BLOOD

Alright! Finally I, the Stranger, present to you the conclusion to the Marie experiment. I hope to hear from you, Marie, and from you others who have held your comments until now. I eagerly await them, please enjoy the end of From Everlasting to Everlasting.

Sparks and lightning filled the nebulous void of earth that was, specters and shades swirled through the high and keening winds, whilst the spheres vied in battle. Superiority, or the position of highest influence was the goal of each and every one. Some claimed to be better in their beings, some in their weaponry, and still others by their ideals. Yet each sphere was filled with beings hell-bent on the fulfillment of their own goals no matter the cost.

The space of the land of none was charged in hostile energy. Chaotic energies were siphoned and stored for fiendish uses while all plotted their way to become the Princeps, the one whose influence caused all others to servitude. The word in its essence meant the beginning and those who chose it full well knew what title they really were taking.

Electric currents from the skies were being allured as if by siren's song to differing spheres, wafting downwards to earth like a lazy serpent. The hideous chimera's and unspeakable mutants of the earth that was were being tamed and trained for the kill, and every being whether visible or not eagerly awaited for the destruction to come. Every being, including Peter and those with him.

More had joined their causes to his and the size of their combined influence seemed as a mountain. A mountain perhaps, yet a mountain in full battle readiness. Sections of the sphere were filled with rods of light, others with wyverns or other flying beasts, and yet more with various elemental powers or mechanized structures. Each and all of them deadly, every one of them ready. The imPure there had constructed all of them from the substance of chaos in the void, all of the death dealing devices were the stuff of dreams and imagination. Just as they had thought it, then it was.

The imPure in the sphere where Peter was sat at council to discuss the hardest portion of their battle plan. "We are agreed then, upon the giving of surrender that we accept it only if they fight with us." Said Peter. Those there all nodded sagely. "I propose that in order to greatly increase our degree of success we must have a command center and with it a general." The wyvern master said and all agreed to this as well, it could not but make sense. Yet all the common sense and logic in the world did not triumph over the problem which caused them and every other war machine sphere to pop like an overfilled balloon. None would agree to any but themselves.

Havoc ensued. Each one left with their means of destruction and left Peter in his sphere alone once more. Peter had not created any weapon because his role had been to maintain the unity of the sphere and to strengthen the shield of its influence. He was reasonably confident he could defend himself adequately from any weapon but to make war now was impossible for him. So he watched as the void of the earth, already full of pandemonium, became a land fit only for devils.

All the others wasted no time in claiming the title of Princeps and launching what attack they could against all others. Lightning seared and cut through many spheres, the beasts mauled and rampaged across the void, fire, swords, mortars, and things of an unspeakable nature decimated the remaining imPure. Few indeed survived, when the abominations had all lost the wills of their masters, the elements their stock, and they had no more weapons to command was the time when the blood ceased to flow.

Spheres with broken husks were slowly fading and all the survivors came to meet. Peter was among them including some he had known but most of them he had only spoken to once or twice before. In total 325 had survived the carnage in one way or another. "Shall we agree to speak?" Peter asked them, and they all agreed. "In this manner is it not clear to all that none shall be the Princeps? Truly, it is impossible to conceive of the way. We live in this null zone, this place of suffering and torment. Yet once we lived in the Holy City, among the Pure. If only there were some one, some mediator to place one hand upon me and one upon..." Peter's speech could not continue when he tried to say that name. Yet all there saw his words to be true.

"We cannot change and we are doomed to struggle for eternity against each other. For though we desire a better way our selfishness will push us to malice. What we need more than anything else is for our very selves to change." Articulated Peter. One by one, all those still living voiced their consent. The shriek of the air, the lightning in the skies, and the turbulence in the foundations of the earth stilled. The shadows fled and every sphere suddenly popped. A door appeared in the air and all around it the ground was solid allowing the imPure to stand.

The door itself was for them to look upon but it obviously had a use. So Peter went forth from them and grasped the knob. It was locked. He tried knocking but received a fist full of splinters as a reward. He had not noticed there was an iron knocker so he lifted it from the door frame and pounded powerfully on the door. At each peal of the iron on the plate beneath it the door shuddered and their expectations were filled with some secret knowledge they could not identify. The imPure waited and Peter bled.

After a time or an eternity the sound of agony could be discerned. The closer it sounded the more they retreated from the door and when it seemed to come from their very throats the door swung gently open. They all witnessed the history and life of a single man through the portal. It sped past them in a coherent but swift stream. Perfection, miracles, kindness, torment, and death. The life and death of a man was witnessed by them as well as something still better.

