And He Doth Descended Into the Depths of Heaven

Epilogue: Part Two

Kuriyamimizu

5/14/01

"Now what?", he asked the still air at the base. As he stared up into the emptiness of the stairs he began to feel unsure of himself. He wasn’t sure that he wanted to go up and talk with whomever or whatever was at the top of that staircase, and yet it seemed that he had no choice Already the darkness around him was pressing him in, silently and invisibly pushing him up the stairs. With a hesitant step he put his foot on the first marble step. Nothing happened, nothing jumped at him, he didn’t fall. The only thing that greeted his small movement was the sound of his clothes rustling and that of the sole of his foot hitting the step. With a silently racing heart he began his ascent up the stairs.

As he walked he thought of his friends and lover. They were hard thoughts to face. The others, where were they now? Were they truly dead? Were their souls permanently at rest? He could have sworn that he saw a dark shadow coming into their small panoramic scenes as he departed, was that indeed the shadow of death? It was pointless to ask himself questions of the like and yet he couldn’t seem to stop, all of his world was slowly and inexorably falling away with each step he took up the stairs. With each step he took he was getting closer to God.

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It seemed like an eternity before he reached the top. The quality of the stone beneath his feet had changed many times, sometimes quartz, sometimes diamond, sometimes granite. He’d walked up all sorts of stairs, with guardrails and without. Finally he had reached the top. A simple door awaited him there, made out of oak. He could tell it was oak from the grain and patterns that decorated the door. Mentally he prepared himself for anything and everything, including dying the moment that he caught sight of the almighty with many names. Tentatively he reached out and took the handle. It turned easily, as if it had been turned many times before. As he entered he found himself standing on a crystal floor, stars beneath him. His own reflection walked as he did, its eyes looking back up at him. Beneath him were clouds and stars and just about everything else that one would see in the heavens. With a small smile he walked on, finally used to walking on seemingly nothing and prepared somewhere in the back of his mind to fall even when he thought there was ground.

After a while of walking he came to a desk. Behind the black desk there was a large leather chair, of the type that would tend to eat you as you sat down in it. The chair was turned away from Quatre, its back facing him. Politely the small Arab cleared his throat, waiting to see if there was anyone in the chair. The chair turned ever so slowly. A pair of wings peeled out from either side of the leather chair, their raven and silver colored feathers a beautiful sight on their own. The owner of the wings was something else entirely. His short hair fell unevenly about his face, half hiding and half exposing his deep black eyes. His skin was as pale as snow. His smile was quietly malicious and entrancing all at once. He was clothed in a pair of black pants, not overly tight nor overly loose. His shirt was long-sleeved and V-necked, with a fairly low neckline. In his lap rested a child. The child was white-blonde, with crystal blue eyes that Quatre could not look into. To look into those eyes was to look into wisdom, purity, power and divinity itself. He was clothed in loose white robes that happily hugged it small form. His smile was warm and loving. The elder of the two spoke.

"Quatre?"

Quatre was staring at his feet, unable to deal with the spectacle of the two any longer. "Yes," he whispered.

The child spoke, with a voice that was made of every noise and silence all it once. "Do you know why you are here?"

"No," whispered Quatre, who found that he had tears running down his pale cheeks. His hands were trembling.

The elder spoke again, in tones of rich shadow and velvet black. "Do you know.. perchance…. Who, we are?"

"Yes."

The child looked to the elder, raising an eyebrow. The elder spoke again, a tad bit of laughter in hs tone. "Then who are we?"

"Allah, Kami-sama, God, the All-mighty, Trinity, the child has many names. And you.. you who speaks, you are the Beast, you are evil, you are the North Star, you are Lucifter."

The child smiled, its face lighting up as it did. "Truly you are astute, small Quatre. Though Dios will suffice for this conversation."

Quatre nodded silently, his pale blonde hair haunting the space in front of his eyes. Lucifer spoke up. "You’re so humble for a sinner, why don’t you look at us Quatre?"

Dios’ voice came to match Lucifer and answer it in a reprimanding tone. "He’s not one of yours Lucifer, he is one of my own. Don’t try to tell him anything else. Yet I too am curious little Quatre, why will you not look at us? You have the chance now, to see that the invisible forces of ‘good’ and ‘evil’ are quite indeed palpable and real?"

Quatre’s voice was husky, his knees were growing weak, he wasn’t sure if he could continue to stand. "Because, being what you are, I cannot look. I cannot bear to look at either of you. I am not worthy to look. I’m just a man. Not even a man, I’m just a child."

Dios tsk-ed lightly. "Truthful and to the point and yet you are so much more my little angel. Now, look upon us without fear of loosing your sanity. We shall speak, for you wished words with us."

Slowly the blonde looked up, his crystal eyes boring into the two divine beings in front of him.

"Why?" He asked simply.

Dios and Lucifer both peered at him strangely from their chair. "Why?" Lucifer echoed, raising an ornate eyebrow.

"Yes, why?" Quatre was trembling but not from fear, from anger and sorrow held in.

