Beyond the Flame

It had been this way for as long as Azuse could remember. Fuel the fire, collect resources, survive. This was all that he knew how to do.

The flame was held within a great stone basin, in the middle of what Azuse called, ‘The Known’. The basin was around one and half feet high, one foot wide, and made of a dark grey granite. It was extraordinarily heavy, more so than it should have been given its dimensions - only once had Azuse tried to lift it in a moment of frustration, to no avail.

‘Flame is life, darkness is death’, read the inscription around the rim of the stone basin in a bright white font. Azuse has lost count of how many times he must have read the instruction. The flickering of the flame that was contained within the basin seemed to sometimes warp the words, or perhaps that was his mind playing tricks on him.

Besides the stone basin, The Known contained little else. A few blankets, a stockpile of logs and kindling, a few scraps of food and a cup. The floor was cold and hard, although Azuse always managed a good night's sleep under the heat of the flame. Around the fire stretched endless darkness, or what Azuse referred to as ‘The Beyond’. Due to the warning on the inscription, Azuse had never been brave enough to wander too far from the light of the flame, but he would often picture what might be lurking in the darkness. 

Azuse did not know a life outside of The Known. He could not remember when he first came to be in this place, nor could he quantify the amount of time he was here. Nothing ever changed or shifted. Measuring the passing of time was impossible when there wasn’t anything tangible he could use to track the moments. He slept, but he could not track for how long, or if each sleep was the same. 

He wondered what he missed when he was asleep. Perhaps The Known transformed into something else entirely when his eyes were closed. He had decided long ago (or perhaps not so long ago), that trying to understand any of these questions was a fruitless task.

—

Azuse woke, more groggy than usual, wrapped up in his usual long grey robe and blankets. He lay on the hard ground, staring up into darkness. His eyes saw swirls and shapes, nonsensical objects, floating around in a sea of black. He would stare at them for as long as he could keep his eyes open, as the moment he blinked they would disappear. Each time he would try and keep his eyes open longer than the time before, hoping that if he kept them open long enough they would reveal something to him. The swirls took on vibrant colours, and swam across the sky with greater speed the longer he stared. 

Something glimmered in the corner of his eye from somewhere in his peripheral vision that made his head turn - when he looked back the shapes were gone.

He rose quickly, glancing around into the darkness trying to pinpoint where the glimmering had come from. Never had this happened before, nothing ever changed in The Known, but he was sure that he had seen something. A light, from something other than the flame. After a few moments of straining his eyes, Azuse gave up. If he knew anything for certain it was that the flickering of the fire could so easily play tricks on his mind.

—

The food is running low, Azuse thought mindlessly, as he chewed wearily on a stale chunk of bread, staring into nothingness. Not that it mattered, as food seemed to appear the moment it was all eaten, without him ever noticing. There was a time that Azuse had once thought this strange, but now it didn’t phase him - it was as ordinary as the heat produced by the flame or the breath he produced himself. It did mean that he would have to eat every morsel of food if he wanted more, which could cause problems if mould had started to grow on the stock he currently had. Azuse had learnt to eat food quickly after a period of painful stomach cramps, when he was forced to eat some questionable smelling meat.

He downed the rest of the water in his cup (which also refilled itself once empty) and stood up, ready to go and pick up some firewood. Every now and then new logs would appear as far out as the flames light would reach. Azuse started walking towards the first log he saw, about 20 feet from the stone basin. As he approached and the light from the flame grew dimmer, he suddenly heard whispers coming from The Beyond. The volume of these whispers grew louder the further away he got from the safety of the light. “Just ignore them”, he said to himself. This was another thing he had learnt by now, the whispers never hurt him as long as he kept his head down and retrieved the log quickly.

He was 2 feet away from the log, but as he reached out his hand to grab the log, he noticed a glimmer of light in the distance, the same glimmer of light he thought he had imagined the last time. Before he had a chance to get a good look, a sudden, immense blast of bitterly cold wind came directly at him, knocking him off his feet. The wind seemed to carry the voices of a thousand, because what was once whispering was suddenly a collection of unintelligible screams, so loud Azuse thought his eardrums would burst. He cowered on the floor covering his ears, the noises and sound of the wind seemingly growing louder and louder. 

