The Last Summoning---Andrew and the Quest of Orion's Belt (Book Four)

by Ivory Autumn

  He sat in the dark for some time, weeping, unable to move. The darkness was inhibiting, grinding, rough, devouring. It clutched at him, like heavy chains, causing him to feel weighted down. He moaned, and hovered near the edge of the tower, contemplating leaping off into the nothingness. Then Gogindy thought he saw something through the blanket of darkness. What it was he could not really understand. It was a misty light that lit up at random, beckoned him to it, beguiled him with a feeling of direction. His eyes were transfixed by the meager offering of light that hovered over him. He instantly jumped up and tried to snatch the light, tried to hold it in his hands. But it would not be still. He turned to the uncertain light, though diluted with shadow, and followed it, nearly tumbling off the edge of the tower where it led him. More confused than ever, he teetered on the edge of the tower, wanting to follow the flickering light, but unable to let himself jump to certain death where the light led him. Gogindy whimpered, crying out in frustration. “I am indeed LOST! What kind of light is this that it has led me to the edge of an abyss? He reached out into the emptiness, towards the beckoning light.

  “OOOOh! I can’t do it. I can’t!” He scooted away from the edge of the tower. “No. I cannot jump. I don’t even have enough courage to end my own miserable existence.” The flickering light instantly vanished, leaving him in complete darkness as before. He groped back through the darkness, his hand coming across something hard and flat. He quickly grasped the item. He grinned, and hugged it to him.

  “OH! I thought I’d lost you forever. My rock, my friend. Oh, I knew it was you. But I had to be sure. You feel changed. Only half of you is here. Huh. What a cruel twist of fate. Only half of me is here as well. You see, I am shaved, and in a very sorry state. Oh, but it’s good to have you back. I knew you would not leave me. I am not so alone as I thought…perhaps we need to put ourselves back together. If that’s possible, I do not know. No. I don’t think it is. There are some things that just cannot be fixed. Everything is broken. EVERYTHING!” His words echoed out through the darkness as if such ominous words liked the company of shadows.

  Gogindy shivered at the sound of his own frightening words given power and strength by accumulating gloom. His words seemed to fit well with the darkness. Too well. As if the darkness wanted more of these kinds of words to be born in its womb, to be given wings and cradled in its oily hands.

  “Hope,” Gogindy ventured. “Does such a word even exist in a place like this? Hope?” The word hope fell out of his mouth like a heavy anchor that plunged into the darkness, instantly hidden by a sea of shadow, smothered and devoured, in frightening contrast to the words of woe he had spoken earlier. Yes, the darkness hid all that had once been good and true. There was only the misleading light of The Fallen to guide them. And where that light led was only to a place of destruction.

  Gogindy closed his eyes, and hugged his broken footprint rock, rocking back and forth, trying to shut out the darkness that pushed in around him trying to crush him with its weight. He could only imagine what chaos the world below him had now been plunged into. Darkness. A thing that most had embraced had now embraced them in its all-encompassing companionship. The only light that was left was darkness itself. Screams, moans, howls, and exclamations of woe, and words of desperation rolled through the darkness, carried for miles, heralding in the despair it fed off of. Such terrible words, such sorrow, and utter woe surged in around Gogindy, twisting and curling, eating away at him, shadowing his mind even more.

  Gogindy closed his eyes tighter, and began to hum in barely audible whispers, trying to drown out the sorrowful sounds that echoed out through the darkness.

  “Wind, rain, storm, snow, and sorrow, are but sma---ll th---ings, in compared to to---mo---rrow’s su---n sunshine, hope for tomorrow…good things, are coming tomorrow….tomorrow, tomorrow?”

  As he uttered those last words, a curious fluttery feeling beat in his chest. He turned his nose up and sniffed the air. He thought he caught a hint of something pleasant and wonderfully familiar, like dandelions. He sniffed again. But he had lost the scent. The heavy darkness tried to hide it. Gogindy breathed in a thick sheet of blackness, and suddenly sneezed, causing him to teeter dangerously over the edge of the tower.

