least I’ll be on time.

Right now, she’s being brave, putting up a front. Later on, she’ll know that she may have been different from the others, but she was never special. Just a means to an end. My heart clenches in my chest.

I repeat it to myself.

Just a means.

Just an end.

Just an end.

She still doesn’t believe me, despite what I know she sees, both in her dreams and in front of her. I always find it odd, how little humans can see something truer than their own reality and still deny its existence.

I’ve never had to convince someone of my identity before. I flick my fingers, and they immediately fall to their knees; many cry—mostly the men.

Except for one.

I tap my knuckles against the tree sending another leaf to the ground, it falls next to my feet and instantly turns to ash.

It’s dying.

After all, when you haven’t been fed, you die, when you don’t water a plant, it shrivels up, just like this tree. I stare down at the roots digging into the ground; they’re twisted to the north, south, east, west. They head out in every direction, diving deep into the cliff with two offshoots.

Only one is dead.

Just one.

Would it really be so bad? Staying here? What purpose do I even have outside of this? And what purpose does this puny world have outside of war and bloodshed, outside of chaos?

I ask myself this more often now.

And yet the knife still comes. It still digs deep and pulls out the toxin of humanity. The poison.

And every time it happens, I remind myself how satisfying it feels when that first drop of blood falls to the ground and I can rest.

You return to where you were born.

For her, the Nile.

For others, the dirt, the sea, the sky.

I shake my head and grab my cell.

Me

She knows now.

Enki

Let me guess, she cried and ran away. Give me a minute and I’ll grab my shit.

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