After what felt like an eternity, Azuse slowly peeled the hands from his face to look for the log. It was miraculously within arms reach, so as fast as his body allowed he grabbed the log and leapt up in one fell swoop, sprinting back towards the safety of the basin. The wind roared against his back and the screams seemed to swirl around him as he ran, faster and faster towards the flame.

Finally he reached the fire and fell to the floor, crashing into the base of the granite. The moment he touched the cold stone the wind and screams stopped dead. The silence was deafening. 

He glanced up at the flame, and swore the inscription, ‘Flame is life, darkness is death’ burned red, but the moment he blinked it returned to its original shining white, contrasting the sea of blackness beyond.

—

Azuse carefully stacked the remaining logs inside the stone basin, being careful not to burn himself. The logs had stopped appearing after the incident with the wind, and now the stockpile was empty. He hadn’t heard the whispers or screams since, but sensed they were just out of hearing, in The Beyond.

The panic rose slowly in him as the moments dragged on, the flame noticeably getting dimmer. The radius of safety around him shrunk smaller and smaller, making Azuse feel more claustrophobic than ever before.

Accepting the fact that he would have to face whatever the diminishing of the flame brought, he lay on the floor, wrapping himself in his blankets for comfort, waiting for the inevitable. 

—

Azuse lay, eyes closed, as the flame went out. Slowly he opened his eyes.

He had never known darkness like it. He could see nothing, not even his hands in front of his face. It was as if everything he had ever known had gone. He looked to where the basin should have been, but could see nothing. Was it still there? Or had it disappeared the moment the flame had extinguished?

To his horror, he could suddenly make out the sound of whispering coming from The Beyond. It was faint, but with each passing moment it grew louder.

Azuse rose quickly and scanned around him, hoping to see something, anything, but to no avail. There was only suffocating darkness.

Azuse felt as if he was going mad, as the whispering grew more and more in volume.

“What do you want from me?!” he screamed into The Beyond, “I’ve done as you asked, and now you torment me!” The Beyond responded by growing ever louder, until the voices turned from whispering to screams.

Azuse let out a guttural howl until he had no breath left, and fell to the floor. Only after a few moments of trying to get his breath back, he noticed it. A glimmering light in the distance. It was tiny, and seemingly far away, but it was all Azuse had. As the screams continued to swirl around him, and the air grew colder and colder, he picked himself up and started sprinting towards the glimmer.

As he ran a wind picked up, so cold it hurt his face. His fingers started to pain him as they grew colder, but still he continued towards the light. The unintelligible screams continued to abuse his eardrums, not letting up. Azuse felt as though he couldn’t take anymore, his senses were overwhelmed beyond anything he had experienced before.

He noticed he could see his feet now as he ran, the light was getting closer. The voices turned more sinister the more progress Azuse made, as if they didn’t want him to reach his goal. The wind was bitterly cold making his teeth chatter. He must have only been forty feet away, thirty-five, thirty…

It was then that Azuse stopped in his tracks, just outside the boundary of the light. There was someone there, wearing a long grey robe, reaching down to pick a log off the floor. Behind him a stone basin was ablaze with fire. The stranger hadn’t noticed Azuse, despite being only a few feet away.

Azuse had frozen, unsure what to do, as the voices in his ears continued to abuse his senses.

“Hello?” he said tentatively, not being able to hear his own voice over the roar of The Beyond. His teeth continued to chatter as the bitterly cold wind picked up speed around him. The stranger carried on with his task, paying no attention to Azuse.

“Hello!” he screamed, much louder this time. The stranger turned his head towards the direction of Azuse. “Just ignore them”, the stranger muttered to himself.

In desperation he screamed once more, “Help! Please!” As Azuse screamed, the wind picked up tremendous speed and blasted towards the stranger, knocking him off his feet. He scrambled to stand and started sprinting back towards the flame, log in hand, looking panicked.

Azuse reached out his hand, “Wait, I’m sorry! Please don’t go!” The stranger continued to run, covering his ears as he did so.

Azuse went to take a step forward, but something was stopping him, his feet wouldn’t move. He looked down, horrified, as he saw that swirling around his feet were shapes and swirls, wrapping themselves around his ankles like tendrils. 

The stranger made it to the stone basin, crashing to the floor. Azuse could just make out the words on the basin, ‘Flame is life, darkness is death’. The words burned a deep crimson red.

In one swift movement, Azuse was yanked off his feet and dragged into The Beyond.