  “Oh dear!” he howled, scooting himself back as safe distance.

  After he was completely sure that he was far enough away from the edge, he sniffed again. This time he could pick out the faint smell of sunshine and dandelions mixed with the oily smell of darkness. He groped through the darkness, letting the smell lead him along, feeling his way over the stones.

  He came to an abrupt stop. “What is this?” he purred, his hand coming across something that was very curious. He explored this new item with interest. His hand wrapped around the upper edge of his bell-ringing stick. “What’s this? Ah. I can’t believe it. I thought I lost you.” He pulled at the stick, trying to dislodge it. But it wouldn’t budge. He pulled harder, but still nothing. He explored further, his hand wrapping around a long sprout sort of thing that looped around like a dandelion stem that had been peeled. It was connected to the thing his bell ringing rod was stuck under. He tugged at it with all its might until it came off in his hands. “I have it!” He ran his fingers over its spiral. “Wait? It feels like…” he murmured, “feels like…”

  “My antenna!” a hissing voice growled.

  “My fur!” Gogindy howled back, shaking the antenna at the bug. “You shaved me, you wicked beast! I ought to pluck your legs off for what you’ve done to me!”

  “I was thinking the same thing about you!”

  Just as the bug moved towards Gogindy, he grabbed his bell ringing stick that had been trapped underneath the bug’s body, and quickly retreated away from his enemy.

  The bug let out a metallic screeching, click clack as it scraped its way across the tower. “Once I get my feelers, I’ll eat you. I’ll pry your head off and pop out your eyes!”

  “Can’t find me now, can you?” Gogindy gibed. “Lost with out your antenna? Too bad!”

  The bug hissed, and spat, clacking and screeching, groping in the darkness for Gogindy. But all it could do was veer in circles. It howled, and cried out suddenly veering off the tower in a loud clacking cry that faded away as the bug fell.

  Gogindy shuddered, and laughed as he heard the bug fall. “Got what you finally deserved. Ha!” Anger, and satisfaction swelled inside him. He took a step back, laughing hysterically. He took another step back, waving his newly-found bell-ringing rod in the air. “Ha, ha, ha…”

  Thud!

  His laughs were cut short. His whole body shook and vibrated. His head rung, and throbbed. His thoughts all jumbled together into a confusing mess.

  He slowly shook his rattled head, feeling dizzy and very confused. “The bell?” he breathed, running his hands along the bell’s smooth surface. He had backed up against the bell. It was still here, in the darkness, waiting like a carcass beneath the soil, in the darkness, for someone to wake it from death.

  The metal felt cold, and slippery, riddled with frost and snow, held in place by darkness. But still, it had reached out to Gogindy. Still it had called it to him.

  Gogindy put his head against the metal, and moaned. “I think I’m too late. Don’t you understand? We are all lost. We are all without hope. Yes, even I. Everything is so dark. So very blackish.”

  Tears spilled from Gogindy’s eyes and onto the surface of the bell. His tears hit the metal, and caused the bell to hum so quietly that only Gogindy’s sensitive ears caught the sound. That sound caused his whole body to tingle, and his heart to beat faster. A small hint of a smile glimmered on his face, though he did not know why. He had no reason at all to smile. Here he was in this terrible place, in this terrible darkness, and yet he felt something light upon him, as soft as a feather, but as powerful as Spring. It cast his darkened world a beam of light. That light seemed brighter than anything he had ever felt, ever experienced. What he felt was pure, powerful, brilliant---more real than an
ything he had ever felt in his life. It transformed the fear he felt into a deep and abiding hope. Hope for what future? The world was cast in darkness. Yet, still hope existed. It illuminated his heart, gave him a reason to look up at the dark sky, though he saw only darkness. But in it he thought he could see hope for the future.

