The Goddess Encounter
by MoonriseUnicorn
A loud crack reverberated in his ears like thunder from a lightning bolt that had struck too close. Then the shock wave hit him. The events around him played like a movie running in slow motion. The screams of the dying and maimed assaulted his ears, tearing at his conscience; tearing at his very soul. The child fifty yards in front of him had stopped screaming. Mercifully, death had taken her, probably through blood loss since one of her legs had been taken off by a high explosive artillery round. The other hung by just a few tendons, the shattered bones sticking out of both sides clearly visible even from this distance.
Ahead of him and to his right, a woman screamed, a fine dark red mist spraying from her lower back as she tried and failed to run for cover and avoid the crossfire of the shootout. The bullet had found her first. She crumpled to the ground, clutching her stomach and crying out in pain, retching as she vomited up blood and bile from what was a mortal wound, but a cruel one that would kill slowly.
All around him, the sounds of screaming and the constant clatter of machine gun fire tortured his ears. And all around him, the sights of the dead, the dying, and the horribly disfigured continued to cut into his vision like hot knives stabbing through his eyes and into his mind. He tried to block them out; tried to shut out the sounds and close his eyes to the suffering. But that only seemed to make the sounds louder, to make him even more aware of them. And even with his eyes closed, the carnage flooded his mind. He tried to think of something else. Of peaceful forests and rivers flowing through them. But the rivers became rushing arteries of red and the trees burst into flames, like burning effigies of the people dying all around him.
He gave up trying to block it out and became aware of the whop, whop, whop of a helicopter above him, The muzzle of the helicopter's cannon flashed rapidly. Then, there were more screams, the deadly projectiles striking human flesh and ripping through it like a hot knife exploding through butter. Mostly, the projectiles struck enemy combatants. But they had no care for the lives of women or children and killed indiscriminately, like a mad man with no conscience or morals who thad no care at all for the sanctity of any life. Several of the projectiles found a target, a young boy running for safety. He never had time to scream, the impact of the tank penetrating rounds cutting him in half at the torso, leaving only a few sinewy strands of muscle fiber connecting his top and lower halves. And through it all, the horrible screams of the dead and dying. Never letting up, never giving him a moment’s reprieve. He closed his eyes again, and screamed.
And then woke up, as he had done a thousand times before, the only screams assaulting his ears now, his own, the images in his mind fading as if the projector bulb on the movie had gone out. Sweat poured off of him and his heart raced. He felt weak and jittery, his face wet with freshly flowing tears. His room was completely dark, although his blinds were open. It was the night of the full moon, but a thickly overcast sky kept its light from reaching the ground.
Every moment of his life for the past three years had been the same. He had tried to stay awake, hoping to avoid the nightmares. But then he was tormented by flashbacks and visions. He had tried sleeping constantly, abusing prescription sleeping pills in the hope that he could avoid the constant flashbacks. But then, the nightmares came to torture him for the wrongs he had done in the past. It didn’t matter how many sleeping pills he took. Oh sure, they would make him sleep, but never deep enough to stop the nightmares from invading and tormenting him like so many bloody axes hacking away at his mind and his sanity.
There was one way to end it permanently. To enter eternal sleep where the nightmares would never torment him again, and he would never wake for the flashbacks and visions to take over the duties of torturing him while the nightmares slept. It was an option he’d thought about using at least a hundred times. His heart heavy, he thought about it no more. He climbed out of bed and got dressed in his marine corps uniform. Somehow, it seemed appropriate that he should be in uniform for the occasion, given that the events which caused his torture had happened while he was wearing it. Then, he walked to his bathroom and turned on the faucet, filling a glass with water. The clear water flowing from the faucet became blood flowing from a mortal wound. Even now, at the end, the torture wouldn’t stop, determined to torment him until the last synapses in his brain stopped firing and they could torment him no more. Well, that would come soon enough, he thought as he opened the medicine cabinet above the sink, taking out the bottle of anti-depressants he had been prescribed in a futile attempt to stop the torment. He always kept one full bottle on hand, for just such an occasion as this, as he also did with the sleeping pills. Just to be sure, he grabbed a bottle of acetaminophen as well. Acetaminophen, he knew, would cause liver failure in large overdoses.
