Chapter 34: Clarity

Richter’s corpse is still bleeding all over the ancient stones. The industrialist’s blood drips from the jaguar tooth at the tip of the staff in Ren Carter’s hands. He sets it down and stares at the man who built up his fortune through torture, blackmail, and sin. The man who set out to obtain the secrets of the universe for the sake of gaining ultimate power. The man who murdered Ren’s parents and put Jasmine into a potentially-fatal coma in his obsession with domination over life. After all that he achieved, all the money and power he won or took, it ended with a hole in his chest and a prolonged, painful passing. Richter had always desired to be entombed in a pyramid, to reflect his wealth and position even in death. Now the wannabe ubermensch will rot in an underground temple, never to be found, soon to be forgotten.

Carter wipes the sweat from his brow, not paying any attention to the gashes on his arms, chest, and left cheek. He sits for a moment after the climactic battle, as if in reflection. Then he stands and looks at the time-worn stone doors that Richter tried to pry open. They are covered with markings of geometric shapes that were once brightly colored before time scratched them away. The elaborate patterns on the door distracted from a single, tiny word scrawled at the top of the doorway: “CLARITY.”

The fabled room, described only in the most obscure mythological texts, existed after all. Carter cannot help but smile, turn to his deceased foe, and say, “The crazy bastard was right.”

He gazes at the doors with a look of wonder and hesitates. When he first learned about the doors from Professor Carvin, he dismissed everything as fairy tale. That was before he learned that Carvin was actually a thousand-year-old sage, dueled with the Jaguar Guardian of the Gods, and used its mystical tooth to create a supernatural weapon and vanquish his fanatical nemesis. Ren furrows his brow in determination and says aloud in affirmation, “Whatever’s behind those doors, it can’t be crazier than what I’ve seen.”

He looks for the way to enter and can only see a puny and insignificant slit between otherwise purely flat stones. Ren looks for something in the room that he could insert into the hole, but there is nothing besides himself, his fallen foe, and the pedestal. With a smile of realization, he retrieves the staff and inserts the jaguar guardian’s tooth into the crack in the wall.

The door immediately opens and Ren peers inside. There are four torches on all four corners of the room, but the only light comes from a floating orb on a pedestal in the center. Ren stares for a moment more, as if contemplating if entering would be a disturbance with horrible consequences, but finally strides toward the pedestal. He gazes into the sphere, waiting for something, anything. It immediately transforms into a beam, going from round like a ball to a rectangular prism like its stand and shooting upward, seemingly beyond the ceiling and into the heavens, back to its gods. Ren lifts himself atop into the light and closes his eyes.

All is as dark when he opens his eyes again as when they were closed.

He stares off into the blackness encompassing his vision, a void outside of the universe where its greatest secrets are stored. His previously spoken assumptions of an ancient tome or a hieroglyph were dead wrong, but the legends he read had never described a dark and cosmic pocket like the one he now found himself within.

“Who’s there?!”

Ren shouts this as if he has heard a voice cry out in the darkness.

“What do you mean, ‘as if’? I just did, and you spoke again!”

He continues to yell into nothingness with a tone that betrays perplexion and worry.

“Are you deaf? There is a voice! It - it just said my tone was perplexed and worried and that I’m continuing to yell into nothing or something like that! Show yourself!”

Wait … can you …

Ren Carter, can you hear me?

“Yes, I can hear you! Who are you? And why were you narrating what I was doing?”

Oh my god. Oh my god, this isn’t happening. It’s impossible!

“What are you going on about?! Just say something that makes sense already!”

I don’t think you understand, this is really not possible! I’m not writing any of this, at this point your dialogue is just coming up on the pages without me even typing … Are you really talking to me?!

“Answer the goddamn questions!”

Um … I’ll try … My name is … Alejandro … and I’m a writer …

“Nice to meet you, now what the hell is going on?!”

Something that has never happened before, to my knowledge. I’m not even sure how to explain this, I’m still trying to believe it’s happening! It really just doesn’t seem possible, I know I’ve said that a million times now but it’s really unbelievable … and you won’t believe it, either.

“Look, I was Christian just a little while back. After a crazy month of dealing with ancient gods and superstition, I think I can more easily believe things now.”

Yeah, that is your personality … Okay, there’s no sugar-coating it, I’m just gonna have to tell it like it is … Oh man, this is so awkward …

“What are you waiting for?! Go on, say it, dammit!”

Ren Carter, you’re a fictional character.

“... What?”

You’re a fictional character. In a story that I made up. I’m the author of your current adventure and a few others in shorter stories.

“Is … is this some kind of joke?”

Does my tone sound like I’m kidding? Wait, can you even hear my voice? What’s it sound like to you?

“It sounds like a teenage boy … This must be a prank, some really twisted and really weird gag, tell me what’s really going on!”

