Ask G'Quan

Dear Readers,

Another year ends and I look back upon it with regret.  I have not done my best for you this year.  I could argue that memories of that time in the Darkness weighed down my prose.  It is only partially true.  You deserve so much more than I have done this year.  I hope to do better by you in the next.

If you are reading this, know that you are in my thoughts and in my heart as well.  Our unity can repel the Darkness. Perhaps even from the dark stone prisons we make for ourselves.

Enjoy your feast days.  Eat, drink and be with those you love. In heart, if not in person. Love to your fullest and enjoy the moments of peace and joy that come to you.

At least that is what I remember.  Since my mother and Pa’Koth were there I believed it needed to be recorded.

The first real thing I saw was G’Lan sleeping beside me.  He looked exhausted, drawn… old.  Rumpled like a leaf from last year.  He is… I don’t even know how old.  At that moment he was almost glowing.  No doubt because, with my dark deadened eyes, the whole room was glowing.  Glowing like the sky above us.  The universe in miniature was above our heads.  I looked around the room. From weeks of entrapment I found myself not moving.  Probably just as well.  Knowing my state, I probably wouldn’t be able to walk to the door.  I lifted a tentative hand to the ceiling as if I could reach the ceiling.  As if I could reach the sky.

“Holy One.” said a voice beside me.  I looked over to see a young Dur’Nara.  They looked at me in astonishment.  

“Greetings.  How long have I been here?”

Their response was to touch my head and my chest.  “You have returned to us.”

“I don’t know that I was that far away.”

“The mountain runs deep.  The heart of the mountain called to me.  I found you, Holy G’Quan.”

“Just G’Quan will do.”

“What may I do for thee?”

“Water and information would be fine.”  I put all my effort into sitting.  It was exhausting but I would not be weak.  I could not be weak.

“You have been gone for over a month, you fool.  The impetuosity of youth.” I heard in a growl.  “Did no  one ever teach you that the first thing is to not get caught?”

I smiled despite myself, “No, the old fool that taught me was too full of himself to teach that lesson.”

“He probably believed that you were bright enough to figure that out yourself.”

“Then who is the bigger fool?  The student for being caught, or the teacher who overestimated his intelligence?”

“Young G’Quan…” I was enveloped in his arms.  We held each other.   We were both crying.

Thirteen meals I have eaten.  There is nothing left of me now.  Now I sink into the ground.  I am the One that was.  Another will come.  I can almost see him.  Maybe he will be able to tell G’Lan what befell me.  I hope they work well together and

Oh! I feel like I will become part of the stone.  The silence is absolute.  The darkness so full that I almost feel as if it has become lighter.  My eyes so attuned that I can now see the light in the darkness.

I am sinking into the light.   So this  this is what death is like?  Everything is at peace now.  Everything done.  

I am lying to myself.  There will be war again  The Darkness will come again.  The deed is not done.  I want to fight off the languor and claw my way back from the stone.  I don’t have the strength.

The Narn have to take their place in the Light once more.  They must do what needs to be done.  My child.  My child will be in the Nexus.  As I was a child of peace that fought a war.  My child will be a child of war that brings peace.  

I felt the tears on my face.  No strength to remove them as they pooled in my vents and trailed into the abyss.  Has Sava come to take her servant to her after all?  

I was so sure the gods were a lie we told ourselves.  Schrock! I would hate to discover my error at this point.

And I fell.  

Sturdy arms held me and the light was so bright.  “G’Quan” the voices say, reverently.  As if I were to be worshipped.  As if I had the answers.  

“I am only a Narn.” I murmur, dry lips, cracking.  My throat burns.

Voices mix.  Guttural utterances that I cannot follow.

“Pa’Koth?” I saw him.  But he has nothing to say.  He just looks at me with a knowing smile.  Saving me again, old friend?  I wanted to tell him my thanks.  Yet he disappears as those who carry me fly on with sure feet in the cavern.  I will tell him later, I assure myself.  