Carrying the three bottles of medication and the glass of water he had filled, he walked into his kitchen, turning the light on with his elbow. And the torture continued, the flash of the light turning on was like a bomb exploding in the night. He walked over to the counter, opening the cover of his food processor and dumping the entire contents of all three bottles into it, closing the lid and turning it on. And the torture continued, the pills turning and grinding against the blades, their dark red coatings swirling round and round, gradually turning the entire mixture crimson.
He deserved it, he thought as he watched the pills being torn apart by the blades. He deserved all of it. The deeds he had done were inexcusable. It didn’t matter that it had been an order that came down from somewhere high above him. No doubt, someone behind a desk, sitting fat, dumb, and happy with no clue of the real horrors of war, had deemed that the civilian casualties that were likely to occur in that mission were acceptable losses. He still deserved the constant torture now. He was a human being capable of making his own decisions. And he could have chosen to refuse to participate in that mission. Certainly, it would have meant prison for him. But that would have been preferable to the constant torment he now suffered. The torment and torture he had earned for himself. He deserved a thousand more nights of torture, and a thousand more after that. But he could bear no more. It had broken him and there was nothing left. Tonight, at the young age of twenty-six, on this cold, cloudy winter night, it would all end.
He turned off the food processor when the pills had become ground into a fine powder, the screams of the suffering becoming silent as the blades stopped turning. Then, he opened the lid and dumped the contents into the glass of water, stirring it with a spoon until the powder began to dissolve. He didn't hesitate at all this time. He’d been hesitating every day and every night for the past three years, but no more. He lifted the glass to his lips, downing the water and its dissolved contents in four large gulps. Without ceremony, he set the glass back down on the counter, and returned to his bedroom. He climbed into bed, pulled the covers over him, and closed his eyes, waiting for sleep to take him, confident in the knowledge that this time, he would never wake up again, and the endless torture would finally be over.
o.O.o
Gradually, Corporal Stanwell became aware that he was all alone, wandering through an inky black corridor as dark as the darkest of moonless nights. On either side of him, it seemed there were walls of the deepest black, leaving forward the only direction he could go. Yet at the same time, it seemed there were no walls on either side. Only pitch blackness, the color of nothing and nowhere. And still, the only direction to go was forward. Turning his head behind him, he saw the same. A black wall that was not a wall, pushing forward with every step he took, leaving him no option to go back. Only forward. And forward, was the only thing that seemed to be anything at all. Gradually, a silver glow appeared and grew in intensity as he approached it. Oh how we wanted that light. He craved it, needed it. And so he willed himself forward, the light growing in intensity as he approached.
As he moved closer, he became aware that the silver light was the light of the moon. Also, he realized, he was not alone. A creature with a brilliant midnight-blue coat, somewhat resembling a pony, stood looking at him. But she was far more than a pony—she because he knew she was female, although he didn’t know how he knew that. Rising from her head, a horn flashed brilliantly in the moonlight, as from the unicorns of legend. Folded against her back and sides were wings of the darkest blue, like the magnificent Pegasus of mythology. An obsidian crown the color of the night sky rested on her head, while a breast plate around her neck shined with the image of a crescent moon. But what he noticed most were her mane and tail. Dark blue, they rippled like waves on a calm lake in some unfelt breeze. They sparkled with points of lights, like they held the stars themselves within them, as if she ruled over all of the objects of the night sky. Furthermore, her mane and tail had a translucency to them, as if they existed in two worlds or dimensions at the same time. Never before had he seen a creature of such magnificence and beauty.
