while the end happens

The cavern stood tall. Taller than any mountain, than any cathedral that my eyes had ever laid eyes on. Echoes were captured, sniped before they had a chance to sing such that even the sound of my breath smelt of something alien. It wasn’t sound itself, it was sound beside itself. Thus was the displacement of such a place, it wasn’t so much a place, but the very plateau of displacement itself.

I clenched my chest; I could hear the flame before I saw it. Its orange danced, exploded against the dark purples and blues. It was melodic as it marched closer.

The flame bearer wore a dark cloak, hood hiding its face. It's hands were claws and as it approached I noticed it walked with a limp. Its left leg lifeless, dragging, leaving a trail of yesterdays… breadcrumbs of nothing.

Tell me, what is it you seek?

My chest clenched my hand. I forgot that it was still there standing as a sigil, proof to myself that I was still alive. Could a dead man clench his chest like this? Could a dead man care?

Is that it? You think you are dead?

If I were dead… really dead, then what I would there be to think for, to think from?… No, no it can’t be that. That’s nonsense, I’m no philosopher… I’m…

Then what? You think you are alive?

The weight of the question caused me to cry out, but there was no sound - for sound could not exist in a plane so empty of echo. What evidence of life could grow here?

You cannot hear your own cry. So you question your existence.

You speak of story and its origins… Don’t you know that endings are of the appendages of eternity.

This is why you play.

You play to forget.

Every game, every birth must forget the end - and you call this forgetting story.

You say we play to escape the end?

No, you play while the end happens.

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I wrote this at a workshop at The Center for Fiction. The topic was Play.