Vessel of All Worlds

“This is all my fault.”

The words taste like ash and copper in my mouth. It feels like I’ve said them so many times that they’ve worn grooves in my consciousness. Yet they are the truth.

Around me, the landscape, if I can call it that, breathes with impossible life. Seven, no eight, probably many more, different skies layer over each other. More like how oil layers on water, striations, swirls, a rainbow of colors that cover the spectrum, and beyond. Colors without names, that I shouldn’t be able to see. Light from nowhere, or everywhere, cast shadows upward, downward, and in directions that I can’t describe.

The Vessel sits there. Just out of reach now. Exactly where I left it. Where I opened it. Where it emptied all things into my world. It’s beautiful and intact, gleaming with otherworldly metal that seems to drink light. Filled to the brim with everything. Yet, it’s also shattered, exploding outward in a frozen moment of destruction that repeats itself endlessly. And it’s empty. A hollow shell that never contained anything at all. My mind refuses to choose which reality to accept. My eyes burn when I try to look at it.

A creature that once might have been human stumbles past me, its extra arms trailing ribbons of flesh that may have been wings in whatever world birthed it. Its eyes look right past me, right through. It doesn’t see me. Nothing sees me anymore. I might as well be part of the landscape, as permanent as the geometry that keeps folding Houston’s skyline into origami shapes that spell out equations in a language older than mathematics.

Something wails in the distance. Something else screams in reply. A discordant echo that is unending.

I close my eyes, but that doesn’t help. Behind my eyelids, I see Dr. Harrison from the Antiquities Conservation Department trying to explain to the Board of Directors why their newest acquisition must be removed from the gallery. That was… how long ago? A week? A month? A thousand years? Time no longer has any meaning here. Dr. Harrison had been so concerned about the artifact’s effect on staff productivity.

“Ms. Renoir,” he’d said, pulling me aside after that disastrous board meeting. “I need to ask you about the Mesopotamian piece. You’ve spent considerable time analyzing it.”

I’d wanted to laugh at that, but I didn’t understand why. I’d studied the artifact before we’d put it on display, and it had captivated me. I couldn’t validate or discredit its authenticity.

It seemed to be made of an unidentifiable metal, its surface covered in intricate, impossibly complex geometric patterns that seemed to extend into the metal itself. The patterns were composed of mathematical spirals, tessellations, and symbols that hurt my eyes to look at directly.

There were seven large gemstones set into the lid and sides, each containing what appeared to be entire miniature worlds. Different observers could see landscapes, cities, creatures, and civilizations moving within the depths of the gems. Hundreds of smaller stones formed constellation patterns along the sides of the artifact.

“Umm, sorry, Dr. Harrison,” I cleared my throat. “What would you like to know?”

“Haven’t you mentioned that there was something wrong with the artifact? Ms. Bradley said you’d told her you couldn’t authenticate it, and that you were concerned that it might be radioactive. Why didn’t you speak up in the meeting?” He seemed to be getting more animated and a bit anxious.

“Yes. That’s true. I wasn’t able to authenticate it, but neither was I able to discredit it. And I had it tested thoroughly for any radioactivity. The tests came back clean.” I frowned as I fished for the right words to say, “It has some odd characteristics. Like maybe its maker was a genius at creating optical illusions, but…” I shrugged weakly, “It’s just weird, but the tests show it’s not dangerous.”

Dr. Harrison frowned, his brow furrowed deeply. He made a sort of grunt before waving his hand dismissively. “But I believe it might be cursed—err, trapped. I do not believe anything so enigmatic should be put on display. We need to know more before letting the public near it.”

He stared at me for a while, but slowly, he realized his arguments had been unconvincing. “For safety.” He finished lamely.

We stood in silence for a few moments. Him wanting me to be convinced. Me not knowing what else to say.

He breathed out heavily in a huff, and with his head low, he shuffled off.

I considered it then. Was Dr. Harrison right? Could the artifact be trapped. Throughout history, it wasn’t unheard of for someone to set a trap for future grave robbers. But a curse. I scoffed at his superstitions then, but the next time I saw the Vessel, his words echoed in my mind.

I didn’t believe in the supernatural back then.

But I should have.

•••

The artifact was put on display in a place of prominence in the main lobby of the museum where the sun lit it throughout the day. The many gemstones caught the light, reflecting and refracting it in patterns that danced around the room in ways it shouldn’t be able. The metal seemed to glitter and glisten in the light while absorbing the light in ways that didn’t quite seem possible.

Many people entering the museum were captivated by the artifact. It drew the attention of all ages and persuasions. Though, none were as enthralled by its beauty or enigmatic presence as I was. I couldn’t pass through there without spending at least a minute to gaze upon the artifact. To trace the geometries scrawled upon it. To lose myself in the events seemingly portrayed in the depths of its gems.

The first few days, I spent minutes that turned into hours, puzzling over its origins. Its purpose. Its elusive nature. Then, I wondered. It seemed to have a lid, but there was no mechanism. There were no hinges. When I’d examined it, the lid did not budge, like it might not have even been a lid, just a design characteristic that hinted at a lid.

Every break I had, I was there. Looking at its splendor. Feeling its cold warmth. Wondering at its purpose.

The thought of it consumed me.

