Written: 8/7/02
The sun rests low on the horizon, casting an orange hue over the vast North American desert. These are the salt beds of Utah. This is the single most inhospitable climate known to man. The few objects that stand out from the flat baked Earth cast shadows behind them several times their size. Humidity approaches zero. Every breath taken of this scorched air actually pulls water from the lungs of living creatures. However, the dryness of breath isn’t nearly as uncomforting as the smell that accompanies it, or rather, the lack of odor. No water, or plants, or even animal waste can be detected. Nothingness is the only scent; the smell of dust, the smell of void.
No living creature found here survives for more than a few miserable hours.
This is where Geoffrey Slate now stands.
“The belief of Brimstone is Entropy. His religion: success. His dogma values only progression. To reach his heaven, he must reach the apex of progress. As with any who hold a doctrine devoutly enough for it to be called a religion, he dedicates himself to reaching that heaven. He will strive to ascend to his heaven no matter what the cost. I am in the place that symbolizes the apex he must reach. I am in his heaven, a heaven that has only enough room for one man.
“I stand as a direct obstacle to him reaching his heaven. I am the cost of his beliefs.
“Every religion, no matter what the belief, must have at least one of two people at the top of its theological pyramid. One is a demagogue; one is a martyr. The demagogue uses speech to propel the religion forward. He uses the power of discourse to drive people to do whatever it is that their religion dictates they must do. He is a main focus of the religion, for it is from his mouth that its followers find the ambition to do what must be done to fulfill the goals of the religion.
“Brimstone, I am that man for you. I am the demagogue for Entropy. Why do I say this? Because it is my speech the pushes you to fight harder. The simple fact that I can say that I am in your heaven, and that I loath this place achieves that end. Every time I say that I am the champion, every time I say I despise gaining the success you long for puts just that much more fire in your will to defeat me.
“I am your demagogue because, the more I talk, the more you want to take this position from me, and ascend into your heaven in the process.
“What is a martyr? He is the man that must be destroyed in the name of the religion. He is the person that makes the ultimate sacrifice in its name. All of its followers look at the martyr’s death as a turning point. As an instance to point at when saying, ‘that was a time where our religion reached a new level of power.’”
Slate lifts his arms from his sides. Each extends outwards from his body, parallel to the ground beneath them. The shadow he casts forms a huge cross. He pulls his fingers into his palms and crosses his feet, so that it appears he is being crucified on the shadow cross.
“I offer myself as your martyr. I will be the crucifix for Entropy. I will be your sacrifice in the name of your religion. When members of EEI need an instance to point at when describing a time where Entropy came to be an even stronger power, they will use the time that Brimstone killed off the reign of Geoffrey Slate.
“I will be your martyr because simply being who I am requires that you kill me off to further your own faith.”
Slate lowers his body, sitting down on the hard, dry Earth.
“However, my standing as either of these things rests with you, Brimstone. Only if my words enrage you to fight harder can I truly be a demagogue. But, should you allow that to happen, than the position of demagogue, by definition, puts me in a position of leadership within your own religion. If you fall under the power of the demagogue, it makes you his follower. That would mean you were following me. I would be your leader, thereby keeping you from ever truly reaching your goal of being the symbolic head of progress. You would have failed in the eyes of Entropy.
“Supposing you have the ability to defeat me, thus making me the martyr of Entropy, you would reach the same goal. Becoming a martyr would put me at the head of your own religion. But, to reach your heaven, you must have no superiors. In defeating me, you will have once again failed in the eyes of Entropy.
“I wish you best of luck in your physical battle against me, because in the physical world you have a chance at winning. However, that chance disappears in the metaphysical world of your own beliefs. Your heaven is the place where you know there is none greater than you are. Should you lose to me, you will have failed to reach your heaven. And, as I explained, should you win, you will fail to truly reach your heaven.
“In the world of the body, you have the possibility of success. But, in the world of the mind, your are in the same spot I’ve been in for several months. No matter what the outcome, you will have failed.”
With that, the sun finishes its vanishing act. The orange hue is replaced by the faint glow of the moon and stars. However, even those disappear as the scene fades to black.
View Geoffrey Slate's Biography