Prologue

Half the light of the moon is only enough to shine upon a raven.


Behind the dead and the living there lays a sprouting growth in the remains of every memory and thought-dream.

An entity to some, a force to some, a trial to all.

It is a concept known as evil, that which, in whatever form it takes, is blamed for conflict come and gone, and for the misdirection that one feels in of themself, those burning parts.

In every pool of dreams, and in every split image between the mind and the body, some evil is said to lay far beneath the surface.

Few see such a thing rise from the murky fringes of the always modern life.

Such a word is too diluted by life after life, story after story, that it becomes just that word.

But can a single word ever describe such a concept?

Could any conception of words create the horrid feelings that lay espoused with the misunderstandings of the day and night?

Is evil more than a word, or is it but another cope of a long dead sentience?

By dawn by dusk these questions are explored.

The intellectuals shuffle off answer and answer as vague as the spirits that lay beyond the mist.

The commonfolk deal little in discussions meandering and meditating on the concept, preferring to jump and say that evil does and does not, and can and cannot exist, so long as life as it is known can comprehend it.

The downtrodden tell simple stories to explain such things, each different in their own interpretations.

And the wandering, the rolling stone, may ponder on these thoughts for all the time that they walk the clean strips of earth and mountain tops, but will always see more, and with that knowledge, only more confusion.

One such of these wanderers, though one contained to the edges of the forest he was birthed upon and was birthed by, held his head to the moon, wishing that his memory was forgotten, and praying that soon he would see through dead eyes.

Hundreds of thoughts rattled the strangers eyes, and most were of such a relationship between the proclaimed evil, and the demanded virtue of good.

He had sat here for some twenty seasons, and would perhaps sit for twenty more.

He went by the name of Stonefoot, named for the paralysis in his leg.

Was that evil, to name a cat as such, for such a terrible reason?

Was it evil that he accepted his name, or was it simply giving into a world that had already made up its mind of his stance?

His stance was crooked, whether because of his leg, or because of his mind.

The trees whispered so strange, a sound unlike any sort of wind that had ever blown through these woods.

They spoke, if not in words then in visage.

The wind had no effect over the tom, however belated he was to realize that it had passed through his glaucous fur.

As much as he seemed one with the eternal, unshapable force, he was only a cat, just as all others were, longing to be free from time, from body, from evil.

He was waiting for somebody now, as he had felt that she was looking for him and knew that soon, she would stand beside him and recount to him of evil, of her evil; a prideful, yet thoughtful view of life through the eyes of just another cat.

They had had this discussion before, on the single occasion that they had made themselves known to each other, but had separated so long before either of them had said all of the words that were needed to understand one another.

Perhaps that's all that evil was, a lie told when one doesn't understand another.

But Stonefoot shook his head at the comment within him, thinking that there must be more to it than that, more nuance, more mystery.

The branches above shook in sync of the wind spirits movements, their newly burgeoning buds standing tall despite the cold of the night.

It was no time now for life to replenish itself across the humble sky.

Perhaps a few more days, and the day would truly be perfect.

It never was, whether in the hottest days, or the coldest nights.

All places in between could only sustain these sproutlings, and yet the wanderer held onto the hope for something beyond the extremes, someplace safe and clean.

A rustle awoke the bushes where the other stood, her name completely unknown to him.

A name had never meant anything in their conversation before. Stonefoot felt the calmness of the night leaving him as she approached, once again sitting beside him without so much as a glance,

"Another chance meeting," She greeted him slyly.

She was lying, they both must have known it.

She had come here looking for the wanderer, and with the intention of speaking again, "Well, what shall we speak of tonight, if no introductions are re-needed?"

"Evil,"

"That nonsense again? Are you here only to make accusations once more?"

"You play life as a game, creating new rules as you go ahead. What do you wait for that this is how you spend the time?"

"Total Genesis," She told him, a smile creeping onto her face even if Stonefoot could not see it,

"You will wander these woods for eternity, waiting for that day," She bristled and stood up, agitated,

"Eternity will come and pass! I don't mind to wait,"

"Then where should you go if you're trapped under these branches?"

"Why should I be trapped? These woods don't hold me! They're nothin' but trees!" She was shouting now, and Stonefoot began to feel for her. He shook his head,

"You are trapped here as I am. I feel your soul far beneath the dirt and pebbles. The most sunken roots cannot reach how far you are away," She almost seemed afraid of these words, and seemed to feel the need to combat them,

"I will kill every spirit and soul that lies in this gravescape! I will send you to Hell and I will be far above this forest!"