  “Hope,” Gogindy whispered. “Can it be that it lives, waiting to be born, even in this darkness?” Gogindy fingered his bell-ringing rod, unsure, yet feeling a rising, flickering hope gleam within his chest. Didn’t hope have restrictions? Wasn’t this the end of all that was good? How was it that hope had still found him here in the darkness? Was it not stifled in this blackness? Did it not see that The Fallen had taken power? Did it not know that without his whiskers he was useless, courageless, powerless? Still hope swelled within him. It did not care that he was a shaved, foolish mouse, weak, and cold. It did not need a powerful giant to give it residence.

  All it needed was a host, a heart, a home, no matter how lowly, no matter how small. Gogindy’s heart was bigger than them all.

  “Don’t you understand?” Gogindy shouted out into the blackness. “All is lost.”

  Yet, hope lingered, waiting, urging Gogindy to set it free, to let it be born, to renew and revive a world that had no reason to hope. And because it had no reason to exist, it had more of a reason to exist, a reason far more vivid and powerful than ever before. That was the way hope had always worked. Hope did not need a reason.

  Gogindy gulped, feeling his heart beat faster with each second. The overpowering feeling he felt emanated from the bell, flooding over him, baptizing him in its purity.

  Hope did not need a reason.

  It never did.

  He had never thought of hope in that way before. To him, hope had always needed to make some logical sense. It needed something to hope for. Here, there obviously wasn’t anything to hope for at all.

  Yet still it lingered.

  He hoped. But what he hoped for was obscure, far off, like a dream. Maybe he was asleep? It was dark, after all.

  Perhaps the best dreams only come when it is darkest.

  Here, there was abundance of that.

  Here that was all one could do.

  “Hope,” he uttered the words reverently, as if he had said a prayer. “Hope lives,” he said louder. “Yes!” His eyes flamed, his heart pounded against his chest. He turned to the bell and lifted the bell ringing stick. Perhaps it did not matter that he had not succeeded. What mattered is that though he had failed, he would try yet again.

  Hope overcame his reason, his doubt, his loss of identity, his feelings of failure. Sure, he had lost all his whiskers. Yes, he had failed. But even without his whiskers, even though he had failed, he had not lost the most important part of him, as he had first supposed. He had not lost his heart. It was he who had to live with himself. And he would live! He would!

  Hope was alive in him even in this dark hour.

  This hope drove him to action, although all his senses told him that it was useless.

  It consumed him, caused his mind and heart to burn as one. Caused him to forget everything else, except for this resounding throb of truth, the hope the bell foretold would come into his heart if he let it in.

  He gripped the bell-ringing rod firmly. He raised it high, his face alight with a light only he could feel.

  “Ring,” he cried. “Sing! Cut through this darkness and ring for me, and for all the world, for the race of people you represent! RING with the voice of hope, of truth. Hope is something that is needed much more in dark places than in light. For you are the voice of hope. And Hope is all the more powerful when it seems that there is no reason to have it. Ring! Ring with the voice of truth trapped inside you! Strike fear into the wicked, give hope to the good, strength to the weak, courage to the coward. Death and life to those whom you see fit. RING! Let your voice be heard though the darkness. Let your voice cut in pieces the darkness that is threatening to suffocate us in its tight grip! RING! LET HOPE GO FREE. LET TRUTH FINALLY BE HEARD!”

  Thus saying, Gogindy brought the stick down as hard as he could, clapping it against the bell in a flash of light.

  CRACK!

  Gogindy was instantly thrown onto his back as the heavy crust of darkness and grime holding the bell in place cracked and fell away as the bell swayed back and forth in an explosion of light and sound.

  A stirring toll arose from the depths of the bell, causing a spray of light to scatter from underneath it like thousands of glowing fireflies.

  Gong! Gong! Gong! the bell tolled, louder and louder, causing Gogindy’s whole body to shake because of the sound.

