two queens

fall of the gods

He sat by the windowsill. Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed a man wrapped in rags doused in blood scurrying down the street, screaming. Behind the man in crimson-stained clothing, were four gauntly men dressed in priests’ robes. Sunlight reflected off their white robes into the onlooker’s eyes. What he found to be the most unnerving was the symbol on the front of the robes, of just a finger pressed to a mouth, like a mother hushing a child to be quiet.

            As he looked at these men in robes, he felt himself succumbing to a trance of artificial means, as if it was a peaceful summer’s day washing over him. As this feeling floated over him, it was as though the man with the bloody rags was disappearing from his conscience. He just kept smiling and the mantra flashed in his head: The gods are just – they love us.  Yet something nagged in the back of his mind, of a similar phrase said a similar time, but the calmness erased that as he kept repeating himself.  The gods are just – they love us.

            Then suddenly the man’s high-pitched screams broke his trance, and emotional thoughts that had long been forgotten came flooding back to him.

            A sudden explosion flew down from the heavens and rocketed the city. Everybody at the market continued what they were doing, but with slight agitation in their movement.  The fires reached high above the highest buildings of the other part of the city. No one said anything. In his eyes, everything unfolded slowly. Hundreds of voices muddled into a blur of unrecognizable words of panic. What struck him was that people were screaming for the others’ help, yet everybody ignored them and kept going on with their own business as if a massacre in the middle of the day was a normal occurrence.

            All he could remember was his feet running beneath him as he went towards the flames. Suddenly, somebody grabbed him by the scruff of his neck. He looked up with tears in his eyes and it was a man who was holding him.  The man just smiled an eerie smile and said, “The god are just.”

            Every time he tried to break away, the man tightened his grip and said, “The gods are just.” After a while, when the man thought the child had calmed down, he walked off and left the child crying.  There sat the child crying in the middle in the market, with everyone smiling and laughing, walking by not saying a word to him. A sudden boom reverberated from the sky and they spoke. 

            The gods in all of their glory spoke in monotone, “The ones whose hearts burn with greed, who dare to topple the gods, will burn in their homes for their decadence.”

            In flash, he was back looking  out the window. The robed men were gone, as the dawning of the cruelty and the suddenly understanding of what happened on that day and again only a few moments ago filled his heart with hate that was directed at the gods in all of the glory.  The gods were not as they appeared and a sudden wave of sickness fell over his body.