Hey, I prefer “young man.” And I assure you, it’s not a joke. This is completely real, and I’m just as weirded out as you are.

“But then why is this happening?! I mean, I just came here thinking I’d find the secrets of the universe, now I’m talking with a voice that claims I’m a fairy tale!”

Not a fairy tale, it’s an adventure story! Give me a little more credit than that. Jeez … Hm, maybe I made the whole “secrets of the universe” thing really vague and so you found out the ultimate secret, which is that a young man made it all up for a book.

“What? Did you even know what the secret was?”

I … was gonna sleep on it tonight and come up with something cool in the morning. But I guess this is the ultimate secret. Yeah, that’s gotta be why you could hear my narration.

“That’s … pretty lazy.”

To be honest, I just wanted to write a good adventure story. Logic wasn’t a priority.

“Still lame … So wait, you, um, you say you made up the whole universe?”

Your whole universe, to be specific. I live outside of it, in a universe where yours doesn’t exist.

“But how could you make it all up? Did you map out every planet in space, did you write every family tree or something? No, one guy can’t do all that, it’s just - just too big!”

Well, you’re right on that count. I really didn’t do all that. All I made was the stuff that was pertinent to the story of how you stopped Richter from reaching Clarity. I didn’t plot out all the family trees and planetary orbits and whatnot, all that’s unnecessary.

“So you, lemme think … you don’t know, say, my first crush?”

Um, never thought about it. Wasn’t important to me,

“Her name … Sorry if I’m not talking straight, still freaking out a little about this existential crisis … Her name was Harriet, she had fiery red hair and we met in eighth grade when she grabbed my butt at lunchtime and blamed her friend … and she was very important to me!”

I didn’t know that at all, I didn’t make her up … but then again, if I made up the whole universe, I guess I really did make her up, too. Weird paradox! Maybe stories and characters really do take on a life of their own.

“So she’s made up, and I’m made up. Does that mean my friends back home are made up, too? My parents, Jasmine, Richter, even the president or something?”

Yes, yes, yes, and I’m afraid not on that last count. He’s president in my world, too.

“I need to sit down …”

Make sure to sit on the pedestal, otherwise we can’t communicate.

“Couldn’t have made it more convenient, huh? So … so if you made up my parents and Richter and stuff related to this “adventure,” then does that mean you made it so that he killed my parents?”

Oh man …

“Or was that another ‘taking a life of its own’ kind of thing?”

Um … no. I wrote it so that he killed them when you were young.

“You bastard.”

You have every right to be pissed at me, Ren. I know exactly how painful it was for you, I had to imagine it, and if I had really thought about it, maybe I would have done somethi

“YOU BASTARD. Where does this fit into your little book, huh? You just get your sick kicks from making happy kids into orphans? You imagine this in your spare time?!”

Ren, pl

“And - and you must have designed it so I was nine when it happened! Nine years for me to love them, nine so I could be old enough to remember when I saw him kill them. You could have made me younger so I wouldn’t recall them at all, you could have written it so I was on the other side of the world or something … you could have even made it less painful for them ... but I had to be at that exact time and place to watch them get shot and slowly bleed out.”

If I had made them die instantly, then they wouldn’t have been able to give their dying speeches! It’s a common trope, you see, and

“You monster! You did everything just for the sake of a good story?!”

Please let me try to expl

“No! Shut up! Where do you get off?! How does depriving a boy of a happy childhood make for a better story? How does having the same killer put his girlfriend in a coma where she could die any second make for that, huh?! And what about the deaths of all my colleagues along the way? Did the story need some more drama, as if my life hasn’t been full of it? I’ve been through so much in my life, and I’ve frequently worried if God even exists. Now I know that there definitely is a higher being controlling everything, and it hates me.”

I … have nothing to add.

“Oh, not even gonna try to defend yourself anymore?”

I just never really thought about just how much power I have …

“Some god you are.”

Hey, I’m not a god, man.

“You created the universe, you planned out the destiny of the people, you possess immense power, and you’re even a booming voice in darkness.”

… Damn, this whole thing just got even weirder. I should write that on my resumé, hand out business cards. “Alejandro Vasquez: God and Subcreator.”

“Not a good time to be making jokes …”

You’re right, sorry. I see your rage has finally quieted down to just sadness, so maybe now I can try to defend myself without you getting all … defensive.

“Some writer you are, too.”

Cut me a break, I’m still practicing here! Your whole book so far is just a rough draft … Um, a very rough draft.

“My whole existence has been determined and shaped into a life of constant peril and tragedy by a teenaged hack. My life is a rough draft. There’s … just no point. No point at all …”

Look, I’m really sorry, Ren. Honest. And I don’t really know what to say here, I just had no idea how important this role really is! But can you really blame me for not considering the needs of fictional characters? … Um, don’t answer that.

“I know … Wait a second. My life’s a rough draft … That means you’ll go back and make revisions, right?”