Water is pressed to my lips and I feel the trickle hit my dry tongue. It is only after more liquid is poured on my face that my throat feels any relief.  

Normal people are what the majority of people decide is normal.  You don’t define yourself in this instance. Normalcy is defined for you.  Or more typically you are defined by your lack of normalcy.  There are many people that believe that we should try to meet the requirements of society.  To be normal.  The circles required a level of normalcy that I never seemed able to maintain.

My brother was normal by all accounts.  He was strong, reliable.  He was handsome enough, tall enough, had a good work ethic.  He sang the right songs in the correct temples and he bonded with a female that was just as normal and reliable as he.  They had their children and taught them to be good normal people.  And when his crazy pouch brother came to him with a story of beings from the sky that would destroy all of his normal life he threw me out of the family.  

Send Me a Number and I'll answer that Question!

1: Is it worse to fail at something or never attempt it in the first place?

2: If you could choose just one thing to change about the world, what would it be?

3: To what extent do you shape your own destiny, and how much is down to fate?

4: Does nature shape our personalities more than nurture?

5: Should people care more about doing the right thing, or doing things right?

6: How can people believe in truths without evidence?

7: Where is the line between insanity and creativity?

8: What is true happiness?

9: What things hold you back from doing the things that you really want to?

10: What makes you, you?

11: What is time?

12: Is mind or matter more real?

13: Do you make your own decisions, or let others make them for you?

14: What makes a good friend?

15: Why do people fear losing things that they do not even have yet?

16: Who defines good and evil?

17: What is the difference between living and being alive?

18: Is a “wrong” act okay if nobody ever knows about it?

19: Who decides what morality is?

20: How do you know that your experience of consciousness is the same as other people’s experience of consciousness?

21: What is true strength?

22: What is true love?

23: Is a family still relevant in the modern world?

24: Where do thoughts come from?

25: What is beauty?

26: How do you know your perceptions are real?

27: How much control do you have over your life?

28: What is freedom?

29: What is infinity?

30: What happens after we die?

31: What defines you?

32: Is it more important to be liked or respected?

33: Do we have a soul?

34: Where does the soul live?

35: How should people live their lives?

36: If lying is wrong, are white lies okay?

37: Is trust more important than love?

38: Is it easier to love or be loved?

39: Is it better to love and lose or never to love?

40: Do aliens exist?

41: The structure of DNA appears to be intelligently designed, what are the implications?

42: Is there a reason to life?

43: Is life all a dream?

44: When does consciousness begin?

45: Do dreams mean anything?

46: Can we have happiness without sadness?

47: How did the universe begin?

48: Is there a supreme power?

49: Do soulmates exist?

Freedom is a slippery concept.  What I find liberating might be quite confining for another.  There are many kinds of freedom.  It is not just being able to say and do whatever you wish to do.  Freedom may only be the free range of your thinking.  An oppressor can take many things from you, but they cannot take your thoughts.  If you can think and dream you can remove the oppressor.  This is why the oppressor is always so interested in the children.  Make the children love the oppressor and the battle is over in a generation.  Luckily oppressors never seem to be able to hide their disdain for the oppressed.  The freedom of thought always finds fertile ground.

The trick to freedom is discovering how all can be free.  I don’t know that society has matured to the point of allowing such freedom.

When I was a child all were free to some extent.  I could do whatever I wanted within the confines of my role in the society.  I could learn whatever I wanted.  I had the freedom to be a farmer.  I could raise whatever I wanted to raise.  As an adult my days were my own.  Feast or famine was based on whether I decided to plant and harvest.  Tarlek-eth was a prized crop.  I could get much recompense for the least amount of effort.  I was a terrible farmer because I had no interest in it.  Females had the freedom to find me less than attractive as a mate.   

There was an understanding that those of other circles were more than us.  That the 10th circle circumscribed my life.  Yet I never felt constrained by this understanding.  To know your destiny in life is to have a certain freedom.  I was meant to be the failure.  Not having to succeed provided a freedom that my brother never was allowed.

