The Thousand-Eyed Crow (#Wattys2020)

Prologue (And the Void Stares Back)

A low, mechanical humming hung in the air, vibrating at a frequency that could only cause the listener to feel awash with dread. The source of the noise seemed to be nowhere and everywhere at the same time; no matter where one stepped in this void, the sound did not change.

The mist oppressed all it touched and with each step through it, the cobwebs of moisture clung to the body, sticky and unrelenting. Despite the air's dampness, the ground – if you could call it that – was smooth and dry. Rather than walking upon it, one could only glide across its smooth surface, its inky blackness so dark that the sensation of even moving across it gave the feeling of being suspended in space and time.

Accompanying the hum, the sound of something dripping permeated the area, but where it came from and what the substance was remained a mystery. In the darkness, there was no direction – no forward, no backward, no around; and there was no existence, only sensation.

They stirred, shifting across what could only be described as "the floor", the smooth surface giving way entirely and retaining indents from the movement. It moved like putty but felt like granite to the touch.

The scream that rang out seemed to echo through the area that gave no indication that it was an enclosed space. Another scream cut through the air, this one more a throaty growl reminiscent of a bear going into labor. With that, the figure clawed at the soft yet hard substance, rising from a kneeling fetal position.

"I can't fucking see!" the voice cried, hoarse from under-use. They sounded like they had been mute for years and only suddenly learned to speak.

A soft sob escaped their lips as they clawed at their own face, cursing whatever gods were out there that they had gone blind so early. It was un-fucking-fair.

"Would you shut the fuck up?" another voice broke through the mist, its iciness betraying just the slightest hint of fire. Scrambling across the floor surface, their breath hitched in their throat as the putty around them gave way with each movement, sinking them further into their surroundings. They swatted the area around them blindly and a bit off-balance, but more gently now, grabbing onto what felt like their partner's arm in the darkness.

"It's not fair..." the first voice sobbed some more as their partner wrenched their hand away from their face.

The humming around them grew progressively louder until it drowned out their cries. Covering their ear with their one hand, the first figure also screamed and screamed until their were hoarse again, begging the noise to stop before they went deaf, too. The second figure held the first to their chest, stroking their hair in a futile attempt to soothe.

Before them, a ball of fire erupted, casting an equally blinding light across the damp space and making the humidity even more unbearable. The fireball seemed to twinkle, reflecting an infinite amount of times all around them and sending the black putty that served as the ground away as it all sank into a singularity. Finally, the ball of fire collapsed into itself, emitting visible light from all across the spectrum and illuminating the area in an Aurora Borealis-type fashion.

After the collapse, the ear-shattering hum ceased entirely as if it had never even happened.

For a moment, all was silent. It was almost peaceful, as they simply watched the slowly moving colors dance across the space only to be mirrored all around them like a never-ending rainbow aura. The first figure had stopped crying, rejoicing in being able to see once again. They had dragged themselves away from the second figure, forgetting for the moment that their legs could not support them, and forgetting that the floor fell away from them with each move they made.

The moment was short-lived, however, as the aura faded back to black and they were left in the darkness once again.

But suddenly the darkness broke again, and this time where the beautiful rainbow spectrum had been, the face of a giant, thousand-eyed crow appeared with a screech that pierced their bones. The face was reflected infinite times, its wail echoing throughout the void and seeming to engulf everything in its path.

"I am your god!" it shrieked in an almost indecipherable manner, not speaking in any human language but still somehow making sense. "You have seen the beginning and the end of the world! This is heaven and this is hell."

Paralyzed, the two figures could only sit, naked, and watch and listen as the crow's words came through to them even though it did not move its mouth as if it were speaking. Its words simply entered them as if by osmosis, but the screeches continued while it "spoke". It was simultaneously overwhelming yet calming, chaotic yet measured; the contradictions were beyond what their brains could even begin to comprehend.

"The false prophets that have used my name in vain... have taught only lies... claimed to know me..." the crow continued, its tone turning more frantic. "And those who have stopped believing in me, because of these falsehoods that the idolaters have promoted... these must all be corrected."

Now the screeching halted, and the crow disappeared, only to physically manifest before them. It glowed, radiating a black energy that filled them with emptiness and dread, and a sense of peace at the same time. The void had stretched deep into infinity and so the god appeared to float, its thousand wings vibrating infinitesimally. Its thousand eyes appeared to stare into nothing while also staring through them and into everything in existence.

For a moment it simply remained suspended in the middle of space, and nothing moved; the silence around them all was deafening. It was as if time itself, if it were even a concept here, stood entirely still.

The crow god opened its mouth one last time, and where its tongue should have been there was instead an endless maw that began to suck the figures in like the vacuum of space. As the darkness engulfed them once again, the crow god expanded and collapsed into itself, a colorful supernova accompanied by the piercing high-pitched shriek of the universe.

As everything surrounding them disappeared, it felt like they were hurtling through nothingness at a speed fast enough to rip the skin from their bodies and pulverize their bones. Their bodies disintegrated so quickly that they felt no pain and instead, joined the trillions of others in the revolving ring of souls at the center of the universe, finally feeling at peace in the silence around them.