Yeah …

“Doesn’t that mean you can just go back to the beginning and fix everything so that I don’t have such a terrible life? You could wipe out Richter from existence and make it so that I live comfortably and don’t have to risk my life and watch my friends die!”

Um, I’m afraid that doesn’t sound like an interesting story …

“Does it matter?”

Well, it’s the whole reason I created you! I can see why you want this, but I don’t think I can do it.

“So you’re aware that I have feelings, but you still want to watch me suffer?”

Well, no one goes through life without suffering a little … Same goes for fiction. Without a conflict, there’s no story.

“Why the hell are you so obsessed with the story?”

What do you want me to do?! If I just stop writing this story, you cease to exist and it’ll all be pointless. I think. But if I change everything and take out any conflict, then it’s a lousy story! Cut me a break, this isn’t easy!

“Wait, I won’t exist if you just stop writing?”

Well, it’s either that or you’ll be in limbo. I don’t really know, Ren, remember that I just found out about all this a few minutes ago. I just really think that one of those two will happen, and neither one is good.

“... So I must still suffer?”

Fradso.

“Huh?”

‘Fraid so. Sorry, misspelling.

“That’s a bummer.”

I know. I felt the same way when my first girlfriend broke up with me.

“... Um?”

Yeah. I found out that she had been cheating on me. For over a year. The worst part about that was that she had fallen out of love with me after a couple of months into the relationship, but she kept pretending and leading me on. I didn’t even know, I was blinded by love. I wasn’t even the one to end it - she just finally couldn’t stand me anymore. And for a long while, I was plagued by self-hatred. “Why didn’t she like me? Why did she stay for so long?” Every new secret uncovered gave more agony … but I’m not hung up on it anymore. I’ve gotten over it. So yeah … I’m okay now.

“Wow … do you know how that makes me feel?”

What?

“Cry me a fucking river.”

Well, I never!

“Let me play you a song on the world’s smallest violin! My heart goes out to you! Oh, woe is thee!”

Hey, fuck you, man! I was trying to help teach you something and make you feel better!

“If that was to show me that sometimes life hurts, well, I’ve seen the light! You clearly had it so much worse than me! After all, I’ve only had to go through the murder of my parents and near-death of my fucking fiancee.”

Okay, Ren, I’m stupid, you’re right. But we need to calm down. C’mon, you know we have to before I start to write that you suddenly had a heart attack.

“Oh, my kindly creator.

Shut up. Let’s just take five …

“What’s the goddamn point? Why do we have to go through all this?”

I don’t know … I guess we just gotta get through it? Come out alive?

“Heh, but no one gets out of life alive.”

… Wait a sec, I think that’s it!

“What?”

What would have happened if you hadn’t gone on this adventure?

“I wouldn’t get the secret knowledge needed to save Jasmine …”

No, besides that! You would have stayed a skittish pushover, never daring to dream beyond your cushy university job. wouldn’t have learned the important life lessons I expressed in this book, about skepticism, standing up for yourself, believing in yourself and other important stuff!

“What? I could have learned that if my life didn’t take a sudden detour to chasing a megalomaniac in the Andes and fighting ancient gods!”

I know, but that wouldn’t have been as interesting! That’s why it’s fiction: that doesn’t happen in our world, and people like escaping in fantastical stories like that. It’s why I don’t like writing stories that aren’t weird in some way and always try to spice things up.

“So what’s your damn point?”

The point is that maybe conflict is a rule for writing. Fictional characters have to suffer … because real people suffer, too. And we read stories to escape from that, but we’re also reading about other people’s conflicts anyway because they are our own. And by seeing the protagonist face these problems that real people go through, such as losing their parents at a young age or struggling against evil, and not only face them but triumph over them and come out better people … Then the readers get hope that they can overcome their own problems, too. And that’s why there’s evil in the world. Because people don’t rise to greatness and go beyond themselves in times of calm. That’s how it goes for everyone, real or in a story. And thus art reflects life and fiction becomes reality.

“Wow ...”

Yeah, this is really trippy …

“But where does this leave me? Is that the point of my existence?”

A story can have many reasons for existing. The point could be to teach a lesson like we just said, or just serve as an entertaining escape. I guess I tried to do both for yours.

“So … where do we go from here?”

I don’t know. At this point of the story, you’re supposed to find out how to make the miracle cure to pull Jasmine out of her coma. Then there’s a little epilogue, possibly with a sequel hook if I get new id

“No.”

No sequel. Well, you deserve some rest. The miracle cure is scrawled on the wall in front of you. Godspeed.

"Thank you ..."

As for me, I'll make some revisions. Including your past. No need to rip off Batman that much. It's been ... very interesting to meet you, Ren.

"You too, Alejandro."

Well, hurry! You gotta save Jasmine!

"Right! But one last question."

What?

"Why do you think your author made you?"

Author? No, I'm real!

"Like me?"

Get out!