Then came the War.  Then failure was no longer an option.  I had to strive.  It was also a time of Change.  No  longer were there people to tell me what to do or think.  The only requirement of me was success.  The only other option death.  There is a certain freedom in knowing that this might be all there is.  That all the rules have been thrown out and now you are focused on one goal.

When we changed society to allow movement within the circles we did something frightening.  We gave those who followed the freedom to be more than their parents.  To move from circle to circle.  Because there was no reason to believe that that one circle was better than another.  All Narn were equal.  The freedom to do and say and be what we want is a daunting responsibility.  As a child I always knew that I would be a farmer because my father was a farmer.  Because that was what we did when we grew up.  

When my brother and I were named it brought confusion not relief.  To be a God named farmer?  G’Qual no doubt found it confining.  He knew who he was.  He was not supposed to be a God named.  He was never meant to be important.  I thought it was an interesting affectation of my mother’s.  That she had been allowed additional freedom in the Name choice because of her status as a Seer.  The freedom to make fools of her sons.

To understand time is to attempt to understand the infinite.  There are infinite universes and all are subject to time in some fashion  It is the absolute of existence.

Time is relative.  As a child it drags.  As an adult you find yourself outpaced by time’s passage.  Time refuses to move at all when you are bored and disappears when you are occupied.  It is we who define time.  We measure its passage.  We define a day by the movement of our planet and our sun. Yet day does not start when the sun reaches an arbitrary point on the horizon.  It starts when you wake.  What matters the time that passes when you are not conscious of its passage?  Does the time you spent doing something trivial count against you in a way that spending time profitably does not?  Is time a bag of coins you take to the fair?  Does someone judge which items took your fancy over those that would have been a wiser choice?  

For @pushmaster-5000

Send Me a Number and I'll answer that Question!

1: Is it worse to fail at something or never attempt it in the first place?

2: If you could choose just one thing to change about the world, what would it be?

3: To what extent do you shape your own destiny, and how much is down to fate?

4: Does nature shape our personalities more than nurture?

5: Should people care more about doing the right thing, or doing things right?

6: How can people believe in truths without evidence?

7: Where is the line between insanity and creativity?

8: What is true happiness?

9: What things hold you back from doing the things that you really want to?

10: What makes you, you?

11: What is time?

12: Is mind or matter more real?

13: Do you make your own decisions, or let others make them for you?

14: What makes a good friend?

15: Why do people fear losing things that they do not even have yet?

16: Who defines good and evil?

17: What is the difference between living and being alive?

18: Is a “wrong” act okay if nobody ever knows about it?

19: Who decides what morality is?

20: How do you know that your experience of consciousness is the same as other people’s experience of consciousness?

21: What is true strength?

22: What is true love?

23: Is a family still relevant in the modern world?

24: Where do thoughts come from?

25: What is beauty?

26: How do you know your perceptions are real?

27: How much control do you have over your life?

28: What is freedom?

29: What is infinity?

30: What happens after we die?

31: What defines you?

32: Is it more important to be liked or respected?

33: Do we have a soul?

34: Where does the soul live?

35: How should people live their lives?

36: If lying is wrong, are white lies okay?

37: Is trust more important than love?

38: Is it easier to love or be loved?

39: Is it better to love and lose or never to love?

40: Do aliens exist?

41: The structure of DNA appears to be intelligently designed, what are the implications?

42: Is there a reason to life?

43: Is life all a dream?

44: When does consciousness begin?

45: Do dreams mean anything?

46: Can we have happiness without sadness?

47: How did the universe begin?

48: Is there a supreme power?

49: Do soulmates exist?

Hello friend.  

I have always believed that the cure for the Darkness is the light of those who care.  I appreciate these *virtual hugs* that you offer in the spirit in which they are given.  

