…And Other Things We Don't Understand
((&))
"Will you tell me what you saw and I'll tell you what you missed, when the ocean met the sky."
Artemis blinked.
Artemis blinked and he missed it. And he would have kicked himself if not for the fact that, upon opening his eyes, he found himself rising up (or perhaps he was falling, it was rather hard to tell) at a terrifyingly dizzying pace.
Well, he did have a habit of blinking at the worst moments; one could cite the time when he blinked, thus did not notice he had cut a critical circuit connection on the robot he was building – granted, he was sneezing at the time, but it was still inconvenient. Then there was the time a passing bird left a gift in his cup of Earl Grey; worst of all was the time he had missed seeing a homeless man take a fifty dollar note he had dropped and, by the time he had opened his eyes, evaluated the situation and alerted Butler to the incident, the man had scampered away. Yes, Artemis Fowl was quite untalented at choosing moments in which to partake in moistening his eyeballs.
No blinking now, though. Artemis's eyes were wide open as he tried to take in the kaleidoscope of colours swirling dizzyingly around his person, gathering speed both steadily and alarmingly in a manner reminiscent of the fun park ride Juliet had insisted he go on at the age of eight. Much in the same way he had on that fateful afternoon, Artemis soon had to close his eyes, had to or else he might just be sick down his freshly laundered suit.
And Artemis wasn't liking his chances of finding someone to wash his suit anytime soon.
What is happening? Artemis asked, more himself than anyone else, squeezing his eyes tight until it hurt and until the hurt stabbed through any other feelings he might be having, grounding him in the middle of the air.
How did I get here? What's happening?
"You missed when time and life shook hands and said goodbye, when the earth folded on itself and said, 'Good luck, for your sake I hope heaven and hell are really there, but I wouldn't hold my breath.'"
Suddenly, it became apparent to Artemis that The Universe was utterly shit at poetry.
I'm dead, then. The thought was utterly anti-climatical, said with a flat sort of apprehension, but Artemis thought he'd better get it out in the open, just in case the rhyme had been a metaphor for the stock market crashing or something equally catastrophic.
"You want it in haiku, kid?" The Universe asked from everywhere, anywhere, or perhaps only somewhere.
Artemis looked over his options. Which were, at this stage, practically non-existent.
So, this is the afterlife? No heaven, no hell?
"God, you're a demanding one." Artemis's thoughts conjured up the image of a rather shady character taking a drag on a cigarette and exhaling smoke rings all over Artemis. "That is that and this is this, hey? You want fries with that?"
Artemis really hoped he didn't have to spend the rest of eternity here with this… thing.
"Annoying, am I?" Chuckle, stub out cigarette butt. "Sick of me, are you?"
Artemis stared forward, backward, it was all the same.
"Well, what if I gave you this?"
Like stars emerging from the stratosphere to display themselves tantalizingly to the mere humans below, a huge pile of gold suddenly appeared in front of Artemis.
Artemis blinked, he couldn't believe it! Millions … Trillions of dollars worth of gold! He was rich, richer than rich!
Happiness burst up from deep inside of him. Artemis was so deliriously happy that he felt as though he were about to explode. Gold can tend to have that effect on a person; of course, it all depends on the type of person.
From far above (or perhaps it was below, it was, after all, hard to tell) a long, slow chuckle reached Artemis's ears.
"You wasted life, why wouldn't you waste death?"
((&))
I wrote this a couple of weeks ago; it is kind of pointless. It is completely, one hundred percent, inspired by the Modest Mouse song, Ocean Breathes Salty, which is an utterly kick-ass song and all the bold/italicized quotes in this are lyrics taken directly from the song. I'm not quite sure what I wanted to get at with this and I really need to take a look at it after Christmas because I am sure it is riddled with grammatical errors, etc, but I wanted to post it because I've already lost the first copy once, I don't want to lose the whole thing completely!