This is the continuation of the Tiamat series:
Ichikawa
Ichikawa blinked open his eyes to a world leached of colour, besieged by relentless, cold rain. Shrouded in an unbearable grey of concrete and ruin, this alien landscape seemed wholly detached from the world he knew. Large raindrops crashed against the earth, their loud bursts the sole testament to life amidst this desolation. Absent their cadence, the scene could have been a silent canvas — painted by one who had never known a world of colour and vibrancy.
He inhaled sharply, the air a tart blend of ash and acid that seared his throat and tinged his senses with the taste of ruin.
Turning slowly, Ichikawa sought to ground himself in this unrecognisable place. ‘Is this hell?’ he wondered with unsettling calm. A sceptic of heaven and hell alike, he had nonetheless harboured a quiet conviction: if such places existed, his path was destined for the darker descent.
Were you to inquire about his self-perception, he might liken himself to a storm cloud in perpetual dissent with the sun — a realistic pessimist by his admission. He navigates the world with a pragmatist’s stride yet harbours a core steeped in shadows, where hope seldom finds purchase. It’s an unending skirmish, this tussle between the logic of his mind and the gloom of his soul, each claiming dominion over his outlook like day wrestling night into dusk.
Deep within, Ichikawa was caught in the relentless tug-of-war between two opposing forces that shaped his existence. The inner turmoil of his troubled soul led to his relentless pursuit of the meaning of his existence.
Standing in the centre of a world that, if not hell itself, at least seemed to have sprung from limbo, he wondered if his curiosity about the question of all questions, the meaning of his existence, would be sufficiently answered.
‘Was the inferno just in my mind?’ The question surged with a pang of fear, recalling the moment he feared his world had been swallowed by an all-devouring blaze — a realisation that it wasn’t merely his demise at stake.
‘What became of the waitress with the emerald eyes? Did she survive?’.
His thoughts wandered to the girl with the deep green eyes in the café, who had been by his side during his darkest hour, offering genuine concern. This was a form of compassion Ichikawa had been deprived of in his past lives, a kindness so profound he had never allowed himself to even dream of it. To him, the gift of not facing death in solitude was the pinnacle of human connection.
He had never encountered anyone with eyes quite like hers. Recalling how her gaze had brought him an unprecedented sense of peace, Ichikawa realised that for the first time, he felt a profound bond, an anchor in the tumultuous sea of his existence.
And so it was that amid desolation, he found his freedom. The perpetual struggle within him finally seemed to come to rest. Like an autumn leaf in a storm, always kept in chaotic motion by the vortex, the wind suddenly calms down.
Something was waiting for him here. It was not all in vain. He just had to find out why he was stranded here. He knew it was his destiny. His final destination.
A sudden, bloodcurdling scream broke the silence, a sound so full of despair and grief that it jolted Ichikawa from his reverie. Nearby, someone was screaming — a raw, unbridled scream that clawed at the air.
Without thinking, Ichikawa ran in the direction the screams were coming from. A man, face covered in wounds that could have been caused by a burn, with a head that seemed to be missing tufts of hair, stood kneeling on the ground. With his hands raised to the sky, he recited a pain-filled prayer to whatever gods he could find.
He didn’t seem to notice Ichikawa approaching him, or he didn’t care. Not far from the man on his knees lay an emaciated corpse of a man, covered with traces of a disease unknown to Ichikawa.
Suddenly, the man started to sing.
Oh, where have you been, my blue-eyed son?
Oh, where have you been, my darling young one?’
Ichikawa knew this song; it was Bob Dylan.
I’ve been ten thousand miles in the mouth of a graveyard’.
Ichikawa came closer to the man.
I saw ten thousand talkers whose tongues were all broken’.
Closer and closer.
Heard ten thousand whisperin’ and nobody listenin’.
He stood directly before the man.
I’m a-goin’ back out ’fore the rain starts a-fallin’.
Ichikawa didn’t know why he was doing it, but he felt with unshakeable conviction that he was doing the right thing. Standing next to the singing man, Ichikawa began to sing along.
And I’ll tell it and think it and speak it and breathe it
And reflect it from the mountain so all souls can see it.
The man flinched slightly, and his dull eyes looked at Ichikawa for the first time. They were no longer directed into the distance. A fleeting hint of relief fell on his face, and they continued talking together.
Then I’ll stand on the ocean until I start sinkin’
But I’ll know my song well before I start singin’
As the two tortured souls stood there singing in the middle of a post-apocalyptic world, thousands of emerald green eyes opened in the black sky above them.
Both men continued to sing as the green eyes began to glow. Growing brighter and brighter, it seemed as if a thousand new suns were appearing in the sky. Glowing brighter and brighter, the air began to crackle with heat. The thousand suns seemed to explode, and a gigantic blaze enveloped the world.
‘Now I understand it all,’ thought Ichikawa as he was enveloped in the fire. ‘This is not my hell. This is my salvation. This is my paradise. And the fire of a thousand suns engulfed everything and everyone.
Me
Oh, what did you see, my blue-eyed son?
Oh, what did you see, my darling young one?
I was on my knees in the middle of hell in the middle of acid-heavy rain, and I screamed. I screamed louder than I had ever screamed in my life. I wanted the thousand suns from which I escaped the last time to rise again. I wished that I could finally find my salvation in their light. I screamed.
To my astonishment, another voice joined in my singing. As if an echo, a memory from childhood, a voice that was unknown to me but familiar sounded.
Someone was standing in front of me. Someone who understood me. Someone who was like me.
I felt a sense of relief for the first time in what felt like an eternity. Peace.
And then what I had been looking for happened. The thousand suns shone for the second time in my life. And this time, I knew when the flames and the relentless heat reached me, they would bring me salvation.
‘It looked like it was about to rain outside,’ I heard my voice say. ‘Let’s go out on the veranda. We could eat outside today’. ‘Yes, Dad! That sounds great’. I looked at my son. A feeling of immense joy and relief gripped me. We went outside, guitar in hand.
Oh, where have you been, my blue-eyed son?
Oh, where have you been, my darling young one?