A large, solid iron gate loomed behind her, reflecting the light of the moon. On either side of the door, stood two more pony like beings, both with dark gray coats. They wore armor that was the color of jet black coal. One, he noticed, had wings. But unlike the winged unicorn in front of them, this one’s wings resembled those of a bat. The other pony guarding the gate did not have wings, but did have a horn. Both of them carried wicked looking spears, the light of the moon reflecting off their razor sharp edges. Both were also somewhat smaller than the midnight-blue winged unicorn in front of him. It was she who spoke first. When she did, it was as if the heavens and the moon themselves were speaking.
“It is unfortunate, that I should find you here in this manner, Corporal Jonathan Stanwell,” she said. Her eyes regarded him with a calm and collected coolness, the expression of her muzzle betraying no emotion.
“Who … what are you? And how … how do you know my name?” he stammered in response, a mixture of awe and fear rising up in him, a shiver of chill radiating outward from the core of his being.
“I know a great many things. In addition to your name, I know what troubles you, and I know what has caused you to arrive here,” she responded, her voice portraying power and authority, but still no emotion.
“Are … are you a Goddess?” he asked, feeling himself trembling, knowing he was in the presence of a being far greater than himself.
“That is what most men would call me.”
“You’re … You’re not what I expected god to be like,” he said sheepishly, wonder and awe still threatening to overwhelm him like a flooding river, rushing to overflow the top of a dam.
“That is what most men say when when they first encounter me. I know what you have come for. And you know it lies behind that gate,” she said, turning her head slightly and motioning behind her to the large gate being guarded by the two armor wearing ponies before looking at him again. “But the gate is shut to you. You may not pass through it. Not yet.”
“Goddess?” he answered simply, feeling confusion and anger rising within him. Goddess or no goddess, he had finally come this far. And no one, not even a Goddess, was going to prevent him from finishing.
“I have claimed you,” she responded simply.
“Claimed me? What would a Goddess want with someone like me. Surely, you are aware of what has brought me here,” he said, averting his eyes to the floor, ashamed that someone like himself was standing in front of a being so magnificent, so powerful and awe inspiring, and so superior to himself.
“I claim those whom I will, for reasons that are my own. But you will know some of them before our time here is finished.”
The alicorn spread her majestic wings once, then folded them again, and he felt his awe for her rise up even further, as if the dam had been destroyed and water was now flooding freely through it. But at the same time, he felt anger. Anger because she was denying him access to the one thing he had wanted for three years, but had only now found the courage to reach for.
“You claim me,” he said, allowing the anger to enter his voice. “Even now at the end, you deny me peace and you insist on continuing to torture me.” The eyes of the Goddess narrowed as she responded.
“You deny yourself peace. You torture yourself,” she said, and he could hear the anger in her own voice now.
He wilted slightly under her gaze and words, but still, he was not afraid of her. After all, what could she do? Kill him? Strike him dead? That would only give him what he wanted. How could she deny it to him? If he rushed the gate, the guards would use their spears, sure. But again, that would simply give him what he wanted. He decided to put his thoughts into words.
“And what if I rush the gate? The guards will attack me with their spears and give me what I want anyway, will they not?”
She turned her head back to look at her spear-wielding guards nonchalantly, then turned her attention back to him.
“They will attack you, yes. But their spears cannot kill that which is already dead. They will simply drive you back away from the gate, although you will feel every stab.”
“And what if I drive through them anyway? Do you really think, after all this time, a few more minutes of intense pain is going to stop me from finding my eternal peace?”
If the midnight-blue alicorn hadn’t been angry before, there could be no doubt that she was now. First, her eyes narrowed. Then, she spread her wings, rising into the air. Her eyes blazed, glowing brightly like twin stars, and her horn shown brightly on her head as if she had suddenly captured a star and brought it in front of him. The intensity of the light increased until it was painful to look at and he had to avert his eyes out of fear it would blind him. The moon itself brightened and the very heavens around him shook, as if in a mighty earthquake.