I admit the memory of that cell still can fill me with sense of dread and claustrophobia.  It was a time of deep despair.  Few look upon the certainty of their own death as a joyous event.   

Yet it also made me understand that when you die, all you have is the life that you have lived.  To be able to look back at your life and realize the sublime beauty of existence.  Of eating a beautiful meal with those you love.  To feel the touch of a lover.  The sweetness of a child’s kiss.  Of laughing with your friends.  Even fighting a just fight with honor.  The resolve that is the aftermath of defeat.  The comfort of friends.  The opportunity to give succor.  

Basking in the beauty of Nar’Shal itself.  The sun as it rises over the mountains.  The cool touch of rain on your face.  The perfection of a flower.

There are so many moments that make up a life.  It is the moments that we regret that always come to mind when death is certain.  Hopefully in that final moment my thoughts will dwell on my happiest times.  The sincere joyous universe.  Otherwise I am in a dark cage of my own making.  I assure you one dark cage is enough for any lifetime.

I have no idea how long I have been here.  I have marked when I have been fed - eight times.  I know that I have not been fed every day.  I feel my strength ebbing.  This is what they want of course.  They want me to be weak.  

I have sat in this room and laid in this room and walked around one way and the other.  Today I spent laying on the floor looking up into the darkness.  My hands have searched every crevice for a crack, a fault in the rock.  For dirt that may lead to an escape.  My hands are bloody from my attempts.  I cannot see my fingers, but I can taste the blood when I eat.  

Over the years I have faced the option of death many times.  I lived through the War Against the Darkness.  I survived the various warleaders and assassins.  I survived battles that I should not have won.  I escaped fate many times.  It occurs to me that perhaps this time I will not.  No one who loves me knows where I am.  I am deep in the ground far from the light.  Any who would come to find me would have to be able to come through the barrier which still kills everything but me.  Survive the creatures that live in this place.  And find me.  It seems impossible.

Heroes are supposed to die in glorious battle or live happily ever after.  So, I must not be a hero.  Politicians are supposed to be assassinated or live a luxurious life and die in their sleep.  I could consider this a form of assassination.  Not one to which I am accustomed.  I still might die in my sleep, but I wish I had thought ahead to have that luxurious life.

There is a certain irony that G’Quan. The one who fought Darkness.  Who made it the mission of his life.  Would die in an alcove so deep in the ground that no light could find him.

I think of all of the things I missed in my life.  Decisions made one way when another option could have turned my life differently.  I could have fathered children.  I could have sailed the sea.  I could have done so much.  Yes I gave my life to Nar’Shal.  I wish I had given part of my time to myself.  

As I lay on the floor I think these sad thoughts.  Now I realize that for every one of things I missed I had something I had experienced.  How many people can say that they have left an everlasting impression on their society?

My name will last one thousand years.  Others will come.  They will save Nar'Shal.  Perhaps the entire universe.  The purpose lives on even if one dies.  In my vanity I wanted to be important.  I thought I would survive.  That the universe would save me.  Now I realize that every moment was my gift.  My reward.

“Where are you, mother?” I croak.  My throat is rough and dry. “Trusted friend?  Where is your counsel now?  I followed your advice into folly.  At least you can give me a dream.  A moment of peace.”  I waste my energy and bodily fluids on useless tears. I am truly alone.

“I am sorry, G'Lan.  You have always wanted to see me be wrong.  Yet you have missed your chance.  I will attempt to feel proper disappointment in your stead.”

For the first time I feel the oppressive weight of the rock around me.  Feel the room close around me. A 4x6x6 box in which I was entombed.  The song in my head is a dirge.  

What does one do when they are stuck in the dark, alone in the hands of the enemy?

I can’t write.  I can’t see.  It will look like gibberish.  To write this small missive is taking all of my abilities and I still believe it will be almost impossible to read.  Maybe someone will find this and learn what happened to me.  It is the only reason I am continuing it at this point.  Of course, it may only prove to them I went insane.  These things cannot be avoided.

