Ulysses Dies At Dawn

Broken Strings

Orpheus' story isn't unusual: a broke young musician with shattered dreams and a dead fiancée, just another life chewed up by the City.

It had started all so well, though. A poor childhood, yet still a happy one in more than one way. He had family, he had friends, he had his music, the words he bent to his will to create the most compelling lyrics—had his heart been darker, Orpheus would have conquered his district and the neighbouring ones in the blink of an eye, through spells woven along electric strings and carried by an exceptional voice. A modern enchanter, wielding without knowing it a forgotten technique to force minds into patterns that weren't their own. In fact, Orpheus could've made a very efficient Ferryman, or even a Master of the Acheron itself, hadn't such jobs already been claimed.

He never realised he could have that, never cared either, for he had love by his side: a princess of his own, a woman to cherish until death would them part, one who cheered at every of his concerts, went with him everywhere, helped him query labels and sell his songs. He was starting to make it, too, slowly but steadily. One day, he'd be as famous as Homer, the legendary blind rock-star who had set fire, literally as well as metaphorically, to the Utica Stadium.

Fate had something else in store for them. All it took was one gig too many, in a club shadier than usual. All it took were a couple of drunks who believed girls should've known better than admire some sissy with a lyre, and didn't take no for an answer. There was a brawl, and knives, and guns, and a blackout, and screams. Lots of screams. When the light came back, Orpheus screamed, too, cradling the broken and bloody corpse of his beloved.

Only our musician couldn't accept that, couldn't accept such a loss in an existence he had barely started to take to the skies.

So he turned mad.

Didn't expect that one, eh?

It went the regular way at first. Depression, pills, booze, forgoing his contracts and angering his potential patrons, locking himself up in the cramped studio flat that still carried so many memories of happier days, where he still kept all her things—throwing them away would've been akin to throwing her away. She had already drowned in the Acheron by then, and the mere thought of her beautiful mind swimming in the bilge of raw data, forever crying and moaning, filled Orpheus with despair.

It lasted for... Nobody knows how long it lasted. And then it ended. and Orpheus raised his head, eyes burning with renewed conviction. He would get his fiancée back.

The City wasn't much different from what it is now, and its universal, unspoken law could be summed up as: he needed money.

So Orpheus spent his days, not lamenting and mourning for a (maybe not so welcome) change, but thinking about the means, he didn't care which ones, to find a lot of money, enough to get a mind pulled out from the Acheron and rebodied.

He also didn't care that whenever someone came back this way, they did so... wrong. Wrong in mind, wrong in heart, forever corrupted by the sluggish waters full of nightmare data. Reason didn't play any role in his life anymore: he needed his true love, he kept telling himself, needed her by his side, or he would get crazy. Crazier. Do not think for one second that Orpheus was sane. In fact, didn't we already mention that?

Music wouldn't help him this time, alas. He had burnt too many bridges, closed too many doors on his way to debilitating sadness. When he knocked on those same doors, angry stares and scornful refusals were all he got. One infuriated club owner, who also played on his own scene from time to time, even threatened to strangle him, turn him inside out, then string his own guitar with Orpheus' guts.

Seldom has there been a more curious combination of towering spiritual strength and pathetic emotional weakness. The hapless young man, broken in heart but determined in mind, or was it the contrary, found himself with his back to the wall. So he came to the most idiotic conclusion one could come to, and made the worst choice of his short life.

He went to Hades.