"Hell is still life, this forest is far from anything that resembles such a thing," The strange she-cat breathed and sighed before speaking again, calmed now,

"Yes, you're right, but I have been trapped before in a place like this, and I will escape again, even if it should cost me my other eye,"

"Then it should be so. Despite how you should suffer for your sins, I wish you luck to be away from here. There is no sin that should lead one under these stars,"

"I'll trust your pretty words. You know far more about this domain than I'm sure even the spirits do. But I feel I must leave now," She began to walk away, but Stonefoot stopped her with more words,

"It's still the middle of the night, and it will be for a long time yet. Why spend it alone?"

"A fire can light up the world, even if the sun refuses to shine," She didn't stay long enough for Stonefoot to respond, nor did he think he would have come up with a response.

And so now he was alone as he ever was, crafting conversation in his mind, a dialogue that attempted to make sense of the world.

An old story came to the front of his head, one that he had been told once by an old wanderer whose teeth were only half the height they were supposed to be.

It told of a cat who had sat so long, thinking of how to define the world, how it was supposed to be seen, and what he was supposed to do with that knowledge, that when they finally came to, the cat realized that so much time had been that all of their family and friends had passed on, and nobody was even left to remember him.

And it was then that the cat realized that what they had truly been meant to do with this life was to spend time with these relations, to not have let the years slip by without them.

It was a beautiful message that Stonefoot found himself in need of in this moment.

He was weaker than he ever had been as every second passed.

He could beat the she-cat with his words, but she had a far stronger will than he ever would, and far more of an idea of what to do.

He thought about where his son could be tonight.

His name was Loneheart, a young soul who seemed to have so much boiling inside him that he refused to share.

He was the only kit that Stonefoot would ever have, he knew that, nor would he ever want to have any others.

The night that frosty she-cat left Loneheart in the frozen-over forest, so young, seemed like it was just a small while ago, but it had been five seasons since then, and with each one he found himself wondering why it was him who had been destined to raise this kit.

He loved his son, more than any cat he had ever known and would ever know, but that's why he thought that it should have been someone else.

He never found himself asking why that she-cat had left him there; it was simply a fact of the past to him and nothing more.

A young star sparkled above, one that Stonefoot had been keeping his eye on lately, and he blinked in return.

When he opened his eyes, a crow stood in his view, sat atop a sturdy branch that twisted around like a broken leg.

The creature had no wings, instead, feathers tightly surrounded its entire small body.

It didn't look at him, but Stonefoot could see the blackness of its eyes.

He pulled away his gaze.

There was a gentleness of this night that he didn't want to ruin, so he padded off, leaving the moon behind him for the time being, not searching for anything, and thus, finding beauty in the whole world around him.

Stonefoot sat down in a mess of ferns and brambles, watching a patch of flowers dance in the wind. He saw how beautiful they swayed.

They were such small creatures, so small that this invisible force could move them around.

No one ever gave mind when they trampled these creatures, but Stonefoot felt the same grief he would feel at a cat's mourning when they were killed.

They were all life, one in the same, and one death didn't hurt less than any other.

But now wasn't the time for thoughts of life and death.

He had been given so much precious time that he had already wasted on non-conclusive debates about such things.

Now was time to simply enjoy the world as it was, the dark sea of grass, the rings of small, jagged leaves rising from their branches, the moss and mushrooms that clung to the trunk, how they all swayed in the gentle wind.

That was what he needed to see right now.

For a moment, he wasn't lost anymore.

He was right where he was meant to be, and he knew exactly where that was.

The moment was fleeting, gone without fanfare, but Stonefoot didn't mind it, not now anyway.

He hadn't made any grand realization tonight, no breakthrough, no brilliant strike, nothing that would change the course of anything.

He wasn't really any different from before this night, except that he was a day older now.

But it was worth that nothing to feel how he did in that moment.

A calmness reserved for philosophers and poets, of which he was neither.

He was just a helpless soul guide, and an unbecoming father.

The thoughts began to creep back into his head, and there was nothing that he could do to stop them.

He only had those occasional moments to ground him in some sort of reality for a second before being whisked away by monsters and demons, all of whom were only the thoughts inside his mind.

So the night kept on, and Stonefoot kept walking, though his knowledge of this land created the visage of a blur in the blue of his eyes as he sped through the trees and undergrowth.

He soon grew tired of this hunt for nothing, and before he could dwell on the thoughts behind his actions, Stonefoot fell to the gentle earth, and breathed out a single time before closing his eyes, and falling asleep.

Until I write again,

-Gojira