“DO NOT DARE FOR EVEN ONE MOMENT TO PRESUME THAT YOU CAN DEFY ME, CORPORAL JONATHAN STANWELL!” her voice boomed out loudly, reverberating through the heavens, echoing as if off of unseen mountains, and cutting to the core of his being.
If he hadn't been afraid before, he was terrified now. He sank to his knees and bowed his head in a gesture of submission, attempting to placate the angry alicorn Goddess, although whether he had done so consciously or not, he wasn’t sure.
“For … forgive me, Goddess. I spoke hastily,” he said in a shaking voice. A distant thought occurred to him that his heart should be pounding with fear, but in fact, he couldn’t feel it beating at all.
His placating seemed to work. The blinding light coming from the alicorn’s horn began to dim, and her eyes started to return to normal. Then, she flared her wings and landed with all the grace of a butterfly, folding her wings once more to her side and looking at him. He remained on his knees as she spoke again, this time in a far gentler voice.
“Why do you seek death so eagerly? Have you truly come to devalue life as much as the mindless metal projectiles you shot at people while still among the living? Chunks of lead and metal that have no care for life and kill indiscriminately?”
“It is only my own life that I devalue, Goddess,” he responded, feeling himself calm slightly now that she had taken a less threatening stance and a more compassionate tone. He chanced to raise his head again and look at her, but he kept his eyes diverted slightly downward, not gazing directly at her. She shook her head once.
“You cannot devalue your own life without also devaluing the life of others.”
“Goddess?” he asked, in confusion.
“There are those who need you now. And those who will need you in the future. People you have not even met yet. There are people in the future whose lives you will change by helping them, but only if you are around to help them. If you aren’t, you may deprive them of their only opportunity for help. If you value your life so little that you would take it, then you do not value their lives either. For you deprive them of the benefit of your help. And that is why I am sending you back and giving you another chance.”
He shook his head slightly in disagreement. “Why should I get a second chance, Goddess? Why not the innocent people … the children who were killed in that battle? Surely they are more deserving of second chances than I.”
“I give second chances to whom I will. For reasons that are my own. It is enough for you to know that I do not give them often to those who have traveled so close to this gate. What you are being given is a rare gift. Do not waste it,” she responded.
Once again, he shook his head, the things he had seen and done haunting him once more. “After the things I did, and the things I didn’t do but should have done, I deserve nothing. Not even a peaceful death. But I couldn’t bare the constant torment anymore.”
If she were at all shocked or disturbed by his words, she didn't show it. Instead, she responded in a calm, compassionate tone.
“Do you know that I once became so jealous of the attention given to my sister, that I tried to bring about eternal darkness to an entire world? Tried to destroy an entire planet? Do not think that I am better than you. Perhaps the main difference between gods and men is that I can make mistakes on levels that you can't even dream of. My hooves have walked in the dark places your feet now tread. If it is condemnation you seek for yourself, you will not get it from me.”
He chanced looking up at her a bit more now, and his soul felt just a little bit lighter. Here he was, in front of a Goddess. And yet, it seemed she could relate to him, and him to her. Despite the fact that he still believed her to be superior to himself, she didn't seem to see herself that way. More importantly, she was not condemning him, because she had walked the same road he had walked; had done things similar to what he had done. He even found himself rising from his knees and standing back up again. Still, he had his doubts. After all, how could someone who had done what he had done actually help anyone?
“But what must I do, Goddess? How can I –”
“You must make peace with your past. You must recognize that you cannot change it. And you must know that death is not a way out. Even if I were to let you pass through the gate, you would carry this guilt and torment with you. You cannot escape from it even in death. And so you must learn to forgive yourself and stop torturing yourself, just as I had to do.”
