The Abyss

Subject X-89 sat down in the chair. Mages, scientists, doctors, all exited the resonance chamber and retreated to a safe viewing room. The entire compound was electric with excitement and curiosity and fear and all the feelings.

The experiment was considered, plotted, planned, for years. And one day, it all just came together. The True Arcanist, legendary for his all encompassing understanding of reality, found what he needed to proceed.

The Order of Arcanists, after searching far and wide, found the Subject. In the most mundane, yet wretched of places. An encampment of vagrants, vagabonds, and addicts in the decaying ruins of one of the old cities.

A young woman, with a hollow, 1000-yard stare, sat amongst the detritus of the world. Another thing left behind by the rapid advances in magic, cybernetics, and genetics.

A rare being in this world, who truly lived a hard life, filled with pain and suffering. It radiated from the core of her being. The locals rarely passed her gravitational field. Curses and nightmares infect and devour whoever spent too much time in her auric field.

This was what they needed to finish their mechanism. A being of such dark, haunted karma that they became a natural extension of the theoretical plane known as The Abyss. The place through which all other worlds could be reached and known. The next frontier.

The Arcanist addresses his colleagues, and representatives of the different factions and nations of the world: 'It is time. Our destiny awaits us. Subject X-89 will enter the Abyss. We will follow behind. Let us begin.' They are notorious for their breviity.

'X-89, are you prepared?' The woman nods. The True Arcanist glares at his assistant. His assistant turns on the Mechanism. The subject's chamber gyrates as rune-engraved loops and hoops begin to spin and rotate. The light begins to invert and bend. The black portal manifests.

The Subject winces, shakes, convulses as the Mechanism activates, it's radiation reaching into her soul, feeding on her dense, black karma. She screams. The scream turns into a wail...then something else entirely, as the fabric of reality waves, wobbles, and folds in on itself.

X-89's soul is turned inside out and her consciousness enters the portal. She feels everything that's ever happened to her. Everything that ever happened to her many, MANY incarnations. She can see the whole reel. Her soul is old. Unbelievably ancient. As old as the Universe.

She was there when the Earth was born. She was there when the first cells emerged. She was there when life arose from the sea. She was there. She was THERE. SHE WAS THERE. OVER AND OVER AND OVER AND OVER. SHE DIED AT THE HANDS OF MEN AND BEASTS. SHE GAVE BIRTH. SHE WAS BORN.

she died, she returned, she died, she returned, she walked the earth, she hunted, she gathered, she farmed, she built, she killed, she maimed, she burned at the stake, she slaughtered the heathens, she was raped by the barbarians, she raped the defeated. OVER AND OVER AND OVER.

Everything stops. There is nothing. Light is a non-concept. Sound, texture, ideas, all of it loses it's meaning. Her soul manifests at the heart of the anomaly. She can remember. After all of the pain, after all of her karma was devoured by the portal, she remains.

The Abyss lies before her. Undulating, expanding, contracting, covering the cosmos, in the space of a cell. Everything is here, and nothing is here. The final destination. She can see into it. She can feel it. She looks back and sees herself, in the chamber of the arcanists.

'a0-u1nasl0-sxkabdllsfiwhoad' whispers the Abyss. "Huh? Really?" The Subject is surprised by what she's hearing. 'ndoa901axjfo09au8u10...' The Subject smiles. "Well...are you sure? I don't mind. There's nothing there for me." '666xoa9w042069 :)' "Ok then." The Subject is ready.

The Abyss strikes her soul as a black lightning bolt, throwing the entirety of itself into her. Her soul, folds over itself, and inverts again, becoming something entirely different, new and connected to the pure potential and chaotic imagination of the Abyss.

The conceptual space inverts. A white portal appears in the black void They inhabit. They pass through it, passing by a million worlds of incredible wonder and beings of forms never before imagined. They return to the chamber of the Arcanists.

They smile. A curse, and a blessing, all in one. What would one call such a thing? An event, I suppose. The Mechanism ceases its motion. The white portal closes. The many intellectuals and observers begin to weep. The experiment was a success. The way is opened.

The True Arcanist stands and walks into X-89's chamber. He walks up to her, looks her square in the eyes, and kneels. He takes her hand and kisses it. He bows his head to the floor. He gently kisses her foot. The mission is completed. The Subject's soul was successfully redeemed.

The Subject is gone. The Goddess has arrived.

Gloria in excelsis Deo.

The End.

with Love, Genius, and Reverence anansi, the soul director divine artist of the gods The Way is open to all willing to face the Abyss.

Originally posted as a thread on X