I have occupied myself other ways.  I have searched the walls for flaws.  I have sung happy songs to keep up my courage.  Told the walls heroic tales from my youth.  I especially enjoyed regaling the walls with the battles from the War Against the Darkness.

It is all to keep up my waning spirits.  I am hungry and tired.  My fingers are raw from searching.  My eyes strained from trying to see in the absolute darkness.  

This is my private torture chamber.  Utterly alone in the dark.  Left to rot far from all I call my own.  I will become a legend.  A warning.  A tale told to pouchlings as they lay in their beds.  If my enemies and their friends have their way my story will at best be whispered among my people.  Or my people will cease to be.

 The Darkness would enjoy that.  The grubby Narn being destroyed from within.  

Enemies come in many forms, but the enemy with the face of a friend is the most insidious and evokes betrayal beyond any other foe.  I have spent time listening to the Narn collaborator in my mind.  If I meet him outside of this cave he will shortly be missing his throat and I will be preparing Phroomis.  

It appears that I will not starve to death today.  I heard voices outside the prison.   Harsh, sibilant then frightening.  I heard in the middle of the nonsense my name.  Clearly, repeatedly.  My name. They knew me.  

I was blinded by a light shining in my face.  I shielded my eyes, seeing nothing but blue afterglow. A black silhouette finally was visible behind the light.  The outline of a Narn.  Undeniably a Narn.  “Hello, G’Quan.” he smirked.  “Finally where you belong.  Our friends are quite interested in making your acquaintance.”.

I believe I recognized the voice.  Someone I knew.  Someone who would recognize me even now…  Could a member of the Kha'Ri be here?  Would one of them betray me to the Darkness?

“Nothing to say?  No eloquent speeches?  They will cut you into pieces, you know, to see what you are made of.  They think you are with the Enemy, but we know you are a useless blowhard.”

He left then.  Soon after some food and water was brought.  I had to make a decision.  To eat and worry of poison or die with food in my reach.  Obviously I chose to eat.  If they wanted to kill me, they wouldn't need to bother with poison.  Just leave me a few more days…  It was strange in flavor.  I have no idea what it was.  It was edible and I haven't died.  

I don't think I want to meet his friends.  I am certain that it will go poorly for me.  Yet if I saw them myself…  would that mean I would go to their home?  Their world?

Would death and torture (probably in the opposite order) be a price worth paying for that experience?

Of course not.  What is the point of seeing the home of the Darkness if I cannot tell my fellow Narn and warn them?

The empty containers melted away leaving nothing.  Nothing to hold more liquid.  Nothing to count my days with.  Nothing to retrieve.  Nothing I could use to escape.  So very efficient.  It was enough to weep.  Though I refuse to show such weakness in front of these.

They are not the ones who battled me before.  They are not so black that they leave a hole in the light.  They are not the Soldiers of Darkness that we fought on the field.  They cannot enter my mind.  They cannot fight me except as one creature against another.  They may have weapons, but I have will and shall not give up.  

I must destroy this place.  I don’t know how it will come to pass at this moment.  I am alone in a way that I have never been alone before.  It is one of the most empty of feelings.  Fear looms large, gibbering in my mind.  Yet I keep my countenance clear.  I will plan.  I will escape.  

I will destroy this place.  I will destroy the Darkness.

I stood outside the cavern again today.  The whispering was more distinct.  It had a sibilance that felt alien to my ears.  Not Narn.  I would like to say that I leaped into action and explored the cavern.  

But I do not lie to you, Dear Reader.

I left.  I went back to the village as if willing people to be there would make Narn sprout from the ground.  I explored the village thoroughly.  The people moved on as a choice, not hurried in any way.  You can tell because the remnants of the village are neatly placed in the town square.  Looters would not have been so polite.  What is left is not worth keeping.  I looked through the trash to excuse my resistance to the path I needed to take.  As if long forgotten, broken crockery is the reason I am here.