He thought about that for a moment. If it was true that he couldn’t escape it even in death, then his suicide would have no point. Slowly, he began to feel the scales tipping, began to feel like his desire to live was greater than his desire to die, as was his desire to work through his mistakes and do what he could to right them. But now, the pragmatic side of him took over.
“Goddess … We have a saying that nothing truly comes for free. And this second chance you are giving me …”
The midnight-blue alicorn nodded her head once. “You are right. This second chance is not free. There is a price you will pay me. There are services I require you to perform in exchange for this second chance.”
He nodded once. “And what is it, you require of me, Goddess?”
“I have given you a gift because you are suffering. Now, I require you to share the gift with others. As I have helped you, I require you to help them.”
“But Goddess … I’m not an eloquent speaker. I don’t understand psychology.”
“You don’t have to be. All you need to do is be understanding and share you own experiences, because you have walked the same path they walk. Just as I have walked the path you walk. You must learn to realize that despite things you may have done in the past, your life still has meaning and value, and there are still people you can help, just as I am helping you right now. And you must teach others to realize that.”
He nodded once. “I will try my best, Goddess.”
“I know you will,” she said, and gave the briefest of compassionate smiles, but only for a moment. Then, her expression turned serious again as she spoke with an air of finality.
“And now you must go, Corporal Jonathan Stanwell. I sincerely hope I will not see you in front of this gate again for a very long time. And when I do see you here again, I hope that it will not be by your own hand.”
The alicorn Goddess took a step backwards, and her horn began to glow again. A blue-white bolt of lightning shot from the tip of her horn, slamming into his chest. He felt the burn, felt all of his muscles contracting against his will, seizing involuntarily, as a powerful jolt of electricity sizzled through his body. Pain lanced through him like a spear and he wanted to cry out, but he found he could not. She’s electrocuting me! he thought in a panic as the image of the Goddess and her moon began to fade from his view, merging with another image, a bright white light and the image of masked men and women standing over him. The sounds of the room faded into his ear, like a distant echo at first but then becoming more clear.
“360 joules. Charging … Clear!” And then the jolt of electricity from the alicorn Goddess’s horn slammed into him.
“We have a pulse … His rhythm is stabilizing.”
And then, he blacked out again …
o.O.o
He awoke later that night, finding himself lying in a hospital bed. Vaguely, he remembered intentionally overdosing on medication. And some type of strange dream involving a winged unicorn Goddess. At least, he thought it had been a dream. He realized now that he’d never gotten her name, and only knew her as the midnight-blue winged unicorn Goddess.
Turning his head, he gazed out the window, but it was just as dark as he had remembered and he could see nothing through the inky blackness. He stood up, a bit unsteadily at first, then walked over to the window. Leaning on the window sill, he gazed up into the night, but the overcast sky revealed nothing.
“It’s good to see you up, Mr. Stanwell. Although you pulled the cord out of the vital signs monitoring unit when you walked over to the window,” a voice said from the doorway behind himn, startling hin slightly.
“I did, didn’t I,” he responded slightly sheepishly as he turned around. “Sorry about that.”
“It’s not a problem,” the nurse responded with a smile. “We’ll just get you hooked back up to it when you want to lay back down. You were very lucky, Mr. Stanwell. We almost couldn’t bring you back. Someone somewhere must really be watching over you,” the nurse said before turning to leave again. “Just use the call button to call me again when you want to lie back down.”
“Thank, you” he responded.
Once she was gone, he returned his attention to the darkness outside the window. As he gazed into the night, the overcast skies seemed to part, the brilliant full moon shining down on him now, reflecting off the trees and causing silver sparkles to ripple through the fountain in the courtyard below. In a way, it almost seemed as if the moon was watching over him.
And then, it all came back to him. He remembered the words the alicorn Goddess had spoken to him. Know that I do not give second chances often to those who have traveled so close to this gate. What you are being given is a rare gift. Do not waste it.
And Corporal Jonathan Stanwell did not waste his second chance at life. And his nightmares and visions tormented him no more.
