#thecompletion

„The day came. The day, on which the shadows grew larger than the last shafts of the sunlight, which spread over the country just before nightfall. Families prayed for each other. Men prayed for their wifes and children. After all these years of fighting, of risking their own lifes for their family they're now standing against an powerful enemy. An enemy they can't fight and just sit and watch and hope. Even enemys prayed for each other, because all forgot the meaning of fighting each other, if it is unsure, that even the next day could exist.

All of this because of a fight. A fight in the skies, a fight between the gods high above their heads. Once it started it seemed, that they would never be a winner. Rocks collided with each other, split and pushed each other off. Both took severe damage and it appeared they had enough of fighting for the time being. They departed from one another. Exactly as quiet and silent as they converge.

Once he was watching over us alone. In the night. The god of the weak light. He lightened the world in some of the nights, so the families could find the way. In other nights he stayed dark and told him this way, that it would be the time to rest. And they rested.

This rhythm was about to change. The god of the weak light got a son. A second god, which was smaller, but wanted to replace his dad. Over days, months and years he stayed at the same point in the night sky. It seemed he waited for something while getting bigger and bigger. He started as a small dot, but soon he was as big as the god of the weak light. The bigger he got, the faster he changed his position. Both of them came close to each other in total silence.

But the silence broke one day. The fight in the skies seemed determined. Both took big a big loss and they rained down on earth and brought the blood of both to the world. Fire, fire everywhere. The world and her dweller had to endure the suffer. And they were only the spectators. But all had to endure the suffer. Every living thing on all of the islands. And the suffer was to big. All life was diminished.

Because it changed everything: the air, so clear and and cool, got choky. The oceans, who gave once food, started to engulf the land and dwellers it once fed itself. Water became land and land became water. So fast, faster than any family could run.

And the days got longer. Every day the sun kept shining for longer, longer than the day before. Every night two gods glared from now on the weak light on the families. Also longer and longer each day.

Everything seemed lost. Fire, Water, Air and Earth tried to bring all the families closer to eradication, but one family had a plan. Chosen one, only the strongest and most beautiful, came to Tay. A tree, the tree, who was supposed to bring the earth back in balance with the sky, so both gods of the weak light would calm down and equilibrate the four elements.

The dwellers fled off the big islands to the many little ones and lives there from now on. They live with Tay in safety until the firestorm stopped, both gods of the weak light got comfortable in their new paths and light and dark stopped changing itself once and for all.

Then they came out of their shelter and captured all the small islands for themselves. But every year the came back to Tay, the tree of life, who made their survival possible, and praid to her.“

Calmy speaks the old teacher the last sentence in this chapter. He knows exactly how the story continues, but none of his students does. He wants to reserve the most astonishing part for the end. His students should think about it all and imagine their own ending. Of course, everyone knows that these are metaphors. But still, it raises the tension of the story from her ancestors. The very people, who saved their survival, so they can live here - at this very moment – on these islands.

Greg lets his minder wander while he closes the book and puts it aside. His storytelling-technique is still unmatched from anyone. Otherwise he wouldn't be able to make a boring story, which is written in overblown words, so interesting to young girls, who are sitting in this classroom. He loves telling stories. He did it his entire live. That's probably the reason for his imense experience. He told many stories. Many of them so often, that he stopped counting. But everytime, when he thinks of either story he told, no matter which one, it reminds him, that he never told his own story to anyone. The story of his life and what he knows. He wants to keep it this way.

His thoughts come back in the real world as one student raises her hand shyly. 'The little Juliette', Greg thinks pleasently and gives her permission to speak.

„What are these „two gods“?, she asks confusedly, „The entire story they speak about war and at no point they're saying, who if fighting against whom.“

„Is this a bad thing?“, asks Greg.

„Yes... No, i don't know. It's just weird.“

'So young and unexperienced', Greg thinks to himself. At her age he was exactly the same: Insubordinate, smart-alec and had the assumption he could explain the entire world by himself. But at the first ambiguity not able to see beyond one's own nose.

„A story is filled with Metaphors – pictures, to describe something easier and more precise. Not every word is coherent. Writers change facts, leave facts out of the story and blow things out of proportion to create tension.“, Greg explains.

„But why?“, another girls asks.

„Because everyone explains his own world in the way he or she thinks it is correct. Some things are constant and definite. But most things aren't. Every person interprets things differently, individually, which he or she sees or experiences.

„But there is only one truth! It's not possible to see the truth and then think something different about it. It is wat it is.“, Juliette says.

„It is? Did you had an argument with any girlfriend so far?“, Greg asks.

„She doesn't have any.“, someone says roudly.

The class starts to giggle quietly. Juliette feels immidiatly bad. She hates them all! She hates them, because they are so mean to her for no reason she can explain.

„I don't want to hear anything like that in this room.“, Greg says strictly and continues, „Whatever. You, Juliette, had at some point in your life a difference of opinions. It's the same thing. Her truth differs to your truth, because she saw or experienced something a little bit different than you. Our experiences define what we observe and consider acceptably.“

Juliette nods slighty, but doesn't reply to it. She doesn't feel like sitting here anymore and pulls her legs in front of her chest. Her face rests on her hands. The other girls, who sit cross-legged all around her, are smirking slightly.

Greg recognizes all of this, of course. But he can't do anything for Juliette. Not here and now. Another girl raises his attention. He allows her to speak.

„What or who is Tay? The tree of life?“, she asks.

Normaly Greg would reply with a question. He wants her students to think for themselves. But his desire to have a long conversation has declined.

„It is a metaphor as well. You have to know, there are many symbols in old stories. Not always does a symbol mean the same thing in every one of them, but there analysis is fairly the same almost every time. In this case, the tree stands for the connection between the sky and the earth.“

„Why?“, another girl asks.