  With each toll, the bell grew brighter, shattering bits of darkness around Gogindy. The shafts of light underneath the bell scattered throughout the darkness as if it was searching for something or someone. The music from the bell tolled in Gogindy’s heart, stirring every cell in his body to some higher plane of thought, to memories he had not yet experienced, of good things to come. The voice of hope struck at his heart, causing him to feel that perhaps, all things were possible. It caused him to remember why he was there. The voice of hope was one of truth, truth in its purest form. It told him that even though the world was captive under a dark power, there was yet a greater power that still existed that the even darkness, not even death itself, could shut out.

  Gong! Gong! Gong! The sounds from the bell flooded over Gogindy, stronger and stronger, flooding his mind with light, causing his whole body to be filled with light. His skin began to glow, shaven and shorn as it was. With each toll his whiskers began to grow back, like glowing, golden tuffs of yarn, shimmering with the hope that emanated from his heart.

  Though surrounded by the blackest darkness, he was not without light anymore. It existed inside himself, bright and brilliant. With it he could see his way in the darkness.

  Gogindy gazed at the glowing bell with shining eyes. A smile perched on his face, reflecting the feeling of hope in his heart. With each toll of the bell, a dazzling spray of light was sent out into the land that reached far and wide. Its music lit up the dark world with something that was not tangible, something that could only be held in brave hearts and souls that were willing to house hope’s gleam. Gogindy rose to his feet and shouted. “HOPE has been reborn! Take that you darkness. You weak, pathetic diaper sheet. We shall see who will win in the end. We shall see what is more powerful!”

  Chapter Forty-four

  Dispersed

  A time of doubt, and a time of hope.

  A time where time and space stood affixed.

  A time where none could remain between or betwixed.

  A murky haze that hinted of light, trickled in through from the north, teasing those who dwelt in darkness with a sense of light and direction, only to have it snatched away, leaving men lost, and alone.

  Light was gone.

  The light’s struggle over darkness was, at last, at a miserable end.

  The Fallen had claimed its own. The world that had worshiped his darkness, had given him power from the darkness in their own hearts, from the darkness they had let dwell in their cities, and had invited into their homes. Now it was a permanent resident.

  No one had believed it could happen.

  All had been duly warned.

  But none had believed it would be like this.

  The Fallen’s promises of true illumination had fallen short. The wages of serving such a master was a price they had not pondered, nor counted. The master whom they served had given them a portion of power, then left them wandering in the darkness. Now all were left alone to stumble and falter, lost in the dreary aftermath The Fallen’s darkness had left behind.

  Light, so often taken for granted---used, abused, undervalued, cheated, poorly paid, and trampled under foot was now in short supply.

  It was now a rare commodity, its abundance that had never stopped giving was gone, devoured, used up.

  Only one source remained, and it was The Fallen himself.

 
A gathering began to take place as the world cooled. Hints of whispered light beckoned them towards The Fallen’s realm. To him they must come, to him must they obey, in him they must put their trust. It was now law, written in darkness, and enforced by shadows.

  Woeful, and wandering. Those are the words that best describe those who gathered towards The Fallen’s light. Wretched creatures who were desperate to lick up the meager snatches of light that The Fallen offered them.

  Days and nights mingled into one so that no one knew how long they had dwelt in the darkness, or how long it had been since they had seen the light of day. It seemed it had been an eternal night.

  The far-off memory of the sun, of color, of warmth, of brilliance were all just faded gleams in the darkness that offered little comfort. What was the sun? Some wondered. Had it been real, a delusion? Perhaps the darkness was the only real reality. Perhaps the life they had lived before was the real delusion.

  This shadowland was now the reality. A reality that seemed to have no end and no beginning. It was ever present, ever here, as if it always was, and always would be.

  In this eternal darkness, one hour felt like a thousand. One moment felt like an eternity. There was coldness, and ice that would not warm. It crept over the earth icing over cities and entire towns.