•••

Days became weeks. I’d begun to feel strange whenever I wasn’t near the artifact. My nights, my dreams had been full of it. Riddles within the patterns. Questions, answers, knowledge. The manner of all things was contained within its decorations.

I knew then that the artifact was no mere relic. It was a font of knowledge, a keeper of secrets, whispering promises of enlightenment to anyone patient enough to listen. And I was listening. Too closely, perhaps.

At first, the strangeness was subtle, like a shadow lengthening at dusk. I’d catch myself staring at blank walls during lunch breaks, tracing unseen spirals with my finger, as if the patterns were being worked out through muscle memory.

Colleagues noticed, of course.

“You look exhausted, Ms. Renoir,” Ms. Bradley said one afternoon, her voice laced with the false concern of coworkers, but in her eyes, I saw a hint of fear. “That thing’s got you bewitched.”

I chuckled and brushed it off, but her words lodged like a splinter.

Bewitched. As if this were some fairy tale, not the rational world of conservation and cataloging.

But the dreams… oh, they were relentless. Night after night, I’d fall into the gems’ depths. Like a wanderer hurled through a catastrophe into another land. In one, I stood on a crystalline spire overlooking a city of living geometry. Buildings folded and unfolded like breathing lungs. Streets that curved into fractals led to infinities.

A voice like music overlaying thunder asked, “What holds the weight of all worlds yet crumbles at a single truth?”

I’d wake gasping, the answer hovering right out of reach.

By the third week, the pull became physical. Like the artifact exerted its own gravity. Away from the museum, my hands trembled, my vision blurred at the edges, as if the artifact’s geometries were anchors keeping reality from unraveling.

I started skipping meals, fabricating excuses to linger in the lobby after hours. The security guard, old Mr. Ellis, would eye me suspiciously as he locked up, but I didn’t care. The Vessel—yes, that’s what I’d begun calling it in my mind—demanded my presence. It offered glimpses: answers to questions I’d not yet formed.

•••

One evening, as the sun dipped low and painted the gems in blood-red hues, I pressed my palm against its surface. It was warm, pulsing faintly like a heart encased in metal.

Then it was that I realized I had to possess the artifact. Not out of greed. No. I must take it and keep it for the world’s sake.

It was the day of my undoing. Our undoing.

I cherished the artifact. Studied it. Held it. I understood it.

Right there. Plain as day. The instructions, written for all the world to read in unmistakable English, of how to open the lid. To open the artifact.

“To open this Vessel, grasp the lid with intent, and lift. All things shall be opened unto you.”

I blinked. Then closed my eyes. Breathed a few breaths. Slowly in… out… Then, I focused once more upon the words. They still were there.

Huh. Really? How could I have not seen them before? How could everyone else have missed them too?

I paused. And I wondered. What if it was trapped? Should I open it?

A voice in my mind answered. Of course. Open it. Why would it have a lid if it shouldn’t be opened?

I scanned the interior of the lobby. People were there, talking, gazing, laughing. But all were far enough away that I felt any trap this small Vessel could have wouldn’t affect them. Only me, if it were trapped.

I picked up the Vessel, I held it in my left hand and gripped the lid with my right. I tried to lift it open. Nothing happened. I looked closely at the seam where the lid and carcass met. I reread the instructions.

“Well. That didn’t work.” I frowned for a moment, then reconsidered the words. With intent. What intent? Just to open it? To see inside? To gain its secrets?

“Alright. What secrets do you hold? All things. I want the knowledge of all things.” I grasped the lid once more and lifted.

Oh, how I wish now that I hadn’t.

•••

For a moment, reality stutters. Dimensional barriers weaken. And the space around the Vessel begins folding in upon itself.

Time stands still, runs backwards into centuries, millennia, before I was born. Futures beyond the death of the world unfold before me.

The Vessel continues to turn itself inside-out in ways that defy logic. My reality is overlaid, overwritten, rewritten, as the contents of the Vessel pour forth and suck in. Draining outward and inward simultaneously.

The Vessel is whole and shattered into a million pieces. Remaining perfect in every way.

I look around me, and I see demons, creatures of vile and repellent ugliness, walking, running, flying, killing, and dying. Angelic beings of unimaginable beauty living out their lives. Humans and human-variants from alternative evolutionary paths mix and mingle, are born and die in an instant.

Just as I feel I can take no more of this without my mind shattering like the Vessel, a towering figure, at least twenty feet tall, steps from within the Vessel. Its features shift between the most beautiful and most terrifying aspects of every possible reality simultaneously.

It looks directly at me. The first and only of all things that has noticed me. It smiles at me. That smile is the most uplifting and glorious smile I’ve ever seen. And it fills me with the most heart numbing feeling of dread I’ve ever known.

I hear a rumble like thunder accompanied by the most beautiful melody ever played. It’s a chuckle. The being is amused by me.

It says to me in a voice that is like music interlaced with thunder, “Thank you for setting me free.”

He turns and walks away. There is no malice in his stride. No purpose other than to be. Yet in his stride, with each footfall, I see countless beings die. Obliterated. Erased from reality with the slightest touch of his being.

He stops for a moment, as if he realizes I’m watching him. He glances over his shoulder at me again, and grins that radiant smile that’s filled with darkness. And I remember his name, Omniras.

He continues walking once more. Out into the world. Into all worlds. And all things die and are remade in his wake.

I opened the Vessel of All Worlds.

I freed Omniras.

This is all my fault.