"Why us? Why me? Why my friends and family and lovers? Why did you choose us to be your pawns when you had a world out there to toy with? Why did you put the responsibility with us?!"

Quatre stared at them hatefully, his small form all tense muscles and anger.

Dios stared back into those eyes unflinching. "Because I choose you. You were the souls that I choose out of the well to be the ones to decide. You were perfect to decide the balance and so you lived up to your potential. Very few humans live up to that potential, you ought to feel proud."

Quatre bit his lip, holding back angry and childish words that were threatening to spill out of his mouth.

"And now that you’ve gone and ended everything? What shall you do now that there is nothing more to watch, nothing more to play with? What shall you do with all of the souls that now are residing in heaven, in hell, in purgatory?"

Lucifer piped up cheerfully. "Well, for the ones that are in hell, I’ll torment them. What Dios does with his children I am unaware of. It’s been a while since I’ve been with them you see," There was sarcastic irony laced and woven into his tone like a fine pattern on a rug. Quatre didn’t bat an eyelash at the humor. He had been asked to address them as equals, or fairly close to equals and that was what he was going to do.

"And what of your glorious world?"

Dios looked almost thoughtful. "I suppose I’ll make another one."

Quatre felt his heart racing. He was talking to God here, he/she/it/they that could remake the world and destroy it too, if it so pleased. "But… didn’t you like the way that the old one was going? Wouldn’t it be boring to watch the same things happen over again?"

The child yawned slightly, its face not registering much interest in the thought. "Humans move through the same cycles no matter when or where you start them at. Birth, life and death are all a repetitive dance that they play at. I have no more interest in what happens or when it happens then I do in any one particular individual."

Quatre stared accusingly at the child. "Scripture says that you love us all and know us all!"

The child nodded. "This is so, I made you all. Ergo I know you all, I know where you’re going I know where you’ve been." It paused momentarily. "And I know to let you choose which lifetimes that you lead, if that is what you so desire. I watch and I create. I protect and I destroy. Lucifer balances me. All is as it should be."

"Then why," Quatre sobbed, "why did you have to kill us?!"

Dios smiled enigmatically. "To give you the choice I am about to."

Quatre sniffed and blinked, slightly confused. "This choice? What choice."

Dios smiled again and Quatre closed his eyes, the radiant sight too beautiful for his mind to comprehend. "You will decide Earth’s fate. Will you have it completely remade? Let the peoples and civilizations be remade into something completely different? Have your morals and standards thrown askew and your planet reformed? Or will you have the world be restarted where it was, without any of the wars that currently rage? With the colonies happily floating in space, but cut off from the Earth?"

Dios paused, staring at Quatre, deep into his eyes. "Understand that each choice has very bad things to go along with it. You shall be reborn into one of the two worlds. Both of them you will remember nothing and be as a new soul might be. I shall lock your memories away until you need them." He paused again, shifting slightly in Lucifer’s lap.

"Choose carefully little angel."

Quatre pondered the two choices blindly and emotionlessly. Either way he would loose himself. But he figured that it was far better to keep the world where it had been and prevent some of the more unpleasant things that came with developing civilization. He just wanted a fairly familiar life back. His choice was selfish, but it was HIS choice.

"Make it the way it was. Let us play into whatever fate we were supposed to before you two decided to end the world."

:Lucifer smiled, then looked to the smaller but much more radiant Dios. "I told you he would choose that."

Dios turned and managed to look serenely annoyed at the Devil. "Oh do shut up! I knew it too, I know what’s going to happen in the future too. You’re a moron."

Lucifer snorted. "You’re the moron. Anyway, I get dibs on Maxwell’s soul! He’s mine!"

Dios bopped Lucifer gently on the forehead, its small palm connecting with a soft ‘thwap’ "NO!"

Lucifer pulled his equivalent of the puppy dog face. Dios remained quite unfazed by the display. "You’ve made the decision Quatre and we will stand by it. But for now, it’s your time to die. So please turn and meet him."

Quatre swallowed nervously. "This isn’t going to hurt is it?"

Dios smiled comfortingly. "Not at all. From what I’ve heard… you get a little closer to God."

Quatre turned to see a calm and serene shadow floating just behind him a symbolic scythe held in one incorporeal hand. The wood that made up the handle was warped and bent, stained a crimson color. The blade was old, sharp and not chipped in any place. Quatre found himself leaning up and staring into that shadow. All of the feeling slipped out of his body in one easy wave. He relaxed, and disappeared with death to go and hang at the river Styx for a while.

Dios sighed grumpily. "Now I have to remake the stupid world." With a pause he looked down into the stars that formed his floor.

"Alright, I think this went something to the effect of… let there be light!"

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

On December 23, 2012,five male babies were born in Santa Barbara Memorial Hospital in the coastal state of California.

One of the small children was brought into the room that held its mother, per the mother’s request. Gazing into her son’s large and violet eyes she smiled happily.

"Duo, I’ll call you Duo."

~OWARI!!!!!!! ~

*AND THE PEASANTS REJOICED!!!!*