Now I look down on the ruined base.  From here it seems so innocent.  Yet the people left.  Was it a feeling of oppression?  Dread?  Malice?

I can remember running for my life as the base exploded around me.  Could there be something there?  Is it like the other base with the underground caverns as well as the city above Dare I leave it for someone else to finish?  

Was my dream correct?  Have I become an old man?

My name is G’Quan and I am a fool.  I am a doddering idiot.

Yes, there are creatures in this ruined base.  They are creatures of Darkness.  And they have captured me.   I thought I was going to surprise them. I was the one surprised.  It is as if they knew I was here.  They were waiting for me to come into the structure. They are so alien from us.  They captured me and tossed me in here with much regard at all.  I do not see any others here.  I have not seen them either.

I do not even know how long I have been here.  I know it cannot have been weeks because I still live though I am starting to weaken.  I have liquid from the walls, but I have not eaten in a while and my stomach is cramping from the emptiness.  They have not brought any food or drink to me.  I am not a prisoner in their eyes.  I am a pest that was trapped.  Like a pest, there is no plan to keep me alive. I can find no escape.  The walls are solid bedrock.  The opening is shut with some force that will not allow me to pass through.  Not just painful  Pain I would endure to escape.  Somehow the empty air just refuses my exit.  

I spent hours trying to get out.  I screamed to get their attention, but they ignore me.  Why would anyone care about the complaints of vermin?  

No one will ever find me.  My bones will mold in this cage, unsung.  Ironic ending to my story, is ti not?  To go from a simple farmer to the Leader of the Narn people, only to die unremembered in the prison of my enemies.  Lost forever.  

The Darkness is in all of us, Dear Reader.  The best kept secret of the Narn is the Darkness that lives in me.  Everyone wants the hero to always be wise and brave.  The hero is always the shining beacon of light in a world of darkness.  How could G’Quan not be the bravest and strongest and wisest of all Narn?  He ruled the Narn as Leader of the Ka’Rhi for most of a century.  He shaped the Narn and chased the Darkness from Nar’Shal.  

Simply speaking… it is an impossible task. To rid the world of that which lives in all Narn.  Easier to ask us all to lose our spots.

I have fallen down this hole many times.  I can put on the brave face and take care of the essential things.  I will never stop working for my people.  In some ways, it is a balm for my lonely Chad’Rasha.  Always busy, even with the most trivial things.  It keeps me from doing even less useful activities.  As if playing knives or sitting in a bar drinking is a useful activity.  There is so much more I should be doing, but instead I do the least useful.  And then I am angry with myself for neglecting more important tasks.

Like telling my story.  I have failed you, Dear Reader.  For months I have been hiding in my work and neglecting this tome.  Some of the tasks were very important, but others…  they are the trivia that never needs to be done.  They are the warm blanket you put over your head to ignore the monsters.  As if the monsters go away because you hide from them. They wait for you, Dear Reader.  They must only be patient.  You cannot hide forever.

Sometimes they already are under the blanket with you.

I have no apology for my actions.  Those who love me do not require it and, for the rest, no apology would be adequate.  I merely explain my actions and my absence.

The Darkness within is the most insidious of all.  It eats at you.  It knows your weaknesses and can use them to devastating effect.  It is the quiet monster under the blanket, mocking your attempts to be safe.

Like all Darkness, it can only be defeated by the light.  For many years I relied on my friends to help me in times of Darkness.  Pa’Koth, for all his flaws, was still a light bringer.  He was the calm in my storm.  He provided strength when I had none left of my own.  His loss was immeasurable.  

But he is gone.  Lost in a way I cannot overcome.

Sometimes you are all alone in the Darkest hour.  You must become your own strength.  Your own beacon.  It takes time and can strip you down to your very essence.  You can become Lost a thousand times in the Dark.  You may never escape.  You must search for the light.  It is inevitably harder than having someone bathe you in theirs.  I only hope it is worth the price that is paid.