Those who killed the man, for it was the imPure themselves, had buried him and walked off to rejoice together. Yet the scene did not fade, a day passed and a night, again it passed, and then it seemed as if they had caught up with time and were watching it now in the present. Two beings, who looked like what the imPure had once been, appeared and dug out the dirt covering the man. He then stood up from the grave and came towards the door and walked through it. From then on not all followed, but all knew that from everlasting to everlasting YHWH is God.

Dt

CHAOS

Now for part two of the Marie experiment...

Darkness appeared as surely as when a light has gone out, and for a while it remained dark. A heavy wind drew in and out and the air was filled with the sound of labored breath. A hissing sound started in the background, while the sensation of vertigo descended on all who yet lived, and the dismal earth was filled with sounds of agony and insanity. Then, slowly, as flowers blooming in the morn, the spheres began appearing.

Peter had been laughing all the while. Too full of shadows and shades, too many thoughts and emotions to process, too much... He could not handle it and remain even remotely sane, so he abandoned sanity and began to laugh as the condition worsened steadily. Then all at once every shadow save one shot out of him as so many rockets, ready to do ill. Finding himself almost alone, Peter could actually think for a moment. "Peter needs to consider and remember, he does." Peter began to recite to himself, "We promise you influence and control, Peter. That's what they said to Peter when he talked to them first." Peter no longer recognized his own persona, but still he was smart.

"Influence, Peter has influence now over the earth." So Peter thought, since there was darkness, and there was vertigo, as well as the strange feeling like nothing around him was all there, and he imagined. Peter thought a sphere would do nicely, something with light in it and gravity, something that causes substance to form around it, and something he can see and hear through and past. Just as he visualized it, it was. A transparent sphere with a unidentifiable source of light illuminating about 30 yards of space around it with semi-clarity. Peter was in the center of the ten foot diameter sphere, his sphere of influence.

As soon as the others who were still conscious saw Peter's sphere, they immediately made their own, some exactly as his was but many with variations. Some emitted a different color light, or had a larger sphere, or a different shape, some made flying spheres or spheres that varied constantly in shape and color. Yet even if it was a square everyone still called it a sphere, because they merely made their actual sphere appear to be something other than what it was.

In this manner many were able to survive the beginning of the period of pandemonium. People began moving about and exploring, although there was never anything new to see. The Holy City had turned into a wasteland and no animal had retained its original form. They had all become chimera, many creatures merging into one, and by so doing formed an abomination. The lions now had talons instead of claws, wings as well, some of them had snakes or scorpions where their tales once were, and in the same manner all the animals had become more deadly and aggressive.

Yet even more hideous were those in their spherical prisons, all of the impure. It was not their appearance which deterred interaction but rather their self serving nature. For from the moment you met one you wanted to leave because of their conceitedness. Many could be seen forming mirrors of their spheres and fixing their appearance, others could be seen using their sphere to increase their physical strength, and others still studied the ways in which they could manipulate matter or perception by the power of the sphere. All they did was to serve themselves and Peter was no exception.

"The world flees from the touch of my sphere." Peter murmured, now that he had time to become reacquainted with himself Peter no longer referred to himself in the third person. "All things around me are shadows and dust and influence is as nothing in the face of the void. It is true, I have control over the way of things around me but if I am the king of infinite space and everything within it is but myself, a thousand other kings, and the nothingness why I think I'd rather find a better way." So Peter pondered on the issue, how could he expand the influence to the extent by which he could enjoy the power he theoretically had.

"Perhaps, if I convince another that it is in their best interest to join their influence with mine, then perhaps we shall change the nature of the void." So Peter propelled himself from sphere to sphere, from one self serving individual to another, and somehow managed to convince two others to join themselves to his cause. James and Mary were their names and they looked eager to grow their power. "Do we agree with one another?" Peter asked them both, they responded, "Yes, we agree."

With that Peter imagined their spheres merging and expanding to create a much larger sphere, covering perhaps 500 yards, and in the center of the sphere they stood upon ground with trees, light, water, and other plants. No matter which direction the sphere swam the gravity and centrality of the land remained, and others around them saw the land and it appeared to them as an island floating in the sky. Just as he thought it, it was. But could he and they continue to agree?

Find out next time in the Stranger's (hopefully) final installment in the serious, From Everlasting to Everlasting. ^_^