Dark Days Oracle
A “Wise World Without End” tale for our times
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It was foretold by the Oracle that the dark days would come, when we — the Abassa sentinels — would have to lay down our glorious wings in sacrificial exchange for freedom.
And of course, when the day came, it was much like any other ending: sudden, sharp and laden with the burden of knowing that everything was no longer to be the same.
On that fated day, we Abassa did not find it easy to release our wings to the enemy, but still we succumbed to the rituals of abject loss. We stood tall and unflinching — stretching our lanky, skeletal forms upright — before the chopping hand of the great Mikonas, where we were de-winged: cut deep in our shoulder blades.
While others screamed and wailed, we silently succumbed to the formation of our wounds that no longer bleed, but forever will symbolize the scarification of defeat.
We knew, by the laws of Kasaba, we had no choice but to abide to the findings of the Oracle; hence, that butchering ritual. Or else, we would further doom the millions of generations to come to an existence far worse than extinction.
We watched quietly as each of our wings was placed on the Great Slate; one on top of the other, until 30 scores high. At this point, green moss was sprinkled along the edges of the offering, along with the careful placement of urns half-filled with the now pure water from the Inkeneke Creek.
It was the Helpers who fetched the water and moss. They too laid our wings down gently, crisscrossing them for reinforcement.
…
The Helpers, who suddenly appeared out of the Ether, arrived simply to fulfill a prophesy whose unrelenting time had come. The Helpers were the keepers of tradition, thus, performers of the unfolding of a tragic coming to pass of the foretold.
The Helpers worked quickly and with humility, despite their — albeit temporary — importance. Those nondescript life forms, with a strength that belied their petite and amorphously inexpressive frames, darted hither and tither — lifting those our mighty wings effortlessly.
In contrast, we fearless Abassa stood immobile — disbelieving — with our right hands placed over our…
