Understanding
-Micer
The water surrounded Otto, the cries of the artificial intelligence demanding the proper orders to commence the measures for self preservation clattered within his skull. All ignored. He stared up at the rapidly darkening surface of the harbor, fed fat by the rivers, the soils of distances flavoring the murky liquid that filled his senses, starving his lungs, bringing up the taint of memories passing...
Spiderman - no, Peter - the boy with so much promise, so much responsibility placed upon his shoulders, and his girlfriend, the one he had risked life and limb in saving, the one who had in return tried to protect him, still above, breathing the air that Otto's own body was craving. Truly that was a love that should never be torn asunder whilst they lived, but there was no desire to fight to the surface, to fight against the pulling weight of those arms - the byproduct of his own madness - the anchor that would take him to his grave at the bottom of the harbor, along with the dying glow of his lost grandeur, his failed experiment that had taken so much from him - respect, sanity... and now his life. The light flowing behind him made wraiths of shadows before his eyes, dancing particles given animation with his passing.
His sun, warming the waters and yet he felt so cold... so empty...
Shape without form ... shade without color ... paralyzed force ... gesture without motion...
In that chaos of words a moment surfaced, fitfully fighting it's way to his attention - images, words - Rosalie, his beloved Rosalie, her smiling mysterious ways - early mornings finding the bed cooling, lacking her graceful form nestled against his, but the small room in their apartment, the one they fought so hard to pay for month by month on meager earnings still haunted by her presence. Awaking to her voice, clear and steady though she spoke quietly, warming and reassuring with each word that fell upon his ears.
Enshrouded with sheet and wrapped in soft light of the dawn, still golden whilst seeping through the oppressive pollution of the city, a warm glow dulled only by her expression, the coy smile that would grace her lips as she caught him staring at her once more, listening as she sat at the windowsill, reading the piece she going to cover on that day with her class.
T. S. Elliot. Perhaps she loved that poet more knowing of how it bothered him so, how understanding was always fleeting to him, his smiling sigh of defeat towards comprehension that only made her love him even more. Her patience, dedication even when the bills were looming, the support she leant him when nothing worked, when all his research seemed all for naught, indeed she was what filled him, drove him to his purpose.
But now...
That was gone.
And just as his experiment had filled that void...
That too was gone.
They had been right, and all had been made victim of his infallible pride. His sanity returned to him with each fleeting moment, each word that fell upon deafened ears.
...Is it like this ... In death's other kingdom... waking alone ... at the hour when we are...
If whatever creature that ruled over all had brought back clear thought to the fading mind, it knew there would be no peace for him, knowing that there was nothing left - that indeed there was nothing left to grasp - just as the waters flowed easily through his open fingers - no chance for purpose other than to be forgotten - a far better fate than to be remembered as a mad man - no final hope but only despair, and the few mocking words of that poet, the epitaph of his existence, to carry him down.
... The eyes are not here... there are no eyes here... This broken jaw of our lost Kingdoms ... In this last of meeting places ...
Would they find each other? Now that thought came to him. Is that what he had meant, this long passed poet? That they would never find each other for their eyes had been closed - to be blind to failure? Was that the hope of the empty man drifting down to the depths? Was that his hope? That they would find each other once more in this fabled kingdom of twilight?
No. Perhaps not... not to the reasonable mind...
It in the end it was folly... all of it folly... the truth was there before him just as the few bubbles of air exhaled floated up away from him, dancing away, out of his grasp if he was to reach for them. False dying stars... there was nothing...
... The Shadow falls ...
In that moment, he knew, the secret had been revealed to him and he knew, and it would follow him to the grave to guard him.
... This is the way the world ends ...
He closed his eyes once more, away from the dying light, away from his dying self - only to those words, those truths, only to the memory of her smile, the look of love she would place upon him, so proud ...
... This is the way the world ends ...
His body seized, than relaxed for the final time.
... This is the way the world ends ...
Even behind his closed eyes he saw the glow of the sun, the light of a morning he would never witness.
... Not with a bang but a whimper...
A tiny smile touched the surface of his fading awareness, happiness filling the hollow man as the final words passing through his mind before darkness took him completely.